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Sept. 8, 2017 - The Ben Shapiro Show

58:55

When Politics Becomes Religion | Ep. 379

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	Democrats decide it's very important to attack a federal judge candidate on her religion.
	Hillary Clinton decides that it's very important to attack Bernie Sanders.
	And Donald Trump decides it's very important to attack the Republican Party.
	Everything's messed up.
	I'm Ben Shapiro.
	This is the Ben Shapiro Show.
	So you made it!
	Finally we're all the way to a Friday and we have the mailbag coming up a little bit later in the show so if you're gonna subscribe now is the time to do it so you can be part of today's mailbag where we will indeed be taking live questions but before we get to all of the various topics of the day and myriad they are first I want to say thank you to our sponsors over at Bull and Branch so as I've said a thousand times on the show I'm really bad at sleep.
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	Okay, so...
	There is a lot to talk about with regard to President Trump and his move to the left on Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, basically saying that he now wants the DREAM Act, the same DREAM Act that he ripped Jeb Bush up and down for.
	We'll also talk about Trump going Democrat on the debt ceiling, what that means, why that's important.
	A lot of people today sort of brushing off the debt ceiling discussion.
	Well, we always raise the debt ceiling.
	What's the big deal?
	Well, raising the debt ceiling, you should at least get one of two things.
	If you're the governing party, you should at least get one of two things out of the debt ceiling.
	One, some sort of systemic change to spending that would actually make sure that you're not taking out as much debt in the future.
	You get some spending cuts in exchange for increasing the debt ceiling or extending the debt ceiling.
	Or two, you blow off the debt ceiling entirely for like another 18 months so you don't have to do this for every three months from now until the end of time so the Democrats can hold up the debt ceiling so that they can spend more money.
	Right?
	You want to get one of those two things.
	Trump got neither of those two things.
	It's a bad deal and it also puts a lot of pressure on Republicans because he also pushed forward a continuing resolution, a budget resolution, that only goes through December.
	So now, Republicans are basically stacked up.
	By December, they now have to pass If they want to do Obamacare repeal, they have to do it, like, basically in the next three weeks.
	If they want to do tax reform, they have to do it before December.
	And they have to do it with that deadline looming in December.
	Because, remember, right now Republicans only have 52 votes in the Senate.
	That means that if they want to pass anything with 51 votes through reconciliation, then reconciliation rules require any bill you pass has to be revenue neutral.
	Well, how do you gauge whether a bill is revenue neutral?
	The way that you gauge whether a bill is revenue neutral is based on the baseline budgeting.
	It's based on the budget.
	So that means that they have to have a budget in place.
	So that means Democrats can hold up anything in December by saying, we're not going to pass any sort of budget.
	We're going to sit off on the sidelines and not pass any part of your new budget.
	And therefore, you can't even get a reconciliation ruling on some of these tax reform bills that the Senate wants to take up.
	It's really a problem.
	Basically, Trump gave them a lot of leverage come December.
	We'll talk about all that.
	But first, I want to get to an issue that has been very undercovered.
	Right now what we're watching in the United States, and it's very disturbing, is a loss of religion across the board in the United States.
	There's a poll that came out this week about evangelical Christians showing that a huge number of evangelical Christians were now uncertain on basic protocol principles, basic doctrinal principles, like, is promiscuity bad?
	I mean, these things are pretty clear in the Bible.
	You may not actually fulfill the mandate, right?
	You may sin.
	We all sin.
	We get that.
	There are certain things that, in Christian doctrine, are pretty well clear.
	Again, it doesn't mean that you uphold them personally or that you don't sin, but there are certain things that are pretty clear in Christian doctrine.
	Evangelical Christians, those numbers are sliding among Evangelical Christians, among people who actually believe in the doctrine.
	There's a poll out this week showing that we've now reached an all-time high in the United States of people who describe themselves as non-believers, people who feel that they are not religious.
	And this is something that's cheered and pushed by the secular left.
	And it's not just cheered and pushed by the secular left.
	There's an all-out assault that's happening from the Democratic left on people of religious faith.
	Because the idea on a lot of the left is that religion leads to these hard and fast rules.
	And these hard and fast rules are bad rules, right?
	They're ancient, and they're bad, and they're bigoted, and they're backwards.
	If we just got rid of all of those rules, then life would be so much better.
	Right?
	Just get rid of religion.
	Force people to bring their religion up to snuff.
	If they're going to believe in religion, let them be spiritual, not religious.
	They can believe in some higher power, sure, as long as it doesn't actually impact what they do in the here and now.
	And we're going to browbeat anyone who actually believes this stuff.
	If you actually believe religious principle, if you actually believe religious doctrine, we're going to beat you up for it.
	So the best case in point that I've seen in recent history is what happened in the Senate Judiciary Committee.
	This would be now a couple of days ago.
	So there is a judge whose name is Amy Barrett.
	She's actually a professor at Notre Dame Law, and she's being appointed to the appeals court, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, or she's being considered for that, and Dianne Feinstein, the senator from California, decided to go after her.
	Why?
	Because this law professor is a Catholic, and she wrote a piece years ago in which she suggested that if you're a Catholic, and you have to sit in on a death penalty case, then you should probably excuse yourself.
	You should recuse yourself, because as a religious person, you have a duty not to actually vote in favor of the death penalty, so the best thing you can do is recuse yourself.
	Now, note, there's a difference between recusing yourself and voting against the death penalty in a particular case.
	Recusing yourself means you don't get a vote.
	That's the purpose of recusal.
	But the way that Dianne Feinstein and the Democrats played this was, well, she's saying that your religion should infuse your rulings.
	She's saying your religion should impact your rulings.
	That if your ruling is going to go against what you believe religiously, that she's saying that your religion should take precedence.
	That's not what she's saying at all.
	That's not what she's saying at all.
	But Feinstein basically goes after her and she says, listen, if you're a religious Catholic, you shouldn't be on the court.
	You shouldn't have a place in public life.
	Here's Dianne Feinstein from California.
	When you read your speeches, The conclusion one draws is that the dogma lives loudly within you.
	And that's of concern when you come to big issues that large numbers of people have fought for for years in this country.
	Okay, so what they're really questioning her about is this 1998 paper that she wrote as a law student, along with John Garvey, who's now president of the Catholic University of America.
	This is according to The Atlantic.
	In the paper, the two authors explore whether a Catholic judge should recuse herself from death penalty cases if she would be unable to impartially uphold the law because of her religious convictions.
	The Pope and the American bishops have recently offered clear and forceful denunciations of the punishment, they said, and many Catholics feel morally obligated to uphold the teachings of the Church.
	In certain limited circumstances, they argue, federal judges should step back from involvement in cases that might raise conflicts of interest.
	They didn't argue that judges should step back from morally complicated cases all or even most of the time.
	According to Garvey, he said, it turns out the number of cases in which we thought an adherence to your moral principles would prevent you from deciding a case according to the law was much smaller than we imagined.
	But again, notice, basically Feinstein is saying you shouldn't be a judge because if you're a judge, then that means that you're going to use your religious doctrine in order to target people.
	But that's exactly what the paper is not saying.
	The paper is saying precisely the reverse.
	The paper is saying if I have to rule alongside my religious doctrine and it would impact how I rule alongside the law then I'm going to recuse myself.
	But the idea here is that if you're Catholic you can't be trusted.
	You're one of those shifty papists.
	One of those shifty evil papists.
	And it wasn't just Feinstein.
	Okay, it was also Dick Durbin, the senator from Illinois.
	By the way, Chicago, I believe, is the most Catholic city in the United States.
	Durbin is amazing he can get away with this, but this demonstrates the level of secularism that is now inherent in our public discourse.
	Here's Durbin going after her on the same grounds.
	It is relevant in that you have many times spoken out as a professor and as a lawyer about the Burden and opportunity presented by your faith.
	This article of 20 years ago, which you wrote with John Garvey, as I understand it, you now say you don't agree with.
	Is that correct?
	Okay, so the idea here is that she's a bad person, she's Catholic, can't be trusted.
	And this is what the left, hard left, truly believes about religion, moving into the mainstream left.
	Remember, Hillary Clinton said in the last election cycle that people who are religious, who believe certain things about same-sex marriage, for example, they have to update their religion to take account of the times.
	That is not her decision to make.
	That is not her decision to make.
	And yet, it's so funny because the left will then use religion as a club when they feel that it's convenient, right?
	So James Clyburn, who is a representative, he came out and he said that anybody who is Christian or Jewish should obviously be in favor of the Dreamers because otherwise they'd be violating their own religious precepts.
	This is Representative Clyburn, a Democrat of South Carolina.
	They love this country, and many of them, this is the only country they have ever known.
	And for us to hold the children responsible for the sins of their parents defies who and what we are as a nation, and those people who believe in the minimalism of Christianity and Judaism ought to practice what we say we preach.
	Okay, again, so the idea is that religion is bad, unless I wish to invoke it, in which case religion becomes good.
	There's no actual concerted principle here.
	There's no actual line of demarcation.
	The Boston Globe ran a long piece this week talking specifically about Elizabeth Warren's faith.
	Okay, Elizabeth Warren is the most pro-abortion member of the U.S.
	Senate, but she's a deep believer.
	You know, she's a deep believer.
	Basically, religion is something that Democrats can say they actually like when it's convenient.
	But the minute that you actually say, my religious values inform my values generally, Then all of a sudden you're a bad person.
	Unless, of course, you're a leftist.
	Then if you're a leftist, then you can get away with it.
	No problem.
	This is a serious problem for Democrats, and I'm going to explain why in just a second.
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	They do wonderful work Okay, so here is the problem Right now we're polarized along so many lines in the United States.
	We're polarized along racial lines.
	Barack Obama spent a lot of time between 2008 and 2016 polarizing us along racial lines for political gain.
	And I do think that there was an element in the 2016 election in which President Trump basically signaled to a lot of people that there was going to be a new white identity politics in response to the Barack Obama Minority identity politics.
	Basically, Democrats said for years and years and years there's this growing majority, right?
	There's this new majority.
	It's not going to include white people, those horrible white privileged white supremacist jackasses.
	Those people who have taken over the United States and used it for their own benefit for the last 200 years.
	They're going to be out on their butts.
	And a lot of white people said, wait, what the heck?
	Like, we didn't do any of that.
	Like, what?
	What now?
	And Trump said to them, listen, I'm your guy, right?
	I'm the guy who's going to defend you against the people who say that you need to not have any power in the system anymore.
	So a white identity politics sort of sprung up.
	And you can see that in the voting statistics.
	The voting statistics in the 2016 election cycle, I mean, if you look at blue collar white voters, they voted overwhelmingly for President Trump.
	I mean, by a huge number.
	I'm looking at the numbers right now.
	And in these areas, whites without a college degree, whites with no college degree, well, okay, Disney, whites with no college degree, they shifted from about 25 points more Republican in 2004 to nearly 40 points more Republican in 2016.
	That's a massive shift.
	Okay, it's a huge shift.
	And basically they voted like a voting bloc, right?
	We're constantly talking about the Hispanic voting bloc, or the black voting bloc.
	Okay, they voted like their own racial voting bloc.
	Blue collar, white voters.
	They voted more Republican than Hispanics voted Democrat in this last election cycle.
	Which is an amazing statistic.
	It's a really incredible statistic.
	Okay, that's one polarization.
	Then we've been polarized along class lines.
	This is what Bernie Sanders wants to do.
	He wants to polarize us along lines of class.
	All the poor people versus the 1%, the 1%, the evil 1%, which does include people like me, but don't worry, I am great, right?
	He wants to polarize us along those lines, and that's why you see Occupy Wall Street, and that's why you see all of these social justice movements designed to tear down the rich.
	And then you've got polarizations along sex lines.
	This is what Hillary Clinton was trying to do.
	There's a war on women, and that's why I'm not president.
	Because there's a war on women.
	Right?
	This is the routine that you got from the entire Democratic Party, Katy Perry and the like, that there was some sort of glass ceiling Republicans had set up, and we have to bust through it.
	Like a firework!
	That's what we have to do.
	And now, the Democrats are basically driving a response on religion.
	This is going to be the next battleground.
	Democrats believe that there's a rising majority of people who are secular and don't like religion.
	And those people are going to form their new majority.
	And the more dismissive and derisive they are about religion, the more they will win.
	And people are going to backlash against this.
	There's going to be a strong religious backlash against this.
	People saying, you leave me the hell alone.
	And the problem with the backlash is every backlash has an element that is a little bit too far.
	So you will see people saying things like, Let's re-enshrine some laws that are sort of religious in nature.
	There will be a few people who say stuff like that because they're backlashing.
	I don't think that'll be the great majority, but you are going to see religious people start to identify as a political bloc of their own.
	That's what you're gonna see.
	None of this is good.
	We all used to be people of random colors and that didn't matter so much, I would say, even 10 years ago, before Obama's election.
	Look at the polls.
	We all used to be people in America who aspired to be rich, but we didn't rip each other down for what we earned.
	We all used to be people who were men and women, people who loved each other, but we didn't break each other down according to which member of this sexual identity group you were.
	And we all used to be people who had religion, didn't have religion, but that was your personal decision, and that could infuse your life how you saw fit.
	Small government allows for all of that.
	Small government means that I'm not going to use the government as a weapon against you, and you're not going to use the government as a weapon against me.
	But now, religious people, look, At people like Dianne Feinstein.
	And they look at Dick Durbin.
	And they look at James Clyburn.
	And they look at Elizabeth Warren.
	And they look at Hillary Clinton.
	And they say to themselves, these people are coming after me.
	They're coming after my children.
	They want me to give up on how I raise my children.
	They want me to give up my religious values.
	They think they know better than I do right now.
	That's why the Masterpiece Cake Shop case that is going to go to the Supreme Court next year, is going to be so crucial in, I think, the next step of societal breakdown.
	Very good shot that Justice Anthony Kennedy rules that you as a religious person cannot live out your religious faith in a business setting.
	Even if it's your own business.
	That if I have a business and I say, listen, I'm not up for catering your same-sex wedding, You know, you're fine.
	I'm not up for catering your same-sex wedding.
	I'm not using the government's crackdown on you.
	Good shot that Democrats and Anthony Kennedy, all these people get together and basically say, religious people do not have the ability to live out their religious lifestyle.
	You know what that's going to do?
	It's going to mean that religious people vote 90% for Republicans.
	That's where this is going to go.
	Senator Mike Lee gets this exactly right.
	Senator from Utah, he says to Democrats, what you're doing right now is dividing the country.
	This country is divided enough.
	Millions of Americans feel that Washington, D.C.
	and the dominant culture despise them.
	And how could they not when they see their leaders sitting here, grilling patriotic citizens about their faith, like inquisitors?
	How could they not feel like their values are not welcome in this chamber, within this government?
	Religious freedom is of deep concern to me as a Mormon.
	My church, members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, have weathered extraordinary religious persecution.
	And much of it, especially initially, was sponsored by government actors.
	Okay, and what Lee is saying here is exactly right.
	So what are Democrats replacing religion with?
	The answer is they're replacing it with a religion of their own.
	Best example of this.
	So, yesterday, Betsy DeVos, who is the Secretary of Education, she rescinded the so-called Dear Colleague letter.
	The Dear Colleague letter was a letter from the Obama administration to college administrators, I believe it was 2013, and it basically said to them, If there is sexual assault or sexual harassment on your campus, then you are not allowed to simply dump it off on the police.
	This constitutes a Title IX violation under the Civil Rights Act.
	And that means that we will either prosecute you or remove your funding because this is sexual discrimination.
	That if somebody is raped on your campus, and you don't do enough to stop it, Then this will actually create an excuse for us to remove all of the cash from your campus.
	And so what did the colleges do?
	They were told what to do.
	The Obama administration told them what you need to do right now is you need to set up tribunals, campus tribunals, these kangaroo courts, like a Spanish Inquisition.
	No one expects it, but there it is.
	There needs to be a Spanish Inquisition on campuses.
	Anybody who's accused of sexual harassment or sexual assault has to be tried by you, but we're not going to use a beyond a reasonable doubt standard.
	And we're not even going to use a strong, clear, and convincing evidence standard.
	Instead, we're going to use a preponderance of the evidence standard.
	So, Elliot Hamilton has a very good piece on this over at Daily Wire today, and he talks about this.
	That the Dear Colleague letter substantially lowered the burden of proof required for college administrators to determine whether an alleged rapist or sexual assault or committed a heinous act.
	The preponderance of evidence is the standard of proof required for civil offenses to show that evidence is at least 50% more likely to have shown responsibility for an act.
	One of the most fundamental aspects of criminal law is that prosecutors need to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that an alleged criminal both acted in a moral manner and possessed the requisite mental intent to commit the crime, but the Dear Colleague letter gets rid of that.
	And these are kangaroo courts abused by radicals.
	Tiana Lowe, National Review.
	Explain, quote, there's another side to the system's evil, one that has been drowned out by social justice blathering and a select few girls who cried rape.
	Because the guidelines are vague and uninstructed in crucial aspects, such as the rights of sexual assault victims and the accused, as well as the standards for keeping public statistics of conviction rates, schools vary widely in how they treat these cases, ranging from extreme bias against men accused of sexual assault to cruel prejudice against sexual assault victims.
	Every school that reaches a guilty verdict without so much as text messages submitted as evidence, there's another willing to exonerate a wealthy student at any cost.
	This gets rid of the due rights for the accused.
	I guess it was a 2011 letter.
	I guess it was a 2011 letter.
	It gets rid of the due process rights of the accused.
	And this is obviously anti-American.
	It's obviously a serious problem.
	But what the Democrats do, what people on the left do, is they say if you want any sort of legal standard actually upheld here for people accused of sexual assault, then that means that you must side with the rapists.
	You must side with the rapists.
	It's sort of a new Salem witch trial.
	Right?
	You're a witch if you float.
	Right?
	If you decide that you don't like these standards, then that must mean that you are a witch, right?
	Obviously you're pro-rape if you want people convicted of rape to actually have to have evidence proved against them.
	This is a religious standard, and that's because the left has a religious belief that anybody who claims victimhood must be considered a victim, unless of course you are a straight white male.
	If you're a straight white male, and you claim victimhood, that's because you're a whiner.
	But if you're not a straight white male, and you claim that you've been victimized in any sort of scenario, then that means we have to believe you without evidence.
	Now, you may have been a victim, okay?
	I'm not making light of people who are actual sexual assault victims.
	People who sexually assault, as I've said a thousand times, should be put in jail for life, castrated, or killed.
	Or all three, okay?
	Like, all of these are acceptable to me.
	But, the idea that you're going to set up your own sort of religious tribunal, that secularism doesn't come with radicalism, that secularism doesn't come with this sort of inquisitorial mindset of his own, it's just not true.
	Now, in a minute, I want to talk about what President Trump is doing to work with Democrats and what impact this is going to have on Republicans going forward.
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	That also lets them know Okay, so, in other political matters, President Trump has gone full Democrat on DACA, on the executive amnesty.
	He's also going full Democrat on the debt ceiling.
	And this is a serious problem.
	On the debt ceiling, I'll let Mark Meadows, who's one of the heads of the Freedom Caucus, explain why this is a serious problem with the debt ceiling.
	Because it is a serious problem with the debt ceiling.
	I think the cliff that it sets up in December right before Christmas is certainly not good.
	But it does show, and you always look for a silver lining, and that's one of the things that I'm looking for, is in this particular thing, it shows that the president is myopically focused on tax reform.
	I think what we have is certainly were people blindsided?
	Yes.
	Was I surprised?
	Without a doubt.
	And I think for many of us, there was not a conservative solution out there.
	You know, and so people want to criticize the Trump administration for making this call.
	We were talking about a clean debt ceiling, you know, months ago.
	You and I talked about that months ago.
	And so as we look at this, if there's not a conservative alternative, why should you get surprised?
	Okay, so there is a conservative alternative.
	Meadows could have provided it, and Trump could have gone along with it, but Trump didn't do any of those things.
	The idea there was nothing on the table that was better than what Trump did here is just not true.
	What he's saying here about this cliff, this fiscal cliff, you remember, we've done this a few times before.
	Basically, in December we're going to hit the end of the budget, and Republicans are going to have to pass a new continuing resolution to fund the budget, plus we're going to hit the debt ceiling again, and that means Republicans are going to have to push off the debt ceiling.
	Democrats are going to try to extract some sort of concessions in return for the budget and the debt ceiling.
	Now, Meadows says, the good news is that gives us three months to pass tax reform.
	That's not true, okay?
	I like Mark Meadows, but he's not right here, okay?
	Ben Sasse is correct.
	When Ben Sasse says, the problem is that if we really wanted to set up for tax reform, Then we would have gotten the government funded now, and we would have pushed off the debt ceiling for longer than three months, because the problem is, now Republicans know in the back of their mind they're going to have to make some concessions to Chuck Schumer in order for them to get the debt ceiling and the budget.
	And that means they can't push for such a harsh tax reform package, because Schumer can hold it hostage.
	Schumer can just say, listen, you're not going to get a single Democrat vote on that, and if you pass the tax reform, no debt ceiling increase and no budget.
	Okay, creates a serious problem here.
	Alaa Pandit over at Hot Air gets this exactly right.
	He says, I think Trump honestly believes Democrats are going to fund the border wall in December as part of a grand bargain to raise the debt ceiling and avert a shutdown.
	He didn't want a shutdown with them over that right now because the country's focused on storm damage and won't stand for a needless crisis of Uncle Sam's own making.
	But he does want a showdown with them eventually, sooner rather than later.
	That's the best explanation I can manage for why he preferred a short-term solution to the long-term one.
	Unless, of course, he and his new friend Chuck managed to blow up the debt ceiling altogether before then, that also wouldn't be conducive to draining the swamp, but it would make fiscal standoffs much harder for conservatives like Sass to engineer.
	So in other words, he's saying maybe the best salute, maybe the best rationale for Trump doing this is that he just didn't want to fight like this moment because of Hurricane Harvey, but he had the upper hand in this fight because if Democrats hold up funding for Hurricane Harvey, Then Republicans win.
	We know this because Democrats actually did this over Hurricane Sandy, and Republicans lost.
	Whichever party says, we're going to hold up the debt ceiling because we don't like what you're doing with hurricane funding, pays the price.
	They pay the political price.
	That actually happened back during Hurricane Sandy, if you recall.
	It actually helped Barack Obama when Republicans pushed for fiscal restraint in the face of Hurricane Harvey.
	But Republicans are in control right now.
	It's just bad policy all the way through, and a lot of it is coming from Trump's animus and ire for the Republicans right now.
	How do I know that?
	Because Trump basically tweeted that out this morning.
	This morning, Trump tweeted out, Republicans, sorry.
	He seriously tweeted this out.
	Republicans, sorry.
	But I've been hearing about repeal and replace for seven years.
	Didn't happen.
	Even worse, the Senate filibuster rule will never allow the Republicans to pass even great legislation.
	Eight Dems control.
	We'll rarely get 60 versus 51 votes.
	It's a Repub death wish.
	Republicans must start the tax reform tax cut legislation ASAP.
	Don't wait until the end of September.
	Need it now more than ever.
	Hurry!
	OK, well, I understand that you're saying now they have to hurry, but the problem is that they're going to have to hash this out.
	Legislation takes time.
	It doesn't magically appear in front of you.
	And this idea that Trump has this weird idea of the presidency that was promoted by some people who I like, like Grover Norquist, that McConnell and Ryan were just going to put legislation on his desk.
	That's not how this is gonna work.
	That's not how this is gonna work, okay?
	The president has to take an active role in shaping how this works, because here's the truth.
	Trump isn't punishing Republicans.
	It's not that Republicans universally want tax reform, and now Trump is urging them forward.
	Republicans don't universally want tax reform.
	That's the whole point.
	There are a bunch of Republicans who are happy to vote with Democrats on this stuff, and Trump, by doing this, is actually granting them cover.
	If you don't get anything done now, Trump is basically gonna say, well, you know, the Republicans just couldn't get it done.
	And unless you're conservative, in which case you get bashed by your own base for not supporting Trump.
	Let's say you're Lindsey Graham.
	And let's say you don't support the tax reform package that's put on the table.
	And Trump says, listen, I gave you guys a chance and you didn't do it, now I'm working with the Democrats.
	You think that really makes people like Susan Collins upset?
	You think she's sitting around going, oh no, now I'm gonna have to vote with the Democrats?
	Of course not!
	The whole critique of Republicans is that they were too willing to work with Democrats, threatening Republicans by saying, listen, if you guys won't work together, I'm gonna go work with the Democrats.
	That doesn't work at all.
	That doesn't work at all.
	I mean, that's legitimately like saying, listen, arsonist who wants to burn down my house, if you try to burn down my house, I'm telling you right now, if you try to burn down my house and you don't succeed, I'm gonna set it on fire myself.
	What?
	That doesn't, no, no, that's not how any of this works.
	The fact that this is being driven by personal ire does not make it good.
	Mick Mulvaney, who is Trump's head of Office of Management and Budget, he basically came out and said that this is all because Trump is mad at Ryan and McConnell.
	Do you know whether the president is genuinely annoyed at Republicans in Niagara, at the leadership?
	And that's why he's reaching across the aisle, because he's fed up with them.
	I just read into what he did with Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi on this dead thing as a sign.
	I'm sick of you guys.
	I'll answer half your question, which is, is he annoyed with Republican leadership?
	Yeah, I think he probably is.
	And believe me, as a Republican, so am I. As a citizen, I am too.
	I was promised that they would have repealed and replaced Obamacare by now.
	I'm a voter.
	I have a member of Congress.
	I have a senator.
	I've not only made those promises to people for the last seven years when I was running for office, People made them to me.
	And I was disappointed and somewhat annoyed that we've not followed through on that promise.
	I don't think that's an unnatural reaction at all.
	And to the extent that the President was annoyed by that, I think he's simply reflecting the opinion of many of the people in the country.
	I agree, we're all annoyed by it.
	I've been ripping on Ryan McConnell all year long.
	I mean, of course we're all annoyed by it, but the solution to being annoyed by it is not to go over to the other side.
	I mean, that was the entire logic of Trump vs. Hillary.
	Literally the entire logic of Trump vs. Hillary was, we have to stop the Democratic agenda.
	It's not stopping the Democratic agenda to vote with Pelosi and Schumer.
	Okay, that's just madness, what we're talking about right now.
	And, by the way, if you think that this is all just a slap at Paul Ryan and he's really upset and Mitch McConnell, they're sitting around crying into their beer because Trump is working with Pelosi and Schumer, recognize something.
	Republicans just passed Trump's deal with Pelosi and Schumer with majorities in both houses.
	Okay, here's Paul Ryan.
	Literally yesterday, two days ago, Paul Ryan said that any attempt to connect Hurricane Harvey funding with the debt ceiling was ridiculous, irresponsible, terrible.
	Trump flips, and boom, look at Paul Ryan now.
	We're getting hit with two hurricanes.
	We're still dealing with Harvey in Texas, Louisiana.
	We're just now getting hit with Irma, and he wanted to make this a bipartisan moment.
	He wanted to make this a bipartisan moment where we weren't fighting each other up in Washington about hurricane aid.
	He just wanted to get it done, get it out of the way, so that aid is flowing to the states that need it right now, so that we can go and then focus on things like tax reform.
	So it's perfectly reasonable and rational why he's doing what he's doing.
	Okay, one second.
	This is the worst idea ever.
	Trump does it, and all of a sudden he's fine with it.
	Does that look like Ryan is very disappointed and upset?
	Or does it look like he's kind of willing to work with Democrats, which was the whole rip on him a year ago.
	The whole reason Trump was elected is because it was conservatives, right, not even conservatives, Republicans like Ryan and McConnell, these rhinos constantly working with Democrats.
	And then Trump goes and works with Democrats in revenge?
	How's that revenge?
	How's that not giving them exactly what they want?
	It's even worse than that.
	Trump on executive amnesty.
	So Trump, let's just do a quick flashback here.
	Let's remember what happened over the past five years.
	Here's 2012.
	Here's Jeb Bush in 2012 talking about how he supports the so-called Dream Act.
	This was an act to legalize all of the dreamers.
	If the law says clearly that you have a case-by-case right to review cases, and you blanket, say, 800,000 people comply, that is way beyond the purview of executive power.
	So I don't support that.
	I think to use the power of the presidency effectively, you don't have to use it for cynical reasons.
	You don't have to use it beyond what your power, what the Constitution allows.
	But having a solution to the fact that we have all these young people, many of whom are making great contributions, don't have a connection to their parents' former country, yeah, of course I'm for it.
	Okay, so that is him taking Trump's exact position today.
	Right?
	How dare Barack Obama do the DACA?
	But if the legislature wants to pass some sort of solution, that'd be great.
	Right?
	And remember, in 2016, it wasn't like Trump was shy about this.
	In 2016, he kept punching Jeb Bush through a wall every five minutes over exactly this position.
	I don't often agree with Marco, and I don't often agree with Ted, but I can in this case.
	The weakest person on this stage by far on illegal immigration is Jeb Bush.
	They come out of an act of love, whether you like it or not.
	He is so weak on illegal immigration, it's laughable, and everybody knows it.
	So, you know, this is the standard operating procedure to disparage me.
	That's fine.
	I don't really care.
	Spend a little more money on the commercials.
	Okay, and that was what Trump did the entire campaign.
	That's why people liked it.
	Because Jeb was weak!
	There was a pansy!
	And there was Trump!
	Beating him down!
	Like Donkey Kong!
	I mean, just ripping him apart!
	And now, here's Nancy Pelosi talking yesterday about President Trump, the guy who savaged Jeb Bush.
	Here is Nancy Pelosi.
	We made it very clear in the course of the conversation that the priority was to pass the DREAM Act, that we wanted to do it.
	Obviously, it has to be bipartisan.
	The president said he supports that, he would sign it.
	But we have to get it passed.
	Okay, so look how magical that is.
	In the space of five years, Trump went from, Jeb Bush is the weakest, in the space of a year, he went from Jeb Bush is the weakest on immigration to embracing Jeb Bush's exact position on the Dreamers.
	Like, word for word, the exact position.
	Hey, is that a slap in the face to the establishment, guys?
	Like, I understand that we've now redefined anti-establishment to just mean whatever we want it to mean.
	I understand we've redefined RINO to mean whatever we want it to mean.
	But these things used to have meanings, right?
	Anti-establishment used to mean you opposed policies like Jeb Bush, and you didn't want to stand with the Democrats.
	Now, anti-establishment means that you want to stand against the Democrats because Trump.
	Okay, so if Trump declared himself a Democrat tomorrow, there would be a contingent of Republicans who would simply say, well, you know, you're a real rhino if you don't go with Trump.
	Because Trump's the ultimate Republican.
	So if Trump becomes a Democrat, you should become a Democrat too, or you're a rhino.
	Okay, then.
	That's weird how that all happened in five seconds.
	Okay, well then.
	Well, I want to get to things I like and things I hate.
	And listen, I hope that Trump pulls back from this.
	I hope that Trump stops with this flirtation with the Democrats.
	I don't see that happening anytime in the near future.
	He's enjoying this too much.
	He's enjoying throwing everyone into chaos.
	He's enjoying taking off, supposedly, Ryan and McConnell.
	He's enjoying the love of the press.
	Please, Mr. President, these are not the policies that got you elected.
	These are not the people who got you elected.
	Pelosi and Schumer will impeach you the first chance they get.
	For the love of Mike, please, for goodness sake, put a head back on your shoulders and recognize you may hate Ryan, you may hate McConnell.
	We're all disappointed in them.
	But this notion that you are going to sit around making deals with the Democrats because you must in order to tick off members of your own party is just a waste.
	Okay, so we're going to do things I like, things I hate, and the mailbag.
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	Okay, time for some things I like and then some things I hate and the mailbags.
	So things I like, before I get to an entertainment thing I like, I first want to point out that Berkeley has now released the tickets.
	It's too late, they sold out in 45 minutes.
	In legitimately 45 minutes, they sold out 1,000 tickets.
	They cut off the other 1,000 tickets because that's what Berkeley does, because they're afraid Antifa is going to come in and grab chairs and fling them over the railings and murder people, basically.
	But Berkeley should obviously release the other 1,000 tickets.
	We have at least 3,000 people who want the tickets.
	At least 3,000.
	Probably more at this point.
	Probably 4,000 or 5,000 people want the tickets, and Berkeley has restricted the venue because they can't protect it.
	But they're taking security measures that are absolutely amazing.
	I mean, the security measures that they're taking because of Antifa are extraordinary.
	They're actually locking down six separate buildings, apparently.
	Six buildings, outside the one I'm speaking in.
	Okay, in a campus-wide email on Thursday, this is according to James Barrett over at Daily Wire, Berkeley's Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost, Paul Alivisatos, detailed the steps the university is taking in order to keep things on campus from devolving into chaos, because I am arriving.
	Apparently, they are locking down a bunch of buildings.
	They're shutting down multiple buildings and parking lots to create a closed perimeter around Zellerbach Hall, where I am speaking.
	I mean, this is scary stuff, folks.
	They're creating a secure perimeter by shutting down buildings, providing alternative options for faculty, staff, and students so they can try to engage in their regular academic activities without fear of violence erupting.
	So if there's still classes going on around that time, they're trying to find them alternative classrooms with police guards, basically, so that Antifa doesn't attack normal students.
	Imposing special restrictions on tickets and IDs.
	You have to show up.
	They're only selling them one at a time.
	You can't buy a block of tickets.
	So everybody has to show up and personally show an ID in order to pick up the ticket, which is an insane process.
	And they're offering support and counseling services for faculty, staff, and students because I might hurt your feelings.
	So, obviously, the real threat here is not the people who might throw chairs into the audience.
	It's me.
	Because, wah-wah, I might hurt your feelings.
	Oh, you need some counseling.
	Antifa, by the way, has released its own poster.
	They don't call themselves Antifa.
	They call themselves Refuse Fascism.
	But, I am a fascist, apparently.
	You know, despite the fact that I have spent my entire career being anti-fascist, and ripping the alt-right, and suggesting the alt-right are garbage people with garbage beliefs, and fighting fascism my entire career.
	No, I am the real fascist.
	It's pretty amazing.
	Also, worth noting, the Berkeley Student Senate wanted to pass a resolution condemning Berkeley subsidizing my event next week, but it failed by a vote of 15-5.
	That vote failed by a vote of 15-5 because there were a bunch of student senators who were upset that the resolution was too broad.
	He wanted to create two bills, one condemning the subsidization of my event, and the other condemning hate speech in general.
	Then that's because they didn't want to lump me in with other people who were engaged in hate speech.
	So, good on some of the Berkeley students who recognize that not all speech is exactly the same, although the hate speech notion itself is sort of ridiculous because it's absolutely changeable under any circumstances.
	Okay, so, the event at Berkeley is going to go forward.
	If you're upset that you can't get a ticket, Feel free to call in and register your disapproval politely.
	Politely.
	Always be polite.
	We're the good guys here.
	Okay, so be polite.
	And I will see you at Berkeley and I will give you more updates next week.
	I mean, this is dangerous stuff, locking down full buildings.
	Craziness.
	Wow.
	But I'm the fascist, by the way.
	My speech is called, Fighting Campus Thuggery.
	And the Antifa poster says, I'm the real thug.
	Okay, they're not locking down the top level because of me.
	I'm not the one tossing chairs, you morons.
	Okay, time for another thing that I like.
	So, there's a series that I've just started watching.
	I cannot vouch for the entire series.
	I can vouch for like the first three episodes, which I've seen so far.
	Hopefully it holds up.
	It has like 94% on Rotten Tomatoes.
	There is some random nudity for no reason, because it was made in Europe, and that's just what Europeans do.
	But here is, it's available on Amazon.
	The show is called Fortitude.
	We live on the one place on Earth.
	We're guaranteed a quiet life. - Where lovers of the wilderness, lovers of the Northern Lights, or just lovers, can witness the wildest things they'll ever see from the safest place on Earth.
	Hello!
	So naturally it doesn't end up being the safest place on Earth.
	You might have gotten that from, like, the fact that it's a show.
	If it was just the safest place on Earth, that'd be the most boring show ever.
	But it's... I'm interested to see where it's going.
	It's got sort of a slightly supernatural element to it.
	I wouldn't say too much.
	It feels sort of like a mixture between The Stand and...
	And wherever they film Batman Begins when Batman is training.
	That's basically the mashup.
	But I can vouch for the first four episodes and they're good.
	Okay, time for a thing that I hate and then we'll do the mail- You know what?
	Let's skip the thing I hate and let's spend more time on mailbag today.
	Because I hate so many things.
	Like, what's the point?
	Okay, so let's just go straight to the mailbag.
	And we'll take your questions live as well.
	Stephen says, what made you choose the violin?
	So, when you're five years old, which is when I started playing, you don't actually have the capacity to choose anything.
	So it was my parents who chose the violin for me.
	The reason was because, just sort of by random coincidence, I had a blankie, and the blankie had letters on it, and it had pictures for each letter.
	And in one corner was a V for violin, and I was constantly kind of sucking on the corner of the blankie when I was like three.
	That had the V for violin.
	And so they said, okay, violin it is.
	And I ended up being good at it.
	I think I'm going to get my kids started on instruments soon.
	The oldest one is three and a half, and I think that next year when she's four, I'm going to get her started on an instrument.
	She says she wants to play cello, interestingly.
	She's a very sophisticated three and a half year old.
	Like really, when we are in the car, I say, what do you want to listen to?
	And she'll say the Firebird, like by Stravinsky.
	She really says this.
	Like the music that she likes.
	She also likes Beethoven's 6th.
	She likes a lot of the music from Fantasia.
	And also she likes In the Hall of the Mountain King by Grieg.
	These are some of her favorites.
	Okay, Jonathan says, Dear Ben, I'm wondering what your opinion is on the drinking age.
	Some people argue if you're able to go to war and vote, you should also be able to drink.
	Do you agree with this?
	Yes, I agree with this.
	If you're old enough to make a decision about voting, you're old enough to make a decision about drinking, and also don't make stupid decisions generally.
	But yeah, if we're gonna set the voting age at 18, or you can serve in the military at 18, or get a job at 18, yes, you should be able to drink if you see fit.
	Devon says, thank you for all the great content.
	I'm a store manager for a large company.
	My company loves to hire 18 to 22 year olds for high pressure sales jobs.
	I'm having trouble getting them motivated to do the work necessary to be successful.
	Any suggestions on managing immature young people?
	Well, I mean, I think the only advice that I would give is the hard advice, which is do the job or you're fired, basically.
	Like, learn the consequences of life.
	This is a hard job, it's an exciting job, you can make a lot of money, but you need to do the work or I'm gonna can you.
	Right?
	Kids need consequences.
	This is the funny thing about parenting now, is that, as a parent, I know, because you love your children so much, and this is true of young people, you love your children so much, That you think that the worst thing you can do to them is set boundaries and rules.
	Kids like boundaries and rules.
	They want to know that the world is safe, and they want to know that there's a set of rules that if they follow, everything's going to be okay.
	This is also true for people who are 18 to 22.
	It's true for all people, that they want to know what the rules are.
	They want to know the rules of the game.
	You know, I've worked with young people at this company for a long time.
	I'm still a relatively young person.
	And I was a syndicated columnist when I was 17, so I was very successful when I was very young.
	But, when I work with young people at the company, basically, they know.
	You have a responsibility.
	Your responsibility is to produce acts.
	I'm not going to micromanage you.
	Right?
	If I hired the right person, I don't have to micromanage you.
	Actually, people at the company know this.
	I prefer not to interact in terms of managing your job.
	Your job is your job.
	I'm going to tell you what I need you to do, and you're going to do it.
	And if you don't do it, you're going to get fired.
	And it's that simple.
	And it has nothing to do with like or dislike.
	You have a job to do.
	And the better you do your job, the more I'll like the job you do.
	I think that you set that standard very early on.
	I think that young people understand that, and they respect that.
	I think it's the same thing with teachers.
	Teachers who want to be friends with their students, it's a total fail.
	But teachers who say, listen, you work hard, you'll get an A. You don't work hard, you'll get an F. I think students appreciate that.
	Nick says, There's a bit of a personal question, but I'll just get right to it.
	Last year, my dad cheated on my mom.
	My mom caught him and said he was going to end.
	It never did.
	My parents are currently getting divorced, and he has become more open about dating this woman he had the affair with.
	Nothing has changed with the way he treated me.
	He still treats me great, and we have a good relationship.
	However, I'm finding it hard to still respect the man.
	I love him, but this has definitely put a strain on our relationship.
	What should I do?
	Should I just accept him with his faults or treat him with respect but never truly forgive him?
	Thanks.
	Well, I'm not sure that he asked you for forgiveness.
	And obviously, forgiveness would also require repentance.
	In Judaism, there's a difference between forgiveness and repentance.
	If you are asking for my forgiveness, you have to stop doing what you are doing.
	If you're punching me in the face, and in the middle you say, I'm really sorry, and then you punch me in the face again, I can't forgive you, okay?
	The whole point of you repenting is that you stop doing what you're doing.
	Now in this particular case, it sounds like your parents are currently getting divorced and it's not getting put back together.
	I think that your best move is probably just to accept that your dad is a deeply flawed human being.
	I don't think it's inappropriate for you to be angry at your father or feel anger with him.
	Your feelings are totally justified, I think.
	But if you want to live a happier life, I think that you're going to have to just accept that your dad is a flawed person.
	That the relationship between your parents is really between them.
	I think your mom will probably understand this as well and I Listen if God forbid that happened with my parents I would certainly have trust issues with my father for the rest of his life for certain so I can't blame you for having those trust issues but I think that reliving this over and over is not going to be a Productive experience if you want to have a relationship with him if you don't want to have a relationship with him then that's a choice you can make as well and that Also, I don't think it's a completely unreasonable choice.
	So, tribalism in Judaism is supposed to be about the ideas of Judaism.
	in religious contexts like Judaism, but unacceptable in political contexts.
	So tribalism in Judaism is supposed to be about the ideas of Judaism.
	So religious tribalism is about the ideas.
	Okay, ethnic tribalism is about nothing It's about outward manifestations, right?
	It's about race or sex or stuff that's not supposed to make a difference, right?
	There is a real philosophical and political difference between Judaism and other religions, just like there is between Christianity and other religions or Islam and other religions.
	These are distinctions that make a difference in how you lead your life.
	So, there can be ideological tribalism.
	That's not really tribalism, that's ideology.
	Now, what's weird about Judaism is that Judaism does have an ethnic component, but you can convert into Judaism, right?
	It's not purely ethnic.
	If you decide that you want to become a Jew, you can convert and become a Jew.
	If Judaism were purely ethnic, then the suggestion would be that you can't become a Jew no matter what, and that if you, and that, and therefore, we only accept people of a particular bloodline.
	That's not correct.
	If you want to convert, we will accept your conversion.
	We also don't believe, by the way, that if you're not Jewish that you can't get into heaven or be a good person or anything.
	It's one of the weird things about Judaism as opposed to other religions.
	We are not exclusive in our access to God or heaven.
	So that's worth noting.
	As well.
	People ask me all the time, from a Jewish perspective, and I'm not going to give the halakhic, the Jewish perspective, I'm going to give my own perspective.
	Now, there's a lot about ethnic Judaism and Judaism, this idea that you have allegiance to people who are ethnically Jewish.
	Okay, I don't really feel strong allegiance to people who are quote-unquote ethnically Jewish, just because they were born and have a last name that ends in Gold or Steen.
	Like, that doesn't seem to, like, Noam Chomsky, if I had a choice between saving Mathis and Noam Chomsky, that is the easiest choice in the world.
	Neither.
	No, the easiest choice in the world would be Mathis, obviously.
	Noam Chomsky's a garbage human being.
	I'm not a big fan of the idea that ethnicity defines your goodness or badness.
	The ethnic Judaism just has to do with who is considered a Jew initially in Judaism and who can be part of the Jewish people.
	But again, you can convert in.
	My question is, in the eyes of God, how is killing during war different than murder?
	And what about collateral damage when so-called innocents lose their lives?
	FYI, totally obsessed with you, not in a Glenn Close fatal attraction type of way, but really close, lol.
	Well, that would explain the dead rabbit, but as far as how is killing during war different than murder?
	Killing during war is different than murder because presumably the people on the other side are trying to kill you, so it's more self-defense.
	This is why there's all sorts, reams of religious literature and moral literature about what justifies war.
	Is preemptive war justified if you're protecting your own life?
	The idea of a purely aggressive war is sort of foreign to moral concepts.
	The idea of, I'm just gonna go to war because I want your resources?
	Most moral people don't believe that's a thing.
	But, if you are fighting an army that's determined to conquer you, invade your rights, kill you, change your way of life, then that changes the math somewhat.
	As far as collateral damage, This is a serious problem that moral people also have to consider, which is, if I have to fight that army, how guilty are the innocents who are associated with that army?
	So this actually has a lot of moral complexity to it.
	So going back to the time of Napoleon, before Napoleon, actually these were very easy questions, because there were civilians and then there were people who were military.
	And the military people were basically lords who would ride around in their armor and hit each other.
	And then they'd have armies that they hired to hit each other, and they'd go out to the middle of a field and fight each other.
	That made things a lot clearer.
	Napoleon was the first world leader who actually integrated civilian with military.
	So he said, all Frenchmen are now soldiers, right?
	If you are a Frenchman and you have a farm, your farm is now a stock place for goods for the military.
	There is no distinction anymore between civilian and military.
	This move has really changed the nature of warfare in large scale.
	So has democracy, because the argument is made that if you voted for Hitler, then you're part of Hitler's army, sort of.
	You know, it's an argument, but the chief rule for moral folks is you try to avoid collateral damage as much as possible.
	That's why the Geneva Conventions exist.
	It's to try to avoid collateral damage.
	It's also why it's so incredibly stupid when people say that terrorists ought to have rights under the Geneva Convention.
	The whole point of a terrorist is that a terrorist hides in a civilian area not wearing a military uniform.
	The whole point of the Geneva Conventions is to try to make your enemy wear a military uniform so you know who it's okay to kill.
	If they hide as a civilian and they hide in a civilian area, you don't know who it's okay to kill, and then you end up killing a bunch of innocent people.
	That's the whole point.
	It's why you shouldn't give the same right to people who dress up like civilians and then act as terrorists as people who are in military uniform, right?
	This is why there's an in-uniform, out-of-uniform distinction in international law.
	Joseph says, What does cruel and unusual punishment mean within the context of the Bill of Rights?
	Everyone I see mention it uses a subjective interpretation, but I feel as if that's not what the founders intended.
	Thanks.
	Well, so I believe in the Clarence Thomas, Justice Scalia originalism view of cruel and unusual punishment, so you'd have to go back and look at what was considered cruel and unusual at the time.
	There's this very, very weird notion on the left that cruel and unusual punishment includes the death penalty.
	Clearly it does not include the death penalty.
	There's an actual penalty prescribed in the Constitution for treason, and it is death.
	So the same people who wrote the cruel and unusual punishment ban would not have also prescribed death if they thought it was a cruel and unusual punishment.
	What they're probably talking about is forms of torture that were used pretty commonly at the time in monarchies, and you can look up the forms of torture that were used largely at the time and considered cruel and unusual, but you have to go back to the time and measure it by those standards.
	Seth says, "It was taught to me in college "that 51% of refugees are children.
	"Can you explain the difference between refugees, "asylum seekers, and other migrants "to show that the threat of a heavily young male "migrant population is real?" So, they're asylum seekers.
	These are people who presumably, legally speaking anyway, these are people who presumably are coming from a place where they are in danger, and we try to grant them asylum to protect them from the country that they are fleeing.
	There are refugees, who are people of any sort who are just fleeing from a dangerous country.
	They're not specific targets.
	Asylum seekers usually are specific targets.
	Refugees are just people fleeing from a bad situation.
	And migrants are people who are coming for work.
	A lot of the people who are coming to Europe right now, a huge percentage of them are male and they're young and they're setting up, so the argument is that a lot of them are coming over and setting up sort of a financially secure situation before bringing the rest of their family in.
	But this also does create some questions about whether these are actual refugees or they're more economic migrants.
	Are these people who are using the refugee situation as a lever in order to get into Europe?
	Or are these people who are actually fleeing?
	If they were just fleeing, you know, Just getting out wholesale, you would expect more women and children.
	So, I think that supply and demand is... Here's... So, let's put it this way.
	Let's say that you're a grocery store.
	You have 100 bottles of water in your grocery store.
	and demand principles or do you think it's wrong and should not be done?
	So I think that supply and demand is, here's, so let's put it this way.
	Let's say that you're a grocery store.
	You have 100 bottles of water in your grocery store and there are 400 people who want the bottles of water.
	How exactly are you going to decide which 100 people get the bottles of water?
	Is it wrong for you to say the people who can afford the bottles of water ought to get the bottles of water?
	Should you go to first come first serve and not raise your prices?
	Well maybe you might think that out of charity you're going to do that but here is the problem if you are a company that is shipping the water bottles down to that area and now it's more dangerous to ship the bottles down to that area because there's a hurricane how are you going to incentivize that company to get those bottles down into that area?
	Now during a natural disaster there's a feeling that everyone should unite and basically put profit aside but It is just naturally more expensive.
	You have to pay somebody more to drive through a hurricane to get the water bottles to the store.
	That means the price increases.
	So, whenever there's a natural disaster, it creates more scarcity.
	More scarcity means you have to go through more in order to get the product there.
	That means the prices are going to increase.
	I do not think it is immoral for prices to increase during a natural disaster.
	I do think it is charitable to try and prevent the prices from increasing.
	Okay, so it's both, right?
	I don't think it's immoral for prices to increase.
	I don't think you're screwing anyone.
	I don't think that's the goal.
	I think that's a recognition of economic reality, and I think it also incentivizes people who are not charitable to bring more goods in to a bad area.
	I think it's charitable if you can do it, to lower prices voluntarily.
	Adam says, Would you rather have dinner with Barack Obama or Donald Trump?
	Which one could you see yourself having a better conversation with?
	That sounds like a horror of a dinner choice.
	I mean, that's like F. Mary Kill with Michael Moore, Rosie O'Donnell, and Noam Chomsky.
	I mean, that's just awful.
	So, you know, would I rather have dinner with Barack Obama or Donald Trump?
	Let's put it this way.
	I think I could have a conversation about literature and movies with Barack Obama.
	I'm not sure I could with Donald Trump.
	Yeah, I think that Donald Trump and I, like, it seems to me that all of his conversations, like, it would just be awful anyway.
	Barack would just sit there talking about how great he is, and then Trump would sit there talking about how great he is, and I'd be so bored, but I get the feeling that conversation with Obama would just be, on an intellectual level, a little more stimulating than conversation with Trump.
	But that's not because I agree with Obama.
	I think they're both, I think Obama's a horror show.
	I think I agree with Trump on more things, but I actually enjoy sometimes talking with people with whom I disagree.
	Anyway, okay, Evan says, what TV shows do you let your kids watch?
	So I don't actually let my kids watch TV shows.
	I let my kids watch old movies.
	So I don't let, the young one is still under the age of two, he doesn't watch TV.
	The one who is three and a half, she is, old Disney movies?
	So she's seen a lot of the old Disney movies, like Bambi.
	She watches Fantasia a lot right now.
	She's in that stage.
	And she watches a lot of old musicals.
	So she knows Singing in the Rain.
	She knows Summer Stock.
	She knows her favorite is Seven Brides for Seven Brothers.
	She loves Seven Brides for Seven Brothers.
	This is how my parents brought me up.
	We used to go to a store out here called Eddie Brandt's Saturday Matinee, which is sort of the great video store in Los Angeles.
	And they used to rent old episodes of Dick Van Dyke and the Waltons and old movies.
	And so that's why I've seen so many old movies.
	She's being brought up along the same lines.
	Austin says, "In the instance that children end up in a situation where they have no caregivers, families killed by natural disaster, for example, who do you believe should be responsible for taking care of those children?
	Private charity, church communities, nonprofit, or government using taxpayers?" So I think that that is the order of preference.
	So friends and family, After that, private charities through religious communities.
	And after that, the government.
	The government should always be the lender of last resort, essentially.
	Because the fact is that foster care and government care is very, very difficult.
	And the adoption process is far too complex, thanks to government.
	Okay, that brings us to the end of today's Mailbag.
	If you did not get into today's Mailbag, then you should subscribe, because next week is going to be a fun Mailbag.
	If I survive Berkeley next Thursday, there will be a Mailbag next Friday, and we can talk all about it.
	Next week will be a big, important week, not just because of Berkeley, but also because we will see where President Trump goes next, which will be fascinating.
	Plus, we'll keep you updated on all the hurricanes and the disasters, because clearly something weird is going on.
	I'm Ben Shapiro.

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