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Feb. 2, 2018 - The Ben Shapiro Show

55:33

It’s Memo Day | Ep. 467

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	The memo is out, and we are going to go through it as it comes out more.
	It's coming out piece by piece, but we'll do what we can.
	I'm Ben Shapiro.
	This is The Ben Shapiro Show.
	Yes, one of the dangers of doing a live show is that news breaks right as you are doing the show.
	So the full memo is not yet out.
	We have only seen summaries of a memo, which is itself a summary of intelligence documents.
	So we'll bring you all of the information as it breaks.
	But we have some interesting, interesting news about the memo, and it's not Exactly a nothing burger.
	There was a lot of talk about how it was going to be a giant disappointment.
	If what Byron York at the Washington Examiner says is true, if what Fox News reporting is true, if the memo itself is reflective of truth, then the FBI has some answers that it needs to be giving.
	We'll talk about all of that in just one second.
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	All right, so we do not have the entire memo.
	The entire memo is about to be released, but we don't actually have the entire text of the memo.
	If it comes out during the show, then I will just read the entire memo to you verbatim, because it's not that long.
	It's about four pages long.
	So here is what we know.
	According to Fox News, The memo suggests that the FBI, when it first gathered a FISA warrant on Carter Page—Carter Page was a Trump foreign policy adviser, and he was supposedly colluding with the Russians, right?
	This was the supposition of the FBI.
	This is why they went and got a FISA warrant on an American citizen who was a member of the Trump campaign.
	The question is, what was that warrant based on?
	When you submit an application to FISA courts, you have to say, here's why we have probable cause to believe that we need a wiretap on this guy.
	So what did they use for that?
	Well, according to the memo, the only thing that they used, and the central component that they used, was the Steele dossier.
	The Steele dossier was a piece of bad research compiled by a spy named Christopher Steele, who went over to Russia and talked to probably some paid Russian folks.
	And it was done on behalf of Fusion GPS.
	Fusion GPS is an OPPO research firm.
	Originally, Fusion GPS was hired by the Washington Free Beacon to do OPPO research on Trump.
	They cut out of that project, but then Fusion GPS shopped around that intel, and Hillary Clinton decided that she was going to fund the OPPO research file.
	So she funded the Fusion GPS dossier, which was based on research from Christopher Steele, who was getting information from the Russians.
	That information was then funneled to the FBI, and the FBI, based on that unverified dossier, based on a piece of information they were unwilling to verify, went to the FISA courts.
	Now, why is that a big deal?
	It's a big deal for a couple of reasons.
	It's a big deal for a couple of reasons.
	Number one, the Fox News Fox News is quoting from the memo.
	They're the only people who have access as Washington Examiner on Fox News at this point.
	According to Fox News, Christopher Steele, the guy who compiled the memo, the original dossier that the warrant was based on, admitted his feelings against then-candidate Trump in September of 2016 when he said that Steele was, quote, desperate that President Trump not get elected and was passionate about him not being president.
	But that's not the only thing that's in the memo.
	According to the Washington Examiner, according to Byron York at the Washington Examiner, the Steele dossier formed an essential part of the initial in all three renewal FISA applications against Carter Page.
	Here is the key point.
	The deputy FBI director who just resigned confirmed that no FISA warrant would have been sought from the FISA court without the Steele dossier information.
	In other words, they used as the centerpiece of getting a warrant on an American citizen who was part of the Trump campaign an OPPO research hit from Hillary Clinton that was non-verified.
	What's even worse, the political origins of the Steele dossier were known to senior DOJ and FBI officials, but excluded from FISA applications.
	So, by omission, they lied to the court.
	They went to the FISA court, and they said, we have information that all this stuff is happening with regard to Carter Page.
	But they didn't say, we got this from a Fusion GPS dossier compiled by Hillary Clinton.
	Because then the court might have said, well, have you checked any of this?
	Then the court might have thought, well, have you checked in?
	This raises some serious questions, by the way, about the operations of FISA courts, if they're not actually doing the research and asking the FBI to verify that the information they're being provided is actually true.
	If they're just putting things like the Russian pee tape—remember, the dossier was filled with a bunch of bad information, like the idea that Trump had gone to Moscow and then hired a hotel.
	He tried to get the room that Barack Obama and Michelle Obama had stayed in and hired Russian prostitutes to pee on the bed.
	Most of this stuff was nonsense, and nearly none of it has been verified.
	If they were using that unverified information to get a FISA warrant, and the FISA court went along with that without asking any other questions, that asks some broader questions about how FISA courts are actually putting out the warrants.
	Apparently, DOJ official Bruce Ohr met with Steele beginning in summer of 2016, and that's when Steele told him that he wanted Trump not to be president.
	The FBI and Justice Department—this is all according to Washington Examiner Byron York—the FBI and Justice Department mounted a months-long effort to keep the information outlined in the memo out of the House Intelligence Committee's hands.
	Only the threat of contempt charges and other forms of pressure forced the FBI and Justice to give up the material.
	Once Intelligence Committee leaders and staff compiled some of that information into the memo, the FBI and Justice Department, supported by Capitol Hill Democrats, mounted a ferocious campaign of opposition, saying release of the memo would endanger national security and the rule of law.
	Now, if what these excerpts show is what's really the main point of the memo, I don't know how that endangers national security or the rule of law.
	That looks like that was a cover, if that's the case, by the FBI and by Democrats, because they didn't want the information getting out there.
	Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes was determined to make the information available to the public, and President Trump, of course, cleared it just today and sent it over to the House.
	Now, I'm rapidly updating my Twitter to see if they're actually releasing the full text at this point.
	They've only released excerpts so far, so we have not actually seen the full thing.
	We're also going to find out whether there's a Democratic response to the memo.
	We're going to find out what the Democratic response had to say, because they're, of course, saying that all of this is taken out of context.
	I'd like to hear how this is taken out of context or how this was gotten wrong.
	So, again, Fox News, Washington Examiner are basically accusing the FBI of the same thing and accusing the DOJ of the same thing, and that is essentially colluding with the Hillary Clinton campaign, who, in essence, were working with a source who's relying on the Russians for information about Donald Trump.
	And then they were taking that information to open a FISA warrant on Carter Page.
	If this is the centerpiece, what does that mean?
	What does that mean?
	Well, it could mean one of two things.
	It could mean that the entire Trump-Russia collusion thing was based on a lie put out by the Hillary Clinton campaign, or bad info put out by the Hillary Clinton campaign, and therefore, fruit of the poisonous tree, the entire Russian collusion scandal was a bunch of nonsense from the very beginning, and that this entire investigation has been a sham and a fraud perpetrated at the highest levels of the American government by the Obama administration, the Hillary Clinton campaign, the DOJ, and the FBI.
	That is observation number one.
	Or it could be that after the FISA warrant was actually gotten on Carter Page, it turns out there was other information that came up.
	And that other information lent credibility to the idea that there was some sort of collusion going on.
	Like, for example, the Donald Trump Jr.
	meeting at Trump Tower with a Russian lawyer, the letters between Donald Trump Jr., the emails between Donald Trump Jr.
	and a Russian PR guy.
	Saying that the Russian government was trying to help out Donald Trump Jr.
	It does cast a new light on a lot of this.
	It makes some of the conspiracy theories about meetings like that a little bit more, I would say, easy to swallow.
	One of the conspiracy theories is that Fusion GPS, which was working with the Russian lawyers who were meeting with Donald Trump Jr., that Fusion GPS set this up as sort of a sting operation.
	I always thought that was a bit exaggerated.
	Maybe it's not exaggerated as much as I thought.
	So, all of this could be an excuse for Donald Trump to start firing people.
	It is quite possible that Donald Trump just starts firing people, that he ends the Mueller investigation on the back of this, and that the president of the United States says, listen, this whole thing was tainted from the very beginning.
	Nothing that the investigation comes up with can be true, because originally this was based on bad information from Hillary.
	We don't know the extent to which the DOJ and the FBI were colluding with the Hillary Clinton campaign to get Donald Trump during the campaign.
	And therefore, I'm going to fire everybody.
	I think that it's going to take a few more steps to get there.
	So Paul Ryan was saying this yesterday.
	He, of course, has seen the memo already.
	It had been circulated in the House.
	He says that the memo is filled with some bad stuff, but that doesn't mean that Mueller should be fired.
	If we're abused, then that needs to come to light so that that doesn't happen again.
	What this is not is an indictment on our institutions of our justice system.
	This memo is not an indictment of the FBI, of the Department of Justice.
	It does not impugn the Mueller investigation or the Deputy Attorney General.
	What it is, is the Congress's legitimate function of oversight to make sure that the FISA process is being used correctly, and that if it wasn't being used correctly, that needs to come to light and people need to be held accountable, so that we do not have problems again, because this does infect our civil liberties.
	Okay, so does Trump now fire everyone?
	Does Trump now fire everyone?
	That's the big question that's going to be asked next.
	And we'll get to that in just a second.
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	Okay, so.
	So, President Trump responding to the release of the memo, and here is what he had to say.
	The memo was sent to Congress.
	It was declassified.
	Congress will do whatever they're going to do.
	But I think it's a disgrace what's happening in our country.
	And when you look at that and you see that and so many other things, what's going on, A lot of people should be ashamed of themselves, and much worse than that.
	So I sent it over to Congress.
	They will do what they are going to do.
	Whatever they do is fine.
	It was declassified.
	And let's see what happens.
	But a lot of people should be ashamed.
	Thank you very much.
	OK, so, you know, the president was also asked about what should happen to Rod Rosenstein, who's the deputy attorney general, who was working in the DOJ at the time that all this happened.
	And he said that he had no answers on that, that he was not going to talk about what would happen to Rod Rosenstein.
	So the real question here is, now does Trump start firing everybody, saying the entire thing was a ruse from the beginning?
	Now, as I say, now we're down to two possibilities.
	Right, we're down to two possibilities.
	One is if the memo is accurate, and if it is not exaggerated, if it's not taken out of context, if it's not lying, we haven't seen any of the underlying applications or materials, which Trump could declassify but has not.
	If, let's say, that that was the centerpiece of Trump-Russia collusion, that's all they had, Was this FISA warrant on Carter Page and this Russian dossier that, in essence, all this is going to come down to is the dossier, then I think Trump has an excuse to say, listen, we're done here.
	OK, there's nothing happening here.
	There's nothing for me to obstruct.
	I've been saying all along I'm innocent.
	And for me to just go to James Comey and say, why won't you say I'm innocent?
	And James Comey wouldn't do it.
	And so I fired him.
	That's not obstruction of justice, because I'm innocent.
	There's nothing for me to obstruct.
	I'm not destroying documents.
	I'm not going out of my way to shut down an investigation.
	There literally is nothing here.
	And this memo shows there's nothing here.
	So that's question—that's possibility number one.
	Possibility number two is a little bit different.
	And that is, as I've said, that there's other information.
	That there's other information that suggests that the Trump-Russia collusion thing is real.
	Right?
	Again, that Donald Trump Jr.
	meeting at the Trump Tower.
	Or maybe there's information that we haven't heard about yet.
	So, we'll find out in short order because the Democrats, I'm sure, will respond to this, the FBI will start leaking materials, and we'll find out whether Devin Nunes' memo is just partisan hackery on behalf of the Trump administration in order to shut down the Mueller investigation, or whether it is something else entirely.
	But bottom line is, here's what it looks like.
	Barack Obama's DOJ spied on his political opponent.
	That's really what it looks like here.
	Chuck Todd is complaining because so far we've only seen excerpts, and those excerpts have been leaked to friendly media outlets like the Washington Examiner and Fox News.
	I'm desperately trying to load the memo right now, and it's crashed the House website because our government sucks at everything.
	So they can't even put up a damn memo so that we can actually read the memo.
	But when people run around this weekend with their hair on fire, I think there's a reason for people to run around.
	Again, this opens up a whole can of worms.
	Why did the FBI and DOJ try to hide this from Congress?
	Number one, they were subpoenaed in order to get this material.
	Why did they hide it from Congress?
	Number two, why were Democrats trying to shut down the memo?
	I assume they'll come out today and talk about which parts of this were out of context, but we haven't heard exactly what was out of context yet.
	yet.
	If nothing was out of context, this is really bad.
	Number three, what other information, if any, was used to get that FISA warrant on Carter Page?
	So there are just a bunch of questions that are unanswered here, and the reason that I'm hesitating is because I really don't want to say anything out of line about what exactly So here it is.
	Okay, so finally, we are now getting this to load.
	It's really hard to do this in real time when the house website is down.
	We're trying to load desperately the actual memo so I can read the text of it to you.
	Okay, so here it is.
	Purpose.
	This memorandum provides members an update on significant facts relating to the committee's ongoing investigation into the Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigation and their use of Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act during the 2016 presidential election cycle.
	Our findings, which are detailed below, raise concerns with the legitimacy and legality of certain DOJ and FBI interactions with the FISA court and represent a troubling breakdown of legal processes established to protect the American people from abuses related to the FISA process.
	So, now they go right into it.
	On October 21, 2016, the DOJ and FBI sought and received a FISA Probable Cause Order authorizing electronic surveillance on Carter Page from the FISA Court.
	Page is a U.S.
	citizen who served as volunteer advisor to the Trump presidential campaign.
	Consistent with requirements under FISA, the application first had to be certified by the Director or Deputy Director of the FBI.
	It then required the approval of the Attorney General, Deputy Attorney General, that would have been Rod Rosenstein, or the Senate-confirmed Assistant Attorney General for the National Security Division.
	The FBI and DOJ obtained one initial FISA warrant targeting Carter Page and three FISA renewals from the FISC.
	As required by statute, a FISA order on an American citizen must be renewed by the FISA court every 90 days, and each renewal requires a separate finding of probable cause.
	Then-Director James Comey signed three FISA applications in question on behalf of the FBI.
	Deputy Director Andrew McCabe signed one.
	Then DAG, that's Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates, and then Acting Deputy Attorney General Dana Buente, and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, each signed one or more FISA applications on behalf of the DOJ.
	Due to the sensitive nature of foreign intelligence activity, FISA submissions, including renewals before the FISC, are classified.
	As such, the public's confidence in the integrity of the FISA process depends on the court's ability to hold the government to the highest standard, particularly as it relates to the surveillance of American citizens.
	However, the court's rigor in protecting the rights of Americans reinforced by 90-day renewals of surveillance orders is necessarily dependent on the government's production to the court of all material and relevant facts.
	This should include information potentially favorable to the target of the FISA application that is known by the government.
	In the case of Carter Page, the government had at least four independent opportunities before the court to accurately provide an accounting of the relevant facts.
	However, our findings indicate that, as described below, material and relevant information was omitted.
	OK, so what they're saying is that the FBI and the DOJ essentially lied by omission to the FISA court.
	OK, number one, the dossier compiled by Christopher Steele, the Steele dossier, on behalf of the Democratic National Committee and the Hillary Clinton campaign, formed an essential part of the Carter Page FISA application.
	Steele was a longtime FBI source who was paid over $160,000 by the DNC and Clinton campaign via the law firm Perkins Coie and research firm Fusion GPS to obtain derogatory information on Donald Trump's ties to Russia.
	Neither the initial application in October 2016, nor any of the renewals, disclose or reference the role of the DNC, Clinton campaign, or any party or campaign in funding Steele efforts, even though the political origins of the Steele dossier were then known to senior DOJ and FBI officials.
	The initial FISA application notes Steele was working for a named U.S.
	person, but does not name Fusion GPS or Principal Glenn Simpson, who was paid by a U.S.
	law firm representing the DNC, even though that was known by the DOJ at the time.
	The application does not mention Steele was ultimately working on behalf of and paid for by the DNC and Clinton campaign, or that the FBI had separately authorized payment to Steele for the same information.
	So that's the big point here, right, is that the dossier was the basis for the FISA warrant, and that was the basis for launching the entire investigation.
	Two, the Carter Page FISA application also cited extensively a September 23, 2016 Yahoo News article by Michael Isikoff, which focuses on Page's July 2016 trip to Moscow.
	This article does not corroborate the Steele dossier, because it is derived from information leaked by Steele himself to Yahoo News.
	The Page FISA application incorrectly assesses that Steele did not directly provide information to Yahoo News.
	Steele has admitted in British court filings he met with Yahoo News and several other outlets in September 2016 at the direction of Fusion GPS.
	Perkins Coy was aware of Steele's initial media contacts because they hosted at least one meeting in Washington, D.C.
	in 2016 with Steele and Fusion GPS where this matter was discussed.
	So, they're knocking down the assumption that there was other information used for the Carter Page warrant.
	Right, because the Carter Page application originally included this Yahoo News article by Michael Isikoff, but that was coming from the same place, namely Christopher Steele.
	Steele was suspended and then terminated as an FBI source for what the FBI defines as the most serious of violations, an unauthorized disclosure to the media of his relationship with the FBI, in an October 30, 2016 Mother Jones article by David Corn.
	Steele should have been terminated for his previous undisclosed contacts with Yahoo and other outlets in September before the FISA application, before the page application was sent to the court in October, but Steele improperly concealed from and lied to the FBI about those contacts.
	So they're now suggesting that Steele should be prosecuted for lying to the FBI.
	Steele's numerous encounters with the media violated the cardinal rule of source handling, maintaining confidentiality and demonstrated that Steele had become a less than reliable source for the FBI.
	Before and after Steele was terminated as a source, he maintained contact with the DOJ via then-Associate Deputy Attorney General Bruce Ohr, a senior DOJ official who worked closely with Deputy Attorneys General Yates and later Rosenstein.
	Shortly after the election, the FBI began interviewing Orr, documenting his communications with Steele.
	For example, in September 2016, I'm reading directly from this fabled four-page memo put out by Devin Nunes, Steele admitted to Orr his feelings against then-candidate Trump when Steele said he was, quote, desperate that Donald Trump not get elected and was passionate about him not being president.
	Now, there's two ways to read that.
	One, Steele thought that Trump was actually in bed with the Russians and didn't want him to be president.
	Or two, he hated Trump and therefore trumped up all this stuff against Trump.
	This clear evidence of Steele's bias was recorded by Orr at the time and subsequently in official FBI files, but not reflected in any of the page FISA applications.
	During this same period, Orr's wife, the Deputy Attorney General, was employed by Fusion GPS to assist in the cultivation of opposition research on Trump.
	Orr later provided the FBI with all of his wife's Apple research paid for by the DNC and Clinton campaign via Fusion GPS.
	The Orr's relationship with Steele and Fusion GPS was inexplicably concealed from the FISA court.
	So all of this smells terrible.
	All of this is super, super dirty stuff.
	And in just a second, we're going to go through the rest of the memo, and then we're going to get Trump's reaction to all of this.
	It sounds like he's preparing for mass firings, so things are about to heat up in a serious way.
	We'll get to all of that in just one second.
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	Okay, back to the Steele dossier memo, back to the Stephen Nunes memo that is blowing up the internet right now.
	It actually shut down the government website.
	So here's what it says.
	So we've already established, according to this memo, a couple of things.
	One, we have established that the FISA warrants originally taken out on Trump campaign member Carter Page was taken out based on a dossier compiled by Christopher Steele on behalf of the DNC.
	That information was never revealed to the FISA court.
	There was apparently no other confirming information that was used.
	We also know now that Steele had an agenda against Trump and openly admitted such, and that he worked with the Deputy Attorney General, whose wife was busy compiling this information on behalf of the DNC and the Hillary campaign for Fusion GPS.
	The memo continues.
	According to the head of the FBI's Counterintelligence Division, Assistant Director Bill Priestap, corroboration of the Steele dossier was in its infancy at the time of the initial Page-FISA application.
	After Steele was terminated, a source validation report conducted by an independent unit within FBI assessed Steele's reporting as only minimally corroborated.
	In early January 2017, Director Comey briefed President-elect Trump on a summary of the Steele dossier, even though it was, according to his June 2017 testimony, salacious and unverified.
	While the FISA application relied on Steele's past record of credible reporting on other unrelated matters, it ignored or concealed his anti-Trump financial and ideological motivations.
	Furthermore, Deputy Director McCabe testified before the committee in December 2017 that no surveillance warrant would have been sought from the FISA court without the Steele dossier information.
	So that's an amazing admission by McCabe, that the Steele dossier was the only thing that allowed this investigation to start.
	And then we conclude, the FISA—the Page FISA application also mentions information regarding fellow Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos, but there is no evidence of any cooperation or conspiracy between Page and Papadopoulos.
	The Papadopoulos information triggering the opening of an FBI counterintelligence investigation in late July 2016 by FBI agent Peter Strzok Strzok was reassigned by the Special Counsel's Office to FBI Human Resources for improper text messages with his mistress, FBI Attorney Lisa Page, no known relation to Carter Page, where they both demonstrated a clear bias against Trump and in favor of Clinton, whom Strzok had also investigated.
	The Strzok-Lisa Page texts also reflect extensive discussions about the investigations, orchestrating leaks to the media, and include a meeting with Deputy Director McCabe to discuss an insurance policy against President Trump's election.
	OK, that is the end of the memo.
	So, the bottom line is, if you think that the Nunes memo covers everything, I mean, this is my show.
	I'm reading this in real time, so here's my real-time take.
	If you think that the Nunes memo is the completion, is the entirety of all of the information in the Trump-Russia collusion case, then the whole thing is not only an empty vessel, it is a sting operation by the Clinton operation, working in cahoots with the FBI and the DOJ, if there is nothing else there, if they can show nothing else there.
	And all this obstruction stuff, all of this Trump firing Comey, all of this Trump asking Rosenstein whose side he was on, all of this, Seems to fall by the wayside because, let's face it, if there's nothing there, and Trump is saying there's nothing there, why won't you guys side with me?
	That's not the same thing as him attempting to obstruct justice.
	So, the memo is in fact a bombshell.
	There is something there that is shocking.
	And also, by the way, the idea that The memo endangers national security, which is what Democrats have been proclaiming, has been pretty much blown out of the water now that we've seen the memo.
	There's nothing there, by the way, that we hadn't already supposed.
	When I was asked about why—when I talked on the show about why the memo—what the memo said, I speculated the memo said exactly this, right?
	If you go back and listen to the shows, I speculated, I hadn't read the memo, that what the memo said was this.
	This was the center of the memo.
	And I said, if that's the case, how does this endanger national security?
	And yet, the Democrats were out there saying this over and over and over, like Jeff Merkley, the senator from Oregon.
	He came out and he said that if the memo were released, the intel community would stop talking with the House.
	That also goes to the heart of the manipulation of very sensitive national secrets, highly classified information that is given to the Intelligence Committee with the understanding that it will not be released in a fashion that endangers the United States or in a fashion that manipulates the information for political purposes.
	And so that understanding goes to the heart of how the Committee is able to get sensitive information in the first place, why the government is willing to share it with the Committee.
	So this really threatens to blow up the whole contract between the branches of government over sensitive information.
	OK, it's just ridiculous that this was the suggestion.
	First of all, Congress oversees this agency.
	This is not how government works.
	The intelligence community doesn't get to tell Congress to stiff itself.
	The intelligence community is run by Congress.
	Right?
	Congress has oversight power over them.
	So the idea that the intelligence community will stop sharing is ridiculous.
	James Comey tweeted this yesterday.
	What an insufferable character he's turned out to be.
	Here's what James Comey tweeted yesterday.
	yesterday said, we should appreciate the FBI speaking up.
	I wish more of our leaders would.
	But take note, American history also shows that in the long run, weasels and liars never hold the field so long as good people stand up.
	Not a lot of schools or streets named for Joe McCarthy.
	So this isn't about Joe McCarthy at this point.
	This is about you oversaw an FBI that was seeking FISA warrants against American citizens based on shoddy intelligence, and you refused to even turn over that information to the FISA court.
	They couldn't even do this.
	I mean, this is insane.
	Speaking of insanity, members of the media, Al Sharpton, Chris Matthews, they're saying that this turns the Constitution on its butt, right?
	That this kills the Constitution.
	It kills the Constitution for the president of the United States to declassify material inside the executive branch.
	Like, they don't understand the Constitution.
	Here's Chris Matthews over at MSNBC making that case.
	All right, MSNBC, get up!
	Come on, shoo!
	Come in here!
	Misunderstand the Constitution and make a lot of money!
	Ah!
	Let's go.
	But a constitutional crisis.
	It seems to me the Constitution has always been turned on its butt.
	We've got a Congress, a chairman of a committee on intelligence, which has historically been a bipartisan committee.
	It's usually even membered members.
	And they're basically there to work together and to try to find out if our intelligence committees are doing their job.
	And it's been turned into a tool of a president who's playing defense.
	OK, again, turned into a tool of a president playing defense.
	That's what I'm seeing from the memo.
	So we'll have to see what the response is from Democrats.
	We'll have to see if they can bring forward more information.
	Again, the memo doesn't answer everything.
	It doesn't answer why the Donald Trump Jr.
	meeting happened, why he was showing willingness to collude with the Russians.
	It doesn't show why George Papadopoulos was lying to the FBI.
	It doesn't cover everything, but it raises some pretty serious questions about how the FISA court does its business, and whether the FBI and DOJ were lying in order to gain a FISA warrant, and whether they have an agenda against Trump.
	Now, again, does that necessarily kill the Mueller investigation?
	Probably not.
	But it does set some pretty rigorous questions in front of, particularly, Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein, who went forward with these FISA applications if all they were—but remember, Carter Page has not been indicted.
	When all these indictments were about to come down, my understanding, my thought, was that it was going to be Paul Manafort and Mike Flynn and Carter Page.
	There's been no indictment of Carter Page.
	So as far as we know, Carter Page was not involved in criminal activity.
	He's just an idiot who wanders around Russia looking for cash.
	This doesn't actually mean that Carter Page was a criminal.
	So that means that you launch this entire investigation on the back of the only guy who hasn't been indicted that we thought would be indicted.
	The Manafort indictment, by the way, has nothing to do with the Trump campaign.
	The Manafort indictment has to do with him lying to the FBI.
	The George Papadopoulos indictment is the only one that has to do with the Trump campaign, because he apparently lied to the FBI about meetings that he had in London with a Russian cutout.
	But it's not clear that Papadopoulos was working on behalf of the Trump administration or the Trump campaign.
	Trump campaign basically disowned Papadopoulos in the middle of the campaign.
	So all of this calls into serious question the entire investigation.
	Does it mean the investigation should be killed?
	Does it mean that the entire investigation should die?
	Probably not.
	But, you know, it's also important—no, Papadopoulos was—the counterintelligence investigation began before the FISA application on Page, but it was on Papadopoulos.
	So, this is an important point, right?
	So, this is—it's an important point.
	So, again, this is all weird and somewhat confusing, right?
	They've been surveilling They've been surveilling the members of the Trump campaign.
	Carter Page has been surveilled by the FISA back in 2014.
	There are a lot of sketch characters working for all of this.
	But Papadopoulos was under investigation first.
	So while there are serious questions to be raised about the warrant on Carter Page, I'm trying to set out the timeline in my own head as we go along here.
	Devin Nunes just confirmed the New York Times narrative that Papadopoulos was actually under investigation first.
	So one of the things that the investigation is covering here is, I want to clarify and I want to backtrack.
	Again, I'm doing this all in real time.
	So, the original FISA application that was taken out against Carter Page, It's now clear from this timeline that that is not what actually launched the investigation, because—paragraph 5, let me reread that, OK?
	Okay, this is the paragraph five.
	The Page FISA application also mentions information regarding fellow Trump campaign advisor George Papadopoulos.
	The Papadopoulos information triggered the opening of an FBI counterintelligence investigation in late 2016 by FBI agent Peter Strzok.
	What's interesting about that, it's sort of buried in there and a little biased, and I had to read it twice because I'm getting texts from lawyers or friends, is that if the Page FISA application mentioned information regarding Papadopoulos, that means that the investigation was already on regarding Papadopoulos.
	So it doesn't kill the entire Mueller investigation.
	What it does do is call into question how the FBI and the DOJ were pursuing that investigation.
	So, that means that there should be serious consequences inside the FBI and the DOJ for the alacrity with which they sought to go after Carter Page, but it doesn't necessarily kill the entire investigation.
	So, that may be the happy medium that we are coming to here.
	If that is the case, then that means that if Trump starts firing people in the Mueller investigation, that is probably a bad move.
	You know, this is—it's not a nothing burger, but it is also not the end of the Mueller investigation.
	Okay, that may be the most—that may be the best thing I can say.
	Now, Trump was asked about all—he was asked specifically about Rosenstein.
	And Trump, being asked about Rosenstein, said that he may fire him, basically.
	Thank you very much.
	You figure that one out.
	Okay, so he's saying that maybe he'll fire Rosenstein— Maybe he should fire Rosenstein.
	Possible.
	Should he fire Mueller over this?
	Again, if the investigation commenced before Carter Page, then there's more to the investigation than just Carter Page, as I said before.
	So, you know, there's some dirty stuff here, but is it everything that is cracked up to be originally on First Read?
	No.
	If you're a little bit confused, that's okay.
	I'm going to explain again.
	I'm going to go back and backtrack.
	I'm going to explain again in just a second.
	You're going to have to come over to dailywire.com for all of that.
	For $9.99 a month, you can get a subscription to dailywire.com, and that means you can also be part of our mailbag.
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	You will love it.
	It is spectacular.
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	Okay, so the short summary.
	You got to see my entire thought process as it happened, right?
	So, here is the short summary of the memo.
	FISA application on Carter Page may have been gotten by ill gains.
	Carter Page application is not the entirety of the Trump-Russia collusion investigation, nor was it the launching point of the Trump-Russia collusion investigation, which means it's very hard for Trump to fire Mueller and just kill the investigation outright.
	Or to say that this is the only thing that was being investigated.
	However, it does demonstrate FBI and DOJ working with the Hillary campaign, presumably, and acting in corrupt fashion, particularly with regard to Carter Page.
	So, is it a scandal?
	Yes.
	Is it a scandal big enough to blow up the entire Mueller investigation and the Trump-Russia collusion investigation?
	Probably not.
	Probably not.
	Okay, so, there you are.
	There is the full-on...
	There's the full-on understanding.
	Okay, so, let's do a couple of things that I like, and then some things that I hate, and then we'll get to the mailbag.
	So, things that I like.
	I think we need to calm down, so let's listen to some Bach.
	So, we've been doing Bach pieces all week long.
	This is a piece that you'll know, you may not recognize that it is Bach, because nobody knows music anymore, but it's Bach's maybe most famous piece.
	You probably heard it when you were in church at one point.
	This is Bach's Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring.
	Oh, we can all calm down now.
	Ah.
	Okay, now that we're all calm. now that we're all calm.
	Okay, now we can get back to a calm, nice show.
	The world didn't implode.
	Everything's going to be okay.
	And listen, it would have been okay anyway.
	You know, regardless of how this went, facts are facts.
	And so we'll have to see how all of this plays out.
	But let's get to another thing that I like.
	So I have to play you what I think is the funniest thing that I have seen in a very long time.
	There is a guy who attempted to break into a car, and a guy who I'm friendly with, John Curley over at Cairo Radio in Seattle, very nice guy, good sportscaster.
	They recorded him doing a play-by-play, like a sports play-by-play just in time for the Super Bowl for a guy trying to break into a car, and it's pretty spectacular.
	Can't break it.
	That's three.
	Four.
	If you're counting at home, that's 14 blows against the window with the mop.
	Now, remember, the dirty part of the mop is underneath his arm.
	He's got a handle.
	Again, he strikes the window.
	And now he comes down hard.
	Raining blows down upon the window.
	One, two, three.
	And this is just about tuckered him out.
	He places the mop on top of a roof, and now he starts to think about whether or not he wants to climb up.
	He places his right foot on top of the wall, here he comes, and he FALLS OFF THE ROOF!
	OH MY GOD, SOMEBODY GET SOME SALAMI AND CREAM CHEESE AND RUB IT ALL OVER HIS FACE!
	HE'S UNCONSCIOUS, ON THE GROUND, WITH THE MOP!
	Okay, sports is fantastic.
	I am going to the Super Bowl this weekend, so I'm very pumped up about that.
	It's the first Super Bowl and probably the last Super Bowl I'll ever end, but it should be fun.
	Okay, let's see.
	Other things that I like.
	So this is something that you have to like because it is not something I like as much as I feel just terrible for the father here.
	So there's a father who's three daughters.
	Would you give me one minute?
	You know that I can't do that.
	gymnastics program, and they were abused by Larry Nassar, this human piece of garbage.
	And the father in the courtroom charged Larry Nassar.
	And I just wish, I wish that the security had not stopped him because Larry Nassar deserves every bit of brutality that this father can inflict on him.
	No, sir, I can't.
	Would you give me one minute?
	You know that I can't do that.
	That's not how our legal system...
	Okay, so, you know, obviously you wish that this should be part of the obviously you wish that this should be part of the justice system.
	I'm I'm all in favor of changing the law so that the parents of the victims of child molestation get to brutalize the child molesters.
	That seems to me completely just, and I'm entirely okay with it.
	Okay, time for a quick thing that I hate, and then we'll get to the mailbag.
	So, the thing that I hate today is politifacts.
	So, PolitiFact is a left-wing fact-checking organization.
	How do I know that it's left-wing?
	Because they don't even fact-check the people they use for fact-checking.
	So, yesterday, they released information that Alan Grayson, a representative from Florida, who is a complete nutjob—I mean, a complete and utter nutjob—thinks Ted Cruz was not eligible to be president, compared the Tea Party to the KKK.
	He's just—he's a complete crazy person.
	He has attacked a reporter.
	I mean, like, here's an actual—here's an actual video of him attempting to go after a reporter.
	Do you seriously think that this is the proper way to conduct an interview?
	You showed up to a Politico event and a Politico reporter is asking you a question.
	My mistake!
	My mistake, okay?
	Now people know, going forward, that simply showing up to a public event means that you come and hassle me and get in my face.
	You're a member of Congress.
	You're a public official.
	That gives you the right to push me?
	You pushed me, sir.
	You pushed me.
	No, I was standing there and you pushed me.
	No, I'm sorry.
	You pushed me.
	I think we have a videotape.
	Well, that's right, and that's a good thing.
	I'll be handing that over to the Capitol Police, my friend.
	He suggested that he was going to have the reporter arrested.
	Assaulting you for asking you questions?
	No, no.
	Not for asking me questions.
	For getting in my face and being a fool and pushing me as I was trying to lead this event.
	Sir, why do you think your ex-wife is asking you and making these allegations?
	You know, I'm hoping that somebody comes here and arrests you.
	I mean, he's a crazy person, Alan Grayson.
	So PolitiFact hired this idiot to actually be a fact checker for them.
	He was going to be the voice of the people.
	They hired a Republican congressman who's anti-Trump, and they hired Alan Grayson to be the fact checkers for PolitiFact.
	And then they had to fire him later that afternoon when it came out, as everyone who follows politics even minutely knows, that he is a complete nutbag.
	Okay, so it just demonstrates that PolitiFact isn't all that it's cracked up to be.
	Pretty astonishing.
	Okay, time for the mailbag.
	So let's do this thing.
	Okay, Patrick says, Hi Ben, can you explain the situation with the FISA scandal, Devin Nunes and the FBI?
	Does this tie back to the Russia probe, and if so, how?
	I hear a lot about it in the news, but the issue is murky to me.
	So, we spend most of the show explaining this, but here is the brief story.
	Okay, the FISA scandal, basically, here's the deal.
	The suggestion—well, Devin Nunes put out a four-page memo.
	The memo came out today.
	We just read it in its entirety.
	The memo basically suggests that a FISA warrant was gotten on a U.S.
	citizen, Carter Page, who's a member of the Trump campaign, and was gotten at the behest of the Hillary campaign.
	It was gotten at the behest of the Hillary Clinton campaign, working through Fusion GPS, and that the DOJ and the FBI basically took a piece of OPPO research put together by Hillary Clinton and then used that as a basis to surveil Trump.
	Now, the implication is that this is sort of the poisonous tree, the root of the poisonous tree, and that should destroy the entire Mueller-Russia collusion investigation.
	That apparently is not true.
	The Nunes memo includes, sort of buried in there, information that suggests that the investigation predated the Carter Page-FISA warrant issue.
	So, two things can be true at once.
	The FBI and DOJ could be corrupt.
	The FBI and DOJ could have been working with Hillary Clinton on her Carter Page thing.
	And it is also possible That the investigation is more than just Carter Page, and that this doesn't kill the investigation.
	But that's the really short story here.
	OK, Christopher Martin says, while it is obvious the Democrats have painted themselves into an ideological corner with regard to the president, do you see an opportunity for them to seek common ground with Republicans in Congress?
	I think it's highly unlikely, because any common ground they find with Republicans in Congress will end up being common ground with Trump.
	They've obviously decided they would rather not legalize 1.8 million illegal immigrants than even conceive of making some sort of deal with Trump.
	So that's sort of an astonishing political move on their part, because Trump either is going to pass good proposals or he won't.
	If he's unable to pass good proposals, because Democrats stymie it, and he puts forward a bunch of friendly, bipartisan proposals, and Democrats just keep pushing back, it's not going to redound to their benefit.
	I'm a South African citizen who recently immigrated to the United States because I, like you, believe America is the greatest experiment in human history.
	My question is regarding the latest Republican immigration proposal, especially as it relates to chain migration.
	Since I, like you, believe in limited government and that people should rely on their family, friends, and local churches for help, how does it make any sense to forbid people from bringing their family with them?
	The current system demands the person sponsoring their family member has to be financially capable of supporting said family member.
	Could we not simply create a means by which we limit the amount of government assistance immigrants can obtain, rather than simply banishing them from coming at all?
	Sure.
	I mean, I'd be very much in favor of that.
	I mean, I do think that the idea of limiting government assistance to immigrants, ensuring that they are culturally assimilated, then I'm fine with open immigration.
	I don't have a problem with the number of people coming in.
	I think that a lot of people like Tom Cotton and Jeff Sessions have made the case that it hurts the country economically to bring in new people who want to work.
	I don't think that's the case at all, by any stretch of the imagination.
	You know, hard to get in their heads.
	I think they would be confused by it.
	There's not a lot of counterpoint in big band jazz.
	They'd probably think that it was relatively rudimentary, because it is.
	I mean, when you compare it to classical music, big band jazz is relatively rudimentary.
	With that said, I think that they would enjoy the work of Gershwin, probably, because Gershwin is creative and also has classical temperament.
	I enjoy big band jazz, by the way, but it is a simplified version of music.
	I mean, it's a simplified form of classical music.
	So they may have been impressed by the emotion of Big Band Jazz, but they certainly would have been impressed by the intellect in Big Band Jazz, even though I enjoy it.
	So I'm not, by nature, a procrastinator.
	I tend to think—I'm very good at delayed gratification, so I tend to think that if I get something done now, I won't have to deal with it later.
	But here's my suggestion.
	It's sort of the same as Dave Ramsey's suggestion about debt.
	Do the little things first.
	Make a list of the things that you want to get done, and then take the things that are easiest to do and strike those off the list first so you feel like you have momentum.
	Because if you start with the really big thing, you're going to want to put that off because it's too intimidating.
	But if you knock all the little things off your list, you'll actually get them done.
	So that's the easiest way to avoid procrastination.
	Cody says, Habit, my wife and I are huge fans.
	As evangelical Christians, we really appreciate your stance on abortion.
	We're wondering what the likelihood of Roe v. Wade ever being repealed would be and what it would take to do so.
	Well, it takes five votes for Roe v. Wade to be repealed.
	That would not, in fact, make abortion illegal across the nation.
	It would just say that states have the capacity to pass laws on abortion.
	So the idea that Roe v. Wade goes away and suddenly abortion is illegal across the country, that's not correct.
	In California, it would stay legal.
	In New York, it would stay legal.
	In Massachusetts, it would stay legal.
	In Alabama, it would suddenly become illegal.
	Emmanuel says, this week you've been reviewing classical composers and music.
	Are there modern musical composers that you know or like?
	I'll be honest with you, I don't know a lot of modern classical composers.
	The ones that I've heard, like Philip Glass and John Gage, are less than impressive to me.
	I don't enjoy their music very much.
	It seems to me that most of the good classical music is actually being written for film at this point.
	If you listen to the scores of Elmer Bernstein or Jerry Goldsmith, or if you listen to the scores of John Williams, then you're listening to some pretty solid classical music, actually.
	I like that.
	just used in dramatic fashion.
	More romantic period, certainly, than classical period music.
	I can't remember the name of the guy who wrote the score to "How to Train Your Dragon." That's a great score with some terrific music.
	All right, Clayton says, "Dear Men, Seeker of Facts, Destroyer of Feelings." I like that.
	"I've been hearing a lot about Chelsea Manning's attempt to run for Senate.
	This puzzles me because according to the third section of the 14th Amendment, he can't.
	The third section has barred a man named Victor Berger from his congressional seat for violating the Espionage Act, the self-same act that Manning himself committed.
	It is worth noting that Bergman was acquitted due to biases of the judge on the trial against him.
	Lastly, I don't think the sentence commutation would save him, as the amendment states that only Congress can absolve you.
	Fun fact, only two people have been absolved, Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee.
	Can this be used to block his run?
	Off the top of my head, my answer is no, simply because I believe that there are other considerations as far as state considerations that come into account, not just the constitutional issue.
	So, you know, I want to do a little bit more research on that.
	Newsweek suggests, at least, that Chelsea Manning is capable of running.
	So, the reason for that, apparently, is that the Constitution allows U.S.
	citizens to have a criminal record to run for Congress, but state laws can be different.
	The only qualifications to run for U.S.
	Senate is you have to be 30 years old to have citizenship in the U.S.
	for at least nine years and live in the state at the time of the election.
	It does not state on their website anyone who has a criminal record can't run for U.S.
	Senate.
	So, I wonder if this other case, Victor Berger, it was barred by state law.
	So, I'd have to check it out.
	Daniel says, I'm stuck between two worlds.
	I've been going to school for music, but I have a passion for writing philosophy and history as well.
	How do I reconcile the artistic with the political?
	Well, I don't think that you necessarily have to reconcile them, but what I would suggest is that the same natural law that undergirds a belief in reason as making possible the discovery of higher truths makes possible the discovery of better music.
	This is a view that was held by Bach, held by Beethoven, held by Mozart, held by Brahms.
	The idea that there are natural laws to the human ear, natural laws to the human mind, that make certain music better than other music on an objective level.
	I think that is true, and I think that is also true in philosophy and history as well.
	Also, I think that, you know, one of the beautiful things about the way that our current free market system works is that if you became a very prominent musician, suddenly people actually care about your opinion.
	I mean, or at least they're supposed to, according to the Grammys.
	James says, What is your view on gene altering?
	I'm concerned that technology like CRISPR is going to expand beyond foundations of medicine from treatment to intentional body modifications.
	Examples of normal muscle growth for sports, or possibly genetic sex changes, or live extensions, or physical characteristics.
	When is altering your God-inspired vessel allowed?
	My view is that if you are correcting a flaw, that is one thing.
	If you are simply trying to better yourself through genetics, that's another.
	I think that carries serious risks of essentially eugenics.
	Brad says, I want to learn about Israel.
	What book can I read?
	Not just old history, but modern as well.
	Now, the one that I recommend for people is a book by a guy named Eli Bard.
	He's the editor called Myths and Facts About Israel.
	It's 300 pages, but they're each kind of bite-sized questions.
	It's a bunch of questions that are answered about Israel.
	Benjamin Netanyahu back in the 90s wrote a book called A Durable Peace, which is quite good about the history of Israel and how modern Israel operates today.
	So the argument for atheism is that there is no free will, we are just balls of flesh wandering through the universe.
	I don't find that completely implausible.
	That's a possibility.
	I'm not gonna pretend that atheism isn't a possibility.
	found some of the atheist arguments quite compelling.
	If so, which arguments, why?
	And why then aren't you an atheist?
	And beyond that, what convinces you that God exists?
	Just being devil's advocate.
	So the argument for atheism is that there is no free will.
	We are just balls of flesh wandering through the universe.
	I don't find that completely implausible.
	That's a possibility.
	I'm not going to pretend that atheism isn't a possibility.
	I will suggest that I find it not more plausible than the explanation that we have free will, we are capable of changing in our own lives, that our action is in our own hands, that we are endowed with reason that extends beyond just neuronal firing. - Yeah.
	That, I think, is a more compelling case.
	So what I'm suggesting is that Belief in God does not have to be certainty to be probability.
	And so, I believe that God exists and that He controls the universes involved in our lives, and that He has handed to us a set of precepts that help guide our lives and make better civilization.
	One of the reasons for that is almost utilitarian, which is that the only great civilization in the history of the world, in my viewpoint, is the Judeo-Christian civilization springing from those foundations.
	But the atheist argument, which is that basically everything happened through accident, I don't find it supremely compelling, but I find it at least plausible.
	I mean, it's plausible, the idea that the universe is eternal, that we've gone through a billion iterations of the universe, that eventually we hit on the the universe that we currently live in, and that just because it's improbable that we exist in the way that we do doesn't mean that it's really improbable when you repeat the game a bunch of times.
	Zach says, "Hi Ben.
	"Which of the arguments for God's existence "is your favorite, the ontological, "like Knowles, the unmoved mover argument "of Aristotle and Aquinas, the moral argument of Kant?" Well, I would suggest that the, I find the Aristotelian Aquinas argument the best.
	The ontological argument I don't find quite as compelling.
	The argument, you know, the ontological argument is usually expressed as St.
	Anselm said, that if you can imagine God, that God therefore must exist.
	That's the sort of very simplified and non-correct version of the ontological argument.
	Now the Aquinas argument, which is that in the infinite regress of causes has to Terminate in a first cause, an unmoved mover, or at least an unactualized actualizer.
	I find that a compelling, rational explanation of why things exist the way that they do.
	I also think that if you believe that, as Kant does, I like the Kantian argument as well, the Kantian argument suggesting that we have an innate moral sense and that was placed by something like God, I think that's right.
	But the only argument that actually gets you to a God who is perfect, good, and all-knowing is the Aquinas argument, not necessarily the Kantian argument.
	I really like Jordan.
	I mean, I think that Jordan is a very mild-mannered guy who is constantly thinking, and it's something that I appreciate.
	He's constantly asking questions and learning.
	I really like him.
	And there's a whole group of folks with whom I may disagree on substantial issues that I like personally, because I think that they are interested in asking questions and like talking about facts and first principles.
	To me, that's the mark of somebody who's interesting to talk to, somebody who likes talking first principles.
	So, for example, I've criticized Sam Harris's views because I disagree with him.
	I really like Sam.
	I think Sam is a good guy.
	Eric Weinstein is somebody who I disagree with, but I have fun talking to him because we can talk first principles and examine each other's thoughts and make them sharper.
	I really enjoy that.
	I think Jordan is one of those people.
	Alexander says, Ben, you are constantly ripping on different pop songs.
	Which pop song or singer is your guilty pleasure?
	Well, I mean, I don't really have one as far as a pop song or singer.
	There was one song that came out recently that the name escapes me that for some reason I find particularly catchy.
	I'll look it up and I'll play it next week to humiliate.
	Okay, so that one is actually a catchy song.
	So I praise that on the show as a catchy song.
	There's also, I don't remember the lyric to it.
	I'll have to look it up, but it's playing through my head right now.
	Catchy song.
	So there are some of these songs that are catchy, but I don't remember who did them, nor do I care.
	Toby says, Ben, what is going to happen in the last season of Game of Thrones?
	What's going to happen in the last season of Game of Thrones is that they're going to all decide on a democracy that is led by Tyrion after Dany dies.
	She's going to be cast as the all-perfect, all-knowing, all-wise person.
	She's going to end up dying.
	And then they're going to have to come up with a democracy.
	We already know this because they've hinted at it.
	It's really boring.
	I'm shocked that last season they had Tyrion openly hint that to Dany.
	Like, they're about to go into battle and he's like, what if we formed a democracy?
	Oh, come on.
	OK, so, like, I like democracy and all, but this is the Game of Thrones, OK?
	It's not the game of destroying the thrones.
	We're going to break the chain.
	We're going to break the will.
	Yes, I understand you're foreshadowing this for seven seasons.
	All right.
	Taylor says, Dear Ben, my brother just graduated Marine Corps boot camp and is now his infantry training.
	He's an honorable Christian young man who joined for the love of country and the values she enshrines.
	I think he's recently realized this choice may one day cause him to take a life, and he has expressed he doesn't want to kill.
	What would you say to those who have the courage to serve but struggle with taking another's life?
	I mean, what I would suggest is that, I mean, if you're joining the military and you're joining a line of work that involves possibly killing people, that's a serious consideration.
	You know, I would say, Obviously, I think that there are people who need to be killed.
	I think terrorists need to be killed.
	I think that there are ISIS members who need to die.
	And I don't think that the Bible suggests that The word is do not murder, right?
	It's not don't kill.
	They're two separate words.
	It's lo tirtzach, right?
	Which means do not murder.
	The word for kill in Hebrew is taharog.
	So it would be lo taharog if they didn't want you to kill.
	Patrick says, hey Ben, I figure you have a pretty negative view of prostitution and pornography.
	Given your general sentiment that people should generally be left alone, how do we balance the laws concerning these activities and leaving people alone to do what they will?
	So public pornography, public displays of pornography, I think can be regulated because you're talking there about things that affect the community.
	They have externalities.
	Prostitution is another thing that affects public commerce.
	I tend to be in favor of legalization of prostitution, leaving aside the exploitation of women, which of course should be illegal.
	That said, my feeling is that a social bulwark is necessary and that if law is the only bulwark between you and the abyss, then law is not going to save you.
	We'll be back here next to one more one more Kate says my fiance and I can't pick a honeymoon location suggestions So the places that I love Hawaii Hawaii is just fantastic And it's also relatively affordable if you can afford it Italy is a fantastic honeymoon location Italy is just phenomenal France is great You know, I love Israel as well.
	I think Israel is fantastic.
	But if you just want a relaxed place, you're just going to go and lie back and not have to rush around seeing things, then Hawaii is the place to be.
	Hawaii is just spectacular.
	And I would suggest the island of Maui.
	I've been to most of the islands at this point.
	Maui is, I think, the nicest.
	All right.
	So we'll be back here next week with all of the fallout from MemoGate 2018.
	I'm Ben Shapiro.
	This is The Ben Shapiro Show.
	The Ben Shapiro Show is produced by Mathis Glover.
	Executive producer, Jeremy Boring.
	Senior producer, Jonathan Hay.
	Our technical producer is Austin Stevens.
	Edited by Alex Zingaro.
	Audio is mixed by Mike Coromina.
	Hair and makeup is by Jesua Olvera.
	The Ben Shapiro Show is a Daily Wire Forward Publishing production.

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