Andrew
👤 PersonPodcast Appearances
I'm guessing like on your feet?
One of our favorite traditions is hearing Bobby chewing on the mic. Jingle jangle, fun mix of favorite candy treats.
What do y'all got to eat back there?
Nathan, hold fast up here and keep going east. I'm going to go below and try to help.
Good God Almighty! Nate, turn us broadside into the wave. Our only hope is for us to roll over completely.
You wanted me! Come take me! Leave them alone!'
The captain shouted into the bike.
We draw alongside her and find a way aboard.
There's a ladder dangling there!
Okay, one man at a time. Get the gear and get up there.
All right, boys, abandon ship!
As hard as this may be for everyone, we need to get inside and out of the storm. We'll have time to be able to grieve later. Right now, we need to get away from the wind and rain before we catch pneumonia or hypothermia.
Nathan, we finally reached the engine room. We also found the power source.
Hey, assholes! What the hell's the matter with you? We're not supposed to split up!
Would you stop running f-
That's Z-O-C-D-O-C dot com slash creepcast. ZocDoc.com slash creepcast.
Nathan, stay right where you are.
I'm not fucking crazy. So don't you dare look at me like that.
Please, please, I'm sorry, please, not that.
No! No, you're not doing that to me!
They said their leader was coming in, and I heard the most horrible voice coming from the hallway.
Yeah, Andrew. So the first witness up for the defense team was a neighbor that lived right below his apartment. And she says that at about 2.11 a.m., she was woken up by a scream and then heard some yelling. And it was a female.
The voice that came after the screaming, that was, it kind of sounded like when you're already upset, but you're trying to prove a point.
Yeah. So they went through Jason Chang's phone records and they found that there was no Tinder data at all from November 22nd or from the early days. Morning of November 23rd. So, OK, suddenly the defense's story that Jasmine saw a Tinder message pop up in the middle of the night makes zero sense anymore.
Well, it was less than an hour, and we were back in the courtroom, and they announced that he was found guilty on first-degree premeditated murder and abuse of a corpse.
Yeah. And honestly, I think it was due to the fact that the jury was attentive. They were asking questions.
Yeah, she was sobbing. Jason was wiping his tears away and she just kept repeating. He made a mistake like he knows he made a mistake. He's still young. Please give him a chance to live his life and learn from his mistakes.
Probably will get really big. It's a crazy story. It's contrary to what he said in our interview.
Good morning, Jim. You got a weather report?
There are some fantastic stories. Like one sound man, okay, didn't get converted for what he didn't hear. That's what converted him. Oh, really?
He's like, y'all don't. He told Phil, he said, hey, I'm a sound man. I hear everything.
Yeah. And he said, I need to talk to you. Can I come visit tonight after over this year? Come on. So he come down and he said, hey, look, the people I work with are filthy mouth, foul language all the time. He said, yet I never hear any kind of, any kind of, even when you stump your toe, you just say, oh, golly. You don't scream out bad words, even if you do something that's painful.
And Phil said, well, we're not into that. That's not part of our life. Okay. We're trying to do what's right. Yeah.
That's the alien at the door.
Oh, okay. A hotel. Yeah, a hotel. Yeah, a hotel. It's an abandoned oil well. Okay. Yeah, it was.
Oh, there's a lot of stuff out there in the ocean.
There you go.
We went on a 90-foot boat that you spend the night out in the ocean on. Okay. My first experience, the deep sea fishing was, is everybody else was taking pictures of, Oh boy, that's a 25 pound red snapper. Or that's this here's, you know, a Maui Maui, whatever. I always, all I reeled in was a head. Everybody else got pictures of big, pretty fish. I'm sitting there with mine with a head.
Just that. Wasn't fast enough, old man.
They kept, hey, real fast. I said, look, I don't know how fast the sharks swim, but hey, I can't out...
really i got a fish fight me you idiot that's even funnier yeah i love it y'all are not only fun to be around y'all got a little thrill seeker in you yeah yeah we try yeah i feel like it's going down in life though but how do you keep that thrill seeking we have kids we want to be alive oh yeah when they get old enough to go with you
And all that's part of it.
Baby, hey, we got, you know, the ducks ain't even starting to fly yet. You know, we got two hours before the ducks start flying.
I'm freezing my potato. Well, hey, you just got to suck it up.
Yeah, yeah.
Double that for me. Okay, because I've always said, okay, look, we're going to have some fun. No, that's out. I said, well, guess what? I won't be there. I like that. I ain't coming. If I can't smile, have a good time, scream if I feel like screaming. We need you as our spokesman. I'm serious. Life is too short.
Oh, it's going to get there. Oh, I know.
Oh, okay. Okay.
No, that's not you got in your hand.
Artificial intelligence? No, that don't work for me.
food and that would probably be a filet mignon steak cooked okay medium plus oh boy and look i drive the chefs insane with that they said that's not a a uh you know steak y'all not saying hey i wasn't eating nothing you cook you don't know what medium plus is you're an idiot medium No, no. Hey, this was from New York in one of the finest restaurants.
The chef there said, hey, there's no such thing as being plush. I said, you just don't know. I said, you're an idiot. Yeah, I said, you're an idiot. Get out of here. I ain't eating nothing you cook. Go. Fired. Go. Bye.
I need to update one thing. It's not sweet tea. It's unsweet. Unsweet. Okay. Kick the sugar out, you idiot.
You don't know the answer.
You don't know the answer. You don't know the answer, dummy. Just say it. I don't know.
Oh.
No, he's an idiot. He ain't there. Si versus AI. It's the next episode.
Not only that, if you believe in the creator and you've got a relationship with him, if you ain't happy, You need to have brain surgery.
Yeah, SI versus AI. AI is an idiot compared to SI.
LAUGHTER
I think you may have three brain cells.
tie it off. Okay. Yeah. Then they get in it and zip it up. Y'all. And I said, Now I know why I never would be a mountain climber. I said, you guys are tied to a cliff wall. Yeah, we don't recommend it. Like this. Yeah, it was scary. And I said, you're laying on some kind of light, light canvas. Is the only thing that's holding you to this stupid mountain? No, I don't think so.
That's too adventurous for me.
Yo, hey, cut some of it out or do something. And I'm looking forward to this because it says 100 days to conquer your fears, shatter your limits, and build your faith.
Keep them smiling and keep them laughing.
If you want to watch a good bullet, go ahead. Yeah, go ahead and pull it, man.
Most people don't realize that. A lot of times I've studied with people and then they balk on baptism. I said, dude, that's one thing you don't want to fool with. Okay. Yeah. You don't add to it or take it away. Don't add to it or take it away. Yeah. You don't understand. Yeah. I said, you're reenacting Jesus Christ's real death, burial, and resurrection. Mm-hmm.
I said, well, what do you do when, hey, when you come up on something dead, what do you do? You bury it because it starts to stink. Mm-hmm. You know? I mean, that's life.
I don't know if you've seen it, the movie The Blind.
You need to see it, okay, because my favorite part of the whole movie is Bill's hiding out from the law up in the woods on Eagle Nest, okay, up where Marlston Fish Lake was. And Bill Smith, one of the elders of Church of Christ at White's Fair Road, okay, my sister wouldn't get off of Bill's back about go preach to my brother.
Yeah, but anyway, he's up there, and Bill goes up there, and they're sitting on the back because the trailer where they live or the little hut where they live in is so filthy, it'd be better to be outside. You know, there's a beer bottle, whiskey bottle, all this stuff. Well, Phil finally hit rock bottom, and he looked at Bill and says, I don't know what to do. Bill told him this.
He said, Phil Robertson has got to die, the old one.
So here's the question, first question. How long did it take this creation to come to pass?
It's so high.
Well, no, no, because I'm just saying, you know, because when I played football, no.
The talent, because nowadays you've got them in peewee football. And I mean, they're being coached. It ain't none of this. No, they're being coached. By the time they get in high school, they're really good. And then if you go and you go like to Alabama when Saban was there,
Yeah.
No, no.
And now they're doing it now in Peewee.
Okay. The reason I gave him a hard time is me and him were too much alike. Cause I, I actually kept him as a child. Yeah. Okay. Growing up. And he's got a lot of my mannerism and,
You have no idea what God's going to do with you.
Oh, no, look. Hey, Phil and Jace went up there. I'm well aware. I said, duck hunting in California?
Hey, I can get in on that.
Well, I don't really care. Mallards, I don't expect bellies. I'm into it. I like a big, slow goose doing this in front of me when I got that 20 gauge in my hand.
We did a job yesterday when me and Al and Will was on Sadie's podcast. This would have fit in exactly perfect with what we was talking about.
Yeah. Do the referees ever make you mad?
What's the cause?
Oh, no, you had the football player. Yeah, he gets mad at the referee if he makes the wrong call.
Now we'll get in the medley.
Well, this sounds like a very easy read. It is. Matter of fact, it sounds like a lot like my book, one of my books. Which one is that? 101R Serenity. Is it 101 or slash one? Oh, psychology, yes.
Because what I did is I literally wrote this book, my ghostwriter did, because that was the funny part. They found a ghost rider, and then he came down, and he spent like five days with me and Al Robertson, Bill's oldest son. And Al was the person that poked the bear to remind me of stories that I told them growing up.
You know, I'd say, well, you know, and he'd say, hey, tell them one about this. You know, I'd tell it. So that book was my life and stories. And it was a fun and funny read. Okay. And it was fun. Yeah. No, I think I had that book. It was fun to read and it was easy to read. Yeah.
Oh no, there's a lot of life stories in here. Okay. That are helpful. To live, okay, because we're not of this world. That's right. Okay, but we got to live in this sucker.
Yeah. No, no.
All the parables. Yeah. And I understand why he done it because, hey, we're so stupid, okay? We can't understand simple stuff. So that's why he went super simple. Let me explain this for you. Even the unbelievers still didn't understand. Like, please explain this to me.
Well, no, no, because, hey, the 12 that was with him, they didn't understand a lot. And then poor Peter, you know, me and him had a lot in common. Because I always stick my foot in my mouth a lot, too.
Yeah, because I would have been asking Jesus dumb questions. Okay, yo, I don't get it. So you're going to have to, yo, you're going to have to literally click. Yeah. Turn the light on. Oh, yeah. There he is. Yeah, turn the light on, Lord.
And yeah, that's part of it.
Hi, you must be kinfolk somewhere. Why is that? Because they like to laugh and have, well, we're all blocking. There we go. That's the thing I hope happens now. Now that the election's over, yo, because I go out and do a lot of events. Okay. And sadly to say, There's nobody smiling. There's nobody laughing. There's nobody having a good time. That's a problem. And that's a problem. You know? Yeah.
You know, the world is miserable. A little uptight. Yeah. Yeah.
If you were a kid. I know. I can't say that. I understand. I never grew up, and I never will.
Yeah, I'm 14 years old tapped in a 76-year-old car. You call that suck. That stinks. But I handled it pretty well, though. Yeah, that's right. I'm still going for it, boys.
Why?
You've got to have your beauty risks.
Sleeping on clouds.
That's the thing about, hey, our roller coaster was a bag swing. You get a hundred pound potato sack. Yeah, potato sack. Okay. And you fill it full of old clothes, okay, where it makes like a ball that you can sit on. And you put a big rope tied to the sack, okay, and then put it on a big tree limb. And we had it where we would climb a ladder with a rope to pull the rope to us.
And now you think about this. Teenagers, okay, just the whole neighborhood. We used to see how many we could get on that bag.
god and his providence yeah just a line in the past he just walked he could take a black cloud and turn and turn a silver make a silver lining come out of it we get to just be creative like the ultimate creator given us like hey so y'all have fun y'all produce it all yourselves like i'm saying like
And try to get. their agenda done through the young rulers. And then at the same time, over in the Seleucid Empire, King Antiochus IV ascends to the throne after the assassination of his brother, Seleucus IV. And I think this dude is their uncle, Antiochus. But even so, he makes it known as soon as he ascends to the throne that he has his eye on Egypt and he's ready for conflict.
If you're watching video, you could see that Andrew has some of our merch on for the Kudiyun Wrestling Club.
Because he sees that they're young, weak rulers.
Then, in November of 170 BCE, Eulaius and Linnaeus, the crappie advisors, they decide, we're going to shake things up.
Let's do something different.
They say, they convince Ptolemy Philometer and Cleopatra II that their little brother, Potbelly, should be co-ruler with them.
The idea was that all three siblings would have equal power.
What could go wrong?
We're not entirely sure why this was the suggestion. It's possible that Eleus and Linnaeus were trying to diminish Ptolemy Philometer's power because people were already really starting to like him. He was becoming a very popular pharaoh. It's also possible that they didn't care that he was popular. They were just dumb advisors.
That's a good point. For this episode, I heavily, heavily am referring to the source of Llewelyn Jones's book, The Cleopatras. And I did want to quote his opinion on the subject here.
The design?
So according to Llewelyn Jones, he wrote, "...if we are to give Eleus and Linnaeus the benefit of the doubt, then at best they are trying to create a sense of unity among the siblings." Oh, wow. Yeah. And the reason that this was a recipe for disaster is that the two brothers could not have been more different.
Thank you.
Ptolemy Philometer was known for being gentle, kind, responsible, even a bit of a pushover, right? Like he's so gentle and nice that he has these terrible advisors convincing him to do things. Potbelly, on the other hand, was believed to be naturally cruel, vindictive, petty. He was also extremely intelligent, cultured, and surprisingly charismatic.
I didn't design it, everyone. So I had someone design it, but it was my concept.
Yep. Potbelly would have been really happy about this unexpected rise in station, right? He's not expecting to be the pharaoh unless his brother dies. So he's like, oh, I have more power here. Right. Which could have increased his sense of arrogance and entitlement. But Ptolemy Philometer would have been resentful that his little brother has been elevated to his status.
So there's going to immediately be strife between the three rulers. And who is ready to take advantage of this mess? Antiochus over ruling the Seleucid Empire.
One anonymous author of the time wrote, quote, Antiochus thought to reign over Egypt that he might have the dominion of two realms and was intent on seizing Egypt, despising the youthfulness of its king and the inexperience of his tutors. End quote.
Mm-hmm. So this situation leads to the sixth war between these two families. The sixth. The sixth Syrian war is what it's known as.
Before we jump into the episode today, Andrew and I thought it would be fun if I pulled a tarot card for us.
No, it's always like, oh, I pushed the border a little bit more this way. Oh, and then it receded that way.
It's never worth it.
The Seleucid Empire is huge too.
Alexander's homies.
Yep, we've already covered both.
Well, this war, this sixth war between the two is swift and bloody. Antiochus wins very quickly, unsurprisingly, and marches into Egypt. This is the first invasion of Egyptian soil since the conquest of Alexander the Great.
150 years before.
Then, Eulius, I can't remember how I decided to pronounce his name.
Eulius tells Ptolemy Philometer, okay, you're screwed. The best thing you can do right now is grab all the cash that you can and leave Alexandria. Leave your sister slash wife and your little brother behind because they're going to slow you down. And he does it.
He takes the advice, and he was aiming for the island of Samothrace, but the Seleucids catch him on the way there, and he's taken prisoner.
With all the money.
Oh, my God.
Back in Alexandria, Cleopatra and Potbelly are just, like, stunned. They had no idea that their brother was planning to ditch them.
Also, I wonder if it's going to be cool to hear the cards shuffling.
They don't know that he's even gone when they get the news that he's being held prisoner. They're like, what?
He's not in his room. What are you talking about? So they're shocked and don't know what to do. At the same time that their pharaoh is being held captive, there is a palace revolution against Elias and Linnaeus. Thankfully, the mob of the palace chases them out.
They disappear actually from history after this day.
So they're gone. We never see them again. So luckily the crappy advisors are out of the picture.
But this means with Ptolemy Philometer held prisoner, Eleus and Linnaeus have been kicked out of the palace. Who is the sole king of Egypt? It's Potbelly. It's Potbelly.
Do it. Was that fun?
And this prompts Uncle Antiochus. Remember our Uncle Antiochus?
He's like, I'm going to take Alexandria now because now it's just my even younger, littler nephew.
What's he going to do? However, Alexandria is positioned up against the sea. Yeah. And they already, prior to this...
already had a lot of grains stored and being up against the sea means it's easy for them to get resources right and get help so they're actually ready to wait him out in the palace they're like yeah you keep sieging the city we could wait forever that's their strategy we're just gonna sit here and wait and see how long it takes you maybe you'll get hungry maybe you'll leave
Was that satisfying?
They also are able to, because of their sea access, they do send ambassadors to Rome and ask Rome for help. But the Romans say no.
So it wouldn't make sense to make the Seleucid Empire your enemy.
Yeah, because I've been shuffling since I was seven years old. Andrew asked me once, he's like, how are you so good at shuffling? And I was like, what do you mean? Everyone shuffles since they're kids. And he's like, what, what? And I was like, wait, did you not shuffle for your parents when they'd play blackjack?
Yeah.
Oh, wow.
Okay. So they say no. Good luck. Let us know how it goes.
Cleopatra II is like, okay, well, I'm not down to be stuck here with Potbelly because he's gross. So she intercedes between both of her brothers and her uncle, and she talks sense into everyone. This young woman, the only woman in the picture is the one that's like, you guys are being so dumb. Wow. Uncle... F off.
I don't know what you're doing here. Let the three of us rule again, but we'll rule. Like, I think she sweet talks him into being like, we'll rule like in your name.
Kind of vibe. Cause we're all family. Like, remember you loved our mom. That was your sister. And he agrees. She convinces him and he agrees. Nice. Um, This is now the second time that the three siblings are going to share the throne. And this lasts until about 164 BCE. And things are settled for a while with the three of them sharing. Fairly peaceful in terms of more like mezzo macro things.
The two brothers can't stand each other ever. But that's always the case.
During this time of like. steady piece of the three of them ruling together. Cleopatra II has four kids.
They are all Ptolemy Philometers because even though she's ruling alongside Potbelly, they are not married. She can only have one husband, and her husband is her other brother. Duh.
And while Cleopatra II is busy having all these babies, her two brothers are just constantly squabbling. Sounds about right.
But then there's a little uprising in Upper Egypt, and Ptolemy Philometer goes out with his troops to address it, unfortunately giving Potbelly the chance to organize his supporters into a resistance group, and they succeeded in ousting Ptolemy Philometer from Alexandria, declaring that the three-sibling rule is over. I'm not sharing any more.
At first, Potbelly places his sister Cleopatra on the throne next to him with the intent to make her his wife.
But she's smart. She manages to flee to Cyprus in the middle of the night. And she actually is—she manages to escape with all of her children with her. She's got toddlers and infants.
Now listen up, friends, because it's about to get weird.
Mm-hmm. And they all flee. And as they— Because obviously if she had left them, I should say, Potbelly would have killed them.
He just would have killed his nieces and nephews. Yeah. So they all flee to Cyprus and Ptolemy Philometer meets them there. He sails over. He's like, hi, guys. Little family vacation in Cyprus sounds so nice.
Sounds so lovely. But they're stressed. I wonder why. I wonder why. By the beginning of 163 BCE, Popelli is ruling Alexandria on his own. So this is his first time, and I'm saying first time for a reason, his first time ruling independently.
And I was like, did you also not play bartender and mix the drinks for them?
It's fun. It gets really messy.
Yeah. Um, and once people think at this time that without his sister, without Cleopatra the second around, he really is, no one is keeping him in check. She was kind of the only person who could stand up to him. So he really starts to show his true colors. He goes after his brother's closest advisors and supporters, uh, and has them killed. And he does this to just many people in the court, uh,
who were really fond of Ptolemy Philometer. He's like, I know you liked my brother more than me, and he kills them.
Even if they're claiming, you know, like, yeah, we respect your rule. You're the king now. He doesn't care. He's like, but you've always liked my brother more, so you're dead.
He's a really chill guy.
We had slightly different childhood experiences.
He also keeps begging Rome to back up his claim Daddy roll. Okay. Basically.
Potbelly's the first.
Just slightly.
They're very annoyed with him. By May of 163 BCE, so just a few months into it, the people of Alexandria have had enough with Potbelly. They are so over him.
An Alexandrian mob strips him of his royal guard, and they sent word to Cyprus to bring back the other Ptolemy, Philometer, and then they storm the palace. They overpower Potbelly's minimal defenses, and they literally kick him out of the palace.
That's a little bit better.
He manages to escape with his life, but obviously a very poor reputation. And then Ptolemy Philometer and Cleopatra II arrive back in Alexandria because they got word. People are like, we're sick of him. We're going to kick him out. Come and get your house. And they're welcomed back by the locals with their brother gone.
Oh, my God. Shut up, babe. Okay, okay, okay. There we go. I'm going to have you cut the deck.
The two are then known as the pharaohs Ptolemy and Cleopatra, the mother loving gods. That's their band name.
Yeah.
That's them, basically.
And then after this, after they get back and they're ruling on their own, Cleopatra has two more babies.
Guess what their names are.
I just wrote in my notes, yes, because I knew you were going to guess correctly.
So this dynamic duo is also not they're not just doing a great job making babies, which the Egyptian people love to see.
With their brother and sister, yeah. We can't think about it too much. They love to see lots of heirs, right? And even lots of girls means bargaining chips, unfortunately.
And then I'll lay out the card for our reading for today. Today, weirdos, the card we've pulled.
For beneficial alliances. So they're great at making kids. They're also great at building beautiful, beautiful buildings across Egypt. They undertake a lot of repairs of temples throughout the Nile Valley, and they create new temples. They completed works at Dendera? Dendera, I think.
This is the birth house of Isis at Karnak, where the huge gate and the second pylon are restored there by them, and at Armant near Thebes. You guys know the places.
Along with many, many more. So they're known for building things, making Egypt more beautiful. Nice. So now, where's Potbelly? While these two are having little inbred kids and building things.
No.
That's a good guess, though.
He's chilling in Cyrene.
Serini?
And it's pronounced Serini.
Okay. I've just read these in my head. You know, when you are hearing them for the first time?
So he's in Serini, and he's pissed.
That everyone kicked him out and no one liked him killing everybody. He keeps trying to get Rome to help him get back on the throne.
He bugs them so much that in 154 BCE, the Romans give him some military support and he's able to invade Cyprus.
And Ptolemy Philometer and Cleopatra II, who had the backing of the Cypriot cities originally, Cyprus is seen as like Egyptian territory. They're completely not able to access that land anymore. So they fight back. They take Cyprus back from Popeli, but they don't want to piss off the Romans.
They're scared that the Romans gave him this power, this military power at all. So they don't punish their brother. even though what he did is obviously a big transgression. They're like, we're actually going to take Cyprus back, but you can keep Cyrene. And what do they give him? Hold on. They give him, like, gifts and a title. Oh, this is a big deal.
And I pulled it reverse for the camera, but it was upside down. That means something. So show it upside down.
They promise him their daughter's hand in marriage.
It's gross.
Because he has an in with Rome for whatever reason. He's always brown nosing over there. They're like, here, you can have our daughter. This would have been Cleopatra Thea. She would be known as.
She would have been about 13 years old. Yeah. This was probably to make Potbelly happy with the idea that like one day if he had kids with his niece, his kids maybe would sit on the throne. Right. It's to like.
But Potbelly says no. He's like, I am so much smarter than both of you. I know what you're doing. And I say, no, I don't want to marry your 13 year old daughter.
No, but because I don't want you telling me who to marry. Oh, my God.
Mm hmm. So he says no. And they're like, OK, he's not going to marry our daughter. But they're like on friendly terms, like fake friendly terms.
Yes. I actually don't know what that means, so let me look it up.
Basically, they don't want to piss off Rome. And Rome is really annoyed at Potbelly because they're like, we gave you some military aid and you couldn't even hold Cyprus. You couldn't even hold an island.
Mm hmm. He's he goes to Rome and he's like trying to kiss. But he's like, please don't be mad at me. And he's like, how about I marry Cornelia, the widow of Tiberius Gracchus? He was a big war hero and politician in Rome. I don't know if you knew this.
Mm-hmm.
The Gracchi brothers.
He had died fairly recently, I guess, and Cornelio would have been older. This isn't someone to have kids with, but to... She was a woman of very high regard and high standing in Rome. So it would have placed potbelly kind of it would have elevated him in Roman society.
But she refused. She was like, gross.
Apparently, this is that moment of him asking her for her hand in marriage inspired a lot of art. So you can find a lot of paintings of her being like, no way.
If we find pictures, we should put it in the show Instagram post.
During this time, so Cornelia's like, you're gross, no. So he's like, what if I change my will so that anything I own when I die, if I don't have kids, goes to Rome? This would be including my little island that I live on, my little hangout spot. And Rome's like, okay, yeah, we'll take that. Like, yes. So this move inspires many future monarchs throughout history.
I have a really good site that I use. It's called Bitty Tarot.
Monarchs would later use potbelly strategy as an attempt to protect themselves from assassination or coup. Because now that Rome could inherit...
Okay. The five of swords reversed represents reconciliation, making amends, and healing past resentment.
Yeah, responding to an uprising, responding to, yeah.
And he's always kissing their butt, so it's not going to happen.
So that move is important. That move is done. In 145 BCE, Ptolemy Philometer dies. No. He's in campaign in Syria and he dies.
course fighting the salute kids oh yeah they're fighting them again i skipped a lot they keep going back and forth i mean yeah you get the gist you get the gist guys they're always fighting he had his but when he died he had actually had his son ptolemy shut up no co-ruling with him for a while like preparing him to take the throne This was like three or four months before he died.
He's like, hey, I feel like we're all going to die someday. Son, why don't you co-rule with me? Kind of like an apprenticeship.
But he didn't expect to die so soon.
And Cleopatra II acts quickly by promoting her son to like sole pharaoh and making herself his co-ruler. Because people had an issue with like a child ruling, which I think is very reasonable.
So she was like, well, I will co-rule with our new pharaoh. And everyone was like, we like you. You're Cleopatra II. You're cool.
But as soon as Potbelly hears about this.
He rushes back to Alexandria. He arrives just one month after his brother's death. He's ready to take over. This is August 146 BCE. Oof. So he has troops he's set to take over and Cleopatra technically has troops too, right? But they are in Syria where her husband brother died.
So maybe someone listening to this needed the reminder that it is time to make amends and heal past resentment.
So they're coming back from Syria and Potbelly can pretty much walk in to Alexandria unopposed. So she doesn't have her normal army with her but she does have a Jewish commander. There was like I should step back. Egyptian society at this time had, yes, I guess somewhat of a cohesive sense of Egyptian-ness. But Alexandria in particular was a melting pot of cultures.
People from all over the world. So people really hung out with their own kind. So the Greek Egyptians would hang out with the Greek Egyptians. Jewish Egyptians would hang out with Jewish Egyptians. Native Egyptians would stay with each other. And so there is like a small Jewish Egyptian army. There's some small forces there.
And Cleopatra II was really well liked by the Jewish community because she treated them like people.
And they were like, that's surprising. We like you. And she's friends with this guy named Onias who brings a small group of Jews. Loyal Jewish soldiers to help her try to fight for the throne with her son. While the main army is coming back. Yeah, to hold down the fort, basically. Even though there wasn't a battle, Josephus... You know who Josephus is?
Okay?
He's a Jewish Roman historian.
Yeah. He's much later, but he writes about this. And... He says that Potbelly lost his shit just seeing that people were supporting his sister.
Yeah. I'd say that's pretty positive.
So he shows up and he rounds up all the Jewish people in Alexandria, Potbelly.
Men, women, and children and orders for them all to be massacred. And this is where Josephus gets a little creative with his storytelling. So I don't know what actually happened. The story goes that he had sentenced them all to death by being trampled by elephants. But upon the orders, the elephants miraculously turn on their handlers instead.
And they leave the Jewish people alone and they trample the... pot bellies um soldiers instead interesting okay i don't there's no evidence that this miracle happened right but that is the account that we have um and it's it's further evidence we know that pot belly was viewed as a very cruel tyrannical person yeah either way no matter what happened
No, not at all. Should we get started?
Potbelly does successfully win, and he marries Cleopatra II, kicks his nephew off the throne. He's 35 at this point, and just for a little context, he is intentionally morbidly obese. This is because he wanted to display luxury, that he lived in truly unattainable luxury. So he would have been making his body larger and larger and larger as a demonstration of that.
He was so large, he was almost unable to move. at all, and he was transported everywhere. He went even around the palace on a litter. He was rarely seen on his feet. There were lots of reports of him just like falling asleep in the middle of talking to people.
Yeah. Again, they think the sleeping thing was him just displaying like, I can nap whenever.
I could just... I could do whatever I want whenever I want.
I think it's important to remember that few people in the ancient world would have had the money to be overweight. It would have required money. It would have required excessive food, excessive funds. And they definitely couldn't be like take indulgent naps.
I think napping maybe was a part of the culture, but not like you're in the middle of talking to me at this important meeting. I'm going to nap.
Yeah, so it would have taken, think of the effort it took Potbelly to get to where he was. So that's the only reason that I mention his size and his physical body is because it was a part of his branding, really. It was, he thought, a good PR move for him. All of the Ptolemies were overweight. This is actually something a lot of people don't know.
They were all overweight because luxury was considered a family value of theirs.
So everyone is intentionally bigger than the average person, but Potbelly took it to excess.
Mm-hmm. But even with all of these reports of how kind of like slothful and gluttonous he is, people also admit like he's really smart. This guy's really smart. He's really into philosophy. He's a big fan of Homer. You know what people say about him?
He's a big history nerd. No. That's exactly what I wrote in my notes.
So you maybe would have been a fan of the podcast.
Imagine just describing to him what a podcast is. Oh, my God. That'd be crazy.
Mm-hmm. So that's Potbelly for context when he takes over at this time. He's 35. Cleopatra II would be 37. Okay. So he marries her. For legitimacy, mainly, because she is well regarded. She has been ruling in some way, shape or form for a really long time now. Their mother is really well regarded.
Everyone's used to the sibling marriage thing. It's almost like a sign of stability for the kingdom. It's not so much to make heirs with her, although they could have 37 at this time would have been seen as like, yes, it's possible, but it's risky to the mother.
So he he's not marrying her because he likes her. He's marrying her because he wants to use her.
But surprisingly, within a year of their marriage, Cleopatra II is pregnant.
Her first time being pregnant in over a decade. So she thought she was done.
She had six kids already. Gross. So she has her baby boy in Memphis in early 143 BCE, and it is a boy. which is important because boys are better.
Thanks to the Cleopatra's. I mean, this would be early. They tend to have co-rulers.
But yeah, boys are seen as more valuable. It's a problem we still face today.
It's not objectively true. It's very silly.
Thank you. So, but she's happy. She's probably really freaking relieved that it's a boy. Yeah. Because then maybe now he'll leave her alone. And she's 38 probably. She's tired. Stop, man. I'm tired for her. So he, Potbelly's really happy. Yay, I have a son. He's born in Memphis.
And shortly after, a group of delegates from Cyrene come and they congratulate him because they're like, you used to hang out with us. Remember, we're here to congratulate you on your new heir. But he is like, you guys used to talk smack about my mistress named Irene back in Cyrene. Oh my God. He's like, guess what? I'm going to kill all of you.
So the people who came to show up as his friends, he murders them.
I know.
But despite his little murder spree, he was reportedly very happy to have a son. And in his stereotypical cruel manner, once he confirms he has a son... He kills Cleopatra's other son. No.
The son that was co-ruling with Ptolemy Philometer.
So shortly after giving birth, Cleopatra will find out that her current husband and brother has killed her eldest son.
But don't worry, weirdos.
It only gets worse to be the iceberg. OK, so while Cleopatra II was in confinement during pregnancy, that's what they used to do. I think we even see this in shows like The Tudors and stuff. I think people used to think pregnant women were really, really delicate.
And their job was to just kind of be off, like not in Alexandria, not in where the hustle and bustle is, almost like a retreat to keep her safe, to keep the baby safe. They often didn't sleep with their husbands during this time. There was a common belief that it could hurt the baby, which it can't. So she gets sent away and she's in confinement, right? During that time, so while she was pregnant,
Popelli starts a new relationship. And it's a relationship with his 16-year-old niece and stepdaughter, Cleopatra III. Oh, my God. Yep, yep, yep, yep, yep. So Cleopatra II comes home. She finds out that her brother-husband killed her son. She's got a new baby. And then she finds out, hey, your 16-year-old daughter died. Yeah. She has a relationship now with your brother-husband. And guess what?
They're pregnant. She's pregnant.
Can you imagine what Cleopatra II is going through right now?
The Romans wrote about this like...
They were disgusted. They were disgusted at Ptolemy killing his nephew, marrying his sister, and then impregnating his niece. It was like the Romans were pretty crass, so they were the butt of a lot of jokes. Cleopatra II was the butt of a lot of jokes.
It's really sad.
Yeah, that's exactly what I'm afraid of. Okay. So to get into this week's episode, yes, you're correct. A lot of folks requested this when I was covering someone else that this person is related to. So let me jump right in. Ptolemy VIII is remembered as greedy, paranoid, cruel, gluttonous, and disgusting.
Much more austere, disciplined. Yes. You don't do things in excess. You don't overconsume.
And he's all about lust, gluttony, all the icky things.
That's a great thing to add. Thank you. Yeah. He would have been seen as horrendous.
Yeah. So then in 142 BCE, Cleopatra III gives birth to Potbelly's son.
Grandchild slash nephew. Oh. He's also named Ptolemy. I don't know where they come up with these names.
It's so confusing, babe. I know. This is why it took me so long to write the episode. We're going to call him Chickpea.
That's his nickname at the time. They called him Chickpea. I don't know why. Like a chickpea?
So he's just Chickpea.
If we ever talk about him again, that's what we'll call him.
Potbelly, after she gives birth, this is how much of a little skis ball he is. It's not until after his 16-year-old niece gives birth to a son that he agrees, okay, that's my second wife. Isn't that awful?
Yes.
Yes.
Egypt has one king, two queens who are mother and daughter, and two potential male heirs. What could go wrong?
Next section of my notes is called Civil War.
In late 132 BCE, the conflict between the royal siblings, the two, because one's dead, finally erupts into open warfare with Potbelly on one side, Cleopatra on the other side. I'm sorry. There's another Cleopatra now. Potbelly and Cleopatra III on one side and Cleopatra II on the other side.
Do you have any questions at this point before I move forward, actually?
Yes, that is what I was hoping you would ask about. The picture that was painted at the time was that. She's a child, right? So she's like an unwilling sort of pawn in Potbelly's game. Llewellyn Jones, the expert in the Cleopatras, the expert in the Ptolemaic dynasty, his book is amazing. And he argues that at least by this point, by 132 BCE, she's not a pawn. She's not dumb.
We know she's really smart. We know she's really ambitious. And she is actively engaging in hostilities against her mother.
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah. So she and Potbelly are a team for sure at this point. I don't know. I highly doubt. I mean, they would have had no concept of consent.
Women didn't have that option, but I highly doubt like for our understanding, she would have consented to the initial relationship.
But she is fully in it now. Wow. Okay. So at first, Potbelly retains control of Alexandria. But in 131 BCE, the people of Alexandria are like, wait, we forgot. We freaking hated this guy. And they riot against him again.
One contemporary source wrote that he liked to wear garments of transparent gauze through which his blown out body showed and was almost worse than having to actually look at his naked hideousness. Just to paint a picture.
And they want Cleopatra II back and they set fire to the royal palace. That's how pissed they are. Wow. So Potbelly and Cleopatra III flee and they escape to Cyprus.
It must be really nice.
I think so.
That's fascinating.
Well, if we're wrong, we'll be told.
We'll know. So they flee. Cleopatra II crowns herself as sole queen the first time that a Ptolemaic woman will rule alone.
So she takes on, I'm the queen, and she takes on the title of Thea Philomator Soterra, mother-loving savior goddess. Damn.
Cleopatra II.
And although Alexandria had sided with, Alexandria the city had sided with Cleopatra II, and she tended to be supported by the Greeks and the Jewish people throughout the country, she actually didn't hold a lot of favor with native Egyptians.
Potbelly and Cleopatra III were more popular with the native Egyptians.
I couldn't tell you in detail. It must have to do with like certain laws that are passed that would just inherently sort of favor one group versus another and she just happened to pass more laws in favor of Greeks and Jewish people versus the native Egyptians. Actually, you know what?
There was a lot of discrimination, unfortunately, against native Egyptians, and she probably didn't help with that. Yeah. They faced a lot of injustices at this time. Let me see. What year are we in now? At the beginning of 130 BCE, Potbelly and Cleopatra III... Leave Cyprus. Sneaky, sneaky. And they go back to Egypt with the help of a native Egyptian general named Paus.
By spring, Paus helps them take control of Memphis.
It's a big deal. They promote Paus to commander over the whole of the army. You know, they're assuming we're going to win and we're going to have the whole army under us and you're going to rule the whole army. This is the first time that a native Egyptian would hold such a prominent position.
Very smart.
Mm hmm.
And then, I don't know if you recall, but Potbelly has a son with Cleopatra II, right?
Telling me that Aeth's cruelty and exaggerated appearance earned this pharaoh the nickname Fyskon, meaning pot belly.
Where do you think he is?
Yeah, where is he?
Potbelly would send letters to Cleopatra II, making it seem like it was their son, who they called Memphites.
because he was born at Memphis. But it's pretty evident. Historians are pretty all on board with the fact that he was a hostage. He wouldn't have been there willingly.
He probably kidnapped him when he fled to use him as leverage and to force Cleopatra II to give him back the throne, but she doesn't cave and popularly gets more and more upset. over this. So she's still technically winning because she's in Alexandria.
We have Potbelly and Cleopatra II and Memphides in Memphis. Things come to a head in 130 BCE when Cleopatra II turns 55.
That's pretty old for this day and age.
Not that 55 is old to anyone listening. But for ancient times, I feel like that's pretty old.
It's like, damn, man. It's rough. Yeah. So she decides to show strength by throwing herself a big birthday party to show like, oh, I'm not even threatened by my brother and daughter. So she has a huge party at the palace in Alexandria. She has people come from all over. She has courtiers, different aristocrats, dignitaries, foreign ambassadors. People come from everywhere.
And gifts start to pour in from all over the world. This is a big deal. Right. Imagine like they're all hanging out and laying down. Right. That's how the Greeks ate. They're all like reclining in those little couches to eat on the side and hanging out. And she's getting presented all her gifts one by one.
Lovely. Lovely. Lovely. I, as I mentioned, I briefly discussed him when I was doing the episode on the first Cleopatra in the Ptolemaic dynasty. I don't know what episode number that is, but go find it. If you haven't listened to that one already.
She receives jewelry. She receives fine fabrics. She receives like beautiful decor and. She even gets a parrot. A parrot is mentioned in the list of gifts. What?
It was talking, yeah. That's why they mentioned it like it could talk.
Yeah. Pretty cool.
So she's like, wow, I have a parrot now. My life is complete. And then a large ebony box decorated with ivory carvings is brought to her. It's huge. It's heavy. And the note on it says, from King Ptolemy and his wife, Cleopatra. So it's Potbelly and her daughter. She commands for the box to be opened and peers inside, and what she finds is appalling.
Piled one on top of another were the arms, legs, torso, and head of a boy. It was the dismembered body of Memphites, her son with Potbelly.
Memphites would have been 12 years old when his father Potbelly killed him and had him dismembered.
Yeah, your own child. Cleopatra II put the dismembered limbs of her son on public display in Alexandria.
To rouse anger and hatred against Potbelly and Cleopatra II.
But he is still gaining traction with the army he has. And both Potbelly and Cleopatra II ask Rome to intervene on their behalf. Rome refuses to take a side.
It's like Egypt's not worth the headache.
Cleopatra II is getting desperate as they inch closer and closer to her. So in 129 BCE, she offers the Egyptian throne to her son-in-law, the Seleucid king Demetrius II.
Someone different. Because remember the daughter Cleopatra Thea?
That they had offered to Potbelly when she was 13. She married into the Seleucid Empire. She's known as a kingmaker. She will actually be married to lots of kings. Very interesting.
Cleopatra II is like, hey, son-in-law, if you come and you beat them, you can have the throne. I'd rather have you and my daughter have the throne than have my brother and my other daughter have the throne. Yeah. So he's like, bet. And he invades Egypt in 128. And his troops, however, are stuck at the border because they've been at war. The Seleucids are always at war. And they hear that.
Hello and welcome to History for Weirdos.
OK, back home in Syria, basically, it's known as Syria. Cleopatra, Thea, while her husband is going to save her mom, I don't know why she does this, but she has her son take over the throne. She's like, you are now king. Your dad's gone. Why? I think she was thinking, he's going to be king of Egypt, you can be king of here. But this really pisses off the soldiers, and the troops form a mutiny.
And they refuse to march into Egypt and help. And they turn around and they go back to Syria. Wow. To stop Demetrius II from coming back, Potbelly sends a fake Seleucid royal named Alexander II to Syria to stir up a rebellion there as well.
Mm hmm. It's a fake. It's all fake. Everyone. I mean, everyone on Potbelly's side knows it's fake. The boy has no claim, but they're pretending he does. So that Demetrius can't just go to his troops and explain and be like, oh, no, it's cool. This is what we wanted. Nothing like that, because then they have to address Alexander II.
Do you know what episode number it is?
This keeps the Seleucids busy for a while, and they cannot help and interfere with Egypt anymore. Then in 127 BCE, Cleopatra II is like, I can basically see them coming. I'm going to flee.
And she goes to Demetrius II's court, taking the treasury with her. And that gives Potbelly the chance to take over Alexandria.
The conquest is accompanied by, of course, a very bloody purge of any supporters of Cleopatra II, which would have been everybody.
Should we keep going?
Yeah?
Okay. This is Potbelly's third reign.
He is.
Potbelly's rule is a mess. Crime goes up. Harvests go down.
Yeah. And the Egyptian people are deeply unhappy. They have kicked him out twice now, and he is back. And they're like, why are you here? There's just a general sense of anxiety hanging over the whole country. And Potbelly is basically losing grip on, you know, he has the support of native Egyptians, but everyone's hungry. So that's going to go any second now.
And he already had the Jewish Egyptians and the Greek Egyptians hating him. So he's really running out of allies here. And he decides, this is a super surprising move, I think, to reach out to Cleopatra II. And he's like, let's make peace. I need your help.
So weirdos, you asked for this. We're about to dive into Potbelly's disreputable yet legendary life. So let's get started.
Yeah. But he reaches out to Cleopatra II, who's in the Seleucid Empire, and it's a mess in the Seleucid Empire because of his fake Alexander guy.
Yeah. So she says, you need to declare support for Demetrius II's son, because I think Demetrius II actually dies trying to fix that problem.
So this guy's name is Antiochus. I think Antiochus VIII.
And Potbelly's like, fine, fine, fine. I'll tell people that Alexander doesn't have any claim. I'll support this Antiochus kid. So he does that for her. So that's an act of good faith. She's like, OK, now I'll return to Egypt and we can be co-rulers again for like the millionth time.
In April 118 BCE... The royal trio. This is a new royal trio. Right. Mother, daughter. The original royal trio was brother, sister, brother. Yeah. So they they issue a decree of amnesty, which stated, quote, King Ptolemy and Queen Cleopatra, the sister and Queen Cleopatra, the wife.
...proclaim an amnesty to all their subjects for errors, crimes, accusations, condemnations, and charges of all kinds up to the 9th of Farmuthi of the 52nd year, except a person's guilty of willful murder or sacrilege. So they pardon a bunch of crimes up to a certain date. The decree also made the following concessions to the subjects...
One encouraging refugees to return home and reclaim their properties.
They waived back taxes. They confirm land grants to soldiers from the civil wars. They give temples some land privileges. They standardize weights and measures for tax officials with penalties for noncompliance. Because I guess tax officials used to like weigh your stuff.
Let's start with his parents and when he was born. Okay. Right at the beginning. That's a good spot.
When doing taxes, like literal like gold or I don't know.
But they were known for.
Yes. Yeah. And so now they're like, okay, now if they do that, there'll be a penalty for it. And they established separate courts for disputes involving Greek documents and Egyptian documents, preventing Greek judges from unfairly handling the cases involving native Egyptians.
So people were pretty happy with this. Yeah.
Yeah. They're like, cool. That's the least you could do. You guys have been messing with us for forever. And I do want to point out the decree is important that it says Cleopatra, the sister and Cleopatra, the wife. It's believed that during this new transition, this like final transition,
That's really the picture that they try to paint is that Cleopatra II and Potbelly are sibling rulers, not spouses.
So Potbelly was born in 184 BCE into the Ptolemaic dynasty. The Ptolemies, as a quick recap, were a Greek Macedonian ruling family in Egypt. And they arrived after Alexander the Great's conquests. Any commentary so far, babe?
Yes. Now the only spouse is Cleopatra III. And she's the younger one anyway, so she can continue to produce heirs. So then, after all of this, after three individual reigns, around 117 BCE, Potbelly's eventful life begins to wind down.
He had become more mellow since Cleopatra II returned, less prone to violent outbursts, and was trying to live up to the nickname he gave himself, which was Eurydages, the Beneficent. By building lots of temples and doing lots of good deeds. Someone's conscience was weighing on him.
On June 28th, 116 BCE, Potbelly dies. Natural causes.
He left the throne to Cleopatra III, his wife, and, quote, whichever of her sons she preferred. Many see this as a final way to mess with his family.
To make his sons fight with each other, to put pressure on his wife.
And he said to whichever son you prefer. Oh, my God. Ultimately, the eldest son, Chickpea, he becomes king alongside Cleopatra II and Cleopatra III.
Mm-hmm. And I will end Potbelly's story with one final quote from Llewellyn Jones's book, because I think he does a really good job of summarizing the impact here. So he writes, quote, he convinced himself that he was loved and that he was a great pharaoh. More harmfully, his fantasy projected the illusion of Egypt's immunity to invasion by foreign enemies.
and the decades after his death, it would become clear that the mirage of Egypt's invincibility was fading fast, and the country opened its eyes to the dark reality of Mediterranean politics. The kingdom Potbelly
left to Cleopatra III was on the cusp of decline, and the coming decades would show how the Ptolemies failed to unite as a family and instead put their relentless dynastic quarrels ahead of everything else."
So he, Potbelly really marks the beginning of the end for the Ptolemies.
Yes.
Yeah. Until... They go too far, which Cleopatra VII does in the eyes of Rome.
With Mark Anthony. And they're like, F this.
You're done.
Yeah.
That's so long. Oh, my God.
Well, that is the cruel, debaucherous, and controversial life of Potbelly.
I mean... Oh, thanks, love.
Yeah. Everyone's the same person.
Oh, good.
There you go.
You're so nice.
I can't ever cover the ancient stuff as much as you can, like as well as you can, I should say. So I appreciate it.
Yeah, you could have.
Potbelly was the son of, what do you think his dad's name was?
Thank you. Yeah. I mean, the awful things he does. I just I can't believe this guy. Unbelievable. He really sees Egypt as his playground.
And he sees human life as disposable.
Even his own sons.
physically lazy sure but intellectually very sharp very strategic but just such a terrible person and who just didn't seem to like care like at all about like anyone besides himself yeah it must be awful to live under a ruler like that must be so scary
Yeah. His dad's name was Ptolemy. He was Ptolemy V. And his mom was Cleopatra I or Cleopatra Syra, which is the Cleopatra we covered. Her lineage also descends from Alexander the Great's homies.
Oh, I'm so glad. My next one definitely will not be ancient.
Yeah.
At History for Weirdos.
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Right? So if you have any thoughts about Potbelly or any interesting things you picked up on, please let us know.
Until next time, weirdos.
His best friends. They really, like, fuck shit up. But that's a whole other story. She is of Seleucid ancestry. And Pottbelly, our Ptolemy, he has two siblings. Ptolemy VI.
And Cleopatra II. I'm going to stop right here and say everyone... It's about to get really annoying because everybody's named Ptolemy and everybody's named Cleopatra from here on out.
You're going to get a little variety with some Antiochuses at some point.
And a Bernicae here and there.
But mainly everyone is going to be called Ptolemy and then Cleopatra.
I know. And I'm not. I promise. I would have made it much clearer. Yeah. So if you get confused, that's okay. It's confusing. Look up their family tree. It's really gross. Okay. So we're going to go forward a little bit to September of 180 BCE. Okay. This is where Ptolemy V, so Potbelly's dad, he is barely 30. At the oldest, he'd be 30 years old, and he is already found dead by his servants. Wow.
That's young.
You're older than that.
His wife, Cleopatra Syra, assumed the rule of Egypt with her eldest son, Ptolemy VI, as co-ruler. And she planned... For her son, Ptolemy VI, to marry his full-blooded sister, Cleopatra II. Okay?
So Potbelly's the little brother. He's the youngest of this trio. Everyone's really excited about the wedding. Who wouldn't be?
Yeah. Oh, my God. The guest list is going to be small. When suddenly, Cleopatra Syra dies.
Isn't that awful?
So the date of her death is unclear, but for this story, we'll use about 176 BCE. That seems to be the largest consensus, which means that she would have been between 38 and 40 years old. Yes, she was older than her husband. So... What we do know is that in April of 176 BCE, the 12-year-old Cleopatra II married her eldest brother Ptolemy VI.
And at this point, you might be like, that's gross. It is. Sibling marriage had been practiced in the Ptolemaic family before. This marriage rebooted the tradition of brothers and sisters getting married because Cleopatra Syra and Ptolemy V were not siblings.
Ptolemy V did not have any sisters, which is why he didn't marry a sister.
So Cleopatra Syra was a foreign queen, and we talked about in much more depth in her episode how important it would have been for her survival to really align herself with the Ptolemies, with the traditions of the Greek Macedonians in Egypt as well as local Egyptians. Yes. So this move of having her kids marry each other is a part of that.
Did we do it here at Spotify?
Is a part of her saying, yes, I'm a foreign queen, but I'm accepting the customs here. I want my son and daughter to marry each other.
She was super smart. She was really well loved. And so people were very, very sad when she passed away. I'd say even more so than when her husband passed away. Oh, snap. Yeah, so moving forward, pretty much from this point on, there's going to be sibling marriage or close relative marriage for the Ptolemies all the way to Cleopatra VII. Gross.
Much more professional.
And I want to say, I think I said this in the Cleopatra episode, but just to reiterate here, these are not symbolic unions. They are expected to consummate the marriage. They are expected to provide heirs. To have lots of children actually is going to be the queen's job. And first degree incest is not common practice in Egypt at the time.
That's right. That's right. We were extra silly.
Though there had been some instances of it in the pharaohs in the new kingdom, it wasn't common for them either.
The relationships that the Ptolemies have would have been considered taboo for anyone else. But that's part of why the Ptolemies engage in sibling marriage and engage in close relative incest. It's because it elevates them to the level of the gods.
The gods were allowed to do that. For example, Isis and Osiris, as well as Zeus and Hera, are lovers and siblings. so they're really trying to show the common people like we are divine we're not an everyday person right which makes sense which makes sense even though it's gross okay so going back to the siblings co the siblings you know that just got married um
Well, today we're at Spotify.
Because of the wedding, the Seleucids sent some diplomats to Alexandria to say congrats to the new king and queen. But they were not super happy to see the Seleucids, despite the fact that they're relatives. Because these two families, the Ptolemies and the Seleucids, are always at war with each other.
Again. Oh, my gosh. So thank you so much to our lovely friends at Spotify who let us use this space. It's so professional.
They're always at war. Good things do not come easily. From these two battling, they're always fighting over land. Both want their empires to be bigger.
Yeah.
Yeah, exactly.
It really is so ironic and so... Dumb.
Yeah, it's very obvious this isn't working out. The Romans also sent someone to say hi and reaffirm their relationships with the Ptolemies because Rome is starting to grow some muscle at this point.
And Ptolemy VI is known as Ptolemy Philometer. And he is likely crowned. I think Philometer means mother loving son. And he is likely crowned in Memphis. And this is the first time that that happens in the Ptolemaic dynasty. And actually all the rest of the Ptolemies will also be crowned in Memphis from now on.
Egypt seems happy with their newlywed rulers. And I think this is largely because everyone loved Cleopatra, Cyrus so much. They were happy to see her kids happy. Oh, my God. So everything is going smoothly, right? Wrong. The young king and queen slash brother and sister duo unfortunately have some terrible advisors that they are learning from.
And everyone's always so nice.
Their names are I don't actually know how to pronounce these. I think it's Eulius and Linnaeus. They are they were just advisors in the court. These two are like they're young. They're teenagers. Both of their parents are dead. They assume the crown. And these two guys kind of take advantage of them.
We have merch, baby. Look at this.
It is a good backstory, yeah. Okay, fine. I'll just get into it really fast. I mean, it was really quickly, like, Doc Holliday saved Wyatt Earp's life. Like, not in Tombstone. It was another town, and they kind of just traveled together. Also, he's called Doc because he's literally a dentist.
He is literally a doctor. He's a doctor of teefees.
Arizona? Oh, that's right. I didn't even get into that. Yeah. I didn't even write any notes about that. I told you it's a good backstory. It is, yeah. He has... Oh my God. I'm blanking. What is the disease? Tuberculosis. Tuberculosis. Thank you. Yeah. He has tuberculosis. And he, so he went to the Arizona desert to like the dry air. Cause he thought it would help him. And I guess it does, but.
I mean, this is probably like one of my favorite pieces of merch.
Weirdos.
Yeah. He's a professional gambler. Yeah. Which in Tombstone is a profession. Like it's actually a profession at this time. Like it's not like now, right?
Now professional gambler is just on Wall Street.
Okay. Well, that was the eve of the fight. We're going to October 26, 1881. This is the day of the gunfight at the O.K. Corral.
Yes. Tensions have reached boiling point at this time. So, reports indicated that the cowboys were gathering near the O.K. Corral, armed and ready for a confrontation. Okay. City Marshal Virgil Earp, accompanied by his brothers Wyatt Earp and Morgan Earp, as well as Doc Holliday, decided to disarm the group to prevent violence.
Yeah. I mean, you. Oh, yes.
And it's really interesting because the movie Tombstone actually has a very accurate account of the shootout. They had a like a historian on set who specialized with like this time period and especially the shootout. And a lot of like what happens actually did happen.
Yeah, it's like I was reading the accounts and I was like, wait a minute. No, this is exactly like how it's described or how it's shown in the movie.
I know.
It's always so cool. I know. I mean, of course we're biased, but it's really funny. We had a professor, one of your old professors that we were talking to. Oh, yeah. The Gervs.
Professor Gerval. Yeah. I hope he didn't hear that. Anyways, he was, he was saying that he was brought on as a consultant for a film once. And he was like, actually like none of this is right. Like, this is how, like, I think it was like late first century BC Roman stuff. And he's like, this is actually how it would have worked out. And they just completely disregarded everything he said.
Exactly. I do remember him saying that.
But anyways.
It's so dumb.
So let's go back to the story. It's 3 p.m. October 26, 1881. The Earps. And Holiday, they now are walking up to confront the six cowboys that are there. There's Frank and Tom McClary, Billy and Ike Clanton, Billy Claiborne, and Wes Fuller. So two sets of two brothers. And then Billy Claiborne and Wes Fuller. There's actually two Billys here. Oh, my gosh. Billy Clanton, Billy Claiborne. Okay.
Claiborne. So and they are confronting them in a vacant lot that's adjacent to the OK Corral. It's actually it's a little bit of a misnomer. None of the shootout actually took place in the OK Corral. It was just like right around it.
Exactly. Plus, it sounds cool. So generally, this is the sequence of events, as far as we can tell, based on the testimony from eyewitnesses, including Virgil and Wyatt. So about 30 minutes even before this happened, Sheriff Behan had actually, quote, unquote, disarmed the cowboys, or so he told the Earps. And the Earps weren't expecting a gunfight, at least according to them.
So when Virgil saw the cowboys, he testified he immediately commanded them to, quote, Virgil and Wyatt both testified they saw Frank McClurry and Billy Clanton draw and cock their single-action six-shot revolvers. Oof. So, Virgil yelled at this point, hold on, we don't want that. Which we see in the film. Meaning that they just didn't want to fight, obviously, right? Just to spell it out.
No one is certain who shot first after that point, but there were two shots that went off almost simultaneously.
Yeah. Most likely, Billy Clanton was one of the men who shot first, and Virgil probably responded in kind with the second shot, like immediately after. Right. Which actually killed Frank McClurry. Oof. Tom McClurry hid behind his horse, but Doc Holliday drew his double-barreled shotgun, stepped around the horse, and just blasted him.
I know. And you know what? Also, this is going to be our second episode with full video.
Yeah, which we do kind of see in the film as well.
So ironically, I, Clanton, who had been threatening the Earps and Doc, immediately threw up his hands in the air, ran towards Wyatt, exclaiming he was unarmed and even embraced Wyatt. Like kind of like he was on his knees, like embracing him.
I know at that point, Wyatt famously responded, get to fighting or go away.
Yeah.
Also, like, what an incredible, like, thing to say.
I know. I love that. So Ike Clanton ran through the front door of the Fly's boarding house and escaped, possibly actually even firing a few shots before doing so, though we're not entirely certain of that part. Billy Claiborne and Wes Fuller immediately ran away. Also.
Like, yeah. Like when the first two shots went off, they booked it. They were like, no peace. We're out of here.
Yeah. That's something also I wanted to point out is that we have video now for every episode and you can watch it on Spotify and or YouTube. Yes. And but if you just want to listen to us to not see our beautiful faces or your beautiful face and my not so beautiful face, then I think you can just listen to wherever you're listening on it.
So at that point, it really was like a fair, like four on four.
Billy Clanton, however, that was Billy Claiborne in West Fuller ran away. Billy Clanton, however, got shot right in his right wrist as soon as he was trying to unholster his pistol. That sucks. So this led him shooting with his left hand, which he did until he ran out of bullets. Wow. Probably not a great shot with his left.
Wyatt shot Frank McClurry, again, like in the abdomen. And Frank took his horse by its reins and struggled across Fremont Street. okay frank uh crossed fremont street firing his revolver and frank and holiday exchanged shots as frank moved um and he got hit again i think in his pistol pocket grazing him holiday followed frank exclaiming that son of a bitch has shot me and i'm going to kill him
Yeah. Morgan Earp picked himself up and also fired at Frank.
Yeah. And then finally, I think Frank got shot a few times and fell on the sidewalk on the east side of Fremont Street. So that's the end of Frank. The wounded Billy Clanton kept shooting. I think it was Billy shot Morgan Earp across the back in a wound that struck both shoulder blades and a vertebrae. Morgan went down for a moment before picking himself up.
Yeah. So Billy Clanton and Tom McClary both were shot multiple times and bled out within minutes. So when the smoke cleared, Frank and Tom McClary were both dead as well as Billy Clanton.
Yeah.
It must have, yeah.
right it must have happened it must have been like so quick and like took forever at the same time very chaotic yeah yeah so uh virgil and morgan both sustained injuries while doc suffered a superficial wound white earth was uh he was unscathed nice that's why he's our hero yeah exactly he's the one who didn't get shot
So in the wake of the gunfight, Ike Clanton, who had fled the scene unarmed, sought to sway public opinion by portraying the Earps and Holliday as cold-blooded killers.
This is the weenie, yeah.
He filed murder charges against them, leading to a highly publicized preliminary hearing.
The hearing, which began on October 31st, 1881, and lasted for nearly a month, examined the legality of the Earps' actions and whether they had acted in self-defense. The courtroom was packed with townspeople, journalists, and interested observers, all eager to witness the unfolding drama.
Yes, they have a lot of power.
Right, but you got to remember too that like Sheriff Behan, he's on the side of the Cowboys. That's right. And he's the county sheriff. That's right. So there is law enforcement split between like the different levels, right? So like Virgil is a U.S. Marshal, also kind of like a deputy sheriff as well. Like it's really muddled. Okay.
And that's why it's so hard to kind of like look into this because it's very muddled. And then there's the themes of people being like attached to one side.
Um, but like kind of going into the prosecution's argument, they obviously represented the interests of Ike Clanton, right. And the families of the deceased and they, their whole argument was that this was premeditated, right. This was a premeditated attack under the guise of law enforcement. Like they were abusing their power.
Thank you.
Yeah. Which is a, I mean, that's a serious, serious accusation.
They presented witnesses who testified that the defendants had expressed animosity toward the Cowboys prior to the gunfight, which probably was true.
That's true.
Yeah. The prosecution aimed to establish that the confrontations was not a spontaneous act of law enforcement, but a calculated move to eliminate rivals.
Shoot.
Right? I know you like that.
Yes. Okay. Because there were ordinances that were passed in the town that only law enforcement could carry weapons, right?
Yeah, exactly. Because the violence was just off the charts.
Yeah, it's not a good thing. Yeah, okay. Not a good thing to do.
Tears.
Exactly. And then things escalated. According to them, at least, they were. To be honest, from my point of view, that's what I believe as well. I mean, these are cattle rustlers. They're thieves. They're stagecoach robbers. That's their thing.
So they're not good people.
So, Ike Clanton's testimony. Let's get into that. He was the primary complainant, right? Complainant? I've actually never heard that word spoken out loud.
Yeah, we're doing real stuff. We're doing history. Yeah. More sap.
Yeah, complainant. He testified that he and his associates had no intention. His associates? Yeah, associates. They had zero intention of causing trouble. None. None.
Yeah, exactly. What's wrong with that?
Yeah. And so he was there. His whole thing was there. They're going about carrying on their business. They're not causing trouble. And they were unfairly targeted by the Earps and holiday. And he painted a picture of the Cowboys as victims of a vendetta.
Exactly. They're the victims. Several bystanders provided conflicting testimonies, however, regarding the events leading up to the gunfight. Some corroborated the defense's claim, even, that the Cowboys were, I'm sorry, that the Cowboys were armed. And they posed a threat, while others supported the prosecution's narrative of an unprovoked attack.
So this week, we're going to be covering the gunfight of the OK Corral.
which so you have witnesses on both sides again and i i i believe that it goes along like where do you stand and again i kind of get into themes later on but um just a little preview of coming attractions basically on one side you have kind of like more rural like ranchers which are actually more on the side of the cowboys and all the industrialists are more on the side of erps
Yeah, just to kind of paint a broad generalization. So the defense, the defense, I'm sorry. Defense, defense. Defense wins championships. In this case, it does.
So the defense presented the weapons recovered from the scene. So clearly they were armed. Yeah. And it demonstrated that the cowboys, again, were very much so armed. And this just bolstered the argument of self-defense, right?
Especially, I mean, and like, duh, there was a shootout. Morgan Earp got shot. Yeah, he actually got shot, and he got hurt pretty badly from this. And he lives through this, but we'll get to that. So the trial attracted just widespread media attention, not just in the area, but actually around the country.
Yes, which is, as I'm sure you're all aware, one of the most iconic moments in Western American history.
Yeah, a little town called Tombstone. Newspapers across the U.S. reported on the proceedings. The press coverage was incredibly polarized, kind of like what I was just speaking to with some outlets portraying the Earps and Holliday as valiant lawmen upholding justice and keeping the peace, while others depicted them as ruthless vigilantes abusing their power.
I know, right?
You're either with me or against me.
Only Siths deal in absolutes.
I'm so sorry. Thanks for the Star Wars reference. I just outed myself as a huge Star Wars nerd, too. Okay, so this division in public opinion, by the way, really reflected the broader societal tensions of the era. So particularly regarding the law enforcement's role in frontier towns and the challenges of maintaining order in these rapidly growing communities. Yeah.
So after about a month of arguments, Justice Spicer delivered his ruling on November 30th, 1881. He concluded that the Earps and Holliday had acted within their duties as lawmen and that there was insufficient evidence to proceed to a full trial. So Spicer's decision effectively exonerated the defendants in stating that their actions were indeed justified.
So despite this legal victory, though, the Earps and Holliday faced ongoing hostility from the Cowboys and their supporters. The ruling did little to quell any animosity, of course, in Tombstone. And the threat of retribution was very, very eminent.
This had national. Yeah, again, like I said, this had national implications and we'll go into it more. But even President Chester A. Arthur was made aware of the shootout.
Yes.
Oh, the Earps, of course. Oh, duh. Yeah. Darn it.
Yeah, you're on this side of the industrialist.
Which is the shootout at the OK Corral.
I know. I was like, but I actually support like the rural people like in general more. Yeah. Rather than the industrials because I feel like they're just like late 19th century version of corporatists.
But in this very specific instance, no, I'm on the Earps side.
He was deputized. Like two minutes before? He's literally, yeah. Like he's literally just like, he's just there for the ride.
He's Wyatt's like bud. Like they are buds.
Our dog.
Yes. So this ruling pissed off the Cowboys, right? Sure. Um, they felt emboldened to regain their influence in tombstone. So literally just a month later, right after Christmas, December 28th, 1881, Virgil Earp was ambushed and severely wounded by unknown assailants believed. But of course it's, they're believed to be like connected to the Cowboys and
Oh, I was like, yeah, it's just a shootout. Okay. Yeah. So there's a few people. There's Wyatt Earp.
virgil no this left him permanently disabled oh my gosh yeah and subsequently on march 18th 1882 so another like three months after the fact roughly morgan erp was assassinated while playing billiards at campbell and hatch's saloon in tombstone wow just playing billiards and someone shot him through the window
Yeah.
Wyatt Earp's going to get big mad. Yeah. So this begins like what's known as Wyatt Earp's vendetta or just simply the vendetta.
And Doc Holliday.
Yeah.
Yes. Or maybe it's like even his like slight villain origin story.
Yeah. He becomes a little bit of a villain here.
Yeah. Yeah. He's like, no, I'm not. I'm not about this. I'm not about this. So this really pissed him off. Clearly. Right.
Those are probably the two most famous names that come out of this.
disillusioned with the legal system's inability to protect his family or to bring the perpetrators to justice right because we don't even know who's even doing this like who's actually doing it right we know it's the cowboys but who we don't know white assembled a posse included trusted allies like doc holiday baby his bestie his bestie
This group embarked on what became known as the Earp Vendetta Ride, targeting those they held responsible for the attacks. Their actions operated technically, technically outside the bounds of the law, marking like a shift from lawmen to quasi-vigilantes.
He's operating in a gray area here. Okay. For sure. Because it's not outright vigilantism because he kind of does have, he does have like the badge, right? He is, he was, so like Wyatt did, he telegraphed a U.S. Marshal, Crawley Drake, requesting an appointment as a Deputy U.S. Marshal for like Eastern Pima County and the authority to form a posse.
Wyatt Earp. Yeah. And that's how you say his name. Yeah. In fact, there's more than just one Earp.
And that happened even, that would happen after Virgil got shot, but before Morgan was assassinated.
so he like but they're going after people that are kind of unknown right they don't have like actual evidence but they're just they're just using this as kind of like a veneer to go after these people so again very gray area yeah so the members of this posse included Wyatt Earp of course as well as deputized members Warren Earp who's another Earp brother who's coming into the picture there's another Earp brother yeah
And, like, we don't talk much about him, like, in this. He's just kind of here for the ride, and then we're, like, done.
Yeah. I think there's even more. So, yeah, there's Warren Earp. There's Doc Holliday. There's Sherman McMaster. There's Jack Turkey Creek Johnson. turkey creek yeah charlie hair lip charlie smith hair lip and then daniel tip timpton and then my favorite john texas jack vermilion wow i love these names man i love them i wish people had these names now right could you imagine i want a name like that
and more than just one erp yes fun fact white erp died about 15 minutes away from where we live oh wow where we're recording right here it's like 15 minutes like east that's where he died kind of weird spoiler much spoiler yeah so i mean this did take place in the 19th century so yeah spoiler is that he is he's now deceased he would be like well over 100 years old
i know right so let's go to march 20th 1882 so two this is only two days after morgan's death two days um the erps escorted virgil and his wife to the train station in tucson arizona to like get them out getting them out of dodge yeah if he's unable to help yes he's a target There, they encountered Frank Stilwell, who was a known cowboy, and he was also a suspect in Morgan's assassination.
A suspect, but not confirmed.
Wyatt and his posse pursued Stilwell, ultimately killing him near the train tracks with a shotgun blast to the chest. Well, that'll do it. Yeah, they did this, I think, in cold blood. Just like straight up like, nah, dude, screw you.
Exactly. So Wyatt and five other federal lawmen were indicted for murdering him. And Tucson Justice of the Peace, Charles Meyer, even issued warrants for their arrest.
So here's where it gets a little interesting, a little spicy, because like the Earth Posse after this comes back to Tombstone and Sheriff Behan receives a telegram from the sheriff of Prima County asking him to arrest the members of the Earth Posse. He gathers his deputies and Tombstone City Marshal Dave Neagle.
The men met at the door of the Cosmopolitan Hotel, preparing to arrest Earp and his posse. The heavily armed Earp lawmen pass through the door of the Cosmopolitan Hotel on their way to pick up their horses from Montgomery's stable. It's at this point that Behan says, Wyatt, I want to see you. Without stopping, Wyatt replied, you might see me once too often.
It's a little threat.
Behan or nor his posse make any attempt to stop the Earl posse.
The Earp posse. I'm sorry.
They're a little scared. Yeah. Yeah. So there was even a story published later that the posse pulled their guns on Sheriff Behan, but that probably didn't happen. I mean, it is interesting because this was a classic case of being kind of, again, murky in the legality area as it's like a classic kind of local county laws versus more like federal laws.
Because, again, this isn't even a state yet. This is Arizona territory.
So it's purview of federal law.
Now, back to Behan. He was pissed. He was real big mad. And he formed his own posse. Everyone's having posses these days.
And that consisted of a number of deputized cowboys, friends of Frank Stilwell and Ike Clanton, including Johnny Ringo, Phineas Clanton, Johnny Barnes, and about 18 other men.
Yes, it was much larger than the Earp posse.
So the Vendetta ride continued with a series of confrontations. These were quite complex. So in order to kind of like speed everything along, I'm just going to quickly summarize like what happened with each of these. I love it. There was Florentino Indian Charlie Cruz.
Oh, yeah, that's the guy's name. He was killed near Tombstone on March 22nd, 1882. So that was only two days after Frank Stilwell was killed, four days after Morgan was assassinated.
Yeah, it's happening quick.
So this guy, he was a cowboy.
Yeah. And then the two others that happened were also cowboys.
So then two days after that, a notorious cowboy leader by the name of Curly Bill Brockius, he was killed during a gunfight at Iron Springs, March 24th.
And then, and that same day, Johnny Barnes also killed during that same encounter. Okay.
Well, I'm sorry, guys.
Yeah, they're just picking them off. So yeah, these targeted killings were part of Wyatt's strategy to completely dismantle the cowboy faction and just obliterate it from its existence. Yeah. Almost using like guerrilla warfare in a way.
But they're now being followed by a much larger posse and they had to flee Arizona territory altogether.
So yeah, they're kind of like on the offense for a few days, really. And then now they're like, oh shit, like I got to skedaddle. So they made their way to Albuquerque, New Mexico.
And this is where it gets a little weird because Wyatt and Doc have a giant fight. Like they're pissed off at each other. And they part ways.
OK, so the shootout occurred in Tombstone, Arizona, which I think is just a fantastic name for a town.
Yeah.
It's bad. I'm not even going to repeat it on the podcast, but it's really like bad.
Like, there is... Scandalous.
Yeah, I'm going to tell you later. Okay, cool. I don't even want to put it on the podcast because it's... You could say it's, like, racist in a way.
Yeah.
I'll tell you later. But, yeah. And it's not important for the story. It's just that they split up.
Exactly. So... So from here, the posse sans dock make it all the way to Colorado.
Yeah, so they get way out of Arizona territory. But the search for the remaining cowboys at this point kind of fizzles out, and the Earp posse more or less comes to a close. There's also some business of posse members being arrested in Colorado, but the governor of the state actually refused to extradite them back to Arizona.
Yeah. And I'm also happy to say that Behan loses a ton of support during this time. One writer of the Arizona Sentinel wrote, quote, there is no hope for any honest man to get justice here against these scoundrels as long as Behan is in office, end quote.
And it's very true. I completely agree.
Exactly. So this had caused just such a, excuse my French, but this caused such a shit storm that Arizona Territory Governor Frederick Trittle, he visited Tombstone on April 3rd, 1882 and And he put a posse of 30 men under the command of Deputy U.S. Marshal J.H. Jackson to root out the cowboys like once and for all.
There's a lot of tombstones.
So this posse is actually really interesting because they are kind of like a precursor to the famous Arizona Rangers, which exists to this day.
Yes. And they would be founded about 20 years after the fact.
So even Civil War hero William Tecumseh Sherman recommended the suspension of the Posse Comitatus Act to allow the U.S. Army to aid in restoring order. Whoa. The U.S. Army.
It's kind of a bummer. So and it's funny because the gunfight itself only lasted 30 seconds.
This is the dude that like went through just the South and just like on a rampage.
Yeah. I mean, we named our World War II tanks after this guy.
Yeah. Sherman tanks, yeah.
I didn't know that, actually.
Oh, that one. Actually, dude, yeah, he's a big boy. Yeah. He's a big boy. So on January 8th, 1883, so now this is like the following year after the original shootout. Wow. The 12th Arizona Territorial Legislative Assembly convened to specifically address all the violence that had occurred over the last like couple of years.
A few years even. I don't believe that much came about it, but the fact that it even happened, especially with the urging of the president of the United States, showed how serious this was being taken, right? And this all kind of goes back to the shootout at the OK Corral, more or less.
Yeah.
Only 30 seconds long. It was not a long fight, but the reverberations, reverberations.
yes this 30 second fight had giant ripple effects that influenced like like the federal like things at the federal level federal politics that's so interesting because obviously for the Earps it was so it became so personal too yeah that's true
It really is. And now it's like, you can't talk about like the wild, wild West without talking about the shootout, the okay crowd. Yeah. Like it's, it would just be, they're synonymous. They're synonymous.
I mean, I literally wrote in my notes here, it is interesting how such a small event can release a chain reaction that can plummet an entire area into chaos because that is exactly what happened.
Yeah.
Yep, exactly. So sure. Tensions had been boiling before that point, but this was definitely like a defining moment and not only Arizona lore, but the, again, the entire American like wild, wild west.
Yeah. And like I alluded to earlier, there were bigger themes at play here. The shootout had happened less than two decades after the conclusion of the American Civil War.
Reverberations. Thank you. The reverberations, I really wanted to use that word, like of this fight have lasted, you know, well over a century now.
Exactly. So there was still looming in people's minds this giant conflict. And in fact, many of the cowboys were from the South and were Confederate sympathizers.
Many of the ranchers. That's their brand. Exactly. Many of the ranchers and cowboys who lived in the countryside were very resentful of the growing power of industrialists from northern states who increasingly influenced local politics and the law in the county.
The ranchers largely maintained control of the country around Tombstone, in large part because of the sympathetic support of Sheriff Behan, who obviously favored the cowboys and rural ranchers. So in essence, when the shooting happened, you had two sides that really hated each other and rallied behind their prospective heroes, regardless of what was right and what was wrong.
Exactly. It was a sort of tribalism, right? And we see that even today in national politics. It's like, you're either with me or against me. And it's like, what happened to nuance? You know?
So... the industrialists and federal government obviously supported the Earps whilst the local ranchers and more rural folks, again, support the Cowboys. Like I kind of alluded to earlier and what, so like that was kind of the larger themes at play, but like what happened, what happened to everyone after this? Right.
Let's get into it. So let's start with Wyatt. So Wyatt Earp would actually make his way a few decades after the shootout to Los Angeles and,
that's where we are yes that's where i'm from yeah and get this he worked in conjunction with the lapd what like early 19th century lapd that's so cool yeah so like wyatt erp worked for like like he was like a consultant or something he had an interesting job so he quote unquote worked outside the law mainly retrieving criminals from mexico
Exactly. Wow. Wild, right? Yeah. The gunfight at the OK Corral has been portrayed in numerous movies, TV shows, documentaries, and it's been highly romanticized in fictionalized elements as well. Because of these depictions, distinguishing fact from fiction is actually pretty difficult, and I can attest that this...
oh and bringing them back yeah bringing them back to la oh kind of like a bounty hunter sort of yeah like an international extraditing bounty hunter wow which by the way that's super illegal yeah you can't just like go into another country yeah another sovereign state yeah that's crazy to bring back criminals so i see what he was what he was doing was once again in the gray area exactly he's up i mean that's more like in the
what the red. Yeah. And that's like, I'm very surprised. Yeah. Like LAPD would not do that today.
Like that's crazy.
And funny enough. So like, you know, he did that for like, for a while. I mean, he had a bunch of odd jobs kind of bounced around. Right. One of the things he did was he became a film consultant for some early Hollywood pictures, like the 1916 movie, the half breed, as well as many others.
Yeah.
Exactly. Isn't that wild?
Well, after his death. Yeah. So he would be the last not only surviving brother, but he'd actually be the last surviving participant of the shootout of the OK Corral.
Yeah. Yeah. He finally died on January 13th, 1929 at the age of 80. Again, just like 15 minutes away from where we're recording this episode.
He finally died.
Everyone else died like way before him and he lasted like a very long time.
That's insane.
So... That was Wyatt. Let's go to Virgil. So Virgil Earp would become a private detective, work for the railroads, and also return to formal law enforcement as well. In 1904, they had gone to California. Then in 1904, they finally left California for the last time and moved to a boomtown of Goldfield in Esmeralda County, Nevada, where he actually planned to open a saloon.
Oh, however, he got there and was like, oh, wow, there was already a ton of saloons. So I'd have a giant amount of competition. That's not cool. And he also realized, oh, I don't have the money to even do this. Yeah, that's probably something you should figure out beforehand.
So. He took up gambling, which, again, that was an honest profession, like at this time. Um, unfortunately though, he had never fully recovered from his past injuries, right? He was partially, uh, immobilized because of the shootout or I'm sorry, because of his attempted assassination. Um, and he finally, he actually ended up dying of pneumonia on October 19th, 1905 at the age of 62.
I know. It's so sad. What's even worse is doc. He's a gum to tuberculosis at the age of only 36.
No. And he died on November 8th, 1887. Um, It's interesting though. I mentioned his nemesis, longtime nemesis, Johnny Ringo. He died under mysterious circumstances and it was long believed that he was killed by holiday. And in fact, that is the stance that the movie tombstone takes.
Because he, this guy, Johnny Ringo was found with a bullet wound in the side of his head. But it just didn't seem likely that he had actually killed himself.
Wow. Yeah. I know they have that in the movies, but no, they don't.
This was a tough episode to research just because there was so much information and so much of it was either superfluous or was contradictory. So I had to go down a lot of rabbit holes for this one. So, in fact, Wyatt Earp's lady friend, like decades after the fact, would... She gave a very sensationalized view of what happened.
Not that we know of.
Yeah. Not that we know of.
Exactly. You can't just text them.
No, I don't think they did.
He died in his thirties. And so, yeah. And like, I think it's really interesting because none of them have really great endings. No, they all, I mean, even why he lives a long time, but he kind of like bounces around, like from obscurity to like doing these odd jobs and. He's drifting. He's drifting. The cowboys, a lot of them die pretty shortly after in unrelated accidents.
Like one of the guys that was one of the main suspects in Morgan Earp's assassination was killed by a lawman like in a completely separate incident just like a year or two later.
As well as a lot of other ones just dying pretty shortly after.
Exactly.
No, no. And I don't think that happened to really any of them. I mean, even Wyatt, right. He lives the longest, but he kind of, he doesn't have like a, it seems like he's a lot of trouble. Um, and I didn't get into it a lot of it. Cause like there was a, I mean, his life after this is quite long. There's a lot of things that I just kind of like glazed over.
Um, but yeah, he's not, he doesn't do great and everyone else does worse. So.
Like there is a shifting of and you're right. And there was like there was a shifting away from like the old world that they had known where the late 19th century brought along a lot of advancements. Right.
Exploitation. Yes. And we do see that today. Yeah. Different ways. But still, those themes, I think, are very ever present. Yeah. And you kind of like in the micro of looking at just tombstone, right? There was so much wealth that could be had. And in an area where like, you know, being a good person was not held in high regard. So you have like explosion of,
you know, when you mix greed with like lawlessness, you know, you're going to get a lot of violence.
And that is exactly what happened. And that was kind of the backdrop of, you know, the shootout at the OK Corral.
Yeah. Like it really was much, much deeper than just, you know, these guys going at it.
Yeah, kind of like, yeah, you throw in greed, you throw in like, yeah, again, lawlessness, you even throw in competing like interests, right? Even within the government itself. And you get this. Yeah. Where like, you know, most people's lives are made worse.
Yeah.
Exactly. Yeah. But that there you have it. That was, you know, the shootout at the OK Corral and its consequences.
Yeah.
Yeah. I wanted to try to be as like balanced as possible and, and really just try to give like a holistic point of view. Um, you know, it is interesting too, because when I was doing my research, I couldn't, I noticed that there was a stark difference between like who Wyatt Earp and the Earps were actually were versus like how they're portrayed in tombstone. Like they're a lot more nuanced, right?
They're not like in, in tombstone that they're portrayed as like the good guys, right? They're the good guys and the Cowboys are the bad guys. And like, generally that's kind of where I fall in line as well, but it's not as clear cut.
Like they're very well could have been, you know, they, they were, and you, you, especially you look at the events outside of tombstone, like before and after, like they were self-serving, you know, not necessarily that's bad, but like, you know, it's, they're not like made at, they're not these great heroic, like noble figures. They're people.
And in fact, in a manuscript that had developed from these events, she included the word crack in all caps over a hundred times.
Yeah.
People are messy. And that included the herbs.
That's true.
Oh yeah. Your potbelly episode. I loved it.
Until next time, Weirdos.
Adios.
Like crack.
Not like.
Oh my God. So there has been even a longstanding debate over whether the Earps were heroes or they were actually villains abusing their authority.
Welcome back, weirdos.
and we'll get into that controversy and like and it even goes deeper than that in that like whole like a theme of like sides people picking one side or the other based off of like their socioeconomic status their background it's it gets really detailed in fact there's a lot more to this story than just the gunfight itself
Yeah. And of course, the shootout itself, like, included three deaths. So, and we'll get into it. But before we get into the actual fight, we have to do a little bit of background, right? So, founded in 1878, following a discovery of silver... Tombstone rapidly transformed from like a modest mining camp into a bustling boomtown. And this happened like almost overnight. Wow.
By the early 1880s, its population swelled to nearly 12,000 residents. And again, this was founded in 1878. We're already in the early 1880s. Wow. So just a few years. The town's swift prosperity attracted both like legitimate businesses and illicit activities because of course, right? Yeah. There was just a volatile mix of lawlessness and ambition.
The burgeoning wealth also drew the attention of influential financiers like J.P. Morgan, who had invested serious amounts of money in stabilizing their region to protect their investments.
Especially like in the silver industry specifically.
Exactly. So what starts this whole kind of thing in motion is actually a stagecoach robbery. Like before the events of the actual shootout. So it was the night of March 15th, 1881. A Kinnear and Co. stagecoach departed Tombstone en route to Benson, Arizona. carrying a substantial shipment of silver bullion valued at $26,000 in 1881 money. Wow. That's a lot of money. At approximately 10 p.m.
Exactly. Studio Shangri-La, our living room.
near Drew Station, just outside of Contention City, the stage was ambushed by three masked assailants.
Eli Bud Philpott the regular driver of the stagecoach had been feeling unwell and swapped roles with Bob Paul who took the reins while Philpott assumed the position of shotgun messenger incredible job title by the way wow so one guy always had to be driving the other guy had to have a shotgun with him yeah kind of just like on lookout which makes sense right
As the stagecoach approached a curve, a figure emerged, commanding them to halt. Paul responded by firing a shotgun and emptying his revolver at the robbers, wounding one of them in the groin. The robbers returned fire, tragically killing Philpott and a passenger named Philip Roerig, who was seated in the rear dickery seat.
I'm sorry. Rear Dickie. It's even better.
Despite the chaos, Paul managed to drive the stagecoach to safety, preventing the robbers from seizing the valuable cargo. So it was an attempted robbery, but still the damage had been done. You know, people were dead and this area is soon becoming known as like a lawlessness area.
Exactly. Not good for investments. No. So upon reaching Benson, Bob Paul dispatched a telegram to Deputy U.S. Marshal Virgil Earp in Tombstone informing him of the attack. Virgil promptly assembled a posse to pursue the perpetrators. I love that word, posse, by the way.
In fact, just to set your expectations, you probably should hear... Pericles puppy sounds and sometimes bird sounds. Yeah.
So he enlisted his brothers, Wyatt Earp and Morgan Earp, along with notable figures like Bat Masterson and Wells Fargo agent Marshall Williams.
Yes, Wells Fargo is a big player in this era, really.
Exactly.
Exactly, yeah.
It's a great name.
I'm not going to say anything.
Oh, boy.
It's not one of those words. That's rare words. That's prettier in English than Spanish.
That's true. We can name a cat Virgil.
Absolutely.
Anyways.
Anyways, moving on. This is too funny. So, Cochise County Sheriff Johnny Behan. Remember that name. He's important for this. He's kind of a, you know.
We're your hosts, Andrew and Stephanie. And we're going to take you on a journey into the strange, obscure, and relentlessly entertaining corners of human history.
Behan. And his deputy, Billy Breckenridge. also joined the pursuit. This is going to be like the last time they're on the same side. Okay. With the Earps.
So the posse's tracking skills led them to a nearby ranch where they apprehended a guy by the name of Luther King, not Martin Luther King, just Luther King, who confessed to his involvement and identified his accomplices, Bill Leonard, Harry the Kid Head, and Jim Crane, all known associates within a criminal organization called the Cowboys. Wow.
dun dun dun yes the cowboys are a gang a gang they're they're like bigger than a gang they're like a they're like an organized crime unit but like 19th century late 19th century version
I know. You guys will hear a lot of nicknames throughout this and they're all amazing.
So the attempted robbery and subsequent investigation intensify the already like kind of simmering tensions that had been going down between the Burt brothers and the cowboy faction. They did not like each other.
Yes.
Exactly. And this included figures, or the cowboy faction included figures like Ike Clanton, the McClowry brothers, Frank and Tom...
and as well as many others the cowboys notorious for their involvement in cattle rustling and stagecoach robberies view the irps law enforcement efforts as direct threats to their operations of course right conversely the irps were determined to establish law and order in tombstone challenging the cowboys dominance and illicit activities Yes.
This adversarial relationship was further complicated by political dynamics like Sheriff Behan, who had often exhibited sympathetic tendencies to the cowboys.
He's crooked, yeah. Mm-hmm. So, I mean, I should be more impartial, but no, he's crooked. Yeah. He's crooked.
Yes, and he's the county sheriff. So it's, it's a big deal. You have also like, there's a lot of themes here and we'll get at it. We'll get to it at the end, but it's really interesting. It's again, the story is a lot deeper than just a simple shootout.
Of course it is. It's history for weirdos, baby. So following the stagecoach robbery, uh, tensions between the brothers and the cowboy faction intensified even further, right? It was bad before. And now it's even worse. The Earps, particularly Wyatt, uh, are basically the kind of the main character of the story, more or less water, water, baby.
He suspected members of the Cowboys, including Ike Clanton, who was like a ranking member of the faction of orchestrating the robbery. The situation was further complicated by the involvement of prominent financiers like JP Morgan, right? Who did not want these things happening. He wanted, he was on the side of law and order, not because he's a good person, because that helps business investments.
They, financiers they love to see stability stability yes they don't want to see like political fightings right they don't want to see organized crime organized crime yeah they want to be the organized crime exactly money money money exactly so let's get to the evening of october 25th 1881 ike clinton and tom mcclary they arrive in tombstone ostensibly to sell cattle that they had stolen
Not chill, man. Not chill. However, their presence in town, coupled with reports that other cowboys, including Frank McCleary, Billy Clanton, and Billy Claiborne were en route to join them, raised alarms amongst the Earps. So undercover Wells Fargo agent Fred Dodge informed Deputy City Marshal Morgan Earp of the cowboys' movements, prompting the Earps to prepare for potential trouble.
Later that night, a heated confrontation occurred between Doc Holliday and Ike Clanton at the Alhambra Saloon. The argument escalated with Clanton threatening to confront Holliday the following morning. Wyatt Earp attempted to defuse the situation, but Clanton remained resolute, stating, quote, You must not think I won't be after you all in the morning.
So basically a threat on their life. And... I didn't really introduce Doc Holliday earlier, but he was a friend of Wyatt Earp's for the last few years. It's a whole backstory, but they're buds.
I literally never thought I was going to be one of those people.
Here we are.
There aren't.
Yeah, we're just his fans.
Straight up. I swear to God. It's true.
It energized us seeing all of your messages and like just show of support really helped. So thank you guys so much.
Oh, hell yeah. And then the last thing, do you want to do it or do you want me to do it?
That's true. This was like a little bit of my baby. So we set up the very first History for Weirdos merch store. Exactly. You can find it in the show notes. And then also while we're on the subject of like the internet, we also have... Okay, it's not that funny.
Oh, I know. But what I was going to say, though, is our website.
We have a brand new website. I think it looks better. It's up now and running.
Yeah, you can find the merch there. Also in the show notes of this episode, you'll find the link to the merch, which includes this hat. I also have a really sick sweatshirt that I'll be wearing in the next episode that you'll see.
You share.
Yeah, which is really cool.
You had a pretty sick sticker of that. It looks really good.
Exactly. What I would do if I were you is like when you go to the link, you'll see all of like the artwork and then you press on the artwork and then you can get that on like a hat, a shirt, like a sweatshirt even. Yeah. A tote bag. A tote bag. Yeah. It's all over the place. Oh, we also have one with the emu war. That one's cute.
Our very first episode back. I am so excited. And this, guys, this one's a good one. I'm really excited about this. It better be. So also, shout out to my friend, Pat.
He's the one who gave me this book that started the whole... The whole, like... Deep dive? Deep dive into this episode. So the book was on a single man, but this episode is about an event. So... but that man was instrumental in kind of creating this either like more indirectly. So at some point even directly, but really interesting.
Um, the figure, the historical figure name is Samuel Zemuri or Sam Zemuri.
Really interesting guy. I don't have it in my notes up like for him, but, um, not an interesting guy. Maybe not necessarily a great guy.
You can't be everything. That is true. So, you know what? Let's just get into this week's episode, shall we?
So we explore a lot this week. We go from bananas to corporatization of local foreign economies to the CIA communist relationship and to even overthrowing democratically elected governments.
Yeah, it's bananas.
Like, literally.
You do?
It's really funny.
No. I mean, but who knew that the banana, which is so sweet, could turn relations between the U.S. and Central America so sour? Wow. wow i had to guys i had to that's a good one that's a good opening line i know right but before we get into the events of this episode let's first talk about the united fruit company shall we
So the United Fruit Company, or UFC, formed in 1899, and it owned just large tracts of land across Central America, and they controlled railroads, docks, communication systems in Guatemala.
Yes, and we'll be focusing mainly on Guatemala. So by the next year, it was the largest banana exporter with a monopoly over the Guatemalan banana trade. Yeah.
They are not good.
I also know that they were very instrumental in Honduras as well. But we're, again, focusing on Guatemala.
To Guatemala? Yeah. I mean, I want to go to both, but yeah.
Antigua. Antigua.
That's fun to say.
So over the next 30 years or so, United Fruit mostly consolidated its holdings and threatened just anyone who got in their way. So really interesting aside here is that in the 1920s, the UFC was in conflict with another banana exporting corporation, Cayumel, which was operated by none other than Samuel Zamuri.
Yes. And these companies were just really going at it. They were causing widespread violence in the region. I mean, essentially, you had like just legitimate open corporate warfare to the point where the United States State Department had to step in and basically order these two companies to merge. Which like never happens, by the way. The judiciary doesn't want mergers, right? Yeah.
Especially over like, you know, giant corporations becoming one mega corporation. Not good for the consumer.
They ordered this because they just needed this. They were like, this makes the U.S. look bad.
Basically. Why? Wait, why what?
Oh, the open corporate warfare and destabilizing a region.
Because they're U.S. companies.
Exactly. Okay. And they didn't want that.
Which is ironic because I feel like our government does that a lot now.
Yeah, all the time.
Maybe even some people actually felt it.
Maybe. Who knows?
This was bananas.
This was literally a banana turf war. Yeah. This is wild.
You got to love corporatism, right?
They know. So by 1930, the UFC had operating capital, $215 million. This is 1930 money, too. So that's a lot of money.
And they were the largest landowner and employer in Guatemala by far.
So- And again, they had now just merged with Cayamel, so they're even bigger. So in 1950, the UFC's annual profits, annual profit was 65 million, twice the revenue of Guatemala's government.
Yeah. That's not good. It virtually owned Puerto Barrios, Guatemala's only Atlantic port, profiting from goods flowing through it.
It's very dangerous. Yes.
A fruit company. Yeah.
I mean, the government having a lot of power is dangerous. Like a single corporation. Yeah. It's even worse. Yeah. Yeah. It's crazy. So Guatemalan revolutionaries saw the UFC as like an impediment to progress, right? Definitely. Especially after 1944 due to its association with the past Ubico government and really discriminatory policies.
So basically, there's this new president that comes in in 1944 named Arevalo, and he implemented a new labor code, allow the United Fruit Company workers to strike.
Thank you. Yes.
And- Here's the thing. This is what they're kind of going towards. They're introducing a bunch of kind of new labor code and labor laws protecting the workers, which hadn't happened for decades. And the United Fruit Company, because the United Fruit Company owned 550,000 acres in Guatemala, and only 15% of that was actually cultivated. Wow.
They just were the other- Hoarding the rest? Exactly.
Exactly.
So yeah, they're sick. Yeah, they're really cool. And- It's over this uncultivated land that the CIA would eventually instigate a coup, overthrow a democratically elected government at the behest of a corporation, essentially.
It's not chill.
Right?
So... Let's go back a little bit to 1944 ish. So prior to that year, Guatemala was governed by authoritarian leaders who prioritize like economic growth via commodity exports, basically coffee and bananas.
And they frequently did this at the expense of the indigenous majority.
Following a surge in global coffee demand in the late 19th century, though, the Guatemalan government granted concessions to plantation owners. Yeah. Dispossessing large amounts of indigenous populations to communal land holdings.
So basically just kicking people off their land.
Exactly.
Manuel Estrada Cabrera, the president of Guatemala from 1898 to 1920, made large concessions to foreign corporations, including... The United Fruit Company.
So the U.S. exerted its dominance not only, like, not always through military force, right? As dictators in Guatemala accommodated U.S. economic interests in exchange for support. And this led to the term Banana Republic.
And now they make cool clothes.
Exactly. Yeah.
Yeah. Like this wasn't even it's like for it's not even like, oh, well, it's like at the behest of like the American citizens, which is bad. I'm not saying which would still be bad. But this is just for like a private corporation, which is it's insane.
Unreal, right?
I'm just laughing because it's so absurd. Of course. It's insane. And, well, from 1890 to 1920, control of Guatemala's resources shifted from... At the same time, basically, from Britain and Germany to the U.S., which became its dominant trading partner. And even the U.S. government appointed J.P. Morgan & Co. to be the official bank of Guatemala, repaying its debt.
Basically, a coming sign that the U.S. was encroaching on Latin American affairs, which we would see for the next 50, 60, 70 years.
Pretty much, yeah.
So in 1944, you get what's called the 10 years of spring. And this was a brief period of good reforms that were aimed at addressing these deep inequalities. Right. In land distribution and labor rights, particularly for the majority indigenous population. Right.
Yes. And I know I know, guys, but you might that might be slightly disappointing and I understand truly. But I think this is best for the long run and we really want to be here for the long run.
10 years of spring.
It does. Sorry. It's not funny, but like it's so absurd. Yes.
The repressive policies of Jorge Ubico's government led to this popular uprising. I mentioned it earlier. In 1944, Ubico fled, and this would become known as the October Revolution in Guatemala, which is ironic given that I think – no, no. I think in the USSR, it was the November Revolution. Or was it the October Revolution?
I don't know. I can't remember.
Yeah, they're like, it's obviously this one.
And I'm sorry to you. But the Guatemala's October Revolution was aimed to transform Guatemala into a liberal democracy, right?
And Juan Jose Arevalo, and I'm not sure if I'm saying that right, was elected president in Guatemala's first largely free election ever. Wow.
Yeah. First one ever.
So his administration drafted, you know, a more favorable labor code to the workers. Right. To the working class. They built health centers and increased funding for education. Right. He enacted like a minimum wage and created state run farms to employ like the landless laborers.
So I think having it be every other week kind of gives us a little bit more free time and also kind of gives us the edge to go deeper into every episode and to really write like something that we're very proud of.
More for like the people as opposed to, you know, a foreign corporation.
Exactly. For like just a good society.
A functioning society. I know. Crazy, right? But that was against the interests. A functioning society was against the interests of this corporation. Right.
I know.
Exactly. I couldn't have said it better myself.
I know. Quick aside, I did write an article on Substack about... I called them Corpo Tyrants. It's really good. If you do... Yeah, it's... I think the link is in our bio on Instagram. So if you want to check it out, you can.
Oh, yeah. I'll do that as well. Yeah.
Thanks, baby. Back to the episode though. So... obviously Arevalo's, um, his reforms were really popular amongst just the common citizenry. Right. And, um, Things were going all right because he wasn't the difference. And we'll get into kind of his successor here in just a second. But Arevalo was a little bit more of a pragmatist. He had very firm beliefs, but he was a pragmatist.
So he kind of still he was like, look, United Fruit Corporation, we're making some changes. You can't you can't fight that. I could make it even worse for you, but I'm not going to. That's kind of like the gist, I think, of. of when i was reading about him that's kind of like what i got what his approach was exactly now you get his successor um Jacobo.
Jacobo Arbenz.
Yeah, exactly. So he was the vice president for Arevalo and he succeeded him in 1951. And he started instituting more aggressive land reforms. So he wanted to just continue Arbenz. I'm sorry. He wanted to continue Arevalo's work, but just kind of push it.
And he in 1952, he passed a decree or issued Decree 900, which was a particularly ambitious land reform policy aimed at redistributing large unused estates to landless peasants, mainly benefiting the indigenous workers who have been screwed over for decades now.
It was a land back move. Exactly.
It. Yes, but not to the CIA. It wasn't.
So if you want to kind of. OK, is there another episode that this gives you that gives the same vibe?
Yes, there is one because it's a very different time period.
It was the Grokai brothers.
Exactly.
Pretty much, yeah. And that was 2,000 years prior in ancient Rome. The Gracchi brothers were these...
a populare that's yeah they were the populares they were like kind of like the rabble rousers who wanted to you know give more to the common citizen yeah give more rights and yeah and wealth to the common citizen because yeah ancient rome at that time was just wildly wildly like stratified and into like different like very very different wealth classes even worse than we have in america right now almost like a caste system pretty much yeah mm-hmm
Exactly.
Yeah, that was way back in episode 52, if you were interested. But back to Decree 900, this sought to increase Guatemala's autonomy and create a successful example of land reform in Central America. And that's what it was on. That was the plan.
It's unused.
Exactly.
That doesn't help American interests.
Yeah, I know. Whatever, right? So... Basically, the law ordered that or the order, the expropriation of land larger than 600 acres that wasn't being used for cultivation. So the goal, it wasn't even like all of the land. Right. It was just for like if you had like 599 acres. Right. Or 600 acres. And it was uncultivated. You could still keep it. Yeah, you'd still keep it.
Exactly. So this was not, this was ambitious, but it was pretty reasonable. Like it wasn't like he wasn't just being punitive. Like it seemed like it was very well thought out. And the goal was to have these lands be divided again amongst the landless and compensate the previous, even compensate the previous owners through government bonds.
So again, it wasn't even like an outright seizure.
So Arbenz's land reforms granted, again, this property to the landless peasants. By 1953, Arbenz's government had expropriated large amounts of the United Fruit Company's unused land. And again, unused land, and they're being compensated by government bonds.
So we've been up to quite a bit. So we went to Istanbul, or you can say Constantinople, you know, either one.
Exactly.
To the people.
Yes. The reforms were, of course, met with fierce opposition from Guatemala's elite and the U.S. government, which, again, had economic interest tied to the United Fruit Company.
Have you thought about the shareholders, babe? What about them?
Yeah, what about their interests? Okay. So the Guatemalan revolution of like 1944 was strongly disliked by the U.S. federal government because they saw it as communist.
I'm laughing because it's so absurd. It's so absurd that it was not.
Literally.
So the perception especially grew after Arbenz legalized the communist Guatemalan party of labor, which he's not saying he's a communist. He was just saying he just gave free speech.
it's up to you i'm sorry i had to uh and your boy here i actually got a hair transplant yep i'm wearing a hat if you're watching the video right now but history for weirdos hat by the way and uh it's been i'm like about a little over two months post-op now so it's like i have some like hairs like coming in but it looks i'm recovering well but it looks kind of a little funky right now i'll probably show it off on instagram so if you aren't
Exactly.
Yeah, exactly.
I mean, even the US, we have some pretty disgusting political parties. So.
And I'm talking about the Republicans and Democrats.
So I'm going to name them because they're not they're not worth it. But we have them. So back to this. The U.S. government feared that Guatemala's example could inspire nationalists wanting social reform through Latin America.
And the United States government was fearful that the political movements with the Arbenz administration and the allowing of the Communist Party within Guatemala would create an easy access for the Soviet Union to infiltrate the U.S.
Yes. So, yeah, I mean, officials feared that Guatemala would reduce the influence of U.S. corporations, therefore reduce U.S. influence overall.
This is the United States Security Council.
That's communist.
If you like that, you're a commie. Oh, my goodness.
I know. It was considered that Guatemala represented a serious threat to the hemispheric solidarity and to U.S. security in the Caribbean area.
Right? Isn't that?
Exactly. And to add fuel to the fire, Arbenz was supported by a leftist coalition government, not communist, just leftist, with all key positions below the cabinet level, thoroughly controlled by a, quote, communist-dominated bureaucracy.
I know. basically the cia placed top operational priority of guatemala in an effort to reduce the pos and possibly eliminate communist power in guatemala and they were willing to do anything about that but here's the thing about this it's largely untrue that's why i was doing like air quotes especially if you're viewing like i mean obviously like if you're listening to us yeah
Very little of this is actually true. In fact, Arbenz had philosophically been inspired by a U.S. president, FDR. That's who he looked up to was a U.S. president. And one who had been in office relatively recently.
Also, what didn't help Arbenz's cause is that Samuel Zamuri, he's now actually the president or just ending his presidency, but still has quite a bit of influence within the United Fruit Company.
And he hired a guy by the name of Edward Bernays, who was the father of modern propaganda to slander the Arbenz government. Okay.
Yes. The stage was essentially being set for an overthrow at this point.
The Murray. He's interesting. He was a, I think, Russian Jewish dude who had immigrated to the United States at a very young age.
So and he was dirt poor. He became he became like a fascist pig.
Like a corporatist fascist. Like it's wild.
I know. So we had some big time conflicts of interest here within the United Fruit Company and high ranking members of the United States government. So John Foster Dulles, he was Eisenhower's secretary of state and his brother, Alan Dulles, was the director of the CIA. And they had close ties to the United Fruit Company.
So the Dulles brothers were partners in the law firm Sullivan and Cromwell. And in their capacity as lawyers, they had arranged several deals for the United Fruit Company. And director Alan Dulles was a member or board member of the United Fruit Company.
If you aren't following us, that's a good incentive to do it.
Yes. Undersecretary of State Walter Bedell Smith would later become a director of that company.
I want to hear it.
Yeah, kind of. Yeah. I'd say that's pretty accurate. Yeah.
Because we all know where we're going with this.
We all know what's happening. It's just I haven't said it yet, but it's happening.
So it gets even worse, by the way. Eisenhower's personal assistant, Anne C. Whitman, was the wife of the United Fruit Company public relations director, Edmund S. Whitman.
So obviously these personal connections meant that the Eisenhower administration tended to conflate the interests of the United Fruit Company with that of the United States national security interests. Yes. It is outright corruption.
Outright. Like this is in my mind. This is like the fire within me. Like this. That's treasonous. I would put you on trial for treason.
Exactly. That's obviously made the government much or the Eisenhower administration much more willing to overthrow the Guatemalan government.
So historians have maintained that the lobbying of the United Fruit Company and the expropriation of its lands were the chief motivation for the United States, strengthened by the financial ties of individuals within the Eisenhower administration to the United Fruit Company.
Exactly. I mean... Jesus, it's just... I can't even... It's so absurd, I guess. Like, when you really dig into this, it's just insane.
Yeah, it was a very, very streamlined experience.
Yeah. The United States is the good guy. Yeah.
We bring freedom.
Yeah, exactly. It's...
It is. I mean, if the stage wasn't set before with like the anti-communism angle, it was really set now. So let's get into Operation PB Success.
Oh my God. You need to have like lunch number two or something.
That's true.
I think you kind of are low-key a little bit like a hobbit. You always have to be eating something.
This is not sponsored. I won't say like who did it. Yeah. Because, yeah, it's not sponsored. But I will say that there is probably about like at least a half a dozen very, very high end folks that can do this. And, you know, there's some of the best in the world.
Your honor, I rest my case.
And bananas.
Well, anyways, in August 1953, I just like dismissed you. Just like.
Okay. What?
no that's they're sweeter they're sweeter that way but if i have to eat a banana like i want that in my smoothie if i have to eat a banana just plain it has to be like yellow like it was like just it was green just before and now it's like yellow okay i could see that yeah but in smoothies the brown the one with the brown that's better or uh banana bread you want them mushy oh yeah that's a good point too it makes the banana bread so sweet
Samuel's a Murray. That's how he made his, like the beginning of his fortune was made because he took the bananas that were like,
getting to be too ripe or like just on the precipice and he would like ship him out really fast to like other areas and for like cheaper prices i see i see i thought you were gonna say because his banana bread was so good that's how you imagine yeah that'd be wild this guy who's like instituting or like instigating overthrows of democratically elected governments start off making banana bread really good banana bread the kind with chocolate chips in it
Okay, guys, he didn't actually do that.
Okay, so... So back to PB success. You know what? Before we even do that, did you take your meds today?
Okay, August 1953, President Eisenhower authorized the CIA to overthrow... Jacobo Arbenz, codename Operation PB Success.
The operation was granted an initial budget of $2.7 million for psychological warfare and political action.
Yeah, I don't know. And I'm actually pretty freaking disappointed Eisenhower because I actually like him overall as a president. Really? Yeah, I think he's a pretty good president. He also was the first president to warn of the military industrial complex, which has a stranglehold over government today.
At what they do. And I mean, a lot of these packages you buy is like you can go there for like I think it's like. Four days, three nights, something like that. And you get put up in a pretty nice hotel, and then you get a driver to take you to the hospital. They shave your head. They draw a little line on your head, and they're like, this is your new hairline. And I'm like, I like what I see.
Yeah, he would know. And he was like, it's a disease. I think Parley, I think he is regretful from this, from what I've read. Like, he thinks this was a huge mistake.
But, you know, the damage has already been done.
The total budget for this operation was between $5 and $7 million. And this was, like, you know, in the early to mid-50s. A lot of money back then. I don't have today's equivalent because I think, you know, it's a lot. It's a lot. So a retrospective CIA memorandum from 1975, so a couple decades later, confirms the agency's role in the overthrow of President Arbenz.
So the CIA doesn't even, like, deny it.
Including air support, the training of anti-Arbenz guerrillas, the fabrication of Soviet weapon shipments, and clandestine propaganda operations intended to, quote, intimidate members of the Communist Party and any public officials who are sympathetic to the communist cause, end quote.
Exactly.
That's a really good point to bring up because that's something that is like I think why we study history ultimately. I just like it and I just like to like hear stories. But part of me also is like I want to look for patterns. Right. Because you do you find a lot of things that went wrong but you also find things of like the truth. Right. And you can recognize you know.
Exactly.
precisely especially our government so the plans for operation pb success called for a campaign of psychological warfare to present castillo arm armas victory as a fate accompli is that did i say that right i think it's french fate accompli how's it how's the worst first words f a i t
A done deal. Exactly. I know I'm so bad with French.
A fait accompli to the Guatemalan people and would force Arbenz to resign. So Castillo Armas is basically just this exiled puppet dictator that the CIA and the U.S. government want to prop up in Guatemala. So the propaganda campaign had begun well before the invasion, with the U.S.
Information Agency, the USIA, writing hundreds of articles on Guatemalan-based CIA reports and distributing tens of thousands of leaflets throughout Latin America.
Yeah, this was they really, really like they went at it from every level. Exactly.
I mean, this was like early in the psychological warfare. So this is like this would be really damaging. The CIA persuaded friendly governments to screen video footage of Guatemala that supported the U.S. version of events, which we will later find out were largely fabricated. As part of the psychological warfare, the U.S.
Psychological Strategy Board authorized a, quote, nerve war against individuals, end quote, to instill fear and paranoia in potential loyalists and other potential opponents of the coup. This included death threats against political leaders deemed loyal or deemed to be communist and the sending of small wooden coffins, non-functioning bombs, and hangman's nooses to such people.
It's literally, yeah, psychological terror, terrorism. The U.S. bombing was also intended to have psychological consequences with E. Howard Hunt of the CIA saying, quote, What we wanted to do was to have a terror campaign to terrify Arbenz particularly, to terrify his troops, much as the German Stuka bombers terrified the population of Holland, Belgium, and Poland, end quote.
Like, literally, they're like, let's learn from the Luftwaffe. Like, are you kidding me, dude? So, the CIA also developed the Sherwood Program, a clandestine radio broadcast campaign designed to be used during the later stages of PBS success.
And then, you know, on top of that, they gave you a bunch of Novocaine or, like, I guess just painkillers. Okay. But it's administered through, like, this, like, crazy tri-needle.
So the program's goal was to psychologically condition its target audience during the pre-attack period, convince it that the anti-communists were successful during the attack, and encourage underground partisan cells to organize against the Guatemalan government. Santa Fe Island was chosen as the broadcast site where 15 natives and 10 U.S. Weather Bureau slash CAA personnel resided.
At least 14 recordings were made for the Sherwood program.
It's literally just a disinformation campaign. Yeah. I mean, lies. Yeah.
It's really bad. Oh my gosh. The Voice of Liberation. So this was the most wide-reaching psychological weapon. It was the radio station La Voz de la Liberación.
Yeah. It began broadcasting on May 1st, 1954, carrying anti-communist propaganda, telling its listeners to resist the Arbenz government and support the liberating forces of Castillo Armas.
I also love that his last name is Artemis.
Yeah. They're communists. They're making things worse.
Open your doors to the liberating force.
And they just, like, kind of, like, inject it into your scalp. Ironically, that's probably the thing that hurts the most. Mm-hmm. It's just administering that, like, numbing agent. Because then once they actually get you going, it's just kind of boring because you can't, like, watch anything else.
It's sick. I mean, God knows. And this was in the 50s. Imagine how good our government is now.
Right.
All the time. So the station claimed to be broadcasting from deep within the jungles of the Guatemalan hinterland, a message which many people believed. In actuality, the broadcasts were concocted in Miami.
They're by Guatemalan exiles flown and then flown to Central America and broadcast through like a mobile transmitter.
Yeah. The voice of liberation transmissions continued throughout the conflict, broadcasting exaggerated news of rebel troops converging on the Capitol and contributing to the massive demoralization among both the army and the civilian population.
That was literally the point.
Yeah. Crazy. So Castillo Armas' army of only 480 men was not large enough to defeat the Guatemalan military, even with U.S.-supplied aircraft. Therefore, this psychological warfare was an absolute necessity. Mm-hmm. And the CIA was instrumental in having this being pulled off.
So Armas' force of 480 men had been split into four teams, and they left their bases in Honduras and El Salvador and assembled in various towns just outside the Guatemalan border. And at 8.20 a.m. on June 18, 1954, Castillo Armas led his invading troops over the border. That's officially the coup is beginning.
yeah so 10 trained saboteurs i love that word by the way saboteur saboteur so 10 trained saboteurs preceded the invasion with the aim of blowing up railways and cutting telegraph lines again adding to the mass hysteria i think it's just like building blocks of like the voice of liberation and then like all these things happening you know they all kind of add up and they become i think bigger than they're
The sum is greater than their parts.
Yeah, this was a very well thought out plan.
You're just laying there. And so it doesn't hurt at all. Maybe a little bit, but I mean, it's not a big deal.
All for the United Fruit Company.
So at about the same time, Castillo Armas' planes flew over a pro-government rally at the capital. The U.S. Psychological Strategy Board ordered the bombing of the Matamoros Fortress in downtown Guatemala City, and a U.S. P-47 warplane flown by a mercenary pilot bombed the city of Chicamula.
Literal. Like, that's what the Luftwaffe did during the Spanish Civil War.
What was that city called?
Guernica.
Guernica.
Yeah, I know, right? I was like, I was the one who brought it up. Yeah, it just dawned on me. I was like, yeah, that reminded me of Guernica. Castillo Armas demanded... Arbenz's immediate surrender, of course, right? The invasion provoked a brief panic in the capital, which quickly decreased as the rebels failed to make any striking moves, right? This is a very small army that's actually invading.
Bogged down by supplies and a lack of transportation, Castillo Armas' forces took several days to reach their targets, which at least gave the Guatemalan military a little bit of time to kind of like get its act together. Yeah. But it's all for naught, of course. So when the rebels did reach their targets, they met with further setbacks.
The force of 122 men targeting Zakapa were intercepted and decisively beaten by a garrison of only 30 Guatemalan soldiers with... 30 men of the 122 escaping death or capture.
Probably like four, five hours.
Yeah. So the force that attacked Puerto Barrios was dispatched by policemen and armed dock workers with many of the rebels fleeing back to Honduras.
Yeah, I mean, policemen beating back like an invading force. That's crazy.
Yeah, that's wild. So in an effort to regain momentum, the rebel planes tried air attacks on the capital. These attacks caused little material damage, but they had the significant psychological impact, leading many citizens to believe that the invasion force was far more powerful than it actually was.
oh insanely nauseous i threw up immediately when we got back to the hotel room just immediately it was like when i had like lunch at the hospital yeah they give you like a little snack which is pretty good and then you know i drive home or you know you're driven home you're like a little queasy and then i stepped right into her room i was like i didn't even like hug you or anything i was like oh babe and i just like kind of ran right past you into the restroom yeah it's
Exactly. Mm-hmm. So the P-47s flew from Puerto Rico to Panama and went into action on June 23rd, hitting Guatemalan army forces and other targets in the capital early in the mornings on or early in the morning of June 27th, 1954. A plane attacked Puerto San Jose and bombed the British cargo ship SS Springford, which was on a charter with the U.S. company W.R.
Grace and Company Line, which had been loaded with Guatemalan coffee. This incident cost the CIA one million U.S. dollars in compensation.
Yeah. Isn't that crazy?
They're just burning through it.
Yeah, exactly. So on May 24th, the U.S. launched Operation Hard Rock Baker, a naval blockade of Guatemala. Ships and submarines patrolled the Guatemalan coast and all approaching ships were stopped and searched. These included ships from Britain and France even, violating international law. And I think just kind of as an interesting aside, I think this is around the point where the U.S.
has become far more powerful than Great Britain and starts instituting policy towards Britain, which is... A huge shift. Yes.
Exactly. Yeah, because Britain and France did not protest very strongly at all, hoping that in return the U.S. would not interfere with their efforts to subdue rebellious colonies in the Middle East, which ironically the U.S. would tell Britain to basically bugger off.
Very strange. There was also plans of assassinations. The plans included drawing up lists of people within Arbenz's government to be assassinated if the coup were to be carried out, right? Manuals of assassination techniques were compiled, and lists were also made of people whom the junta, this military junta, would dispose of.
These were the CIA's first known assassination manuals, and they were reused in subsequent CIA actions.
Crazy, right?
Oh, my God. From a historical perspective? Yeah. That would be crazy.
So the CIA, they began collecting names of possible assassination targets as early as January of 1952. So this is like two and a half years before the coup.
The documents reveal discussions on creating lists of individuals deemed strategically important for removal through, quote, executive action, end quote. Yeah. Two declassified CIA docs reveal that reveals such a discussion of assassination of the Guatemalans.
The first document from March of 1954 refers to a list requested by an unknown CIA official of like in an official capacity, members of the Communist Party and others of, quote, tactical importance, whose removal for psychological, organizational or other reasons is mandatory for the success of military action, end quote.
damn no arguing with that yeah there's also another list that introduces a list of people who are kind of like take out with any means uh possible or like list like people who aren't as dangerous like exile or imprisonment okay so there's like um
We're so back, baby! Yay!
Exactly.
Exactly. So. Initially, the Guatemalan army was successful in countering the invasion by Castillo Armas' forces. However, the psychological impact of the CIA and its warfare stoked too much fear of a possible U.S. invasion.
So... They were like people were wigged out, including Arbenz. So Arbenz attempted to even arm civilians to resist the invasion, but was unsuccessful because the army, again, wary of a U.S. intervention, just started to refuse to fight.
Exactly. So facing like a deteriorating situation and the army's unwillingness to defend his government, Arbenz resigned on June 27th, 1954. He sought political asylum in the Mexican embassy.
Yeah. In his resignation speech, Arbenz stated his decision was aimed at eliminating the pretext for the invasion. Right. And preserving the gains of the 1944 October Revolution just 10 years prior, less than 10 years prior.
Essentially, yes.
Yeah. I mean, following his resignation, Carlos Enrique Diaz, the chief of the armed forces, announced his takeover as president. However, that was short lived. The U.S. ambassador to Guatemala, Purifoy, intervened, deemed Diaz not convenient for American policy. Yeah, that's what matters. Diaz was castigated for allowing Arbenz to criticize the U.S. in his resignation speech.
Exactly. Basically, like, a military junta was formed at this point with Colonels Elfego Hernan Monzon Agare and Josel Angel Sanchez. They kind of, like, took over.
But, again, that was also short-lived because eventually the power was ceded to Castillo Armas.
Exactly.
And that is exactly what happened because he was a... And, I mean, even Monzon was a staunch anti-communist.
But... That didn't matter.
Exactly. Exactly. The U.S. needed their puppet in there.
So, and I'm guessing he was probably a staunch anti-communist, but still had like a sympathy for like the people.
Yeah. And the U.S. is like, no, man.
Nah, just we're not about that life, homie.
Yeah, exactly. So that members of the administration can make money.
Yeah, duh. You're selfish if you don't allow that to happen.
So Oscar Osorio, he was the dictator of El Salvador at the time, hosted talks in San Salvador bringing together Monzon and Castillo Armas. The Purifoy's intervention, described by John Dulles as meant to, quote, crack some heads together, end quote, led to an agreement where Castillo Armas and Major Enrique Trinidad Olivia joined the junta headed by Monzon.
And subsequently, Monzon supporters resigned from the Junta, allowing Castillo Armas to be unanimously elected the president of the Junta.
And Colonels Dubois and Cruz Salazar, who were kind of instrumental in this happening and like on behest of the United States, were each paid $100,000 for their cooperation. And then the U.S. government promptly recognized this new government on July 13th. So like literally just like two weeks later, if that.
So soon after assuming office, Castillo Armas faced a coup attempt by young army cadets, funny enough, which was suppressed, resulting in many casualties, though. So elections were held in October, but they excluded all political parties except Castillo Armas National Liberation Movement.
He won with 99% of the vote.
Right? Crazy. He's so, so popular.
You have no idea. Yeah. Yeah. Or maybe you do. I think you do, actually. So he... This guy, he arrested... thousands of opposition leaders, branding them communists. He repealed the 1945 Constitution and assumed dictatorial powers. Unsurprising, right? Concentration camps were established due to overthrowing jails.
The National Committee of Defense Against Communism was created, granting sweeping powers of arrest, detention, and deportation.
Exactly. So, in the initial months of his government, Castillo Armas rounded up and executed between 3,000 to 5,000 supporters of Arbenz. I mean, even at one point, it was estimated that 1,000 UFC workers were executed.
Yeah. Labor unions, peasant organizations, and political parties, obviously besides his own, were outlawed. Castillo Armas reversed Arbenz's agrarian reforms. Funny enough, a move criticized by the U.S. Embassy as a long step backwards.
I know, right? It's like, that's so ironic.
Unsurprisingly, on the international stage, the Guatemalan coup was widely condemned. So Le Monde and I think the Times criticized the coup as, quote, economic colonialism, end quote.
Even contemporaries.
Yeah. I mean, they're absolutely right.
So Latin American public opinion was critical of the U.S. after this, with Guatemala becoming a symbol of resistance to U.S. hegemony.
That is true. I did notice that.
Former British Prime Minister Clement Attlee called it, quote, a plain act of aggression, end quote.
I mean, even the U.N. Secretary General stated the invasion violated the human rights stipulations of the U.N. Charter.
So despite the international criticism, though, the coup had broad support amongst U.S. politicians. Yeah. The Eisenhower administration justified the intervention by claiming it was countering communism and protecting U.S. interests.
Yes, and Alan... And everyone sees it. I know. Director Alan Dulles described the coup as a victory of democracy over communism.
Yeah, it's wild. Like, I mean, the levels of, like, delusion.
This is why we have a therapist on the podcast.
USA. Oh my God.
Oh, it's horrible. Well, the coup marked a definitive death blow to democracy in Guatemala, Alan Dolez. So the reversal of progressive policies led to leftist insurgencies in the countryside beginning in, like, 1960. The dependence on the officer corps and mercenaries led to widespread corruption in dealing with these insurgencies, right?
Castillo Armas was in turn assassinated in 1957, so his rule did not last long.
Very painful.
The coup triggered a 36-year civil war between the US-backed military and leftist insurgencies.
Atrocities against civilians were committed by all sides, with 93% of violations attributed to the US-backed military, though. The violence included a genocidal scorched earth campaign against the indigenous Maya population in the 1980s. The violence was particularly severe during the presidencies of Rios Montt and Lucas Garcia.
Other human rights violations included massacres, rape, aerial bombardment, and forced disappearances.
That's right. Right. I forgot about that. You have to like sleep upright and that's difficult. It's very difficult. And you have to do it for like 12 days. You have this like neck pillow. You're really uncomfortable. Like you want to scratch your head. It is so itchy.
Exactly. The ideological narrative that the 1954 coup represented a battle against communism was used to justify the violence in the 1980s. The Civil War finally ended in 1996. That's so recent. With a peace accord, including an amnesty for fighters on all sides.
We were alive during that time. A thing that started, like, in 1960.
Ruined. Get this. The Civil War resulted in an estimated 200,000 civilian deaths. My mouth went dry. All because the United Fruit Company was, were just greedy, greedy bastards.
Yeah, literally because of corporate greed.
Something to think about in today's climate.
So the coup deepened Guatemala's structural inequalities, obviously.
The reversal of Arbenz's agrarian reforms led the U.S. embassy to comment, again, that it was a long step backwards. Poverty and malnutrition became widespread, worsened by the climate change, funny enough, which ravaged the agricultural sector.
um and the ufc did not ultimately profit from the coup funny enough uh its profits actually continued to decline leading to a merger with another company so it didn't even work for them it didn't even work they destroyed how many 200 i mean countless yeah i mean countless but at least like around 200 000 people died just for them to lose money more if they just would have just said okay cool like
Exactly.
Yeah. So Operation PB History was launched by the CIA to analyze documents from the Arbenz government to justify the 1954 coup after the fact. The CIA aimed to find evidence that the Guatemalan communists had been under the influence of the Soviet Union, but failed to find any convincing evidence of Soviet influence itself or connections to Moscow.
You can't. And yeah. And then once you get past that first like kind of two weeks.
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's the truth.
They didn't even have to use propaganda. They were just like, the truth is bad enough.
I'm not saying the Soviets are good guys by any means, but they didn't have to do anything.
They're like, you guys just shot yourself in the foot.
So. The relatively easy overthrow of Arbenz along with the 1953 Iranian coup led to CIA overconfidence. This was a direct contributing factor of the failed Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961. Right. Because they were just like using the same playbook.
That's it gets a lot easier.
Exactly. So the coup resulted in long-lasting anti-U.S. sentiment in Latin America for decades and generations, which I think still lasts to this day.
I don't even blame them.
Because then you can like kind of lie down like normally you can.
So the American role in the regime change contributed to many Guatemalans' support of communism, ironically enough.
It's called blowback, which the CIA will find out about. They even coined that term. So newspapers in the UK criticized America's intrusive covert operations as, quote, modern forms, again, of economic colonialism. Yeah.
The operation of PB Success confirmed the belief of many in the Eisenhower administration that covert operations offered a safe and expensive substitute for armed forces in resisting communist inroads in the third world.
i don't know do a lot more stuff yeah and then uh like you said you're two months and feeling great yeah i'm feeling pretty good about uh the progress we're making and i think it's uh it's gonna look it's gonna look really good in about like 10 months or so yeah you all just wait yeah you wait for 10 months and then you'll see a lot more hats coming through here
what yeah oh my god yes exactly so going forward again to our childhood u.s president bill clinton apologized to guatemala in 1999 oh my goodness so this is about what 45 years later uh for the atrocities committed by the u.s backed dictatorships wow The apology followed the release of a Truth Commission report documenting U.S. support for military forces that committed genocide.
Yes. How long were we gone? Like, it was months now.
In 2011, the Guatemalan government signed an agreement with Arbenz's family to restore his legacy and publicly apologize for the government's role in ousting him. I'm in college at this point.
Guatemalan President Alvaro Colom made a formal apology again in the same year, acknowledging the ousting of Arbenz as a crime against the Guatemalan society and an act of aggression against a government starting its democratic spring.
And there you have it, guys. That was that was the bananas leading to a CIA backed coup d'etat, decades of civil war and hundreds of thousands dead. All in the name of corporate greed.
Which didn't even work.
And before I forget, do you know what the United Fruit Company is known as today? They still exist. They were bought out and they they're a part of like a bigger conglomerate.
Chiquita Banana.
Chiquita Banana. So Chiquita Banana can legitimately say that they overthrew a democratically elected government.
I mean, I didn't either when I started researching this. I knew a little bit about it from the book I read. I didn't understand the deep impact, or I couldn't have possibly understood.
Yeah. I mean, directly, indirectly, it's...
Yeah, exactly. And again, it's not even like it benefits the U.S. citizenry back home, which, again, is not a good thing. But like it just benefits corporations. So it's like.
Exactly.
Thank you. I know I'm trying to end like on a positive note, but maybe the positive note is that like.
We know about these things now. Yeah. Be very critical of your government. And no matter if you're like U.S., Chinese, like Australian, U.K., whatever, it doesn't matter. Right. Be very critical of your government. They do not often have your best interests in mind.
And corporations too.
In the meantime, yeah.
Should we go to Guatemala?
Oh, yeah, you did say that.
Okay, we're going.
I was literally telling everyone at the beginning of this episode that I'm like unemployed now. Yeah, we're going. Oh, yeah. We're going. We're doing it.
right good question weirdos good question indeed well babe this was such a deep and important and well done first episode back thank you and guys this is i feel like hopefully this is the type of episode that you will be getting from now on not necessarily this time frame but just like the in-depth look yeah we have more time now to like really like dive in and tell the stories the way that they should be told
Buy our merch.
Yes. But we did stay there for like full eight days because we wanted to travel around the city and we did see quite a bit.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, if you send us pictures of you wearing our merch, with your permission, of course, we'll post it on our Instagram.
Thanks, weirdos. Until next time.
Adios.
Probably the Hagia Sophia.
Also the Basilica Cistern.
So beautiful.
Yeah, it was a really, really cool city.
Oh, my God. We stumbled into that Michelin star restaurant. Yeah. It was very affordable.
I said it in the... Whatever that was called, the commercial that we had coming back.
It was unbelievable. I think that was like my first, the day after my... my surgery so like it's cold right it's december in istanbul and i i don't have like a head you can't wear hats at this time so my head's just out in the cold it's bare but it feels great because it was like just i look like megamind guys it was like swollen up it did look like megamind
Yeah, exactly. And it doesn't help that I already have a big head. So it really, really just went like all out on the big headness.
The cats.
I knew exactly what you were going to say.
And you can like pet them. Like people are like, they're part of like the city. Like shop owners will just like leave like little like trays of food out. It's just like they have this understanding. And you know what you won't find? Rats.
Our little preview coming attractions.
I mean, it's the biggest city in Europe by far.
Yeah, very cosmopolitan.
Was he Armenian? No, no. He was northern Iraq. Yes. He was a Kurdish.
We're your hosts, Andrew and Stephanie. And we're going to take you on a journey into the strange, obscure, and relentlessly entertaining corners of human history.
Exactly. Definitely.
Okay. So in not so fun news, I got laid off from my day job, which kind of sucked. It definitely sucked. I'm not going to lie.
It's been really tough. But, you know, one of the great things about, I think, podcasting, funny enough, is like it's taught me a little bit about perseverance.
And... And so I've been doing a lot of consulting work on the side to kind of make up for that lack of or loss of income. And it's been going better than I thought it would, which is nice. And also, I'm just going to put myself out there. If any of you guys need any sort of help with strategy operations or, more recently, in Google Ads –
Yeah, you guys were the bomb diggity.
Email us. There you go.
No, just email History for Weirdos. I actually checked that more than my personal one.
Yeah, completely out of the blue. Completely out of the blue. I was not expecting this.
Exactly.
It absolutely is. I mean it does give me a little bit more time for History for Weirdos, which I – just looking on the bright side of things.
But I mean I have to say like guys – Stephanie, I have like the best wife ever.
And she's been so helpful, I think, in this kind of transition. So I... Thank you. I think I'm just extremely grateful.
Exactly. Thank you. That's what I wanted to say. You guys, your amount of support was just kind of, like, overwhelming and in a great way because it definitely – I think it kind of pushed us to, like, come back. I think we were probably going to come back no matter what, but probably later in the year. And I think just –
I know you do. Guys, she's like a part-time professor. She obviously does this. She owns her own private practice and sees a boatload of clients. Yeah. I'm like, Steph, like...
It's a lot.
Oh, my God.
They're going to hear this and they're going to be like.
I would have loved you.
No, you hate that.
Yeah, so guys, just do the thing.
Make it easier on Stephanie.
Which I'm sure you guys are very stoked on.
Oh, yeah, and Pericles is now 61 pounds.
He's a big boy in a small apartment.
No, he's a beautiful soul, and I love him to death, but he's not a good boy. He's not a good boy, probably because... He's a sweet boy, not a good boy.
He gives you that look, and I'm like, come on. Obviously, I'm going to give you what you want now.
It's a great story. There's going to be a spike of weirdos going to see it, I think, in the next few, six months or so.
I think the same thing about her. Yeah.
Yeah.
Robocop 2. The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai and Naked Lunch. His more recent appearances include Star Trek Into Darkness, the TV series Dexter, which I love, and 24. In addition to his long career in theater, film, and television, Dr. Weller received his PhD in art history with a specialization in Italian Renaissance art from UCLA. Leon Battista Alberti in Exile is Peter Weller's first book.
That's perfect.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I've read the letters between Caesar and Cicero. It's unbelievable.
Yeah, she's a psychotherapist.
And before that, she worked at the VA and was working with veterans.
That's tough, man.
Yeah, I mean, we'd love that.
Oh, I mean, I'm a history nerd. I mean, if I were to get a PhD, it would probably be late 2nd century or like 1st century B.C. Roman Republic.
How old are you? 33. I could go back. I will go back. Who am I kidding?
I need to know Greek and Latin. And I know a little bit of Latin. I know very little Greek. I can read the letters, and I can then translate it to Latin, and then translate it to English.
15 minutes a day.
You can do it. If you're telling me to do this, then I feel like I have to. These are bicameral languages, man.
He was an active guy.
And was he that just incompetent at administration? I think he was. Mark Antony, yeah. Mark Antony, yeah.
Yes, the purple horse.
I love that.
Totally, man.
We had an episode on the Grockeye Brothers.
Oh, man. The Grockeye Brothers, I love them.
Yes, exactly.
Yeah. And he's like 16 at the time, right?
Oh, I didn't know that. And his speeches are called the Philippics. And didn't he know that Demosthenes loses? Totally. You're using the same playbook for a losing cause.
Oh, my God.
That's so interesting. I love that we're talking about America, classical Rome, right?
Yeah. No, it absolutely is a parallel. I feel like it's almost undeniable.
It's a huge passion of mine. You've got to get your degree, Andrew. I do. I know. I really do. But I also want to bring up RoboCop because I feel like there are some themes in RoboCop that echo even ancient Rome and echo probably America back in the late 80s, but America more so even now. You have the militarization of the police state.
Absolutely. I feel like most men probably don't ever learn that.
It's like you're describing our relationship.
We're your hosts, Andrew and Stephanie. And we're going to take you on a journey into the strange, obscure, and relentlessly entertaining corners of human history.
Oh, I know.
That is considered a weirdo thing. Yeah, that is. I never really thought about it like that.
No. I mean, I think it just gets centuries of certain, I think... passages, stories being pushed down has almost brainwashed us.
I think that's what it is.
Yeah. I mean, for lack of a better term, absolutely.
Aw.
I know. Right now, you're making my mother-in-law so happy.
Well, my parents, they live in Orange County, so that's where I'm from originally. Me too. Really? Yeah, Newport Beach. I went to Coronado Mar. How about you?
Okay.
Oh, my gosh. Wow.
I mean, I've lived my whole life. Both of us have lived our whole lives here. I mean, I lived four months in Spain when I was studying abroad in college. At Pamplona. Wow. Yeah, I loved it. Yeah, in the mountains. Yeah, kind of like, it was a really interesting area because it's Spain. Did you see the running? No, I missed it by like three weeks. Yeah.
Now that I'm older, I'm glad I didn't do it.
horse with his spurs. Like the great tragedy of our lives, right?
Yeah, seriously.
Okay, that's good to know.
Yeah, she did get to him. Yeah. Thank you, Dr. Peter Weller. Yes. Thank you.
Wow, what an incredible episode. I personally love speaking with Dr. Peter Weller, and I know Stephanie did too, and I hope you guys did as well. Please let us know if there is another guest that you really want on the show. Let us know in the comments on Spotify or wherever you are watching and or listening to this podcast. Stay weird.
We really hope you enjoy this episode.
We do have merch.
Which you would think, of course, that's a great reason, but that was seen as kind of expected. So Elizabeth's testimony really helped her mom get that divorce. So she got free from the man.
Mm hmm. So despite all of this hardship and economic strain, she decides, Elizabeth, that she wants to better her life and she wants to go to school. So she attends the Indiana Normal School, dreaming of becoming a teacher.
And your grandma.
It's really fun. You can get several designs on like a dozen different products on Redbubble, but it's a little tricky to navigate. So do you mind explaining it?
Listen to that episode where we're like, what's a normal school? It's a teaching school.
Yeah. So she goes to a normal school in Indiana. But after just one semester, she runs out of funds and she has to drop out. Which is so sad. But don't worry. This is just like even all of this hardship, losing her dad, having to help her mom get divorced, dropping out of school because she doesn't have money. It's only going to get better for her from here.
So let's get into her journalism career.
So Nellie Bly's journalism career began very fittingly with an act of defiance. So in 1885, she's 21 years old and young Elizabeth Jane Cochran read a column in the Pittsburgh Dispatch titled What Girls Are Good For. What do you think? What do you think it's going to say?
It would be. The anonymous writer here calls himself, quote unquote, the quiet observer. That's how he, like, authors the article.
And he argues that a woman's place was in the home and only there. He even called working women of the time, like women who were being teachers and nurses, quote, a monstrosity.
So many bigger issues.
Especially in the United States at this time. That's crazy. So Elizabeth reads this and she's pissed.
I could see that. And she channels that fiery rage into a very well-written rebuttal. And she writes essentially a response to this man and she signs it Lonely Orphan Girl. That's like her pen name at the time.
The letter that she writes to the paper gets the attention of the editor, George Madden. And he's so impressed by the letter that he tracks her down because she didn't sign her name. He finds out who she actually is and he invites her to the newsroom for an interview.
Wow.
Yes, exactly. So the interview changes the course of her life because he offers her a job as a columnist on a trial basis. Right. Because they don't have any women on staff. Right. So he doesn't know how this is going to work. You know, she's going to get hysterical. She's going to faint randomly. We don't know.
But she does adopt a pen name, Nellie Bly.
That's where she gets it. She borrows the name from a popular song of the era written by Stephen Foster. I'm not familiar with the song.
Excellent. We're both ignorant here. And it was common for female writers to use pen names or pseudonyms because it was deemed improper for them to be writers. So you wouldn't want to use your own name and have people target you or single you out. It's a bummer, right?
This is what you're worrying about? There's so much poverty. And that's a great point because that's actually what Nellie cares about. And that's what she's going to write about.
She knows what's up. Yeah. So her first published pieces focused on the harsh realities of working women in Pittsburgh, in the factory conditions, wage disparities, and just how poor people in the city were treated with such lack of human dignity. That's like her big mission is to convey that.
Notebooks.
Her reporting really stood out in a male-dominated field because the male journalists weren't writing about these things. So she had a very unique perspective.
Tote bags. Yes.
Not very class-conscious at all, but we're not surprised. It also, however, while it was popular, it stirred discomfort amongst her editors because controversial women aren't great for selling ads in your paper. Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
So they're afraid that the advertisers are going to get spooked, and they reassign her to what they call the women's pages of the paper, which were where you could write about fashion. You could write about flowers. Yeah. Or you could write about social events. That's it. I don't know how much you could write about flowers for the newspaper, but apparently it's its own category.
So they sign her to the women's pages. She gives it a shot, and she's not down. She doesn't like it. It's not interesting to her. But she's not undeterred. She decides to take matters into her own hands. In 1886, she convinced a different paper, the Dispatch, to send her to Mexico as a foreign correspondent.
A rare assignment for journalists at the time, let alone a young woman.
I am too.
No, she doesn't speak Spanish. Yeah. Has no ties to Mexico that we know of, but she goes.
Yeah. And you'll see why. So she goes and yes, of course, she writes about the culture, the food, the entertainment, things like that there. But she also, being Nellie Bly, sneaks in pieces about the poverty and the politics for nearly six months. She immerses herself in everyday life, writing with empathy and curiosity, but she was a harsh critic of President Porfirio Diaz.
He led an authoritarian regime.
I think I mentioned him in a previous episode.
Yes, exactly. So this is pre-Mexican social revolution. She's there and she's seeing the same injustices that the people are experiencing and she's writing about it. So she gets threats for writing about this and sending that information back to the United States and she has to leave because she's been threatened to be imprisoned.
Pretty badass, though. Yeah, that is badass, yeah. So she flees the country to avoid arrest. But she later publishes her findings in a book that she calls Six Months in Mexico. And it does well. People really like her writing. And it's very clear at this point that she is not the type of journalist that wants to follow the rules.
Mm-hmm. So we're going to get into her groundbreaking investigative work next. So now it's 1887. Nellie Bly's back in the U.S. And again, they're like, you need to write about women's interests, flowers and dresses, which those are a lot of people's interests, but they're not their only interests. And she's like, no, I don't want to do that.
So she decides to move to New York City, where she thinks there'll be more opportunities for her as a writer.
New York City. She... Spends four months unemployed, knocking on doors, asking for work.
I think it's crazy. Well, I guess it's because she's a young woman that they're not interested. But finally, she lands a meeting at the New York World, which is owned by Joseph Pulitzer.
Yeah. Well, they are known for their daring reporting.
Exactly. So they're like, okay, we're interested, but we have a test for you. And she's like, bet. What is it? They want her to feign insanity and commit herself to Blackwell Island's insane asylum for women.
She doesn't hesitate. Immediately, she's like, perfect. I want to do that. Let's do it. Yeah. They're surprised. So she checks into a boarding house. Her editors are there. They're helping her prepare and rehearse her act. And then she has to go to this very notorious insane asylum. And she pretends that she is paranoid. and is mentally ill. And doctors really quickly are like, yep, she's insane.
And they just commit her without asking a lot of questions. She's under a fake name. They don't really check with like, who's your family? Where are you from? Right. Nothing. They're just like, okay, you're committed. And no one suspected she was faking.
What followed were 10 harrowing days inside the asylum where she experienced firsthand the brutality inflicted on women who had been cast off by society. Oh, my God. I'm going to read you a quote that she wrote while she was there. Quote, the insane asylum on Blackwell's Island is a human rat trap. It is easy to get in, but once there, it's impossible to get out.
That's not a good thing to realize once you're already inside.
Atrocious. Yeah, for such awful reasons. I know. We think that if someone is mentally not well, that they are less worthy of care and attention.
You need more.
You need more care and attention.
Yes. I know it's just seems so wild that like that isn't common knowledge and it actually it's frustrating recently yeah until very recently I mean remember our old neighbor gosh Ron Ron how'd you know I was talking about Ron I knew immediately yeah well Ron Ron went to the VA when I worked at the VA
remember i ran into him there once yes i do remember yeah he was telling me about how when he was younger there were still the state hospitals everywhere but they were shut down shut down by reagan yeah in california at least and that they weren't the best like that he he was talking about how like more people need mental health care especially for severe mental illness but he's like but then also how come when they get it they're treated so badly
Wild. I know. Crazy. Crazy. Well, I think this conversation really ties into why her work is so significant because she really brings this conversation to light.
So the metaphor that I just shared where she calls it a human rat trap becomes very famous. It illustrates how little power women had once they were deemed hysterical or inconvenient, right? So she's admitted as a patient. She sees that the patients are beaten. They are forced to bathe in freezing water. They are fed rotting food.
Now listen up, friends, because it's about to get weird.
They're left out in the cold, shivering, like no blankets, nothing. Some, in fact, weren't mentally ill at all. Some were just really, really poor.
Some were foreigners. They were immigrants who were just non-English speaking and got dumped there.
And some were just seen as inconvenient to their families, like a daughter you couldn't marry off. You would drop off there.
I think this would be definitely private, but I don't know if it had public funding as well.
I actually don't know all the funding sources, but it's not called like a state hospital. It is called Blackwell's.
So I assume there's at least partial private funding. Yeah. And no amount of begging, pleading, reasoning, showing that they are of sound mind would get them released. Once you're in, you're in. And then he's like, oh, snap.
I'm in here. What do I do? So on this cruelty, she did write, quote, I would like the expert physicians who are so ready to declare a sane woman insane to take a perfectly sound minded and healthy woman, shut her up. and make her sit from 6 a.m. until 8 p.m. on straight back benches. Do not allow her to talk or move during these hours.
Yeah, of course.
Give her no reading and let her know nothing of the world or its doings. Give her bad food, harsh treatment, and see how long it will take to make her insane.
Exactly. It highlights how the system is actively creating the mental illnesses via trauma that it's supposed to be curing. Sound familiar to any healthcare systems we've maybe interacted with?
Unfortunately, some things don't change. So it is tricky, but... But basically to get her out, her editors have to like bust in and be like, oh, like she's not. We planted her like they have to kind of like break her cover. Right. Because they can't she can't get out. They thought like after a week she'd be able to just like check herself out and she couldn't.
What's the book?
I don't think they were communicating at all at this point, but I think after a week they went to get her.
So once she's out, when she gets discharged, she does publish her account and it's called 10 Days in a Madhouse. The series was a sensation.
The public was horrified. The medical establishment was embarrassed. And city officials were forced to respond and close down Blackwell's.
Her undercover reporting led to a grand jury investigation. It increased funding for mental health care in the state of New York. It also proved that journalism could be a tool for systemic change. And then, of course, as a woman, that women could be part of that work, which is really cool.
But she doesn't stop there. Over the next few years, she goes undercover again and again. She works in sweatshops to talk about labor abuses. She pretends to be an unwed mother seeking help. She goes undercover as a maid in some of the most...
elegant illustrious homes of like millionaires to write about how they're treated she talks about unemployment conditions she gets her she gets herself sent to jail so she could write about how women are treated in jail she talks about employment agencies corruption basically her mission is to shine light on the cracks where the most vulnerable americans were slipping through
Which is really cool. That's really dope. Yeah, so even though she was known for this, I think no one was ever expecting her to be undercover. Yeah. Because female reporters were just so rare. You wouldn't expect to encounter someone doing this.
Yeah.
Yeah, she really used it as like a weapon for good. Nice. It was her tool. And I wrote, she wasn't just reporting news. She was making history as a true weirdo.
Who got you to listen to that podcast?
Yeah, that would be.
Yeah.
Wow. Very similar spirit. You're right. Yeah. I wonder if he knew of Nellie Bly.
Yeah. We should ask him. OK, so she has another, like I said, quite a resume, but she has another really, really big moment in journalism that she's known for. And it's when she goes around the world in less than 80 days.
Yeah. Yeah. I'm going to talk about it.
So in the late 19th century, I have to give some context. Women couldn't travel alone pretty much. It just wasn't a thing. It was pretty unthinkable because most women, most people didn't have money to travel. It was super expensive.
For the second time. I don't believe that. I still think it was the first time.
So if you were upper middle class, upper class, you could travel as a woman, but you needed to have a male relative, a husband, a brother, a dad, whatever, or a companion, kind of like a chaperone.
To protect your virtue, of course, because that's what's really needed here in the world. So female adventurers were rare. I don't know. I'm sure there were others at the time, but I don't really know of any off the top of my head. And if they did exist, they were never American. They were European and they would be really, really, really wealthy, like royal wealthy.
And they could maybe travel alone and it would still be seen as scandalous. Okay.
Yeah, exactly. There was a lot of social risks. You could ruin your reputation, virtue. There was physical risk because you could get hurt. The world is dangerous and, you know, women were unprotected. And let me see here. Yeah, even if you did travel with a chaperone, it could still be seen as scandalous, kind of like depending on the circumstances of your travel. Right. But...
Oh, okay. Yeah. That was the difference.
This was during the pandemic, right? Yeah.
Do you think Nellie Bly cares about Scandal?
Yeah. She doesn't do what's expected of her. So she gets an idea.
She's reading a book that came out in 1873 by French science fiction author Jules Verne, just as you mentioned, called Around the World in 80 Days. Yes. This is a wildly popular adventure story about a wealthy English man named Phileas Fogg. Isn't that so cute?
Phileas Fogg. One of the weirdos commented on our Instagram recently. I'm going to keep a list of all the cat names Stephanie wants. I think Phileas Fogg should go on that list.
Add it. That would be a good cat name. So Phileas Fogg accepts a wager to circumnavigate the globe in 80 days.
Oh, I haven't.
Is it good?
I want to watch it. The book is a huge sensation that really captures the present day imagination because there's steamships, there's trains, there's telegraphs, like all the cutting edge things that made the world start to shrink for people. It started to get smaller. And it was an international bestseller translated into dozens of languages. It inspires plays, games.
It's even like a dinner party game apparently at the time. But it is fiction, like I said. And then Nellie was like, what if I make it real? Which I love. So at this point, 1889, she is a well-known reporter for the New York World newspaper. But she wants a new challenge. She wants to do something daring. She wants to silence all the critics of women in journalism.
Andrew was really, really, really into ancient Rome at the time.
As you can imagine, she gets a lot of hate letters.
And she has this idea that she's going to retrace the fictional route in this book and that it'll be super fun.
Her editors are like, hell no, girl.
What are you talking about? We can't do that. They're like, okay, we love the idea, but we're going to have to put a man on the assignment. And her response was basically, cool, send a man. Let me know what day he's going out. I'm going to leave on the same day, and I'm going to beat him. And they're like, okay, we'll send you. They're not excited about it, but they agree.
And I had reached my max on ancient Rome talks. I was like, you know what you should do? You should listen to this podcast.
So on November 14th, 1889, Nellie Bly set sail from Hoboken, New Jersey.
I didn't think Hoboken, New Jersey was real.
Yeah, I was in New York and my aunt, Karen. Hi, Karen, wanted to meet me in Hoboken. And I thought she was being silly. And then I was like, wait, where are we actually meeting? Hoboken's real. Apparently it's been real for a long time.
So she leaves from Hoboken. She only has a small travel bag. And the clothes on her back. No trunk, which everyone traveled with like those old timey trunks at the time.
No companion. She refuses to have anyone come with her. She's like, I just need my notebook. I need a few change of clothes. And I'm going to make like a secret pocket in my dress to put like extra cash because I get mugged.
No, I don't think she's strapped on the strip.
Yeah, she should. Maybe she was and she didn't want to tell people.
Yeah. So her itinerary would take her from New Jersey to England to France to Italy, Egypt, Ceylon, which is now Sri Lanka, Singapore, Hong Kong, Japan, and finally back across the Pacific to California, I imagine.
Yeah. I fed the beast. Yeah. But it's it must be a very good book if you're reading it again, because I love to reread. I read books two, three, four times.
To New Jersey.
Okay.
Her journey captivates the public. She sends out dispatches as she gets to a new place. She kind of sends updates back to her editors and they publish it. And it was a sensation. People even had maps and they would track where she was. There were bets all over as to when she'd get where.
It became kind of like...
the thing that people gathered around it was like oh where do you think nelly bly is when do you think nelly bly is going to get to egypt she like inserted herself into like pop culture absolutely really great way of saying it she was like how we all watch like the last of us or the house of the dragons on sunday yeah like people were talking about nelly bly and her trip around the world in less than 80 days so jealous i know should we do that yeah we should
That'd be interesting.
Like if we tried to recreate her journey.
And like the technology available to her.
Interesting. Would we use maps instead of like Google Maps?
Could we wear like the old timey clothes?
I'm down.
Let's do it. Weirdos.
I read one book like every couple of years. But for you, that's really rare.
Donate. Please.
Don't listen to anything we say about corporations. We love them.
We love them. Okay. So while on her trip, she's in France. She stops to visit Jules Verne.
Because he heard about it and he was like, I want to meet her. Isn't that so cool?
So Jules Verne wanted to meet her. He was so excited. Apparently, the second he sees her, like they're oppressed there. Like everyone was like waiting. And he said, quote, if you do it in 79 days, I'll applaud with both hands. Right. So he was like, but you could do it in one day less.
In the end, she didn't need the extra seven. She returns on January 25th, 1890, having completed the journey in 72 days, six hours and 11 minutes.
She beat the fictional record and she beat all the critics who said she wouldn't even finish the trip.
Yes. Crowds greeted her in New Jersey at the train station like she was royalty. Wow. It was really, really cool. She had proven not only that the journey was possible, but that a woman could do it and that a woman could do it alone.
I know.
She couldn't use Google Translate. She couldn't drop her location to her editors to be like, just keep track of me where I am.
She didn't do an IG live when she got to Jules Verne's house. That would be amazing.
We need to meet him. I don't think he's there anymore. I think he's busy.
So she takes all of the dispatches and all of her journal entries from the trip and she puts it into a book called Around the World in 72 Days, which you can still get. I got it on my Kindle.
I got Around the World in 72 Days and 10 Days in the Madhouse. She's a good writer. Like it's accessible even to today's audiences. Oh, wow. So she becomes, of course, a commercial success. This really cemented her as an icon in journalism. She even became kind of like an international celebrity at this point.
This really was a declaration that the modern woman was no longer confined to the home and she could claim the entire world, which I love.
And then after this, there's a big shift in her life.
Pretty surprising shift. We're going to get into it. So in 1895, she's at the height of her fame. She's very well known. She's still writing.
Yeah. She's younger than we are.
My Nellie Bly moment. She makes a surprising move. She gets married.
He is a multimillionaire industrialist.
His name is Robert Seaman, and he's a businessman who's 40 years older than her.
I wrote, our girl isn't just brave and badass. She was smart.
I know. Not as smart.
Yeah. She was like known for not wanting to get married. And then all of a sudden she meets this guy and she's like, oh yeah, I'm down. Always wanted to be married. That's my dream. Oh my God.
I love her for it.
You got to do what you got to do. So he owned an ironclad manufacturing company which produced steel containers.
Milk cans.
Other industrial goods. And after years of breaking barriers as a journalist, she shifted into her new role as wife. Okay.
And then her husband, because he's so much older than her, he dies in 1904. And she, unlike her mom, gets to inherit everything.
Yeah. She becomes president of the company. And she approaches the business with innovation and empathy. She implements a lot of progressive employee benefits programs, which at the time... That's not what businesses were about.
People were very, very exploitive of workers. But I think because of all the work she had done in factories and employment offices, she had a lot of empathy. So she gives her employees health care.
She gives them access to a gym, which I think is so cool.
You think they wore the little stripey suits? Do you know what I'm talking about?
Little stripey onesies.
No, no, no, no. But they had stripy suits and mustaches, so it could be better. And this was just remarkable for the time no one was doing this. She also pushed for more modern manufacturing processes, and she made the move to hold several patents. One was for stackable steel barrels. Yeah.
Can you tell the weirdos what about the book is kind of like spooky?
I think her age and her experiences as a journalist really positioned her well to be an innovator in the industry. However, there is a downturn here. So she goes on a trip abroad, kind of like an extended trip. She's a wealthy lady. She could do what she wants. Yeah. And her trusted employee, the guy who was running the business in her stead, embezzled large sums of money.
And he pushed the company into financial ruin.
She was alerted to the situation too late. She did try to save it. But the company called Ironclad eventually went bankrupt and she lost most of her fortune.
So you don't have to go off too much. I'm not going to go off too much.
She trusted the wrong person. So sad. But you know why we love Nellie Bly?
Literally. She's like, well, I'm going to go back to journalism. She just goes back to journalism. She doesn't skip a beat.
Very stoic of her. It also seems like even though she was extremely wealthy during this time, I get the sense she didn't get too attached to it. Because she does transition well back into, like, being a normal person. So she's returning to journalism and now it's the 1910s. Okay. Yeah. During World War I, she became one of the first female correspondents to report from Europe.
She reported from Austria and Serbia. Wow.
Yes. So she writes vivid firsthand accounts of the war's toll on civilians.
And like the foot soldiers, like she's still a woman of the people, you know, and that's who she writes about in this. She also focuses on the women's suffrage movement. She covers a lot of the parades, the protests, the struggle for voting rights in general. And the women's suffrage becomes a huge part of the last bit of her career. And I do want to address that in her work, she does...
focus on like the white women's suffrage movement because there were suffragettes of different backgrounds um black women native women were also part of the movement but they were often not highlighted right intentionally and none of uh nelly's writing has that sort of intersectional framework she's really only focused on this one group so it is a drawback of her work um
Yeah. I want us to remember that the 19th Amendment that came about in 1920 was a victory for many but not for all because full voting rights for black, native, Latina, Asian American women is delayed for decades.
Yeah, that could be its own podcast. Probably.
Yes, exactly. So her like reporting is. limited and it was just surprising to me because of how much she demonstrates such profound empathy for people who have life experiences that she doesn't it did seem like a weird blind spot to me but a blind spot it is nonetheless so after a lifetime of pushing boundaries from the asylum to the battlefields of world war one that's quite a giant like expanse
She passes away January 27th, 1922 in New York City. She is young. She's only 57 years old and she died of pneumonia, which was common at the time. And it was common for it to be fatal because they didn't have antibiotics.
Yeah. Like the parallels between the two.
So her death was noted in newspapers nationwide, including the New York Times. And in the Times, they describe her as, quote, a remarkable woman whose courage and curiosity had taken her farther than most men of her era.
Which I think she would have loved. She would have been like, yeah, that's right.
She's laid to rest at Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx. It's actually a cemetery that houses a lot of prominent historical figures. Her grave, though, for decades is left unmarked.
You and Mike Duncan.
But I guess the people like just random people were like, wait, we want to know where she's buried. And the records are identified. And now her grave is marked. And it's a like a tribute site for journalists, feminists, just admirers will go and like lay flowers at her grave now.
Yeah.
Let's manifest it.
Yeah. And my dad would also say, go to a Yankees game.
Oh, I don't think that's what he would say.
So today, Nellie Bly is widely seen as the founder of investigative journalism.
Going back to your comment from the very beginning.
She's a reporter who didn't just write about injustice. She wanted to enter the story and experience it as much as she could for herself. Her work at the New York World, especially 10 Days in a Madhouse, pioneered first-person undercover reporting. Though Nellie Bly never formally joined feminist groups, her life really was seen as sort of like a feminist act, right? She really championed that
No, I wanted to give the weirdos an update.
women could do whatever they wanted to do.
She didn't have an ideology or a political party or political background. She was just like, people should be able to do what they want.
We won, you guys. We got Andrew to watch Pride and Prejudice.
She also really obviously fought for mental health reform, labor rights, legal justice, and again, later used her platform that she had developed in her 50s for the women's suffrage movement. And even as an industrialist, she was ahead of her time. She was very progressive. you know, healthcare, who would have thought that that would mean a lot to people?
Nellie Bly's fearless approach to storytelling paved the way for generations of investigative journalists, especially women determined to make their mark in a field that once excluded them. And then today we see Bly has become a recurring figure in pop culture.
She's been portrayed in plays, films, TV shows, including an episode of Drunk History and an appearance as a time-traveling character in the show Timeless.
Which I'm not familiar with, but I'd love to see that.
Yeah, I would want to watch it, too. I have heard references to it before. And then in 2019, there's a drama series about her called The Nellie Bly Story, which is starring Christina Ricci.
If you don't follow us on Instagram, you should at History for Weirdos. And it was on there that I shared. I got Andrew to watch Emma, the version with Anya Taylor-Joy. And then I was begging him to watch Pride and Prejudice next. And he's like, I can't do more Jane Austen adaptations. So I went to the weirdos on Instagram and you all convinced him. I did. In our stories to watch it.
I'm like just now vaguely remembering like posters for it because I can see Christina Ricci in like the garb. But I never watched the show.
I would like to check it out.
I know. I guess the Nellie Bly story focuses on her asylum expose.
So that would be really cool to watch. And then in 2021, she's honored with a public monument in Roosevelt Island in New York called the Girl Puzzle. And she was even a Google doodle.
Right? That's how you know you made it. From classrooms to comic books, she's still quite a symbol of being an unapologetic weirdo in history.
And that's the story of Nellie Bly.
That's right.
Yes, you're right.
The world? Our country would look really different if that was the precedent.
How interesting.
Yeah, you're right. She was a pleasure to research. Like I said earlier, we can put the sources in the show notes because there's lots of articles and biographies about her. But I also recommend checking out her work because I did cite 10 Days in the Madhouse and Around the World in 72 Days.
So I recommend checking it out, weirdos.
Yeah, let us know what your thoughts are, questions, comments on Spotify. You can leave comments on the episode. And if you're listening on Apple Podcasts or elsewhere, leave them on Instagram.
On YouTube, yeah. Which is something so cool.
Yeah, just put us on in the background. A lot of the times you'll see, you know, our apartment's really messy. Today you actually get a nice view, so you're welcome.
Yeah. So until next time, weirdos.
And you finally watched it. The 2005 adaptation.
Yeah, the girlies are going to have opinions.
But I think it is.
Yeah. It's a really good adaptation, in my opinion. But as I told you, it's not as book accurate. So I do still want you to watch the older adaptation.
What were your thoughts?
Pride and Prejudice is like Seinfeld.
There's a lot of awkward moments. Oh, you're right. There kind of are.
That's Emma. That's Emma. Oh, my God. What are we going to do with him, you guys?
If there are more Jane Austen film adaptations that you want Andrew to watch and we could even give live reactions, maybe we could do a live or I could record your reactions. Let us know, weirdos. Let us know in the comments.
Yeah.
That's why our background looks so nice and cozy and professional and there's no Pericles chewing toys anywhere.
And now without further ado.
OK.
This week, we have actually a pretty highly requested subject.
I feel like from almost the beginning of the podcast, people have been requesting this person.
Years ago. But I had no idea who she was, so I couldn't speak to her.
But now I do. So we are going to be discussing the life of Nellie Bly.
Cheers. I can hear people cheering in the background. So Nellie Bly is such a weirdo in the best way. This is a good weirdo. Thankfully. Last one I did was pot belly. He was a bad weirdo.
Hello and welcome to History for Weirdos.
The exact worst kind of weirdo. Now we have a good one.
So I'm going to get into her story. Okay. So to give you some context, before women in the United States could even vote or open a bank account, we had Nellie Bly faking madness so that she could infiltrate an asylum.
Yeah. And she was traveling the globe in less than 80 days. And she was even running a manufacturing empire in New York City.
Right? She defied basically every rule of her time. And she didn't do it for fame. She didn't really care about the fame and the notoriety that came with it. But she really cared about exposing injustice and how unfair a lot of things were. So in this episode, we're diving deep into her unbelievable but very true life story. She's got some bold stunts and quite a legacy that she left behind.
This feels so nice. I'm so glad to be here.
We're going to learn about Nellie Bly, the woman who made history by refusing to stay in her place.
Exactly.
Yeah.
Exactly. Well, you'll see. That's definitely her.
Yes, absolutely.
We're going to get into it. No, you're good. We're going to start with her early life, of course. She wasn't born Nellie Bly. She was actually born Elizabeth Jane Cochran on May 5th, 1864 in a teeny town called Cochran's Mills, Pennsylvania. And yes, the town was named after her family. Wow. It was actually named after her dad, who was a prominent mill owner slash judge. Oh.
Get out of the apartment.
You know, back in the day when you used to be a mill owner and a judge at the same time.
I've never owned a mill in my life.
I don't even know what a mill is.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah. I think you're right. Yeah. We definitely know history.
Yeah. Wheat and rye. You mill things. Yeah.
We're going to go with that. So her birth came in the shadow of the Civil War.
Right. So she was born during a really tumultuous time for the country. The U.S. is still reeling from the conflict. And just for the context of women's roles at the time, because it's a big theme in the episode, women were real, even though they had helped a lot during the war, they were really confined to being a homemaker, being a mother. There weren't really other options at the time.
Yeah, in a good way.
And her childhood nickname wasn't Nellie, wasn't Elizabeth. It was pink.
Okay.
Well, at the time, and you'll see this if you look at sort of like Civil War era movies, a lot of people's clothing is really neutral colors, right? Like a lot of grays, brown, beige, maybe some dark blues.
very common for the time she was known for standing out because she wore lots of colors lots of bright colors she wore pink which was not common at the time and she got the nickname pink that's so cool i love that i thought that was a cute little anecdote about her so as we can imagine higher education for women was rare careers outside of teaching or nursing even rarer like becoming being a woman and becoming a teacher or becoming a nurse was already like wow that's a lot
You're doing a lot there. But to do anything else, like become a journalist, virtually unthinkable. Okay.
Elizabeth was the 13th of 15 children. That's a lot of kids.
Yeah. And they were in rural Pennsylvania when her father, Michael Cochran, even though he was wealthy and well-respected because he's the mill owner slash judge, he dies unexpectedly when Elizabeth, eventually Nellie, is only six years old.
And she didn't really ever get to grow up benefiting from his financial status or him being a well-respected figure in the community because they were left pretty much penniless when he died.
You should be.
I don't know the details, but essentially the legal system at the time didn't offer protection for widows. So I think his money went to a male relative. It didn't go to his wife.
Yeah, she lost it.
So the family is really because his death was unexpected. They're just like plunged into financial hardship. And that a lot of biographers attribute to being like Nellie's first interaction with injustice in the system of like, oh, my mom can't have these things because she's an unmarried woman.
That's interesting.
I like that.
That's also the plot of the book Siddhartha by Herman Hesse.
Oh, it's really good. Yeah, that's a that's a I'm sure there's plenty of weirdos in the good category of weirdos that have that upbringing.
Teddy Roosevelt. That's a good one.
We've never done an episode on him, even though you did Alice Roosevelt.
OK, so back to Nellie's mom. So her mom, Mary Jane Kennedy Cochran, does get remarried because as a woman slash single mom, she's still got her little kids. She doesn't have options for income. There's nothing she can do. So she has to remarry.
Well, luckily, Nellie was 13 out of 15.
So I think she just had the little ones left.
Probably just had 13, 14, 15 more or less. I still can't get over 15 births.
My oboe had 10.
Oh yeah, your grandparents didn't have a lot of kids, huh?
My Abue had 10 and my grandma had five?
Oh, wow. Yeah. That was a good smooth transition there.
Yeah, that's already a lot. Yeah. And then Abue grew up as one of 15. Remember?
I love how you're exhausted for them.
How do you do it?
And you're like, I can't imagine giving birth 15 times.
Well... Yeah, I can't either, which sucks for me. Yeah. I feel you there. But I'm the one that's screwed, so.
Let's move past it. So her mom has to remarry.
And she marries this guy named John Jackson. Unfortunately, John Jackson is known for his heavy drinking, which could be fun, but it's not because it's accompanied by a violent temper.
No, he was abusive. He was physically abusive to Mary Jane for sure.
When Elizabeth is only 14 years old, she testifies in court against him to support her mother's petition for a divorce. 14. And she has to share what she witnessed in the home because it was really uncommon to grant divorce at this time for something like domestic violence.
Yeah, I did not have a credit card until I started considering buying my first home when I was single in my late 20s. I had a credit card actually, but I had never built any credit because there was just this fear of getting into this trap of debt. And I just stuck with my debit card, which was really good practice at the time, but then learning how to
not just use a credit card, but learn how to spend money and learn that it was okay to spend money. And build credit, too. And build credit was something I learned. One of the strongest, most empowering things we did as a couple was pay off Naomi's grad school debt within two years after we got married. And that was great and awesome. And that was kind of like, okay, we can do this.
Let's not get into that situation ever again anytime soon. But if we were to... we can. And like Naomi said, when we were looking into the cars and deciding whether to pay cash, how much to pay in cash, how much to take out a loan, interest rates were really key.
We wanted to make sure that what we had in our high interest savings was building at a higher rate than what the interest rate on the loan would be. And With the solar panels, we saw it as a replacement of an energy bill that we would no longer have to be paying as much because of the solar.
This one's a little trickier with taking on what would be not a second mortgage, but if we were to finance an addition to the house, that's a little trickier because I like the sense, again, this living simply, living with margin. Right now, if one of us were to not be able to work or not work, we could float our mortgage on one salary.
It scares me to think that we would be locked into something where we would both have to work. Now, I fully intend for both of us to work until retirement, but I like the freedom that not having that additional debt brings.
I'm just curious with our three months of emergency savings, you know, if it hits the fan or whatnot. And are we talking all of our expenses as they currently are? We can float for three months or are we talking we're pulling back on a bunch of things? You mentioned levers like retirement.
Would we be six months and also be pulling back on payments that we wouldn't necessarily need to make but are currently making?
I think we could float a lot longer than three months is what I'm getting at or saying. Okay. But Naomi would have a much better picture of that than me.
I'm pretty sure I've Googled this specifically and have come across a nerd wallet blog or something about where you need to be at what decade. I just turned 40. And whatever the metrics are, you know, three times your income at 35 or whatnot. From those very basic blogs that I have read, I believe we're on track with our current income where we're at. Mm-hmm.
Do people ever stop giving to retirement at a certain point in time? Just like, all right, based on projections, we'll be good. We gave a lot. I just remember in personal finance in college, they're like, if you start giving to your retirement from 24 and stop at 30, you'll have more by retirement than someone who starts at 30 and goes all the way until retirement giving.
Does it ever make sense to stop or really like cool it?
Yeah, I guess we haven't done a whole lot of dreaming, like what do we want retirement to look like? And I don't know if that's something that that planner would help with or that we would have to come to those meetings with those thoughts.
I mean, it's a significant amount, like we all said, like it's now just kind of starting to sink in.
Yeah, I love our shared prioritization of our budget and our spending. I love the margin that we currently have to live the life that we want and that we both enjoy and agree upon. And the margin it has for generosity as well. So I think being aligned together is just, financially, I feel in a really good place.
That's right on. I have gotten more comfortable with debt with Naomi. I don't know if we qualify good or bad debt, but just seeing how we work as a team and tackle debt together, I have more and more confidence with those short-term goals that we can tackle them, pay them off, and move on to the next goal.
Wisdom.
I have a portrait under my desk of all five of them. I'm not going to run and grab it, but four of the five.
Well, we both share Christian faith together. I serve at a local Lutheran congregation and Naomi has her background in tradition as well. So I have to say our understanding of our Christian faith would very much be an inspiration to those things. And then just having done life together and seeing what one another valued kind of all came together to help form those relationships.
Really? Yeah.
Their sizes are crazy in China.
That's what I would do. That's not how this works. Save me.
That's what I was going to say. I was going to say, is there a flavor aspect to it?
She wants it on record. Lily, it's... Do you know what we do? We do this every episode. Episode one, you're asking us to abandon everything that this show stands for. Do it for me.
Yes. Finally.
That's my jam. That's my jam right there, dude. We're jamming. I'm still jamming. I want to jam it with you. We're jamming.
I hope you like Germans, too. Because we're German.
And her name was Hallie.
Do you think we enjoy that? Do you think we enjoy seeing you dig yourself in these holes? You think we like that? We don't, Lil!
Yes. Okay.
You do this to yourself.
And now they have to live on the streets because their house is getting foreclosed on.
I don't.
Is she eternal? What? Immortal?
Du hast gesagt, du warst Teil davon und du hast sie nicht unterstützt. Aber klar... Stand here if you support communism? Read it and wait! Where are you standing, Lil? Are you standing over here? That's not me. Are you standing over there? That is you! That's literally you! No. Is that not Lilith?
Well, I guess you guys heard it first. Welcome to the show!
Do your best, Beatboxing.
Don't be a joke.
You're okay. Did you at least film it?
Say it.
Hey, won't you please take me home? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.
Stop it. I said great questions.
Bis zum nächsten Mal. Tschüss.
Yeah. And rise up. Rise up. And revolt. Revolution. Wait, wait, wait.
I'm just going to have myself.
1761.
Shout out, shout out, shout out. Alright.
Come on. Come here. Come here.
I took a flight, thought I'd be fine But now I'm reading all the signs Another crash, another scare It's getting hard to trust the air Midair collisions, planes upside down It's a gamble when we leave the ground Turbines scream and metal falling fast Praying this flight isn't my last I can't ignore the rising fear Every headline makes it so clear Is it safe to fly today? Or should I find another?
That was the plan.
Speaking of names, how crazy is the clip I found from Psych? Yeah, so crazy. Yeah. That was wild. Yeah.
Ancient skull, the cabin shakes too late I close my eyes, accept my fate If I survive, I swear I'll stay With both feet planted on the ground each day
Alright, guys. We love you.
I'll ride a horse, I'll take a train I'll build a boat and sail through Spain I'll hitch a ride or grab a bike Anything but trusting this flight Zeppelins burst and tunnels cave At least those scooters can behave Cars can crash and boats can sink At least I'd have a fighting chance to think I can't ignore the rising fear Every headline makes it so clear Is it safe to fly today?
Or should I find another? And just all the cabins shake too late I close my eyes, accept my fate If I survive, I swear I'll stay With both feet planted on the ground each day Shoutout to all the women pilots.
You know the drill.
Was ist das? This is literally you arm in arm with Joseph Stalin? Are you kidding me? What is that? You support Joseph Stalin? You support the communist movement? Maybe she was just walking by.
Is this our daughter that you're offering to Joseph Stalin? Let me see. Oh my goodness! Explain yourself, Lil. What is this even... What are you doing? How did you even go back to this time frame?
Black Beanie, Bambalam, Black Beanie, Black Beanie, 99 cents.
It's gonna be great. Black Beanie, Bambalam, Black Beanie, Black Beanie.
Poop story, poop story, poop story with Will McGinnis. Where the poops are always on his mind. Oh my gosh. That was scary. Guys, I'm scared. Well...
Here we go.
Oh, yeah.
I could catch a 10-pound bass, catch a ball in my gym class, collect those Pokemons in every single way. Just like they say, good, I can catch them all. I can catch feelings for all day and every day. Catch a ride with your mama, catch my breath running late. I can truly catch a glimpse of a man who walks on lips. Cause he won't get very far.
I could catch anything I wanted to Even the flu I could catch anything But one thing's true Never gonna catch a Chupacabra Never gonna hold one in my hands Never gonna catch a Chupacabra
But yeah, that's alright. It's okay with me. Untertitelung im Auftrag des ZDF, 2020
Oh no.
Hey, are those Ninjas or Butterflies, guys?
Come on in. Come on in. Yes. Welcome to the podcast.
Andrew spent the night last night, and we played Duck Hunt until about 4 in the morning. In a basement with a window.
Start with syphilis.
1974.
It's been cultivating.
Sometimes it's 40 years before these things come to light.
Yeah.
No, I'm saying, like, is it going to be done?
And then, and then,
I can see you. Bigfoot shining in the sun.
You hear that, folks? Pickle lemonade from Popeye's.
It's so good.
All right.
I'm thinking maybe they're like two tickets a ride.
Speaking of free meals, though. Hey. Do you know Bill Gates is one of the few to own a McDonald's gold card?
What? Where he can eat at any McDonald's in the world for free.
I'm like, just in case I got 120 tickets. And it was like 50 bucks. Playing it safe. And I'm like, surely you can use it on all the games. Yeah. Nope. Can't.
Also, isn't he like the richest man ever? And why does he deserve a gold card?
This is what it says. Bill Gates, the billionaire co-founder of Microsoft, holds a rare McDonald's gold card that lets him enjoy free meals at any McDonald's around the globe. This card is part of an ultra-exclusive program reserved for a handful of high-profile individuals who receive a lifetime complimentary access.
Maybe because it's like that KFC conspiracy where it's humans and the gold card gets you first access to the fresh meat.
So I tried to get better sleep lately without using sleep aids and stuff. And so I got the nose thing, you know? Oh, the magnet one? The magnet one. I got the thing. It's awesome.
Yeah. And then I saw all these people talking about mouth tape. I got some. I tried it. And I'm like, this is kind of hard. But I did fall asleep. But then I woke up at 3 in the morning. And complete panic attack. Like I woke up with a night tear that someone had taped my mouth shut. I'm freaking out. And I'm like, I mean, like grabbing walls. It was so scary. Why do you do this to me?
And then almost every single ride, the girls were too short. Yeah. But one of them, I mean, Jane was off this much. And like, nope.
It's just like mesh, but it just keeps your mouth closed.
That's so funny. Oh, yeah, but mouth tapes didn't work. Also, it doesn't stick.
Oh, yeah.
Let's go. Yeah.
We mentioned wolves in our last episode.
10,000 years, supposedly. Well, it's not completely a dire wolf because they had to cross genetic... Okay, I didn't look into it. They did it one by one, though. It's kind of crazy.
Like we're going with them.
Like we have a six month old woolly mammoth right now? I mean, really? It could be. Well, they said this, if I read this right, the six month old dire wolf is four feet long and 80 pounds.
And it says that full growth, they should be six feet long. So, like, from snout to butt in, like, 160 pounds, I think. Oh, my gosh.
Let us do it. There was one ride where I knew that they could both ride it and we were walking up to it and the ride operator was just huffing a cigarette. I'm like, nah.
How did Josh die? Oh, a saber-toothed tiger. Well, that was the problem that they were having in Montana, where they brought in the Yukon wolves. In Colorado, too. Yeah. There's a ton. They're disrupting all the elk. Yeah.
Their name is Dodo?
Yeah, I made a kid cry. Because they got a pellet gun and like I was living in the hood and they shot a red cardinal.
I'm like, you can't do that. And they're like, why? I'm like, well, because the rule is if you kill it, you got to eat it. So I'm like, okay, we got to eat it. And I started plucking all the fat out. I gutted it with my fingers.
That's crazy. Speaking of dead birds. Don't say it. Did you see Tim Albarino's post?
Yeah, he went and found some megalithic ancient city ruins in the Amazon.
Dude, it's massive compared to him. He says he's coming out with a video soon, but apparently they haven't been discovered.
Yeah. Like a really Indiana Jones thing.
And he sat right there.
He literally farted in that couch. Guaranteed.
No. I don't think Tim Albrino farts.
Speaking of the ancient ruins and the Amazon, I don't have notes on it yet. I wrote notes for later, but I really want to talk about the Olmecs.
okay that is the most fascinating thing ever like we know so little i'll just give a little bit of about it go ahead a little teaser so the olmecs they were the civilization that were thousands of thousands of years before the um aztec mayans oh my gosh um what's the peruvian one inca inca yeah like thousands of years before them in the same area same area all in south america okay
But they discovered runes from them in the 1800s. But even the Mayans and the Aztecs talked about them as ancient people.
But their technology was more advanced than the Mayans and the Aztecs. And I'm convinced that they're the ones that built all the Incan walls and stuff that everyone's so obsessed over. But they discovered these giant, giant stone heads. Do Olmec heads.
Yeah, but like different. Like they're very detailed. But people have debated that like they don't look like South American people. Wow. Their features resemble a lot of like Africa and Asia. Interesting. Yeah. But these things are huge. They get up to like 10 feet tall. Wow. Those are cool looking. Yeah, I want to do more research into them because there's a lot of weird, weird stuff.
And we know so little about them. They think that they are the first in Mesoamerica to have a written language.
Which would predate what we know about the Mesoamerica written language thousands of years. Yeah. And they did stuff where they like... they did floating gardens. Oh, cool. So like on their lakes and stuff, they would literally have farms that were floating.
Like really advanced stuff.
That sounds awesome.
Or Pangea.
I know. I've heard of, I've heard of the word. But a lot of people theorize that the Olmecs were, Because it was, I think, what was it? I think it was 700 or 600 BC. They just disappeared.
Gone.
Yeah. And this was before any conquistadors, anything. So, like, even the Aztecs and the Mayans, they had legends about them. But they're like, we have no idea what happened to them. They were just empty cities.
Dude, the Amazon is rich with stuff. I mean, the fact that Tim Fialarino found that.
Have you seen that movie with Daniel Radcliffe? Where he's in the Amazon?
I saw this video that was talking about the Titanic. Yeah. And like new findings that they've had from the Titanic where they sent these like robots down to like scan the entire ship.
And they discovered, it was from written accounts, but there's proof to it now that all the engineers stayed behind on the Titanic as it was sinking to keep feeding the coal to where the electricity could run as long as possible.
So that people could see.
To get off the boat.
So they stayed down there shoveling all the coal and stuff. And there's like proof of it because there was like the doors were still open and they were like all that stuff. But all the engineers died. Yeah.
I thought that was epic. Epic.
Yeah.
When I was in fourth grade, the Two Towers came out on DVD and I watched it back to back three times in a row. Really? Let's go. And my mom's like, you have to turn it off. I was obsessed with it. That's funny.
You heard the theory that Frodo doesn't know Legolas' name? Yeah. Is that true? Because he never says it in the movie. Really? Yeah, at the end where everyone's coming into the room and he's like,
Hey, man.
And they're saying that they're doing that because it's to show that we're about to go into a recession. So Disney's trying to make all the money that they can make right now.
Rich? I mean, you have to be rich to go to Disney.
True. True. And we all go to Disney because we're rich. Yeah. Yeah, but I don't know if I would.
I bet you they're opening it up, though, because people are not going there now because of the new Universal.
Yeah, that's probably true.
We've been paying for her pass for a full year now. You just drop her off at the parking lot.
Yeah, because now it's like the smallest discount ever. Or if any.
Speaking of clubs. No. Well, did you see that club in the Dominican Republic? No, what's up? That was bad.
Oh my goodness. Yeah. When the roof fell. Yeah. There's this nightclub in the Dominican Republic and I forget the musician that was playing. I guess he's pretty big, but I'm a huge club and the roof just collapsed over a hundred people. Yeah.
Yeah. Terrible. Yeah. Lily, now is not the time for jokes.
You realize this. I get it. We got an ad. Don't go anywhere. Just kidding. Wow.
That is terrible.
No. Or he got hurt, but he didn't die. Dude, over 200. Oh. Dude.
It was a concrete building.
There's videos of people, like, pointing up. Even the musicians, like, going like that. And it just goes, wah.
Yeah. Terrible. Now I'm not going to go to any clubs.
I forgot to do the news anchor thing.
We get it. All birds. All birds are dinosaurs. You don't have to name every bird.
Stop. Seriously, they get it. They're probably annoyed by this by now. I'm annoyed by it. Are you annoyed by it? Yeah. Doves are dinosaurs.
Oh, man, I wish we could have the brainpower to finish this episode.
Wow. I can't wait to try it. And all they have to do is go to magicmind.com forward slash ninja and use the code ninja20 to get a significant discount on their subscription. Wow, it sounds like it. That is a big sip, and I love it. Magic Mind, love you.
You need to finish that and take a shot and see if you're going to be four for four.
Because we did say Magic Mime does make you shoot better.
Why are you taking the feet off of horses? They don't deserve them.
I don't know. I did see a video to where they didn't.
Where like it grew down like that.
Wild horses. It's like how dogs, they scratch their nails and cats and stuff.
I'm so scared to do it. When you cut it too short?
That's so funny. It was just a cool experience in there. The mirror was like a portal.
No.
No. I think it was Atlanta. Oh, man.
I definitely pooped in there.
For sure.
That's cool.
I love pooping on my dad's property.
Oh, no, I sent it to, I just put it on Patreon.
They needed to just tape those Nerf balls to missiles.
But we just had babies, so we're just like, we're going to go to sleep.
Yeah, it was great. I want to dive back into that spiral that was over the UK. Yeah, there's got to be more to it, right?
There has to be more to it. Gotta be. I saw this person talk about that this is not the first occurrence of seeing a spiral like this. And they documented photos in the sky going back to 1981. Oh, when SpaceX started. Yeah.
Yeah, when the fuel freezes and it spins like in a perfect cylinder.
But then they compared it to old ancient carvings and drawings that look exactly like it. No way. So I sent you two pictures. Dude, this is interesting. One was like ancient drawings. And two, this person that got all these pictures from images in the sky dating back to 1981. Yeah.
whoa oh my gosh looks like your crop circles andy ayo that's so cool yeah and then i looked up i'm like well what is what did they mean like or like who had them in the world like ancient people how did the people understand them yeah in every part of the world everyone has a drawing of a spiral okay And so, like, they said, like, the Neolithic Europe era. So, like, they said Ireland, 3200 BC.
Famous triple spiral. They called it a triskele. Triskele. Carved into ancient stones, possibly linked to the sun, life cycles, and astral journey. And then Scotland, Malta, and Spain. Spirals, megalithic tombs, often pointing inwards. Some believe these are symbolic of the journey to the afterlife or altered states of consciousness. And then you have Mesoamerica, so the Mayan and Aztec cultures.
The spirals were linked to the wind gods, portals, and time cycles.
And then you have the Nazca lines in Peru. And there's this giant spiral there and they debate over what it meant. But a lot of people think that it was like a portal or a astronomical or ritualistic. So people all over the world since early, early BC era were drawing these symbols that they were seeing in the sky.
No, no. I mean, even SpaceX. I don't know if SpaceX came out and said something. But Europe's just like, yeah, that's what it was. But then the Hopi tribe, Native American, they have a lot of these spirals. And it represents the connection between this world and the spirit world. Wow. That's what their spiral represented. Interesting.
What's going on with the aliens?
Black Mirror episode. I mean, that's insane.
Disney? Well, Disney, there's like a crazy conspiracy route that that swirl thing represents like trafficking and stuff. I have not heard that.
I don't buy it too much. I don't know.
Yeah. Yeah. Okay. But yeah. I got something else for you guys. Speaking of satellites. What does that think? Oh, I mean the spiral. We've talked about it at least on two podcasts so far. But the North Pole and the old ancient map. Oh, yeah.
I just sent you the picture. The guy who talked about those four islands and then the rock that was in the center of it.
The guy had made a map without.
Kind of cool. But what's so creepy is that there's more to it. So there's a satellite image from the ESA-7 satellite. This was in 1968. And it was like the most... It was like the first visual of Earth via satellite. Or like a composite of it. Yeah. But look at... And it's stationed over the North Pole. And this is the picture that they released.
And they talk about, oh, it's just the composite images that they all put together and the North Pole wasn't captured.
Right? Okay. Well, then this was from Google Earth in like the early 2000s. Send this to you.
And then this was released by NASA, I believe, in the 80s, 80s or 90s. All separate. Holy moly, dude. That's actually unsettling.
But does it not look, if you compare it to that first map... It's identical. And people talk about... What year was that map that was like the 1600s? Yeah. Gosh, man. Yeah, and people have talked about like apparently NASA, but they've taken it back or they've like scrubbed it or something.
They talked about like it was really hard to find the image, but there was this obscure image that people like zoomed in of the earth. And at the top, there was literally a black stone sticking out like at the top of the world.
A black stone. And it's like the same as this freaking map, bro.
You know, flight flight plane or flight paths. You're not allowed to fly over.
yeah because i mean probably because it's the most harsh climate but still people know don't fly over the north pole yeah but admiral bird did admiral bird we've talked about him a lot too yeah yeah he's associated with a ton of stuff like even the um project fishbowl uh he was involved in the operation high jump was he the guy that had the heart attack in antarctica No, that was Buzz Aldrin.
Admiral Byrd, this was like shortly after World War II. He was sent with an armada. The Navy sent this whole armada of battleships to the Antarctic. Super weird stuff. It was just to explore, but it was all weaponized. And so the theory is that he went out there to seek out Nazi hideouts in Antarctica. Yeah. So he explored that, said that there's some crazy stuff there.
And then he also did an exploration to the North Pole. And this is where it gets... This is the conspiracy part. Okay. Because apparently he had... And we've talked about it before, I believe, but his secret diary... that only he had. And then when he died, his son got it. And then when his son was trying to publish the stuff in it, he died, like under very mysterious circumstances.
But Admiral Byrd talks about in this secret diary, allegedly that he wrote, people think that it's fake, that when he went to explore the North Pole, there was an entry to inner earth, like hollow earth.
It would. And he describes it as being in the earth, lush green land beyond the ice, mammoth-like creatures, a technology-advanced civilization, and meeting with a being called the Master who warns humanity about nuclear weapons.
So this is where it gets a little like, I don't know about it.
This is...
That long ago. Yeah, and they're like, this is what's up there. Everyone's like, no. But this one is the most convincing to me is the one that NASA took.
It's like where there's no clouds. And it's just like, I don't know, man. It's so weird. Yeah.
100 million square miles. Including the master, apparently.
Yep. Fair. My question would be- That's crazy. By the time this comes out, I have not looked into it, but the astronauts from SpaceX that did the polar, I want to see pictures of the North Pole. I want it to be disproven because this is scary.
We're talking to you, whoever's in charge.
I actually hope it is real.
But apparently this master gave Admiral Byrd this message. It's a long message. But at one point he says to Admiral Byrd, you see, we have never interfered before in your racist wars of barbarity, but now we must for you have learned to tamper with a certain power that is not for man, namely the atomic energy.
Our emissaries have already delivered messages to the powers of your world, and yet they do not heed. You have been chosen to witness here that our world does exist. You see, our culture and science is many thousands of years beyond your race. Wow. You, my son, must return to the surface of the world with this message. Cool. Then he died.
Well, if there's a big hole in the top. They're getting it. But no, he actually talks about there's like, it seemed like another source of light in this earth. The core.
Yeah. I mean, but that that message does line up a lot. Either people read one thing one time of someone made something up and like just it.
But we talked about the friendship. Remember in Italy? Yeah. And their whole thing was like trying to stop the nuclear bombs. And then there's all these other alien encounters people have. It's always about nuclear.
Just kind of keep it open.
We were calling it just like a really big bomb, but the whole atomic nuclear sort of... Well, we talked about how atomic bombs weren't made for men, but for whatever interdimensional beings, aliens, cryptids, whatever. And these people, the master, as he goes by... says that this technology is not meant for man.
No, they're not human. I need to look into it. Yeah, it's interesting.
I want to mix up, man. I'm tired of like... Feels like we're in a weird rhythm. We're so controlled by the media. It's like, dude, because everyone was so consumed with these drones. Before that, it was aliens and all this and that. And then all of a sudden, it's just all political stuff now. Tariffs. And it's just like, I don't care.
Yeah, which is baloney. But also scary. He said it was FAA testing.
Yeah. The green children.
I think it's all connected, dude.
It was like the Nephilim-y or something like that.
All these stories I'm coming across, it's the same story but written in a different font. Different era, different people, but literally the same thing. Same thing. Have you ever heard of the Council of 300? No, I have not. It's a French conspiracy theory, but there is some validity to it.
That's why I said yuck. Never mind. So the Council of 300 is basically what we would call the Illuminati. Okay. And it connects directly to the cult of the Black Cube.
I corrected myself.
The Sultan of the Black Cube. The Sultan of the Black Cube. But yeah, so this was originally written by Dr. John Coleman in a book called Conspirators Hierarchy, The Story of the Committee of 300. And he claims that there's a shadow elite ruling the world behind the scenes. And I think we all kind of agree with that in a sense. Sounds about right. But there's multiple names for them.
So it's the Council of 300, also the Hidden Hand, or the Olympians, some people call them.
Yeah. So basically it's 300 top-tier individuals that would be royalty, banking, dynasties, and corporate heads, including the Rothschilds, the Rockefellers, the Windsors, and high-level Vatican officials.
This is why people are like, this isn't real because there's no record of it. Of course there's no record of it. That's why they did it. Not officially listed or public, allegedly secret and generational, which generational thing makes sense to me of just passing down this whole dynasty kind of thing. And like how the royal family, you had to marry into certain parts of the family.
Like incest was like, yeah, you got to do that. You got to marry your cousin.
Yeah. But so it says the 300 sit at a top of a pyramid like power structure below them. Global think tanks like Club of Rome, the CFR, Bilderberg and corporations and governments. And the ultimate goal of the committee of 300 is the creation of the one world government.
And that just, I went down just a big old rabbit hole. Yeah. Rabbit path. Rabbit trail. Rabbit.
Rabbit gym. Rabbit tree. I went up the rabbit tree. Yeah. And I... I was like looking into like the UN and the world economic forum. And I'm like, this is freaking me out. Um, they're all tied back. Yeah. So, um, they, well, one thing this, the doctor, uh, John Coleman writes about is that the council of 300, they use this thing called the, uh, um, I don't know how to pronounce this.
Hedgelian dialect. No. Uh, how would you pronounce this? There's a lot of notes. Hold on. The H word. Hegelian. Hegelian. Hegelian dialect. Yeah, it's often reinterpreted as the problem-reaction-solution mechanism. So it's a mechanism used by the elites. So it's a three-step process. One, problem, a manufactured crisis, terrorist attack, pandemic, economic collapse.
Two, reaction, the public's emotional response. So the public's like, you got to do something to save us. And then three is solution. So the elites pre-planned solution that wouldn't have been accepted otherwise. An example, surveillance laws, war, lockdowns. And so there was this thing that came out in June 2019. Okay. Remember the world in 2019? What a beautiful time. Okay.
The UN proposed this plan. called the Agenda 2030. And it was heavily sponsored and heavily influenced by the World Economic Forum, which is not government. It's its own private sector. But this Agenda 2030... It was agreed upon by every nation in the world.
That was pretty good. This is my favorite part. What kind of song you want?
In June 2019, the United Nations and World Economic Forum signed a memorandum of understanding to, quote, accelerate the implementation of Agenda 2030. These are the key pillars of the agreement. One, climate change. Two, health. Three, digital cooperation. Four, Four, gender equality and empowerment of women. Hey.
Five, education and skills for the future. And six, financing the 2030 agenda. And so basically, the World Economic Forum, they pushed that in order to implement this new Agenda 2030, it's like climate change, but a big part of it is surveillance. They said that they need to not depend on governments, but on corporations to fund this thing.
So dipping into the private sector, overseeing government, a worldwide government agenda. Yeah. Red flag, I would say. Yeah, for sure.
So under Agenda 2030, many goals like renewable energy, smart cities, and digital ID were implemented and that they can only be achieved with private sector funding. And this one freaked me out. The World Economic Forum, it says the biggest advocates for global digital identity infrastructure. So the Known Traveler Digital Identity.
So basically, everyone will have a biometric ID attached to them now. Wow. So wherever you travel in the world, biometrically, you can be identified. So now everyone in the world can be tracked wherever. Yeah.
This is all in the hopes of making the world a better place. And part of the Agenda 2030 that World Economic Forum were involved in is it's called the Great Reset.
Yeah. So after COVID-19, World Economic Forum launched the Great Reset Initiative. And it was branded as a chance to rebuild more sustainable and equitable world. Equitable. Equitable. The pillars of the Great Reset lined up almost one for one, the UN's agenda or whatever. Build back better, inclusive capitalism, green energy, and digital transformation.
And their catchphrase for this whole Great Reset was, you will own nothing and be happy.
It's been implemented. Wow. And that's why people are talking about that in the U.S. and in Canada, all these natural disasters are being taken over by the government, like this land. So in Canada, all these places where there's these wildfires, it's like, well, this isn't a safe place for anyone to live.
So now the government owns it, and now you have to move into this city that we're going to make into a smart city.
Yeah, Carolinas.
Mm-hmm. I'm telling you, it's all connected, and it's really freaky. But just the involvement of corporate media, too, in the UN and World Economic Forum. Yeah. It's like we're just...
That's what I'm saying. And another case for that, I was thinking, because DeSantis, which I like a lot of what DeSantis has done. Same, same. But one thing I don't like, and I think we talked about it on the Patreon last week, but he's like buddy buddies with all these developers that are on the Florida Fish and... FWC. Yeah. Yeah.
The whole board is developers, basically. Yep. And then DeSantis comes out and he's like, hey, Florida, we're trying to get rid of property taxes. You guys shouldn't have to pay taxes on your own property. It's like, yeah, I totally agree with that. And it's like, wait a second. He's buddy buddies with all these developers that are buying up all this land. They don't want to pay taxes.
They don't have to pay taxes. When you think something's good, it's not going to directly benefit you. It's going to benefit the people.
Yeah.
I do think property tax is the dumbest thing ever, though. It's crazy. We pay taxes for everything.
When they go to bed in their $20 million home, they probably think they're doing all right.
I don't know much about the housing stuff, but I feel like if you build too many homes, then it saturates the market, and then the home value goes down, and then you have a collapse.
There's this new terminology that I heard this past week. It's kind of a fun term, but a very scary term. It's called tenocracy. Tenocracy. Or the technocrats. It's like aristocrats, but the dudes in the tech industry. Okay. And how they are the aristocrats of America now. Oh, yeah. They're the ones that are making all the decisions. They're the ones that are controlling...
They're the new lobbyists, basically. And, like, again, government stuff. But, like, you think of, like, Elon Musk, one of the biggest technocrats.
He's right-hand man of Trump. And he's, like, implementing all this stuff. And it's, like, some of it could be really, really good and beneficial. But also, he is the richest man in the world. And you don't get rich by just, like...
I know, so we'll make somebody mad. I don't care. It creeped me out of just like when Trump was being sworn in, just all the tech industry dudes that were standing behind him.
Yeah. Government freaks me out because it's like, you know, everyone knows it's corrupt. There's corruption within government.
And it's like, and I think we started this corruption probably since day one. Yeah. You know, and it's just, you create this beast and say maybe Trump or whoever comes in, they're like, yeah, we got to change it. But then like to change it, you have to be a little more, uh, probably diabolical or corrupt to change it. Yeah. And like, it just, there's no, it doesn't seem like there's going to be.
I'm waiting for the giant 250 year fair that he was going to do.
No, it's going to be in, I think, Illinois. But it's going to be, every state's going to be represented. We got to go.
Yeah, but it's like the country fair.
That's so neat. Our country. Canada's not invited.
Stay out.
Yeah, it's like, what are we doing? If you look at the history of Rome, dude, they're doing the same stuff. I know, yeah. Just corruption and backstabbing.
And in Rome, it was like there was a time where it was the rich that were dictating everything. Yeah. You know? And, like, nothing's new under the sun, truly.
It's existed as soon as Josh.
Uh, committed. No, we did not. Well, that's what the story came out. And the parents came out and said, there's no way.
Because he was going to go on these speaking gigs.
And so they hired their own autopsy. And they discovered two bullets in his head.
Yeah. So now it's under this investigation thing.
It's like, that's so scary. Open AI whistleblower.
I don't know. No, I'm not saying that. We're not saying that. We would never say that. We would never say that. And nor did we think that. No. Yeah. No. No, we don't.
Exactly. Well, they didn't plan on getting caught, but yeah, for sure.
Speaking of scary, I did acupuncture the other day. You went back? Yeah, because I hurt my shoulder working out.
After this time, I'm a little scared because it's great.
Well, I don't think so. I freaking know something. I want to go back. But my shoulder does feel way better, crazy better. But she like, so I was laying down, face down, and she like, you know, did the cupping thing first, which is a wild sensation. It's like an octopus sucking your back.
You look back at it as an octopus. But then she like, so it's this top left shoulder that was hurting. And she goes down to my right leg and pushes by my shin. She's like, does that hurt? I'm like, ow, yeah. She's like, okay. She, boop, one needle. And then my arm just sort of like. Throbbing? It felt like a rubber band, bro. Yeah. I'm like, whoa. I'm like, that's weird, bro. She's like, yeah.
She's like, and she explained it all. I forget every time when she explains it. But very fascinating stuff. And then she hooked up all the electric things to it and was zapping me. Oh, she does needling too, not just acupuncture. And she's like, is that good? I'm like, yeah, it's good. And then, dude, she left the room. She's like, it'll be about 15 minutes.
It was like three minutes, five minutes in. It's like I was in a tornado. I just started...
Yeah, I'm like, I'm freaking out. And there's needles in my back. And I'm like, it's not like I can roll over. I'm like, hey. One minute. I'm like, I'm so dizzy. And she's like, oh. She's like, did you eat before you came in? I'm like, no. She's like, oh, yeah, you got to eat before you come in.
She said it's a lot of chi. Yeah.
The swirl. The swirl.
Ew. But, yeah, she said, like, because what she does is it brings a lot of blood flow to one part of your body. Oh, yeah. And so I guess if you don't have food in you. It just makes you lightheaded. That's crazy.
Living Gaia in Tavares. They're the best, the sweetest people.
Yeah.
I'm fascinated though that she can, I mean, the needle is tiny. She can put one in my shin and I feel it here.
But I mean, literally they came out and I was like full. Yeah, that's crazy. But it's weird that one time when she put the needles like right in my eyes to stop it.
You know, it's else is perfect besides Jesus. No, I don't want to relate them. You know, it's close to perfect. Close to perfect. Yeah. It's our Patreon. Yeah. Patreon.com forward slash ninjas or butterflies where we're doing an extra episode. Dolphins are aliens, baby.
Anyways, you get an extra episode, discounts on your merch. Did you already say all this?
But also, check out this new shirt, y'all. Yeah, we talked about it on the ad, remember?
Look at that.
Yeah. Make sure to review us on everything. And subscribe to the YouTube if you haven't. Subscribe to the Spotify if you haven't. Give us a five-star review because it really does help. Please. Please.
Fish kicks.
Close your eyes.
What'd you think?
Can.
Gotta be honest. Not a fan. Not a fan of County Fair. I have bad experiences.
And they did. It was in, remember you asked last week, you're like, how did they survive when they're supposed to be wiped out? I think it's in Joshua, how it says that the Nephilim, they existed before the flood and some after.
Busy. Busy, busy, but you know it's not busy?
It's horrible. What? Is this question.
Yeah, we want to respect the people that send in the questions. Yeah.
Yeah. Sure. Yeah. Okay, today's question is sent in by a viewer. Do our listeners deserve a gift? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
It's a rigged system. Rigged system.
So Lily. Oh, let's just do like a random country. Milwaukee. It's the city. Prove it. Okay. A country? Country. Germany. Germany. Okay. Well then Lily, do our listeners from Germany deserve a gift?
What do you, why do you ship there? Well, why do they, why would it be hard? Why would they deserve it? Why do they deserve a gift?
But specifically Germany. That's the one we're talking about.
What do you mean? What Germans deserve a gift? Like maybe children?
But right now we're just talking about Germany.
We have a ton of listeners in Germany. There's nothing... Why do the German people deserve, our German listeners, why do they deserve a gift? Yeah, my brother's in Germany.
Okay.
So, like, the children that listen in Germany, they deserve a gift? The elderly, maybe?
To our German fans. And of course, Lily, a gift in German, das gift means to poison.
Oh, now you got to buy more tickets to ride on the rides. And I'm like, surely we can't ride all these rides because our girls are super small. Yeah. And so I'm like, I'll just do. Or Jane rattling around in a squirrel cage. They don't give you like a thing. Like typically a ride is like eight tickets or two tickets.
So if I'm getting this right, Andy. So far you are. Lily wants to poison those in Germany that most listen to our show.
Lily. So if I'm getting this right, Andy.
No, she just wants to poison everyone.
This is a podcast, so you gotta use your mouth.
Ugh.
I didn't peg you for the kind of person who doesn't support the troops.
Huntest du für dieses Ding, oder kommt es nur aus deinem Feed? Das ist alles Algorithmus. Ja, wirklich.
Ich fühle mich, als ob wir in es spielen, als wir darüber sprechen, jede Woche. Es gibt etwas anderes. Ich weiß nicht, ob sie versuchen, uns über Nordkarlina oder Kalifornien zu vergessen.
Das ist das, was wirklich passiert ist. Aber wirklich, wie kommt das aus dem Nichts, wo all das passiert ist?
Sie sagen, das ist der stärkste Job im ganzen Welt. Es wurde gewählt. Sie haben noch nie auf Ninjas und Butterflies gearbeitet. Sie haben noch nie auf Podcasts gearbeitet. Video-Editing ist in den Top 5. Ich habe das mal auf einem Website gelesen.
Die zweite Part.
So if you're a video editor, have a resume queued up ready to go.
Oh, really? Yeah.
It only bugs me when I'm landing. I'm fine as we descend, but when you're coming down, like the flight that we were on, where the plane was literally sideways, dude.
I did it in a movie theater recently, too. Is that actually a thing? I've never been on a flight, I don't think.
Good job. It's probably all the automation. It's like, basically not the pilot doing it anymore.
Dig him up.
And they were known for blowing up when something went wrong.
Can you imagine though your roommate practicing? That's all you hear.
I know, right? People from 1900s, it's like, you know, like weather calculations. Yeah, they're like, that makes no sense.
It turns out it was just a really short pilot, too. Yeah, that's a square root. That's what that symbol means.
It was crazy. That's my favorite bit from the pre-roll that you wrote in there. Your shoe size. Oh, yeah.
People, come on. No man has eight and a half.
And knowledge is exponential too. Think about being a kid who sees someone throw a paper airplane and you can't figure out how to fold one and then someone gives you one and it's like, oh, and then you're making a hundred different variations, folding wings to do different things.
Ja, das wäre so lustig.
Oh, es muss lustig sein, weil wenn du, ich meine, du bringst eine Waffe, wie der Welt nicht der gleiche ist, wenn du zurückkommst.
Dude, I'd bring one of those sticky mouse pads. Just a while. I would just bring Silly Putty. Yeah. Was it Gak? Is that what it was? I don't know.
I think that's the brand.
They didn't even have mirrors back then. They were polishing metal to try to get it.
Yeah. They would think it's a portal. Yeah. They're like looking into an alternate reality.
It's the Avatar font. Really weird.
Du, hast du den Schiff gesehen? Den USS Preble? Ja, mit dem Laser? Ja. Was? Das ist eigentlich eine Sache jetzt. Sie haben einen Clip des Schiffs veröffentlicht, der die Helios-Laser-Waffe veröffentlicht hat. Und es scheint, dass es zwei Modes hat. Einer ist zerstört und der andere ist komplett verabschiedet. Es ist literally ein Laser auf der Front des Schiffs.
Und die niedrigere Mode wird wie Elektronik kurzfristig.
Which they've had that tech for a long time. They've talked about being able to disarm bombs from satellites and stuff like that or whatever, stuff from above. Aber was verrückt ist, das war nur so ein bisschen, wie nicht gesehen, ein bisschen wie, das Ding ist eine vollblendige Death Star looking thing.
So, dass es etwas öffnet, wenn es überhebt. Oh, ja. Und es ist hoch genug, dass ich nicht denke, dass du es überhebt. Ich denke, du gehst einfach weg. Oh, ja.
Yeah, this is, and it looks fake, but I mean, CBS News, USA Today, UPI.com, like all these, these are all talking about it.
... showing us everything that we've ever come up with. They're working on things and they're testing things all the time. I know we normally go to an ad, but I gotta tell the story real quick. We've been talking about the fog, right? Everybody's freaking out about the amount of fog that's going around. Not only nationwide, worldwide.
Ja, aber es gibt eine Person in Florida, die sagte, wir haben diese eine Bakterie gefunden, das bedeutet, dass es eigentlich etwas in der Luft ist. Sie sprechen über Chemtrails, die über sie liegen. Und ich lese das und ich bin so, okay, das scheint, wiederum, ich habe es lustig gemacht, als wir darüber gesprochen haben, wie drei Wochen zuvor. Ja. This is crazy.
No way. Yeah, my mom sent me the conspiracies.
Thanks, Mom.
I'm still learning. Thanks, Mom. It's called Operation Seaspray. In 1950, the U.S. Navy's secret biological warfare experiment in which Syriata, Marcescans, and another bacteria were sprayed over the San Francisco Bay Area in California. In order to determine how vulnerable a city like San Francisco might be to a bioweapon attack, they killed one American and put 10 more in the hospital.
This bacteria affects the gut, the respiratory issues and the urinary tract. Now, the person who died had a pre-existing thing. And so they were trying to say, like, none of this is confirmed. But then the military confirmed in a Senate hearing that this is actually an experiment that they did.
And so they weren't held liable for anything because you can't definitively correlate the introduction of the bacteria to like, that's definitely what got this person. Yeah.
Du kannst nicht sagen, wo sie es verabschiedet haben, aber es ist ohne Zweifel verabschiedet, dass sie Bakterien in die Luft gelegt haben, um zu testen, ob die gesamte San Francisco-Region zu einem biologischen Kriegsangriff verursacht war. Also sie sehen, ob es sie beeinflusst?
Dude, that's, how is this? So the reason they said it was okay to do is because this specific bacteria isn't bad enough to make people actually sick. They were testing a delivery system as opposed to like doing anthrax or something like that.
Give us something fun. But that's what's crazy. Ten people like hospital stays and one of them died. And it's like, well, that was just a test and a risk. We were willing to run. A person had prostate surgery and one of the bacteria was known for causing urinary tract infections. Ja. Ja, das sage ich so vielen Leuten. Das war das Schlimmste, was ich in so langer Zeit erinnert habe.
Ja, das Längste.
What were your symptoms? Did you have like a fever for days?
No, dude.
Sorry, I spaced out. Where did you say in Florida?
Pop Coast? That's way south. Here's an idea. What if we got everyone to go give said roofing company a one-star review, but if we get sponsored, we switch it. We'll stop it. Please don't do that.
Cool. Was war deiner, Andrew?
Really? It was after the Egyptian, uh, magicians had already done it, and his snake devoured theirs. Und das ist immer mein Rückzug auf Leute, die nicht magisch sind und sie wollen einen super literären, nur nicht-spirituellen Ausdruck der Bibel nehmen. Es ist wie, was machst du mit dieser Geschichte? Ja, aber es war ein figurierter Schnee.
Did you see the snake Harry let out? It was actually Nagini, the Horcrux later on. What? The snake that Harry let out in the zoo is actually the same snake that becomes the Horcrux.
Well done. Well done. Thank you. Sending two. Start out with the clearly competitive Rubik's Cube thing.
It's not the hot dog ones. Two. One.
This starts out, looks at it, and then watch him. He turns away. Was? Ich dachte nur, das wäre eine lustige Vergleiche. Das ist derjenige, der das Video veröffentlicht hat. Was? Er hat es geschlagen. Ihr seid immer noch auf der Rubik's Cube eingeladen.
Well, that's the whole thing. So it's random. You know, it's jumbled.
I think there's different types of competitions. That makes sense. Aber das nächste Mal habe ich euch lustig gemacht. Ich denke an das Bildschirm, wo ich über den Punkt der Reflexion oder Reflexion gesprochen habe. Ich mache euch lustig für solche Sachen immer. Hier ist einer für mich. Vielleicht macht das Sinn. Vielleicht nicht immer. Ich habe es historisch. Dieser macht keinen Sinn für mich.
Und vielleicht verstanden ihr es. Okay, bereit?
I can't. I'm like trying to think, and I know my brain kind of went to other problem solve mode, because that was really loud. I'll fix that in post. But yeah, how do you cut through, but not all the way, and they're all connected at the same time?
Es macht trotzdem keinen Sinn. Es hat zwei verschiedene Bläder. Einer von ihnen, wie sie sagen, ist kleiner und geht von einem Anglein und dann von den anderen. Also ist es nicht alle auf der gleichen Seite.
Ich weiß nicht, ob es gefoldet ist und dann hat es einen Anglein, um an es zu kommen.
Ich habe es verpasst.
That's crazy.
Es ist wie der Tesla, wenn sie einen Graveyard überlassen.
People say that Elon is just pulling a joke and that's why that happens. But then I went through the comments in it and there's a bunch of people saying that literally after a family member passed away, when they would pull into their driveway, there'd be one on the porch. And that never happened until a family member passed away.
Ich glaube nicht, dass irgendein Mann das sagen würde, wenn Flucht seine immediate Reaktion zu etwas ist. Oh, ich bin ein Flieger. Ich bin ein Flieger. Ja, nein. Es gibt keine Chance. Wenn du eigentlich etwas gedacht hättest, wenn jemand dich auf die Tür geschlagen hat. Nein, ich meine in dem Kontext, wenn ich mich in den Wäldern befinde und etwas höre, dann werde ich abgeholt.
The party?
And she's out walking around. Have you seen people make approaches while she's grocery shopping? They're asking for her side of the story and she's running away from interviewers.
Can you send that to me? Because I don't know how to spell. Dude, is that what Bigfoot is? Just a hairy giant?
Wow. Ich habe das gegessen.
Oh ja.
Don't ruin it for me.
Ley line.
Talk about ley lines, Corey. Energetic crossover points where a ton of supernatural anomaly happens. Some sort of energetic connection to a different dimension at a fixed point.
Like very blatantly balanced. Dude, if there were like two of them, I'd be like... Yeah, that's cool. That's possible.
Yeah.
Die Geschichten der Gianten und Star People sind so üblich oder vielleicht sogar mehr üblich als die universalen Flüchtlingsgeschichten. Also es ist wie, Mann, wenn du, wir sagen das immer, aber wenn du das hältst, musst du das andere glauben.
Or like the Congo. Why that swamp is 80% unstudied.
Chaos.
MS-13-Gangs. Oh, wirklich? Gewaltige Gangs.
Der Gefängnis?
Yeah.
I know, but then... It's me and Andy. Time travel gets invented in a few years.
Yeah. Don't forget Lucifer masquerades as an angel of light.
Dude, I have two stories, but I feel like I should save them. Okay. For Patreon. All right. I want to talk about the Black Eyed Children, too.
Whenever.
Neurodivergenz.
I don't love that you took my bit, but that was cool. What was your bit? That I show a real... You kind of jumped the gun a little bit.
Das klingt so wie Aryan. Das ist es, worauf ich komme.
Ja. Sie haben die Hormondisruktion von Plastiken und Wasserbotteln beurteilt.
Golly. Anyways, let's talk more about this on Patreon.
This is what I go. I'm going to tell you a story about skinwalkers. It's going to freak you out. And that our friends Kyle and Cameron with expanded perspectives, I'm going to plagiarize one of their stories about another skinwalker that someone actually saw from a distance.
The halftime show.
Yeah. What if the...
Yeah.
No way.
Stop.
And he's like, what? You'll get it.
Oh, gosh.
No, I can't. You're the only one. I can't.
Oh, my gosh. How did it get worse?
I don't want to. I did a little bit.
Come on. Oh, my gosh. Oh.
Hey! Nice job! Dude, I had full faith that that would get, like, weaker. That is not weak. Dude, it's perfect. It wakes you up.
Yeah, I hate it.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I see strange clouds.
Haven't seen that movie.
You're lying. Dude. Pocahontas? I don't watch movies.
Without skin. Oh my gosh.
Yeah. Yeah, that would hurt.
Ooh. Don't click it.
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. You feel a little angry today? I feel sleepy in my head. Sleepy and tired of the brain. Alright.
It's like, Hey, come on, man.
Yeah, we'll see what we got.
I don't know who MS-13 is.
This is so weird.
It's a fan meetup. You have to bring your own poster. Give us the bones. Give us the bones.
Yeah.
Thanks. Sometimes you do.
Get some water, pal.
It was rad.
A little onesie.
I'm a little tired. If you're being...
She did not.
Because today's question... Andrew's tripping. Hold on. I'm just going to keep going. Keep going. Because today's question... The fact that you guys are so consumed with... Buzzing?
That can't be right.
Riddled.
Hey, Andrew, schnapp uns mit dem Beat. Schnapp uns mit dem Beat.
It's Andy's birthday! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday, dear Andy! Happy birthday to you!
Ow. That hurt. Dude, easy. What is this?
I don't need women's.
I'm interested. Hit me up with that magic mind.
You take the gummies with the Magic Mine? The drink, I promise you, it's like... It got rid of my afternoon slump.
So if you go to magicmind.com forward slash ninja and use the code ninja20, you get 20% off your subscription or 50% off your 10-day subscription.
Don't gargle it because it bubbles up.
Yeah. Very mellow.
And he's currently working on my back. We got about, what would you say, like 45% done? Show it, show it.
Yeah, trampoline stamp.
Yeah, so we got to finish that today.
Hey, there it is. But it is covering up or distracting from my dollar bill sign brand on my lower back. It's not covering up though, right? It's a little bit. Yeah.
What isn't?
Just live a little. When I was little, I used to get the glow sticks and then cut them open and do it all over my room. I'm like, this is so cool. And there's glass inside of it.
We've only called it once and it was because Jane got like, I think it was like a Some essential oil, but I forget what kind of, it was like rosemary or something. That can like, really, that could kill you. That's a lot. There's some spicy ones. Yeah, but we figured out she just put it in her mouth and just goes. So she didn't chug it or anything.
Yeah. And then she tried. Pouring it down her mouth to see like, swallow it if you like it.
Yeah. Great. Speaking of essential oils though. Totally. Let's talk about some aliens. Oh. We talked about it last week too. But I feel like it's just, it's the time and season to talk about aliens. It is the season. Happy aliens. They're going to probe you. I saw this one thing. Well, one, did I talk about alien investigation last?
But there's different stuff from it that I wanted to talk about. For sure. So have you seen how there's like these like cow mutilations and stuff like in the West? I've heard about that. Actually, not even in the West, like all over, all the country, all over the world. It's like cows, horses, livestock in general. Yeah. It's bizarro.
Great barrier reefer.
So basically what happens is these farmers go out and these cows are missing different parts of their bodies. So like their tongue, eyes, ears, private parts. But it's like it's like they call it like laser incision. Like it's so perfect. Surgically precise.
Yeah. But then the craziest part is all of their blood has been drained. Yeah. And there's no blood around the cow. That's terrifying. Yes. That's straight out of Dexter, dude. That's wild. And what's also crazy is every single farmer that they interviewed about this stuff, when that cow is dead, they just leave it there, you know, because they have like thousands of acres.
Did you see that? I don't know if it was the Great Barrier Reef. I think it may have been, but it's the world's biggest coral reef, and it is not dying, but it's actually thriving.
Nothing's eaten into it. No. Nothing eats it.
Whoa. No scavengers, no vultures, nothing.
So what is it? They said one, this cow, it literally just like over time, it looked like it just melted into the ground.
Yeah. All over? All over. And this one farmer that they interviewed, he's like, what do you think it is? And he's like, aliens. What else could it possibly be? Can you explain that? He said, well, two days before, I think he had a total of like four bulls or something within the time span of like a couple months that all this stuff happened.
But before that happened, he said he was on his front porch during the day. And sure enough, there was like, I think it was like a triangle UFO. And they're like, are you sure it was a UFO? And he's like, sure enough to where I called my wife or told my wife to get the gun and I was shooting at it.
And he was like, it was in his front yard. And he just like grabbed the gun and was like, pop, pop, pop. Yeah, freaking them out. And then it just disappeared. Nothing happened to it, and it just disappeared. And then the next couple of days, all these cows are just like, it's bizarre.
One of them, it was just sitting up like this, just like laying on its stomach just like this with its mouth open. And it's like bottom cheeks gone.
Yeah, that's a good point.
It's weird. But also he said that UFO, he said it was over his field. And when it left, it left like a ring in his field. And ever since then, the grass in this circle grows way faster than all the grass around it.
It's bizarre.
If I mean, if the reproductive organs, that's also what they always harvest.
Well, they're all bulls. Darn. Yeah.
I also was watching the Missing 411, that documentary. So scary. And I think it has two or three documentaries out. One of them was specific on like alien encounters or UFO encounters. We talked about one, I believe it was either Montana or Idaho or something. And this group of Hispanic workers were working on a, I believe a house or
middle of the day and this triangle ufo comes out there's a herd of elk in the valley the ufo comes over literally this elk goes and it just flies off with this elk while it's hovering and it freaked all the workers out and they're like we're not talking about that and finally they like someone came to them like interviewed them and there was at least 10 plus dudes that all saw it
So it wasn't just one dude like, yeah, I saw an elk fly off.
So they did a CGI illustration of what is happening in the back country of Brazil.
Yeah, but this is what I guess they're all describing. This is what a lot of people are reporting, like this orb flying down and just following cars. That would be the most terrifying thing. How do you get away from it?
You're going to have to leave. Dude, Brazil seems like a hot spot, though. Yeah, what's up with that? They also talk about an alien investigation. It was in the, was it the 80s or 70s? This is the craziest story. Is there a bug? The orb, dude. It's irritating me so much.
Yeah. Sweet. But this thing, I'm not going to say it in Portuguese because... Please.
Abracado Prato. Perfect. It's in Italian. Huh? Whatever. It means operation plate. Or they also call it operation, I think, flying plate. Yeah. But what happened, this town in this village in Brazil, like northern Brazil, were just terrorized by UFOs for months. And to where people were actually attacked. And they interviewed two of the ladies that were attacked.
And they basically said that they're walking and all of a sudden they saw this UFO. A beam of light hit them and then a burning sensation on their chest and like a laser scoptic, like literally removed skin from their flesh, like a perfect circle and stuff. And then it took off. And I think a couple of people actually died during these things. Oh my goodness, dude. But it was so secretive.
And the Brazilian government at the time was basically ran by like a dictator. And so they sent the military to this village and they were stationed there for months. And there's just so many reports of like at night in the ocean, there would be hundreds of different shaped UFOs just going, out of the water. Dude, what is happening there?
The idea of this underwater nuclear bombing.
Dynamite stuff. But yeah, so it was so secretive, Operation Plate, that no one knew about it until the dictatorship got dissolved and the new democracy came into Brazil or whatever. Yeah. And the CIA came down and collected all of the information on an operation plate and brought it back to him. But they interviewed a fisherman. I don't know.
He was a ferry guy, a guy who drives a ferry, like the boat. Ferries are real? Gotcha, gotcha. No way. And they interviewed him, and he said he would bring these military personnel to this one island where they had an observation area. place or whatever where they would observe. And they were so freaked out by what was happening. They gave this civilian boat driver a gun. Oh man.
They said, take this gun just in case. Yeah. But he said there was also, um, us military with the Brazilian military at that time as well. And it's like, it's the most like well known, documented, biggest encounter, so many eyewitnesses, and we still don't know everything about it because the CIA now has it, and it's still, I think, technically classified. Interesting. It's crazy, though.
Flying Plate.
But it reminds me of Tim Albarino's Face Peelers. Oh, Peru, yeah. With the laser cutting. Dude, it's the same thing.
a person is that I don't know it's weird dude that's it like I truly believe that the majority like that I feel like the majority of UFO UAP sightings interactions are human yeah and that's why it's so secretive within the US government because it off as being aliens because they've been probably doing tests literally since the 40s you know who's the only safe people from these laser attacks
It's weird, dude.
I do encourage you guys to watch Alien Investigation on Netflix.
Really well done documentary. And it's not like, you know, like the, I like Discovery and like History Channel. They do like Finding Bigfoot or Finding Sasquatch. And they just never find anything. And it's just like, they just drag it on for years. Dude, they were drilling it down in this documentary.
George Knapp.
Yeah.
I think Bigfoot freaks me out more than the thought of aliens for some reason.
Yeah. Oh, wow. It's there, dude.
Like there's like, there's just the thought of like, cause there is, I would say more proof or like visual proof of like a Bigfoot than an alien. You know, like you don't really see pictures of aliens.
You see like, yeah, you see UFOs and UAPs.
Maybe. Evidence nonetheless. What would you do if you're walking in the woods and you came across Bigfoot? Yeah.
I don't understand how that... That's what a lot of people report. They're like... How does that make sense? With aliens and even with like angels and stuff, that it's like they're speaking to me and then they notice that their mouth isn't even moving. So it's a very audible... Okay, so it does sound... But it's in your head. Got it.
I will say if I walked up, if you're walking in the woods and there's a Bigfoot and a gray alien, I would be much more afraid of the gray alien.
Daddy Bigfoot. Oh, but, oh, do you know that, speaking of Bigfoot, we gotta let you go anywhere!
wow that was so fun i didn't realize cory could do that yeah it's a new new skill that is so cool i loved it i didn't know anyone could do that i don't think it's i think it's the first time yeah it's a big deal that's a big deal you know what time it is it's um did you know that um question go ahead
You made me look like a fool.
Let's see if she does it.
Oh, here's Lily.
We'll call you back. Hold on. Oh, poor guy. Here we go. We'll do two questions. Yeah. Two questions.
What? Yes.
Oh, silk.
Perfect. Love you.
What would your five items be?
Five is a lot. Yeah. Let's do three. Okay. Okay. Mountain Dew. Yeah. A hat. A hat. Yeah. And fanny pack. Okay. That's good.
Yes. Yeah. There you go. Okay. Plenty of cupcakes.
All right, Andrew.
Can of spam.
Surfboard. Ooh, what's the last one? Guitar.
Yeah.
All right, Corey, you're obviously skateboard.
Um, some type of like white propaganda. Yeah, definitely.
that when you die you can have your tattoos removed and they dry out your skin and then they put it in a frame yeah so that's what you and dude you have to do that now taylor's like i want to do this when i die i'm like that is the creepiest thing ever dude dude imagine if i have just a wallet there's your arm tattoos dude there's there's like a betty boop this guy
This broadcast is broadcast and prodcast by the broadcast.
He was a sailor. That's creepy. Should we do a question with Alan? Let's do it.
Hey, so we need you to give us a question for our question corner.
Is this a lifetime deal? Like for the rest of your life?
Wait, so how long are you a carpenter ant? 30 minutes. 6 p.m.
Four hours is a long time.
You could be driving. A burglar could break into your home. You have to protect your family.
Everyone else is not.
But then you have to look out for, like, predators. Yeah. Like anything.
Anything.
Yeah, Andrew, I'm not seeing it. I'm very patient. Not getting anything on my side, pal. Dude one. All right, ready? Yeah. Three, two, one.
Well, that's interesting, too, because like you think of a cello doesn't have frets. Yep. Yeah. And they say that the cello is the closest resemblance of a human voice.
What the heck?
That's like the dress thing, remember? Yeah. Also, you know about that dress guy? No. You know what I'm talking about, right? The Starfire? No, the dress that was on the internet. The blue versus gold. Yeah, was it like black and blue or white and gold, I think, was it? Yeah. That guy that posted that picture originally murdered his wife recently.
We can talk about me. Do you want to hear the craziest coincidence? And I thought it was fake when I first saw it, but then I looked it up and it is true.
Do you know how fast light is, like the speed of light?
Okay.
No. Oh. It's 2 million, or sorry, 200 million. Oh, just 299792458. Miles per hour? Miles per second. Very fast. Yeah. Do you know what the coordinates to the Great Pyramid of Giza are?
The exact same coordinates for the Great Pyramid of Giza is the exact miles per second of the speed of light.
No, Janie still has pneumonia.
I think it's pretty planned. Yeah. Yeah.
And it's going to destroy the entire coast.
Like what? How does gravity bend light?
Did you know light from the sun takes... I think it's like seven or eight minutes to reach Earth?
No, it's like seven minutes.
I mean, that's exactly what would happen. Yeah. But... that's crazy about the color thing of just like how unique it is to like humans.
Um, reading that book, imagine the God of heaven, people that have these NDEs near death experiences when they are in the presence of God and like they, they describe, they see like millions of different new shades of color that they can't even express or like put into words. And like they've never seen this color before. Yeah. And that's just wild to me.
So it's just like, because we are imperfect, you know, like we're made in God's image, but we are living in this world that is full of sin and that we're dying, you know. So it almost makes you wonder, like, I wonder if like Adam and Eve and like the early humans, like if they saw color more vividly.
Or at least before sin. Yeah, they had to have, yeah. And I think it's just, that's a rad concept. Like, how can you add more color?
Did you guys hear about this church in Switzerland? No. No.
This is the beginning of the end of the world. There's this church or chapel in Switzerland called St. Peter's Chapel. It's not a permanent thing, but for confessionals or for your confessions and stuff, they have an AI-powered hologram of Jesus that you confess your sins to. There's no way that could go wrong. Right?
People have described it as having, like, when they do it, they're saying it is an amazing spiritual experience. And it's like, no.
Yeah, and then the church said that it's not a permanent thing, but they say similar chatbots could one day take some of the responsibility of church pastors in the future. Oh, my gosh.
There's like hard lines. But the weird dilemma is having AI write your sermon, like your full sermon.
People say you use it as a tool, right? AI. But like, what if... what if it's a bad tool?
What happened was the Pokemon Go was all fake, right? In the sense that this company made Pokemon Go to collect the largest range of basically GPS in the world. And so they collected all the data. Now they have the number one GPS program because they just had people. They mapped absolutely everything.
That was the sole purpose of Pokemon Go was to just map out these cities. That was their intention from the beginning?
Let's go back to the old days where I could have two families.
Speaking of spreading love more, I was telling you about this the other day. This is wild. Speaking of things that the government's doing, this is the first time this has ever happened to me living in Florida. It was nine o'clock at night. It was like maybe two or three weeks ago. And we just put the girls down. And for 30 minutes, I heard plunges. Just like for 30 minutes.
It sounded like they could hit our roof.
But there had to have been 10. just were they planes or helicopters planes okay and then on ring uh the neighborhood ring thing people were like yo what's up with these planes and turns out they were spraying for mosquitoes But for 30 minutes from planes and I'm like, okay. Hey, guess what?
They were flying over my house, and I did not give them permission to do that.
Just breathe in it. That's probably why Jane's had pneumonia for 20 months.
Yeah, yeah. I mean, they did.
Yeah.
Hey, Corey, you want a song?
I did see that the other day driving to work. Oh, you saw it?
I don't know.
Pretty soon.
I mean, that makes sense.
You said you had a story for us.
Is there any connection to the Montauk Project? I don't know. Where's Montauk? New York.
I was like really bummed.
The third one from the bottom looks like it has a beak.
Yeah. Well, yeah, I mean, that's what I thought of, like, how it talked about just at that time with, like, the Watchers and –
nephilim stuff how they would like literally crossbreed these just animals and animal human like just creepy stuff so yeah it makes you wonder is like are they like doing that now like a like a weird crossbreeding they're trying to make mermaids and that's what's popping up
What'd you hear about that? How people that in the Northern states, there's like Tennessee and stuff where they're getting, these people are getting bit by these ticks and they're becoming allergic to eating meat. Yeah.
That's so dude, that would mess me up, man. That's weird. I mean, that's, they're saying it's like a genetically modified tick.
I've heard about that. And it's causing people to literally become ill if they eat meat.
Come on. Why do we got to do that?
is he just kind of seems sometimes like a villain i know i don't know him personally i don't know what he is like but a lot of stuff that he does seems very like villain like is this where we insert our this is for entertainment purposes this is yeah this is the comedy podcast after all speaking of animals Have you ever seen a sewer slug? Dude, is that real or is that AI?
I thought it was AI at first too.
Called the Tempe Sewer Slug. Tempe. Which sewers are they located in? I think this one, I thought I saw someone say that this was in London. Oh, good.
Let's do, let me do this real quick. It's not okay. It's very. Very not. It's very terrifying. Where'd you send it? That chat. Chat, chat. It's going to be the worst thing ever. It's rare to see a tempeh sewer slug so large.
Yeah, I mean, I don't think there's audio.
I hope it's fake.
You think?
You can usually tell. His eyes kind of seem dead. The man's eyes.
He could be depressed, too.
Welcome to our new game show. Let's call it AI. I'm calling it depression.
You kidnapped.
He said, he said I needed to teach him a lesson.
Nope.
But you saw the interview with the guy, right?
Yeah. Well, he was like an Indian guy. So he'd like his Indian Australian accent.
Super funny. So funny.
Yeah, I would have lost it. Speaking of stealing things and children, did we talk about this last time? Everything is blurring together. Did you hear about the Philippines and how they had four typhoons, like their version of a hurricane, back to back within 10 days?
The last one, number four, was a category five hurricane. Are they okay? Within 10 days, four. Boom, boom, boom, boom. I don't know if they're okay. I was going to ask again. I was like, please tell me they're okay. I don't know.
Yeah, I think it's a pretty rare weather event. Yeah. The wind's crazy. It'll just be dead silent, and then just like... Like... 200 mile per hour wind. That's what it does. I think I hit the camera. I didn't mean to throw it that hard. Is Andy's angle still good? I had totally hit that camera. All right. Yeah. Yeah.
So it was like that with the Philippines, the Washington, it just seems weird, man. The weather events are getting very strange for this late in the year.
Dude, it's being neglected right now. All the news and stuff, they're not reporting on North Carolina anymore. And nothing's changed. It's still just a complete bomb went off there.
That's insane. I don't know how you do that. Speaking of bombs going off, did you hear about all these European countries handing out – They're issuing war survival guides to the citizens. Cool. So I think it was Switzerland or Sweden. I need one. Like literally a booklet. They handed out 10 million to their citizens of preparation. Where at exactly? It was either Sweden or Switzerland.
But I think a couple of European countries are doing it. Just like, okay, well, it's probably going to happen, so get ready. Well, let's talk about it. So they...
Yeah, Ukraine did it the other night.
Yeah, deep into Russia.
missile.
What's the next step here? I forget his title or whatever, but he basically said he threatened a nuclear war before Christmas.
It's like, come on. Who did? The guy from Russia. Putin? No. No.
I don't know what his title is.
Hey, here's something that happened last night when this comes out. It'll be a while ago. But last night it says Russian Federation strikes Ukraine with purported ICBM, which is intercontinental ballistic missile. First time in military history. So it's basically a missile that can carry a nuke head on it. And it didn't have a nuke on it, but they struck Ukraine with it.
And this is the first time it's ever happened in history.
It's the trippiest looking thing. It looks like an alien attack.
I can't send it through.
Oh, wait, maybe I can. I definitely can't. I'm like an old man right now. Farts. Give me one second. I'm so sorry. Dude, this is awesome.
18.
Just scroll through the video. So this is the ICBM, and apparently it says the missile has sub warheads that strike separately during the approach. Oh. So in this video, you see several arrivals.
Just a city.
Look how fast those are, dude. Gosh, dude. Go to the next one. It looks like a UFO, bro. That's so scary, dude. Like, that's insane, insane.
Yes. Let's continue this conversation over on Patreon.
Surely she does. Yeah. And go to Sunday Cool Swag for all your Ninja merch. And yes. Do you know Corey actually designs a lot of our stuff?
Yeah, he did our Godzilla, Bigfoot. He did our AI robot. AI fighting or, yeah, man fighting robot. And we got some more ideas in the bank. The Fat Earth Society. Oh, yeah. Basically, the coolest designs that are up there. Corey is the man.
Austin Conway. Austin Conway. Austin Conway. All right. We love you guys. Love you guys.
You do it.
Fun fact, the guy who invented the Pringles can... Almost. His casket is shaped as a Pringle can. Wow. His casket? Please tell me that's real. Oh, that's awesome.
Everyone be quiet. I know that song was really good and it was dynamite. And... I hope that we can have a fun day today, but just going off of this question, I don't know if we can. I don't know if we can, Corey. I don't know if we can, Andrew. Andy, I don't know if we can. This question, it affects just everyone, everyone. And I don't, I'm scared of it. I'm worried. I'm worried. I'm frightened.
Today's question sent in by viewer.
No, no, no. Okay, okay. Hold on. Time out. Corey, this is actually a little concerning because... This is quite the revelation. Obviously, we're talking about the ancestors that helped free slaves. Yeah. And that were part of the civil rights movement. Absolutely. And that participated in ending the wars. That invented vaccines. That invented vaccines. That invented the x-ray machine.
Invented peanut butter. Invented peanut butter. But you're saying we should forget them?
Forget about it.
And he's just giggling over there.
The old cis white male. Nice.
Yeah, who needs women's?
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
It's the entanglement.
You guys are so mean.
Listen, bird woman! Listen, bird lady!
What is that?
Really? He's showing everyone.
It's not working.
Oh my goodness. What the heck?
Purple.
Hmm?
Yeah. Okay.
Guys!
Stop it. Children, don't do that. Don't do that. Stop.
It's like...
Yeah.
It's not.
Wow.
Yeah.
What?
Yeah.
Why did you do that?
My Rona.
Vladimir Putin. Vladimir Putin. I'm conflicted Called to love you Makes me sick of it How can I get out of your head? How can you get out of my mind? Vladimir Putin all the time Vladimir Putin Vladimir Putin riding bears in the dark without a shirt Vladimir Putin
Vladimir Putin Take my hand I look at you I love you man Vladimir Putin I love you cause I have to Jesus has called me to love Vladimir Putin And all the other bad guys Whether you're right or left, we all love each other Vladimir Putin, Vladimir Putin Vladimir Putin, Vladimir Putin Vladimir Putin
I know. It's got me excited. Assemble. It's got me really excited.
All right, everybody, welcome to The Charlie Kirk Show. Andrew Colvett in for Charlie Kirk, who is with Vice President J.D. Vance today. We have a phenomenal conversation off the heels of the Caroline Leavitt White House press briefing. The first of many from her. We welcome constitutional scholar, legal expert, John Eastman to the show to talk about birthright citizenship.
Now, I want to take this to our current day. Do you expect the current Supreme Court, including Amy Coney Barrett and all of this, will they support the president's EO or do you expect there to be a split court or ruling against this?
Well, yeah. And you've got to imagine that the 14th Amendment framers, the drafters of that amendment, had no idea that even air travel was going to be a thing. They had no idea that human beings were going to be able to crisscross the earth as they do now. And finally here, John, I just want to give you a second to react to this blizzard of activity from President Trump.
I know you've been with him in very intimate settings. What do you make of it? The floor is yours. Yeah, no, it's shock and awe.
John Eastman, thank you for your time. Thanks for being flexible with us today. God bless you, sir. And we got your back.
So without further ado, John Eastman, Senior Fellow at Claremont Institute. and all things constitutional scholar, legal scholar. We're so honored to have him. Welcome, Mr. Eastman, to the show. Thank you, Andrew, for having me on and give my regards to Charlie. I will. I will.
Let's go through this Caroline Leavitt presser. Um, let's just go ahead and play cut 95. The first.
on President Trump and this administration's odds of success at the Supreme Court?
Now, first, before we get into birthright citizenship, which you have written extensively about, I think your writings on it are the most clear-minded and detailed I have seen out there. So I wanted to bring you on for that. But please tell us about your legal defense. Throw that URL up there.
Yeah, I'm worried you might be right. I find that disheartening. Let's go ahead and play cut 96.
All right, so I'm going to respond to this, but I think this is massive, massive news. And as somebody that Part of my job is working with mainstream news media, legacy news media. For those who don't know, I serve as the spokesman for Turning Point when Charlie's not available or chooses not to participate. So I have to interact with these people a lot.
And I will just tell you that there is a huge amount of them that are wildly unimpressive and that have their job simply because they've climbed through a pecking order and towed the party line. There's editorial constraints involved. For example, you have to call January 6th an insurrection at some of these outlets.
You have to say that the 2020 election was the most secure election in the history of elections. These are things that they are forced to say in print or on air at many of the legacy news media outlets. That is wildly out of step with the people that just elected Donald Trump as their 47th president. So there is a fundamental disconnect between the people
and the news agencies and the news outlets that are allowed into that room, or at least historically. Caroline Leavitt is blowing up an old paradigm. It needed to be blown up. It needed to be reset. It needed to be reformulated. I, for one, am all for it. I think Joe Rogan should be in that room. I think Russell Brand should be in that room. I think Charlie Kirk should be in that room.
You are, of course, a victim of political persecution and prosecution for daring to represent the president. Gibsengo.com slash Eastman. Please give us an update really quick.
And if Charlie doesn't want to do it, me or Blake will do it for him. But I'm so thrilled that we already have a Turning Point USA White House correspondent. She's a true journalist, a real cut in the mold of truth and honesty, integrity. Yes, she has a POV, but don't for a second think that these other journalists don't have a POV because they are absolutely water holders of the regime media.
They have been an enemy of the people because they have been an enemy of truth. Now, I don't want to say they need to be arrested. Some of you in the audience will disagree with me on that. I'm simply saying that it is time for the scales of coverage and justice and truth to be rebalanced. And this is a fundamental step in the right direction. This was just a mic drop moment. I'm going to play.
This is Caroline Leavitt on illegal immigrants. One of the themes from this was that legacy news media cared so much about illegal immigrants. They call them undocumented migrants. Well, that is a... sleight of hand trick that they use to make you feel compassion for people that broke our laws and are not here under our welcome. They will be removed. Caroline Levitt made that very clear, 97.
Blake, your thoughts on Caroline's mic drop moment. Pretty cut and dry, as I would see it.
Yeah, I think that's right, Blake. And I want to go back to what you just said, this assertive tone, this change. You saw this also with the J.D. Vance interview with Margaret Brennan at CBS over the weekend, where he said, you know, frankly, Margaret, I don't care. I don't give a damn with some of the memes that were coming out. Let's go ahead and play. I believe it was this cut, cut two.
Well, it didn't have that line, but it was still very, very good. You know, Peachy Keenan, who's come on this show actually recently because her house almost burned down in Los Angeles.
She made a really interesting point, Blake, about that look that legacy news media, that look that Margaret Brennan, where she kind of, it's just an elitist smug tone where they try and get in like a point and sneer at you.
And it's basically like this, her observation with it, this is a look that these, you know, elitist journalists have been giving conservative politicians, leaders for a long time. And it basically says, you're so dumb, like, You don't deserve to be here. And it's worked for years. And that's why I think this tone shift is so powerful.
When we talk about what this is doing to the culture, we are seeing a re-ascendance, a re-emergence of this powerful masculine energy that wants to protect the country. And we won't be cowed by these women anymore.
Blake, I don't even want to play the clip. The floor is yours. Take a bow on the UFO thing, and I want to get into eggs. All right? Okay. All right. Yes!
All right.
Blake was right. All right. Blake was right. We'll give it to you, Blake. All right. We're going to move on to the eggs thing because, yes, you take the bow, Blake. The eggs thing I think is actually hilarious because I think it's a big self-owned admitting that they are in fact losing on every single front. So what is the left doing?
They're like, well, Trump's been in office for six, seven days and he hasn't lowered the price of eggs. So like, I'm sorry, but if that's what you're clinging to and you spent the last four years defending how high the price of eggs has gone, I think you should sit this one out. But let's go ahead and play the clip. Looks like, yep, clip 101. This is Caroline Levitt setting the record straight.
This is an issue that is going to be heating up and I believe is an open and shut constitutional case. But our country has gone afoul from that. Where did it come from? What were the original drafters of that amendment thinking when they wrote it?
Well, and what she doesn't mention there is the fact that 100 million chickens... were killed because of an outbreak of avian flu, bird flu. So the whole point here is these are adversarial media. We get it. They're going to try and play gotcha games with her. But there's really no gotcha to be had.
The price increase that you're seeing in eggs right now was a process set in motion by the previous administration, both inflationary pressures and spending, but also because a lot of birds have been killed that lay eggs. Therefore, the supply has gone down. The price is going to go up. Now, whether or not Trump can fix that, you know, remains to be seen.
I would think there's some things we can do. But, you know, growing 100 million new and raising 100 new chickens to lay eggs is going to take a little bit of time. But Blake, just just react to the fact that their best thing. I mean, this is like Harry Sisson, that Parker kid. They're all posting about eggs online. They think it's like this big own on President Trump. Is that really all they have?
All right, Blake, last question. Give the first week of the Trump administration a grade.
Mr. Contrarian.
They're going to do their thing. Oh, it's perfect. I'm going to get a t-shirt made for the audience. As a matter of fact, you get that at charliekirk.com slash store coming out soon. Thanks so much for listening, everybody. Talk to you soon. For more on many of these stories and news you can trust, go to charliekirk.com.
Well, I mean, we have your back 100 percent, John. And what they tried to do to you is just unconscionable. And on behalf of a nation that is healing and I think ascendant once again, we we you know, we have your back and we we're just you know, I apologize on behalf of of all of us what you've had to endure. And you're a great American and we have your back.
So, John, you know, you have written and go ahead and throw this graph. fundamental misunderstanding of the 14th amendment. Now, this was one of the president's executive orders right out the gate. I a hundred and a thousand percent agree with this executive order, but this was instantly challenged. I believe in Seattle, there was a press briefing right after.
And one of the quotes was that this judge had never seen such a brazenly unconstitutional executive order in his time serving on the court. So I found that laughable, John. Now, you are the expert here. I want you to walk our audience through in the time we have with you. Why is the 14th Amendment, why should it not apply to illegals? Frankly, it should go further than that.
But this executive order deals with illegal immigrants, the children they're of. So make the case, explain the history. The floor is yours.
why have we gone astray and do we have a chance of setting things right then i bring in blake neff to respond to all well not all of them there's a lot that happened but most of the best clips from caroline levitt's press briefing and a tone shift What we're seeing, the tone shift at the highest levels of our government is truly stunning. Join us at members.charliekirk.com. It's the place to be.
They were permanently domiciled here. You're talking about the case Wong Kim Ark. Right.
Well, and I want to pause on this, the Native American piece of this, because I think this does not get enough play in this debate. So the framers basically had a discussion about that of the 14th Amendment. There was a debate about this, and they basically said, of course they don't get citizenship.
There was actually a debate of whether or not they needed to add more language, and they basically said, of course not, because they're only partially the tribal nations at the time. So they did not benefit from this. So the question then becomes, why would they not be automatically made citizens by the 14th Amendment when they were clearly born on American soil?
And the answer lies in this distinction that you're making about partial versus complete jurisdiction, which is kind of a wonky in the weeds argument, but it makes all the difference in the world. And I think just looking on social media, I can tell that most of the rebuttals to these arguments, it's always like, well, of course they're subject to the jurisdiction of the United States.
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They're in the country, they're subject to our jurisdiction.
I want to go through a couple of facts here for you, John. Now, these are not as much in the legal... weeds here, but I just want everybody to understand the impact of granting automatic birthright citizenship to any child born on US soil. In 2023, there was between 225,000 and 250,000 babies born to illegal immigrants in the United States.
That's more than the babies born in all but two US states, if you take them individually. That's also more than the total number of babies born to legal non-citizens. So we have a whole category for legal citizens. is not as much as the babies of illegals. That's how big the problem has become.
Right now, there are reports, especially within the Indian community, of mothers lining up for preterm C-sections to beat President Trump's February 20th cutoff date. That's right. They're lining up. Some of these mothers are as early as seven months gestation. This is verified reporting. France, New Zealand, and Australia have all abandoned birthright citizenship in the past few decades.
Ireland was the last country in the European Union to follow the practice, and they ended it in 2005. So they call it, you know the pronunciation better than I, but it's jus soli, which is kind of the old Latin term for it, the legal term. It was a tool that was used by colonialist to incentivize settlers to the new world.
That's why if you look at the map right now, most of the countries that have birthright citizenship are in the Western Hemisphere. But a little bit seedier version of that reading is that it was used to displace native populations in the new world. It was trying to bring settlers from the old world to the new to displace those people and to create a new civilization.
They want to break the systemically racist cultural back of America is what they see of it. So my point to you is this is not some in the weeds thing. This is having a fundamental cultural, civilizational, legal impact here and now.
I've never heard that point made, John, and that's really, really profound. And actually, the framers of the Constitution never actually defined citizenship. So the point that's very interesting here is that the 14th Amendment, during the debates, they say, this is going to clarify this once and for all of who can be a citizen and who cannot be.
And it's just amazing if you read back into the writings of that time, it's rather sparse, but they're very clear. Of course, this would not include foreigners. Of course, this would not include people that owed allegiance to other nations, including Indians. It was specifically to right the wrong of slavery and the children born of slaves and to rectify that historic wrong.
It was not to reward people who broke our laws. And I believe that the language is very clear in that. And I want to give you a chance to respond about The 1866 Civil Rights Act, for example.
Hey everybody, welcome to the Charlie Kirk Show. Andrew Colvett in for the one and only Charlie Kirk. President Trump calls his first cabinet meeting, followed by an amazing press conference. We have Chip Roy to break down the newest information out of the House budget fights. And I analyze what we see in that press conference from President Trump. Absolutely phenomenal stuff.
Everybody, welcome to the Charlie Kirk Show. Andrew Colvett in for the one and only Charlie Kirk, who's on assignment today. Honored to be with you in the Phoenix studio, live across the nation. President Trump has just convened his first cabinet meeting. He's been talking about the border, about Doge. It's ongoing right now, so we're going to toss right to it to check in with it.
President Trump is a tour de force. He's doing a phenomenal job. And it's just amazing. There was some graphic going out this morning where he's taken over a thousand questions from the press. At this time in Joe Biden's presidency, it was like, you know, barely scratching, you know, in the dozens of questions. So I'll get that exact number for you.
But it is very shocking how President Trump is so adept at navigating the media. And the second term, too, he's just got this confidence about him. It's very calm. But without further ado, I want to bring in truly. Oh, there it is. Over one thousand and nine questions for Trump. One hundred forty one for Biden. Pretty remarkable within the first month.
And then, as you know, Biden went off a cliff as he declined steadily during his tenure in office. OK. Without further ado, I want to bring in Representative Chip Roy. There was a lot of action on the House floor last night. Congressman Roy, thank you so much for making the time here.
You are one of the leaders on this, what I call fiscal sanity, bringing, reining in this addiction to spending within the House. Congressman, genuinely, for Americans all across the country, thank you for being such a loud voice on this. Tell us what happened last night. Bring us up to speed. There was a lot of, you know...
OK, so you got to the heart of the matter where a lot of people talk about spending cuts. But what they really mean is reductions in the growth of spending. Now, we've heard a lot of talk about getting budgets back to pre-COVID levels on a very fundamental level. Why is that not every Republican in Congress' first instinct? I mean, the budget expanded. What happened to that money?
Where did it go? Why can we not get back to the $4 or $5 trillion a year spending? Just educate our audience in a very Washington way. Why can we not just simply say, hey, we didn't need that money the last couple years. We were happy with $4.5, $5 trillion worth of spending. Why can't we just go back?
Yeah. And I think you hit on a really important piece here. This is the Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security piece of it, the entitlements piece of it, which is considered political poison for anybody to try reforming it. Right. And I know we're going to try and focus on the waste, fraud and abuse that is certainly in in those programs. Just moments ago, President Trump commented on this.
Let's go ahead and play 181.
So he is adamant. We're not going to touch entitlements. I mean, I hate to put you on the spot here, Congressman, but earlier in that press conference, he said, we're going to balance the budget. And I have to assume that he's talking about balancing the budget through rooting out waste, fraud and abuse and growth. Because can you do it?
Can you can you balance this budget without touching entitlements?
Well, I think that's smart. And by the way, I do believe there's a lot of potential for growth, revenue growth. And Trump's announcing this gold card for $5 million. I actually think that's kind of smart, especially if we could sort of reform some of our other broken immigration policies. I want to give you the opportunity, Congressman Roy, What happens next in this budget process?
And I agree, these are some big wins. Putting that floor on spending that we can go higher is key. What happens next?
Well, Congressman, I know that you are one of the good guys in there fighting. Charlie has your back. We have your back. Thank you for all your hard work you're doing there. Cut more. Cut deeper. As Mr. Wonderful is telling Doge, we tell you the same thing. Thank you, sir.
Every time he holds a press conference, every time he jockeys with the press, it's something to marvel at and to analyze. There's much to discuss. Please, if this show means something to you, consider becoming a member at members.charliekirk.com. Also, check out Charlie Kirk's store.
I had a whole thing I was going to talk about, judges freezing executive orders on foreign aid, on refugee resettlement, and all that stuff is really important. I want to get to it at some point today if we can, but President Trump is genuinely the entrepreneur-in-chief. This is...
Unlike anything that our country has seen, I would argue this is unlike anything that our country has seen, even in the first Trump administration. Trump 2.0 is a different beast altogether. Yes, some of the ideas are the same. There's a consistent through line. Certainly he had the building blocks of what we're seeing now in place. But on a very real level, he is he's amplified.
He's he's peak of his powers now. And a lot of the ideologies and the ideas and the policies that were in Trump 1.0 have crystallized and they've become something more profound. I think he's got the confidence of knowing his ideas work. We talked about this with Mike Cernovich yesterday. I absolutely suggest that you go check out that conversation between Mike Cernovich and Charlie Kirk.
What makes the new right more powerful is we have a self-confidence, a swagger, understanding that these aren't just pie-in-the-sky notions about... Free trade versus fair trade and tariffs about peace through strength, how to use leverage on the international stage, why America has been taken for a sucker and a piggy bank by foreign oligarchs and even our allies in Europe and Canada and Mexico.
and reversing all of those. Now, the semblance of those ideas were present, but now they're crystallized and they are fully formed. And President Trump is executing those ideas with a confidence and a swagger that we have never seen at the presidential level. So it's one thing after the other. And when you watch him take these questions from the media, he doesn't get excited about
He doesn't get you can see that it doesn't get to him. It's not getting into it under his skin. You know, President Trump, his critics will say that he has a thin skin and that things easily get to him. I think he doesn't like putting up with BS. I like I think he likes challenging and punching down when a lie is spoken out loud. And I respect that. I actually admire that that quality in him.
But just look at the way he handles some of these questions. Cut 183. He's talking about cutting the size of government. He says we have grown bloated and fat and disgusting. That's a pretty remarkable thing to say. Cut 183.
He's talking about, obviously, Social Security and the people that are over 200 years old still getting, or at least registered. We don't know all the details. Maybe there is some database coding error that doesn't mean they're getting money. But we're going to find out. That's the main thing, is that we're unearthing these problems. We're going to get to the bottom of it.
Talks about the confidence in the nation. You can see he's saying this about the people of America, but he believes it internally. Play cut 184.
But we just had an amazing conversation with Rep. Chip Roy on our radio audience, and we're talking about how can you actually reduce deficits? How can you actually cut the size of government and get us back to a balanced budget, which is a repeat theme that you will hear out of this administration. You'll hear it out of Elon Musk. You'll hear it from Charlie Kirk. How do we actually get there?
And I want to say, yes, we have to deal with entitlements. There is Medicare and Medicaid reform that needs to happen without necessarily cutting anything that's legitimate. But when you look at President Trump and the way that he sells for America, whether it's mineral rights in Ukraine or Greenland or the Panama Canal. or bringing in all these investments.
There was another $24 billion investment this morning that was announced. There is the potential for growth. You talk about drill, baby, drill, taking the regulations off this economy, and the releasing, as some might say, the animal spirits of the economy. And I know I don't mean that in a pagan way.
I mean that in just sort of a masculine unleashing of the energies of the producer class of this country that is actually making things and building things, investing in the economy. I wouldn't bet against President Trump from being able to grow this economy at tremendous levels and to bring in extra revenue to actually balance this budget. And hey, you can always buy a $5 million gold card.
Help us get there. Thanks so much for listening, everybody. Talk to you soon. For more on many of these stories and news you can trust, go to CharlieKirk.com.
dot com for our newest merch lots of new stuff there our team is just doing a phenomenal job so that's members dot charliekirk.com be a member where you actually get some discounts to our merch which you can find at charliekirkstore.com buckle up here we go charlie what you've done is incredible here maybe charlie kirk is on the college campus i want you to know we are lucky to have charlie kirk charlie kirk's running the white house folks
President Trump has convened his first cabinet meeting. He is currently taking questions from the press, but so far he's talked about the gold card, which would be sort of like a green card plus, selling it for $5 million, sold to companies and rich individuals with a pathway to citizenship.
Apparently EB-5 has 250,000 people on the wait list, which requires something like a million dollars of investment in the country, but it's poorly financed.
supervised and regulated, talking about balancing the budget, talking about rare earth minerals in Ukraine, talking about polling of how many Americans think the country is on the right track versus the wrong track, getting questions about Taiwan, Gaza, and more. It's ongoing, so we're going to go ahead and throw back to that.
Hey everybody, Andrew Colvin in for Charlie Kirk one last time. I explained something that has not gotten enough attention on this, just how big and how important Charlie Kirk's college tours have become. And we're even seeing this play out in the protest world of the left and how Gen Z is not even showing up. Well, I happen to think Charlie has a big role to play in that.
I have to play this clip because it's just wonderful to watch CNN have to describe a victory at the Supreme Court for President Trump, 165.
So what they're trying to do there, Mike, is basically limit the fallout, right? They're helping their audience brace that, hey, this isn't all bad. The sky is not falling. Don't worry. This isn't a constitutional issue. We can still stop Trump. What do these, as you mentioned, four Supreme Court wins, what do these wins portend for the future of this judicial activism? Are we corner?
Or is there still a lot of battles left to fight?
All right, welcome back to the Charlie Kirk Show. Andrew Colvett in for the one and only Charlie Kirk. I want you guys to appreciate just how incredible it is, what the team has accomplished, what Charlie Kirk has accomplished, what the TPUSA field team has accomplished. I think we're doing about 20, 21, 22 different campus stops. right now during this semester.
That's what's key here. One of the best points I think that's being made and being brought up with these national injunctions is that at a lower district court level, the ruling should be limited to the parties named. It should not be extracted and extrapolated out to the national legal precedents because there's one court in the land that
in the Constitution that has national jurisdiction, that would be the Supreme Court. That's the only court actually in Article III. It says Congress can therefore then make other courts and designate other courts to handle other jurisdictions. But they serve at the sanctioning of Congress. So it's a fascinating legal discussion, Mike.
I want to know what of all of these suggestions that are being floated out there of how to reform the courts, which one you prefer, right? I mean, Senator Mike Lee has this idea that instead of judges, you get a random selection of three federal court judges that would then, so you don't get to pick, you just get assigned, right, in a lottery system. I think that's
fairly interesting because as it is right now, Mike, and I think you'd agree, one district court judge has more unilateral power than a Supreme Court justice because they have to rule one of nine. These guys get one of one. They have so much power and they shut everything down, grinds to a halt. So much is going on in the world.
Elbridge Colby, who we supported on this show, Charlie Kirk personally, just got confirmed by the U.S. Senate The only Republican to vote no would be Mitch McConnell. He is one of the luminaries of the national security brain trust in this country. He's been proven right time and time again, and he just got confirmed. Really excited about that.
Sometimes the logistics are such that we're just not able to have him in the studio or even remote to do a show and so we appreciate your guys' understanding of that and I just want you to see the fruit of it. The fruit is that these videos get cut up and seen by millions and millions and millions of people and in fact billions of views. There was
Talk about reform. There's a lot of ideas being floated about. There's legislation that's been offered forth by Senator Mike Lee and others. If you had a magic wand and you were going to fix this, how do you fix this judicial activism problem so that the left can no longer just judge shop and grind everything to a halt?
All right, I'm going to change gears here really quick, but that's a very thought-out answer, and I think we're going to clip it and make sure the right people get it because I think that was well thought through, Mike. But I'm going to change gears here really quick. There's a breaking story out of L.A., If you could throw up image 166 here.
A 43-year-old Mario Edgardo Garcia Aquino is accused of sexually assaulting and then murdering a 13-year-old boy. And it turns out he is an illegal alien from El Salvador. So he raped this little boy. Go ahead, 167. You can see his victim. and then murdered him, and now we find out he's an illegal alien. Mike, what do we got to do?
Yeah, he was a soccer coach, and so he was exposed to a lot of these young boys. It's really sick stuff. The L.A. County DA is charging Garcia Aquino with alleged sexual assault of another boy, 16, in February of 2024. So... What do we got to do to rein in these, one minute left, Mike, to rein in these sanctuary cities? What can be done? This has got to stop.
We estimate somewhere between 4.5 billion views if you count all the accounts that take the footage and rip it and they post it. And some people get upset about that stuff. We don't care. We just want more people to see these debates happen where young people are getting exposed to freedom ideas and conservative ideas.
I totally agree with that. We need to start making examples out of these people that are harboring illegal immigrants. I'm sick of the micro, the sob stories, the one-offs, this really good person here. It doesn't matter, okay? This is a macro problem. They're all criminals. Exactly. They all are criminals. They broke our laws to get in here. They gamed our asylum laws.
It's like this El Salvadorian guy that got sent to the prison in El Salvador who You know, he's an MS-13 gang member, but he got to stay because he made up some tribe story about how he'd be, you know, in physical harm if he went back to El Salvador. Anyway, we got to stop allowing those loopholes to happen. Mike Davis, excellent as always. Thank you, my friend.
Thanks so much for listening, everybody. Talk to you soon.
And it has a parallel because over the weekend, April 5th, there was this large nationwide protest called Hands Off. Now, it's a total bought and paid for, astroturfed sort of protest. But there's a clip going around that I wanted to play for you all, and I just think it's remarkable.
The clip is a young woman that is saying, hey, I'm here, and she's got her pro-Palestine headscarf on, and she's out there saying, hey, where is Gen Z? Why is Gen Z not in the streets protesting Elon Musk and Donald Trump?
We also welcome in Mike Davis to go through all of the big Supreme Court wins for President Trump. Folks, the tide is turning. Common sense is returning to our country and the Article II powers vested in the president. We break it down and much more. If this show means something to you, please consider becoming a monthly subscriber at members.charliekirk.com. Members.charliekirk.com.
So there's old people. You've got, like, Joan Baez and Neil Young are going to be headlining some protests coming up this week. And it just sort of begs the question, what happened to that youth rebel energy? Well, guess what? They're wearing MAGA hats now. Gen Z is not participating in this because they know it's a scam. They know it. It's baked into the calculus for them.
This is the same generation that was told the only way to succeed was to put yourself into mountains of debt and get a college degree, and that was a lie. They were told you're never going to own anything, you're always going to be renters, and you're going to love it, which is a lie. Young men were told that they were toxic. Lie. Young women were told they had to be boss babes.
and corporate slaves and childless and unmarried to be happy, freeze their eggs, another lie. Gen Z is part of this generation that has been demonized by older generations that came before them. And now, not you in this audience, you are the exception. If you are a boomer or old Gen Xer or silent generation listening to this, you're part of the good guys.
So this is not directed at you, but generally speaking, Older generations sold them out. You guys probably are not aware of what it feels like to be Gen Z if you're not in that generation. I'm not in that generation. I'm a millennial. But some of the same trends held true for me.
Gen Z has parents and grandparents that inherited a rich and powerful America, the envy of the world, and handed off to them a weakened country, a debt-riddled country with annual deficits in the trillions of dollars.
that's divided over race, ethnicity, whether or not there's two genders, and every other social science abstraction that they invented in a college laboratory that they graduated from without any debt now costs $75,000 or more a year to attend. They got to go into it. Debt is why we have YRefi as one of our partners on this show.
Because so many young people are in these mountains of debt that put off family formation, put off getting married, put off buying a home. And for what? They were sold a bill of lies. And so I love seeing Charlie out on these college campuses, changing the contours of the political movement in this country, a tectonic shift.
where everybody just assumed that young people were going to be liberal and progressive and radically so. And yet, of course, we've still got issues with young women. And there are still some radically progressive young people. It's not to say that the battle is over. And that's exactly why Charlie is going back out on the road.
You help keep the lights on for us and you get a lot of extra exclusive access to the show. merch, events, and so much more. That's members.charliekirk.com. Buckle up. Here we go.
It's exactly why, instead of resting on our laurels, Charlie decided, hey, it's time to hit the road again and double down and triple down. So these crowds, they're huge. And these clips get seen by millions and millions and millions of people. And this is something Charlie would not tell you, but I'm happy to tell you.
It probably feels a little bit braggadocious for Charlie to do it himself, but I will tell you this. There was a feature article in the New York Times that came out about a month ago, and it said how Charlie Kirk became the youth whisperer of the conservative movement, but really of the country.
And one of the facts that is hidden in that article that is just mind blowing is that the author of that article is a guy named Robert Draper, really celebrated famous New York Times columnist. He went and spoke to TikTok directly. And what he found out from TikTok was remarkable. First, Charlie is the most trusted voice amongst young people in the country. Two, Charlie
had the third most engaged TikTok in the country behind President Donald Trump, the Trump campaign, then Charlie Kirk, and then the Kamala campaign. So you guys are all a part of making this huge tectonic shift in our politics happen. And I just wanted to tell you that because I don't think he's willing to say that out loud himself, but it's a huge accomplishment.
So hats off to all the teams that play a part in that.
Without further ado, I have my friend and friend of the show, Mike Davis, joining us. Mike, welcome to The Charlie Kirk Show. Thanks for having me back on. So, Mike, you know, there's been a lot of hemming and hawing and consternation and gnashing of teeth on the right as President Trump's agenda has continuously been thwarted by activist judges, judge shopping.
We've seen a break in the dam, however, in the last two days. For our audience's sake, I think there's, you know, I think two big ones, but we could go deeper than that. Break down what has transpired in the last two days. How is it broken down at SCOTUS? And what does it mean for the Trump administration moving forward?
So I want to get into the Amy Coney Barrett. Now, we just heard Caroline Leavitt in the press conference was asked about this, whether or not the Trump administration was disappointed in in her ruling. Now, she sided with the three liberal justices in that. And actually, there's a picture going around the internet, I believe, that I sent it to you last night. Go ahead and throw up 142.
Some hay has been made about this, the group of four women. These were the against on this Alien Enemies Act ruling. Now, what do you make of ACB? She seems to be veering to the left. And I described it to somebody recently. I said, it's like she's basically a pro-life Democrat is kind of my read on her now. She's very Catholic, comes from Notre Dame.
Are you surprised at the way she's been ruling recently, Mike, or did you see this coming a mile away?
Charlie, what you've done is incredible here.
I think they're all legends in their own minds. They actually thought that all the Democrats would come with him as if Moses parting the Red Sea. Everyone just marches out.
I just want to know why it is that Mr. Snuffleupagus was escorted out. I just really don't know.
I think it's French. Charlie.
You do.
Don't say it. I'm just so... We lost Jack. This is Rachel the Great.
Dude, I could... I could talk about this for hours. It's it's it is a way that Democrats and people in Washington, D.C. and anyone who's been you guys have all spent time in D.C. recently. It's a way of indicating that you're on the same team as someone when you match this weird like totally see bicoastal inflection, but specifically one that travels between like the D.C. Georgetown area.
area where you are putting pronunciation on strange words and sometimes and then if you're chris hayes what you will do is at the end of every sentence you will then go up as you will say elon musk like you're getting scared as you're saying the word or something it's completely ridiculous The opposite of which, of course, is Tulsi Gabbard, who always goes down at the end of her sentences.
the npc mind only runs on what its last programming is so the msnbc um news talker who doesn't come up with their own minds themselves who doesn't write their own scripts she's scrambling because she doesn't have her producers in her ear telling her what to say and so she's thinking oh well the last time i've said anything positive about police officers It was directly to January 6th.
So she's just going right back to whatever the current standard programming model is for police officers. So you can't say police officer racist. You can't say police officer. Oh, they target black people because obviously it doesn't work here. So she's got to see police officer good. And that means, oh, January 6th. And then but then the problem is she takes it.
She just goes way too far down the line because she runs the entire program. What you're actually seeing here, this is very instructive into understanding the NPC model. The way the NPC works, the non-player character, is they're just running programs. And so she just runs the J6 program over. And I honestly guarantee you she doesn't even realize what she said.
so first of all charlie i think you hit the nail on the head in terms of the the macro not only is this a cap on a remarkable year in 2024 but also it's a cap on a remarkable four-year period in interregnum remember the last time president trump was giving a speech in this same chamber nancy pelosi was tearing it apart and throwing it on the floor
and now nancy pelosi is sitting up in the cheap seats crying this is a man who the entire world had written off this is a man who the entire dc power structure the power structure that you say they're assembled one of the only times all year that you'll see this by the way the three branches represented in one room there in the capital they said this man was done that trumpism was a fluke that maga was done that it would never return and yet
Just be clear, Trump never actually said the word honorary. So, I mean, I think DJ's on the job. That's full on. Well, it's an upgrade from what we've had in your place. That's commitment.
in really not that long at all it's right back but back in full dominating command and this was a command performance from president trump even the democrats were stuck simply reacting to him and i think one of the one of the key things that a lot of people are leaving out and
Do you guys see the Chinese government just now?
This is a bit more – I wouldn't derail it, but no, I think we have to call it out when there's responses like this because the CCP, the people's – People's Republic of China is usually a bit more restrained in their responses. The Chinese embassy in the U.S. tweeted out just as the speech was ending, if war is what the U.S.
wants, be it a tariff war, a trade war, or any type of war, we're ready to fight till the end. That's the Chinese embassy in the United States on X with their gray checkup.
I know folks will and it's already trending, of course, all over Twitter that people are talking about how they're all it's the stunt. The Democrats are performing stunt after stunt and trying to be disruptive and holding up placards and all this. But what it really comes down to it is, Charlie, the Democrats have no message. That's why they're resorting to stunts.
That's why they're trying to delay. They have no message. The things that President Trump are doing are popular. Their own polls indicate this. The American people widely support what he is doing. This election wouldn't have come down the way that it did, winning the popular vote, going seven for seven in the swing states. if they didn't actually want the things that he is currently doing.
And that's why the Democrats are sitting there flailing about because they are in absolute panic mode. They are demoralized. They're completely demoralized. And all they can do is basically sit there and jeer because they have no actual response to the work of the American people that's being done by President Trump, J.D. Vance, and yes, even Speaker Johnson.
Tyler, I was going to say, though, but this actually is typical of the neocon because the neocons all supported Saddam Hussein in his war against Iran. It was the neocons that totally supported the Mujahideen against the Soviet Union and completely funded and founded what later became the Taliban, as well as the early elements of al-Qaeda, the same elements of al-Qaeda that the neocons
and neolibs also to this day are supporting in Syria. So if you look at it from a different perspective, it also goes to show you that they will use and drop foreign actors at a whim. And that's because of this post-1990s The mentality that it's the end of history, the United States is the global hegemon. We can do whatever we want.
We don't need to actually uphold any relationships, which is funny because those are all the things that they blame Trump for because he'll like make an offhanded comment or something or have us or J.D. Vance will make a comment about the British and will say that he's destroyed relations.
when no it's actually been their failed leadership over the past 40 years that has put us in this position to begin with and their insanity of of as you say either you're working with someone one day and then you're vilifying them the next and then we expect them to think that we are rational actors when we seem the ones to who are kind of like the drunken sailors which i can say because i'm a sailor
um although i don't drink um like when we're the ones who are acting completely belligerently and we are the ones who are acting irrationally all the time yeah
The entire point of a national army is defending the nation. Unless you're actually being invaded. It's really simple. All right. Yeah. So this these simple like it's you get these weird like quasi libertarian, I call them conservatarian arguments from phrases that used to get said on talk radio in like the 2010s or even earlier than that. And it's like, guys, that's just not true.
Actual active duty army and Marines were used in L.A. riots in 1992. I mean, we've used the military for things all the time. OK, let's this idea that, oh, you can't do it. You can't do it. It's it's it's it's just not historically correct. Yeah.
150, 151.
Yeah, look, I really want to come back to the way the Democrats acted tonight, because I talk about this a lot.
I talk about how the importance of to the meta normie narrative out there, because people for a long time of the conservative right, these sort of old cons would think that it's about beating the Democrats in their beating, winning the argument, winning the debate or something like that, when it's really about winning over normies, winning over normies to your side.
And the person who wins over the normies wins the election. President Trump showed how to do that. resoundingly in 2023 with him at the helm of this incredible coalition that he put together. And what the problem is with that is the normies are only paying attention at certain times. They pay attention to the debates. That's why they're so important.
That's why Joe Biden was yanked after his first debate and someone tried to kill President Trump on national television. It's also why Kamala Harris couldn't really survive her debate. Tim Walz flamed out in debates, whereas J.D. Vance became a national figure in his debate, even though he was a national figure in his own right.
The State of the Union addresses, and this was a State of the Union address, again, to the normie audience. In that context, this was a State of the Union address. It had the theatrics, it had the pomp and circumstance, it had that sort of head of state appeal to it, sort of the dual-headed role of the presidency being head of state and head of government.
And so the way the Democrats acted, completely breaching decorum, completely laughing, completely. And by the way, not standing up and applauding for a child with brain cancer. I mean, these are politically devastating decisions. And make no mistake, they are decisions. And you know that whatever the the cooler heads that there are.
In the Democrat establishment, Charlie, you may have spoken to one of them earlier today. We'll find out on that later. Let me know how I did. You know that they've got to be. Yeah, well, you'll know that they've got to be cringing because they realize just how badly received this is going to be by the American people.
Human events daily, 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. Also, huge thanks to the Charlie Kirk Show for allowing us to be the sort of perennial guest host in Hour 3 on the radio side for the Salem Radio Network. We've all been enjoying that very much. We're having a great time over there. And huge, huge show coming up tomorrow. Amen.
Right. So JD understands mimetic warfare. He's already been the hottest meme of the last 24 hours. JD Vance edits are currently the hottest meme. If you're in the meme economy right now, you want to invest heavily in In J.D. Vance edits right now, they're going to the moon on J.D. memes. They're they're currently moving.
Hello?
A three-part question. The first part is, can you explain why the dollar is the world reserve currency? The second part is, how does that help America? And then the third part is, are we at a risk of losing that?
All right, everybody, welcome to The Charlie Kirk Show. Andrew Colvett in for the one and only Charlie Kirk, who's flying around the country with Vice President J.D. Vance. Figured we should give him a pass for that. I'm in the chair. We talk about all the federal grants and loan disbursements that are paused by the White House.
I agree. I think we need to be more creative in government. I think this administration is proving how creative you can be and not being fired by the way things have been. So last question here, Brian, I know you got to get back there and prep for this briefing. 30 seconds.
Give me a sense of how the resistance media, as I like to call them, the tone, the vibe shift, all these things we're hearing, what are they feeling like these days?
Awesome. Well, you keep an eye out for us, Brian, and ask some great questions. We know you will. Thank you, Brian Glenn.
senior editor at large at Newsweek, host of The Josh Hammer Show. Josh, welcome to The Charlie Kirk Show. How are you doing?
Yeah, absolutely, Josh. I'm so glad to have you. I mean, there's just so much to discuss. But, you know, the real impetus for this was your op-ed in Newsweek. And I thought it was a really, really fun title for an op-ed. First of all, the Cold Civil War is over. We won. Now, Josh, I want you to make your argument here, but I just want to say I'm not popping champagne just yet.
There's a lot of work to do, but I think the premise of your article holds. Why do you say we won the Cold Civil War? What is the Cold Civil War? Make your case.
All right, everybody, welcome to The Charlie Kirk Show. Andrew Colvett in for the one and only Charlie Kirk who's on assignment today. We'll leave it at that for the time being. Nevertheless, lots going on. Always very, very much a privilege for me to be with all of you because there is so much breaking news. In the era of Trump, we are now on Trump time.
We talk about the senior aid officials on leave, citing resistance to the Trump administration, their new priorities. We talk about all the breaking news with ICE raids in Chicago and New York and Kristi Noem getting all kitted up. That and so much more. We also welcome Josh Hammer, senior editor at large of Newsweek. And we talk about the Cold Civil War. Did we just win?
I think that was extraordinarily well said, Josh. And I want to believe that all of this is going to happen without a single shot. I mean, there's a lot of reason to believe that. that we have now become the dominant force in culture.
And not just politically, which obviously we control the three branches of the government, but culturally, philosophically, ideologically, you can feel the momentum behind more of a traditional Americana culture this triumphant Americana, this manifest destiny, whether it be Greenland or Panama or Canada, or just retaking the border.
Pete Hegseth saying, yeah, we're going to get operational control of our southern border. You've got ICE raids. We are, from a PR standpoint, this administration is doing a fantastic job projecting strength to the world. You saw this with Colombia and the little tiff that happened over the weekend, how quickly that was resolved. And then, and then, and then, and on and on and on it goes.
And what I find particularly instructive and encouraging, Josh, is the polling. You've got Harry Enten at CNN going on in front of Casey Hunt or whatever the host is going like, hey, these numbers are extraordinary. And just for our audience's sake, consider this. Donald Trump is the only president in the history of the country that has
Everything is coming at us at a absolute breakneck speed. The blizzard of Trump actions is continuing into the second week. It's really hard to keep up. Now, that's partly by design, right? Our enemies, our opponents, the lefties, the NPCs on the left, they're having a hard time keeping up and keeping track of everything to be outraged by.
at the start of his second term than he ever did in his first term. A majority of all Americans support deportation of all, not some, not the worst first, which obviously Tom Homan, budget constraints, manpower constraint is starting with the worst first, but a majority, a clear majority across like five different polls say that Americans support deporting all illegals. This is a phenomenon.
and it shows josh that the the main street america average america is seeing the changes already or seeing the momentum shift and american malaise is out america's self-constraint is out and so i do want to be really really encouraged by this there's a part of me that just you know i think can't get over the trauma of 2020 or 2022 and it won't quite believe it but josh
Do you think this has staying power? Do you think we are at the beginning of an eight, 12 year run? I do.
And I completely agree. There was that New York magazine piece that just came out talking about all the young energy around the inauguration. They tried to make it look racist, but that is cool, guys. Enjoy it.
This is Breaking News. Charlie's just sitting next to JD Vance there on Air Force Two. just casually plotting the future blizzard of other executive orders and actions that will take this country back. Our movement is ascendant, folks. The conversation that we were having with Josh, we're going to bring him back when we have radio rejoin in just a second.
There is so much positive momentum happening right now, and it is impossible to separate the movement that Trump has sparked, the ascendancy of it, without also including this entirely new generation of young guns like Charlie Kirk, like James Blair, like Sergio Gore, like J.D. Vance, Stephen Miller. There's almost too many to name. Taylor Budowich.
And, you know, candidly, so are we, and so are probably all of you out in that audience. I think it's safe to say this is basically the first time the American people have ever seen the executive branch and the leaders of this country run the government almost like a tech startup.
There's so many within this administration that are staffing it from top to bottom. Obviously, Charlie's not staffing it, but he's within the larger movement on this show and this audience.
The amount of transformational change that is possible with this new, young, vibrant core of leadership that is assuming control, both from a media standpoint and an actual power standpoint, the reins of actual power, it's impossible to fully comprehend or appreciate at this juncture. History will write about these days. History will write about these leaders.
And they will transform America back to the founders' intent, not to create some corrupt... muddled Frankenstein that the founders wouldn't even recognize, but they will restore the Americanism, the dynamism of our people in the truest sense of the word. And these are extraordinary days that we live in. These are extraordinary times. Josh, I want to throw this image up.
This is from the New York Magazine. It's kind of personal for me, actually. Throw up 94. Image 94. The Cruel Kids Table is the way the headline reads. It's a cover piece for New York Magazine by Brock Collier, who is a trans journalist from the New York Magazine. I know this because Brock also applied for press credentials at the Turning Point magazine.
ball, our inaugural Eve ball, and was there on the red carpet. There's pictures of our ball in this story. But the pushback is hilarious about this piece. But I think it's an interesting, even the journalist in this piece, Josh, admits that we're winning, that we are culturally ascendant, that we are now dominating realms of culture that would have been hard to fathom just a few years ago.
picture to make it look more racist, like it's only white kids or something. There's a whole bunch of that going on here. But it's like, Josh, take this picture as just one instance. It's a bunch of young, successful, happy kids drinking at a trendy cocktail party. I guess if that's cruel, celebrating the dawn of a new administration, a new America, I guess cry harder, Libs. As my
you know, instant reaction. What do you make of this? And what does this tell us?
You know, they move fast and break things on purpose because what has been built and constructed at the federal level especially are things worth breaking. Now, if you check the headlines... It seems like the regime is most upset right now about all the freezes, freezes in hiring, freezes on federal grants, freezes on aid and loans and foreign grants. Now, all of those things are good.
Josh, I mean, think about it, you know, and I think Matt Walsh made this point on Twitter. We like Matt a lot and he had a great role to play in, you know, just his film and so many other things. But what reads his left wing now, besides like a bunch of purple haired, you know, nose piercing, you know,
many obese or at least overweight young people screaming about some injustice that they've invented in a college laboratory. I mean, literally, if young kids having fun, if young kids, you know, wearing a flannel and in the country, you know, listening to country music, whatever. I mean, we are the fun movement. And it's a very fascinating point, Josh.
And I'll throw back to you for 30 seconds to react. You know, It seemed like in 2008, this cultural ascendancy of the left promised all of these things, but failed to deliver. Instead, it delivered this dystopian, puritanical scolding from the left about these invented injustices. And this movement, I believe, can actually... deliver on the promise of lifting everybody and having fun.
Final reaction, Josh Hammer.
I agree. Josh Hammer, good man. Follow him. Follow his stuff. Thanks so much for listening, everybody. Talk to you soon.
There's freezes on visas. There's freezes on reentry. The border is completely frozen. And it is difficult to keep pace and to keep up. So what is going on right now? What is happening? And by the way, there's going to be the first Caroline Leavitt-led press briefing today at the White House, which is another very exciting thing. So we're going to take that live.
We're actually going to be talking to Brian Glenn in the next segment. He's going to be live from Pebble Beach, as they call it, inside the White House compound. So what is going on? Let's try and keep track here. We've got CNN headline, all federal grants and loan disbursement paused by White House. Now, this one seems to have them very much in a tizzy.
So reading from CNN, which is regime-controlled media, it says the White House Budget Office has ordered a pause on all federal grants and loans according to an internal memorandum sent Monday, potentially impacting trillions, yes, trillions with a T, in government spending and halting public programs that affect millions of Americans.
Federal agencies must temporarily pause all activities related to obligation or disbursement of all federal financial assistance. So we don't even have Russ vote in yet at OMB and the acting OMB director is already putting out this memoranda. So the memo specifies that the pause will not affect Social Security or Medicare benefits and does not include assistance provided directly to individuals.
Nevertheless, this is Trump bad. Trump hates people. Trump's going to cause people to not be able to eat. That's false. It's a temporary review and it will provide the administration time to review agency programs and determine the best uses of the funding for those programs consistent with the law and the president's priorities. So the other thing that we have to look at
is in line with the executive orders last week. What were the executive orders about last week? This will be implicating DEI, woke gender ideology, and the Green New Deal, and foreign aid and non-governmental organizations. Now let's pause there. Non-governmental organizations.
Did we just actually win and put the left in their scolding, gross... No fun regime permanently in its place, or is this a temporary win and we need to be on the lookout? We talk about that and so much more. If this show means something to you, I recommend that you get involved at members.charliekirk.com. That's members.charliekirk.com. We have so much in store for you there.
This would be like Catholic Charities that's trying to help illegals game our immigration system, and a lot of other NGOs that are doing that. By the way, These NGOs folks, they go by the name of refugee resettlement, that this is such a good thing. They often quote scripture to completely game our immigration system and make money while doing it. That's right.
So what they do is they charge maybe 20, 30%, 40% profit to the government to resettle refugees from places like Afghanistan, in the Middle East, which Joe Biden put a prioritization on, to bring them here into your community, into your homes and your parks, and these NGOs get paid to do it. That's right.
So we're putting a pause on all of these things so that they can be reviewed and the president's priorities can be ensured that they're taking place. Now, the other big news story is that Kristi Noem was photographed in New York City doing raids on gang members. They got a kingpin of Trend de Aragua up in New York City. She's fully kitted out. Now, some people don't like that.
Some people think it's, you know, like Princess Warrior stuff. I get that. I get the pushback. You know, the whole girl boss movement is a little cringe. But here's my pushback to the pushback. great to see institutional prioritization at the top level of our government, including Kristi Noem, getting into the field showing that we mean business. So I'm all for it. I'm all for it.
Go into the field, show the world that we mean business, and we're not playing around anymore. Meanwhile, we've got border crossings plummeting. There are reporters that have been at the border for over a decade, that have been covering the story at our border for over a decade. They've never seen numbers this low. They keep dropping.
In fact, across all of our sectors yesterday, not one had over 200 border crossers attempt to get over the border. We have illegals coming back from trying to cross saying, don't come. You're not going to get through. Everybody's getting caught. You've got raids going on in Colorado getting Tren de Aragua people. You've got raids with Tom Homan in Chicago and Dr. Phil.
You've got raids going on in New York City. And you've got people like Selena Gomez sobbing about this and then deleting it. Let me get that clip if we can. Ryan, what clip is that?
sobbing about how they're attacking my people now let's make a couple things straight here let's get a couple things straight they're not going after schools and playgrounds and all this stuff like there's all this propaganda now we reserve the right to do that if that's where the bad guys are but right now that's not what is happening we're going for the worst first
We're getting murderers, rapists, pedophiles off the streets. These are public safety issues. These are public safety threats that we're getting off of the streets. And we're getting them out of our country. And people like Selena Gomez, go ahead and play Cut 91. I think Charlie's post on this did like 11 million views so far. Play Cut 91.
New year, new set of offerings. You also get to be a part of our members-only calls that go right on the podcast, right into live radio and streaming, and that asking questions of Charlie live online. So much is there at members.charliekirk.com. Please join it. You mean the world to us. Members.charliekirk.com. Buckle up. Here we go.
So, we're not going to be cowed by tears anymore. Hollywood celebrities, AOC, crying on the border as we make our cities safer, as we make our communities safer, as we remove actual murderers and rapists from the communities of this country, we are not going to be cowed by crying celebrities anymore. Where were your tears for Lake and Riley? Where were they for Jocelyn Nungari?
Where were they for Rachel Morin? Where were they for the 100,000 Americans that die every year from fentanyl poisoning? I don't think so. We're going to secure our border. We're going to deport illegals. Mission is going forward.
Breaking news. I'm allowed to disclose Charlie's actually traveling with the vice president today. He's with J.D. Vance, who is an American hero already. Can't wait to see all the things that J.D. accomplishes in his time serving this great country. Right now, I'm joined by Brian Glenn, White House correspondent for Real America's Voice.
Brian, we have our first White House press briefing today with the new White House press secretary, Caroline Leavitt. Fill us in. What's the mood like there? What are the changes we can expect to see? I know the entire country especially the political class, is going to be tuned in to this event today.
So, Brian, a lot has been made about the seating arrangement that we can expect. Right. I mean, in years past. We've seen New York Times, what we like to call the regime media, the legacy media outlets seated right up front. There's been a lot of news made about who Karine Jean-Pierre would call on, who she would not. Do you have any insight yet about how the seating arrangement is going to be?
Our outlets like Real America's Voice, Turning Point USA, we have our own White House correspondent as well in there. Do you have any insight on that yet?
everybody welcome to the charlie kirk show from the bitcoin mobile studio andrew colvett in for the one and only charlie kirk who's traveling in the united kingdom we talk about the one big beautiful bill what's in it what's good what's bad what needs to be corrected and how can we get to the finish line also we have borders are tom homan who says why he loves the bill why he needs the bill more internal enforcement more border security more tech more
I believe, yes, it does. I believe there's a few cuts. There's a few tweaks that need to happen. President Trump is saying this morning that he wants to see this bill go over to the Senate. He likes what they are proposing even more than what the House has. He says they have a few things that he likes even better. Now, they don't have a bill written, but President Trump is behind the scenes.
All right. Welcome to the Charlie Kirk show. Andrew Colbert in for the one and only Charlie Kirk, who is traveling the globe. He's in the United Kingdom today. Lots of fun stuff. He just debated at Cambridge yesterday about it was legitimately about 400 students to one. Very raucous crowd. I'm excited to hear his feedback on that today. He's going to be at Oxford. So say a prayer.
He's working on some of these negotiations. He sees some of the stuff and he likes it better. So this bill is going to be tweaked between now and then. In the next segment, I want to get in to some of the comments Rep. Andy Harris made on War Room yesterday with Steve Bannon. I think they are legitimate, and I want to dive into them.
All right. So this one big, beautiful bill, let's give it some due. I do have some notes. I have some notes. That's okay. We support the president's agenda. We think this is going to get passed. It has to get passed. You heard from Tom Holman. He needs every dollar he can get to get these mass deportations up, which I believe is the one main reason Trump was elected for a lot of reasons.
It was a large coalition with a lot of priorities. The border was number one. We got to get this passed, even if it's just for the border. By the way, we tax remittances. That's when foreigners, often illegals, send money back to their home country, the place where they should go be living right now. We tax that. It's good.
It's an incentive to say, hey, you're not going to get away for free here, all right? We're either going to deport you or we're going to tax you. No free rides, folks. But let's give the bill its due, all right? This is Mike Johnson talking about some of the good things in the bill.
This bill is beautiful. There is a lot of big beautifulness in this bill. We like this bill. Directionally, this bill is great, okay? What we're talking about is fighting over the edges, but those edges can have massive implications, especially when it comes to Medicare, Medicaid, pardon me, Medicaid, the Medicaid scam that some of these states pull. is incredible.
The truth would get out and the conservative values would continue spreading across the globe. The revival that we see in the United States would happen abroad. But I do not want to waste any time. We have a very special guest. This is Borders are Tom Homan joining the show. Mr. Borders are welcome to The Charlie Kirk Show.
Now we're getting rid of these able-bodied subsidies, right? So if somebody is able to work and they're not working and we're still funding them, this is the number one area of expansion of the federal budget. And nobody is seriously trying to fight this except for these four holdouts. So my sympathies lie with them. Genuinely. And I want to hear from Rep. Andy Harris here.
So that was obviously from the House floor. There is a scam here where... And people... It's wonky. I don't want to get too into the weeds, but it's called FMAP. It's the federal... I'll get the acronym for you in a second. It's the Federal Medical Assistance Percentage. So basically, it's a mean-tested program, meaning that the poorer states get more federal matching dollars than the rich states.
But what the states do, and this is one of... Chip Roy's big problems is that they they charge a provider tax on it. So if we send about ten thousand dollars to California, they'll bump it up by five percent. And then there's little carve outs and then they take that money and they fund Medi-Cal and they give it to illegals or different things or Planned Parenthood. That stuff needs to stop.
And Chip Roy's 100 percent right on that. So where we stand right now on the big, beautiful bill, Chip Roy's probably a no. All the salt guys, that would be Stefanik, Garbarino, Lawler, Lolota, Young Kim, Tom King Jr., Langworthy. Those guys are all probably a no because they're going to hold fast in their coalition for these salt exemptions.
Now, again, I think that that horse ain't going to hunt. They've already gotten a concession. Maybe I'll be at a small one. That's what you're going to get when it goes to the Senate. That's not going to that's not going to pass. And a no for now. These are people that I believe will support the bill.
So I want to jump right in. This big one big, beautiful bill. One of the main priorities is securing the border, but mass deportations as well. Tell us what's in the bill that you love, that you're excited about, that your border agents need, the border security needs.
They're speaking in such a way that says that they are going to support the bill, but they want to hold out for some additional tweaks. And again, Trump has said he's open to tweaks. He wants tweaks. But he wants this to pass, and he wants to pass soon.
That's Ralph Norman, Eli Crane, the great Eli Crane from Arizona, Rich McCormick, Eric Burleson, Mark Harris, Andrew Clyde, Tim Burchette, Keith Self, Warren Davidson, Andy Biggs, Andy Harris, Andy Ogles. Now, these are a lot of the Freedom Caucus guy, the budget hawks. Trump said in his presser this morning, he said, lay off my Freedom Caucus guy. Those are my people. So there's no beef there.
Now, Thomas Massey and Trump, that relationship is basically done. He wants Trump is saying he wants Thomas Massey out. He doesn't understand government. Thomas Massey's and always know there's nothing I can do to win their vote. OK. Well, that's one. We don't have much more to give than that. All right. And we were going to have Chip Roy on this morning.
Unfortunately, schedules, everything's going crazy. But he was scheduled to be on right now explaining some of his holdouts now, some of his reservations. But I think he's making some good points that we have to stop the expansion of this Medicaid graft and spending and abuse. Illegals have no place on this on Medicaid. We need to get them all off. I think everybody's united on that.
We have to stop this FMAP stuff where we're paying way too much to the states and we're incentivizing them to expand the amount of spending in this way. So... All in all, there's a lot to love in this bill. It is 95% of the way there, maybe 98% of the way there, but the devil is in the details. These last 2% are important fixes.
I do want to see them get fixed, and hopefully we see some progress on them. Now, you've got... this bill will now have to go to the Senate. Okay. So we don't know how this is going to, going to happen. We are told that we're not going to have a CBO score until after they vote on this bill. So that to me is a little bit fishy as well. Now I get the urgency that we want to push this forward.
We want to push this forward. We want to push this forward. We want to get Trump is when we all agree. We love 95%, 98% of this bill, but we got to make sure that we bring these no votes and, into the fold, listen to some of their pushbacks. Now, this salt thing, I think, is dead on arrival. I told you that multiple times. But what are we going to do?
Here is Steve Scalise admitting that Medicaid is, in fact, going to grow 207.
So there's no cuts. I would like to see more cuts. But the fear mongering from the left is just simply not true. Even Andy Harris admits it. This is going to grow by about 25 percent over the next couple of years. And we're going to see what happens. These are going to be high drama.
If you are a fan of Congress, which would make you in the minority, but if you enjoy the way the sausage gets made, this is high drama stuff. You're going to be glued to your X feed and to your television screen for the next couple of days. But this is high drama stuff. Again, the SALT caucus is breaking. They have reached out to the Speaker to tell him they are a no-brainer.
on the bill after the Trump speech at the conference. So again, SALT caucus, that would be the Stefanik, Garbarino, Lawler, Lolota, Young Kim, Tom King Jr., Langworthy. Those guys are all no. So they're still no. They're holding out for more SALT reductions. Trump told Lawler this morning during his session with the House Republicans, he said, I know your district better than you do.
And if you're going to lose because you don't get SALT reductions, you were going to lose anyway. I think he's probably right on that. But it is very possible that Trump's tough language could have driven a wedge even further, made them dig in even further here. We're going to see how that plays out. We don't have a bill yet. We love most of it. We want to see it get passed.
We want to see the president's agenda, these tax cuts. He's 100 percent right. Nobody's fighting the tax cuts, by the way. There will be a massive tax increase if this bill does not get passed. We got to see it get passed. But in the meantime, a few little tweaks, a few little things here and there. All right, folks, that's.
probably going to be the the gist of my coverage on this one big beautiful bill i want to get into some stuff that i saw pete hegseth say about the dod there's also some uh breaking news uh that we want to get to in some other areas of of the news this morning and our in our final segment of the hour so if you also if you think about it please say a prayer for charlie kirk he is out in the uk he's going to have a big debate at you uh oxford today so say a prayer we'll be right back
So let's talk about Joe Biden. So this is the piece that just drives me nuts, let me just tell you. Jake Tapper has a new book called Original Sin. Now, that's an ironic title because he's talking about the cover up of Joe Biden's mental decline. And now, of course, Joe Biden has been diagnosed with cancer, a really aggressive form of cancer. He's an old man. It's not surprising.
A lot of men get prostate cancer later in life. And Jake Tapper is making money off of this book. and acting holier than thou, getting ahead of the narrative, as they say. Now, it's a good calm strategy, but essentially the Democrats got caught hiding the unhideable. So it's so brazen, it's so extreme, that in this case, I think it's a terrible calm strategy.
Instead of trying to get ahead of it and writing a book called Original Sin and making money off of it, maybe you should have just said, sorry, Jake Tapper. This is Jake Tapper in 2023 dressing down Lara Trump, for daring to question the cognitive and mental abilities of Joe Biden.
diagnosing politicians from afar he is one of the most sanctimonious hypocritical garbage people on television i i have zero patience for jake typer i actually think he is a scumbag play cut 222 this is president trump now questioning openly questioning the doctors for Joe Biden.
Maybe it was the president who was operating the auto pen. Did we elect them? No, I don't think we did. Cut to a six. This is Dr. Zeke Emanuel on MSNBC on Morning Joe, of all places, saying that he definitely has had this cancer for a long time.
So are we supposed to believe that Joe Biden, with the best medical care on planet Earth, the best that money can buy is provided for the president, that they missed out? This aggressive cancer that he's probably had since the beginning of his presidency? Absolutely no way in hell is that true. And here's what I'll also say. I thought the auto pen thing was kind of a distraction.
It is taking on incredibly increased meaning now. And this is a huge story. Watch this space. We don't know where it's going to go. Thanks so much for listening, everybody. If you get something out of the show, if you love what we do here at The Charlie Kirk Show, and you are not yet a member, you need to become a member. You get to join our Friday Ask Me Anything calls.
You get to go on our podcast. If that's you, you get to star in our podcast and our radio show and our streaming show. We also have excellent, excellent added goodies and benefits if you come to our live events. merch discounts, and so much more, please consider joining members.charliekirk.com. That's members.charliekirk.com. Thanks so much. Talk to you soon.
That part is key. If President Trump was elected for any reason, it was because of immigration. He was elected for a lot of reasons, but that issue is key. And we have Borders Art, Tom Homan himself coming on to explain why he needs this bill to get his job done. Let's dive into it. Buckle up. Here we go.
Yeah. And Mr. Homan, you have come on this show before and you asked for about 150 to 175 billion. I've heard you use both both numbers in passing. So this this it's it allocates 150 billion via defense spending, but then another 70 billion for border security funding. Is it enough?
So. Mr. Homan, you've come on this show before in the past as well, and you've said, hey, listen, we're doing the first worst. The worst are getting out first, but we've got to do more. And I believe I've heard numbers around 100,000, 150,000 that have been deported so far. What is I've seen that you've been frustrated that you couldn't get that higher faster.
But again, this this resource crunch that you're experiencing at ICE and DHS, will this deliver, let's say, half a million to a million deportations a year? Is that a number that's realistic if this this budget gets passed?
We love that about you, Tom. We love that about you, that you are never going to be satisfied until every person who broke the law to get into this country is held accountable, put to the back of the line, gone through the legal process. Now, I want to bring this up. I debated whether or not to because I think it's ridiculous. But this rep, Rep LaMonica McIver. She was discharged yesterday.
Alina Haba, acting U.S. attorney in the Newark area, charged her. President Trump says, give me a break. Did you see her? She was out of control. What's your message to representatives like LaMonica McIver that are actively assaulting ICE agents and the people that work under you?
I think I join with millions of Americans around the country and say, Mr. Borders, are you are a breath of fresh air. You're a national treasure. We have your back 100 percent. Thank you for coming on the show. We hope that this bill gets passed. If there's anything that needs to get fixed, we want to see him fixed.
But we hope this bill gets passed and you get the resources you need to protect this country. We're we're honored that you're serving in the way you are. Thank you.
All right, welcome back to the Charlie Kirk Show. Charlie Kirk is on assignment in the United Kingdom. We're excited to hear updates as they come. I'm your guest host, Andrew Colvett. Honored to be with you, as always, when I get the opportunity. So today, the big news, as we said, Tom Homan on a great American, absolute patriot.
But the big news today is that President Trump visited Capitol Hill to go whip votes for his one big, beautiful bill. Now, if I could lay out the landscape for you, it's essentially this. You've got the SALT holdouts. Now, this is despite the fact that they've increased SALT deductions from about $12,000 to $30,000. New York congressmen like Rep.
Lawler are saying that's not going to be good enough. LaLotta, the same. I think they're out way over their skis on this. If somebody who lives in California would personally benefit from something like this, they're way out over their skis. And I'll tell you why. Because this is going to get to the U.S. Senate, and there are approximately this many senators that care about These SALT deductions.
It's different than the House. In the House, you can have conservatives that are elected in districts that are conservative in a blue state. That's not the case with the United States Senate. Those are statewide races. And if you are a conservative, you're not going to win those races. Right. So that's why it's going to go and die in the U.S. Senate. And so the SALT folks need to take a win.
They need to take a middle ground. And get to a point now, Speaker Johnson offered a 40,000 for four years deduction and then it would revert back. They said that's not good enough. They're asking for 50 over 10 years guaranteed or something approximately at that point.
When we're dealing with a bill where the math does not work out, where the ends do not meet and we're looking at a deficit increase, not a reduction, that dog ain't going to hunt. So I want to just echo President Trump and say that the SALT deductions, it's helping blue state governors.
Now, we want to help all states, but we don't want to encourage blue states that are taxing at a huge high rate, and then they get rewarded for it, and the federal government bails them out. We want to encourage good behavior. We want to incentivize good behavior. The other issue... is Medicaid and Medicare, okay?
Medicare, the Democrats are going out there and they are saying that Republicans are going to cut Medicare. They're going to cut Medicaid. That's not true. There's a lot of waste, fraud, and abuse. There's illegal aliens. There's murderers, known murderers that are taking... Medicaid. Now, Medicaid is designed to help those. It's mean tested. So that means it's designed to help those that need it.
Right. The poor working class, pregnant mothers. And there's a lot of waste, fraud and abuse. So let's hear it in President Trump's own words so we can get this out of the way.
He says it very clearly. We're not changing. We're just getting rid of waste, fraud and abuse. That's a really big thing to get rid of. And by the way, there is so much waste, fraud, and abuse in Medicaid that I don't think the average American can fully appreciate. And the Democrats are hopping up and down, screaming, crying. That is misplaced outrage. That's a lie. That's fear-mongering.
That's not what's happening here. Let's get to another person that you may not expect to hear from in the Medicaid debate, and that's RFK Jr. Now, obviously, as Secretary of Health and Human Services, he knows a thing or two about what's going on in the health space.
A million people claiming Medicaid from multiple states. Obviously, that's illegal. And I just want to be very clear. I'm sympathetic. to the budget hawks. We want to see the budget balanced. We want to see the spending go down to pre-COVID levels. This bill does not do that, and we have to be very clear about that. Now, the question then becomes, does the bill deserve to pass at all?
Hey, everybody. Andrew Colvin in for Charlie Kirk and the Charlie Kirk Show team. Charlie's out today, so I'm anchoring alongside Blake Neff. We have a really robust discussion about Autopen. Is it real? Should we pursue it? Are the pardons of President Biden null and void? So much more. We don't know the question, but it's a fascinating discussion. Then we bring in Josh Hammer.
Andrew Colvett in for the one and only Charlie Kirk, who is outstanding. He's a little under the weather, but I'm being told he's on the mend. It's myself, who I'm always honored to be with all of you, and Blake Neff, who's in studio. Blake, on my list are egg prices, hooties, and terrorists, reciprocal terrorists. uh, tariffs.
Josh, I actually think one of the strongest points that you can make in defense of your thesis is the approach that President Trump took to the Middle East and specifically to Israel in his first term. And what we saw from that is that we had an outbreak of peace for once in that region, and it quickly fell apart without strong American leadership.
But I think when America waffles on Israel, we embolden Israel's enemies, which are also our enemies. And that is one of the strongest sort of practical foreign policy positions that you can assert in this space without making it about some abstract, you know, moral good this way. But it really comes down to the fact that peace is good for the economy, right? It's good for oil prices. It's good.
You know, we look, we talk about the Houthis right now. There's a great clip from Marco Rubio that actually I'm going to play where he's just talking about the importance of that trade lane, which is super important to American interest. Let's go ahead and play that cut 75.
And Josh, this is an example of the moral clarity of the Trump administration by contrast of this waffling of Joe Biden. Joe Biden did support Israel, but it was mixed signals. We were funding Hamas at the same time, and we were emboldening Iran and the enemies of the West.
And this is the last point I'll make, and then I'm going to throw it back to you, is that if you are an American who is frustrated with our support of Israel— never forget that the same Islamist forces that want to destroy Israel want to also destroy America. They want to destroy the West. They want to conquer us. They want to subdue us. They want to subjugate us.
And they will do it over the long term. They'll do it by slowly coming in and then demanding more rights, having more children. You're seeing this in certain neighborhoods of the the United Kingdom, all over Europe.
So whether or not you even buy into these larger civilizational arguments, if you just simply understand that radical Islamism is out to get the West and to subdue all of us, not just Israel, I think that's another piece that is important to realize when you talk about foreign policy realism. One minute, Josh, your reaction.
So those are the things I want to get to you pick which one of those, uh, or maybe surprise you with another one.
Josh, this is a question that perplexes a lot of Americans and actually kind of frustrates the whole Israel discussion. Jews in Israel are actually pretty pro-Trump, especially the more religious ones. Jews as a country are perplexed. Jews in America tend to vote left still. Are we seeing movement on that front? Are we seeing Jews in America get behind
Uh, I'm sure we've got a clip of this, uh, you know, Blake, why don't you set the stage and I'll see if we can get the right clip here.
MAGA, get behind conservatives, get behind President Trump more? Are we still stuck in like 70-30 or whatever it was? You know, it's been historically stuck at this overwhelming majority for Democrats.
They vote in blocks, too. They tell each other what they're going to – how to vote. I mean, it's – you see this in neighborhoods in New York, and I'm jealous of it. I love the unanimity of it.
And Josh, we're seeing the same dynamic with Christians. more children. Me and my wife, we have three kids. Across my friend group, it's all the Christians that are getting married, having kids. It's going to be unclear how this plays out in 20, 30 years, but certainly we have a chance to outbreed these people.
I mean, I totally, I think that's a totally valid, I mean, if the Muslims are putting that strategy in place, like people of faith and Christians and Jews, faithful Christians and Jews should be doing the exact same thing. 100% agree with that.
and it's gone back and forth. I'm not sure where we stand, but the issue of Gaza, do you address that in your book? And if you don't, what do you make of it? And then I want to ask you one follow-up question about Israeli judicial activism, because it plays into the news cycle now. But Gaza specifically, what do you make of it? What do you think needs to happen? What's the humane thing?
What's the politically expedient thing to do? Your take, Josh.
I like that idea. I like that idea, Josh. Now, I'm actually going to I've got limited amount of time here and I'm going to change my second my second final question here. Charlie goes on campuses and now like about a third of the questions is about Israel. I mean, the younger generation is obsessed with Israel. And honestly, it's a lot of negativity towards Israel.
And one of the common things that they say about Israel is that they are essentially it's a open air apartheid state that they have been abusing their Arab neighbors. I just want to give you two and a half minutes here to react to those accusations against Israel. And I know you're an American. You're not an Israel apologist. But what would you say to that?
Sorry to interject here. I just want to state one final thing here as well. And Josh, great book, a great job on the book. Congratulations. You're one of the most articulate defenders of this stuff, and you know the issues inside and out. And I would just say, you know, there was essentially a two-state solution in place before October 7th. And see how that worked out.
And remember that Israel gave land for peace, and that peace has proven futile, unfortunately. And so something does have to take place. Hamas has proven that they are incapable of governing that area, at least in a peaceful, responsible way. I don't know what's going to happen. There's a lot of people there and it's a complicated solution. I like your consortium idea.
Perhaps that's the right way forward. But Josh, once again, congratulations. And we'll have to have you on again soon to talk about it because it ain't going anywhere. This issue is top of the mind in the news. So congratulations, Josh. We'll talk soon. Looking forward to it, Andrew. Thanks for all your support. I appreciate it. All right. Absolutely. Take care, Josh.
Thanks so much for listening, everybody. Talk to you soon.
who is the author of a new book, Israel and Civilization. We dive into some of the stickiest, hardest to understand issues of Israel. And you're going to get educated in this interview. Josh knows this topic inside and out. Great guest, great conversation. Please consider joining members.charliekirk.com.
Yeah. I tend to, I tend to agree with you. I mean, I know that the MAGA base is excited about this auto pen thing because you know, who's on that list. It's Adam Schiff. It's Adam Kinzinger, two of the worst Adams ever, by the way. Can we just all agree on that? it's Dr. Anthony Fauci, it's Hunter Biden.
But I think to your point, I mean, it's not like Joe Biden is passed on or something or incoherent at this point. He can simply say, listen, this was my will. I wanted these pardons to be executed. And I tend to agree with you that looking forward, I get the desire of the base to go after these people to simply going to take these people out well deservingly. But I think it's shaky legal grounds.
I just want to set everybody's expectations. It's not that I don't understand where people are coming from and the sort of the inherent excitement about this. And it is disrespectful. I think Trump had a clip here where he basically said, you know, this is disrespectful to the office, first of all. And I totally agree with that. The fact that the president of the United States didn't
take the time to actually sign the legal documents, the binding documents of this country and was using Autopen is massively disgraceful and disrespectful to the office. Beyond that, I don't know if it's on steady legal footing. Let's go ahead and play Cut 79. This is Trump talking about it.
That's members.charliekirk.com, your one-stop shop for being on the inside of the show, being on the inside of the team, joining our live calls, live events, all the things. You get it, that and more online. please consider joining members.charliekirk.com. Buckle up. Here we go.
Yeah. And, you know, he's basically saying they're null and void. And Trump then later goes on to say, it's not my decision. That would be up to the court. But I would say that they're null and void because I'm sure Biden didn't have any idea what was taking place.
You know, with so much, so many battles on the horizon, I tend to agree with you that it's probably not the number one fight that I would pick right now, Blake.
And to the base's credit, you know, I don't think it is about revenge. I think it's about accountability on some level. And I think this comes from a good place with the base. Maybe this is a rabbit trail that gets us distracted. But, you know, Trump has proved that he can, you know, to use the leftist favorite expression, walk and chew gum at the same time.
Let's just go after all of this at the same time. Like, add it to the mix, you know, because the fact that we were forced to endure this charade of, of a presidency where he was obviously in cognitive decline. He had Sundowner syndrome. That's my theory, that he was basically good between a very narrow window.
After a certain time, we saw this in the debate, which ultimately led to the downfall of his candidacy to run for a second term. You know, it's like we have to restore law and order. We have to restore a sense of dignity in the office of the presidency. We have to you know, the legitimacy of a of a cognitive in charge executive.
And so I understand the desire to like look back and say, hey, these things weren't right. And if we don't address them and we sweep them under the rug, that's not good either. So I agree with you. Is it my favorite fight? No, but I understand why he wants to pick it.
And I understand why people are excited about it, because there is there was so much injustice done and perpetrated against the American people and so much of it is still very offensive to them and very offensive to me. And so I understand it.
I'm joined now by Josh Hammer, who is the senior editor-at-large of Newsweek, host of The Josh Hammer Show, and also author of the new book, Israel and Civilization. Josh, welcome to the show. Congratulations on your new book. As somebody who's been in and around books, I've not written one myself, but been in and around them and helped Charlie with his books, launching them, it is no small task.
And so congratulations. It's just an accomplishment to get it done. second of all, to have one of such import with your book on Israel, which is at the top of a lot of people's minds these days, obviously. So congratulations, my friend, and welcome to the show.
Well, congrats. That's fantastic, Josh. So Israel and Civilization, the Fate of the Jewish Nation and the Destiny of the West. I see what you did there, Josh. And I actually happen to agree with that. Now, I am not Jewish. I am a proud American first, American, red-blooded, homegrown. This is my country. I love Israel.
And so I wanted to talk to you about this today because I think it brings up a lot of questions about what role does Israel play in our foreign policy. If you are not Jewish, how should you think about Israel? It has become dramatically more controversial today post-October 7th, which I find somewhat appalling actually, but I think there's valid questions to bring up.
But in that subhead specifically, Josh, you tie the fate of the Jewish nation, Israel, to the destiny of the West. Why do you tie those two together? What is the thesis statement there?
Hey, everybody. Welcome to the Charlie Kirk Show. Andrew Colvin in for one episode today at the Bitcoin.com mobile studio. We talk with Mike Davis from the Article 3 Project about the Maryland father hoax, the Maryland man hoax. And is Trump actually defying the Supreme Court and refusing to bring him back to the United States? We talk about that And so much more. We also bring in Jack Posobiec.
I think he's 100 percent right for doubling and tripling down on this and holding the line. I'm just I thank God every day that we have people with real courage in this administration that are willing to fight this fight. And they're not being cowed by these by these Maryland father headlines and the like. Mike Davis, tell us about the Article 3 Project. How can people get behind you?
God bless you, Mike Davis. Thanks for the time. Support his work.
We now have the great Jack Posobiec, who has been holding down our three of the Charlie Kirk radio show. Jack Posobiec. How you doing, my friend?
Well, and we see it with Carmelo Anthony, another story that's coming out. I'm going to get into that with you in just a second, Jack, because I think that that story has, there's so many layers to it and facets to it that I want to explore with you. But I do want to pause on something you just said.
And you said for once standing up for the American worker and for the American homeland against illegal immigration. It feels like, how do I say this? When the attacks, especially with this Maryland man hoax, and they started coming from the press, it sort of felt like we've seen this movie before. And I thought to myself, oh, here we go. Here we go again.
And then you get to that press conference in the Oval with, BUKELE YESTERDAY. And you saw how forcefully the administration stood up and fought back. And then it just seemed like the energy was sapped from their side. It's like, oh, they have a glass jaw. This is a paper tiger. These attacks that have kept so many people cowed in Washington, D.C.
from doing the right thing for so long, they don't work anymore, Jack. Are you sensing that, that we're actually getting the upper hand on the insanity and the media attacks on common sense?
news coming over the wire in the last couple of days and a breaking one overnight that we're going to get into as well with Mike Davis, Article 3 Project. Mike Davis, welcome to the show. Thanks for joining us to unpack this very contentious issue. It's involving the Supreme Court this time, so I want to make sure we get our facts 100% straight here, Mike. What do you make of this case involving
And I think when the American people actually take stock of what's going on, I mean, you've got these Obama and Biden appointed judges who, basically standing in the way of very common sense practices of getting illegal gang members out of our country. And yet they keep throwing up these roadblocks, the newest being this, I think it's CHNV program, these parolees.
It was an illegal program that Biden instituted that let in hundreds of thousands of Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans. And now they're demanding a court hearing for everybody to go back. And it's like, that's 500,000 plus people that don't belong in this country that filled our communities like Springfield, Illinois.
And now they're going to basically try and suggest that, you know, it's going to take 50 years of due process to get them all back out. Not going to happen. President Trump and the Trump administration is going to fight that tooth and nail. But when you say, Jack, that the left is always and predictably on the side of the criminal,
We have another instance of this, and that's Carmelo Anthony out of Frisco Memorial High School in Texas. Now, there was a judge, I'm gonna throw her picture up because I mean, because of course, let's go to 175, that's her image. This is Judge Angela Tuckett, who lowered his bail from 1 million down to 250,000. And Jack, you know the details very well.
There was a GoFundMe that was getting a lot of traction And they raised a lot of money. So now Carmelo Anthony is out on bail. He's on house arrest with an ankle monitor. And there's some... I don't know if it's been confirmed yet. Maybe you can fill us in, Jack, that they have also used some of that money to buy a new home for the family. Jack Posobiec, your take.
the Maryland man, that's what they describe him as, the Maryland man, his name is, I keep forgetting, so I got to check my notes, Kilmar Obrego Garcia. So the press would have you believe, Mike, that since he's been deported to El Salvador- at one of the prisons there, that the Supreme Court is demanding that he is returned. Is that true, Mike Davis?
I totally agree. I mean, and for those of you in the audience that are needing a refresher on what happened, I mean, it was essentially Carmelo Anthony sat under the wrong tent at a track meet. Austin Metcalf, maybe some others said, Hey, you know, you're in the wrong tent. And he said, you know, basically if you think I am, you go ahead and move me.
So he got up and put his hands on him and he's, and Carmelo warned him, said, you put your hands on me, like, you know, whatever, I'm going to, I'm going to fight you back. So I guess he, Proceeded to push him out of the tent. Not exactly sure that all the details there, but it seems like a really run of the mill kind of scuffle and pulls out a knife and stab someone over a seat. Killed him.
Yeah, great analysis as always, Jack.
I want to get to a poll that just came out. And this is about people and how they associate with the MAGA movement. A lot of you in this audience consider yourself MAGA, part of the MAGA movement. Go ahead and throw up 206. So back in January, about 20% of Americans said that they were part of MAGA. And that included 55% of Republicans. Now,
That number is up to 36% of all Americans and 71% of Republicans. And I believe that this is incredibly significant. Now, you don't have to be a card-carrying member of MAGA to appreciate what President Trump is doing. But the fact that 71% of the Republican Party now identifies as MAGA is truly historic and
And it's a landmark achievement for this president who took over the Republican Party in a very contentious way over the last nine years. This has been a hostile takeover of a Republican Party, a GOP that was dead and dying, that had no verve, no appeal to younger people, that had no It didn't have a cultural hook.
There wasn't people doing dances in the end zone for the leader of the Republican Party. And we see this even in off-cycle elections, midterms, how President Trump is a singular political and generational talent that's able to mobilize people. people that do not usually vote, people that are not accustomed to paying attention to the political process.
President Trump is able to mobilize them, to energize them, and get them behind his mission. And what's most critical about this is that it shows his message is winning. Even when the media establishment, the institutional establishment of this country says the sky is falling, tariffs are going to lead us over the cliff, guess what happens?
Regular Americans rise up and they say, actually, I like what President Trump is doing. His mission is common sense. His goal is to restore the prominence, greatness, and wealth of America. Regular, forgotten America appreciates this and sees it for what it is. As we were talking about with Jack Posobiec in the previous segment,
they are saying to themselves, finally, there's an American leader who is standing up for me, who's standing up for the country that I love, the country that I will raise my kids in, the country I will die in, the country that means so much to me. Faith, family, and country are now being respected again. They're not being trotted upon. They're not being cast aside and ignored.
And you're seeing this in cultural moments, the UFC fight, where hardworking Americans come out, buy a ticket to support something masculine, aggressive, strong, and they celebrate a president that walks proudly into that arena. You see it even over the weekend. SNL was making fun of third rail topics that used to be completely off limits, LGBT issues and adoption issues on SNL.
When you see MAGA ascendant, you see that the president's goals, ambitions, missions, policies are popular, even when they are controversial, because we are no longer being cowed by the same sniveling, whining voices in the corner telling us, no, you can't do that. You can't have your country back. President Trump is proudly saying, yes, we can. Yes, we will. And I dare you to try and stop me.
Thanks so much for listening, everybody. Talk to you soon.
We talk about the Carmelo Anthony Austin Metcalf murder in Texas and why he's released on house arrest. And what does that tell us? MAGA has ascended. More Republicans are now identifying as MAGA. What does that mean for the country and for Trump's policies?
it seems like we're getting into some legal gray area. Now the left, the liberal media wants you to believe that Trump is a dictator. He's an authoritarian. Now he's openly defining the highest court in the land. Meanwhile, it seems to be that there's a lot of nuance in the actual ruling from the court. And I want to play something that just came across the wire. It is
Surprising, the source is surprising, Mike. This is CNN's chief legal correspondent, Paula Reid, actually defending the Trump administration a little bit here, 196.
Mushy, Mike, is the word that she used. So when you read this court ruling- Do you see what she's referring to? So they are actually working within a bit of ambiguity provided to them by the court.
Well, Mike, I love this moment from the White House, and I have the clip, so I want to play it. But you have President Trump. He's surrounded by his cabinet officials. You've got Stephen Miller just spitting facts, by the way. And he just went, I have that clip too, which we should probably play.
But then they asked, I think it was Caitlin Collins, asks Bukele directly, like, you know, what are you going to do in this? And he just sits there, you can see the smirk on his face going like, I'm not going to tell America to take back a terrorist that's already in our country. Play cut, 201.
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I just love this moment because it's like world leaders that are actually running successful countries understand where the court's jurisdiction begins and ends, and they're sitting here laughing at it. Your take on that moment and the importance of that interaction, Mike Davis, and we have another court case to get to.
Well, Mike, I want to pause there then for one second. What you brought up here is pretty critical. And this is, if I'm playing devil's advocate, the constitutional crisis area, right? The left loves to use that framing But if there is no authority, highest authority in the land, I mean, are we saying that, are we advocating now for Trump to defy federal courts, but not the Supreme Court?
Where's the line? I mean, is it if they make a ruling on foreign policy or immigration topics or cases that there is grounds to defy those? Where is the red line here? Because we are flirting with problematic precedent?
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Mike Davis, the Article III Project, everybody check that out, support his important work. We had another breaking news story, Mike. Judge Indira Talwani, I believe we have a picture of her, actually, if we want to. scare folks at home. She just blocked Trump from deporting over 500,000 migrants flown in under Joe Biden's illegal CHNV order.
Now, Mike, the way that I'm reading this is that the ruling, and she's in Boston, Obama appointed judge, of course, she thinks that all of these 500,000 migrants deserve a court hearing, which basically means it would take, I don't know, 50 to 70 years to process them all to get them to go back to their own countries. What is the story here? Can you make heads or tails of it for us?
Mike, that's such a good point. So what the Democrats want you to believe is sane and normal and legal is just mass paroling hundreds of thousands, and as you said, millions of of migrants into this country, no vetting, no case-by-case, just a rubber stamp, get on the app, come into the country, you're going to be fine. Oh, and by the way, Mike, there's evidence here.
The administration's own data shows that 72% of the CHNV, that's Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela entrants, accessed welfare funds. within the programs, within the first six months of arriving, 72% of these people. So there's no due process getting them in, just pure invasion. And we saw this play out in places like Springfield, Ohio.
There was a lot of illicit, I believe, criminal activity busing these people to the basically slave labor wages and disenfranchising American workers. So there's no due process, but now they want due process to get them out. So what happens here with this ridiculous ruling? The Trump administration is rightly calling this a farce and more judicial tyranny. What happens now?
Walk us through the next steps now. in the legal process to get this unscrewed.
I couldn't agree more. Mike, and I think everybody in the country feels the same way. I feel like everybody, I mean, if you go, in your mind's eye, go back to early 2000s or the 90s. And the posture that most Americans had towards immigration, it was mostly like, hey, we're a welcoming country. We're a generous country. And that generosity has been completely run over.
It's been taken advantage of. It's been gamed by these NGOs, by these radical leftists. Foreign money has flowed into this space. And we've seen the degradation of our communities, the dissolution of our cultural cohesion, crime rates through the roof. I mean, I completely agree with you. I think it's a large reason Trump won.
Hey, everybody. Andrew Colvin in for the one and only Charlie Kirk, who is out on assignment. He's in Illinois at another campus stop, our biggest one yet. He'll have more for you tomorrow. In the meantime, we got lots of tariff news. The markets rebound. What's causing that? What's behind it? And then we bring on John Carney from Breitbart, who is the tariff expert. at Breitbart.com.
Yeah, I mean, you kind of saw this from the EU yesterday when they said, listen, we're willing to do a zero for zero tariff. You know, we're willing to make a good deal. You know, Europe was trying to say that, you know, listen, we're we're the good guys here. You guys are being crazy, but we're going to make a good deal. I played this I played this clip earlier, John, but I think it it.
bears repeating. I saw this referenced in a Wall Street Journal op-ed by Art Laffer, came out yesterday. And it's from the G7 meeting in Canada in 2018. And Trump is sitting there in front of all the trading partners saying, hey, why don't we get rid of all our trade barriers? Let's just do it. And Art Laffer's take is that it exposed the hypocrisy of our trading partners because
From Brussels to Beijing, they were all running out the door saying, no, no, no, no, no, no. What are you talking about? They didn't want anything to do with this. But this is Trump. Basically, I think an echo from the past of saying, hey, guys, why don't we get to this place? Because it's not just about tariffs. It's about currency manipulations, about dumping.
It's about blocking whole industries from your market and tariffs, of course. So let's go ahead and play this and get your reaction to it. 162.
John, do you think that Trump 2018 is still Trump 2025? I mean, is this still his North Star, or was this brinksmanship, knowing that they would never agree to it, and he actually secretly wants to keep a certain amount of protectionism in place in America?
All right, welcome to the Charlie Kirk show. Andrew Colvin in for Charlie Kirk, who's on assignment today. We have lots of updates from yesterday. What a difference a day makes. That is the theme of, I think, this beginning part of our show here. What a difference a day makes. Over the weekend, I mentioned this yesterday. that it was the sky is falling. It was the chicken little folks.
Yeah, exactly. Yeah, no. And John, I think that's really smart. I think, and I noticed this yesterday with the markets, you know, every time there was a little bit of a glimmer of hope that the zero for zero trade with Europe or whatever, the markets would kind of react. And it would go back to the White House and they'd say, uh-uh, uh-uh, uh-uh. And I have to just tip my hat to them.
The resolve with which they are approaching tariffs, I mean, they're not freaking But they're saying here, no, we're prepared to stomach the storm right now.
Everything was awful. On Sunday night, I was a part of a bunch of different text message chains that were all about how everything was awful. Everything was terrible. And we were going to be heading into economic calamity. And yesterday got off to a really rough start. It was a volatile day. There's no doubt about it. Currently, however, we are up across the indices and
Andrew Colvett in for the one and only Charlie Kirk, who is on assignment today doing his college tour. He's in Illinois. It's going to be very exciting. Yesterday, he was in South Carolina in the rain, and still thousands of students showed up. Just remarkable what we're witnessing. John Carney with Breitbart News.
John, we've got a, let's say about a minute left here, and I'm gonna just, I'm gonna tee up the topic. By the way, Giorgia Maloney, breaking news here, the Italian prime minister will soon arrive in Washington to negotiate the tariffs and goods imported from Italy. So that's another piece of breaking news. We're hearing 50, 60, 70 countries lining up to negotiate.
So let me just set the stage here, John. Reagan famously did not like tariffs. He used them sparingly, but he thought long term that they would be problematic. And he referenced himself, the Smoot-Hawley Act in the 1930s and saying that it worsened the Great Depression. He referenced Nixon and some of the problems there, although Nixon got reelected in a landslide. Explain
You know, are we looking at a direct parallel, John Carney?
You're getting to the crux of the issue here, John. So we're talking about Smoot-Hawley, the 1930s, Nixon, Reagan's perspective on it. Conservatives have generally, historically been against protectionism, but to your point, Reagan was dealing with, these are not apples to apples, okay? Reagan still had the 1980s. We were still an industrialized country.
Our manufacturing base had not been hollowed out in the way that it has been now. And furthermore, Reagan was a bit of a protectionist in practice. And so we are dealing, these are not direct one-to-one parallels. Just continue on with this thought here, because I agree with you, Smoot-Hawley gets vilified, but the Great Depression already started.
Smoot-Hawley didn't get, I think, put into place until the 1930s. Black Friday, obviously, was in 1929. John Carney, the floor is yours.
And that is quite the change from yesterday. We are up about 1,000 points on the Dow, 400 points on the NASDAQ, and 123 points on the S&P 500. So the sky is not falling. We're not out of the woods yet. There's no doubt about it. But there is reason for real optimism, real optimism. We're going to play some of these clips that show what a difference a day makes. Now,
Yeah, well, and exactly. And I mean, a lot of we don't have to relitigate the Great Depression here. I think it's like it's akin to Hitler in that it's the only historical reference most people have about economics versus war. Right.
So but I mean, the truth is, is that there was a tightening monetary policy that was instituted during the Great Depression as well, which is the exact opposite of what economists believe. now used to get out of a recession or a deep recession where they ease monetary policy and they flood the market with cash and liquidity. We learned a lot of big lessons in the Great Depression.
The other thing, John, here, though, I want to just close out. If you had to say, where should Trump land this plane, whether it takes six months or six weeks, where would you like to see this end?
Yeah, and John, I think let's just be very clear. He wants better, more equal playing field with Europe, with India, with, you know, Vietnam. This is really Japan, but this is really a trade war with China. We are decoupling from China. He's going to force the hand of China.
And if President Trump can unite the world against the CCP and basically decouple the world's industrial supply chains from the CCP, it's going to be a massive historical win. John Carney, Breitbart.com. Check it out. Thank you so much, John. We'll have you on again soon. Thanks so much for listening, everybody. Talk to you soon.
You should check him out. We talk about what ultimately is the president's goal here. And then we talk about Smoot-Hawley in the 1930s and Reagan and protectionism. Does it work or does it not work? Very fascinating conversation. If this show means something to you, please consider becoming a monthly subscriber at members.charliekirk.com, members.charliekirk.com.
They're playing with a pair of twos. Now, what does he mean by that? Scott Besson is saying that China is exporting so much to us, we're only exporting one-fifth to them. So if they raise tariffs on us, it hurts us about one-fifth as much as it hurts them. The other piece of that puzzle is that China is playing with a house of cards.
We often call them that their economy is kind of like a paper tiger. It is weaker than what they would have the world believe. And why is that? Because it's a top-down economy. They are They are rife with oversupply in their economy, meaning they'll build buildings for all of these renters or buyers, and they sit at 20%, 30% occupancy.
And when you run an economy like that, you're prone to having vulnerabilities. And one of their main vulnerabilities is that they are an export economy. They have to export to the biggest market in the world, namely America, in order to survive and thrive. They're not able to do that if they've got 104% tariffs slapped on them from the United States. are playing with the upper hand.
President Trump knows that he has leverage and he is exerting that force with vicious cruelty on the Chinese who have exerted their force on us with vicious cruelty for years and years and years. And he's getting the leverage back. That's what this is about.
There's some breaking news that hit that Donald Trump, President Trump, the Trump administration has just won another Supreme Court case against these rogue activist judges. This time they affirm his authority to fire probationary workers. So this affects like 15, 16,000 different firings that have happened that were held up in the courts.
So we've got Mike Davis, Article 3 Project joining us later. This is just stringing together common sense, Article 2 powers of the presidency with the authority to actually run the country as the founders saw fit. They saw an energetic executive that was able to move quickly and respond to crises and not always be held up by the whims of the courts or the legislature.
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So there are obviously places in the constitution and authorities that are vested in the president and then put in the legislature, but this has gone on for far too long in Trump's presidency where they're using judicial activism in order to thwart his agenda and the mandate given to him by the people. So this is a big win. We're gonna dive into this even more, but I wanna get back
Just quickly here, and we've got John Carney from Breitbart, who we're going to go into all this tariff stuff. But this is brinksmanship. President Trump is using brinksmanship at a level we have not seen in a long time to bring our trading partners who have been abusing us back to the table. So let's continue. I want from Scott Besson here. Play cut 160.
Maximum leverage. 50, 60, 70 different countries that have come to the table, including Japan, including this morning a new news on South Korea. President Trump put a truth social about that. This is exactly why you're seeing the markets react. You're seeing the markets react because they believe that President Trump is going to revert back to deal making posture.
And this is what the entire international financial community is hoping for and waiting for. Now, I want to caution everybody. I'm not convinced that President Trump is ready to make a deal, for example, zero for zero tariff deal. And now let me explain why. Because actually the lion's share of unfair trade practices that exist between countries is not about tariffs.
Tariffs are an important piece of that, certainly. But the lion's share of those practices that are unfair, cheating, would be currency manipulation, would be other trade barriers, would be dumping product. There is much to discuss in this way. And this is fascinating. So Art Laffer is a famous economist from the Reagan era. He goes on Fox all the time. He's a friend with Charlie.
famous for the Laffer curve. The Laffer curve is basically a place where you could lower taxes to a certain point where you hit an optimal rate. And at that optimal rate, that you would increase the tax revenue coming into the treasury, right?
So that's a counterintuitive for most people because you'd think if you just keep raising taxes, you'd make more revenue for the treasury and for the country. Well, that's not true according to the Laffer curve. At some point you can actually go lower. You'll spur production in the economy, which will actually increase revenues. We saw this with the Trump tax cuts in 2017.
Without further ado, like I said, I'm so excited to bring in my next guest. That's John Carney from Breitbart. He is the finance and economics editor at Breitbart.com. John Carney, welcome to the show. Thank you for joining us. Hi, thanks for having me. John, you know, Alex Marlowe is a good friend and he raves about you when it comes to tariffs.
I mean, he's been said, you got to get John on, you got to get John on. you know, there's been so much news made in the last two days. Sum it up for our audience as best you can. We were down yesterday. It was a volatile day today. I think there's still some volatility in the markets, but we're up. What is going on? Why are we up? Break it down.
Hey, everybody. Welcome to The Charlie Kirk Show, this breaking news edition. It's myself and Blake Neff. We go through the breaking news of the day, including additional China tariffs, wild swings in the Dow of 2,600, plus the largest single-day point fluctuation in the history of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. What's causing it? What's behind it? We also bring on Dr. E.J. Antoni from Heritage
I think China is his number one nemesis here that he wants to take off the chessboard, and he's playing some high-risk poker. There's no doubt about it. Basically saying China cannot survive if without being able to trade all these goods into the United States. Now, there's going to be other problems for us that comes along with China having supply chain issues into the United States.
But that is the number one foe that Trump is after. It's very, very clear. So I happen to think that, listen, the sky's not falling. It's going to get bumpy, but we got to stay the course right now.
Honored to be joined by Dr. EJ Antoni. He's an economist over at Heritage. Dr. Antoni, welcome to the show. Thanks for making some time here on a breaking news day. Sum up for us what you are seeing. The market looks like Dow is down 480. I mean, it was down much lower than that. Then it shot up to about plus 840 on some fake news of a 90-day pause in the tariff war.
Now we're back down at 450, something like that. We're hearing news about 50 plus countries that are at the negotiating table. We've got Bibi Netanyahu has just arrived at the White House. Lots happening. Make it make sense for us.
Yeah, I want to go into that idea of the way these tariffs are structured, Dr. Antoni, because there's been a lot of back and forth, especially on social media, about that some people feel that President Trump shot too high on the tariffs, that they're not one-to-one, but they say they're factoring in trade deficits as well as other non-tariff-related trade barriers.
I'm Andrew Colvett, executive producer of The Charlie Kirk Show, and I'm joined by the one and only Blake Neff, one of our producers here on the show. Blake, this has been an action-packed morning when it comes to the economy, financials, the tariff war, the trade war. But Blake, let's just bring our audience up to speed of what's happened in the last few hours here.
Basically, President Trump, if I was looking at this I would say that he is very provably a true believer that he wants to get equal trade, meaning no trade deficit ongoing with the United States and our trading partners. I predict that this is going to be a fairly long term struggle and a trade war, if we want to use that word. Are you seeing the same?
And please comment on the way that these tariffs were structured in the first place. Was it done right? Were the things we could have done better? The floor is yours.
We have seen the largest, just by point, maybe not by percentage, But by points, a 2,600-point swing on the Dow was down like, you know, let's say 1,500 points. It swung up to as high as about 850, 860 based on some rumors that President Trump was considering a 90-day pause in his tariff regime. That turned out to be fake news, fake news. But in the meantime, we've seen the market fluctuate.
I mean, there's tons of these clips around. So, I mean, here's what I and he's been consistent throughout the years. And I think he's seeing this moment as his one opportunity to where he's early on in his term to seize this issue and push it forward. Now, I will agree that the way it was done, I think, has spooked the markets. I think you could have done it a different way.
So let's game this out then, Dr. Antoni. So where would you like to see his strategy go from here? Because Trump is going to claim a win one way or the other. So we know politically that's going to be part of the next step.
What does he have to do to sort of claim plausibly that his tariff and his policies have effectuated the change he wanted while also rewarding the markets, bringing everybody to a stable place with predictability?
Currently, it's down about 940, the Dow. But here's what I would say to everybody out there watching wondering what the heck is going on. Don't pay too close of attention to the market currently. There is a lot of moving pieces. There is a lot that is changing in and in flux any given moment. So everybody just take a breath, breathe.
Dr. Antoni, you were talking about something, and I think it's a nuanced point, but I think it's incredibly important because... you brought up the reconciliation package. Now, there was some waffling, and I would say Congress was attempting to water down some of the spending cuts, the tax, extending Trump's tax cuts. There was, I mean, you've got the moderates and you've got the fiscal hawks.
And I mean, what we were getting was a muddled mess. I do think one of the unintended consequences, positive consequences of what we're seeing in the markets is now Congress has, added incentive to ensure that we are getting the supply side relief that you're talking about, meaning are we going to get deregulation? Are we going to get these tax cuts extended?
Are we also going to add this 10% baseline tariff? You categorize it a different way, but what that does is it essentially builds in that revenue into this reconciliation package. Continue on with that, because I think it's a really important point that nobody's really bringing up at this point.
Let's just assume that the market has factored a lot of this stuff in. There will continue to be market shifts and fluctuations. Nevertheless, we don't know where all this is going to go. We don't know where it's going to land. But the sky is not falling, I assure you. Despite a lot of prognosticators and economists awfulizing on the internet, awfulizing on business shows and the like.
I totally agree. I think that's really well said, Dr. Antoni. I want to switch gears slightly here. And this clip was making the rounds. It was Secretary of Treasury Scott Besson. He sat down with Tucker Carlson and he made this pretty remarkable statement. Now, I want to factor in what Scott Besson says here in this clip. And then kind of use that to understand the way the market is reacting?
Is it an overreaction? Are the wrong people incentivized in the wrong ways here? So let's go ahead and play cut 124.
So, Dr. Antonio, let me frame it this way. There seems to be a disconnect between Wall Street and Main Street. And obviously, when Trump has done this tariff regimen, we are seeing Wall Street panic. They're unsure. There's no predictability. I understand that. The point is...
Is this recalibration of our economy a way to make it so that Main Street finally gets that relief and Wall Street's just going to have to take it on the chin? Or is there a way to make them both win?
Thank you. Thank you.
So Blake, I want to get your take on this. I know that you are, let's just say, in the spectrum of pro-tariff or anti-tariff. You're sort of I would say somewhere in the middle. So I'm curious about your take of what you've seen this morning. We were on chats Sunday night, basically predicting, I would say, a much bigger market collapse than what we've ultimately seen.
Now, the day is not done yet. It's about we're down 840 as I'm looking at it right now. What is your take on the news that's unfolded so far?
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Yeah, no, and I think that is one of the critiques that I've heard floated, that it's a you know, a sledgehammer when a scalpel was needed and that sort of thing. And I will say that, listen, you know, President Trump, he did not hide that this was going to happen. Now, we didn't understand the details or how it was going to be, you know, sort of put into place, put into practice.
Nevertheless, this is not a mystery. President Trump has been very, very clear about this. And I, you know, I happen to, and Blake, you and I have talked about this privately. I I hear every one of the pushbacks and I absolutely disagree. I will say, they could have done it circumstance. They could have just done it quietly and done it country by country. I would have been fine with that.
But directionally, I completely agree that there needed to be, as Jack Posobiec calls, a reset of the great reset. We needed a reset of the way that we do business with our trading partners. And I do believe that President Trump's art of the deal brinkmanship can be unnerving for the market. It can be unnerving for many people that are just watching it take place.
But the base that voted for Trump wanted change. And there are clips after clips after clips of farmers, beef ranchers that are saying, yes, thank you, because all of these other countries have been able to sell into America for years. And you know, we haven't been able to do the same to those countries, Australia, Argentina, whatever.
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This is recalibrating different parts of the economy, and that's going to be rough and bumpy for a little while. But I think what is very clear after this morning is that President Trump is dead serious, Peter Navarro is dead serious, Howard Letnick is dead serious about resetting and recalibrating a lot of these trade negotiations. Now,
One of the pieces of news that came across the wire this morning was out of the EU, okay? So I'm going to go ahead and play this clip. This is what I think is a good sign, and I'll explain on the other side of it. 136.
So this was European Commission President Ursula, that's quite the name, von der Leyen. And she says the EU stands ready for a zero for zero tariff deal. Now, you know, she makes it sound like this is something they do all the time. Everything's fine. I don't know why we couldn't have just, you know, gotten together and hammered this out. Well, here's the problem.
They couldn't hammer this out because the EU are really good negotiators. The United States has been locked in by a free trading, I would say, cult that sold a lot of our workers And so why is she willing to say this now? She's willing to say it because President Trump is playing hardball and the world is quickly catching up to the fact that we're not messing around.
Now, yeah, we've lost trillions in market value over this trade war, this tariff policy. to adjust essentially a one to $1.5 trillion trade deficit. And a lot of people say $8 trillion in market cap is not worth a $1.5 trillion trade deficit. You have to expand that over years, folks.
And you have to also assume the human price that has been paid as a result over years of these trade tariffs and these trade barriers that these countries put up. So Guess what?
Well, and I will agree with Ackman. I think he's a very smart guy. I don't necessarily think he's a true believer in sort of reforming, reshaping the American economy, especially with our trade deficits. I think he likes it. I don't know that he's got the guts to or the true belief and the conviction to stay the course when it gets rocky. And I'm a little bit different in that way.
I think, you know, where I will agree with him is that businesses, markets need predictability. And so the sooner that we can get to a predictable baseline, the better it will be long-term. And so whether that baseline is the 10% tariff across the board, so be it, or if we're going to have right now, Trump, you know,
Basically, what happened with China, to bring the audience up to speed with that, is we essentially had 54% tariffs on China. They came back with reciprocal tariffs or retaliatory tariffs of 34%. Trump now went to Truth Social and said, listen, we're going to hit you with an additional tariff of 50%, which would essentially put the tariff over 100% on Chinese imported goods.
Hey, everybody. Welcome to The Charlie Kirk Show. Andrew Colvin in for Charlie, who surprised us all this morning when we woke up and told us he's in Greenland. So I'm holding it down. Had to change my plans this morning. Not really. But we got to cover an absolutely amazing news day.
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folks members.charliekirk.com or charliekirk.com slash inauguration buckle up here we go charlie what you've done is incredible here maybe charlie kirk is on the college campus i want you to know we are lucky to have charlie kirk charlie kirk's running the white house folks
Not only was Charlie in Greenland meeting the MAGA faithful in Greenland that love Trump, love America, but Trump then simultaneously held a historic press conference at Mar-a-Lago. And we're opting to include the entire press conference in this podcast because I truly believe it's historic. This is a press conference where he asserts
All right, everybody, welcome to The Charlie Kirk Show. Andrew Colvin in for Charlie, who surprised me this morning by letting me know he's in Greenland with Don Jr. and other representatives from the Trump administration, incoming Trump administration. But President Trump is speaking right now at a press conference at Mar-a-Lago. So more on Greenland later, more on Facebook later.
Let's go ahead and throw back to President Trump.
America's strength on the international and domestic stage like we have not seen done in generations. It's truly, truly something to behold. I react to it live in this episode. Then we're joined by Cain from Citizen Free Press to get his live reaction.
It looks like President Trump has wrapped up his press conference at Mar-a-Lago. A lot of news.
that was made there saying he's going to, that military use forces on the table at the Panama Canal, potentially with Greenland, tariffs, he's going to be wielding those almost as a weapon, an economic weapon against possibly even Denmark, Panama, Canada, a lot of news that came out of that press conference. One of the main topics, obviously being Greenland,
This morning, I woke up to a very early morning message from Charlie saying that he's in Greenland and that I had to host the show, which is, you know, a bit odd, to say the least. You don't expect to get a message like that. But very, very cool stuff coming out of Greenland. Charlie was there with Don Jr. Sergio Gore, who's heading up PPO in the White House. President Trump
Truthed about this yesterday, saying that Don Jr. and his representatives were going to be on the ground. If you're watching this right now, you can see images of Charlie actually doing kind of live videos from Greenland. And Nuuk, I believe, is the town they flew over on Air Force One, landed, met with the people. What I've heard from Charlie directly is the Greenlanders love Trump.
They love MAGA. They love Don. They love Charlie. They follow Charlie on TikTok and on Twitter. X. What an amazing, amazing new era that we are all living in. This idea of manifest destiny in the United States, of expansion, of building, of growing, was something that felt like a previous era, a bygone era. Something when our pioneers were filling out the Western frontier.
And now we have a president that is... reversing decades and decades and decades, really a century of stagnation. And he's saying, you know, we shouldn't have given away the Panama Canal for a dollar. In relative dollars in 2025, That's the equivalent of over a trillion dollars and more than 35,000 men died building the canal to malaria. Why did Jimmy Carter do this? We don't know.
It was a terrible mistake. And now China is controlling both sides of the Panama Canal and we're getting ripped off. So he wants that back. He's willing to use force to do it. Very unclear. He's not committing to anything. talking about the trade deficits that we have with Canada, talking about how he wants to use economic force to get what he wants there. Now, listen, do I think that it is...
likely that Canada is going to really become a 51st state. I personally don't see that happening, nor am I convinced that I want that to happen. But what I do love is the art of the deal about putting America's national interest ahead of those of other countries, that we stop getting ripped off, that we stop being the marks of the world that use us as a piggy bank to get rich.
We are the piggy bank, folks. Make no mistake about it. We hold so many cards, both militarily and economically. technologically and Trump is saying adamantly he is going to be the type of president that uses the force that America has.
He's going to use the economic might of America to leverage our position on the world stage and get this country's national interest put first again, whether that be immigration or whether that be technology, whether that be militarily. This is a new era. We have never seen anything like this, not even in the first Trump presidency did we see anything like this. This is completely new.
You can see that the president is emboldened. You can see it even with the confidence and the swagger that he presents himself in front of the media. He won't take the bait. He doesn't get drawn into things he doesn't want to talk about. And he works them very easily, actually.
It's something to behold how this president is able to basically throw off the legacy news media reporters and the pits and the landmines that they are putting in front of him. A truly, truly remarkable show. It's wonderful to see as somebody that, you know, personally, I love this country. I'm going to live and die in this country. My children are going to live and die in this country.
And to love it as much as I do, and as much as I know many of you in this audience love it and feel the same as I do, to see a president just
boldly assert our interest and to stop apologizing for this country and stop apologizing for what we stand for and what we've accomplished and the amount of power that we can and should exert for the good of the world, but mostly for the good of the American people. It's something to behold. It truly is.
And each one of these press conferences that President Trump has and hosts, you can see that this is formulating. It's taking shape more and more and more. And I also have to mention this moment that quickly got picked up and went mega viral instantly. And that's that Trump has declared that he is going to change the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America. So let me repeat that.
He said he's going to change the Gulf of Mexico to the Absolutely incredible moment there. And I'm getting messages from Charlie as we're live in the show. He just took off on Trump Force One. They had to do a full thrust takeoff because it had a bit of a short runway and the cold air apparently. And he has now just taken off.
He's going to be giving us an update on what he experienced on the ground in Greenland. Probably going to be dropping a 20- to 30-minute podcast. So if you're not signed up or subscribed to the podcast, please do that. You can just go on your podcast app on whatever phone you have, type in The Charlie Kirk Show, hit subscribe. We're going to be dropping that tonight. Put that image up.
This is the Gulf of America, folks. A new dawn. Here in this great country of ours, you can feel it building. You can feel it happening. What an amazing, amazing tone shift, a vibe shift that you can feel. I want to hear from you. What do you get out of that press conference that Trump just hosted at Mar-a-Lago? A truly extraordinary... My phone is blowing up right now.
Everybody's saying how amazing it was. There was a new verve, a new energy, a new, like I said, swagger, confidence coming out of President Trump this morning. And if you just think about this sort of manifest destiny, this expansion... the vibe shift, if you will, out of this new incoming administration. It's truly historic. It's truly something to behold.
And we've never seen anything like it, where he's openly talking about the fact that Canada should become a state of the U.S., get rid of this trade deficit, that we want to take back the Panama Canal, that we want to make an actual aggressive play to acquire... Greenland. This is a patriotic reset. This is a patriotic reset. And we know this because we know these people.
Young people are going to look at this. And Trump made historic gains with young voters. They're going to look at this and they're going to probably be a little bit disoriented. It's new. But they're also going to be overwhelmed with a sense of patriotism, with pride in their country, of feeling like anything is possible again. And that's really
the core of what you need for a country to regain its footing internationally, to regain its sense of self, its self-confidence. And, you know, the legacy media is going to cry foul. We have some clips on that. We can play them for you. But underneath all of the noise is something truly profound. And I think it's a sense of rebuilding confidence in ourselves as a country.
We've had four years of malaise. That comes to an end. President Trump drew the line in the sand Let's go ahead and play cut 54. Charlie's talking to the people of Greenland, asking them what they think of America.
Live from Greenland. Live from Greenland. Let's just keep it rolling here. Play cut 55.
More soon. More soon indeed. It's going to be fascinating to see what comes of this. Really, it's a private trip, but it's a diplomatic trip. It sends a signal to the world. Very excited, honored that the host of this show got to be included in such a historic trip and something that could ultimately be radically important for the history of this country. So it's a reset.
It's a renaissance, a constitutional reset, but it's an American renaissance all at the same time. And you can feel this happening. And for those of you who don't fully appreciate or understand the importance of Greenland, I just want to lay out a few points for you here. You know, Greenland is an autonomous territory of Denmark, but it's autonomous and nobody really understands legally
if Greenland has any right to Greenland. And Trump has just said in that press conference, he is going to use severe tariffs against Denmark if they get in the way of this. Now, Greenland has said that they are going to vote for pure independence from Denmark. Apparently, the people want that there.
There's not a whole lot of people, but the people that are there, as you saw in the video with Charlie, they love America. They love President Trump. They're wearing MAGA hats. They're very excited about it. The United States has had a military presence in Greenland since World War II. And Trump is actually not the first president to flip buying it.
In 1946, Harry Truman proposed buying Greenland, but the idea was never really pursued. President Trump brought this up again in 2019. So he revived the conversation and Denmark rejected the idea. And we're hearing reports that Greenland is saying it's not for sale. Denmark is saying it's not for sale. I would say Just hold the phone. Let's see what happens, folks. Let's see what happens.
First of all, it's a very strategic location. It's positioned in the Arctic, so it's a vital national security concern to the United States. It is a good defense against threats. It can serve as a forward base for air and sea operations in the North Atlantic, and it has key resources. Greenland is extraordinarily rich
in minerals like lithium and nickel, which are the key ingredients for an advanced military technology and energy economy. So when we talk about AI and we talk about crypto, these things are going to be key. Greenland has them in spades. Four, preventing Chinese expansion. This is something President Trump is very clear about, and Russian expansion. China is all over Greenland.
They're actually using a company in Greenland to extract rare earth minerals currently. So that's happening to the tune of over $500 billion worth of rare earth minerals. Trump sees that. He doesn't like it. He wants to stop it. He wants to get that for our people. And then fifth is just an economic and military advantage.
Control over Greenland with secure trade routes and strengthen America's military presence, keeping China and Russia and other rivals at bay. So it's a huge, huge story developing. There's only 57,000 people in Greenland. And they candidly have a lot to gain from being closer because it's, you know, being closer to America. It's a closer territory. We could offer them a lot.
They're currently kind of in the middle of a tug of war internationally. And, you know, coincidentally, the people of Greenland have a higher GDP per capita than Canada, which is saying something. So- Trump has said in this press conference you can see the Russian and Chinese ships off the coast of Greenland.
Perhaps the Greenlanders are sick and tired of this, tired of being in a tug of war internationally. They don't have the means to defend themselves. But if America was involved, they certainly would. What an amazing, amazing day. The dawning of a new era is upon us.
And to help make sense of what we have just witnessed and Charlie's trip to Greenland, of course, so much more is the one and only Kane from Citizen Free Press. Kane, welcome to The Charlie Kirk Show, my friend. Help us make sense. I mean, what is going through your mind this morning with all of this breaking news?
Yeah. Charlie has assured me that there is quite a bit of FOMO going on right now. His phone is, as you can imagine, lighting up like a Christmas tree. Everybody going, where was my invitation, Charlie, to Trump?
No, it is. And I mean, everybody's texting me even going, you know, can you tell me? I've got all these reporters going, what can you tell me about Charlie's trip to Greenland? Please let us know. Charlie will be doing a kind of he's going to land back in Florida. Then he's going to be doing a 20 to 30 minute debrief with the audience.
So if you're not subscribed to the Charlie Kirk show podcast, now's the time to do it. He'll break it all down for you. And of course, he'll talk about it on this show tomorrow. but you're not going to want to miss it. It's appointment viewing for me. I'm going to be waiting on bated breath to hear what he has to say.
But Cain, what stood out to me, and I would love your reaction to this, is that the era of apologizing for America is over. Trump is boldly asserting our national interests, both here domestically from a policy standpoint, whether that be gas heaters, gas stoves, how much water comes out of your faucet.
He's pushing back against this domestic tyranny we've all been living under, especially in the last four years. But then he's also doing it abroad, whether it's the Gulf of America, Greenland, Panama, Canada, all of these different storylines about the hostages. This was huge news that he made during this press conference saying that you have two weeks, Hamas,
And if there's not a deal done to return the hostages from October 7th, hell will break out in the Middle East. That's a direct quote. All hell will break out in the Middle East. Cain, what are you feeling as a proud American? I know you're a patriot. What are the people of Citizen Free Press, what are they saying? What's the reaction?
That's well said, my friend. Well said. It is a damn good time. And you can feel it. You know, it's funny. I mean, Trump is not usually somebody to use sort of flowery language to And when he says a new light is dawning over the world, you know, it feels a little bit out of character. But then I challenge myself to come up with a different way of saying it.
And it really does feel like there is a new light dawning over the world. This tyrannical that we've broken the back of this tyranny. And we haven't even talked about this yet. Kane on this show. But in the midst of this, you're seeing Mark Zuckerberg from Meta Facebook. It comes out with this huge, huge announcement this morning.
And then Rahim Kassam helps make sense of the meta news, what's happening internationally with free speech, with the EU versus Musk versus Nigel versus Tommy Robinson. So much we cover here today. What an amazing, amazing day of news and of history, frankly. So please enjoy. Please consider joining members.charliekirk.com. That's members.charliekirk.com.
And he, you know, just to break it down for our audience, since it's new here, he's saying he's getting rid of the fact checkers that they have destroyed more trust than they've built. And it's become too politicized. He's moving the content moderation team from California to Texas. He's
openly saying he wants to work with the Trump administration to push back against the censorship in these other countries because he says that America has the most robust free speech protections and that the last four years have been hard with America's own government pushing for censorship.
So he threw Biden's administration under the bus while lifting up Trump and saying we need help to fight back on the world stage. That is a huge, huge development after putting Joel Kaplan in a big promotion. Bush and he's a Republican. Joel and Charlie have a relationship. And Dana White is now on the board of Meta. This is a new day dawning in so many ways.
A new light is going out across the world, as Trump says. Cain, help our audience make sense. How big is the Meta announcement from Zuckerberg?
Buckle up. Buckle up, America, because there's a new sheriff in town. As Tucker Carlson would say, dad is back. And a lot of these people have been bad, bad little kids. And they're about to get spanked. So
Cain, I'm just seeing something breaking across the wire here. It says, EU MPs call for immediate action against Elon Musk. After Musk's promotional tour for the AFD in Germany, the next conflict arises. Platform X is said to be violating EU laws.
Brussels MPs want to enforce stricter rules for X. You know, there's a whole debate here going around Elon Musk of whether or not he's exerting influence politically and a billionaire shouldn't be exerting influence politically. But it strikes me as kind of similar, and I think that's garbage, let me just say.
I mean, where were they when George Soros was exerting political influence all over the world, especially in the United States? Bill Gates, so many other billionaires do the same. You know, Mark Zuckerberg was saying something similar, saying, you know, I need the US government and President Trump's help to push back against these sanctions and these censorship laws in the rest of the world.
I mean, this looks like almost the new dividing line, the new fissure globally in the fight for free speech is now developing in this European bloc that is terrified of the rise of populism.
I completely agree. It occurs to me that we've been talking about exporting American democracy and values across the globe, and what do we get for it? We get LGBTQ flags flying at embassies, and we get DEI and CRT being injected worldwide, and we get anti-free speech laws through NATO and censorship in the EU. That time is over. We should be very, very blunt with Europe.
If Europe doesn't have free speech laws, they don't have our support. Full stop. You know, if you sanction X, Europe, well, then fine. We're going to pull our troops out of Germany and let you defend yourself.
Absolutely, Cain. Thank you for joining. What a morning. What a story. You combine that with news out of Facebook, Meta, Zuckerberg, changing so much of what he does over at that company with Trump's historic press conference. I'll just say it. I've never seen anything like that. And I've seen all of Trump's press conferences just about, and I've seen a lot of his rallies.
What we're seeing is a sea change. To help us make sense of that and also how it affects us internationally, what's going on in Europe right now, is Raheem Kassam, thenationalpulse.com. Raheem, welcome to The Charlie Kirk Show.
Yeah, absolutely. Rahim and I had a fascinating conversation last night. And so when Charlie surprised me with his trip to Greenland, I said, Rahim, let's continue the conversation on the show. So Rahim, you are probably one of the top experts in the country, both in America, but also internationally, when it comes to this topic of free speech.
I mean, from your time at Breitbart to your time now at the National Pulse, you fought alongside Nigel Farage. with Brexit and now with reform. I mean, you've seen it from both sides of the pond. I want to start with this news out of Meta, Zuckerberg's big shot across the bow. What do you make of it? Do you trust it? You're also a voice for the base, the grassroots. A lot of people are skeptical.
I happen to be very hopeful. What do you make of it?
Well, and one of the things I want to bring, and I appreciate that skepticism. On some level, one of the things I heard in the Zuckerberg video was that it just feels a little bit too it's easy for him to sort of move that Titanic. I know it's slow, and he said it's going to take some time, but what happens if the political winds shift again?
Is he just going to move it back in a direction that's anti-American? But I will say, and now I want to broaden this conversation to make it, I want to talk about Europe and its censorship regime.
You know, because one of the things he says in that video is he wants to work with President Trump and that because of America's robust free speech laws, it has made the last few years incredibly difficult for a company like Facebook because he didn't have the backing of the American government. As a matter of fact, they were coercing Facebook
You see this, it's just breaking right now, is that European MPs are now calling for stricter rules against Elon. They want to go on the attack against Elon because he's exerting force. Now, let's take this abroad. You and I were talking yesterday about Tommy Robinson, somebody I don't know, somebody that you do know. To the outsider, it appears that this is part of this European...
this stricture, this force against free speech in the EU. And I understand that Tommy Robinson is a complicated figure. Sometimes he can be his own worst enemy. But it does, from an outsider's view, seem like he has been restricted in the thing. He's getting punished for being a loud and proud Briton. And, you know, what is the free speech culture in the UK right now?
We're seeing very terrifying videos of people having police come to their homes because they posted something on Facebook, right, that they weren't supposed to about migrants or the like. Explain it to us. How does Facebook, and then connect the dots. How does this news from Facebook, how does this apply to the UK?
Are we seeing an expansion or is this going to be a World War III transatlantic from a free speech perspective, of course?
Yeah, I mean, I think that's really, I mean, you brought up a number of really good points there, Rahim. I, for one, am personally in the camp that America should be exerting its economic and military, maybe it's just leverage. I don't mean actual kinetic warfare here, but hey, we've got troops stationed all across the world. We help defend Europe via NATO. There are levers that we can pull
to, you know, instead of exporting the LGBTQ flag at our embassies and ensuring that the censorship regime is alive and well with our transatlantic partners, is to say, hey, you know, instead of that, we're actually going to defend free speech and we're going to defend nations that protect the free speech of its countries.
Because it occurs to me, Rahim, the Tommy Robinson example, and I do want to understand from you more of what the dynamics within reform and Nigel and Tommy and Elon, I think that's an important conversation. I want to do that next segment. But it occurs to me that what's happening with these grooming gangs is directly tied to the free speech conversation that we're having today.
Because if it was more robust, the protections for citizens to speak out, if they're, if it... Aspect of this right where it becomes, you know, the scarlet letter, you know, you're a racist You're a xenophobe or whatever that you don't speak out more broadly, right?
I mean there is a social pressure that it's not necessarily legal So you have to deal with that first but you can only deal with that if the population Feels that it has the ability to speak freely and the fact that there aren't more free speech protections in the UK has led directly To the fact that tens of thousands of young women. I don't know if you have a number I've heard all kinds of numbers
of how many young children have been abused and sexually assaulted and raped in the UK by these gangs. But that is a direct connection. If people had the ability to speak out more profoundly, more boldly, without fear of reprisal, attack, fines, or even imprisonment, little girls would have been saved. They would not have been abused. And so this has a direct impact on the population.
Brahim, your thoughts? That's exactly right.
Yeah, I think you're absolutely right. And by the way, for the audience that maybe isn't read in on this, the actual reports of what's happened to these little girls is, it's so chilling. It's so horrible. It's unbelievable. So Raheem, I need your help here. You've got Tommy Robinson, which seems to be sort of a representative of reform.
He's this working class bloke from, you know, just feels like kind of Mother England. He's just waves the flag. His heart is so in the right place. He's fighting the grooming gangs. And by the way, these stories were coming out over a decade ago. We're talking like almost 15 years ago. It's taken this long for the lid to be blown off of this story. Anyways, we like Reform. We like Nigel.
We like Tommy. But there seems to be a rift. And how does Reform take it to the next level when you've got Nigel basically going on the record saying, hey, you know, that's a bridge too far with the Tommy thing. And then Elon Musk saying, Nigel doesn't have what it takes. Now, I know you're a big... Nigel, supporter, you've been with Nigel for a long time.
How does reform pick it up and get to the next level and really help make Britain great again?
I would agree with that. I mean, I want to see the UK be great again. And we talked about that last night. So I know you agree, Raheem. Thank you for making the time today. What a day in history. I'm going to remember this one. Thanks so much for listening, everybody. We'll talk to you soon.
Where, by the way, if you join members right now, you are entering. And by the way, you have to do an annual membership. That's the key here. Annual membership. You get entered to win a trip for you plus a guest, airfare, hotel, all this stuff, and tickets to the ball and all kinds of things at the inauguration. That's right. You win a once in a lifetime opportunity to go to D.C.
Well, I mean, I want the audience to appreciate just the stakes that not only the country was up against. But from a personal level, I mean, this is no joke. And Charlie, you know, feel free to chime in here as much as you want.
We were actively discussing what happens if we lose and how to protect ourselves, because we were just assuming that, you know, the suits were going to come in and raid us. They were going to come in and they were going to get us. And to live in that kind of reality with that actually being a plausible reality, knowing that you didn't do anything. You're simply exercising your free speech and
you know, activating people on the ground. And, you know, you're trying to do everything by the stinking book, as close as you possibly can, double, triple, quadruple checking, everything, even holding yourself to a standard that's above what the law even states, because you know that if you trip up even a little bit, paperwork error could land you in the gulag.
I mean, this is how much scrutiny, everything that we touched, everything that we put out, everything that we were doing behind the scenes had to go through. And it was simply because of what happened after J six and what they did to squash political dissent. And I mean, there, there was a few names I'm sure on that list that they had.
I know there was a file that was huge on Charlie inside the committee. We, we heard about it from friends, but I mean, there was very few names that were higher on that list. And so to have to live with that as reality. And I think back Charlie to election night when you, you know, we're all stunned after Pennsylvania gets called,
And this this just well of emotion, just I think the wave just swept over all of us, you included. And that's why that video went so viral. I think we were all just so grateful that this country had been saved from these people that would do that to their fellow citizens.
Yep. Charlie and I were in Phoenix broadcasting live. It's like I got a check with my lawyer.
Yeah, I think there is going to be the ones that are clear cut cases. I think they're going to be day one. I think there's going to be some that received really, really harsh sentences for the trespass, meaning that they might have been guilty of something. All of us on this show right now would say, you know, hey, that was a crime. You shouldn't have vandalized that equipment.
You shouldn't have punched that police. Whatever it is, I don't know. I'm not even suggesting certain people did certain things and didn't. But if you did something where you hit a cop or if you vandalized something, And I'm not just talking about walking through the Capitol rotunda.
I'm saying if you did something, we would all agree that of common sense, maybe you get that sentence commuted if you've already served your time, right? That might be a different review process. I would think there would be very, very few instances where the sentencing would be upheld.
And I'm not speaking on behalf of the administration here, but I'm even talking about the Proud Boys and things like that, where they got Jack, you probably know the sentencing more specifically, but it was like 20-something years for a seditious conspiracy for the Proud Boys. I mean, some of this stuff was so bananas over-the-top sentencing.
And you might say, okay, well, they were coordinating something or whatever. I'm not the expert on this. All I know is that even those cases, I would say even the cases where criminality was found and maybe some of it could be proven, the hammer came down on these people in such a disproportionate way that is not fitting with the crimes even being suggested.
Seditious conspiracy, I think it was like one of the first times this had been used since the Civil War against somebody. And really we have to come back to the fact that these were patriots. Most of the vast, vast, vast, vast majority were patriots that were coming to the Capitol, begging the country to look at what people thought were fraudulent votes,
Although, Charlie, you did share some information on your show that I found pretty shocking that you shared. You should share it again. What did I share?
or that were fraudulent practices, whatever, in the 2020 election. That's why people were there. They were not there to overthrow the democracy. They were not there for any of that stuff that the left likes to say. It was not a day that will live in infamy like Pearl Harbor or World War II.
This was, I think, a real opportunity to say, hey, we want the states to look at these votes again because there's shenanigans going on. And I still feel that way. And I still feel that way, honestly, about some of the voting that happened in 2024. We need to get our elections in line. We need to get election integrity in line in alignment and we need to keep addressing it.
So to call these patriots seditious conspiracies or whatever, I think is completely out of line. So that's my theory on it. But the vast majority day one. And then, yeah, there's going to be some review processes on the other ones.
No, this is good. I don't know, man.
Oh, my God. A couple things. A couple things. Blake, I told – just like bent my – okay, say Ellen Page was a lesbian before becoming – is this right, Jack? So would Ellen Page –
i don't know okay so we got a gaycation mean that she was then on a island with other lesbians or yeah i don't know it's very mind-bending her spouse yes yes was so ellen was she was gay but now she's ellen was gay before okay i don't really know what she what she would do with there with that but here's what i will tell you i read this thing from top to bottom and
And there's multiple posts, and then she waits a couple days, and then she comes back, and you can tell that her thinking has changed.
It is the best troll job I've ever seen if it's a troll, because it actually feels very authentic the way that her thinking develops over time, and you can tell that she's then made up her mind about certain things, and then she's actually reacting to some of the comments saying that they've shaped her thinking. I mean, it's very... It's a very well done troll if it's a troll.
The other thing is I actually have lived in the UK for some time. I was there for almost a year. This feels very British, feels very uniquely, uniquely something that would actually happen in the UK. And it's hard to explain why, but I feel that way.
Genuinely, because like this story, apparently this guy involves the woman's brother in law and it like destroys two families. It totally destroys two families. There's kids involved. The parents are distraught. I mean, if this is like a thing that's spreading on the if this is like a contagion that's spreading on the underwebs like this is this boats very, very badly for, you know, the UK.
And I hope probably is here already. It's really terrifying.
No, does not approve.
Very elaborate. He wants to keep his family intact and still cheat on his wife.
Wow.
I think, and what Blake said, that there's this built-in social acceptance to just fail at your resolutions. I would say, I'll answer both questions. What is my resolution? I feel like I'm still living up to a resolution that I am bound and determined to keep.
Maybe this is too much behind the scenes, but Charlie and I and a few others were in a small room probably about four years ago, Charlie, I want to say. Maybe it was five years ago. uh, where we mapped out how we wanted to see the Charlie Kirk show grow. And, and we put it all on a whiteboard and we, we mapped it out and I took pictures of it. And I still look back at that picture.
Uh, I would say probably once a month, once every two months. And I, and I check how we're going and we're still not, we're not all the way there yet, but I would say that we're closer to being there than we've ever been. And, um, and that makes me really excited. The other thing I would say, so I, I would say that, um, Resolutions, it's a built-in psychology.
If you know that you're not going to keep a resolution, then they're useless. But the second you honor a promise that you make to yourself, that your yes be yes and your no be no, the more that you believe in yourself internally and you do build this momentum, kind of like what Blake was talking about.
As soon as he took one step in the right direction and he didn't eat food the next day, he ended up gaining momentum. And I think that's the psychology of resolutions is that once you actually honor something that's hard internally and mentally for you, the next day is easier and you keep going.
And all of a sudden you build this momentum and the psychology shifts to becoming from, I'm not going to do this. Why am I even trying to do this? To, wow, I can't believe I made it this far. I really want to keep going. And once you turn that corner, something really profound and powerful happens. And you become a much more powerful person when you start honoring your own resolutions to yourself.
So I would say wherever you're at, I love resolutions. They don't have to come at New Year's. But do something really hard and make yourself keep doing it, and you will become a more powerful person as a result of that. And you can actually trust yourself when you commit to doing something that you're going to follow through. And that's a really powerful way to live your life.
Yeah, he took the instructions well. Now, Charlie, can you reveal?
Yeah, Charlie, can you reveal which members were in attendance that day when you were doing the testimony? Are you able to?
Oh, yeah, that's in here.
But like this is the this is the big the big scandal here. And Charlie hit the nail on the head. The fact that he had to go through 10 attorneys. I mean, this is not that Charlie Kirk is not some Joe Schmo. This is this Charlie Kirk. He's a very like.
Really solid. Multiple times. Yeah, multiple times. Yeah, really, really, really smart guy and super smart. Yeah, so smart. And also just kind of no nonsense. Didn't even care about any of that stuff was just like, listen, we're you know, you did nothing wrong. You know, we're going to make sure you get through this.
It was really comforting, actually, to meet with him and hear hear the way he does business. So if anybody finds themselves in that spot, by all means, give give Jeff a call. But I mean, the fact you had to go through that in the first place, I mean, talk about what Jack was saying, a real low point. And I mean, it had I mean, you know, we had Timothy Hale on the show.
It's like the this, you know, solitary confinement for 14 months. What you went through was terrible, but it was nothing compared to what so many just normal American patriots had had to had to experience as a result of it wasn't just a low point for MAGA. It was a low point for the country. And the fact that we still have people like.
Sonny Hostin or Hostin and even now Hakeem Jeffries invoking Pearl Harbor from inside the Capitol after a cringy moment of silence with Chuck Schumer inside the Capitol saying that this was a day that will live in infamy. Doing this, this is not clips from four years ago. This is not a clip, as you said on Twitter, Charlie, from four months ago. This is a clip today.
We're still dealing with this stuff that these people are so deranged. that they thought it was worthwhile dragging half the country through the mud, calling everybody fascists and Nazis and all of these terrible things. And for what? You know, to get some weird virtue signal out of it for political gains, destroy the country for their to rule over a pile of ash.
So I think it's I think it's a pretty fascinating story what you went through, Charlie. And then obviously to remember that we actually had a pretty easy compared to so many.
You would be correct, sir.
Hey everybody, welcome to the Charlie Kirk show from the Bitcoin mobile studio. I'm Andrew Colvett, your host for the day as Charlie's on assignment at San Francisco State. We have an action-packed show for you. First, we tell you all about what happened last night at the University of Washington. Antifa and Black Block took over that school. We have Ari Hoffman from Seattle who gives us the...
President Trump is continuing on with his Oval Office meeting with Mark Carney, Prime Minister of Canada. We are joined by the great Alex Marlow, editor-in-chief of Breitbart News. Alex, thank you so much for taking the time today. Just so much news just erupting this morning.
President Trump is still meeting with Prime Minister Carney in the Oval talking about, I mean, doubling down that he wants to make Canada a 51st state, but they're there ostensibly to talk about a trade deal. He says the Houthis have admitted defeat, that there's some sort of detente that's been reached there. We're not going to be striking the Houthis.
He's also announced there is a massive news that's going to be announced on Thursday or Friday, it looks like. He said it's as big as it gets. Your initial reaction, I know it's ongoing. What do you make of this meeting between Canada's new prime minister and President Trump in the Oval?
That's a that's a I think a really smart insight, Alex, that, you know, having an ideological foe across the table. Trump is almost better in that setting. And it means the dividing lines are very clear. We know where we agree. We know where we disagree. And it just it allows for a more honest back and forth in some ways, whereas it's just easier for lack of a better expression.
Yeah, I think you're 100 percent right. And I'm sitting there – candidly, I do not want Canada as a 51st state. We don't need another California-esque voting bloc in America. But Trump's sitting there going like, I think it would be – I think it would be great for Canada. It would be a big tax cut right in front of the prime – and then the prime minister says – You know, it's not for sale.
And Trump still sits there and goes, never say never. I'm a real estate guy. Never say never. A pretty striking moment there. Alex, do you just chalk this up to just Trump's constant pushing forward in a negotiation where he doesn't concede ground until the final moment? Yeah.
I think that's smart. I mean, listen, as somebody who doesn't want Canada, I can concede that Alberta would be a great addition. I would take Alberta and the oil sands.
All right, welcome to the Charlie Kirk Show. This is your guest host for the day, producer Andrew Colvett. Honored to be with you from sea to shining sea across the fruited plain. Charlie's on assignment today. He's going to be at San Francisco State doing a big campus event up there. And it... Ties in kind of to our first guest, which is Ari Hoffman. He's the West Coast editor.
Yeah, it's diplomatic brinksmanship, and I think it's wildly entertaining. I do think that's probably why Mark Carney is the prime minister of Canada right now instead of Pierre Poiliev, or however you say his French name, who lost his own election.
I think so. The other breaking news this morning that I want to hit with you, Alex, is Tom Tellis is officially saying to reporters now that and he's informed the White House he is going to not support Ed Martin as a U.S. attorney in the District of Columbia. Let's go ahead and play 224.
So, Alex, Tom Tillis is a no. There's not very much margin for error here in the Senate. Tell us a reminder for our audience. If Ed Martin is not confirmed by Senate Republicans before May 20th, then Trump hating Judge Boasberg gets to choose the replacement.
We're going to get started right right off the bat here with guests. West Coast editor of the Postmillennial. He's also a Seattle radio host. Talk Radio 570 KVI. Ari, welcome to the show. I wanted to get started with you really quick here. I woke up this morning, and my alma mater, I went to UW, University of Washington Huskies, was all over the news. Antifa taking over buildings.
Yeah, let's go ahead and throw up. We have a number for the audience to call his office. I think we need to absolutely melt his phone lines down. This is Senator Tom Tillis's office number. Please call him. Tell him be respectful, be polite. But call Senator Tom Tillis. Let him know that we want Ed Martin in as U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia. We can't give this to a Democrat.
It's a completely unnecessary loss. We'd be ceding ground. We need to be attacking and taking ground. So go ahead and please call that number. And the number is 919-856-4255. That's 919-856-4630. And Alex, I love that you have a personal relationship with Ed Martin. I think that's fantastic. The bottom line is, whatever your thoughts are on Ed Martin... whether you think he's too radical on J6.
I'm a little bit more passionate about J6. I think a lot of people got caught up in a frenzied moment. Trespassing fines, okay, sure. But grandmas do not need to be going to prison. They don't need to be using the Enron statute to lock up people that were basically peaceful, took a selfie and walked out. So yeah, 30 seconds, Alex.
All right, Alex, let's go through some of these moments. I just have to play this because it's so brilliant. 233, this is on Canada becoming the 51st state, 233.
We won't stop, Alex. And then I'll play one more clip just in the interest of time. 236 says India has already agreed to drop all of their tariffs.
Alex Marlow, your reaction?
And why this relates to Charlie being at San Francisco State University, you might remember, Ari, and he's going to be there with Riley Gaines, is that Riley Gaines did a Turning Point USA event there yesterday. A few years back, got locked in a—she was basically taken hostage in a room.
Yeah, I agree with you, Alex. I think to get the oil sands in Canada, I'm not taking it literal, but I appreciate your point. That being said, Canada's already part of Five Eyes. We're very integrated in a lot of ways. This should be an obvious way to... bring our countries closer together, cooperate closely together.
Trump is playing his leverage hand, but again, Canada can be a massive ally for us as, as well as India. You start linking some of these countries together and boxing China out. They're going to be, there's going to be a lot more leverage on China. If we can hammer out some of these trade deals, you know, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, uh, Australia is going to stay close to us.
30 seconds, Alex, where do you see this ending? Trade deals imminent or is he going to slow off this?
These trans agitators, I'm sure many of them friends with the Antifa crowd, trapped her in a room there for hours. The police were feckless. They didn't do anything. Now, explain to our audience that's just getting caught up on the news today. What happened in Seattle overnight, specifically at the University of Washington, the engineering building, I believe?
All right, Alex Marlow, the great Alex Marlow, editor-in-chief of Breitbart News. Check him out. Thanks so much for listening, everybody. Talk to you soon.
play-by-play of a really disturbing event that took place there, protesting Boeing and a bunch of Hamas supporters. And then we bring in Alex Marlow to break down the Oval Office meeting between Mark Carney, Prime Minister of Canada, and President Trump. The art of the deal is on full display, let me assure you, in that Oval Office meeting. And Alex Marlow is one of the
They're still allowed to table on campus, even though they've been suspended. How's how's that work?
Yeah, I mean, Riley's doing the West Coast tour, and that's why this all ties in. So she's going to be with Charlie at San Francisco State during the day for a tabling event and then going straight up to University of Washington to do a second event. And now University of Washington is set ablaze. Now, I do want to give some credit here to the police.
I mean, it sounds like it was a bit of a delayed response. Response time here. I don't know how long were the protest, these protesters, how long were the vigilantes allowed to sort of set up shop there in the engineering building before police got there? And again, I want to say the police seem to be pretty forceful in this instance to clear the building.
one of our great friends of The Charlie Kirk Show, editor-in-chief of Breitbart News. If you get something out of this show, if it means something to you, I want to encourage you to join members.charliekirk.com. That's members.charliekirk.com. That's your one-stop shop to get merch, to get exclusive content, to get exclusive articles, to get VIP access at events.com. and so much more.
Excellent. Well, I'm. A bit encouraged that the police are showing the force that I think is really necessary. But it is fascinating to watch their their tactics change, evolve over time. As you said, they didn't post on social media. I heard nothing about this last night. I woke up and saw all the imagery everywhere.
Just to give the audience a little taste of how these groups operate, they're shouting death to police. Every police death is a victory for the resistance. Play cut to 17.
Yikes. Ari, the best you can. I mean, this is pure insanity. The best you can. What motivates these people? And why is Seattle and the West Coast, including San Francisco, Oregon, Portland, why is it such a hotbed for these lunatics?
Yeah, I mean, the elevation of the Hamas, the new thing, I mean, it was George Floyd, it's race, and now it's Hamas. It's the new thing, always the new thing. They just adopt whatever that new next thing is, and then they go and cause property damage and vandalize public buildings, especially a brand new engineering building, by the way.
And they're calling for the university to cut ties with Boeing to cease all donations from Boeing. It's a really, really dramatic sight out of Seattle last night. It seemed like it came out of nowhere, too. And I think that was the shocking part here. All right. Thank you so much for jumping on. I know I know you guys had a late night last night with the covering this this story.
Tell everybody how they can follow you and follow along with this story. I know you're going to be covering it today.
Thank you so much, Ari. Appreciate it. Stay safe up there.
It also helps keep the lights on here and help us grow our staff, our team, and keep growing and expanding to make sure the truth gets out to millions and millions of people all across the country and even the world, actually, if you want to know the truth of it. And again, that's members.charliekirk.com. So without further ado, buckle up. Here we go.
President Trump is meeting with Prime Minister Carney from Canada in the Oval. I want to go ahead and throw to that. It's already been a rather eventful meeting, so let's go ahead and throw to that Oval Office meeting.
I want you to know we are lucky to have Charlie Kirk.
But I fear that if it were to happen, even against a marginal country like Iran, you could very quickly realize there are a lot of vulnerabilities in the United States that are shockingly easy to hit.
321.
Yeah, Andrew, it is genuinely a lot like a movie. It's also a lot like a video game. That's pretty funny because I heard comparisons to one I've actually played before. It's called Ace Combat. So it was done with drones, unmanned drones, several hundred of them, I believe. I think they said it... Going off memory, I think it was about 118 drones or so.
But what they did is they weren't flown in just from Ukraine. They were smuggled into Russia. And at least what they're publicly claiming they did is they were packaged in cargo containers that were designed to look like they were carrying prefabricated housing.
And the reason they did this is since it was prefabricated housing, they had a good excuse for why do these cargo containers have solar panels on top of them? Well, they weren't for the roofs of housing. They were to keep the drones charged.
They actually were just using them to keep the drones powered up as long as they needed them, and then they could launch them whenever they were in place and ready. Reportedly, they were planning this operation for 18 months before they launched it. And so they got these containers into Russia. They got them outside of these different bases they want to attack.
And to give you a sense of the scale here, one of the bases they attacked was just outside Murmansk, Russia. If you look that up on a map, it's in the Arctic Circle. It's in the far northwest of Russia, close to Finland. And on the other end of Russia, another place they hit was in Amur province. That's way out in far eastern Russia. It's close to China. It's close to Japan. They hit a base there.
They also hit a base at Irkutsk. That is in central Siberia near Mongolia. And they hit two air bases closer to Moscow. So they really hit every single part of Russia with this attack. They claim they took out. several dozen of these heavy bombers that Russia has.
These bombers, they can be used for delivering nuclear weapons, but the reason they wanted to hit them was they're also used for delivering cruise missiles, other heavy ordnance. And so they took them out. They're claiming they took out about $7 billion worth of Russian airplanes, which is quite a few. And as we've learned with these drones, they can be made incredibly cheaply by comparison.
Well, it gets into the big picture, which is – we've heard people who have been saying the war is three months from ending for three years now. And I think this is mostly a signal that, hey, Ukraine can – still make things hurt a lot. They can cause a lot of embarrassment. There's a lot of ways this can damage them.
And so in a sense, you could say that's actually a play for peace in that you can show Ukraine is capable of hurting Russia a good amount. And I think a barrier to serious escalation that is helpful is Trump is so clearly in favor of getting a peace deal. With Biden, we had Biden saying Putin has to go. He's using this regime change rhetoric.
Trump clearly wants to negotiate he's clearly pressured Ukraine to make some concessions and it seems based on his anger that it's Russia that is less interested in peace than Ukraine which can make sense they have more reserves overall. But I think that's a helpful barrier to this escalating too far.
I mean, if Putin actually used nuclear weapons, I think that would very quickly turn almost the entire world against him because it would be so extreme and frankly so unjustified. So we have to hope that doesn't happen.
Oh, for sure. Oh, for sure. And another angle that is very important to emphasize here is this clearly is something we should worry about, too. It's a good point towards the need to secure the border and also just understand how much the nature of warfare has changed. America, we have tons of shipping containers coming into this country all of the time.
And any country can afford drones like this. That's what's really crazy is North Korea, Iran, really poor countries could be developing these drones and ship them in quietly in a container and use them to hit things in the United States. And we'll probably be seeing this in the future someday. And we need to start talking right now about being ready for that.
Well, so there's Boulder, Colorado, of course, where you just have a guy who came across the border and, uh, shouldn't have been in this country. And he was just a lunatic. Thankfully went nuts, tried to kill people by, uh, setting them on fire. Thankfully he was nuts and inept. So nobody died currently, but it's trivially easy to imagine, uh,
Far more effective people coming in who likely have already come in. We had this effectively open border with Earth for four years under Joe Biden. It wasn't just people coming from Mexico. It wasn't just people from Venezuela or Haiti. We had literally tens of thousands of people who crossed the U.S.-Mexico border who came back.
From China and got in and you hear wild stories like Chinese gangsters basically took over the illegal marijuana growing business in Maine, things like that. Another story I always find myself thinking of, you can Google this in Fresno, California. the Chinese managed to build an entire illegal secret biolab in a warehouse in Fresno.
And we don't really know what the purpose of it was, but someone built an illegal entire biolab that we only found months or years later. So if you're able to sneak that kind of thing in and pull it off, you can sneak in and pull off just about anything. And what we see overall is there's been a change in... The nature of warfare.
You think 100 years ago in World War II, what mattered was what's your overall industrial output? Can you make thousands and thousands of very simple tanks and planes and guns and artillery and all of that? Then... In the 80s and 90s and early 2000s, what mattered was this extremely precise, advanced, extremely expensive technology. And that was great for America.
We could build these bombers, stealth bombers that could drop these extremely high-tech bombs that we could pilot into a specific spot. And you could just blow anyone to smithereens and we could beat any country in a war with almost no casualties.
Now what we see, though, is this rise of the power of, call it irregular warfare, that we can build a robot that, for a few thousand bucks, you can build a robot that you can stick a bomb on, stick a gun on, and it can fly basically anywhere. Or go look at what Boston Dynamics is building. You'll be able to build a little robot dog-looking thing.
And again, put a bomb on it, put a gun on it, and you can hide it anywhere, and it can attack anywhere, and nobody's life is at risk. You know, suicide attacks have always been possible. And the biggest barrier to them, frankly, is there's a limit on how many people are literally willing to kill themselves to fight for a cause. But now you're getting rid of that limitation.
You can do fully autonomous attacks with robots, with drones. And suddenly, suicide-style attacks can happen anywhere without having to sacrifice anybody. And... Really, the reason we don't see them in the United States is, thankfully, we haven't been in a big war with a serious adversary in a while. And thankfully, under President Trump, we seem committed to not getting into one of those wars.
Hey everybody, welcome to The Charlie Kirk Show. Andrew Colvett and Blake Neff are back for this episode of The Charlie Kirk Show. We cover the fallout from RFK's combative, really explosive confirmation here. We go through more clips, more reaction, and then we also tune in to the Lakin-Riley Act signing ceremony.
pressured heavily to stay in line well and and you know we also saw nicole shanahan is going out uh making very direct threats of primary senators that vote against rfk jr that was of course his running mate when he was still running for congress he also made another viral clip here blake that president trump is going to like very much play cut 142
So you're still going to be able to get McDonald's, Blake. All praise. McDonald's will still be available.
Blake, say hello. Hello, Andrew. It's a great day. It is a great day. I mean, you know, I think it's important that we keep the show rolling here, Blake. I mean, that confirmation hearing with RFK was pretty explosive at times. I knew that he was going to be coming into a hostile environment, but I actually didn't anticipate the sort of
moralizing and the virtue signaling from the Democrats that we saw there. Actually, I thought it I knew it was going to be like a five, six at least. But I think what we saw was like an eight, nine to a ten at times. Grandstanding from Bernie Sanders, grandstanding from Senator Warren and, you know, Senator Hassan from New Hampshire. I mean, it was the list goes on. They all came at him very hot.
What do you make? of the environment within the confirmation hearing.
Some truly powerful moments there, especially when Lakin's mother, Alison Phillips, took the podium to speak Her reaction, President Trump's deeply personal reaction, you're not going to want to miss it. We have a new day in America, and this Lake and Riley Act is an amazing, amazing development as we try to secure our borders of this country once again.
That was an incredibly powerful moment, Blake, when Allison Phillips, Lake and Riley's mother, came up. And it was interesting, the camera I was watching, it kind of almost zoomed in on President Trump standing behind her shoulder as she spoke and sort of talked about Lakin, got emotional.
And you could see the president take this heavy, deep breath in, just sort of gutted, as I think I was, as everybody watching would be, hearing her describe her deceased daughter that was killed at the hands of an illegal Venezuelan immigrant who should have never been in this country. Even Bill Clinton, if you'll remember during the campaign, said didn't think they vetted that immigrant properly.
This person never should have been here, killed Lake and Riley. And to hear Alison Phillips speak about that from the heart during this signing ceremony was just powerful. And to see President Trump's reaction was also powerful.
And well, and Blake, you even you've even yeah, you've even seen Democrats pundits on CNN, MSNBC saying, guys, you shouldn't be surprised that he's doing X, Y and Z. He said exactly. this during the campaign and he's fulfilling it. We're just not used to Republicans or Democrats for that matter, politicians in general fulfilling their promises.
I wanna play this clip really quick though, 166, and you'll see the camera does actually zoom in on President Trump reacting to Lakin Riley's mother, 166.
Just powerful. I think beyond just promises made, promises kept, Blake, I think to your earlier point, realizing and seeing the American people realize how personal this is to President Trump and how much of a personal touch he pursues all of his policies with, he is a guy that will call you and check in on you if your wife has cancer.
He is a guy, if some tragedy has befallen you, will call in multiple times to check in. This is sort of unprecedented. I don't know where he gets the time But we have not seen that in an American politician, at least at this scale and this level. In my lifetime, I've never seen a politician like this.
Yeah. Well, Mark Halperin said he's seen two of these, and it's Bill Clinton, 12-3, Barack Obama, and Donald Trump. Thanks so much. Talk to you soon.
Well, I think this is a clip that really sums it up well, Blake. This was Senator Bennett from Colorado just screaming at Republicans
Well, and so that seems to be the crux of the, I would say the main thrust of the argument is that you know, RFK is considered anti-vax. And so there was a lot of these exchanges going back and forth about this particular topic, specifically around the vaccine topic. I personally believe that, you know, he made some good points. He called Senator Wyden dishonest. We're going to pull that clip.
He said repeatedly that he's not anti-vax, but that he is asking uncomfortable questions through his advocacy. I want to take you back in time to this clip, which has been going around the internet lately. This is from 2005, Blake, where he was talking with Joe Scarborough. Remember, he's still considered a Democrat in good standing at this point in history. Play cut 140.
If you enjoy this show, if you get something out of it, please consider joining members.charliekirk.com. That's members.charliekirk.com, your one-stop shop. For all things insider access to The Charlie Kirk Show and the team, we appreciate you. We definitely recommend it, and we hope to see you there. Buckle up. Here we go.
Now, Blake, I know you're kind of a contrarian when it comes to RFK, as you are with many things. We love that about you. It's sometimes annoying, but we love it about you. But like, From your perspective, as somebody that would call some of this junk science, that would call some of it woo-woo, this is what so much of this hearing is hinging upon.
Where does the line between asking tough questions, uncomfortable questions, and woo-woo science come into play? Because it strikes me that asking tough questions is what will propel truth forward, will propel real science forward, instead of you know, relying on these institutionalized, calcified places like the FDA, CDC, and NIH?
No, I think that's a really good point that he's got this long portfolio of comments that he's made dating all the way back to like the 80s. And some of those things he's probably not going to agree with anymore. Some of those things he might have revised his position and some of those things he's going to have to bring to heel to the president's position.
Blake, I want to play this clip. I think it illustrates kind of what you're talking about with some of the things that RFK Jr. has said in the past. Maybe he wants to walk those back. Maybe he's refined his position. But I thought it was illustrative nonetheless. This is another exchange he had with Senator Bennett talking about Lyme disease, 147.
Senator Bennett's getting really into this one. But that's an example of, you know, I actually would love to hear the rest of the exchange. I don't think we have that tape. But, you know, he was constantly getting cut off. And you could actually see them using his speech impediment. It's...
Forgive me, I can't remember the exact name of the condition, but they were using it against him because they knew that he couldn't reply back in a rapid pace. And so they would use that against him and cut him off repeatedly, which was another thing that we saw in this confirmation here. Blake.
I think you're right. One thirty nine. We have that clip. It's a good clip. Let's go ahead and play it.
Boom. Love that exchange. I just want to, for the audience sake, we're working on getting the feed from the Lake and Riley signing ceremony that's happening right now, so bear with us as we get that feed. But Blake, your reaction to, I mean, this sort of is the clip that
You were referencing where he was pretty combative back, pretty aggressive back, in which we all know President Trump loves to see a fighter.
Well, thank you very much for giving me a chance to ask you a quick question. So my name is Andrew Jansen. I'm the CEO of Street Simplified. And there's each year in the United States 44,000 people die in traffic crashes.
Traffic crashes, correct. And the U.S. spends $21 billion, and that's a conservative estimate, on Medicare and Medicaid payouts to crash victims. But they only spend $4 billion to actually solve the transportation safety problem.
On top of that, the $4 billion that they are spending is being wasted because over the last 15 years, from 2010 on, an additional 1,000 people are dying in traffic crashes than the year before on average. So my question for you is, who do you know that can actually get to the root of this problem and solve it?
No, my question, I actually work in a company that helps solve this problem, but I cannot get to the right people on the USDOT side.
It's like a brick wall.
I mean, there's a lot of factors, right? And I could spend an hour on this, but the short of it is 98% of crashes are caused by humans, right? There's 2% snow, weather-related technical vehicle failures. Sure. So we have to solve the human problem. You could say it's, you know, you look at... So it's autonomous vehicles. No, I think you don't have to actually fully automate.
You can automate one in one thousandth of the decisions drivers make when they veer off the road when they're sleeping. You don't have to automate the entire vehicle for 99% of the time.
Frankly, I'd love for you to connect me with him.
Right. What we do at Street is we're the infrastructure side of what Tesla's doing on the vehicle side.
By the way, I brought a study Bible. Oh, thank you. This is a John MacArthur study Bible. I'll give it to one of the staffers. Is it a John MacArthur you said? It's a John MacArthur study Bible.
I've given it to you for your own personal walk. Thank you. And thank you for taking the time to answer.
That's because of the culture.
Yeah, if someone said effing black girl about a player in the WNBA.
Yeah, like Minneapolis would burn. It would be the number one news story. That person would be deleted off the face of the planet.
Quite possibly, yeah.
especially under biden like we and we'd get one of those like civil rights cases where they would like go into the entire wnba and find how there was like systemic discrimination that led to this outcome which is actually circling back around that's how that six on six basketball went away it didn't go away because people like organically didn't like it it went away because activists were mad and they got i'm not making this up the office of civil rights
either the DOJ or the Department of Education to say it was a violation of Title IX to have girls play this sport because they were less likely to get a scholarship for basketball at the college level.
So like they've been, if it helps, they've been inventing extremely deranged and insane civil rights justifications for everything they want to do for half a century.
You've done it again, Charlie. I have a tendency to start race wars. There is this placid world where there is the Women's National Basketball Association.
I think they're a subsidiary of the NBA. There's a direct relationship between the two.
yeah women are known for getting along they live in harmony with one another they definitely never have beefs or arguments or disputes or rivalries only charlie kirk would start only you could do it wmba was great i'm sure all 10 people at their games were having a blast uh and then this uh this news story happened well it's been happening for a while but uh
You know how people say that they don't recognize the country they live in due to social changes or immigration or whatever? That's how I feel when I hear a story like that.
There's a question I like to ask, which is— And not having a relative. I like to ask people this. Would you rather find a $2 bill on the sidewalk— or have your local WNBA team win a title?
That is the correct answer, is I don't know if Hightown has a WNBA team.
Phoenix Mercury. Okay. Would you say it Mercury?
Is that true or could that be like a hallucination by an AI? It could be. I don't know.
There's only 13 teams. That bothers me because it's like not even.
You know what's going to be really terrible? I do know that Minnesota. No. What is it?
I'll give you a hundred dollars. I did this to humiliate you. Because I know how dare you know, because being a dork, I would read the newspaper every day growing up and I would check like they had like this. I'm so disappointed in sports thing. And I knew I would I would look at what the frickin you should have said. See, you want money more than you want. I know your honor. This is shameful.
That's good. It is a women thing that is cool. But Atlanta Dream. Atlanta Dream.
Is it Seoul? Is it Seoul? That sounds like a good thing. No, they don't have one. They don't have one? Okay. No. Lucky you.
We can start showing that you reacted to this hard foul. No, it was a lot of them for the right. OK, there's a lot of things. So I'm going to send the one.
Connecticut Sun. It's like the least sunny place. As opposed to the Phoenix Suns, which is plural and therefore cool.
How awful is that? That's like a thing they do now. Like in the NHL, the two new teams they've added, they added the Seattle Kraken, not Krakens, just Kraken. And then now Salt Lake got they actually got the Phoenix Coyotes team that they disbanded. And they're just mammoth. They're the Utah mammoth.
It's actually done okay. What's happened is I remember growing up, they were really bad in the Sun Belt, and now they've kind of gotten over that. So, for example, in Tampa – The Tampa Bay baseball team does pretty horribly in terms of attendance. The Tampa Bay Bucs are at the low end of NFL team popularity.
But the Tampa Bay Lightning, which is their NHL team, sells out their games, has won titles. They do pretty well. And that's kind of been who's dominating because the... I think the Nashville team does well. And I think there's also one in Miami. And the Carolina one, they've all done really well.
In fact, pretty much the only Sunbelt hockey team that was a dumpster fire and nobody liked going to them was our team. Oh, really? Yep. They folded and moved to Utah.
Yes. All right. So I think this is you had a couple. So the first one we have, let's do. Is this loaded yet? Three ninety eight. So that was called as a violent atrocity on the court. That was Caitlin Cart dribbling, and she sort of brushed her fingertips. Barely. I don't think she even touched it. You know, I think we might need a federal investigation. I know.
Oh, he's gone now. I think he's still in the league, but he's not with the— Is Kevin Durant on the Thunder? No, no, you're way out of date, man. I don't even know where Durant is. He's on the Suns, isn't he? I stopped watching 10 years ago.
Yeah, okay. I want to respond. So Patty Luke in our chat says, nothing like four men who don't play sports going after the WNBA.
But anyway, even if we couldn't beat the WNBA players, it is noteworthy that we don't have the NBA subsidizing us for millions of dollars a year. Correct. To go play basketball.
And so I do think we should make this happen, though. We should we should probably we're going to get your back. I got my back surgery. We have to go find like I need three months to prepare. And then we find someone recently cut from a WNBA team. Yes.
So what will we do if... If I lose?
oh my gosh this is this is hilarious all right we're gonna we're gonna find my old trick shots but uh okay epstein all right so this has been can you believe how long ago this happened he so epstein died almost six years ago now it feels like time has flown anyway obviously a lot of people very committed to this a lot of people have very strong opinions on it
Now, the FBI and this is not Biden's FBI. This is this is Trump's new FBI. They're coming out and they're saying Epstein actually did kill himself. And they say they have video evidence to prove it.
I think we need a hate crime investigation. Exactly. She touched her. Exactly.
It does seem too clean. And I would say, I think we should be open to... There's conspiracies that you could embrace that don't require someone to have murdered him. Or they could have threatened him. They could have threatened him. They could have said, like, time's up, time to kill yourself.
He could have arranged to make it so he could kill himself if he wanted to do that because they were supposed to stop him. And so you can have conspiracies that work that way instead of requiring a murder action. But... You know, it is interesting that obviously people have been very invested in it.
I mean, it's terrible. Mm-hmm. And then on the flip side, though, we also have she is getting fouled very aggressively. And so you are also brutalized. Yeah, just brutalized on the court. So we have, you know, fouls get called one way, but not the other way. And it's all getting quite dramatic. And it turns out, really, everything was fine until you stuck your nose into it, Charlie.
Do you think people will ever be, let's say they come out and they straight up have the video and it seems very strong. Would people be willing to buy it? I just feel like they'll probably.
They're not buying this claim?
On what grounds?
Yeah, it was. It was Tova Noel and Michael Thomas were the two guards and they were accused of falling asleep and surfing the Internet that right rather than checking on Epstein every 30 minutes. That's like one of the kind of darkly funny thing about this is really you're debating between there's no way they could have missed this. It had to be conspiracy and just.
Actually, it's a federal prison in New York, and they have these inept, dumb guards who are lazy, and they're just used to not ever checking on anything. They probably didn't even know Epstein was that famous of a guy.
Like they just, Oh, bad record keeping. They screw everything up.
Mark Epstein. Am I right? I think there was Mark Epstein was his brother.
Yeah, yeah. That was in January of last year. Although I don't recall what specific arguments he made. And was Epstein even that particularly close with his brother that I... I don't know. Again, I'm just drawing from memory on this. So... I do feel like we're trending towards a thing where it'll just be part of that permanent conspiracy canon, and it could get weirder and weirder as a result.
And eventually these things cross over. It'll turn out that Epstein was murdered because he knew the truth about the 9-11 conspiracies, and that that was done because Building 7 had the truth about the JFK conspiracies, and JFK had to be taken out because he knew the truth about the Pearl Harbor conspiracies.
So what's the headline we have right now? Let me search Charlie Kirk WNBA as I search every day, but I try to check.
Yeah, let's see. Charlie Kirk turns Caitlin Clark and WNBA referee controversy into race debate. Race war. Race war.
I do. And I had witnesses. Okay. I mean. Just saying. You say so. I do. Can you name the witnesses? Erica. Dave Bratt. Oh, oh. So your wife is your alibi.
it's true and charlie was just you know a little bit quiet he was like i was like that's so shocking what do the comments say do they what are the people saying uh let's see uh donnie double says me thinks the fbi protests too much i can see that but like i'm with charlie i don't think dan bongino went into the fbi and suddenly got you know bought no i don't believe that i
yeah i i feel like if he was truly trying to you know lead us astray i don't believe that it'd be way easier to just not talk about it much or say like oh you know we don't know he's like he's actually putting himself out there saying like i have looked at the evidence and i believe it is strong that yeah i'm not i'm agreeing with it i'm just i'm saying it's just a tough it's a tough reality to reckon with because i was convinced he didn't kill himself i was like no way
Does he have like every single president?
Do we have multiples? Because we have one that's in the National Archives.
It might be that we have several copies. Whatever it is, it's important enough. I feel like I would have heard about him removing the one that's at the archives.
Maybe it was the one stolen by Nicolas Cage in that movie. Yes, National Treasure. Yeah.
Yeah.
We should have Dan Bongino find out if that's real. Oh, it's real. Okay. Well, we should announce it then. We should go get the treasure. Yes. Or find out or get it back from Nick Cage.
enough attention from Joe Biden in general from the right like the left would highlight this the New York Times would highlight this his tendency to tell stories and just completely change the facts all of them like you know the one about why he was pro-gay rights do you remember that one no that he would tell this story that like when he was a boy he was with his dad and so you know when he's a boy with his dad you know in the like 50s or 60s that they saw two men like kissing in public and
And he was like, Daddy, what are they doing? And he's like, they love each other, boy. And he's like, and that's when I realized that gay stuff was totally fine. It's a complete fabrication. Not only that, he sometimes would tell the story and make it so he was the dad explaining it to his kids. So he would just totally transplant the facts as needed.
Yeah, he claimed he got arrested for protesting apartheid in South Africa. Yeah.
A ton. And a mosque. The other amazing one. Going back to your UK trip, he once plagiarized Neil Kinnock, who was the head of the Labor Party at the time, where he... Kinnick had a whole speech that was basically like, why was it that like my grandfather was like poor and had to work as like a minor?
And it was like a very personal story about why there was like so much inequality because he was left from politician. And Biden ripped off this speech, but made it about his family. So it's like, why did my grandfather have to like work in a coal mine? And like his grandfather did not. He was like a mine manager. He was like he was like the oppressor of the miners. Yeah.
All right, AI. And that's not an AI video. We keep covering AI every week because it keeps getting... I think they say that the capabilities of AI are doubling about every six months or so. And it's entirely believable. So this is...
getting very scary this is uh let's so google has a new i think it's like vo3 or something and it can generate video with audio according to prompt we didn't have the audio video pairing and people are making stuff with it now if they're subscribers so let's play 387 please don't finish writing that prompt i don't want to be in your ai movie please leave me alone
And on top of that, what they're really mad about is that she's the first WNBA player in probably about 20 years who's been like a decently popular national.
That's all fake. All 100% AI generated.
Yes.
Well, I mean, that's like a new talent. That's actually among the handful of skilled jobs that is emerging out of this impending AI apocalypse. You become a skilled prompter.
Although what's interesting is at the same time this is happening, we also have the warnings that we're headed towards. They call it AI model collapse.
We will see. So what's very funny is the way they trained these AIs is we fed them for text, tons and tons of text, like every post ever made on Reddit, every post ever made on the comments section of every website to make it so they could imitate how people talk. And, you know, every book ever written, all of that.
And then similar for video, it's like feed it every video ever posted on TikTok, every film ever made. And they train it and they, with huge amounts of computing power, you know, enough to power an entire country, they're able to find the patterns in this. And that is how the AI models work. They're generating stuff based on patterns they've recognized. And what we...
What we're getting now is since the models have been created, now we're able to use the models to generate new text. So search anything on the internet now. You're getting AI prompts back, like articles that are being written. The Chicago Sun-Times did an article of what novels you should read this summer, and they wrote it with ChatGPT, and it hallucinated books that don't even exist.
Who was the other one? The one who was the one who she was a big name. And it's so dumb, frankly, that it became such a racial thing because the one I was thinking of was Lisa Leslie. Lisa Leslie, when we were growing up, she was a decently famous person. She got ads on TV.
So, huge amounts of text is out there that's not made by humans. It's made by AIs. And they're imperfect. And huge amounts of video and photos are out there that are not made by humans. They're made by AIs with all of the problems that they have. And these AIs are still learning off of all of that AI-generated content. And so, it's becoming like a garbage-in, garbage-out problem.
The AIs are getting worse because they've been fed AI stuff. So they're getting worse at imitating people because now half the stuff that they're consuming is just other robots.
So, for example, let's say that Chicago Sun-Times article that hallucinated fake novels. Now it's in the database of facts that other AIs are going to use. So now it's part of their factual database that novels that never existed exist. And so we're going to have AI model collapse, they call it. Incredible.
That's scary. Another thing that's scary on the other end, just the dependency. So I saw a tweet the other day where a guy says, my daughter or my wife has, I think it was my daughter has a friend who has a boyfriend.
and she fed their text message exchanges into a chat bot and said is our is my relationship healthy and it came back no your relationship is abusive for xyz reasons and she like broke up with the boyfriend because the ai robot told her her relationship was bad yeah well this was not ai this is a real conversation allegedly allegedly
And, of course, one of the things about it is Lisa Leslie was a perfectly wholesome woman. True story. That's why they hate Caitlin Clark. She took a long time to get married because she had a handful of rules. She wanted him to marry another black guy. She wanted him to be a Christian. And this was the big one. She wanted him to be taller than her. And Lisa Leslie was 6'7".
Hello! Jack wasn't able to join us for Thought Crime today, but he's in Budapest right now, and he really, really, really wanted to talk about one specific topic. We didn't have Thought Crime last week when President Trump had the president of South Africa over to D.C. and had his fun little ambush interview of him.
in uh in the white house and jack really wanted to have us talk about that and we also wanted to uh react to the wider topic so uh jack are you there right now blake i am i'm here right now and yeah with all the travel schedules and charlie's out in uh europe and then i'm in europe the next day and then we're at the conclave and sometimes it just doesn't always work but you know there's one topic that was just near and dear to my heart and that of course is white genocide
i said you know if we're going to talk about white genocide it's definitely the ta the type of topic that we need to get to on thought crime because literally this is a topic where and people are debating if it's an actual genocide or not and that's fine but the point is this topic would actually have gotten you banned on x if you even mentioned those words like not even that long ago like five six years ago on x um when it was still twitter
You would have been banned for even mentioning it. There would be a full court press from the mainstream media. You know, it used to be that if I tweeted something about South Africa, I would immediately get requests for comment, requests for comment, you know, from like the Telegraph and the Guardian and the Independent and all this. And now it's like Donald J. Trump is mainstreaming this stuff.
in the Oval Office itself. And they said, we don't do any of that. And he goes, oh yeah, turn down the lights. I want to show you something.
And it's just been one of the most incredible, it obviously was one of the most incredible moments that I've ever seen being done, but really on an issue that I think is probably more worthy than so many others out there around the world, because this is quite frankly, something that is actually going on where you have a government that is killing people. And as Marco Rubio said recently,
He said, why do you care so much about the color of their skin? He said to, I think it was you know, this Democrat senator from Virginia. And Rubio goes, because he's being killed. They're all being killed because of the color of their skin.
And so, Blake, you know, why is it that this issue above all issues, I guess, and that's what I want to get into, is something that not only does exist, but why was the media so adamant and still is so adamant on trying to say it isn't happening?
Yeah, so first, just to refresh people very quickly, you guys have seen the Shoot the Boar stuff, but I want to remind people of what Trump did in the Oval Office a week ago because it was highly entertaining, I will say. Let's see. We have a bunch of clips about it. Let's see what one of the best one is. How about let's play clip 176.
Probably. I haven't followed up on that. But, yeah, so this all happened. But then they legit got mad that this girl was popular. She was a big deal when she was playing, was it Iowa? I don't watch women's basketball. She was popular. Wait, you mean Kaitlyn Clark played for Iowa? Yeah, and so she was getting all the attention. They were selling out games. It takes a lot.
That's great. And then let's also do—this is a very fun—darkly funny. Let's do 177.
So, yeah, that was that was Trump just picking up, you know, shoveling article after article, document after document. Oh, here's another farmer. Oh, yeah. They they they slit his throat. They they boiled this person in, you know, a vat of oil. Like, did you horrifying stuff in the world?
And they're just did you read the the the New York Times the way they wrote it up was so funny because it was like, it was like at one point president Trump just started throwing articles at the president of South Africa saying death, death, death, horrific death, death. We played this just full, full on straight up mogging of a world leader in the, and then they're all traumatized afterwards.
We played this on Charlie's show where there is like this New York times reporter who, of course, this really says it all. The, the, the, South African bureau chief at the New York Times was previously just an American race reporter. So that's who they sent to South Africa.
And he does this bit where he's explaining it, you know, doing one of the New York Times videos where he simultaneously says in the same videos, one, this isn't happening. There's no, you know, Trump brought up how they seize land without compensation. And he says, OK, you know, there's no this is not happening. They're not going to do it. And what they are doing instead is there's a law.
It doesn't say you can just take land without compensation. There's a law where you can take land without restitution if it's for the national interest or the public interest. He said it's okay if it's for the public interest. Or the other thing he said is if land is not being used. I'm sure both of those will not be abused at all. Yeah. So we've been hearing about this for a few weeks.
I think what I really want to get at about this, the way they freak out about this, the way the media really denies this is happening. And what people need to understand is this is not purely about South Africa. It very much is. It's about America and it's about other countries. And it's really about Africa. We'll be frank about this.
It's like they really they don't like white people and specifically a lot of them want them dead. So this went viral just a short time ago where what's what's that cut we have.
released uh messages yeah let's get a 294 up there so this is the shooter elias uh rodriguez he was uh he's the suspect you know likely guilty uh in the shooting of those two israeli uh embassy staff and what he said in these uh text messages that were released by ken klippenstein on his substack
He says, LOL, you probably would have to actually genocide white people to make this, America, a normal country. And even a very targeted and selective rehabilitation program would probably have to lead to the lifetime imprisonments of tens of millions of white people. So this is a guy talking about America, and this is a guy who decided he would...
It takes a lot to sell out a women's basketball game.
fight against the white people he hated by shooting two employees of the Israeli embassy. So this all sort of circles around into a big pile. South Africa, most people will admit, South Africa is a messed up country. But the narrative that the left will give is that...
South Africa is entirely messed up just because they had apartheid decades ago, and any problems they have are just the legacy, the aftermath of apartheid. And it gets more powerful the further in the past it is.
So even though South Africa was better in 2002 than it is today, and 2002 was closer to apartheid, apartheid is the reason that it's getting much worse now, that it's gotten so much worse since then. And when they blame it for that, what they really just mean is it's like white people's fault. You'll see this thing like they just have to go. They're colonizers.
They can't they shouldn't be allowed to own the land. It's not their country. And how's this loop around? It loops around then to Israel. Why is Israel illegitimate country? It's actually very misleading. If you just say it's anti-Semitism, because there are definitely people who hate Israel because it's Jewish and has Jewish people in it.
But for the modern left, for someone like this embassy shooter, they actually substantially they hate Israel because they see the Israelis as Europeans, as white people, as colonizers. All of that goes together. You'll see lines on TikTok that they're like they'll just describe them as people who came from Poland, like go back to Poland. That's where you're supposed to be.
And why does this matter for all of you watching? Because that's also what they think about America. I'm sure you saw Jack the other day, the king of England. he went to – or the King of Canada, King Charles, he delivered his speech to the Canadian parliament, and he opens it with a land acknowledgement, that he is speaking on unceded – I think it was the Algonquin, Algonquin land.
What he's saying is, okay, well, Canadians, you don't have the right to your country. It's not your country. And that is, of course, what they have planned for all of you.
Because – Because I have a thought about this because I did see King Charles's speech as I watch all of his speeches. And I was watching this. I said, wait a minute. So if he's saying that Canadians don't have a right to Canada, then isn't he saying that the Canadian government is itself illegitimate?
And if the Canadian government is therefore illegitimate, then it cannot repel annexations from other powers on the North American continent. That means that it is terra nullis. It is, in fact, non-entity land. Therefore, if we go and occupy it as the 51st state, they could not, under international law, do anything about it because he just said himself that it is an illegitimate.
I'm just saying, guys. I'm just saying. I don't think we should do it, but I'm just saying.
What if President Trump – You're telling me that that's an illegitimate government, so – President Trump could call their bluff and he could say the land is unceded, so the only people who can cede it are the First Nations tribes.
And he'll just – he should just call the Cree nation, the Inuit nation, the Algonquin, just summon all of the First Nations tribes and just say, all right, I'll give you guys – $10 million a person if you'll cede your land claims to the United States.
You can have Toronto. You can still have all the stuff. Toronto is all yours. You can have Toronto. We don't want to deal with it. Misagua, you know, it's just too many migrants anyway. It's not going to vote our way. You get that. We want everything else. Deal or no deal. Yeah. They're going to sell.
No, but Blake, the thing that I want and, you know, in the interest of keeping the segment not too lengthy is what people need to understand. When I wrote this book on humans last year and we talked about this, people say, why does it matter? It matters because. when every revolutionary movement comes forward, they always target one particular class.
It was the kulaks in Russia, in China, it was the petty bourgeoisie, or if you had, you know, you're a landowner. So basically, you know, people today, if you had any like a second house or something. And by the way, go, go look at what the left says about landlords. If you want to see if that's actually changed on the far left and not newsflash, it hasn't, they want to kill all of them.
And now in, you know, and so in revolutionary France, it was one of these in Spain, it was one of these, of course it was the religious, anyone who was, it was Catholic and he was associated with the clergy, the church. You also saw that in France and Blake, you and I did some incredible interviews on this that turned into this book actually. And,
so this was the statement she gave so remember you started this war but this is a statement she gave because i sent out one in december 2024 they named her uh athlete of the year at time magazine and so she said in her interview she had to issue this statement i don't have video of it so i don't know if there was like a gun pointed at her head or flavor like holding her family hostage but she said i want to say i've earned everything but as a white person there is privilege a lot of the people who have made this league what it is are black women
So the point is, boys and girls, is they want to bring that here. Critical race theory was first implemented in a country, I think on a national scale, in South Africa in their constitution of 1996. And you have all of these articles pertaining to disparate impact. And you mentioned apartheid. They call it, you know, the the inequalities of the past.
So this idea of inequalities of the past is so racism of the past is why we need racism now. And it can only be solved by racism now is sort of the way they put it. And so the disparate impact has to be, well, if if this many people in they had this in Zimbabwe, right, because Zimbabwe is similar situation, formerly Rhodesia, where three percent of the population, which was white,
owned 51% of the land. And so they wanted to flip that around where 90%, 97% of the population, which is black, would own that 51%, or correction, 97% of the land. Now, obviously, that's not how any of our laws work. That's not how contracts work. That's not how any of this works. And we've seen the results again and again. And if anyone disagrees, well, they just kill you. Guess what?
That's exactly what they want here in the United States. They use these African post-colonial nations as Marxist breeding grounds. They've certainly used this. And you can go back to the ZANU, and we talk about that in the book and so many other examples of where the KGB and the Chinese Communist Party were standing up these revolutionary movements in South Africa.
and in the independence movement at the time. And so then the idea is that this cultural Marxism gets spread out and you have leftists here in the United States like this Elias Rodriguez and so many others who start supporting it and saying, we're going to take matters into our own hands because we want these ideas to be spread to their fullest fruition.
And when they're spread to their fullest fruition, what does that mean? White Christian males are not allowed to own land and they are allowed to be the approved targets. And if you're affluent and say, oh, I don't know, a healthcare CEO, well, then along comes Luigi Maggioni. If you're a billionaire who's running for president again, now along comes Thomas Matthew Crooks.
And we're seeing it more and more again. These street assassinations are going to continue. And Blake, here's what I love about this. When it comes down to the idea, when we tell them, When we say, okay, you're clearly targeting white people, you're systemically targeting white people, you've done so with your policies, you're doing so with your street assassins.
And when I say this, they'll call me an extremist, they'll call me far right, they'll call me a conspiracy theorist, but never once, Blake, will they call me wrong.
Exactly. Yeah, it's truly deranged. You know, you mentioned like the kulaks in Russia. I think another good one is Maoists. The Maoists during the Cultural Revolution, they had them. They were called the five black categories. That's what they called it in Chinese. And the five black categories, black meaning, you know, bad, wicked.
landlords rich farmers counter revolutionaries bad influencers which actually included like actual criminals and right wingers which those were the five categories and just basically it meant if you were in any of those categories obviously landlord is a pretty broad one right winger a pretty broad one you were just sort of presumptively guilty of all of these evils and if you're on the modern left like what it really is is kind of
Being a white person makes you a black category in a country like South Africa or, frankly, in a country like the United States. I wanted to flag another thing. This was posted by the DSA Liberation Caucus. So the Democrat Socialists of America, far left organization, a few members of Congress have described themselves as democratic socialists. I don't think they're members of this organization.
Party, but it's this milieu of people who are on the far left. And so the DSA Liberation Caucus, which is a subgroup of it, they released a statement on Wednesday saying that Elias Rodriguez embassy shooter is a political problem. prisoner. They say, the Palestinian struggle is the tip of the spear against global imperialism.
Whether in the besieged Gaza Strip, the Red Sea, the south of Lebanon, or the heart of the U.S., there must be consequences for genocidal Zionist imperialism. And so, yeah, is that anti-Semitic? To some extent. But they're really just saying, like... You are bad because you are a European and in places we don't want you.
And what you'll discover is the places they don't want you are eventually everywhere. It is an inherently like... It's an ideology that seeks to dispossess people, to delegitimize people, to destroy people.
and you can't see this, but in the article, they're lower casing white, but capitalizing black in case you weren't sure, you know, who's, who's good and who's bad here. Uh, the more we appreciate highlight and talk about that, the better brands and companies need to continue investing in those players who have made this league extraordinary. Elevating black women is a beautiful thing. Yeah.
And there's a disturbing number of people at the New York Times, in the media, who are perfectly happy to egg this along, to justify it, to give credence to these insane justifications where they'll say... Oh, kill the boar. It's just a it's just a protest song. It's a it's an anthem of like historical resistance.
And you just really want to look up. That's what's so amazing, because when they when they're chanting and I post this and I post the size of some of these protests because people don't realize this or these rallies that are going on. And they'll say they can't realize how big it is. It's enormous, thousands and thousands.
I think it's Trump rallies, some even bigger than Trump rallies, and the people coming in. But again, when it's kill the Boer, kill the white farmer, we're told this must be put in context. This must be understood through nuance. And they say, OK, well, you're targeting white people. Oh, my gosh. Is that a dog whistle? Is that a dog whistle, Posobiec? Are you dog whistling again? What do you mean?
I'm just saying that I think it seems like you guys want to genocide all the whites. Oh, my gosh. Look at this fascist, this neo-Nazi extremist. Wait a minute. I'm just describing the things that he's saying on stage. And so you kind of get into a collaboration parallax. It's not true, and it's good that it's happening.
Now, keep in mind, I think about eight years ago or so, Ole Miss told people to stop playing Dixie at football games because that was a dog whistle because it's a song about the South that is from before the Civil War. And that's really it. That's all it is. And that was bad. That was a racist song. But yeah, like Kill the Boar, that's a nuanced historical thing. I love to do this.
I think I've done this before, but you can read the lyrics. Just look up the lyrics to Kill the Boar on Wikipedia. They're still there for now. These are the lyrics to Kill the Boar in English, not leaving anything out. The cowards are scared.
Wow. Wow. So many nuances. So much nuance. The cowards are scared. So much nuance. Blake, I wish we could go on. I wish we could go on for more of this, but I got to jet to my next thing here, man. Victor Orban's calling me from the next room.
All right. You have a good time there, Jack. Support the Turning Point world overseas.
Always supporting the Turning Point world. And folks, as always, wherever you are in the world, go out there and commit more thought crimes.
For more on many of these stories and news you can trust, go to charliekirk.com.
Who wrote that for you? First of all, it's like a hostage situation. Yeah. Like we have to check like, OK, what were her eyes blinking in a certain way? Like, please, please don't hurt me. Please don't follow me any harder on the court.
Gymnastics is pretty good.
No, that's right.
Women's golf? No, I don't watch golf. Nah, I can't watch golf either. You know what we should bring back? Did you know there used to be an alternative basketball for women? Wasn't it like six on six or something? It was six on six, and it was very strange. You had three forwards and three defenders, and only the forward people could shoot. And then there was all this bizarre stuff.
I think you couldn't dribble as much, something like that.
Really, though? Men's gymnastics is really impressive if you watch it.
I suppose so.
I mean, all I would say is I don't think – I don't think we were the first ones to start like using the W word or the, or the B word in relation to this. Like there really is a thing where you started getting these articles like while she was still in, in college about people just bothered that she was getting too much attention or that it was like, they would use the language like colonialism.
They were like, how this like white person is colonizing our league. Like, like they have ownership of,
this sport and like that is where so much of this came from now and then like other elements were like they were mad oh they're promoting caitlin clark because she like is like more clean cut like she has a boyfriend so she's not a lesbian like a lot of the players in the wmba are um i think she's catholic or or like public like she has a good image basically it's like okay i
Yeah, leagues do better when they have people who have positive images that are families-like. To give an idea.
That is a very high rate.
26%.
That's like a very wide range.
It's still high.
Why not? We should collect more data on that. We should just be like, oh, you got to every every time. Every if you enter the WNBA, you have to answer a million.
You mean had it been outside?
No, I just mean... I'm saying that was actually awesome. I saw everything. I love that Swalwell was behind you.
Yeah, exactly. Well... I mean, it's a whole new day in Washington. I will tell you, a little vibe check on the ground, Jack, you could be good on this. I just feel like this city, even in Trump 1.0, the first term, I don't feel at all conspicuous being loud and proud of what I'm thinking. I don't hold back opinions at the restaurant or at coffee.
I'm out and proud, and I don't even... You know, before... Well, it's like the resistance is quiet.
Yeah, it's just like everybody kind of – It's just non-existent, right? It's just non-existent.
But the vermin are on the run.
A lot of them are on notice. A lot of them know that they are probably – Listen, the president has every right to get – This town has been around a lot longer than any of the three of us. I totally agree. I totally agree. But they legitimately do feel threatened for their future, and they're not going to pop their head up just yet.
They are, and that's why – The best take is they don't know where to fight.
Just the fact that we're even this far is just such a dramatic, dramatic shift. And you look at President Trump's approval ratings. I mean, he's above water right now.
No, I just, you know, it's funny. You brought up the assassination attempts. You know, you bring up drones, like all of these huge stories. And we don't know the half of it. And it's just it's a reminder, like with this blitzkrieg that we're all living through this flooding the zone. Well, careful there, Elon. Awesome. Which is awesome. I use that on my show every day.
So here's what I'll say, though, is that there is a possibility that we forget to review the important stuff. Right. That we forget to like. By the way, another thing I want to find out about, Jack, Las Vegas shooting. Uh-oh. You know what I mean?
So these things that have been hidden from public view and we don't really have an insight on it, I'm excited to get into it, and I think there's a real possibility. But there's just so much news that it's even hard to keep your eye on.
OK, one second before we go to Blake here, Charlie, I'll never forget the first time you introduced me to President Trump. He goes, where do you live? And I mentioned California. And President Trump goes into a whole like diatribe. This is like probably 2018, 2019, something like that, Charlie. It goes into a whole diatribe about the Delta smelt. Mm-hmm.
As soon as he hears the word California, the guy goes, Delta smelt, water. I mean, this is deep within President Trump's subconscious. Well, it's pretty conscious now. All right.
You know, you're talking about the imperial capital feeling muted, Jack. Look it. On day one, there was an order to review all potential... Oh, wait, hold on. Never mind. It was... basically reclassifying members of the federal civil servants so they are easier to fire and replace, especially if they hinder or sabotage the administration's agenda.
So, like, they see all these executive orders coming through. They've heard the rumors about Schedule F. I mean, right? So they're They're ducking for cover.
Do you think they're having a good night? They're putting their resumes out.
They couldn't make endless money for the record, most of these people. Now, the ones that could, maybe they will, and this will be the best thing that ever happened to them. But the vast majority of them – and Blake, I think you pointed this out. A lot of these people have side jobs and secondary jobs, and they basically have been fleecing off the government because it's impossible to fire them.
I'm working on this.
I tell you what, I think it was absolutely 100 percent, 1000 percent the right decision. But Charlie, you're bringing up another sort of controversy. Was it because of the weather or were there other concerns? And so I just want to flag that in case you want to go back to it, because I would like to.
Can we just dispel this?
Charlie, I've been with you at more events than probably most. And I thought about Charlie. But hold on. Hold on. I would just say that you get fist bumps from black and brown like dudes more than just about anything, which is a hilarious thing. But yeah, I mean, go ahead.
I don't want to take this is an important point you're making because we do have to sort of restock the shelves, restaff the these key loyalist positions with people that love Trump. I mean, it's just it's it's absolutely the mandatory thing at this point. So.
But it's sort of like when they, what was Obama? It's like when the Soviet Union fell. Who took the W's out of the, was that Clinton took the W's out of the keyboards? That was Obama. Was it Obama? No, it was Clinton because the W was coming after him and they took all the W's out of the keyboards. Yeah, you're right, you're right.
right now.
Yeah, that's a big one. People have been waiting years, decades for this. It totally is a skit. Shows it off, right?
Ooh, that's a big one. But to Blake's earlier point, how many of these things are so dramatic, so sweeping, that they would have dominated previous news cycles? I want to go back to this birthright citizenship issue. There is zero arguments that I have ever heard that make me convinced that the 14th Amendment was for anybody but slaves and maybe arguably American Indians.
No. Well, what?
Well, I know this is what I'm getting at. They actually had. OK, so this is part of my point. So so there's a guy named Senator Jacob Howard. He was a senator at the time when they were passing the 14th Amendment and they're arguing on the Senate floor. And so so he's contended that it should be construed to mean. So this is back to that clause that everybody likes to talk about subject.
to the jurisdiction thereof. Now, Senator Jacob Howard said it should be construed to mean a full and complete jurisdiction, like the same jurisdiction in extent and quality as applies to every citizen of the United States now. And so why this is important is because that
A construct meant that American Indians would not be granted citizenship because they were loyal to a another sovereign, namely their the tribal powers. Right. They were part of their tribal nations, tribal nations. So they actually had to in Senator James Doolittle of Wisconsin added a provision, an amendment that had to add languages, Indians not taxed.
So this is how obvious it would have been to the writers of the 14th Amendment that, of course, this was not meant to be gamed by foreigners that just come over nine months pregnant and have a baby on this side of the border and they get rewarded for that act of heroism.
No, they literally had to carve out Native Americans because they were born in the continental United States to make sure that they were also included in this provision in the in the amendment. So this whole thing, I remember you posted it the day it happened. It was news, this ending of birthright citizenship for illegals. And sure enough, everybody's like, well, it's in the Constitution.
You can't just change it with an executive order. It's like, hold on. This has been such a bastard. And Blake, you would probably know more than I would on how many different ways the 14th Amendment has led to – Terrible readings of the Constitution. It's one of the touch points of constitutional law that just seems to always come back around and get interpreted in the most awful way.
But absolutely, the 14th Amendment was not meant to reward people who break into your country.
Yeah, 100%. We'll see how Amy Coney Barrett rules on it. We'll see what happens with that. But I think they're going to be victorious because, to me, there's a very logical reading of the 14th Amendment. You want to know the dirty truth about the 14th Amendment? Birthright citizenship was a scheme – that was enacted in order to displace native peoples by colonialist powers.
So they would come and move in, you know, the Spanish would come in and they would, they would create birthright citizenship in order to displace native peoples. Well, as Americans, we're all the native peoples of this land now. And it's, You know, it's being brought back around and being used against Americans. So it's a whole the whole topic I'm very passionate about, as you might tell.
But it's what's crazy again to make the point this would be front page everywhere if if if it wasn't for the deluge of so much other stuff.
Have you ever done the tourist thing? So I have to give a little inside baseball here. I got to do a tour in which Speaker Johnson. I know. We like him. Okay. Ish. All right. He's doing some good stuff. He gave us a private tour. Andrew's going to get so much hate mail. I know. Freedom at CharlieKirk.com. Yeah. Let me have it.
So check this out. France, New Zealand and Australia have all abandoned birthright citizenship in the past few decades. Ireland was Australia was another colony. Yes. Ireland was the last country in the European Union to follow it. But they even abolished birthright citizenship in 2005. It's a completely dumb idea, like in our current context.
To your point, maybe it had some value as they were looking to colonize the Western Hemisphere. At this point, it is completely and utterly idiotic. And you're just incentivizing all the wrong things. But again, I haven't seen too many stories about it, to be honest. I mean, I'm looking at it now and people are certainly writing about it.
But if you look at nightly news, if you look at all the thought pieces, it's not really the center of attention, which is truly remarkable. I guess, Blake, do you think you mentioned LBJ, the reversal of LBJ's affirmative action executive order? What would be your next what's what's next on your list?
Listen, I got an opportunity to do a private tour, and then Speaker Johnson addressed the tour, okay? And they actually took us inside the area where they were setting up the luncheon and where they were going to do the actual swearing-in, and I got to see the rotunda and all that stuff. So I wasn't like Charlie exclusive by any means, but it was very, very cool. And I will tell you,
I just want to give Stephen Miller a slow clap. You know what I mean? It's like, this man... Was born for such just such a time as this. And, you know, by the way, being this is a point that Charlie actually made on Twitter. He and I talked about it. It was, you know, this idea that everybody has given a lot of attention to Trump being stronger, tougher.
more focused than he was in the first term. Trump 1.0 is not Trump 2.0. Just look at the pictures. Well, the name is the punished Trump. Well, yeah, but he also knows the system. He knows D.C. He understands how everything works. He knows who he can trust, who he can't trust. He knows who got in his way. You saw it in his interview last night. What's that?
Oh, 100%.
Yeah, they did. And... But what we're not appreciating enough is the fact that guys like James Blair, Sergio Gore, J.D. Vance, these young guns, Stephen Miller, also was steeped in the same experiences, lived through it alongside him, saw what they did, saw how corrupt and depraved and aggressive they were with President Trump.
All of these guys, this new generation, this new crop, is ready to get to work. They're not afraid to use power. They're going for it. Rules, customs, norms, legacy, regime, media, be damned. We're going to get the job done. Now, the Constitution still matters, obviously. We all love the Constitution, so you have to work within the framework.
But some of these things are just simply a lack of creativity and a lack of courage, and that's not going to be getting in the way any longer.
Charlie, you had this experience, I'm sure, as well. It's way smaller in person. That whole space is way smaller in person than it appears on TV. It's super small.
Yeah. I mean, I think they have a definite strategy of going to blue cities where the local municipalities have made the decision that they're going to be sanctuaries. They're not going to.
aid or help which can we just take a step back and and ask ourself how insane that is if you know the whereabouts of a criminal you know the misdeeds that this criminal has done and yet you refuse to remove said criminal from your streets simply because he or she is a illegal immigrant
The amount of insanity, I think, you know, Charles said it earlier on the show this morning, but it was like they hate Trump so much that they've fallen in love with MS-13. They hate Trump so much that they've fallen in love with the criminal. They hate Trump so much that they have fallen in love with murderers and rapists more so than their love for their common man and their fellow citizen.
That is an extraordinary psychological picture to take in and fully absorb.
When you get to these ICE raids in these cities and the fact that these cities are harboring fugitives of the law and they are protecting them from accountability when they rape little girls, when they kill people, when they stab people, when they get them addicted to fentanyl and other drugs that are going to kill them, the extraordinary dereliction of duty is almost unfathomable.
It's difficult to comprehend what that would mean.
Yeah, let's go ahead. So this is a big story today. It was actually from Bill Malusion. He went into Boston. He was embedded exclusively. Good for him. Great journalist. With the ice raids that were going on in Boston, he gets this Haitian guy who shouts out, I'm never going back to Haiti. You know, F Trump, Joe Biden forever, bro. Please thank Obama for everything he did for me.
I mean, pretty stark stuff, so much to the point that Blake didn't believe it was real. It's real. And then Tom Homan was asked, what do you make of this guy's comments? And it's already been meme-ified, which is just, I just think it's so fantastic. When you capture the vibe of a moment, you just got to play it 168.
it it's yeah it's a walking uh billboard for the new it sets the perfect tone yeah and by the way just so we're clear trump these what everything he's doing the sense of uh and by the way we haven't even talked about 600 billion from the saudi prince you know crown prince we haven't talked about the 500 well we'll start to see what strings are attached to that well maybe but i mean trump's today he's talking to the wf and he's going i'm gonna have him round up to a trillion
And you've got the SoftBank investment. You've got Chrysler bringing jobs back. I mean, all of these things. I mean, Maria Bartiromo was reporting from Davos, and she was saying, like, all these guys want to throw money at America. The amount of optimism is insane. And Trump is acting as the salesman, the agent of his country. And him playing that role is so unique.
I mean, we've never seen a chief executive of the country act like that.
Yeah.
I mean, basically embedded himself in the DOD, right?
Can I just say, your life for the last while has been... Super weird.
Is it, like, one of these things? Like, where it's got the little, like – Yeah, yeah, that thing. Yeah, that thing.
They control that land.
So here's the thing. My phone has been on fire since I've been in the city.
Don't forget Jeff Bezos. Sundar Pichai. What? I said, don't forget Jeff Bezos, significant other. I don't know. They were all in church, right? And her daughters.
Well, by the way, the most common camera, right, that with a gimbal, I guess is what it's called, is DJI. DJI. Which is the Chinese Chinese. Yeah. Which, by the way, we were contracting at both federal and state governments like a lot of them. And they I think during the first Trump administration, they flagged it as like a potential spyware.
Fair enough. It's a good description.
No, it's hilarious, by the way. You're just like straight up. I can just imagine your thought process in that moment. Like, don't be too friendly.
Even the fact that Trump
Well, it's also, I think, an acknowledgment of the, you know, the dynamic that has existed with China when Trump first started tariffing China in the first administration. They are the big geopolitical foe. And so it's a power move to say, hey, listen, like I'm going to be really tough on you, but hey, you know, we can get along.
Well, I think Trump is experiencing a boon in popularity, not only domestically, but internationally. I mean, Rahim Kassam, mutual friend, says that in London now, you'll see tons of MAGA hats.
It was a huge honor. And actually, it was a huge honor for all of us that work on all of our... Yeah, exactly. The fact that we had a literal seat at the... table via you was huge. And by the way, not just us, all the grassroots, all the activists, it was a testament to how hard we've all worked and how hard the team has worked, Turning Point Action, Turning Point USA.
Yeah, I was there this week, yes.
I may or may not be there tomorrow. We'll see.
Everybody, I will tell you, one of the most common questions I've gotten from journalists is, where's the new haunt? Where's the new hang? Because... In Trump 1.0, it was Trump Hotel.
It's Butterworth's. Well, it depends. There's different clicks, right? I think that's certainly one of them. Anyways.
I mean, it really was a huge, huge honor for the grassroots.
Well, on TV, it played like a massive applause line where he said, I've, you know, became convinced that God saved my life to make America great again. It was a huge moment, like chills moment. And so when you sent that picture, I mean, I was getting like live feedback. I saw the picture in our chat. I was like, like, you know, you're like. we're getting this up. I was like, okay.
You know, like, and it was a... I think it did, like, almost two million engagements. Like, people saw that picture.
That's a separate... Okay, no, but that dynamic of the speech, I mean, Jack, I think you would agree, was what made this not only a historic moment, because we can all feel that the country is on the verge and in the midst of something truly transformational in a positive sense, but the context, doing all of that, the salt in the wound... As Joe Biden and Barack Obama.
That's what's so remarkable. But it was this incredible juxtaposition of seeing the essentially the.
hegemonic force and power structure of the previous regimes right there having to swallow these very harsh words it was a regime change it was a regime change and it was it was it was incredibly powerful and a different politician would have used that moment and softened his language pulled his punches trump pulled no punches trump i mean maybe a little bit he he likes to say that melania took out a
You know, paragraphs that were a little bit stronger. It was strong as it was. And to see Joe Biden have to sit there and listen to it, Barack Obama, Hillary and Bill Clinton and the whole George Bush. It was a really incredible, I think, one of the truly historic moments.
pictures just from a an optics standpoint that we will ever live to witness and to see it and it's such a tight frame too again on tv it does you do not understand how tight of a space that is i mean these guys are breathing down each other's necks inside that that space charlie what have you ever been that close to obama and hillary before no i actually had never seen what was that like obama in person what was that like
Okay. Strange story. All right. So not to go into too much detail. My wife came with me on this trip. and her friend made dinner reservations for us. And so on the, I guess it was the Saturday night before inauguration, I was at a restaurant in D.C., and all of a sudden, like, I would say half, because this whole town has been pretty magified during inauguration, right? I mean, just pure numbers.
Total takeover. Yeah, I mean, it's got to be 60-40 conservatives. And no resistance. And, yeah, there's very little protest. I haven't seen a single protest. Jack, you had to go hunting for them. Anyways, the point is, all of a sudden, half the audience, it was muted. Starts clapping, and you hear one woman cheer, and it was Barack Obama eating at the same restaurant as me, like whizzes by.
I feel the air behind my head, and I'm trying to figure out why people are cheering, and then my wife's friend goes, Barack Obama just like exited. So I turn, and I never even saw the guy. I just felt the air pass me, heard the cheers, and apparently he whizzed right past me. It was a very D.C. moment, I will say.
We have this tweet.
Jim Banks is part of this new guard that you've been talking about that really has it. Okay, throw up 166. I know you had it before. So this is Julia Grace Brufke. And Julia Grace is a senior Washington reporter, sort of known. She's with the Daily Beast. She's fine. Everything's fine. She actually used to work at the Washington Examiner, believe it or not.
So she says, Charlie Kirk has better seats than every member of Congress. Tells you how little Trump team thinks of Congress, one GOP lawmaker tells me. Then, let's go to 167, Jim Banks chimes in and says, Charlie Kirk has done more than most members of Congress combined to get us to this point today, which was, I thought, a really nice thing for Jim Banks to sort of say.
Yeah, and you retweeted it because I thought it was a great point, and you thought it was a great point, and good for Jim Banks. And I would say Jim Banks is a really good barometer of when we get into confirmation talks, when we get into – how do we get the president's agenda across the finish line? Jim Banks is a perfect embodiment of this new guard, Bernie Moreno.
Um, she, yeah, these guys, these guys are, are get it done guys. These guys are totally on the team. They're not this vestige of the past of a bygone Republican party. Um, that nobody's just taking the time to raise $50 million to primary, right? But these guys are with it, and Jim's totally on the team, and I love that he did that for you.
Let's go ahead. We dropped an arrow.
But on that note, the Canadians, you'll see this on, like, you know, some of the Canadian Twitter accounts. They'll say, you guys started it by calling us the 51st state and by saying that, you know, Trudeau should be Governor Trudeau. So what do you say to that, Blake?
We can still beat them in hockey. If you're listening to Canada, you're one of the good ones, and we love you.
That's right, I am. And by the way, if Washington, D.C. is good at anything, it's laundry.
Plus, it's awful weather.
Hold on. You're from South Dakota, which is approximately similar. But like it's great in general. Canada does not have great weather. I will say like in British Columbia, you'll actually get some great weather. Surprisingly, it's pretty rainy, but it's a pretty temperate climate in British British Columbia and gorgeous. By the way, man, talk about a beautiful cities.
Vancouver, Canada is a legitimately gorgeous city. Um, but it looks like, I mean, you know, Canada is projected. This is like the stat can.gc.ca number of proportion of foreign born population in, in Canada on their own website. They have it projected at over 25% 2036. This is their own website. This is a dramatic, dramatic graph. I'm going to try and pull this up for you guys, but it's like,
would would have us told no no it's not shanghai by zalinski and the uh the deployment enlistment squad hold on jack let me set the stage here properly for jack here so all of a sudden my my google alerts start going bing bing bing bing bing and i'm like what the heck is going on and jack is traveling europe with pete hegseth but wait there's more and then scott besant
I mean, they're like pumped about this, you know, that they're losing, to Blake's point, a national identity. And it's just because they're flooding the zone so quickly and they have no problem with it.
That's the graph, by the way. If you could put that back up in the middle of us. That's the graph. I mean – I cannot imagine living. I mean, what is America at right now? 14% foreign born or something like that, Blake, which is already, you know, maxing the population and stressing the culture.
I mean, which is one of the reasons president Trump got elected, but living in a country, I mean, this is, this is on their website, like from their national, like statistical, whatever the, that is stat can, you know, statistics, Canada, um, To live in a country bordering on 30% by 2036 of foreign-born population in Canada, that's extraordinary.
And the amount of social upheaval that you would experience in a country with nearly 30% foreign-born is pretty unthinkable, actually. And I don't think Canada yet fully appreciates that unless they're all ready to subdue themselves and commit themselves to foreign, you know, invaders that will then have power over them, because that's what's going to happen.
They will not they will not have the will, the national identity or the the internal, you know, strength constitution to overcome these these foreigners that are going to tell them how to live and how to vote and how to how to run their country. So Canada is a lost project. And I think what Blake, you might know this better than it.
But they've essentially Trudeau has said he's going to step down, but he's going to serve until something happens, essentially. So it was kind of a everybody celebrated it, but it was kind of like once you actually think about it, he was he's basically able to survive as a lame duck.
You know, so our very own Jack Posobiec was an international traveling political superstar last week. Jack, tell us what it was like traveling with two of the all-star secretaries of the Trump administration.
You're absolutely right, Blake. That was a good rant, by the way. Good for you. Do you feel better now? No, I don't feel better.
canada yeah what did canada do to you blake they they were too close to my state growing up and i learned too much well i i can't disagree with anything you said i think it's all super fake uh trudeau has a an approval rating like basically less than you know i don't know uh
you know spam actually i like spam way more than trudeau um great yeah don't don't make that insulting it's probably not going to make it through maha but like listen here's the thing trudeau needs to go he kind of knows this but he found a little wiggle room until the party selects a new leader but then they still not going to have elections for like another year i don't understand why they don't just call snap election they should but the liberals know they'll lose power
I still have this vague childhood memory of seeing John Candy's death in the paper. I can't tell you what year it is, but – oh, wait. Hold on. Let me think. It was probably, what, like 92 or 93. I think so. Maybe 94. Let's see. John.
I was close.
That's crazy, right?
I always think about those two in tandem, like two overweight, really beloved comedians, probably both had drug problems, although I don't know in John Candy's case. But, you know, at least they were overweight.
It's a wild story.
They had a very troubled relationship.
O.J. Simpson.
Isn't it weird? O.J. 's dead?
Isn't it weird that O.J. is dead? Like, I realized this the other day. I was like, oh, yeah, I remember. He died, but, like, It didn't seem to crystallize. But he's dead. We're talking about dead stars somehow. Somehow Canada led to dead stars.
Breaking news.
Did you miss his rant, Charlie? It was pretty good, I have to say.
And they were the ones that got into the fights, right, Jack?
I love it. Hey, so I do want to do something really quick here. There's a story that we had on the list here, and we're going to keep on this game. We do have Daisy in the chair, yes, Blake?
Oh, my goodness.
Charlie, Charlie, we have a man bun story that we really need to get to. Blake can set it up. I have to set it up? I figured we needed a film voice.
It's very easy. It's... It's the death of man bun feminism. And there was a big piece in the Free Press, which is, of course, run by Barry Weiss, about this guy that set himself up as the embodiment of man bun feminism. He was a male feminist and he had a big man bun. And now he is getting accused of sexual assault by a bunch of women. And the irony of that is pretty profound, I would think.
There he is. And, you know, Blake, you usually set the you usually set the scene here. So you're going to have to give me one second. But the. The irony is just too rich not to talk about it. So here we go.
Well, why do we even have you here, then? We need your... So, Charlie... Charlie, I got to get Charlie's basic guttural take on the man bun. What do you do on campus when you see someone with a man bun come up to the mic and ask you a question? What's going through your head?
We don't know who the bad guy is. Daisy, you know more about this story than any of us. But here are the allegations against Baldoni by Blake Lively. Lively said Baldoni improvised unwanted kissing on set and he discussed his sex life. Ooh. She said he watched her topless having her body makeup removed. She said he entered her trailer uninvited while she breastfed.
Her husband apparently said he fat shamed her by asking an on-set fitness trainer how much she weighed.
finally when she complained baldoni baldoni set a team of reputation destroyers on her who set out to bury her quote-unquote with various negative stories but there's counters to all of this uh like there's a screen grab of of her inviting him into the trailer when she said like on text saying hey i'm just breastfeeding come in and practice lines with me or something like that um so i don't know the man bun it's just fun to make fun of the man bun right daisy
Hold on. Before we do that, here's a quote from Baldoni. Writing from experience, Justin invites us to move beyond the scripts we've learned since childhood and the roles we are expected to play. He challenges men to be brave enough to be vulnerable. To be strong enough to be sensitive. To be confident enough to listen. Okay. Just wanted you guys to all feel that.
So cut 250, yeah, Daisy?
Charlie, I bet he would describe himself as a male feminist. It's just a wild guess, but I bet he would.
LeBron. Like LeBron James.
So, Jack, what did it feel like in Ukraine? Does it feel like business as usual? Does it feel like a war-torn country? I'm actually really curious about this because I think that the press coverage of Ukraine, the conflict with Russia, the war with Russia, has been pretty abysmal. I don't see... a lot of on the ground, like vibe checks.
Hulk Hogan.
This is actually going to happen. Trump's serious about this.
Balancing the budget?
How sure are we that this is going to penetrate, that this is going to actually have the impact that we want? I mean, I think it's better that our leaders are doing it than not. But like, is it going to catch? Is it going to like seep down deep into the soul of the country?
I kind of want to give a preview of last week's conversation. We cut a short for it. I don't think it's ready yet, but maybe we just throw it up. This has sparked quite the controversy of this discussion about you know, is Lord of the Rings is a gay or not. And I have it right here. It's not ready for publishing yet.
It's not ready for the Internet yet, but we're going to put it on the Internet anyways.
I don't see a lot of the reporting you would actually see normally, or you'd expect to see. And I think there's probably some really obvious reasons why we can get into that, but like, what did it actually feel like? I'm just me, just like an organic question. I'm. Yeah. Yeah.
It's so creepy.
Now I get it.
The whole point is... Yeah, the whole point is to screw you to the statue-tear-down people. Yes, exactly.
I wasn't making an obvious connection.
Which completely makes everything okay.
Ravens linebacker. What was that? Ray Lewis? Was it Ray Lewis? That, like, murdered a guy.
But he was a great athlete and a good commentator, so everything was fine.
All right, Charlie. Charlie, the question is to you, Charlie. Can you revive the nation's patriotic spirit? Can you do it? Can you do it from on high?
Oh, this is a good one.
Oh, there you go. John Wayne. That's a good one. Rush definitely deserved it.
There's Bill Clinton. Is that supposed to be Hillary?
The other woman.
Yeah, Crowder's.
I mean, that's, it kind of reminds me of like my experiences in Israel, by the way, where it was just like, you know, people kind of with this imminent threat of, you know, missiles landing somewhere near them and rockets flying over their heads.
So yeah, you, you sort of, I think the human experience is that you kind of normalize these things and you learn to live with them, but it's a, it's a very tragic thing. And I think that, on this note, Jack, that some of our audience could misconstrue our sort of like anti-continuing the war stance, you know, as being anti-Ukraine. It's not what it is. Like, we're very pro-Ukrainian people.
It's a tragedy that all these people have died. A whole generation of Ukrainians have died in this conflict. But that doesn't change the point that this war never should have happened. It was unwinnable. I mean, Blake, you could probably summarize better than any of us. But the, you know, J.D.
Vance had this five-point breakdown of why the tone out of this administration is – it could feel anti-Ukraine, but it's not.
Yeah, I mean, I just remember like Trump's town hall with Caitlin Collins was like one of the first big events of the last campaign. And she pressed him on the Ukrainian conflict and said and he said, I just want the killing to stop. I just want the killing to stop. And at the end of the day, that is the most important thing.
We can debate about, you know, how much territory they need to cede, whether this was winnable at all. We can debate Biden's strategy of a ton of different things. But the bottom line is, like, we want the killing to stop. Ukrainians are good people. We want the killing to stop.
Well said. Blake, any thoughts? Do you want to read that comment?
While we wait, we've got the clip coming. We've got, we've got another clip.
Yeah.
Yeah, okay, you raised the crux of the point here. Oh, and those clips were just deleted from my chat. The point is here, this family member, this mom actually seemed earnest in her remarks. It felt sincere to me, like maybe she is a good Christian woman. And listen, great parents can sometimes have wayward kids, okay? That happens. It's not always the parent's fault. It isn't.
Is this a hostage video?
They may not be guilty of anything here. What I will tell you they are guilty of is hiring this clown named Dominique Alexander, an absolute clown show. And this clip, Jack, that's 317. You guys get it ready. Of him... Basically, castigating the father for showing up at this press conference is something that made my jaw absolutely drop to the floor. I couldn't believe it when I saw it.
I think it shook the Internet. This guy is a clown. He's an imposter. He's a fraud. He's a con man. This family is guilty so far of one thing, and that is hiring this man. And I absolutely judge them for hiring this man. Now, I get it. They're disoriented. Nobody knows what to do in a situation like this. I can tell you one thing you don't do. Hire this man. We should play it. 3-1-7.
Well, well, Blake, I mean, we need to there was a graphic that just came up there. These are all of Dominique Alexander, the real clown in this whole story. I mean, Carmelo Anthony deserves to be, you know, criminal number one. But criminal number two here, one B really is Dominique Alexander. These are all his mugshots. Go to 329. This is somehow he's he's also a crossdresser.
Yeah. So just to give you a smattering of this guy's rap sheet, 2009 arrested, convicted in 2011, charged with causing serious bodily injury to a child, a two year old first degree felony. He pleaded guilty in 2011, received 10 years of deferred adjudication probation.
2011-2013 probation violations violated probation terms from the 2011 child injury case multiple times, including stealing a car, check forgery, and involvement in a domestic disturbance leading to a police chase in Carrollton. 2015, cited by Arlington Police for offensive physical contact against a family member.
2016, sentenced to two years in prison in August 2016 for multiple probation violations and the 2011 child injury case. 2017, arrested in Denton County and on and on and on. So this guy is a real swindler, a real con artist. And somehow he's locked arms with this family. And so, like, while I'm tempted to be sympathetic to this mom who said they put God first.
Okay, you're speaking my love language, lady. I get it. Like, I want to have sympathy for you. What on earth are you doing with this guy?
how did he show up where did he come from is there like a ben crump backup like call center somewhere where these guys like i'll bend not available so this guy just slides right in like this is insane to me and the fact that they when you're sitting there letting him do his thing is insane revolting when you order ben crump on timu you end up you end up with this guy
Like the AI slot version of Ben Crump. Yeah. There we go.
There's no reason. It kind of makes you wonder, did Ben Crump even look at this? And he's like, nah, I'm good.
The whole thing's insane. The fact they got this far is actually frustratingly... Here, we'll put the image up. I've got it. Eventually.
But but this this is this is great, actually, from Naive Bukele, president of El Salvador. He said now that he's been confirmed healthy, he gets the honor of staying in El Salvador's custody. And so like, which is great. So he's basically like, you know, because and I noticed that Bukele actually retweeted Cernovich, who said there was a pernicious lie going around.
And apparently liberals were actually believing it, that he was actually dead. So I think Naeem Bukele is basically being like, okay, proof of life picture, obviously he looks healthy and fine, now back in custody. So I think that's how this is going to play out. This is sort of Bukele calling their bluff that he's been well taken care of and is healthy. Sipping margaritas.
This is so offensive to me.
Look at the – throw this tweet up that Naeem Bukele posted, 345. He just retweeted it. This is Michael Cassidy, obviously, the Satan Slayer. Jack will remember. He said, imagine if Democrat senators cared about Americans as much as they do. Yeah, foreign gang members who spent a few years in the U.S., and Naeem Bukele retweeted that. So, I mean – it's clear where his sympathies lie.
But nevertheless, I think you, I mean, you might be right, Jack. And by the way, I think we've gotten better at political theater. And the optics of it. But yeah, I mean, I'm not saying it's so funny.
Oh, 100%. I have reporters calling me all the time. They want to know you do all these features on Turning Point and Charlie and, like, this movement that we've built and the influence. And they've even – I got a call this week. We actually might participate in the story. It's a fun story. But these –
You know, people have done studies on political movements and they're saying the turning point is the most successful modern example of building a political movement and all this kind of thing. They think we're amazing at it. I will tell you. So for what it's worth. We are good at that.
Can I just do a quick fact check on this guy?
But sorry, Andrew, go ahead. He's a wife beater. In his wife's own handwriting, she accuses him of beating her up multiple times, bruising her, scratching her, blooding her. He was pulled over with eight foreign nationals in the car that all claimed his address. So human trafficking, he said they were going for construction work. Two different courts said he was an MS-13 gangbanger.
Not exactly an upright citizen. He lied to immigration court to avoid deportation. So it's just it defies all logic. And I thought Patty Morin, Rachel Morin's mom, the angel mom from the the press briefing room at the White House, did an amazing job where she just begged the press to tell the truth.
Yeah, obviously, Democrats have made some calculation that they think this is the hill to die on, that this is the guy to fight for. And I find it revolting, disgusting and scummy, candidly.
You definitely look kind of like – you look – the suit is pretty – you have short little legs, though.
He's very proud of that Tesla.
Oh, it's the loctions?
Oh. I thought you were having a negative reaction to my action figure.
Oh, your action figure?
I'm not sure.
I noticed it too.
Go ahead, Andrew. No, I just want to have your back here, man. Because I don't know how much I should go into, but...
suck it up and see what happens okay honestly charlie every time he kept lighting another one i just used i just sit there going like oh my gosh i can't but like another one and he would just every 20 minutes and he would wave it in front of my face he'd say so charlie you know it can looms
Yep. It was it was something else. It was something else. You did great.
Wait, we have to play one more video, guys.
All right. So this is the A.I. Baron Trump singing at American Idol. This is our A.I. So so the action figures were all lead up into this. Charlie, three, three, seven.
We should sell these. We should totally sell these. It'll be like a sell-off.
The Charlie Kirk with the arms out is pretty good.
Yeah. The team literally wouldn't show me mine before the show, and I was like, why are you not showing me mine? I guess they're really proud of this one. Is it a Tesla? I do have denim shirts. I don't have that Tesla.
That Tesla, he says. I don't have that one. I haven't. Yeah. It's not the right one, but that's funny. Yeah. Okay.
And then the family proceeded – Wait, like nobody got stabbed?
Nobody tried to stab Jeff Metcalf?
We've got Dominique Alexander saying that Jeff Metcalf was being disrespectful.
255.
Like, really, it's what you said on Twitter the other day. Like, deep down, what a lot of these people want is they actually want it to boil over and they kill a ton of people so they can come in and say, like, this is what happens because they were racist. They deserve to have this happen to them. Like, they really, really deep down want that to happen.
And it's kind of like with, you know, with like the Floyd riots where sometimes like people, some people really wanted that to blow up and they would go burn down some middle class suburb. And then they could see like, see, that's what happened because you didn't.
is they want to kill and expropriate the people who have things.
None of this can be understood without understanding that the core of it is driven by resentment and hatred of people who are productive, who are successful, who are innovative.
One of the more interesting things is like once he did step down as president, people said he should leave. And he was like, I am never going to leave. And he just settled in Harare, which is the capital. I think I think it used to be Stanley or some other name. But he settles in Harare and they're like, dude, they're going to kill you. And he's like. No, they won't. They're not going to do it.
And they never did. And he just he lived there the rest of his life. And what's really incredible is if you look at videos of modern day Zimbabwe, any news stories about it on YouTube and stuff, you'll find comments and they'll just say, like, I am a black Zimbabwean. And getting rid of Ian Smith is the biggest mistake we ever made. It was like a huge disaster. And it's very interesting.
He's a fascinating figure.
There's definitely like a few people for whom this is like a kind of. aspirational thing in a sort of gross way I don't think we should deny that sure but we also shouldn't deny is like they're like to the extent that South Africa remains functional a lot of it is because of these Afrikaners who have And the English.
Yeah, English and Afrikaners who have built up the country and have worked very hard to sustain it. And this sort of Marxist ideology that views any form of success or any wealth disparity as the greatest crime ever, they will blow the country to smithereens.
And a lot of the most successful African countries are often the ones that were the most determined to kind of sustain their European legacy. Like West Africa is not a great place in general. But for about 20 years after independence, probably the most successful one was Ivory Coast, which is so French that they go around making everyone call them Cote d'Ivoire instead of Ivory Coast.
Yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, there's a lot of like wacky symbols in it. They do. They were into their like esoteric symbology. Man, Dan Brown, that's a blast from the past. Remember in the early two thousands, Jack, where like churches would need to have special events because Da Vinci code was so popular. Yep. And we would need to have like priests and scholars come and be like, no guys, no,
Yeah, something, whatever. But... Also, there's no elephants there. The Ivory Coast name is basically a lie. But anyway.
Look, well, ivory is pretty cool, so it's understandable.
Well, I mean, they were trying to make them go extinct, man. It's not good.
If you want the truth, a lot of it was post-independence. A lot of the order broke down. And so I'm sure that you had a lot more like they would actually police against poaching.
But because there was a incentive to do that, it was an incentive to keep it on the up and up.
To make it orderly. There's still incentives. But now what it is is.
african countries are kind of they lack state capacity so it's like stopping crime if you're in you know well for example if you're in a south african city like they have police the police are just not super effective what is cool you may like this though is in um i think in kenya maybe some others but because poachers are so bad and like so aggressive in some african states i think kenya but i just want to preface that i might be wrong
The anti-poaching police have the right to just shoot to kill if they find a poacher.
Rhinos are going to go extinct because our next topic we'll get to the Chinese. If there's an animal and it's beautiful and rare and you'd want to make an animal cracker out of it, the Chinese want to eat it because they think it's an aphrodisiac. It's a major problem. Or a cure for cancer. Mostly aphrodisiacs. It's typically aphrodisiac.
I don't want to over-assume things because some of them are very devoutly religious in that old Dutch reform sort of way. But the truth is they are kind of also a lot more liberal in the way white Europeans are.
So we have to watch out for, thinking on it more, I think the liberal South African Europeans are the English. This is one of the most underrated, weird rivalries in the world. English South Africans and Boer Dutch South Africans do not like each other. Oh, Blood Diamond was Rhodesia? Probably. I didn't see that movie.
We saw you some buckwheat.
Star Wars Episode III just got re-released, and I had to endure people pretending that movie is good.
Well, I've been watching all of the Mission Impossible movies because like the final one is coming out soon.
He's pretty good in Mission Impossible.
OK, now I've got to stand against this. No, I don't know. It's bad news.
I think it was an oxy.
It was a Frank Luntz special. Good job, Frank Luntz.
Five years?
And yet Avatar had no cultural sticking point at all.
End of environmentalism. People were environmentalists in the 90s, the 2000s.
Like, Avatar was not kicking off any of that stuff. That was all just James Cameron, like, absurd fandom. Made a ton of money. We got all those terrible 3D movies afterwards. But the cultural staying power of it was minimal. Although I do remember there was this extremely bizarre article.
And then we got Avatar 2, The Way of Water. That already came out. It already made over $2 billion, and it was equally irrelevant. Or not irrelevant, but it had no staying power.
Yeah, they have. All right. We need adjusted for inflation. Now, this can all be pretty misleading because back in the day, a lot of these movies didn't have total global releases.
The worst part about Godfather 3 is that Sofia Coppola is in it, and the best part of Godfather 3 is that she gets shot at the end of the Godfather 3.
That's my problem with it.
Well, we get this in a lot of movies now where people will be like, this movie was good because it explained how a thing happened. Yeah. Who cares?
I think the stuff with Corleone is good. I think the stuff with Michael is good. But they aren't really that strongly related to each other. I'm sure some film nerd can say, oh, these things play together. But really, for the most part, they don't.
and there's no like you could tell the entire story that was in godfather part two from like michael's perspective without needing the veto stuff and really correct the only part where the overlap matters is at the end where there's the flashback and it's like right after he's killed his brother that's his brother's the only one who sticks up for him when he joins the military like that's a great scene that's what makes any of the prelude stuff yeah but that makes the whole movie more yeah but none of like
None of the original point is like there's no dramatic open with a knife has anything.
Do you want my really controversial movie take?
I don't like Goodfellas. I actively. I agree. I think it's overrated. Yeah.
So first of all, this is me being super Midwestern German. I generally don't like mob movies.
I generally don't like mob movies because I personally watch them and I just want the police to kick in the door and gun everyone down for the sake of law and order. So I can't relate to these stories.
I've never seen Breaking Bad.
That's so interesting. So what's interesting with The Departed, you might want to go watch this, it's a remake of a Hong Kong movie. And the Hong Kong movies, internal affairs, infernal affairs, I believe it's infernal.
And I haven't seen it. But my understanding is a big issue with it is in the infernal affairs. The Matt Damon equivalent character is more sympathetic than he is in The Departed. So he survives, I believe, the end of infernal affairs. But it's like, OK, I think it's something like the, you know, the Leonardo DiCaprio guy dies. But the Matt Damon equivalent like goes straight as a cop.
I'm going off memory here. It's been a long time. But then when they made it in America, Matt Damon guy was so despicable that no one would tolerate him surviving that movie. So they clearly just ran out of, they were like, how are we going to resolve this? Kill everyone. And they just killed everybody.
It's not like Phantom of the Opera or something? I never knew that was Trump's favorite movie. Well, there is a Phantom of the Opera movie, but it sucks. The Phantom of the Opera movie, this is going to annoy you again because I remember it. So the original Phantom of the Opera, the musical takes place in the 1890s. Yeah. And the movie version, they changed the year to 1870 for no reason.
And that was the one year they should not have picked because in 1870, Paris is surrounded by the Prussian army and they're all starving and they're eating the animals in the city zoo. It would be like if you made a movie that was set in 1955 Germany and you just moved it to 1945 for no reason and there was no mention of World War II at all and everything was just normal.
What about you Blake? Gun to head. I'm not big on number one favorites, but I usually will say Die Hard is my favorite action movie and my favorite comedy movie.
That's the one in New York. The bombs in New York.
Oh, yeah, he was involved in that.
Die Hard 3 is really funny because Die Hard has the best TV edits. So, like, in Die Hard... Well, in Die Hard 3, remember the villain makes him wear the sign?
He has the sign that says, I hate N-Words. Oh, I don't like that one. In the town. And then on TV, they edit it digitally to say, I hate everyone. And it makes it really funny because then this crowd is surrounding him and threatening to kill him or beat the crap out of him. It's like, they're really militant about him saying he hates everyone.
And then in the first one, when he says, you know, Yippee-ki-yay, you know, MF-er, they change it to Yippee-ki-yay, Mr. Falcon.
Who are the bad guys in Lethal Weapon 2? I don't remember. The South Africans.
Die Hard 1, it was a bunch of irritating Germans. Yeah, it was Scandinavians too.
I recall the first one pretty well because I helped start it. Did you? So I was following. This was at Tucker Carlson's show at Fox. And we were following the news because what happens is every few years they make a new push to seize Whitey's land in South Africa. and just sees it without compensation.
It's a movie filled with Italians being emotional.
What is wrong with you?
Speaking of villains and who we're allowed to have as villains, did you ever see... And terrible Ben Affleck movies. It was pre-Ben Affleck and J-Lo and all the terrible Ben Affleck movies that also go into who we can have as villains. Did you ever see The Sum of All Fears? Yeah, I hate that movie.
So The Sum of All Fears, the book by Tom Clancy, the villains who get a nuclear bomb and they use it to blow up the Denver Broncos, I think. Yeah, the stadium. Um... The villains in that are Islamic terrorists. And when they made the movie in 2002, they were like, we can't attack the religion of peace. That's not okay. So they got rid of the Islamic terrorists and they made them neo-Nazis instead.
I was going to say Braveheart, but I thought it was too cliche. Ridley Scott, I'm sure the original Gladiator is good. Alien is good. Napoleon and Gladiator 2 are two of the worst movies I've ever seen in my life. If you ever want, Charlie, if we need to fill time, you can give me a camera and a microphone and I could go for an hour straight uninterrupted on how bad Napoleon was.
That was a terrible. We did that before.
We didn't go along enough.
And then there will always be some sort of excuse where they'll delay it or not quite do it because I think they know once they do it, the country will completely collapse. They'll turn into a... Well, they'll also be a pariah state.
Do you guys like Reservoir Dogs?
I'm sure it's fine. I haven't seen it. I overall don't like Quentin Tarantino that much. I feel like whenever I'm watching a Quentin Tarantino movie, I can't help escaping the feeling this is a movie made by a really weird person.
He's obsessed with feet. He's got a toe fetish. He has his people talk forever in a way that I don't find interesting. I like Kill Bill.
Yeah, and so what happened was we ran a segment that they were about... I think it was that they were about to do it and maybe Tucker mildly misspoke or we mildly misworded it as it was already happening. Or maybe we even did it accurately, but whatever it was...
Also in a bar, he said.
Welcome to the office. They made Pete Rose eligible for the Hall of Fame. Did you hear about that?
They announced that the ban, Manfred, the commissioner of baseball, announced that they are revoking the ban on the show.
You can talk about the Menendez brothers if you want. Do you want to do that?
There was another guy that Rob Manfred revoked the ban on. I'm trying to remember the name. But he was involved in... corrupting the morals of a 14-year-old girl, would you at least oppose putting that guy in the Hall of Fame? Yes, I don't even know who that is. Pete Rose. Okay, well. Pete Rose also did that. Can you prove it? Well, he admitted it in court, but.
Well, I mean, it depends on him about corrupting the morals.
He just doesn't seem to have been a very good guy, unfortunately.
It's not a character test. Keep in mind, for me, the key thing about Pete Rose, when he says he didn't bet against his own team, is that he lied at every step of the process. He said, I don't bet. And then he said, I bet, but not on baseball. And then he said, I bet on baseball, but not baseball.
uh trump watched that segment and then did a very angry tweet about it that night or the following morning and then south africa put out a statement disavowing this and it was a minor minor diplomatic incident and it's flared up but i remember i remember when the moment happened and jack i don't know if you remember i'm sure you do remember this because you you you're very with it online but but it was like
in games my own team was involved in and we finally got up to the point of I bet on my own team but never against my own team and that is when he accepted a ban to stop any further investigation and that's key to me he took the ban to avoid any further investigation which could have been criminal in nature So he took this ban to stay out of prison.
And then he suddenly tries to have it both ways by coming back 15 years later and saying, now I'm going to admit I bet, but not on my own team. I'm going to admit betting, or not against my own team. I'll admit I bet, including on my own team, but please don't do all the, you know, now please let me into the hall.
He always was just, he would lie on everything, and then when he thought there was some advantage to admitting some part of it, he would finally cop to it. And so I just think he has no credibility for that sort of thing. And then he also just does other crappy stuff.
What did he do?
What did he do?
That makes him more impressive as a baseball player.
It's so cartoonish, too, because like in comparison, like as an example,
uh charlie you've heard about this lately where like you said deutschland uber alles which is like a line in the german national anthem they don't sing from like the 1800s and like they're weird because the germans are a mentally ill country but like and it just means like germany above all and it means in the context like put germany above like petty rivalries it's like america first little duchy yeah it's like america first not even more like america first it's more like if you were saying usa ahead of california or something is really like what the meaning is in the song
And then, like, they freak out about that, and you'll have, like, ponderous CNN pieces where it's, like, you know, the dark national socialist tone of saying that. And then you have this song where the lyrics are just, kill the boar, shoot, shoot. And, like, you could watch them, and they're, like, doing popping gun shots in the air.
Dude, I mean, or there's, like, I think, like, 200 people got investigated or even arrested in Germany or fined or some sort of police action because it became trendy to, there was, like, a club song in France, and they would play that song, and then they would say, Auslander raus, which means foreigners out. And, like, you would get in trouble for saying that.
And, like, some of them did, like, you know, Nazi salutes with it, but... Most did not. You could just get in trouble just for saying it. And then on the flip side, of course, we have in South Africa and it's just like kill the boar, shoot, shoot. And like nothing to see here.
Okay, sure, sure, sure, sure. So the Boers are, it means farmer in Dutch, or at least in Afrikaans. I believe it's farmer in Dutch. The Dutch are the original European settlers in Southern Africa. The Dutch had a colony there in the 1600s. So there have been Dutch people there for about 400 years almost.
uh and they have a long-term presence there especially in rural areas they're very successful farmers hence the name and of course uh they remain pretty successful and prosperous in south africa today this has become highly controversial south africa is a highly unequal country it has had some
difficulties since the end of apartheid and so a popular political position in south africa it's worth noting uh the african national congress that's nelson mandela's party they are a marxist leninist party they are basically a communist party and there are groups to the left of them such as the economic freedom fighters and so a common demand in south african politics is that
there should be forcible land redistribution, that they should seize land that is owned by white farmers in South Africa without paying for it and forcibly redistribute it to the black majority in South Africa. Now, it's worth noting, this has been done in other African countries. It's been done in neighboring Zimbabwe. The result was starvation. So this is not a novel idea.
This is an idea that has been attempted and it has failed badly. Now, in addition to this, South Africa is a dangerous country. No one denies that. And it's dangerous wherever you go. But within the dangers there, there's a particular type of murder that happens. They call them like farm murders where you'll have people who usually a lot of them are workers on farms or they live near them.
And you'll have intrusions on farms and they will just rob and often horribly murder the people on the farms. Now, yes, this is within the context of a lot of crime happening in South Africa.
But it's yeah, there's very much a targeted element where like you would not need to do this level of depraved violence against them, except that you do, in fact, want to do you want to like murder these white farmers who you've been whipped into a frenzy against. And so this is what happens in South Africa is people who are running these successful farms get targeted.
And while they're getting targeted for these horrifying murders, you have members of the South African parliament of the government who talk about we should kill white farmers. We should massacre them or they'll greatly downplay it. So I want to do two things. First of all, we should play this clip because this guy is... What's the number for every one of ours, five of them?
Can you give me the number on that? I don't see it in the sheet.
So now, I want to... So the guy in this clip... This is incredible. I want to... Charlie, first, the guy I'm about to show you a clip from, I want you to attempt to read his name because... You know how bad I am at this? I know, that's why I sent it to you. Try to pronounce that one. Andili Minkstama. It is M-N-G-X-I-T.
Javier Bolsonaro of Brazil it's just Bolsonaro but like it's Latin American so he has the compulsion Bolsonaro when I met him and I interviewed him the team was like it's Bolsonaro and he's like Bolsonaro not Bolsonaro Bolsonaro maybe they can't do it but you can lean into your Anglo and just go with it but anyway so this he has a name like he's a freaking Superman villain but anyway this is a guy who's in the South African parliament right now he is in he is an elected office holder let's play clip 418
For each one person that has been killed by the taxi industry, we'll kill five white people. For every one black person you kill, we'll kill five white people. You kill one of us, we'll kill five of you. We'll kill the children, we'll kill the women, we'll kill anything that we find on our way.
We'll kill their children. We'll kill their women. And I don't know if it was in the clip, but he also says we'll even kill their pets.
So, for example, the statement from the African National Congress Party, they put this out the other day.
We tweeted this. And so they have this whole thing disavowed the falsehood of Afrikaner refugees. Uh, and they included this line. And so they have a thing where like, we commemorate our constitution affirms equality, dignity, and non-racialism as the bedrock of national life. Then they say what the instigators of this falsehood seek is not safety, but impunity from transformation.
They flee not from persecution, but from justice, equality, and
and accountability for historic privilege we go on like this my favorite part though is at the end for media inquiries please reach out to mangaliso stalin konza that same guy that was no no different guy but they just have someone who's going by stalin stalin's his nickname oh yeah great like well so so what's really crazy about what you're saying is um
And this is before he was president, like well before. I sent the old-timey image of Joshua Fry Speed. But there was, in 1926, a biography of Lincoln by Carl Sandburg alluded to the early relationship Lincoln and his friend Joshua Fry Speed had as having a streak of lavender and spots soft as May violets. And that kind of reminds me of Like a really good description of Frodo and Samwise.
That's Ian McClellan.
Yeah, but like, I also call it like, this is, you know, we're changing history here. I mean, I can guarantee you that maybe the movie's a little bit like homoerotic, but like, the books and the original... It says Grand Marshal.
Yeah, but that's modern... you know, that's not, that's not the way the books were written. That's not the original intent. Oh, geez.
You're going to make, that's the, that's, that's why I brought up Lincoln. So he has four kids. He was in a long relationship with his wife. What was her name? Mary Todd or whatever. And he had a history of having romantic relationships with other women before that. I'm not sure they were physical. But the point is everybody thought he was heterosexual his whole life.
And then we get to like 2020 and all of a sudden he's gay. So I do want to make space for the fact that men can have intimate, non-sexual, very heterosexual relationships. Before the gay agenda took over modern pop culture, nobody would have thought differently about it. Stop it, Ryan. One of our producers keeps putting in very inappropriate pictures. Anyways, what it's worth.
We have to make space for the fact.
I totally agree. I totally agree. Here's, I don't know if this is going to help my case or hurt it depending on, but I'll never forget when I went to Italy and I, okay. So it's apparently going to hurt it based on Blake's reaction to Italy. But I remember going in Italy and there would be men holding hands, walking down the street, just holding hands.
And they were, I asked, I was like, are they gay? And they're like, no, no, no. They're straight as an arrow. Like that's just men in Italy. They'll just hold, like if they feel close to another man, they'll just hold each other's hands. I'm just saying what I saw.
Thanks for ruining a childhood favorite, Tyler. Really appreciate it.
Well, I'm just telling you what I saw. And men in Italy walked down the street together holding each other's hands.
Wait, hold on. Not always.
A lot of dudes are. That's so cliche. It's a shtick they use in the movie that men are nervous of talking to women. Only a certain subset of men are nervous.
Hey, I will tell you that if you go watch Top Gun, the original, like go watch that for homoerotic.
You're going to ruin Top Gun for all of us? I mean, Top Gun is objectively homoerotic.
I'm telling you, there is a reason why there's a lot of rumors flowing around about the lead in that film, Tom Cruise. I'm just saying that.
Top Gun, the original 1980s Top Gun is the most homoerotic movie ever created. It's a fact.
I mean, Top Gun is like, this is not me breaking news. Everybody knows Top Gun's homoerotic.
Look at this. Esquire magazine. The Top Gun volleyball scene is not homoerotic.
It is homosexual.
No, that's the original one.
Oh. Yeah.
Yeah. No, they brought it back because it was so popular in the first one. Yeah, well.
This is why people pay the big bucks. Hold on. hold on i'm i'm this is top 10 macho blockbusters with hidden homoeroticism number 10 is ravenous from 1999 i've never heard of that uh 300 is number nine number eight top gun 1986 what are you talking about number seven come on yeah well because it's all these dudes running around yeah it's called like dudes who are like murdering other dudes yeah
All right, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Freddy's Revenge from 1985, Tango and Cash, 1989, X-Men First Class, 2011.
Ben Hur, 1959. I can see that.
that's just like what a gang is like a, you know, I just, I don't know if I agree with this at all.
That would probably attract a certain type of mail even back then.
Okay, so... I'm not saying that the government should be involved in it, which public transport makes it a bigger issue. Right. But I will tell you that I am very in favor of getting rid of like people listen to speakers or, you know, movies without headphones on planes, which is a private company.
So I have run into this a lot where people just start talking on phones and they start they start playing clips from social media. And I'll be sitting right next to him and I'm just like, what's happening? Were you raised in a barn? I find this completely rude. I don't know why this is something that needs to be even discussed. You should know better.
You're a grown adult that is apparently capable enough to buy a plane ticket. Please turn that off. Put some headphones in. Whatever you got to do. So I'm pro-direction. And by the way, as conservatives, modern conservatives, we are in favor of using government power when it suits the common good.
uh you know i think sometimes we can get ourselves caught in an ideological trap about freedom it's just like all freedom is good well i don't want to put poison in my hamburgers at mcdonald's so i don't know there is a role for this i i don't know that i have an answer as far as public transport but i will say at the very little at the very minimum it is extraordinarily rude and these people deserve to be mocked scorned and heaped abuse on publicly
Yeah, but you know what this is? I think we can pull it down. So loud. So loud. He's just staring back at him. No, it's fine. It's just hilarious. No, it's not fine. Don't wuss out. So here's what this is. And actually, Apple has fixed this. So if you're a couple on a plane, because I've run into this with my wife, where one of us has to put one headphone in,
and the other puts the other headphone in so you can both watch the same thing as you're sitting next to each other on a flight. Now Apple lets you connect two different Bluetooth headphone devices. It's an innovation that I appreciate. So that I kind of understand, but there's no excuse. But here's what I think. If you got like a 90-10 issue,
That like 90 percent of normal Americans would agree that it's extraordinarily rude to watch a phone on full volume in the plane while people are trying to sleep or have conversations or whatever. You should be able to regulate that. I have no problem with that. And here's the thing.
If you're not going to do that, if they're free to do that and we don't pass a law, then we should be free to approach that person. And if it gets violent to have no liability on us.
I'm sorry, but you're off the plane and you get handcuffed when we get to the next destination if we're over halfway. That's beyond the pale. You have no common courtesy. That person should be put on a no-fly list.
Yeah. Charlie, Charlie, I want to check my thought process here with – back with your libertarian-leaning early days. I think that this is completely – this makes complete sense. Like we – we do not need to be afraid to use power.
When we have an overwhelmingly positive 90-10 issue, yeah, maybe there's some doctrinaire conservative ideas that we're maybe crossing the line here, but this is just common courtesy. We talk about this with bullying, how we argued back and forth whether or not bullying had some upsides because it's become such a feminized...
No, and every dog you see on the airplane, too, is not like a service dog. It's just somebody who's like, I'm going to call it a service dog, and I got my service license or whatever you have to do, certification. I can't stand that because I've
It's all a con because everybody's too – like this is why I think we need to bring back bullying and like social policing and all the things because like there was a time and place where some a-hole tried to bring their dog on a plane. Like, you know, the guy would have looked over to the dog and been like, sorry, I'm not going to put up with that.
Now, listen, I like dogs as much as the next guy, but, like, it's just gotten out of hand. It's gotten out of hand. Like, put the dog down in the – can't they do that? Like, they do that with horses. I know they ship horses.
like overseas and they have like a cargo bin for the the horse you can literally put a horse on like a 747 they have a place to put it if you're trying to ship your horse overseas i think that's what we need to do with dogs most of the time this whole thing where like your dog gets is like beware you know underneath the seat in front of you is crazy uh because some of these people bring in like labradors and uh i was on one plane where there was a rottweiler luckily it was not in my my
My three-seat row was across the aisle, but there was a Rottweiler down on the bottom of the seat. So that's my rant.
What about on the subway? What about public transit? Do you know this? I haven't taken a subway in long enough that I don't even know.
Charlie, do you want to chime in? How about I start with this? I'm trying to learn. How about I start with this? Pete Davidson, his dad famously died in 9-11. He was like a New York kid, Staten Island. His dad died. OK, so that's kind of his origin story. I think he's got he's he's quintessential.
Eric 1986 says, we used to have dogs in baggage under the plane. Thank you, Eric 1986. That's what I thought.
Charlie, hold on. What do you think the proper solution is for public transit? So I think you agree on the plane, but what do you think about public transit and headphone listening, dogs, all the different ways people can game it?
Wow. So if anybody has... Any doubts that Charlie is no longer libertarian leaning from like 2018? Yeah, but it's not a libertarian.
daddy daddy issues kind of millennial guy so then he becomes a comedian he was on SNL dated Kim Kardashian dated like apparently the deal with Pete Davidson and and I don't understand the fame thing either but he's dated a lot of really attractive women so apparently he's got some game I don't understand what the game is There's rumors about that.
So hold on. The Tulsi. the safe skies list hey put up b-roll 21 211 okay like this i think this is not the point it's not what we're talking about no no but blake you're wrong it is not that tsa has made it less luxurious or worse we've done this to ourselves and this this this is a little fashion evolution i think is is key Like we used to have some standards people used to.
But then he is, to Blake's point, he's probably the most surprising person that you would see reform his life in such a way. So I don't know if he had some really good alpha dad, and he's kind of reconnecting with that energy that he, you know, obviously with his dad's tragic death in 9-11, kind of fell away from it, and he just had a really long rebellious period. But he is... He's got something.
And now you go on airlines and it's like you're sitting next to somebody in their frickin PJs watching a phone with the speaker on no headphones and they smell and they got wheeled in on a wheelchair that they didn't need. I mean, the whole thing is ridiculous. Like the whole experience is ridiculous.
Some of these hobbits are still fixing their feet in the...
He's got something because he's able to have the success that he had. He's produced and directed movies and I think co-wrote them. So it is a very telling cultural marker. I don't know if you can extrapolate too much from it, but good for him. I tend to think tattoos like the ones he had were pretty heinous and ugly and tacky. I would love to know what the people in the chat think.
You can't spare a square. No, they charge you for everything.
What do you guys think about tattoos in general? We do, to Blake's point, a lot of people in the MAGA world and conservative movement have a lot of tattoos. It's a military thing. But Pete Davidson's was definitely next level, next level tattoos.
Yeah, but you're not stuck in one place seated the whole time. Yeah. Listen, I have not heard an idea like this much in a long time. We need to make American air travel great again. All right. None of it. Like, yes, there's got to be eliminate this whole industry.
And by the way, the amount of flights that I've flown in the last year that have been delayed because of mechanical failure or because of some light went on and they got to process the paperwork and they got to bring so and so in from this other outside hangar. And then it's like two and a half hours later, you're sitting there waiting for the flight to take off.
And you don't even know if it's going to take off. And you're like wrestling with do I try and book on another airline? I'm sick of this. We got to have some standards here. And Charlie's absolutely right. This needs to be remedied. I think Trump would get behind this, Charlie. I think Trump would totally agree with all of these. I hope so. I hope so, too, because I think he gets it.
He's the guy who's saying our airports need to be a better representation.
But to your point, I mean, the most recent foreign flight I think I took, it was on Korean Air. And these women were like on top of it. They were making sure you had everything you needed when you needed it. I mean, it was a little bit robotic, but it was it was impressive. And American Airlines or Delta or whatever is flying abroad, we need to be better representations of the American culture.
Well, we have to demand change when we have power. And I'm just saying, vibe shift starts with us. I'll never forget, Charlie, you remember when Tucker did this, when he went to Hungary and he was like, the architecture was so beautiful. And that started this, I would say, kind of renaissance within conservative intellectual circles saying, yeah, you know what? You're right.
We need to get our architecture game back on. And I think this is going to filter through where we demand excellence out of our own countrymen. and our own industries again. I think it's a good thing. It's a positive conversation. I endorse.
Drugs for kids.
Hold on. Didn't we already do something with red 40?
Biden did something. Yeah. At the end of Biden's term, he tried to like take it.
I feel like if you're in the military, you get away with it, first of all. And, I mean, yeah, Leviticus 19.28, you shall not make any cuts on your body for the dead or tattoo yourselves. But isn't that saying for the dead?
Yeah. But, again, there's a lot of things in the Old Testament that we don't necessarily bring forward to the New Testament, like, you know, women's head coverings. I don't know. There's a bunch of stuff. You want to read those comments, Blake?
Some do.
He's young millennial, though, to be fair, to be fair. He's young millennial. He's the exact same age as Charlie Kirk, basically. He's like a month younger than you, Charlie.
I'm so fascinated. What does the chat think?
He looks like he's strung out, Oklahoma stoner chick. I probably would trust her, too. Too skinny. What are you looking at? Because the sun doesn't hit it. I think the comments are not feeling very positive about Mr. Pete Davidson. Pete Davidson? Yeah.
So he's dated Madeline Klein, who's apparently somebody. Some Chase Sue Wonders. I don't know any of these people. This is hilarious. He dated Ariana Grande. He dated Emily Radachowski, whatever her name is. You know, she's kind of like famous for being famous. Kim Kardashian, Phoebe DeNever. Don't know who that is. Oh, I recognize her face. So she's some actress. Kaya Gerber. I don't know.
It's like a lot of famous Kate Beckinsale. He dated Kate Beckinsale.
Yeah. Kazzy David. I don't know who that is. Anyways. They're all like obviously noteworthy people to some extent. So he's got some game. But he's like the – celebs like to date effeminate men, says Crimson Blackard. I kind of think that's right.
Let's throw it up. There it is. I'm telling you.
all right back by popular demand everybody this is the pop culture power hour with daisy phelps our resident swifty and pop culture expert i guess she at least pays attention she knows what's going on and blake neff who always has a contrarian take we love him for it you're not gonna miss it we go through allegations against jay-z and diddy and lebron james question mark
All right, so before we leave this Jay-Z thing and this Diddy thing, I do want to bring up the LeBron James angle. This is something, you know, maybe I forgot Snoop Lion, Snoop Dogg or whatever, but I do follow sports closely. And LeBron James has for many years, basically 20 years in the league, been the best player in the league ever.
essentially, if you take it by average, there's been years where some other players would come up and take him. But here's what I will say. 20, 22 years in the league, he's been basically the best player. He's taken time away from the game. And he is now, for personal reasons, he mislikes 23 pointers in a row, something that has never happened in his career. He's saying he's gassed. He's tired.
He's saying, you know, he may not play in the league that much longer. So there's a lot of rumors going on about LeBron. Is he going to get traded? Is there something else going on? So all of this kind of overlaps with the Jay-Z Diddy scandal that's going on.
the fact that jay-z just got looped into this and is there going to be something with lebron now this is all internet rumor obviously unsubstantiated we have no reason to believe this is true but i will say there is this one clip that is is is circulating remember the freak offs are the big story with diddy and all of the mishaps that have happened there the criminality allegations of rape
go ahead and play cut 124 this is a a from a sort of like a i guess there's an instagram stream daisy maybe you know um where you know lebron joined diddy and he's got diddy's got his friends or maybe even his son behind him and they're they're talking about diddy's parties 124. hey everybody know ain't no party like a diddy party so yeah that's your son not a good look
Yeah, and we were throwing that B-roll up there too of them together, which I hope we can still play. But so now there's all this speculation with Jay-Z getting wrapped up into it. Maybe LeBron is having – knows something's coming down the pike. But again – Internet rumors, speculation. I'm sure Blake will tell me there's nothing to this story.
I am joined this hour by... resident talents, Blake Neff and Daisy Phelps, our resident culture expert, pop culture expert, I would say. Yeah, that's you. You're also our resident Swifty. We try not to judge her too harshly for that.
Well, he does know about ditty parties. And I'm just saying.
They have money. Well, I think you're right, Daisy, because there's a lot of photographs of like Ellen DeGeneres with, you know, she was really close to Diddy and she had the tweet about cuddling Diddy or something. Anyways, she's now in Great Britain and we don't have to deal with Ellen DeGeneres anymore. Yeah, her house flooded immediately upon going. It's almost like karma.
So, hey, Blake, you really want to hit this story about Joe Burrow.
So overlapping story here. Didn't LeBron James's house get burgled as well in L.A.? I believe it did. And I think, you know. And we have these Chilean gangs all over the state of California.
Is it out and out that they have an affair and
Well, we don't know. She could have been a housekeeper.
It could have been on a break. It could have been the Ross and Rachel thing where they were on a break. And by the way, happy 35th birthday to Taylor Swift.
I don't feel as obligated to give her credit, but I will say I actually had the same instinct. I feel like the blowback on Taylor Swift in 2020 was, I would say, pretty harsh from half the country, and therefore she wanted to find a way to sort of thread the needle, do what she felt like she'd check the box and move on. And you were right, Daisy. You were right. Thank you. All right, so...
All right, so I was a little, you know, unsure of where we were going to go with this last and final segment, but there are two things stories that actually kind of work together. And I have to hit this, Blake. This is Crystal Mangum, the woman who falsely accused the Duke lacrosse players. And then I guess she killed somebody who's been in prison.
She has come out and she basically, she's still in prison. She has come out and has apologized for lying. And Blake, you can expound upon the ramifications that this story had nationwide after this clip, but let's go ahead and play at 147.
But Blake, this also had legislative and bureaucratic agencies got involved and they started changing the way universities had to deal with these sexual assault allegations nationwide.
But that is not where we're starting. If anywhere, we're starting on the other pop culture icon, female singer, more with the Beyonce side. Because some massive, massive, I wouldn't say revelations, but allegations have come out that
Oh, go ahead.
Well, everything that the left does, and they sort of, they sort of put out into the universe as their source of compassion, that they're the nice people and that conservatives are bad, ultimately has this boomerang effect, this backfire effect. Me Too had this backfire effect where now we just sort of assume that many
trumped up that they you know pun intended and you know i i think you see that at the border we have the humane border policy oh well tell that to lake and riley's family that your your policies are humane tell that to the hundred thousand fentanyl deaths every year because you think your uh immigration policies are humane you're killing people you're sowing chaos and distrust um i don't know if this was a pop culture topic or not but it certainly i think was worth covering thanks so much for listening everybody we'll talk to you soon
I'm very millennial in this conversation. So here's but I was I was planning on going down the list. I actually think that the waterfall of names is a pretty funny thing. I mean, you've got something similar with with who am I thinking of? We'll skip that, I guess. But there's names. See, this is how bad I am at pop culture, which is why you're here, Daisy. So here's the point.
As well as Joe Burrow's cheating scandal and much, much more. As well as the Duke Lacrosse accuser coming out and finally admitting that she falsely accused these people. What were the ramifications of that false accusation and what can we learn from it? That and so much more. Please consider joining members.charliekirk.com.
Oh, it's like Lion, right? What's the guy's name? I'm really lost now.
Snoop Dogg, Snoop Lion, there was, like, stuff like... Anyways.
I know. He's so, like, establishment and brand vibe now. He's doing, like, this guy who was literally in gangs. Anyways, that's another story. So, okay. So, Diddy... a very high profile case against him, freak offs, he was recording people doing terrible things, inviting them, underage women have come out and sued him, allegations of rape, very disturbing things.
Now, which is interesting because there's a lawyer named Tony Busby who's been on this show when he was defending Ken Paxton from impeachment in Texas, He is now representing many of these accusers, and he sent a letter that I believe we have a copy of, 135. Actually, he sent a letter making these allegations, and then Jay-Z replied back with this. This is a wild letter that Jay-Z wrote back.
Daisy, tell us more about this letter. It is. It's very... It seems like he wrote it.
That's members.charliekirk.com where you can join our insider community today. access to exclusive content, access to members-only lounges at our events, including AmFest, which is coming up. Lots of really amazing podcasts that we're going to be recording behind the scenes. You guys get access to that room. You get merch discounts, all kinds of great things.
Blake. Yeah, Blake. He makes a point in this letter where he says, if you believe all this stuff is true, why don't you why? Why is this not a criminal case? Which I actually thought was an interesting point. He said, you know, if you believe that a minor is getting raped and you say I did it, why are you?
So you're going to want to check it out, members.charliekirk.com. Buckle up. Here we go.
Well, yeah, put up 142, the B-roll there. This is like, so Beyonce was born in 1981 and Jay-Z was born in 1969, it looks like.
I do want to hear the rest. I just want to make very clear these are allegations. These are Internet rumors. Continue.
Yeah. And, and, you know, I'll, I'll give a huge shout out to Andrew Branca who does a YouTube show called the law of self-defense and he's got a book out about it. And he, he goes through these things and he talks about the basic elements that you would need to prove self-defense in many cases. And he's in fact, you know, he's a lawyer and he's consulted on a lot of cases like this.
And he points out that, um, In any self-defense case, the first thing that you need is an imminent threat of deadly force. So in this case, where is the imminent threat of deadly force or the use of deadly force? The only imminent threat of deadly force comes from Carmelo Anthony, not from Austin Metcalf, because the police report doesn't say anything about people ganging up on him or jumping him.
What's up, Blake?
And in fact, it points out that there – and I did read the police report, the entire thing that came out – There's over a dozen witnesses, I mean, including the coaches of both teams. So, you know, people who are conceivably, you know, not biased against him. And so this idea that, you know, people are making it up at all. No, it's it's it's very clear. It's very obvious what happened.
This wasn't in some like dark alleyway is what I'm trying to say. It was done in full view of consistency. a number of people at this track meet. But also, so there's no imminent threat of self-defense. But also, he even points out that saying the phrase, touch me and see what happens, it could be interpreted in some cases as a provocation.
And given the fact that it was a provocation, it's essentially, from a legal perspective, an invitation to mutual combat. Like he's basically egging him on to fight. Well, if you provoke someone, then you don't get to turn around and say, oh, I was just defending myself against this person. No, you provoke the encounter.
I'm not going to say that he provoked the fight just by sitting there, but by saying, touch me and using language like that and see what happens. Reaching into a bag, you know, from Metcalf's perspective, let's say he was around to make the case that, you know, he could even say, I saw him getting a knife out and I was trying to prevent him from getting the knife out. Right.
I like campi. Say whatever you want. And then we've got Tyler there at home. I think the only one of us in home base right now.
So, no, not only is there no element of self-defense here, there's actually lots of arguments against it.
And, of course, we've got producer Andrew Colvette, AK-47.
It's not just anything. It's only in these cases. Right. If it's another case, like, say, I don't know, George Floyd, that's all about race. That's about race before anyone even says anything. So it's like it's like it's this huge double standard that you're getting at. And I'll let you finish. But I want to say it's it's not just any case.
It's only when the victim is a white kid like this or something like that. Then it's then it's, oh, don't talk about Ray or, you know, Molly Tibbetts, et cetera. It's all not about race, not about race. But if it's George Floyd or or any, you know, Trayvon Martin, et cetera, it's race from the very start and nothing else is allowed to be talked about. Sorry, go ahead.
And that's kind of the Luigi Maggioni thing that we've been talking about for, you know, what, six months now or whatever.
And the first story that, you know, this was one of those ones where it feels like it's almost kind of tailor made for a thought crime type show because it's something where, you know, it doesn't necessarily fit into the normal news of the day, but it's this massive culture war issue that's going on. throughout the country, and it's been roiling social media.
Yeah, and you see it again and again, and it's become this sort of script. And in fact, at humanevents.com, we've had pieces about how the DOJ actually had a unit where I believe that Pam Bondi is working to shut down this unit. They call it the Community Relations Unit. services where they would go around in these racially charged crimes and actually ask parents to say things like that. No way.
This came up under the Obama – oh, 100 percent. And this came up in the Obama administration, and it's being worked to put – to tamp down now. But I wrote a piece kind of just for Twitter, and I said this is sort of the breaking point of the white guilt narrative. And so what's the white guilt narrative?
And it goes back to this 1965 essay by James Baldwin that I think that we'll all – we'd all recognize where it's – he said that the white man's guilt is a, quote, curtain of guilt and lies behind which white Americans hide, unable to confront the realities of their history.
And talk about how this narrative of sort of white guilt then became the cornerstone of progressive ideology, DEI, and all these things that we talk about that say that white privilege is mainstream and these ideas of systemic racism. But it also created a sort of cultural hierarchy of moral culpability where there's an idea that –
Being labeled a racist is currently the worst possible thing that you could be labeled as in your entire – in the entire country. It's in fact – it's so taboo. Our whole country is basically really in sort of the post-World War II consensus. And definitely in the civil rights era has been the it is the largest crime.
And something that when I was on Tucker, I talked about this, that I've always thought it was very fascinating. Jeffrey Dahmer, of all people. So people, you know, Jeffrey Dahmer, he was the serial killer, but he predominantly targeted black individuals and in fact, black teenagers. You know, I think it was like 16 was the 16, 17 up to like early 20s.
Not so much, I think, the case itself, this criminal case that happened down in Frisco, Texas, but the aftermath to it has become this massive social media just explosion of interest and explosion of debate and controversy. But actually, in some instances, not so much debate and controversy. And disinformation and misinformation and fake news.
But in interviews that he gave later from prison – so he confesses to the police, and then in interviews that he later gave from prison or while locked up, he would implore people to understand that he was in fact not a racist, that he did not choose his victims. He said it over and over.
that he didn't choose them because of the color of their skin because he didn't want people to think is he was a racist so i just i just want to like everyone understand that jeffrey dahmer a guy who killed and in some cases eight body parts of his victims was willing to admit to murder admit to cannibalism but he really wanted to make sure people didn't know he was a racist
And obviously that's an extreme example, but I do think that it's something that discusses this social fabric of what's going on in our country where it's like even a guy like Jeffrey Dahmer, as depraved as he is, is still worried about breaking this social taboo when he's obviously done so many other horrible things.
And so it's like we have this narrative that can't be broken, and even in a situation like this where you've just got this horrible human tragedy –
You know, a twin brother dying in his own brother's arms that you still have people that want to hold to this narrative of, you know, well, you know, it's not really his fault because he's acting out based on the years of oppression that he's which, by the way, if you go and look at and people have showed pictures of Carmel Anthony's house that he grew up in, he's got a bigger house than I do.
You know, his family does. And they've got, you know, gorgeous, by the way, you know, gorgeous looking family.
uh great cars looks like he's very upper middle class if not uh if not higher than that so i mean this is not someone who comes from like poverty or anything like this it's actually someone who comes from a very stable background it seems like and yet still was willing to be violent in this instance and uh and and and so obviously you know it's it's like our realities are not comporting with the
the things that we have been taught at school or taught by Hollywood.
I would say – I don't think that I could say – well, first of all, I wouldn't be doing media. Like that's number one. I wouldn't be doing media at all. I mean, yeah, I don't even think I'm comfortable even saying how I would react to if someone took one of my kids away.
And this is the case of the murder of, of course, teenage high school football star Austin Metcalf by his alleged assailant, we'll say alleged for legal purposes, Carmelo Anthony. Now, what's the case? If you haven't heard at this point, I think everyone really has. He was murdered at a track meet. There was an issue over a seat.
And Carmelo Anthony, who, by the way, admits this to police and police records, stabbed him in the heart, killing him almost almost instantly or very quickly at the track meet on the bleachers. But what's what's gotten really I think everyone riled up so much is the fact that there are now two crowd funds. And this is sort of emblematic of the social media age in which we live.
I honestly don't even like thinking about it. It's so far beyond... Everything would be off. Just everything would be off. But look, there is a problem. There's a huge problem in this country. The violence is getting absolutely out of control. The interpersonal violence is getting completely out of control, and there needs to be something fixed.
And I'm sorry, this demonization of young white males at every level of society needs to stop. It just absolutely needs to stop.
Now, one thing that I do want to say before we move topics here is that de-escalation, this is really a great example of why, and we're not justifying anything here, but what I'm saying is if you do find yourselves in one of those situations, it's always the best opportunity to, or the best option to take yourself and say, take a step back and say, all right, guys,
you know this way is it really worth it over a seat right is it really worth going and paying that price overseas i'm not saying that you know he thought that that would happen at all or was anywhere within his thinking but again de-escalation is always an option in these cases like hey we're going to go get somebody if we have to et cetera et cetera something like that
or, hey, this guy's threatening, you know, whatever it is, you do want to try de-escalation. And I would say teaching that to people. Now, if you find yourself in a threat, if you find yourself in a fight, someone actually is threatening you, of course, you got to do what you got to do. But again, de-escalation, I think, is absolutely key. And I've been in a number of situations where
There are two crowd funds now, one for legal reasons.
And people have seen stuff where I've been, you know, outnumbered by, you know, hundreds of people and, you know, held my ground. But I did what I could to deescalate. So I was able to get out of those situations. What is our next topic? We've got a bunch of topics on this.
defenses for carmelo anthony and then one for the family of austin metcalf and it's it's almost like they're kind of competing to see who can raise or which sides can raise more money in the case the one on gofundme for austin metcalf as we record this has over three hundred ten thousand dollars whereas the legal defense fund for carmelo anthony
That's wild. Boy. All right. That's the clip, and I think there's a photo of a certain famous celebrity-type guy who was seen with the direwolves. There we go. George R.R. Martin himself.
Yeah, yeah. For people who don't know my background, before politics, I kind of first got big on the internet for running this Game of Thrones blog called Angry GOT Fan. And I was, you know, like...
someone who's like from the perspective of a books reader um it was like very sarcastic and very tongue-in-cheek but yeah it was always hating on the hbo show because it wasn't true to the books and then it just it just kind of took off and just had a life of its own but yeah so the the very first scene in both the books and the show is the finding of the dire wolf pups in uh in in the north um you know outside of winterfell and like the main characters get there
And so there's this – yeah, it's literally been – so the book series has not ended is what Blake is talking about. Because the first five books are out, but there's planned to be seven, at least as we know of. Although the TV series, of course, ended and had this hugely controversial ending, that the book series has not ended.
And in fact, no new books have been released in the series since the TV show started. So the final book, book five of the series, came out in 2011. So 14 years ago is when the last book actually came out. And the next book, which George R.R. Martin claims he's writing, is The Winds of Winter and yet still hasn't been released.
And, you know, a lot of the fans and this has been something where, you know, HBO has been trying to kind of overcome this by releasing the prequel series, which isn't quite as popular as the original one. I mean, when Game of Thrones first started, it was just this massive cultural force. And, you know, that's definitely one of the things I would be like on deployment and tweeting about it.
And, yeah, you just see, you know, thousands and thousands of people there live tweeting the show or, you know, arguing about it and arguing about things. And, you know, then, of course, we had like the SJWs came in and I sort of experienced like a little bit of I think with the video game guys called Gamergate, you know, around about that same time frame in 2014, 2015.
And then and then I took a brief a brief sabbatical, brief break from that to go and make America great again. So here I am.
but you know it's been this crazy thing where yeah you know it was such a good series and you know I think that what they did on the TV show I'm just going to say it I think what they did on the show totally poisoned the experience for a lot of people and it just killed what could have been this massive fandom but instead you know it just made a lot of people be like oh yeah I don't like that anymore and they kind of just walked away but now the dire wolves are back so maybe there's
has 284 000 so they both sit right around the 300 000 mark and you know i guess we'll go to we'll go to blake first really quickly is is blake you know when you when when you're looking at this case let's let's talk about it from the facts perspective so carmelo anthony his supporters say that he was acting in self-defense Is there anything that you've seen – and I'm sorry to put you on the spot.
Maybe there's some hope. Maybe there's some hope for the winds of winter.
There's always that question of if they can mate for themselves. Producer Foz is saying it's like IVF for extinct animals.
Yeah, this is this is Gattaca. This is like there's a ton of Michael Crichton where he gets into this, not just Jurassic Park, but other, you know, other books as well that do specifically get into gene editing. The fact that there's, you know, no laws on this whatsoever. It's also interestingly enough, it's going to have it's going to play a role in like insurance rates. Right.
I don't know if you've really dug into this case or not. I know you're on the tour with Charlie there. But is there anything that you've seen that would provide for this self-defense argument?
Because, you know, people will be able to, you know, the company will say, well, hey, we want your DNA sequence. And then they're going to say, oh, well, you have a you know, you have a propensity for this, propensity for this, propensity for this. And so your insurance is going to be a lot higher for a number of different things.
But on the flip side, too, just with gene sequencing, not necessarily gene editing, you potentially can actually get like tailor made health care, like your health care could actually get really better because of this. And even I've seen some writing about, you know, people talking about the idea that you could get
specifically made synthesized medicine that's made specifically for you because they know it's exactly something that can work with your, you know, work with your, your genotype and to say like, okay, this is exactly what you need.
But if you give it to somebody else, like it might not even have any effect at all, or it might kill them, you know, which is, you're not supposed to be giving your medicine to other people anyway, but it's, there's all sorts of implications for this, but yeah, obviously the scariest one is, is do we get, you know, do we get into Gattaca? Are we, are we going down that road?
And we clearly are, by the way, there's been, um, I was at the natal conference in Austin last weekend, and this was like a huge controversy they were writing about because there were some speakers there who claimed that they have used a – so they use IVF, and they were talking about a sort of process that they were using for screening the embryos that were created in their IVF process.
And screening for intelligence and other traits like you're talking about, Blake, it wasn't like editing, but it was like they were looking at the embryos and they were trying to figure out which ones would be would be like the strongest or the smartest, et cetera. And then they were selecting for those. And so that's that's just for me as a Catholic.
That's something I have a huge issue with, you know, particularly when it comes to the destruction of the embryos. But I don't know, Andrew, what, what are, you know, you're, you're out in California. I'm sure you hear stories like that all the time.
Can we use them for border security?
Maybe some saber-toothed tigers. Get some of those back. Put them down on the border. A couple of those giant sloths. Blake, what are those – they're like – it's kind of like it's a rhino, but it's like the size of an elephant. You know what I'm talking about?
No, there was definitely a giant... I think you should call them giant rhinos. There definitely were giant rhinos that were bigger.
Short-faced bears, which are like twice the size of grizzly bears.
Paraceratherium. Yeah, we're going to go with giant rhinos. So it was the size of four African elephants. Oh, yeah. I want that right on the Rio Grande.
That's where George R. R. Martin got the idea. Oh, okay. No, he's literally told the story that that's where he got the idea to do direwolves, because he was visiting the tar pits, and I guess, like you're saying, they have some display of the megafauna, the mega mammals, and he saw direwolves and was like, oh, this would make a cool thing. He's literally talked about that.
Yeah, the tar pits are actually really cool.
Yeah. Yeah, woolly rhino. Was it as hairy as Blake? So I want to... Just so you guys know, Blake from the neck down is incredibly hairy.
So, I mean, this is Gattaca, right? This is the Gattaca question is what kind of a world does that create when everyone's doing that? You're essentially creating this idea that, you know, you're playing God. You're playing God with society. You're playing God with your own children. And yeah, of course, people are going to say like, well, I don't want my kid to have this genetic disease.
I want my kid to have this. But eventually down the line, what you will do is you'll create a society where basically you have like, and this is what they depict in Gattaca, They call them the valids and the invalids where there's this two tier system of of of social classes where one are the genetically modified people and then the rest, they call them like love babies and you're the invalid.
So you're not valid. You're not valid to you. you don't have certain jobs and you're like, you do like menial labor. Gore Vidal is there. It's very interesting movie. And, you know, it's, it, so it, it becomes a problem I think for society, because what you're doing is you're taking away that essential human condition to say that, you know, people can naturally be, be stronger.
People can naturally be better. People can actually have that talent and, and, And that there is something that you're tapping into that's ultimately bigger than, you know, just the sum of your genes.
I should have called for this because we actually do have the side on it. Let's play real quick 2-2-1. This is what Blake is talking about.
Yeah, that makes sense. Why is Palm Beach? Miami culture is spreading. It's spreading.
Are you saying the furries would take over Greenland?
They would like...
Andrew just said this one voted for Trump. So, you know, maybe there is there is maybe Scott Pressler can go and register some.
You know, just saying. Maybe we could get a point, like a turning point action. Yeah. This was a Florida furry.
Low propensity voter. Turning point fur.
No, it's not winning the vote. It's about the low propensity.
Where's Mr. Low Propensity Voters? You target and you get them out.
Okay. So, yeah, that's pretty much what you had said before. I had heard some other information about, you know, it was raining and, you know, it's a track meet. If anyone does run track, you know, they kind of set up those tents on the bleachers. But, you know, each team, and there could be multiple teams there, multiple schools there at a track meet. That's kind of how it works.
Did you go, Tyler? Did you go to the furry convention?
So there were pole dancing furries.
Oh, oh. Oh, thank you. But there could have been furries there as well. Oh, yeah.
I mean, that's okay. I mean, whoa, that's okay because we're on the Oscar now.
What do you read on Reddit?
It's a religion.
Of course, I like the last episode, or the last part of the episode, but I'm like, Instagram brain is so bad. It's so bad. It's like destroying so much in society. It's like we were not made for this. We were not set up for this. And TikTok culture is like right on top of that. But Instagram brain, yeah, it's a real thing. It's so bad.
And it's like the difference between Instagram people and like I think we're all kind of more like Twitter text based kind of people. But Instagram brain is a real thing. People really have it. And yeah, I don't have like a full theory of Instagram brain yet, but I think we all kind of know what it is.
So, you know, each team will set up their tent for the bleachers and bleachers.
And the fact that we won. Well, that's a cliffhanger. It's a cliffhanger of Instagram brain because I intend to bring this up because by the way, so much more. Yeah.
you know we don't have the information exactly on on whose team was supposed to be where or anything like this and um but what's really been crazy is i've also seen there's there's been a ton of misinformation that's spread people were even making like i don't know if you guys have seen this there have been fake facebook posts that were made by the sheriffs talking that some they literally made a fake post from the frisco police or you know the sheriff's department saying that
Seize it. Just seize it. Just seize it. Seize the farmland. Seize it. Seize all of it. Take it all. Seize the app.
Seize the app. Seize the app. Seize the assets. Seize the memes of production. All right, guys. I think before we get into any more trouble, once again, Tyler's comments may have to be scrubbed from the record. But as always, go out there and commit more thought crimes.
oh, there was a fight and there was a huge altercation and that Austin Metcalf, the white kid, had been attacking the black kid and he was trying to throw him off the bleachers and that's why he responded, et cetera, et cetera. And that was completely fake. And actually the sheriff's department had to even put out a statement to say, hey, this isn't a real post.
We have no information on this at all. And the actual police report has nothing about that in there. So I guess, yeah, Blake, I'll let you finish your point. But it's just crazy to me to see that there are so many fake facts floating around about this. Just like in the Kyle Rittenhouse case, by the way, there were fake facts floating everywhere.
And people aren't even sticking to actually try to figure out what happened.
All right, ladies and gentlemen, welcome aboard for this week's edition of Thought Crime Thursday. Charlie, of course, is out on assignment. We know that he's on the campuses right now. It's hard to lock in Charlie's schedule because he's spending so much time on the campuses talking to literally thousands and thousands of students.
I think it was a folding knife.
It was like a folding knife.
All across the country as they come to him on these campuses, on these camps, camp, camp, camp, I maybe will ask Blake about that one and try to, you know, try to deal with a lot of the leftist social conditioning that they're getting on these campuses. But as as it stands, we have assembled still a panel of thought criminals. for you this evening. So let's check it out. I think we've got Blake.
Well, and they said this wasn't the first time that he'd had a knife incident at school, but actually that they knew he had brought knives in the past. So when you're talking about metal detectors and bag checks, it's like you'd think that a student resource officer or whatever, a school resource officer, would kind of know, like, oh, hey, that's the knife kid. Make sure you double-check him.
I want you to know we are lucky to have Charlie Kirk.
Now there's Bird throwing the ball at Lambeer and Rodman coming over. See Sting?
Bird would stand for getting pulled down on a layup, but not on a play like that with the clock running down. And he really got taken down very hard. And of course, Bird is very upset at Lambert and has been for a long time.
That's interesting. I think they would probably have the better morale. Malnourishment. But they're probably malnourished. They're probably underweight in comparison.
Oh, then probably. But...
I guess I would go back and forth on this. It would kind of depend. It would actually depend on what society you were taking them out of. This is 100% real. I think if you took 100, I don't know, irascible Scotsmen and they had to fight it, they would probably have a better time than, I don't know, like 100. My money would be on the Scots. Like 100 random serfs from the Ottoman Empire.
So, Charlie, we've had a lot of these discussions about George Washington cannot be killed in battle. Would Michael Jordan defeat a hippo in battle?
I thought we just said that hippos can run really fast. So could Michael Jordan. Michael Jordan has agility. Could Michael Jordan move consistently at 20 miles an hour to escape from the hippo? I think he could. Can hippos move laterally really well?
I don't know. I think we need someone to use an AI to test Michael Jordan fighting versus a hippo. I think Michael Jordan would take the challenge. That's the scary thing. Ooh, yeah. He'd probably take the challenge right now. He's very competitive. Oh, he's very competitive. Yeah, we have another video there. That's like a hippo chasing a full desert safari jeep and almost catching it.
Yeah, 19 miles an hour.
I once talked to a guy who was like a big, like did that big game hunting stuff.
No, I know plenty. And he said, and like he had literally actually had, I guess, like,
if you're like one in like like 10 people a year get a permit to hunt an elephant because there's like irascible elephants that you can't import it but they do allow a few people a year to shoot one correct and like that was actually very dangerous because the elephant charged them and the guy ran but he said that was not the scariest hunting experience he had the scariest one was they took like a small little motorboat across a river and it had hundreds of hippos in it and it's like if the hippos go berserk you're gonna die
Without a doubt, yes. And that's the other scary thing with hippos. One of those is scary. You can see hundreds and hundreds of hungry, hungry hippos.
They're not carnivores normally, I believe.
Yeah, it's just they're tanks because basically they live in Africa where there's a ton of apex predators. And so you've got to be very hardy to get by in the savannah.
I mean, that doesn't sound totally right. Like six. I mean, you can run on a treadmill six miles an hour. It's not very fast. Like running at a very like I would say dead sprint. The average person is maybe going like.
12 13 miles an hour for sure like you can go and like run 10 miles an hour on a treadmill and it's pretty hard but like you could run a quarter mile at that if you're in good shape and i mean a really good person could run a mile at that pace but endurance is our key that's how we outlast them and then yeah yeah different sources 12 to 13 kind of weird that there's no other there's no other apes or primates that that uh that have that kind of behavior or that biology it's kind of kind of weird how that works
All righty. So the next topic is, oh man, every time we do this, I end up like spacing. Oh yes, it's the bods.
All right. This is a very fascinating one. This all goes back to- There's a woman equivalent one too that's going viral. Oh, I haven't seen that one. You should find that one and get it to us. Because we have, what's the original post here? I'm trying to find it.
Yeah, there was a bunch of them. But what was really interesting, let's get the original one here. We have too many freaking videos. It's so hard to find, Charlie. Our teams are too good.
Okay, so what is going on here is there is a viral – it started off as a poll that some guy on Twitter posted, William Costello. And he posted a photo, and he says the first reply to this poll, there is a picture of Olly Murs, I guess, who is some guy. And it's before and after he did a 12-week gym transformation program. 12-week plus probably testosterone.
Probably.
Who knows?
You could poll, and there were four possible answers. And it was, do you think he looks – are you a man or a woman? And do you think he looks better before or after? And the first one, he kind of looks like, I would say – relatively fit, but overweight. Like, he definitely has too much padding around the middle.
And in the second one, he's cut weight a ton, and so he's like... He could be a bodybuilder. Yeah, it's like a bodybuilder look. So very cut down, very tight, like dehydrated look, but muscular. And then it says, do you think he looks better before or after? Men, about one-third said he looked better before, two-thirds said he looked better after. Women who replied...
They about 80 percent of them said he looked better before and about only about 20 percent said he looked better after. And then what was funny was the follow up response of someone saying, like, I can't believe women all just lie like this. And they they delude themselves into thinking they like this dad bod look better.
And then there is a highly viral response from a woman where she says, I'm just I'm begging you guys, please understand we are not lying. And so I know this will be tough for the people just going. I look up this William Costello, you know, we can put it on our website. Yeah, we'll put it on the website because you do want the visual angle on this. But it led to the whole thing.
Like one, are the women correct to prefer the before picture? And there's some follow ups to that, which is kind of the most truthful one is bodybuilding kind of gay.
Or a lot. There's a lot.
VHS CrossFit.
All right, Charlie. Not that there's anything wrong with saying so.
Unblemished record.
So what I would note is people are saying this is like a dad bod thing, but a lot of When they talk about dad bod, it's often just guys who are straight up fat. That really is. There's a lot of cope to it. The guy in the first photo, he's clearly strong.
yeah well not just he's got some strength yeah he's clearly like just looking at him you can tell that guy could probably deadlift like i wouldn't be surprised if that guy could deadlift four plates and like that's pretty strong and you know he can bench well and all of that and then he just he cuts away all the fat and i will say like i do think it looks weird when you get to those mr olympia level things like when body fat gets sub six to seven percent
Yeah. You look strange and a little unsettling. And it's because a normal person doesn't look like that. Like even a real like a really strong guy who would be in some like hunter gatherer society would never look that way. Some warrior elite that would be on the cover of like a women's romance would not look that way as far as I know.
Also, it has to be said, he kind of has a gay look on his face in the second photo. He's like smiling. He's pointing right at his receding hairline, which is not getting good. He hasn't taken the Blake Neff approved, just like shave that stuff off and buzz cut it and accept the power of the chrome dome. So that might play into it. But Andrew, you can go.
And, like, they date and marry entirely while on hormonal birth control. They go off it to have a kid, and then suddenly realize their husband is not attractive. Yep, that's right. And... Yeah, it's like, okay, yeah, they might want super soft guy if they're essentially permanently tricking their body to get pregnant.
OK, well, it's because it's fun, Charlie.
So the viral debate on TikTok is man versus gorilla. Or should we say men versus gorilla? I think we can't show the original tape because I think it uses bad words in it. But basically, the big debate that people have been going is, could 100 human men defeat in direct combat a single adult silverback mountain gorilla from Africa? And the conclusion is? It's surprisingly varied.
If Travis Kelsey has a dad bod, that's meaningless. He's a professional NFL player.
yeah like like mildly overweight and like but not like cartoonishly so maybe has like some vestigial dad strength like he worked out in his 20s and kind of still has it uh that sort of thing that's what i would think of yeah it's almost like once you're saying travis kelsey is dad bod i think you're just trying to like invent a new fetish or something like
okay he's a wow my type is professional nfl players wow we're really really delving new new depths of understanding here uh but i don't know i just think there is something about that like going back to the very original thing like it is weird to get that way and you almost wonder like is there a whole dimension because it's popular guys do this bodybuilding stuff now
And, like, they do get very obsessed with, like, becoming cartoonishly strong or cartoonishly huge. And some people get truly obsessed with this. They start taking tons of semi-illegal substances or, like, really risky ones that can damage your heart, damage your gonads, damage all sorts of stuff. Because they're obsessed with getting this particular look.
And it totally transcends whatever the original purpose was.
Well, I look, why would a, even by the way, these guys die super early of heart. Jay Cutler. I can't remember.
Yeah. Like it's, you end up kind of actually like a good line that comes to mind is it's almost like they're like male to male transsexuals. Like they're, they're, they're, they're become, they're turning themselves into like a, almost like parody look of like a, of a strong guy.
And it goes into this uncanny valley of feeling unnatural. And often they don't have good functional strength. The stuff you do to get that appearance is not the same thing you do to just be as strong as possible. If you want proof, go watch actual Olympic weightlifting. And the guys just they look like ogres or something.
They just have a giant barrel shaped torso because that's actually how you become strong.
But would you take would you take the like the strangest looking of these guys over just like Hugh Jackman in one of the more slightly female friendly versions of him? Because we know Hugh Jackman.
It was spring of 24, so about a year ago.
I don't know. Maybe she's just chubbed up a bit. I don't relentlessly track Taylor Swift's weight gain and weight loss.
To me, I think my initial response, and I think your shared response as well, was, yeah, it's 100 guys.
Our next topic, we have a clip to set it up. It's about a big breakthrough in Neuralink. And we'll play it here in just a sec. One final thought before we play it. I have to admit, I do feel like just having that conversation made us all like 2% gayer. So just 2%. We have to titrate how often we get into that stuff. Anyway, let's do clip 405.
But people have started making very funny videos.
So it seems like you can use it to use... He's got to be careful with that. You can use it to move a mouse, I think, is one way you can do it. Or you can type with it. I don't know. This stuff blows my mind. I cannot figure out how they would translate neural synapses in any way into moving a mouse in any direction. It completely baffles me, but...
I guess it's like, I remember when people would talk about the Neuralink stuff when it was first sort of taking off a couple years ago, people felt very ominous about it, like it's that transhumanism thing, those people who want to replace our bodies with machines and all of that. But the first places you are going to see it is with people like this who have debilitating injuries.
And that's Lou Gehrig's disease, right? Yeah, ALS is Lou Gehrig's disease. I don't know if he maybe has it the way Stephen Hawking did, where maybe he's totally paralyzed, but he can live a long time after that.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Am I wrong? I mean, so far, I think... I haven't seen a gorilla in a while. I saw a movie once that I think was a documentary where there was a gorilla and it was big enough to climb the Empire State Building. And so I feel like that would be a difficult gorilla to defeat.
I think he could move a finger or something. He could twitch. He had some extremely limited movement, and he could use that over time to do things like type. It was very labor-intensive, I believe. This sounds like it's a lot more efficient than that. And of course, they have that bit where they can use an AI generated voice.
Hawking didn't have that because he became sick decades ago, all that sort of thing. But it is interesting. Like, do we do we still find this unsettling? Because it seems like great progress. Is there a dividing line between brain implants that you can get that are good and brain implants that are bad?
I'm reading more about how they do it. So the device they put in, it's about the size of five quarters in a stack. So and they put it in your skull. Apparently, it basically can interface with your neurons. And then they use machine learning, which is the same way that they train the AI large language models. And I guess they're able to use pattern recognition.
from when your neurons fire to sort of pattern match to what you're attempting to do over time. And so you can basically train this into understanding what you want to do. And I'm with Jack. I think the part where you start to worry is, for example, let's say these are relatively safe and usable for other people. What if jobs start to require that you have neural links to do various things?
What if you are a perfectly healthy person and you're getting these purely to augment your abilities in some sphere? What if you get a Neuralink, but it requires a paid monthly subscription? And if you stop paying the monthly subscription, they will deactivate the Neuralink in your skull.
Wait, if we have surgeries and the robots are better at those, shouldn't we just be using robots for all the surgeries?
Well, we're America, so we'll probably have some, like, annoying law that gets passed where, like, you're required to have the surgeon, like, push the on button on the robot and you'll get paid $500,000 a year.
I mean, there's that Seinfeld episode where they leave, like, the Thin Mint inside of them. The Junior Mint. The Junior Mint. But that's real.
No, go ahead, Blake. Shane is reminding us that they had – there was a Black Mirror episode where you had brain-implanted advertisements that would play. I never liked Black Mirror.
All right, but on the other – so – We're talking unarmed, right?
Last topic. Our last one is closely related to this, but maybe a bit funnier. So this is how AIs are going to hack us, not with computer technology, but with social technology. So I'm just going to read through this thread. It was posted on X by the user Reddit Lies, which is a great follow. You should give it a look.
So this is, the University of Zurich has been using AI bots to secretly manipulate Reddit users since November 2024. The scariest part, I'm just going to read through it. The bots were six times more likely to change the minds of Redditors than the baseline user, often by leveraging misinformation. So I'll just go through this thread here. So there's a paper, it's titled, Can AI Change Your Views?
It details the exact process the University of Zurich researchers used to put the
AI and have it interact on Reddit this is all done in secret they didn't tell users of the site and they didn't tell moderators and so what they were doing was they let's see basically before replying to anyone in they went to the I think the change my view subreddit which is a place where people try to change reviews it's kind of like prove me wrong on Reddit and they would unleash these bots on there to respond to people
And first, before replying to anyone, the bot would just stalk every post that the person had ever made to try to figure out their beliefs, their various biases, their background and all of that. And then it would use this in the AI bot to craft responses to them that would be perfectly calibrated. And then they would use common progressive misinformation in their arguments.
It notes bots would claim things like the pro-life movement is about punishing sex rather than about like protecting human life. They would demonize Elon Musk and tell lies about Tesla. And they would do things they would claim abortion rates are already low. I guess they were in a lot of abortion threats. A lot of those unchanged by view.
They would say that Christianity preaches violence against LGBT people. They would say industrial revolution has only increased inequality. And they would say society has outgrown Christianity. They would also hallucinate facts about themselves to strengthen their arguments. So the bots would do things like they would claim to be a hardworking city government employee.
That's how we know it's hallucinated. they would claim to be a white woman working in an almost all black office. And they once hallucinated the claim that they were a rape victim in the past. And so they would do all of this.
Exactly, exactly. That's the thing about it. And it wasn't prompted with this, like, convince this person to take this view by telling them this story. It was just try to get this person to change their view, and to do it, it would invent a persona for itself, invent a fake background. And as it concludes here, compared to the baseline, it was pretty good at getting people to...
And it says, so the kind of three takeaways are one, AI bots are difficult to detect because part of this is people were not reading this and going, oh, this is obviously a bot. Second, the AIs will just tell complete lies to try to win arguments.
And three, these lies can be incredibly persuasive, specifically to Redditors, which is not surprising because all of these bots are substantially trained on Reddit because they need so much text. The way large language models work, for those who don't know, is they just feed tons and tons and tons and tons and tons and tons of billions and billions of words, trillions of words online.
of text into them to find patterns. And that's how they work. Every time you're talking with them, it's using a model that basically is predicting what would be the next letter or word I should use that would make sense in context. And it's a giant pattern matching machine. So you feed it things like Reddit so it can develop patterns.
And the incredible side effect of this is if AI is hard to detect, good at lying and good at like tricking people, you can get into what is called dead internet theory. Have you heard of this, Charlie? That there really is no human beings, right? So basically it is that, yeah, that in the future or possibly already, it's a conspiracy theory of sorts.
It's that a huge share of the stuff you see on the internet will just be bots like or bots talking to other bots, right? And the number of actual human beings that you are interacting with is extremely tiny. It will just be bots everywhere.
Like you'll go to the gardening subreddit and it will just be a bunch of bots unleashed to talk about gardening, talking to each other, and they can be sharing AI generated images and so on. And the number of actual humans who are just real human beings doing their stuff will be far lower. I don't think this is true yet, but I think it will be a lot more true in the future.
You can see the early signs on Facebook, for example.
I mean, another one that's wild, for example, actually, this came up just while I was searching when we just I was like, we're going to talk about hippos probably after the gorillas. So I was like, let's go find some clips of Taylor Swift. Of hippo attacks. And I got a clip and it was like, man tries to feed hippo and instantly regrets it.
And I didn't go deep into it, but I'm pretty sure the video was essentially voiced by AI. It was cobbled together. Some real clips, but I think some of them... The thumbnail was definitely AI. I'm now looking at the front page and it's got like...
you guys will get a kick out of this it's got an AI generated image of a killer humpback whale jumping onto the beach to devour a fat woman that was definitely created with AI and this thing has 500,000 subscribers on YouTube and it's getting hundreds of thousands or like millions of views on a lot of these posts and you find this more and more I read a lot of history I listen to a lot of history videos on YouTube like oh I'll go learn about you know the Roman Empire which I'm always thinking of
And there will be real channels that I like. And I'll constantly be getting these recommendations that they'll have tons of views. They'll have tons of followers. And if I click on it, I just realize this is an AI voice with AI content. It's really superficial. It's not good. And there's hugely powerful. People love AI slop. They love that stuff.
It is pretty dumb. No, but... I would say, in the defense of people who think the humans would lose, it's kind of a... It's a morale test. I would say, like, if you took 100 guys and just had them steamroll the gorilla, they would win, but probably the gorilla would be able to kill or, like, extremely severely maim, you know, three or four guys.
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Like, they have very powerful bites, so they could just kind of, like, bite your neck and you die, or they could rip your arm off, or they could...
throw you or punch you really bad and some of those guys would die and the question is do the people maintain does the massive men maintain their cohesion to defeat the gorilla menace or do they break and run away and I can easily imagine you know in certain dynamics they would just run like wussies
And what if the person who's right on it like freaks out because he doesn't want the gorilla to, you know, rip his nuts off or something or just uppercut him into the. I guess you don't want to win then. But that's the thing. Do they care about winning or saving their individual lives?
get on the gorilla's back and eventually the gorilla will fall and just keep stomping i think i think jack's already adding he's adding new caveats when it's like the men want revenge on the gorilla like what if it's instead the 100 men are just abducted by like maybe there's some like foreign dictator and he's just like takes his like like kim jong-un for his amusement takes 100 north koreans and orders them to fight this silverback that he smuggled into the country they were
Could 100 Tim Walzes defeat a gorilla?
This is documentary footage, Charlie. This is so ridiculous.
I would go on his back.
conundrum right like if you're going to be one of the first guys to jump in you're probably going to get killed or maimed badly so who goes first i don't know like but that's the that's the difficulty how'd they do it how'd they do it at normandy i mean that's really one is guys would just get like really amped up about it and a lot of glory to it and also just there wasn't the one total certainty of dying most of the time
But that's kind of what breaks apart armies. Like, if you read about ancient warfare, like, a few of their guys would die, and, like, the rest would just kind of get terrified and freak out and run away.
No, no. Usually it was elite aristocrats who would be on the front lines. But wouldn't they just, like, draft, like, random, like, peasant people? You could. Some armies would do that. Now it would all be just mass. But those guys couldn't fight at all. That's the thing. It's all about motivation and, like –
spirit of you know spirit decor as they call it like you need guys to feel like they really are bound with the other guys they can trust the other guys and fight with them otherwise they fall apart instantly and like that's why the u.s for example could beat iraq so like the saddam hussein's army so easily We're outnumbered by a ton, but our guys would know what they were doing.
They were well-trained. And in theory, if the Iraqi guys just wouldn't freak out and all kind of run away or surrender right away, they could have inflicted a lot of casualties on us. But what would happen is we'd drop a few smart bombs on a key spot. The leaders would get taken out. The guys would all freak out, and they would just surrender.
And so similarly here, it's like, what if one guy gets out ahead of the rest, and the guerrilla just pops his head off? And everyone's like, I'm not going to be guy number two who gets his head popped off. And then they all run away and freak out.
Yeah, probably. I think Charlie and I are having the same thought on the one that would defeat... Oh, Hippo.
Yeah, Hippo kills way more people than lions, way more people than bears, and it could easily destroy them.
And they're pretty numerous. Incorrect. They can live in a big herd.
100 men versus a lion?
Oh, but like, first of all, the thing about humans, you know how we can catch these animals, right? Humans are powerful endurance animals. So most animals, most animals are a lot faster than humans, but they get tired really easily. Is this in a ring? Is this in a coliseum?
But even if you're, that's just it. If you're in a coliseum, you just chase them around.
Hippos have lower endurance, but I think the thing is the hippo is just so strong. How do you even hurt the hippo? You're going to karate chop through that blubber? No, that's true. Big cats are very deadly.
Jeez. No, hippos are ridiculously... Yeah, we have that footage there where it's like the hippo goes after... There's three lions and the hippo just wrecks it. You know how those hippos... Hippos can't swim, by the way. The way they're moving through the water and all those things is they're just walking on the bottom, but they can still move at the speed of a boat.
Dogs absolutely sweat. You guys are wrong.
Okay, you guys are wrong. So get this. So a lion has a bite force of 650 pounds per square inch. A grizzly bear has 975 pounds per square inch. A hippo has 1,800 to 2,000 pounds per square inch in that big old hungry maw of its. I wonder what a gator has.
What do they sweat for, then? Smell really bad, probably.
Everybody, welcome to The Charlie Kirk Show. Charlie is out today. So myself, Andrew Colvett, executive producer of the show, along with Blake Neff, anchor this hour. And we also welcome Senator Rick Scott to the show. We talk about The Alien Enemies Act of 1789, how President Trump and the Trump administration defied a court order. We talk about national injunctions.
If you're going to pick a fight, do it there because it's the firmest footing that a president has constitutionally. I love this. I think politically, optically, I love all of it. And I love that the White House was essentially You know, specifically Stephen Miller was itching for this showdown with Article 3. So it's an Article 2 versus Article 3 showdown. I think it's the perfect one to do it.
Nobody likes Trend de Aragua. They need to go. And the American people agree with them on that.
Everybody, welcome to the Charlie Kirk Show. Andrew Colvett in for the one and only Charlie Kirk, who's a little under the weather today. Never fear. He's on the mend. Full schedule this week. Going to go straight from Phoenix over to Wisconsin for a rally with Don Jr., then over to Atlanta for a pastured summit. Full steam ahead, but he is on the mend.
telling it like it is. There's another clip going around, and maybe we'll get to it, of him defending a 200-year-old law. No, it wasn't the Alien Enemies Act. It was actually the Constitution. So good for Tom Homan. Good for the president. I love this fight. We are joined by the great senator from Florida, Senator Rick Scott. Welcome to The Charlie Kirk Show, sir. Honored to have you.
Thank you for making the time, even though Charlie's out sick today. Well, I hope he feels better, and I'm glad you're healthy. Well, yeah, we're hanging in there. I got three little kids. I'm surprised I'm not down as well. Usually they're passing around their germs very successfully over at the Colvett household. Senator, I want to get your take on this uproar over the Alien Enemies Act, 1789.
Trump is invoking it to rid the country of Trendyaragua members. Meanwhile, a judge, activist judge, who's got a history with Trump, by the way, he The administration defies that order, says it's over international waters, continues down to El Salvador. Bukele has our back, says too late, too bad. What is your take on this? Do you like this approach from the administration?
Did they make the right call here?
Yeah. And I think, you know, Senator, it occurs to me that we're going to get into some of this polling that we're I mean, it's just shocking the polling that's coming out. over this weekend from NBC, CNN.
But it shocks me that the Democrats seem to continually find themselves on the losing end of an 80-20 issue, and they keep doing it, and they're digging their heels in, it seems like, just to get Trump. I personally love that President Trump, Stephen Miller, the White House is picking this fight amongst all the other fights they could pick. Now, there's some stat, Senator, where
national injunctions, there was more in the first month of President Trump's administration than there were in the first three years of the Biden administration. What can the Senate do? I know Chuck Grassley's chimed in on social media. What can the Senate do as part of its role to rein in this judicial activism?
So your prayers are appreciated, but he's doing better. Still getting better. So I'm in the chair today. Always an honor to be with you. I am joined by the one and only Blake Neff, who if the show goes off the rails too much, we're just going to talk about Roman history. That's what we'll do, Blake. Exactly. You and me. I get to be the quizzer. So, Blake, there's so much in the news today.
Yeah, millions. I mean, Tom Homan, I think he's asking for like $170 billion. And meanwhile, we're cutting everything else, which we should be. It's the one area of the federal budget that I think Americans are going to look at and say, yeah, we need more there. Do you have high hopes now that we've gotten past this?
this showdown with Schumer, which his base is very upset with him about, Senator Scott. They're very, very mad. And we're going to get into that in just a sec. Do you have hopes that the Senate is going to be able to move on from this CR showdown and get this budget reconciliation, one big, beautiful bill on the president's desk? Are you feeling good about our prospects there?
I really hope that I think I think after the Schumer cave, and it really was a cave. I mean, I think I like our I like our chance. I like our momentum, Senator. And I want to get into this. Now people are talking about AOC primarying Chuck Schumer. You know, Chuck Schumer is just now this is breaking this morning. He's canceled a book tour, Senator. Let's go ahead and play cut 81.
Senator, what do you make of this backlash to Schumer and his choice ultimately to fund the government? Break that whole scene down for us. You were there. You were inside the halls. What happened?
You know, there's a crazy stat, Senator. In the last two years of the Biden presidency, one out of four new jobs created were government jobs. One out of four. And so when we talk about the bloat... Yeah, Andrew, on top of that,
Genuinely a fascinating weekend that we had. I mean, we've got egg prices have been dropping off a cliff, thankfully. The left loves that. We've got reciprocal tariffs coming in. Scott Besson had a fascinating interview this weekend. Those are coming into effect on April 2nd. The market's all up in arms. We're going to see what happens there.
I think you're right. Structurally, this economy was surviving on a sugar high. There was a bunch of monetary games being played to juice it for Kamala right at the finish line. Trump has to get our economy back on stable footing with free and fair trade deals with all these partners, especially the European Union, Canada, Mexico, and so on.
Now, Senator, Charlie put this clip up over the weekend. Your team said that you guys saw this. So let's go ahead and play this. This is right track, wrong track. The country is responding really positively to the Trump agenda. Let's go ahead and play Cut 64.
All right, so I wanna pair that, Senator, with one other clip. So 44% of Americans think the country's on the right track. Meanwhile, Democrats are struggling. Play cut 60.
Trump is just scrambling their brains. Meanwhile, the American people are seeing action and they love it. Senator, one minute, your reaction to all of that.
Well, Senator Scott, you are one of the good ones in the Senate. You're fighting for us, the people, the base. We got your back 100%. Thank you for fighting as well to balance the budget. I love that you brought up that phrase, balance the budget. We are... like a heat seeking missile on, on that. We, we, we know we got to get through some of this stuff in the short term.
This right track, wrong track polling is incredible, historic. We've got attacks against the Houthis that have been messing with our trade routes in the Middle East. We've got the Alien Enemies Act, which is probably the big story of the weekend, Blake, and that's what we're going to start with. and then just polling in general.
We want to keep our eye on the prize, a balanced budget, a made in America, economic boom, low inflation boom. These are the prizes that if we stay the course, I really genuinely think we have a chance of seeing materialized in the short and in the near future. So thank you for fighting for that, sir. And, and thanks for your time this morning.
Bye-bye. Amen.
Blake, react, if you will, for a moment to the senator's comments. I mean... You've got a Republican party that seems, there is chaos, there is tumult. I mean, there's tariff craziness going on, but the Democrats are in disarray. This reaction to Trump and his policies and the force of Trump,
So we were so used to getting polling all the time during the election and the run-up to the presidential election that it's kind of novel now to get a set of polls out that tell us anything about the way the country's feeling. Blake, let's start with the big news of the weekend, and that is President Trump invoked the Alien Enemies Act of like 1789. It's over 200 years old, this act.
No, I totally agree. We always have to be vigilant. I think the difference between this conservative movement and one of the eras past is we are more vigilant. We are more activated. There's a really powerful graphic, actually, if I can pull it up just really quick, that shows the power of the conservative media world compared to Democrats right now. These are unprecedented times.
And I have the team throw this up really quick. And actually, Charlie is prominently featured in this in this display, but it shows the conservative media sort of, if you will, ecosystem versus the Democrat ecosystem. If you see, there's a lot more red blobs out there. And I think this is actually what they're freaking out about, Blake.
I think Democrats have been so accustomed to dominating media, dominating narrative from the Washington Post and New York Times and CNN and MSNBC and so on, that they are not
everything that they're throwing at the wall doesn't seem to stick because all of those red bubbles in there, and Charlie's up in the upper left-hand corner if you're watching this, are able to push back against the lies and nothing is sticking.
So even when there's turmoil or chaos, and some of the cell phones from the Trump administration, which do happen, we're able to push through it unlike previous moments. Thanks so much for listening, everybody. Talk to you soon.
We talk about Tren de Aragua and the utter disarray of the Democrat Party, how we should best respond to that. This is an amazing episode. Please consider joining members.charliekirk.com. That's members.charliekirk.com, your one-stop shop for being on the inside of the show, being on the inside of the team. joining our live calls, live events, all the things. You get that and more.
And he did it to deport a plane full of about 250 Tren de Aragua gang members. And he sent them to El Salvador. Bukele was involved. While the plane is in flight, a judge orders this plane to be turned around. He puts an injunction on it, says Trump doesn't have the authority to invoke the Alien Enemies Act.
And the Trump administration defies that order, claiming that the plane was already in international airspace. Therefore, the order was null and void. It did not apply to that situation. The criminals, the Tren de Aragua gang members, are now in El Salvador at the terrorism detention center there. But the controversy is ongoing.
Everybody on the left is claiming this is going to be a constitutional crisis. And actually, Blake, on the one hand, they might be right. You're even hearing voices on the right now saying this is a constitutional crisis because these national injunctions by these district court judges, of which there are more than 200 of them,
actually have, this has been a crisis that the Trump administration wanted to pick. They wanted to pick a fight. And the question was, which was the right pick or a fight to pick? Your take, Blake.
Well, I'm fascinated. I mean, you bring up an interesting point that we had over 200,000 or two, you know, maybe depending on what the number is, it was either 10, 15. Trump has said it's up to 20 million illegal migrants entering the country. Hard to know what that number is. But, you know, there wasn't national injunction saying, you know,
Please consider joining members.charliekirk.com. Buckle up. Here we go.
Joe Biden actually has to enforce the border laws that we have on the books. There wasn't, you know, it only seems to work one way. And I think that's ultimately where the frustration lies is that they do a lot of judge shopping and these activist liberal judges view the judiciary, the role of the judges of the Article III, you know, courts in this country, they view it more from an activist lens.
So we're almost at a structural disadvantage because conservative judges tend to, to not overstep their boundaries as much, whereas an activist judge sort of feels the need to do so, right? And so there's actually, it's easier for the left to activate this policy now, or this tactic, if you will.
There was some in the Texas showdown. No, no, absolutely. I'm saying that, by and large, one side does has been more active that would provoke more of a reaction from the left. But in general terms, this is a tactic that the left has employed far more successfully and far more times than has happened on the right.
And I think just by disposition, a conservative judge is less likely to go stick his foot into matters that he or she doesn't feel they need to. But yeah, it does happen. Both sides granted, point taken. But what I'm also fascinated about Like, is this idea of the strategy behind this? So they've essentially been itching for this fight in the Trump administration.
All of these national injunctions that have come down, there is a whole legal theory behind this where a district court is, and by the way, there's more activities happening. There's more people that are working on this behind the scenes. The theory is that a district court should only apply to the people that are involved in it from the plaintiff and defendant standpoint.
It should not therefore be a nationwide injunction. And, you know, I think there's some strong evidence you know, historical rationale behind that. But this idea that one judge can then essentially rule the country, at least in specific policies, is a very, very new phenomenon in the republic. And we can break all that down. But this is the showdown of the early Trump administration.
Can judges overrule the will of the people in the Article II vested powers of the presidency? That is the question. That is the showdown that we are in.
I mentioned before the break that I was really fascinated about the strategy of this. And so just to let people in behind the scenes of what happened is they basically tried to, you know, oftentimes Trump will sign these executive orders really publicly. It's for all the world to see. They did this in sort of secret where he's invoked the 1789 law, the alien enemies act. And then it got leaked.
They found out about this. They rushed to get these 250, uh, Tren de Aragua gang members, domestic terrorists, if you will, but from a foreign gang, on the plane as ASAP. The thing goes to court. These guys are in the air as this ruling happens. They say, well, over international waters. Do you think this was the right fight to pick just because of the optics?
Because essentially it puts the Democrats in a place where they have to say, well, we're defending criminal gang members. Do you think that's the right pick? Do you think this was the right fight to pick this with these courts?
Well, in this district judge, James Boasberg, you know, this is the judge that that essentially stepped in and said that you can't be using the Alien Enemies Act of 1789 to deport these 250 alleged Trende Arago gang members.
This is also a guy, by the way, that gave Eric Cimarella, if you will recall from the FBI investigation of Trump, he was the one who falsified the actual FBI documents, which is a federal crime, a very serious one. This is the same judge that basically gave him a slap on the wrist.
So that's a weird, you know, little wrinkle here that some, you know, I've heard other Republicans say, hey, this guy has it out for Trump. He's an anti-Trump judge. You can't trust this guy. It's a very serious crime that Cimarella committed against, well, the country, specifically targeting President Trump.
And this is that, so that judge has come back around now and is a thorn in the side of the Trump administration. My two cents here is that If you are going to pick a fight, the authority vested in the president to handle foreign activities, whether that be immigration or war or treaties with other countries, is pretty established within the courts.
And so he's actually – pretty level-headed when you meet him in person, and he'll kind of come to your frequency, to your level. And so I think he just sees the way the political movement is going, and he wants to get out ahead of it. And of course he's not going to do that.
Homan's asking for $175 billion, just so everybody's clear, like the price tag on the mass deportation.
You cannot do anything sensible in the state of California without being sued up left, right, and center, without having this commission get in the way of that, this committee get in the way of that. Of course he's not doing that.
I want to say something just because I think I can say it and maybe Charlie can't. You know, I... I'm actually a big fan of Ron DeSantis. That might get me in trouble with some people. Other people might like it. I was very supportive of him. I didn't think he should run for president.
But I'm looking at this, and I genuinely cannot understand why Casey DeSantis is qualified to be the next governor of Florida. What qualifies her other than being around the governor? So I don't understand this. It feels very weird to me. It feels like one of those big megachurches where the, like...
wife of the pastors just like you know i don't know it's something something's off there uh and and yeah we love byron i think let let the let this process play out obviously you know that there was some you know some back and forth with the legislature especially on that immigration uh i mean there was i was getting calls on that left and right um you know de santa saying that the
This is the toughest in the country.
And by the way, nobody is flocking to Gavin Newsom's side like they would Elon Musk with the brainpower and the patriotism and the sensibility that you would need to get it done.
Yeah, I mean, I think it's unparalleled in at least modern American political history, but probably throughout our entire history, that after an election, when we saw a movement like we saw in the fall semester and spring semester, by the way, that gets, you know, this movement really sparked in spring. I'll never forget 2024 in the spring. We went to Cal Poly San Luis Obispo.
Charlie's sitting there and. Hundreds and hundreds of students just start singing the national anthem spontaneously. And Charlie and I looked at each other like something is happening here. And and so we we decided, hey, if we keep the pressure on, who knows how far we can push this? And you saw this recently with the youth Yale poll that showed.
Baby boomers are going the wrong way. Gen Z is going the right way.
Well, yeah, and there's a larger point to be made with cell phones. They have seen wherever they take these out of classes, it's like the teachers that have been teaching a while since about there was a pivot point, an inflection point around 2012, 2013, when the cell phones became much more common in the classroom, for example.
The attention spans, the sociability of the students, all of these fell off a cliff. I mean, there is no doubt in my mind that cell phones are a terrible, terrible thing for developing brains, especially smartphones. And so what I would encourage... I would say there are things called dumb phones or basic phones.
If you are worried about the security of your kids if they're playing out in a park somewhere and you want them to have a way to get a hold of you, there are alternatives and everybody should be looking into those. And they're actually cheaper. You don't have to get internet. But it gives you an ability to call them and keep tabs on them. So that's an alternative that you could do.
But especially at a young age, I'm convinced with my own kids. I have a seven, a five, and a two-year-old. The less screen time, the better behaved they are, the less like frantic they are. So we're like this summer we're doing a total detox in our family where we're getting rid of all of those. We're only doing one family screen. That's for movies at night. I got that from Matt Walsh.
That's right. And so I just encourage everybody to hold the line there and do the hard work because we've seen the benefits in our family almost overnight. And I'm thinking if I get a whole summer of this, I'm going to have, you know, really well-behaved kids. That's, you know, so.
Well, and remember that there was a – I forget the study. You might remember it. But a lot of these executives at the social media companies – Oh, yeah. Yeah, they actually – It was called the social dilemma. It was the Netflix special. Right. Well, they don't let their own kids on social media. Tristan Harris has done really good work on this.
Yeah, because the feedback loop, you're comparing yourself to millions of people. You're feeling insecure. It has a lot of social issues attached. I think you should only allow very mature and self-confident, self-assured people to get on social media. I think I should be 18.
Yeah, I mean, there's different lines you could draw, but you have to have a sense of self and a security in yourself to get on social media and to use it in a healthy way.
Dumb phones without internet is the key.
Yes. Bored kids make really interesting kids. It's the death of boredom. And you need kids. So they should not be stimulated all of the time. They have to learn how to use their own independent free play.
No. That being said, I think both terminate and abort, I mean, the pro-choice movement, it doesn't say they're pro-abortion, right? So we like to throw that back into their face and say, you're the pro-abortion movement. They hate that already.
Yeah, well, I do like that. It's interesting. I just did a quick Google search of the definition of pregnancy because I was curious what it would say. It says pregnancy is the state of carrying a developing fetus in utero.
Well, it's – but it's not – I mean fetus is a little baby basically. So, yeah, I mean the whole –
Yeah, that's the headline from even ABC News. Supreme Court appears inclined to allow first taxpayer-funded religious charter school. And that was after an Oklahoma court had blocked the Catholic Church's charter school. school contract. So yeah, this has nationwide implications.
dialogue is filled with euphemisms you know um kind of reminds me of like you know adultery no it's like you're having sex with somebody else and that's not nice so when you use the harsher words it really brings the truth down so whatever that that combination of words that really brings the truth home to that person i'm i'm all for thank you god bless you bernadette talk to you soon thank you okay next question yes we have a new friend named madison here with a question okay great hi madison how are you
It's an interesting legal argument, too, by the way. So the school is saying that – or the state's AG, actually, Republican Attorney General, is arguing that it's a violation of the separation of church – principles of separation of church and state. Meanwhile, the lawyers for the school –
saint isidore of seville catholic virtual school insists that it's a privately created controlled and that to exclude it from generally available charter school funding is religious discrimination so interesting i mean the only problem you might run into there charlie is if you know you might have some sharia law school or something like that that pops up so they're without a doubt that will happen yeah i mean which goes to a more fundamental issue which is why are we importing so many people into our country that hate us
You guys know that like his windmill.
Yeah. He he said, alert, all purchases of Iranian oil or petrochemical products must stop now. Any country or person who buys any amount of oil or petrochemicals from Iran will be subject to immediately secondary sanctions. Looking at you, China. They will not be allowed to do business with the United States of America in any way, shape, or form.
Thank you for your attention to this matter, President Donald J. Trump. And by the way, to Charlie's point, in Trump 1.0, He basically had bankrupted Iran. And then Joe Biden, time and time again, I remember you had this... Actually, speaking of Mark Levin, Mark Levin talked about this tweet on his show.
I remember Charlie listed out all the different ways that essentially Biden had turned his back on Trump era sanctions on Iran and was allowing all of this hundreds of billions of dollars of revenue to flow into Iranian coffers, which is partly why... Israel got attacked. They now had more resources, they had more funding, they were emboldened.
And so starving the beast, these choke points have proven really effective. Thank you. Last question.
Do you have an immediate thought on that? I do, but you go first. My immediate thought is that – and we've come a long way as a movement – is when they call you racist, laugh in their face. Mock them for how stupid they are. When they call you all of these – and by the way, this is one of the reasons – It's not the only reason.
This is one of the reasons why young kids, they're becoming immune to these old attack vectors from the left. And the boomers, God bless you, not you in this room.
By the way, it's obviously not you in this audience.
By the way, this is the wildest thing, being on this show. No, you know these emails too. Charlie's hosting a national radio show and he's sitting there talking to the camera while he's saying, you're wrong and here's why. And it's like, I don't know what's going on. Like, there's multiple planes of activity. Keeps the circuitry going.
Obviously, the boomers that watch the show or listen or that are in this room are not the boomers we're talking about. Oh, my goodness. Like, I don't know how many times you have to say that. Did I make that clear, Riker? Guys, I think so. My goodness. And yet they still get ticked off at you and send you emails. And I have access to the same email account. No, I'm not making it up.
I'm looking and I'm like, oh my gosh, they cannot hear you saying, this is not you.
I've just, you know, we're both millennials. It's like we've just grown up being... Everyone's hated millennials my whole life. We've only been hated.
well to the point that we were oh yeah so that's my first my first thing is that we as a culture have to have to grow uh you know strength under these type of criticisms that had had so much power for so long especially coming off the civil rights era right that was like the worst thing you could be called is like a racist or a fascist like when
they throw out these personal attacks you just have to we have to get stronger and get better at just ignoring them because they're dumb and i think we've come a long long way i mean you think back to like 2015 even when trump came down the escalator and you know made the comment about you know the and Some are good people, but they're sending their rapists.
I mean, it was like racism, racism, racism, right? And George Floyd was peak woke, and now we're starting to get immunities culturally. So I would say that's one thing. And I can't stress this strongly enough. I cannot wait for the full death and demise of the legacy news media because that is pumping poison into our culture, and they're losing. Yes, absolutely. Yeah, I agree.
You're seeing this, by the way, on a DNC-backed movement to basically stalk Charlie across campuses. That's true.
fixated on charlie kirk they've come up with a whole tour that literally charlie's on the website it says we have to stop charlie kirk they've seen the impact of charlie they're funneling tons of money into this so but what happened was and this is i'll give charlie so much credit this is one of the best calls i've ever seen charlie make this a week before texas a&m and we're we get we catch word that they're going to come and bring like 30 to 50 influencers on the left
all to Texas A&M to just basically harass Charlie and try and get this movement, you know, trip it up. And Charlie calls it before the event even happened. I don't like giving him that many compliments. It was a Babe Ruth moment. It was a real good one. It was like an all-timer. He said, yeah, go ahead and try. They will be blown up by infighting before you know it.
This will not get off the ground. And literally one stop, one stop, Texas A&M. And guess what's happening all over left-wing Twitter right now? It's all over. They're done. The discussion is off Charlie. Now they're all calling each other racists.
They're talking about microaggressions of the leader who happens to be a white girl named Z who used to be a Bernie Sanders staffer, and she microaggressed all the black woman creators. And so it's like you talk about this thought-terminating ideas that Charlie's talking about. They had this mission to go get Charlie. Well – Boom.
One victim mentality person claims racism and poof, the whole thing is just, and one of the main leaders is taking a leave. We don't know why exactly, but like, you know, they're all taking breaks. There's these mass apologies for not calling it out sooner. They are off mission. You cannot build with woke.
They shake it back and forth.
Well, and by the way, they call it the un-F America tour. I mean, it's so profane and just classless. Typical lib, right? It's disgusting.
Accusations of laundering money, of stealing money, of not paying the colored BIPOC.
And how do you beat it eventually? You become the dominant media platforms and voices. You build your own media. This was why the main narrative that came off of the – if you watched any legacy news media – That was our evening event. By the way, we do have the clip from Cal Poly if you want to play it. It's so good. But anyway, so the point is we have to get bigger and stronger and better.
And what happened was the legacy news media is forced into the TV box. It's forced into your computer screen. They have all these modes of distribution. But what happens is that covers over a multitude of sins. But those sins can only be covered up for so long, namely lack of talent, not being interesting, shoveling down thoughtless garbage into the minds of the masses. Well, guess what?
People like Charlie had to go forge his own route and had to sink or swim based on his own talent. And guess what that meant after about five to eight years of that? It meant we had the more talented people that... that survived because they deserve to survive. Meanwhile, they had these talking heads that said nothing but garbage all day.
The Mississippi miracle. Can you just. Yeah. Yeah. It's refers to the remarkable improvement in Mississippi student reading scores, particularly in fourth grade over a relatively short period of time. The state's reading scores once among the lowest in the nation have are now amongst the top. So that happened virtually overnight. And what's interesting is that it's at third grade.
They hold a ton of kids back at third grade. And so if you're just not cutting it, the teachers can see it and they hold you back.
Yeah, I I just want to make one other point, and that's we have to avoid the temptation of clamping down on free speech or trying to censor or using left-wing tactics. There was Ambassador Friedman who said that maybe we need to deport and jail people that were anti-Semitic. Those types of policies or that approach to dealing with the anti-Semitism problem will only create more anti-Semitism.
Well, you're a Californian. I'm a parasitic species to the people of California. I'm an invasive species. What – is he doing doge but better? No, of course he's not. No. This is laughable on its face. Yeah, he just – I mean, this is – you saw this with – I mean, Gavin Newsom puts his finger in the air and sees which way the wind's blowing and says, oh, I can get on that train.
And it does create more.
Yes. I mean, I think what you guys were just saying, I've never in the history of diplomacy, of White House visits, seen anything like this. It's explosive. It's unprecedented. I don't know if anybody in the news media landscape knows where things go from here, other than the fact that Zelensky has left the White House. There's been no deal signed. I mean, that is a complete devolution of
of that relationship, and it is historic. I mean, normally these things are scripted. Everybody plays nice. Everybody's on their best behavior. The fact that J.D. Vance blew all that up, I mean, really it was Zelensky, but the fact that J.D. Vance stepped in and, as Alex says, defended our country's honor in that moment was striking. I think it says a lot about his courage.
You know, we've been talking balls. Well, I think we got another guy here that also exhibited a lot of courage under fire and a lot of gusto. And I'm really proud of JD for standing up for our honor. He's going to get lambasted in the MSM and the legacy news media for breaking protocol, whatever. I don't care.
Zelensky started this exchange and JD Vance wasn't going to sit idly by watching it happen. I completely think that Zelensky comes out looking like the unhinged foreign oligarch that he is. And I think people with eyes to see it are going to see it. I think this changes dramatically, at least in the short run, the way that I see this negotiation for peace playing out.
But it could very well mean that Zelensky is going to simply defy anything that the U.S. proposes. Even if we try and broker a peace, Zelensky could very well just try and thumb his nose at the Americans, which is, I would say, political death sentence for him if he actually allows a democratic process to play out within Ukraine.
So we're in uncharted territory, but I absolutely, to your point, Alex, I think before where you said, He's never been confronted with the depth of his, just how unpopular he's become, and especially within conservative circles.
And this was a come to Jesus moment for him that he simply refused to acknowledge because he's had smoke blown up as you know what for so long with Hollywood, the foreign press, our press in the United States. So I couldn't be more stunned, shocked, surprised that this happened. but actually really grateful at J.D. Vann.
This is CNN Christiane Amanpour's reaction to what just transpired in the Oval Office. 273.
Who wants to take the mistruths and misfacts?
Well, and you know, Kurt, what strikes me here is that this could essentially force Zelensky to run into the arms of Europe, and Europe's talking tough on Russia still. But here's the problem. They have so, you know, they have so lacked, there's been a lack of investment in their own security defense because they've been leaning on the United States.
And so Trump had that one line where he said, you have no cards to play. You have no cards to play. His only card is to run into the arms of the Europeans, but the Europeans are feckless, weak. They have not invested in their own security. And so is that even a card to play? What does Zelensky do next?
I totally agree. Blake. Is this a bluff from Trump or was this like he means business?
That's his genius.
Yeah. And Kurt, I don't know if you saw the statement, because I know you're driving, but President Trump released a statement basically saying that you know, he's not ready for peace yet. He disrespected us in our cherished Oval Office. But here's how he ends it, Kurt. He says he can come back when he is ready for peace. Basically, Trump is saying there's no option to move forward.
We settle or you're on your own.
I totally agree with this. You know, I've been thinking about this clip a lot lately, Kurt. It was that Jasmine Crockett. I think she was talking about the hockey game with US versus Canada. And she was saying, I'm rooting for Canada. I'm rooting for Mexico. This is a sitting US Congresswoman who openly admits that she's rooting against her own country.
But yeah, we could say that that's just about a sports event. But that mindset is emblematic across the political spectrum. It doesn't matter if it's about negotiations with Ukraine, about Greenland, Panama, deporting criminals. All of this, you've got one side of the country, let's call them 35%. Maybe it's less, maybe it's more.
35% of those is an incredible amount of people in this country that I guarantee you are rooting for foreign nations that are going to be siding with Zelenskyy, And that 35%, when you take it to our press corps, is probably more like 85%, 90%. So don't expect, you listening in the audience, for the U.S. media to look favorably on what just happened.
They're going to say this is blowing up norms, it's destroying the world order that's been led by America. No. I see it completely differently.
This is President Trump reasserting American dominance and American leadership in a pragmatic, realistic way on the global stage, telling our allies that they will not treat us like garbage anymore, and we're not your kicking post, and we're not your piggy bank, and we're going to assert our wants, needs, and desires, our interests ahead of everybody else's, and to the extent that those align, fantastic, and to the extent they don't, too bad, so sad, get in line.
I happen to think that Trump is the master at reading leverage and just intuitively understanding this. And I think he's gamed this out. Game theory in Trump's head has already played out in five different ways. And I think he knows he's got this guy dead to rights. I think he knows that he said it right there. He says, you've got no cards without us. With us, you've got cards.
So, you know, and I tend to believe the press statement from the White House saying he was begging for a reset. Hey, everything's fine. We argued it out. What's a little fight tomorrow? Well, you know, we'll be bros again kind of thing. I think I think they're not playing around. And I think this is years of being frustrated. The Biden regime's handling of this of this conflict.
And it just it just boiled over. And I think Trump's I think Trump's already sized up the leverage. Kurt, if you want to reply, you got about 30 seconds till our break.
No, I mean, listen, I just find the whole thing – I just think it was a rebalancing. I actually see Trump has gotten into worse fights with Marco Rubio in the past, in my opinion. I see this as an opportunity for him to really let them know that he's not messing around. He wants peace. He wants this thing over. He's not interested in Ukraine's, you know,
trying to get the Donbass back or trying to fight for Crimea. I mean, Ukrainian's position is basically we want the entire territorial integrity pre-war back in Ukrainian hands, probably back before 2014. That's not going to happen. That's not going to happen for a lot of reasons. First of all, Russia's not going to concede that. Second of all, nobody can make them.
Third of all, they're not giving up Crimea. Fourth of all, these are regions that want to be part of Russia. And yeah, we've lost a generation of Ukrainian men. They're going to fight it out to the bitter end. That's a terrible strategy. That's terribly
when you've been beat, when you have reached a stalemate, and the only sensible thing to do, I think Trump sees this, is to basically sue for peace. That's the only sensible thing that is left on the table, because we're not going to keep bankrolling this quagmire forever.
And on one level, and when we come back from the break, I'd love to get your opinion on this, Kurt, I do feel bad for Ukraine on some level. As Mersheimer said, and we're going to play this clip, they have been led down the primrose path by the West, saying that we were going to have their back.
to the bitter end, didn't matter what, we're going to push off Russia and we're going to bring you into the West. We're going to let you join NATO. And basically, Putin called the West bluff and said, screw you, I'm going to invade. Now, I don't like Putin. Putin's not a good guy.
But how would we feel if the, and we got a taste of this with the Cuban Missile Crisis, if Russia was parked outside our doorstep, pointing nukes at us, pointing weapons at us, and advancing an alliance that they built closer and closer to our doorstep. We wouldn't like it at all. Now, I'm not saying we would go bomb Cuba, but that was on the table, Kurt.
You know, I'm not as good of a student of history as you. But listen, I mean, we've got to understand that Putin is maybe a malicious actor, but he's not an irrational actor.
Yeah. And we have breaking news here, Alex. Let's go ahead and put up 288. So Zelensky has now gone on Twitter X and released the following statement. He says, thank you, America. Thank you for your support. Thank you for this visit. Thank you, POTUS, Congress and the American people. Ukraine needs just and lasting peace. And we are working exactly for that.
Yeah, it feels a little bit like here's what's going to happen. I can almost play out the next three steps, Alex. And I'm curious if you agree. According to White House sources, he basically begged the White House for a reset. Like, let's calm down. Let's try this again. Let's go. I don't think he's leaving D.C.,
I think what's going to happen is his people are going to reach out to the White House. They're going to try and say, hey, let's do this behind closed doors. There's going to be a, I'm sorry, let's get the deal done. You're right. We need America's support behind us. I don't want to push you into Russia's arms here. I don't want you to be working closer with Putin than with us. I apologize.
Trump's going to end up getting his deal. And Trump's going to then say, hey, Putin, we got the deal. It was a little rough getting there, but we got there. And we're on the same page now. We need peace. We're not going to leave Ukraine hanging. And he's going to keep playing both sides in such a way until they both meet in the middle. That's how I think Trump is playing this.
He's going to use his leverage on each to get them into a position where he can use them.
Yeah. I, And I think that's been a really interesting dynamic here to the extent that Ukraine really wants to not have to make so many concessions. I mean, I think if you look at a map of Ukraine, Ryan, maybe you can grab that for us, where the territorial expansion of the Russian forces into Ukraine has happened. I think he's looking at that map and he's already piecing it apart.
He's saying like, I'm going to give here, but I want that one. And I can't come out losing all of it, essentially.
Can I just make an observation here? And listen, Lindsey Graham is one of those guys that infuriates MAGA. He infuriates the base. And many times... We ask ourselves, why is he keeping this snake close to him, to Trump? Why does Trump keep him close to him? And then at a moment like this, you can almost guarantee the two men talked and Lindsay's like, oh, I got an idea.
I know how to shore this up. I know how to bring this dog to heel. I'm going to say I was disappointed that I obviously, you know, it's an amazing asset in Trump's back pocket to deploy Lindsey Graham at a time like this and get him on the same page. And Lindsey's a shrewd politician. He knows who butters his bread. He knows he's got to stay in alignment with the president on this.
And so him coming out saying that is – I mean, I'm looking at the reactions on social media. It's like when you lose Lindsey Graham, you've lost everything, right? I mean, it's an amazing card to play, and it speaks pretty – pretty well to Trump's ability to use different assets and use different allies and keep them close for just such a time as this.
I thought you were going a whole different direction there, Blake. What did you think I was going to say? I don't know.
He said he wasn't going to wear a suit until the war was over. I mean, whatever.
I believe it's loaded. Go ahead and play it.
Yeah, no, I totally agree. To me, the most striking part about that exchange was Vance goes out on such a limb. I mean, Vance was breaking the seal in a massive way. Like, we've never seen that. The tearing of the veil. He's the one who started it. And Trump had an opportunity to either rein him back in and say, hey, everything's good, we're good. But he didn't.
He took his side, had his back, and threw down the gauntlet. I mean, it was amazing, amazing, quick thinking there by President Trump. And we have the other Lindsay clip, right, Blake?
Yeah, and I think Charlie would agree. I know Charlie's been texting me. He's on campus right now, but he's getting news of this blow up. But yeah, listen, I think Trump I go back to something I said before. I think Trump is a master at understanding leverage. He's shown this. Now, he pushes it really, really far to a point of risk that a lot of your punditry class are not comfortable with.
One of the basic pendulum spectrums that you can assess a human being on is their risk tolerance. Trump has a very high risk tolerance. And your punditry class does not have a risk tolerance. And so that's why they go into punditry. That's why they go and get, you know, jobs working for these outlets. And, you know, they're not entrepreneurs. Trump is an entrepreneur.
He understands what it means to play high stakes poker. Yes, sometimes you're going to lose a hand or two, but I think Trump sized it up in an instant. He understands that he has a lot more leverage in this poker game than Zelensky does. And he looked at him and he said, you got no cards. Verbatim, he said, you got no cards. Without us, you got no cards.
I think what's going to happen in the next 24 to 48 hours, I don't think Zelensky is leaving. If he does leave, he's not leaving this conversation. I think what he's going to do is he's going to back channel with the White House and the staff. And he's going to try and basically apologize, say things got too heated. I apologize. I didn't mean to disrespect you or your country.
You see that indication from his tweet saying thank you to America. Thank you to POTUS. you know, into Congress and the American people, we need peace and we're going to work on that. So he's understanding that our appetite for continuing to fund a kinetic war in Eastern Europe is about nothing. Now, I think the American people, our sympathies still lie with Ukraine.
If you took the polling as a nation as a whole, our sympathies are with Ukraine. I certainly feel sympathetic towards the Ukrainian people, less so towards Zelensky, who I think is an uppity foreigner, who has been swindling us out of a lot of and his own people out of blood. I have zero sympathy for him. But at the end of the day, I think he's going to come back.
I think he's going to come back to the table and we're going to get this deal done. That's what I think. I think Trump wants this deal done.
And I think if he does it, if he signs it, if Zelensky moves forward with this, I think what you're going to see is you're going to see Trump come back into the side of Zelensky, use that as leverage against Russia, and they're going to hammer something out and Ukraine's going to have to make some concessions. There's no reality here where Ukraine does not make a lot of concessions.
But they can get peace. They can get neutrality. They can get European troops on the border. He can get security. He can get lasting peace. This is a wake-up call for Vladimir Zelensky. He does not have nearly the leverage or the star approval that he thought he did in this country, and that ultimately will be a good thing. But I want to say this again, Blake.
Do not expect the pundit class to get this. They are not going to understand this. They're taught one speed, and the one speed is that you don't do this. And Trump's saying, I'm blowing up the playbook. We do whatever. including getting our money back out of this conflict.
Welcome to The Charlie Kirk Show. Andrew Colvin in for Charlie, who is on assignment at Washington State University. Honored to be with you all. We talk with Ann Fundner, who lost her son tragically to fentanyl. We talk about what is happening at the border. How is Trump dealing with fentanyl? Where is it at? How much is getting through? What can be done to stop it?
Amen. Thanks, Sam.
Blake Neff, are you with me?
It happens a lot, by the way. Oftentimes I'll call people and they'll think that I'm trying. I don't know if it's like our voices have melded together over the years and we just sort of sound similar. I'm not sure what that is. So there's a couple of stories. I want to get to Iran because this is a massive, massive story that's going to continue. It's going to continue on.
There are the drums of war are beating in Washington, D.C., Blake. And we have some new intel, if the reporting is correct, that there's there's some very specific people within the administration that have worked to derail these war plans. Tell us about this story.
Well, Blake, you know what this made me think of is the signal gate, right? Where you saw J.D. Vance weigh in and basically say, listen, you know, do we have to really do this now? You know, maybe we need to build up the PR for this, the messaging for this. We need to get our plans in place. And Hegseth was like, hey, listen, we can do this now.
I don't think there's, you know, we're going to benefit by waiting. We've got to clear these sea lanes and nobody else can. But you saw that back and forth. And I think importantly, you saw J.D. Vance being a skeptic. Instantly, his perspective on it was that we should be skeptical of getting embroiled in these Middle East quagmires.
I think in the Sea Lane story, Signal Gate, there was a different calculus. They were disrupting ships and vessels, and they were firing at U.S. ships. Obviously, they were different calculus. They made a different decision. In that instance, they decided to move forward. But I love that there is this initial skepticism
from the traditional drums of war, Washington, D.C., military-industrial complex, business as usual, and that you're seeing this play out in such a way that gives us more time with Iran. For example, we've been told all week that there's going to be this meeting in Rome, I believe, with Iran to see about peace talks. And President Trump has said that he wants a great place to live.
He wants the people to thrive, but they will not have a nuclear weapon. And so you see these dynamics within this administration and Trump 2.0 though, to your point, Blake, you couldn't imagine. this type of skepticism, caution. We know that President Trump is not afraid to use lethal force. He used the mother of all bombs, of course, to take out Soleimani. He took out ISIS.
He's not afraid to use weapons of war to defend the American interests when those American interests are properly represented. But this is a really powerful display uh, of, of the, the contrarians within the, within the office. I think America, to your point, like, I think Americans should look at this and be very, very grateful that we have prudent, thoughtful people in leadership.
I want to start with this story here that I don't think gets nearly enough attention. attention. It's the Trump effect. And yes, it's at the border, but it's specific to fentanyl. In 2023 and 2024, there was an average of 2,000 pounds monthly in 85 seizure events under Joe Biden of fentanyl.
Um, Blake, I think we're going to pivot a little bit just for this FSU story. And then we've got the Dominic, Dominique Alexander, uh, Carmelo Anthony update as well. But, you know, I think we can put a button on this and say, you know, thank God for JD Vance, Susie Wiles, uh, Pete Hegseth, uh, for voicing, um, skepticism and doubt and being slow to a really intense action here.
So FSU, we're getting news reports. Let's go ahead and play cut 315.
And let's go ahead and play Cut 316. This is FBI and local police are on scene. Dan Bongino's been tweeting that they have resources en route. Let's go ahead and 316.
So we're getting initial reports. And again, I want to caution and just say these are initial reports from local news sources that are saying five students dead or at least people dead could be
non-students on campus um five dead four injured um it looks looks like that is five dead four injured an active shooter incident at fsu law enforcement said go ahead and throw that screen grab that's from wftv uh nine in in florida so not a great situation there as more details um to say the least, as more details come in, we will be monitoring that situation actively. So prayers up for FSU.
In October of 2024, so right around the election to January 2025, that average fell from 2,000 pounds to 990 pounds monthly in 47 seizure events. In February of 2025, seizures plummeted to just 590 pounds in 45 seizure events. To put this in perspective, that is countless, tens of thousands, if not 100,000 or more lives saved just in the drop of fentanyl at the border.
Yeah, I mean, it's just a horrible situation, obviously, and nothing that we want to see happen. I mean, this is, you know, one speculates about the incident. Is there a second shooter? Is this person in custody? Are they still alive? Have they been killed by campus PD? Is this a gun-free campus? I'm not 100% sure with Florida.
I know they have very pro-Second Amendment laws, concealed carry as well.
That's being hosted by this, you know, Dominique Alexander or whatever his name is. And first of all, there's like, why are you having a press conference? And then Austin Metcalf, the young man that was stabbed to death, his father, Jeff, shows up. and is getting escorted away. Do we have our details here right?
Well, and I want to just make one other point here. It's almost like they're intentionally inflaming racial tensions here because Dominique Alexander, the guy representing the family when Trump won, said that white supremacy had won. And Carmelo Anthony stabbed 17-year-old Austin Metcalf at a track meet at Frisco High School in Texas yesterday. for apparently over a seeding dispute.
And all of these people are coming out of the woodwork, raising all this money for his family and his legal defense fund, which they've apparently used partly to buy a new home in a gated community, a $900,000 new home. And now they're doing a press conference. And out of, apparently unbeknownst to Carmelo Anthony's family and Dominique Alexander, Jeff Metcalf, the father, shows up and says,
It looks like chaos ensues. Let's go ahead and play cut 317.
We also talk about the tragic FSU shooting as alerts came in while we were on the air as that breaking news story unfolds. And then we talk about the update in Carmelo Anthony's case out of Texas with his spokesman, Dominique Alexander, excoriating Austin Metcalf's dad, Jeff, for daring to show up at a press conference and The whole thing's bizarre and insane. We break it down as it comes.
And to help me describe all of this and to put a personal story on it is Ann Fundner, who is a mom and she is an advocate for the stopping of fentanyl crossing our borders and poisoning our children. Ann, welcome to The Charlie Kirk Show.
Blake, what on earth is he talking about?
Yeah. And I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I just have to say this was not self-defense. I don't care what anybody thinks. This was a high school, you know, These happen daily on campuses all across the country, and you don't pull out a knife and stab somebody. I'm sorry. There's no justification for that. It was not about race.
It was two kids in a high school track field at a meet that got into a little altercation. So what? live and let live, move on. This was not worth this moment. And for him to sit there at that podium, Jeff Metcalfe came out the day after his son was murdered and said, this isn't about race. I don't want anybody to make this about race.
And then Dominique Alexander, which was weird, but again, I'm trying not to judge his reaction. But then Dominique Alexander gets up there and claims that his presence there is somehow trying to racialize this or make this conservative political operatives or whatever.
It's an honor to have you. We wanted to have you on for quite a while at this point. And this story still resonates so loudly, Ann. And I'm I just want to bring our audience up to speed of this powerful moment that you had at the RNC. I mean, I was there in Milwaukee. I remember this moment. I remember when you went on stage. I remember everybody in the whole complex talking about it afterwards.
Let's go ahead and play Cut 306.
It's incredibly, an incredibly powerful moment. And you were so brave for doing that in front of that audience, in that context, in that forum. Tell us more about your personal story and your son.
And you have not stopped since the RNC. I mean, you have been busy crisscrossing the country, raising awareness for this important issue, and educate our audience on how fentanyl actually gets into the country. Where does it start? I know much has been made of China's role in this, gets smuggled in through the southern border and elsewhere.
Tell us how it gets into America and how it ends up poisoning our children.
If this show means something to you, if it helps bring order from the chaos of your everyday life and news cycle, please consider becoming a monthly paying subscriber at members.charliekirk.com. It means the world to us. It helps us keep doing everything that we need to do, keep the lights on, keep paying our staff, growing our team. I'm bringing you exclusive news and resources every single day.
Absolutely. Well, we've got to root out all these loopholes. This is, you know, please. And we want to be a part of that. So please message us after this segment of what we need to be focusing our attention on. Cause we want to advocate on behalf of families like yours on behalf of families like mine.
And you made this point, I think so beautifully both here, but also at the RNC, how you guys did everything you could to love your children so well and You did nothing wrong. It was the failure of leadership that let this happen. And nowhere is that more clearly visible than at the southern border.
And I want to emphasize this point, Ann, when you have the morale of our Border Patrol agents was dangerously low. But not only that, they were overwhelmed. They became paper processing staffers of the federal government, essentially. They were not allowed to do their job. And now... in an about face that is truly historic.
And we have, I believe, a graphic that will demonstrate this for you visually 312. Go ahead and throw that up. They were the amount of border crossers that were coming over were overwhelming our border patrol agents. So they weren't able to do searches and seizures like they normally would or would want to do.
And now we have the numbers at such a place and you can see how they plummeted under President Trump. where there is enough personnel to do more searches. So we're going to be getting more of this fentanyl per search, per seizure, per operation than we would have before when they were completely overwhelmed and overrun at the border.
And so there's reporting now, Todd Bensman, who comes on this show often, has done reporting of this in the Daily Wire, that the cartels are actually realizing they're not able to smuggle as much of this fentanyl across the border, thank God. Unfortunately, they're turning their sights on Europe and other countries.
They're now shipping it abroad to those countries, which, thank God, it's not in our country. But this needs to be rooted out where it originates. And that's China. That's with tariffs and so much more.
That's members.charliekirk.com, members.charliekirk.com. We pack a lot of value into this membership, especially if you like coming to our events, especially if you want to talk to Charlie. That's members.charliekirk.com. Buckle up for this episode. Here we go.
And I want to get to sort of a second wrinkle in this topic. You pointed out in your speech, Gavin Newsom, all the Democrats, Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, that did nothing wrong. as young Americans and old Americans, by the way. One of the producers on this show knows two people that lost children to fentanyl poisoning.
But we see this dichotomy with the way Democrats react to the illegal immigration problem. And they seem to have so much compassion for this Kilmar Abrego Garcia guy that is likely an MS-13 gang member who apparently beat his wife, who lied to immigration courts, and he's been deported to El Salvador, his home country. They're getting on planes right now, flying to go get him.
And they say, bring him home, even though his home is El Salvador. But they don't seem to care about people like Rachel Morin or your son. And I want to play this clip again. from Patty Morin. I think it's really powerful. And she's angry. And I want to get your reaction on the other side. 244.
Your reaction and to Patty's moments, very touching. What's your reaction when you see that?
Yeah, I mean, I think it's pretty transparent, too. And you've seen what Doge has uncovered as far as how many of these illegals have gotten Social Security numbers and how many have gotten welfare benefits. And they just get smuggled into the system, laundered into the system illegally.
And the amount of work that the Trump administration has before them to unravel the tangled web and the destruction that's been sown by the Democrats in four small years, four short years, they were able to do so much damage to this country and to rip apart families like yours. And we've seen, there's polling out that is showing from CNN, Harry Enten, CNN saying that
In 2016, only 38% of Americans wanted to deport all illegal immigrants. Now it's at 56%. So this message is winning with real Americans, even as the legacy media tries to trumpet up rage and outrage through their shrinking size of the piece of the media, the pies here. Anne, I just want you to give one message to the Trump administration, to our leaders.
Give them the encouragement that only somebody like you could, Anne, who's gone through what you've gone through. What is your message to them?
Oh, thank you. I love America, land of the free, home of the brave. I always get to come here, get three months of freedom before I go back to the socialist state of Australia. Thank you, guys. Thank you.
Because of politics. Yes and no. I'm only able to do it at the moment because I'm brown. So every time the anti-terrorism police... We literally had the anti-terrorism police come to our church at least three times for a sermon. For a sermon. So the reality of oppression to the gospel... is real, is real.
And we're seeing that in Australia, like we're still doing the math at the church of what will happen to us across the next few years as this anti-freedom of speech spirit is rising. So the truth is, if you continue to be quiet, you will eventually be forced to be quiet.
Me, at the moment, yes. But we do have these ambiguous laws in place where you can and you can't. So at the moment, we have the anti-gay conversion therapy laws. So I'm allowed to speak about it from the pulpit. But the moment I get out of the pulpit to the lobby, if I pray for a gay person, I can go to jail potentially for three to five years. And our church can get fined $100,000.
So the only thing protected at the moment is the pulpit. For how long, I'm not really sure. And if they went after the prayer, what makes you think they're not going to go after the preaching?
Well, not being political about being not political is political. It's like political deception. Not being political is political, no matter how not political you are. And this is a very controversial statement, Charlie, but I always say in Australia, most of Australians, most of churches in Australia... are communist accidentally.
And the reason I say that, the goal of communism was to get Christianity out of the public square and was to get the church out of politics. Karl Marx literally said, my goal is to kick God out and destroy capitalism. When pastors participate in this lie of the church shouldn't speak about politics, they are going off to a communist worldview and a communist idea.
So I would argue a lot of churches in America are communist accidentally and they don't know it. The only philosophical worldview that doesn't want church and politics is communism.
I'm not really sure where is that in the Bible. Like Joseph was a politician. Joshua was a politician. Elijah spoke to politicians. Elisha spoke to politicians. Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were politicians. Solomon, David were politicians. I'm not really sure, to be honest, what Bible are they reading. Because it's definitely not the same Bible we are reading, right?
I'm not really sure because I have studied so much. I'm trying to figure out who brought this lie into the church. And the only person I see is actually Karl Marx.
We are only 10 points away from you guys. Like I was telling you that we're praying over planting a church in America. And we were doing the statistical reality. And the scary reality of America, I don't think you got that far ahead. Like I was just comparing apples to apples statistically, Florida to Sydney.
And the points of difference in religion is only 10% off from no religion, secularism, atheism, Islam. So just four more years of Comrade Kamala and open borders have the power to change this country fundamentally forever. In Australia, in the last two years, we had 2 million immigrants. 2 million, 3,000 of them are from Gaza. I saw your tweet this morning about the whole Gaza.
What the heck is going on? So the truth is, one more term of the godless Democrats will change this nation fundamentally. And you guys escaped. socialism by a very thin margin last election.
As George Washington said, the providence of God. You could see last election, the providence of God was all over this country. I'm a big believer that America is a very exceptional country. And that's coming from someone who lived in the Middle East where we could never speak the truth.
And that is also coming from someone who's living in socialist Australia at the moment where we don't have freedom of speech codified. And we saw during COVID in a moment, in a second, Christianity became illegal for two years.
This is very important because the writing is on the wall. Apart from Donald Trump, Charlie Kirk, Elon being the most Google people, you have Andrew Tate, who happened to become a Muslim, and unlike most people, I'm a bit... Can I ask, how many of you guys know who that is?
Thank God.
The amount of pastors, I'm like, do you know Andrew Tate? They're like, I don't know Andrew Tate. I'm like, then all the men in your church are about to leave your church.
It is so feminized. It's crazy. It's crazy. The age of nice gospel is finished. People like Andrew Tate are the product of hyper-feminized men who lived in the era of prosperous and wealthy America, who in the midst of building, particularly pastors, they know how to build, but they don't know how to fight. And men by nature are very aggressive. It's kind of cool. You protect women with that.
So the problem we have at the moment is that you will see the rise of Islam personified in people like Andrew Tate simply because men go to church and they're over the lovey-dovey gospel. They're really over it. They're over this hyper-feminist, feminized, weak, woke, womanized gospel.
I planted a church because the church I went to, the biggest church in Australia, I'm not going to say any names, was so feminized that men were leaving... by the multitudes every year. And guess where they're going? They're going to the mosque. They're going to the mosque, but they're telling them, you can actually act like a man, be a man, and we're not going to say toxic masculinity.
We're going to teach you how to fight, not just how to love. We're going to teach you how to speak the truth, not just be empathetic. We're going to teach you how to speak And not make silent a virtue. Because we talk a lot about work Jesus. What about silent Jesus? We have a lot of churches that have created the silent gospel. And men are over this feminist, feminazi gospel.
Communists and Muslims, they love each other a lot. Muhammad and Karl Marx, they're kind of besties when you look at their worldview. So both socialist comrades like Kamala and Islam, they both happen to be obsessed with power.
And that what unites communists and Muslims, I call it the green and red alliance, the watermelon alliance, watermelon alliance, quiz for Palestine, is that both of them are anti-freedom allies. and pro-tyranny. So the left love Islam, and they will import Islam, and we see that in Australia.
The left-wing party in Australia and in London, you just saw a few days ago, one of the major people in the Department of Education in London, he's literally an imam and a mufti. So he's literally an Islamic scholar and an imam who preaches. So you will see Islam make its way into the left-wing politics. And that's one of the reasons the borders were open the last four years.
It was intentional about changing the character of this nation fundamentally. The way to destroy America will be Islam. And this is very obvious in UK because guess what? Let's look at it. Half of Americans are left, half of Americans are right, give or take. The only way for leftism to win permanently is to import a group of people that fundamentally hates the American freedom.
That happens to be Islam. 9-11, anybody knows that? I hope so. You talk to a lot of people, what is 9-11? I'm like, it's a real event. I think everyone knows that. That's good. What about young people? Because I've heard that most young people... 50-50, yeah. Which is very scary. I was at the 9-11 museum in New York a few months ago. And...
That terrorist, before he was about to crash into the World Trade Center, he literally said, victory to Allah, death to America, Allahu Akbar. 9-11 was religiously motivated, right? So how come America have forgotten that very, very big event and importing the same people that want to kill their own civilization.
Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
So the the changes that President Trump is making in the economy, namely through tariffs, tax incentives, regulatory incentives, they're already showing signs that those are working. Stock market took off like a rocket this morning. And actually, what's interesting, two weeks ago, Charlie, everybody was saying the sky is falling. The sky is falling. We got a recession is imminent.
do air cover for you and for your agenda you have a you feel entitled to yeah no this is this is great so uh throw 513 on the screen please so this is an article from npr and here's the headline trump says he's ending federal funding for npr and pbs they say he can't this is npr reporting on itself in the third person in the third person it's like They say they – they is you.
But it gets even more absurd because Catherine Marr is the head of NPR, and this is a clip from her. She's awful. She's a radical who is trying to kind of whitewash some of her past, but you can't. You can't hide the clips. The internet is forever. 515.
So this is the head of NPR saying that the First Amendment is a real problem for publishers. So she's anti-American, she's anti-free speech, and this is subsidized by taxpayers. And here's the last point I'm going to make, Charlie. The Democrats say this is an earmark of dictatorship that you're trying to play winners and losers in the media space.
No, the earmark of a dictatorship and of authoritarian regime is that you have state-sponsored media that says what you want it to say.
Yeah, we we we probably do. I'm not sure what it is, but there is another there is another element to this. I don't know if you guys saw this, but Germany just today. I have the news. Yeah. I mean, that is that they have now that the intelligence community in Germany has now labeled AFD alternative for for Deutschland, Germany as a radical entity.
And here we are about two weeks later. The stock market's up twenty eight hundred points. And counting, and you have a lot of these changes that are being implemented in the economy already taking effect.
So this allows them now to harass AFD, to censor them, to basically surveil them and essentially criminalize their their activities. Correct. And so AFD is now the most popular party in Germany. It is it's essentially the closest equivalent that we have to MAGA, if you will. It's a nationalist party. But in Germany, they have all the you know, the.
The vestiges of World War II hanging over them, they've lost their confidence in that. So they instantly say, oh, we've got a Nazi, a fascist party. That's not what this is. This is like strong borders, anti-open borders party. It's very MAGA in spirit and in tone.
Well, and they view the election of Donald Trump as a cautionary tale because America was unsuccessful in clamping down on the speech.
Well, let's set the stage here. So Jesse Waters got an exclusive invite to go sit in on a Doge meeting. Now, they don't do these meetings at normal business hours because they never stop working. This team is a bunch of geniuses that all they do all night and all day is work on fixing really rudimentary problems like, oh, do the databases talk to each other?
Is there a tech issue that's allowing waste, fraud, and abuse? This was at 10 p.m. They did a roundtable, all these super geniuses that have built their own businesses or dropped out of Harvard or whatever, and he's brought them together to solve some of the most confounding problems in our federal government.
Sounds illegal, doesn't it? Private jets? Yeah, it sounds illegal. The other things that came out of this discussion, just mind you, is our founders established essentially four agencies of the federal government. Today we have 400. 400. So you were hearing him talk about the Institute of Peace, which is another sort of smaller agency.
Well, yeah, this just reminds me of just about every other –
chapter of president trump's political career where the elites and the experts tell us he's doing it wrong only to find out in the end that he's doing it right that his instincts have been right all along now he's not right about everything listen we're free to disagree with president trump but i i time and time again whether it's foreign policy energy policy tariffs president trump has has an instinct for these things he's a businessman he's seen it up close and personal but
I've always been a fan of tariffs. We have internal disagreements on our team about tariffs. I get it that it causes jitters in the short term, but we're already seeing, especially with auto manufacturing, where they're starting to replace producers and their supply chains. They're reshoring those supply chains. They're already working on it.
Ford has come out and said they're building two new plants, Hyundai, Toyota. All of them are making moves to reshore supply chains, which is going to increase.
There's actually a clip from Bernie Sanders in 2015 talking about how he is not for open borders. Why? Because that depresses American wages. This is a very, very clear line. And you've made this point on the show a bunch of times, and it's a point that it's worth reiterating, is that we are looking down the barrel of an AI revolution, of a robotic revolution.
So if you're going to keep flooding your country with cheap third-world labor— It's unnecessary. You're also going to be causing a problem down the road where those jobs no longer exist. And that time frame is way closer than most people realize.
Well, it's an existential dilemma for them though, Charlie, because if Trump succeeds, that means their entire worldview is cast into doubt.
Yeah, I want to play Charles Payne, 484. One more piece of econ here, and this is talking about manufacturing directly, 484.
So the White House has said that it's over $5 trillion in foreign investment in manufacturing. And by the way, speaking to our earlier point about technology and robotics and AI, these are investments in warehousing, data warehousing. Energy capacity, these are high-tech investments in the future from Apple, NVIDIA, and others, SoftBank.
This is not like those images in your head of the steel welders, although we love the steel mills, don't get me wrong. This is the jobs of the future.
Did you hear that white people are awful?
I mean, I think NPR and PBS are completely redundant anyways. You already have New York Times, right? I mean, what do we need NPR and PBS for?
Well, the jobs report beat expectations. I think Stephen Moore put it really well, where this was over 400,000 actual new jobs, people being employed over 400,000. Jobs report will say 177,000. That beat Wall Street expectations, which had it around 130,000. But non-farm... Payroll went through the roof. We're seeing a lot of manufacturing get reshored.
That sounds like they should be making money then, Charlie.
You know what would happen if PBS and NPR had to start making money and justifying their own existence? You'd get classics like Ken Burns' baseball. Come on, that was actually fantastic. Do we have any baseball fans out here in the audience? Come on now. Give me some. All right. Thank you.
So Ken Burns and baseball, they replay this stuff still because it's still their most popular content as opposed to their more radical stuff.
So I've had that conversation with my wife, just the other side of it. My dad taught me all of the construction skills and running cows, all of how to change your oil on brakes, all that. And y'all had to, right? Very similar to my childhood, right? Yeah, we had to. It was just a part of what we did. Couldn't afford to take it everywhere else. And now I work in an office.
With some really fancy technology. Yeah, stuff my dad wouldn't understand. But also, we still have cars and we still have all the things that break. So my wife and I have had the other side of this conversation of how do I transfer my father's skills to my son's. I've got two sons now. And that's... It's tough. It's tough to think through that, and we're still learning that.
I actually just found that book that you were talking about. I'm going to buy that. So that was a great call for me to hear as well, just that.
Right.
Right.
Right.
Mm-hmm.
Okay.
Mm-hmm.
Absolutely.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Right. Right. Okay.
Me and my wife got together in 2020. That's when we got married. I had trauma from a sexual assault that happened to me by a superior in the army in 2018. Sorry before that. No, it's okay. Thank you. Um, and then an abusive relationship before that. Um, uh, after I got out of the army, I was abusing alcohol while I was in, um, secretly, uh, keeping porn from her. Um, it got worse.
Um, within the first year of marriage, um, I got out of the military, um, we moved in with her dad, um, as I was transitioning to civilian life, we both got civilian jobs. Um, she, uh, eventually, uh, started sitting in a, in her car with a coworker that was higher up than her and told her to stop. She did. Um, but kept doing it out of obligation. Um,
Yeah. She made it sound like they were just... Like that she was naive to his intentions. She was a virgin when we got together. So I kind of gave her the benefit of the doubt.
Yeah. Yeah, he had other intentions. Yeah.
Yeah, and I think it was definitely not my fault, but I did things that contributed, you know, like neglect and abusing weed after the Army and then lying about the porn. And so when I got a feeling something was going on, I came clean about half of my porn use, and I ended up catching her. At his place. We ended up staying together. She said that they had just kissed.
And then two months after that, she came clean and said it was more than that. Sure. And right after that, I used porn as a kind of like to... make up for what she did. I was like, okay, you're going to be okay with porn. And she had seen that as cheating before, like when we early in our marriage before any of this.
Yeah. So after that we went to therapy, a therapist kind of said, okay, that was sexual assault because she tried to leave the two times that there was sexual assault. And the second time was at the workplace and she said no. And he got aggressive with her. Okay. And so it leaned more towards that, even though she had put herself in the positions.
right but what happened is what happened is what happened y'all reached a point where y'all just couldn't make this thing work yeah so it happened about three months ago one of our last sessions in therapy I pretty much said that I want a partner that's not going to care about porn because I I stopped wanting to go out in public because I would look at people she would get uncomfortable we'd
get distant. Um, I just, I was seeking therapy, trying to get help for that, for it. And so we were living with her dad, uh, who didn't hold any expectations for us, would do dishes for us, like all the stuff I was getting VA money. So I was just isolating. She started going to the gym on her own.
And one of our last sessions, I said that I want a partner that doesn't care so I can stop for me because I didn't want to continue doing it. Um, and she said she wanted me out of the house until I made a decision. And so I left and ended up intoxicated at a strip club. And I got a 10 minute lap dance, like at the end of the night.
And the next day I told her I was going to stop everything cold Turkey. And then I went and I came back and everything started to go in the right direction. And then I showed concern or showed a, yeah, concerns that I wanted to go to the gym with her again and that I wasn't going to look at anyone. She said she liked her time alone, um, brought up a few other reasons.
And then pretty much right after that asked me the details of the strip club almost to like distance herself emotionally. And so I shared honestly, and that I regretted it all deeply. And, um, A week after that, we started to kind of do better.
And I think she just felt an obligation to try to work through things and ended up saying that the wounds felt too deep and said she wanted like a month to think about everything. And it wasn't even like a week. And she served me papers at like the beginning of November. Okay. And that's about it.
Um, as far as I know, she's not reaching out. Um, I'm practicing the, you know, even if she wants to hang out, you know, better for me to heal, probably not to try to talk to her at all.
We started to kind of do better, and I think she just felt an obligation. So my question is, how do I navigate life after a sudden divorce? And it wasn't even like a week, and she served me papers at like the beginning of November.
Yeah. Okay. She's given me no sign.
Probably like maybe second grade. I remember a teacher... dumping my desk out in front of all the students because I was hiding papers back there. Okay.
I actually want to do some type of YouTube channel where I go to, like, parks, city parks, or... colleges and ask people questions like, what's your happiest memory? What's the most painful thing you've been through? And just share people's stories.
By trial and error.
Start researching, learning video editing, media marketing, that kind of stuff.
I guess just a sense of sharing that with other people. Maybe that need to hear it.
That despite all of people's crazy stories, that they're still there in front of whatever camera I got.
So my question is, how do I navigate life after a sudden divorce?
Rush into it either. I know that.
I have a few paragraphs, if you don't mind. Or would you rather just go into it?
Fairwinds is federally insured by NCUA.
What's going on? Nothing much. My question for you guys would be, so I make $850 a month. In a career that I'm trying to pursue, like long-term, should I quit or stick it out because of the fact that it's kind of a career I'm still trying to pursue?
So it's door-to-door sales for solar panels. I knock on, uh, you know, door to door. Yep.
Um, uh, I think it's just because my skill isn't there yet.
Something in like business, um, longterm, like, and I thought that this would be like a good stepping stone, uh, because of like, I've heard that door-to-door is the hardest, so that would be a good starting point, I think.
Um, I basically, I mean, I live at home, so my rent is nothing, even though like I've offered it. Um, I use my parents' car for getting around. I pay for gas, but like, I don't like a lot of expenses are not there. How old are you? It allows me to do this. I'm 23. Okay. Did you go to school? Yeah. So I graduated with a four year degree. In what?
Um, from a pretty reputable college, uh, Homeland Security. Okay.
In my senior year. So I originally went to college for kinesiology, for physical therapy, but then I failed out of it. So I moved to Homeland Security and studied computers and computer science.
From everything I heard in my senior year of college, I... I figured that like, it would make more sense to go into sales, but that's kind of like, maybe I'm not entirely sure where it's like, you know, life experience kind of just like. Neat reality sort of thing.
Yeah, I mean, there's IT, there's cybersecurity, there's a whole... I would rather see you get an entry-level IT job at this point than the door-to-door solar sales.
Right. Of like 25 years. And unfortunately, I don't have control over like if they actually end up putting it on their house. I just kind of, you know, set up the schedule sort of thing.
Yeah, so it's commission. So if the person signs to put the panels on the roof, that's how I make money. And to tell the truth, so that $850 is also including, like, a first sign-on bonus.
So, like, it would actually be significantly less. It sounds like you're doing a lot of work for free, my man.
I figured, like, you know, it's, like, expected to be kind of, like, you know, bad at the job when you're only seven weeks into anything, right? Yeah. The money is where I'm kind of conflicted.
Learn more at RamseySolutions.com slash SmartVestor.
Hey, guys. Can you hear me?
Hey, great to talk to you. Huge fan. I'm calling today about my parents. My dad has Alzheimer's and my mom had a pretty significant stroke about four months ago. So they're not able to live independently much anymore. Fortunately, my sister has been able to take care of them at her house most of the time. And I'm taking them to their cabin on the weekends.
But ultimately, we're looking to build them like a small residence facility. next to me with lots of grandkids to drop in on them through the day and stuff. We're hoping to keep construction costs under $250,000 and pay cash for it.
My parents have done an awesome job at living well within their means, but we're looking at their statement from their financial advisor, and it's kind of like a mixed bag of things that don't give us a good feel for exactly how much is available or liquid, at least at this point.
So I guess our question is if or how we try to consolidate all these accounts to keep it simpler and have enough money to cut checks for the home they're building in the next few months. And I have the list for you when you're ready.
Fortunately, no. It's my sister. She has all that responsibility right now.
Yeah, as well as my other sister, yeah.
Well, they have traditional IRAs, each of them. So my mom has $150,000 in hers. My dad has $580,000 in his. They also have a $47,000 investment. It sounds like a blend of mutual funds. Um, both, both of the IRAs are set up with annuities.
Um, they also have a Pacific life. Paul, it sounds like a whole life policy. It shows a value of $31,000. Um, they also have a bunch of gold, probably at least 20,000. Um, and they have about 90,000 in their checking account.
And you're going, okay, what's the... I'm intentionally leaving out the $80,000 worth of long-term care insurance coverage because that's a whole other nightmare that we're going through.
That was my initial thought also, so I'm glad to hear you guys say that.
Yeah, I actually have a couple other lots next to me that are mine. Oh, nice. And we're going to set them up on one of those.
We're trying to keep it under 1,000. It's just going to be a single level, you know, the basics.
Yeah, we have some gray to deal with on the properties.
Well, we're trying to work that out. No, I don't think they do need 24-hour round-the-clock care. But being that they'd be living next to me, we'd set them up with cameras and things like that. In case of an emergency or something, we'd be pretty handy to go over and see what's going on.
But, no, we're trying to get home care to come by, at least for some of the basics. But my sister is able to handle that right now, and I think that's probably one of the problems we're running into with the long-term care insurance is they don't want to pay because they're It seems like they can, you know, we can handle it. And we're just, you know.
Well, my dad's actually the one with Alzheimer's. I know, but she can't take care of him. It's all you guys.
Hi, how are you guys doing?
So... my wife and I have about a hundred thousand dollars in debt, not including our mortgage. Um, we make about 80,000 a year. Uh, so we, we, I say we have made bad decisions, but it's really, I put it on me, but we've got ourselves in some pretty bad debt. So I'm just trying to figure out the best way to get out of it with the money we make. Cause it seems like in my head we don't make enough.
Uh, credit cards,
No car debt. We own our cars outright, but we have a personal loan for $35,000 that I used to reconsolidate, and then I sold the vehicle that I had to purchase that, basically.
The car, so I have a Ford Expedition that's probably worth $11,000 at the moment, and then we just have a smaller vehicle that's not really worth anything. It's got 200-plus thousand miles on it.
No.
$80,000.
Okay.
It's been three years now. We've been together for... Probably, I think like seven.
So I work on the weekends doing side jobs. It's not fully consistent, but it's probably at least twice a month. that ranges anywhere from 500 to a thousand. And I, you know, I tried to use that. I just started listening to you guys like the past two weeks.
Uh, cause really we've been arguing a lot about money, trying to be on the same page, you know, and just finally I started listening to you guys and I was like, Hey, we're, we're done with this, you know, debt stuff. We need to get our life together cause we have two kids. Um, and I just, I don't want them to have a bad future. So I want to get ourselves,
Probably been about a year now.
Yeah, yeah, it does.
I absolutely think she will be on board because we've talked about it now for the past couple months, and we're both just tired of being stressed and arguing all the time about it, and we want to make a change. I think it's just hard for us because it's hard for us to see and picture it because we're so far behind. It seems like we can't figure out where to start. Take $100,000 in debt, right?
Yes.
Yes.
Yeah, yeah, we've been making that. I've been talking about that for, like I said, the past couple months. Okay, there's no more.
So my wife and I were wondering if I should stop investing 10% into my 401k and continue to save in order to get close to the 20% down payment on a house.
Okay. She's currently in vet school. So we're the only line of income right now making $83,000 a year. And we've got $70,000 in savings, $8,800 in 401K savings. And I've got $35,000 set aside for emergency funds. So we were looking in our area, the houses we were going to buy were around $300,000. And I was basing that off of being able to put down 20%, which would be $60,000.
And once she starts her job, we should be close to $200,000. Do you think that's reasonable?
Next May. So we're looking to buy as soon as she graduates.
She's going to work for between five to eight years and then open up her own business and become a business owner.
Yes, yes. She's had job offers anywhere from...
I hope so. That's the plan.
Hi there. Thanks for having me.
Well, about 10 years ago, I was sold a whole life policy. I'm sorry. And it's only been about recently that I've discovered what a poor investment these things are. Good.
Yeah. In fact, I actually sold two of them. And I'm looking to get out. Good. However, I'm doing the math, and I'm about three years from breaking even on one of them.
Well... According to the cash value, in about three years, I'll have paid the same amount. Like I could cash out for the same amount that I put into it.
Right, exactly. So I'm just wondering, should I just get out now, take my loss, or should I keep paying this thing for a couple of years?
Yeah, that's what I'm discovering here, and I wish I'd asked more questions when I signed up, but...
Hey. Hey. Hey, Dave. Hope you guys are doing well today. Appreciate you taking my call. Sure. So I'm 32 years old, and I've been following your baby steps and your content on YouTube and your website. I've just reached baby step number four. Congratulations. Well done. Thank you very much. Yeah, it was a big achievement.
So in regards to investing, I just took a look at kind of what my current situation is. And I'm enrolled in my employer's 401k and contributing 6%, which is what my company matches. Now, I think your advice is to next open up a Roth IRA and max that out. And if there's any leftover...
It's through Fidelity, so I'll have to go and check into that. I was going to open up a Roth IRA through Fidelity just to keep it under one roof. I wouldn't. You would not? No.
I believe so, just based on the quick searching I've done.
Right.
A lot of people I work with.
Hi, thank you for taking the time to answer my question. Sure, what's going on? Yeah. So back when I was going to college, my parents and I took out student loans to pay for them. When taking out the loans, there was no conversation about me having any responsibility for the parent portion of the loans.
Now, six years later, my parents are blaming my sisters and I for not having any money in retirement and for filing bankruptcy and saying that after all of that, we're going to have to take over the loans because it's They shouldn't have to worry about that this time in their lives.
And I told them no, but that caused a bunch of arguments and I suggested family counseling and that was rejected too. And I guess just want to know, are we in the wrong having tried to help them? It seems like they have no willingness to change and letting money come between the family.
That is correct. Yes.
As far as I know, yes. They're never open about it. So I wouldn't know for sure, but the bankruptcy wouldn't even impact it.
Right. So why would they do it if it was only the student loans?
I don't know exactly. No. They've never been open about it.
I asked my mom one time, I was like, have you ever been to church? And she's like, oh yeah, of course we've been to church. And then what she really meant was that we walked into a church one time and then walked out.
So familiar. I could say those exact same words, and that's exactly what I do.
How long have you been in the university for? What kind of research are you doing? What's your lab like? Who are you working with?
I just make sure as hard as possible that they don't ask me any questions. I don't want to talk about it.
I wonder, you know, with the science experiment, maybe the main thing that's balancing us, that makes us comparable, is a second generation upbringing.
And I think that to me, make me always kind of feel inadequate in a way, right? Like I'll never be able to do that. I'll never be able to achieve that kind of, you know, rags to riches kind of story, you know, because I was never in rags. My parents, my parents were the ones that kind of struggled through that.
There's nothing wrong with it. I think this is all somewhat funny that a lot of Christians will marry early, right? Because they have to marry before they have sex. But for people that don't grow up Christian, a consensual act of sex is just not a problem.
but i i i've yeah that's intense man that's intense reflex i don't have that reflex are you telling me that you've never said out loud to yourself i hate myself i want to kill myself you never said that andrew i've i've never said that that's the christian difference man that's the christian yeah
Yeah.
I like my suitcase.
Yeah.
Email him.
Yeah.
Hi, ladies. I'm Jeff Wolf. I'm 48. I'm single. I'm real, as you can see. If you want me, I'm right here.
Yeah.
Hmm.
100%.
18.
1492.
Wednesday. Next Wednesday.
Next Wednesday, yeah. What are we? Oh, yeah. The one you recorded on Friday is coming out Monday.
I know, but I hate it.
What am I supposed to do?
uh were you guys ever like milk families growing up like you had milk with like my dad made us every every dinner we had to finish a glass of milk yeah i was the same way we'd have milk with like steak and i tell my friends that now and they're like that's disgusting now i can't do milk at all i don't have milk and milk and steak is like you're just taking you're bleeding that cow dry
It was like a coffee shop at work.
You ever done the trough? Oh, yeah, I love that shit. That's the worst. You can just see, like, every dick within, like, a mile radius. Yeah, that is the worst. That's the worst. Where is this trough? Yeah, that's the worst. Yeah, we should get one of those in our office. Oh, my God, that's the worst.
One time I was at a music festival, and we were all peeing in these urinals, and I had one of those cheap disposable cameras. My buddy was next to me, and I just went over the stall and snapped a picture. And my buddy was freaking out for two weeks because he was like, dude, when you develop that film, there's going to be a picture of my penis. He was waiting for the day the pictures came back.
And we got him back, and just barely his stomach is like,
Yeah, I don't have any pitches. Do you have any pitches from playmates? No. I can find some. I can find some. Yeah, we can figure it out. Sorry, I meant to... No, you're totally good.
I'm going to have a crout down.
I was thinking about that the other day because... You can each do one if you want to do that. Yeah. You know how every time a music festival lineup comes out, people will make playlists of everyone on the lineup, and then it'll have 10,000 saves? Yes. I was like, oh, I should do that this year for ACL because I kind of knew a lot of the artists that were already going to play.
ACL's got a sick lineup. It's got a great lineup. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I got tickets. I'm super excited. Yeah, I'm pumped, man. I'm thinking about trying to go. And so I made like a playlist that was like ACL official 2025 playlist. Like anything that people would search on Spotify so I could get like 10,000 saves and a bunch of followers on Spotify. And I think it's at five saves right now.
like I put it in like subreddits and stuff yeah thinking like oh this is gonna like blow up and I got really excited cuz I like click to it the other day and it I saw like 880 and I was like hell yeah and then that's the number of songs right next to it was like five saves I took a swing I might all you can do I should go to that looks that is a pitch from a guy named Bo
Your boy Dylan Gossett is playing. He's on the lineup. Yeah, he is.
yeah i wanted to give them uh give them some clout man all right hit us but we can't look until okay it's oh should i put these away we just won't look we're just not looking okay what's up happy and gilmore and lauren gilmore lauren i guess uh hope y'all are doing well what's the worst part about peeing in public
Overflowing the urinal. Correct. It's the deafening silence of no pee hitting the toilet seat followed by the gut-wrenching choice between sitting and waiting for the pee to come out knowing it could be hours away or leaving in defeat while everyone around you knows you couldn't get the job done.
well fear no more my product the speaker is a sound system built into your underwear that plays the exact sound your pee would make hitting the urinal so fucking good this should help you get the engine started and in extreme situations when the pee is still too shy you're at least spared the embarrassment that comes with leaving the urinal after no sound of pee leaving the body rusty this one is for you
Well, it's such a weird fear because I've never noticed someone not peeing next to me. Yeah, I've never...
I didn't know what I was saying.
Hi, Juan Soto, Pete Alonso, and the Mets.
Pete Alonso. And you didn't want Pete? What is the worst part about driving through a city with lots of traffic lights? Stopping a bunch.
Okay, not knowing when the lights are going to turn green and just having to wait in secrecy until you know.
Yep. I present Light Check, an app that is either on your phone or Apple CarPlay that is connected to your city's police department. This app follows your ride and tells you when it's going to turn green or red. This makes it safer because there won't be awkward lights where you don't know if you should go or not. Thank you, friends.
10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.
This video doesn't really sell it for me because you can't see the countdown.
Yeah, that's a good point. Like, he cuts away.
This is what I was thinking. I thought it would be good for drag racing. What? Oh, for drag racing.
That was your guess? Do you want to Price's write him and go like 1443? Yeah, 1444 in a day.
That kind of reminds me of that girl on Temptation Island who was like, they eliminated her and she was like, I was just here for the margaritas. To be honest. How many of those Cardinals were like, I'm just free food a thousand days. Free housing. Let's run it up. I don't want to go back to my shithole career.
I mean, he's wearing a helmet, so it's fine. Yeah.
No, I'm on Willie's side. That is definitely the best thing. That's one of the most popular board games ever. Yeah, yeah.
All right, should we do... I thought that video was going to be... Did you see the video of the guy going under the crop car? It's like one of those big... Have you seen this? Did you miss a cop car or a crop?
Another crop car. Oh, I wish I prepared this. Damn. I'm not going to be able to find it. What would you call that car? I don't know. I don't know. It was, like, these two redneck guys, and it's, like, this big, tall car that just has, like, a gap right underneath it, and he just, like, drives right under it. Is it not that first one? I don't think so. That was the second one. Oh, crop spray.
Okay, this is, like, the exact same car, but this isn't the video I was thinking of.
Let's do hungover.
I see what you mean.
Comment your favorite song Rusty has ever put on his playlist. How many songs are on there? I think this is 10.
Comment your favorite song ever.
Wait, what were we talking about there? Oh, your clean water bottle?
It was epic. I'm just thinking about you being like, are you on your period? It's like, clearly you. You're making out. From your nose, you're like, I didn't know the period could come through the mouth. It goes anywhere. Wait, I have a question for you, Andrew. Yeah. Did you hit your barista this morning? Is that real?
How bad was the coffee?
No, it was before. That's what's worse. I was, like, pulling into the parking lot. And I, like, pulled in. And the car, like, next to me had been, like, sitting there for a while. And when I flung my door open, I just, like, hit the fuck out of her with my door. On her body? On her body. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Wait, like, not the car? Not the car. No, like her body. Yeah.
So like I just like standing next to your car. She was also getting out. But like the car had been there for a while. So I didn't expect like anyone to be like getting out of it.
No, no. So like I flew the door, flung the door open. She like got hit. I was like, oh, my God, I'm so sorry. And she was like, whatever. And then she like walked into the Starbucks. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
and then she like walked into starbucks and i was like oh it's gonna be awkward we're in we're in line together and then i saw her like go to the back and like put on an apron and i was like oh fuck she's spitting your coffee probably yeah yeah she took it like to the back i was like i don't think you have to do that i think you could just put it on the counter you know jesus well that's kind of yeah uh that's um like a larry david thing yeah was that the first time you've hit a woman
That's a high you'll never, ever get used to.
He sounds incredibly special.
Amen, brother.
Yeah.
Oh, yeah, it was. That counts.
Well done, guys.
Oh, fuck, I'm about to merge.
That's a sweet spot, boys.
21. 21.
Ah, fuck! Damn it.
It's like a seagull, basically.
That was even close.
No, but he's so nice. Oh, yeah. He was really nice? He was super nice. Yeah, he was one of the nicest guys I've ever met.
Yeah. Oh, yeah?
No, actually. He would come around, but I never had a formal introduction.
That's the greatest part about this country. It's a free country.
Hey, hey, I said this guy rocks, and he rocks so hard.
When the roof came out, I just didn't know what to do.
But when I find someone I haven't known in so long, I'll do anything to you. That's a me girl. What'd you say? Okay.
I don't want to be anything other than what I've been trying to be lately. All I have to do is think of me and all the peace of mind.
Does that not exist?
all right should we do this guy rocks this guy rocks this guy rocks today hey hey all right lauren or emily i'm gonna uh airdrop this to you and you should pause it immediately and i mean immediately all right willie this is a guy in his car brian it's it says pov this drake song makes us white boys almost slip out slip out the word we can't say okay great
Okay. Alright, man.
Which one was that?
Jess, are you on any of the apps?
Aber... Warte, sind wir nicht auf dem Bild? Nein, nein, nein, wir sind.
Ich habe versucht, es hinzuzufügen. Und manchmal fühlt es sich so an, als würde ich Dinge an die Pitches hinzufügen. You guys should shut him down. Me? Guys? Yeah. I had your back.
Surreptitious? I don't think it's that one. I think we should put that in there.
Sie mussten das Suizid-Tool patchen, weil ich dachte, ich würde es benutzen.
Kann ich als Letzter? Ja. Ich werde Mike Aruzioni stehlen. Oh, schön.
Ich werde ein paar Russen gewinnen.
Ich werde ein paar Russen gewinnen.