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Sept. 20, 2024 - Dinesh D'Souza

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BEHIND THE SCENES Dinesh D’Souza Podcast Ep922

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	coming up debbie and i are going to do a friday roundup except this time it's going to be a well a kind of an in-depth discussion of not just what's in the movie of indicating trump but the mechanics of making a movie How do you fund it?
	How do you produce it?
	How do you market it?
	You're going to learn a lot, and it's going to get you really excited about seeing the film when it opens next weekend.
	Hey, if you're watching on Rumble or YouTube, listening on Apple, Google, or Spotify, please subscribe to my channel.
	This is the Dinesh D'Souza podcast.
	The times are crazy.
	In a time of confusion, division, and lies, we need a brave voice of reason, understanding, and truth.
	This is the Dinesh D'Souza Podcast.
	W and I thought we would make this roundup, this weekend roundup, a not so much a review of events of the week but rather a preview of the movie itself.
	It's just one week away.
	Next weekend.
	And so I hope you are on it.
	I hope you've gotten your tickets.
	If you haven't, it's not too late.
	In fact, good time to get them now.
	VindicatingTrump.com and we'll dive into not just the movie, but kind of the art of moviemaking and maybe some of the specific and unique themes of this movie.
	But before we do that, I thought I'd mention you were a little hopping mad this morning because you were looking at Facebook.
	And you noticed a meme that someone put up with a quotation by Ben Carson.
	And then you were kind of noting the reaction to it on the part of some people.
	So talk about that.
	Well, a friend of mine alerted me to this post, which actually is a mutual friend of ours post, right?
	And all she had was a meme of Ben Carson basically saying that people will be fooled by Kamala Harris.
	Read the quote.
	I think it's interesting.
	Well put by Ben Carson.
	So it says, absolutely she can win.
	This will be a great test of power of the media to take someone who formally was universally disliked and transform them into a godlike figure.
	The question is, Are the American people smart enough to see through it?
	Okay, let me comment on that before you go into some of the reactions because it's true.
	We sometimes talk about this, you know, are the American people clueless?
	Are the American people smart?
	Do the American people get it?
	My thought is that the American people are somewhat in the middle, but they do have a capacity to see through things, and my proof of this is, in fact, movies.
	You take the ordinary guy, and this is a guy who doesn't, you know, he's not a detective, he's not a law enforcement guy, but you put him into a movie that's, let's say, a mystery or a whodunit, and And you know how scriptwriters are.
	They will plant some very sly clues that they're hoping that you'll miss so that they can later point them out and you have to go, aha!
	But a lot of people are totally on it.
	They're like, oh, that guy's the main suspect, but he couldn't have done it.
	Here's why.
	People are, when they are put into a dark room, their senses and their mind goes alert.
	And they're able to spot things and they're able also with a small gesture, a turn of a face, they're able to interpret psychological clues.
	So all this is a way of saying, I don't think people lack the capacity of being able to see through what is happening.
	The media is putting on, I agree, they're putting on a massive Show.
	And they are trying to create an artificial Kamala Harris.
	This is Kamala Harris 2.0.
	We want you to believe in this Kamala Harris and not the real Kamala Harris that you've been seeing off and on for the past four years or even more than that.
	And I think people will recognize that this is a scam.
	Well, contrary to your opinion, the Post garnered like so many people to like, you know, talk about it.
	React to it.
	React to it.
	This woman, for most conservatives I know, like me, who are voting for Harris, We do not see her godlike or even that great of an option.
	We're voting against the immoral, federally indicted Trump.
	We're excited to have a better option than Biden.
	But it's not that most of us think she's so great.
	It's our moral conscience that leads us to vote for Harris this election as a vote against Trump.
	I see a lot of conservatives on my thread saying the same thing.
	We feel Trump has the potential to overthrow our democracy.
	I mean, OMG!
	Well, this is never Trump derangement syndrome, right?
	Because think about it.
	For all the people who say Trump is going to overthrow our democracy, you just have to ask, number one, the guy was in office.
	Name one thing he did.
	Now, of course, I know the answer.
	Well, what about January 6th?
	Can you prove that Trump instigated people and told them to go inside the Capitol and tried to interrupt the process?
	What's your basis for suggesting as if it were fact that he did that?
	Okay, so I have an answer to that.
	Basically, this is what happened, okay?
	These women that are answering this post saying, Oh, yes, he's a threat to democracy, blah, blah, blah.
	Okay, what happens is they're not really on it, like they disconnect, they may go vote, and then they go live their lives, they take care of their children, they take care of their families, they do their jobs, whatever, but they don't really see what goes on.
	The people that went to the Capitol on January 6th did it because they knew something was up.
	They weren't feeling quite as motivated as some people are, okay, you know what, he lost the election, move on.
	They knew something was up.
	They knew something was not right.
	And they knew the far-reaching implications of that because if something, if let's say the 2020 election was stolen, That sets up every subsequent election to be stolen.
	Not to mention that alone is the true, true, true destruction of democracy.
	Right.
	This is what happened in Venezuela, as I always talk about.
	This is how Hugo Chavez was able to take control of Venezuela through fraudulent elections.
	And so these people have no idea that that even happened.
	They don't think it did.
	And then when they say, you know, then let's take another phrase, the federally indicted Trump.
	Now, again, in an era of, in an earlier, maybe a different time in America, if the FBI came to your door, there'd be reason to believe I must have done something wrong.
	If you are federally indicted, you must have committed some high crimes.
	But now it's very clear Look at all the people who have been prosecuting Trump.
	To a man or to a woman, they are partisan Democrats.
	He's not being indicted in Texas.
	Where is he being indicted?
	New York.
	By a prosecutor.
	Again, to my point, these people don't engage, therefore they don't know this.
	They watch mainstream news and think it's the truth.
	So they think that Trump actually did get indicted for something that he did, which we know he did not do.
	Well, it's the old view and quite honestly, many of us shared it, right?
	If somebody were to tell you or me, let's just say 20 years ago, here's a politician and he's facing 20 criminal charges.
	We would be like, oh my God, this guy must be a habitual criminal.
	What has he done?
	20 criminal charges?
	This is horrible.
	This person needs to be removed from office.
	But that's because we had this implicit faith in the system That justice is being served and we now know that this is because we've seen it again and again and again so I mean what gets me about These people you're describing is not the fact that they don't know.
	I understand, you're busy with your life, you just pay occasional attention to politics, but the cool assurance with which they express their ignorance.
	I mean, they step into the arena and they go, not only am I voting for Harris, a lot of my conservative friends are because, you know, this guy's a criminal.
	So the confidence with which they say that Backed up by nothing more than a chasm of ignorance.
	That's the shocking part.
	Honey, not to mention the fact that they claim that she's morally superior to Trump.
	Do they know what she did to become a DA in California?
	Do they know that she went after this gentleman who was exposing Planned Parenthood?
	You know, for selling human parts?
	She actually threatened to jail him for this.
	She had one of those mobile carts to come have abortions at the DNC.
	I mean, that was probably her idea.
	I mean, these are people utterly without scruples.
	How can you morally say that she's superior?
	I don't even know.
	Well, but you are right that when you think of people who are ensconced on the right, they're consuming Breitbart, they're consuming Gateway Pundit, they watch my podcast, so they are informed in that way.
	Yeah.
	Then you have, but the people in the middle, they only see the mainstream media.
	You're right.
	And I think what's happening is that you and I believe, and our side believes by and large in objective truth, right?
	We believe that there is a truth out there.
	Either Biden is taking money under the table or he's not.
	Right?
	Either Kamala Harris is this way, or she's not.
	The left, I think, doesn't think like that.
	It's not that they disagree with us about what the truth is.
	They think the truth is something that can be created.
	So, the way they look at it is, here's Kamala Harris, and they go, doesn't really matter what she really is, or... It's a matter of no interest.
	Here's the question.
	Given her image, Given our control of media, given our campaign strategy, given our reach into digital media, what can we manufacture?
	How do we create this, I kind of call it the ricocheting bullet syndrome, because a lot of people, like the people whose posts you're reading, They get facts because they hear something from five different places and they think it must be true.
	So they're like, well, you know, I saw a book about that.
	And oh, wow, I saw Rachel Maddow.
	She was talking about it.
	And Michael Moore has a film on it.
	And it was it was being discussed in NPR while I was driving to work.
	And they think since you have all these sources, they don't realize.
	Wait a minute.
	These are not independent sources.
	This is the same bullet bouncing from one wall to another.
	These are the same birds all moving in flying formation.
	These are not independently corroborating sources at all, contrary to what you think.
	Right.
	So this is why you decided we should do a movie vindicating Trump so that people like this woman and others could go with an open mind and see for themselves who Trump really is.
	I mean, the movie is a way to do an end run around the media, right?
	We try to go on Facebook, they can restrict you, they can censor you, same with YouTube, same with Google.
	Theaters are something that they don't really control.
	And so theaters are a wonderful way For us to get our message out, for you to experience the message, for you to then share that information.
	So that's why we do it.
	And we hope to see you at the theater.
	We'll be talking a lot more about this, but next weekend, September 27th through 29th, opening weekend.
	Go if you can.
	VindicatingTrump.com.
	That's the one-stop shop to get tickets.
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	Debbie and I are doing our Friday roundup and this latest movie, in fact, you asked me, was it yesterday?
	How many does this add up to, right?
	How many have we done?
	And we did a little bit of a count because we have enough.
	It's kind of like with my books.
	I cannot give you the exact number now.
	I'll say something like 13 or 14.
	I'm sometimes off by at least a couple.
	Now with movies, what was the count?
	So this is number eight.
	This is number eight, not counting Infidel, which was a feature film, not a documentary.
	This is number eight.
	Now, I had already done Obama's America.
	We met the year, I believe, I released America, although you weren't involved in that movie, but you were involved in all the others subsequently, starting with Hillary's America, which was number three.
	And it is pretty funny because we have a small team and sometimes I think people will wonder, you know, hey, like, how did Debbie jump into this, into this sort of little movie team and become an integral part of it and bring things to it that actually go way beyond So people know you're a singer and they know you sing in the films, but you're actually actively involved in all aspects of it.
	So talk a little bit about how you did that and also a little bit about what it was like to sort of move into this and spot what this film deal was all about.
	What is it about it that surprised you the most?
	Well, you know, it's interesting because I did produce a CD in 2003, and even though it's a tiny little microcosm of something much bigger, like a movie, I still had to raise money.
	I still had to produce.
	It still took me a couple of years to do.
	And then once it was out, then I had to market it, which was like the toughest part of the whole thing.
	I thought making the CD was hard.
	Marketing the CD was even harder, right?
	Right.
	So I brought to the table the knowledge of being able to know how to do those things.
	In a movie, you know, and obviously, as you say, I do sing in the movies, which is fun, but that's not really the only thing I do for the movies, right?
	I'm a really good, I guess when I see a scene, I have a really good feel for the visual, not just the sound, obviously, for music, but the visual, how it's put together, so, you know, kind of help you sew it all up.
	Coming up with a narrative, because I know that with this movie, we were having a little bit of a tough time doing the narrative for the movie.
	It's like, okay, how do we want to thread this movie?
	What is it that we want to say at the end of the movie?
	What do we want audiences to get from this movie?
	Well, when you say narrative, this is really what we mean.
	If I write a book about Trump, I don't actually organize it this way, but I could do it this way.
	I could say, listen, Reagan and other candidates give you reasons to vote for Trump.
	And so I'm organizing this book around seven big reasons why you should vote for Trump.
	And that works for a book.
	A book is an argument.
	And you can talk about his personality, his policies, the border.
	Like I say, I didn't use this organizational structure.
	In fact, to me, it's a little bit crude.
	But my point is a book can be organized in that kind of a legal brief way.
	A movie can't.
	No.
	A movie is inherently a story.
	It's a journey.
	Not if it wants to keep your attention.
	Right.
	Not if it wants to keep your attention.
	And so a movie operates different.
	So when you say narrative, you actually mean the storyline.
	The storyline.
	The developmental pattern.
	That's right.
	Which is not only an intellectual arc, but it's an emotional arc.
	Right.
	Because if you notice in a movie, and this is true, I think, just as much of thrillers, romantic comedies, documentaries, If you notice, there is a certain familiar emotional arc.
	You get into a movie and generally things are going okay.
	And then something bad happens, which causes a problem and a serious problem.
	And then as the movie gets long, the problem gets deeper, more existential, more fundamental.
	In fact, at some point, everything is on the line.
	And then you have to have some way of dealing with that, resolving it.
	Sometimes you resolve it with just utter destruction, but you have to come out somehow on the other side of it.
	And so you're talking about the early stage where we think about, like, what's our theme?
	What's our plot?
	But that's the creative and that's the intellectual side, as you know.
	And I think this is really what distinguishes us from, say, Michael Moore, right?
	If Michael Moore makes a film, And he doesn't really do much of that anymore, and he's kind of a master of the flop these days.
	It's not like his old days, when Fahrenheit 9-11, I think, was his high point.
	And he made some other... His first film, I think, Roger and Me, was probably his best film.
	In any event, when Michael Moore wants to make a film, he goes to a studio.
	He goes to Hollywood.
	He goes, I want to make a film.
	And they go, here's 10 million dollars.
	And then he makes the film, and then everything is done for him.
	They're like, we'll do the paperwork, we'll do the legal stuff.
	You bring us the film and you'll be booked on The View on Monday, Good Morning America on Tuesday, you know, you're going to be on Face the Nation on Wednesday or on the weekend.
	So, it's already made.
	But on the conservative side, and this is why, you know, it's hard work for us, but we also commend other people who do it.
	You need to have the business savvy and raise the money.
	You need to do the legal.
	You need to be good at making the film.
	And even if you do all those things, you will still fail if you are not, and I would have to say, you have to be really good at marketing the film because film economics are pretty difficult.
	I think that and luck.
	And a little bit of luck.
	And a little bit of luck because... Here's what we mean.
	I mean, let's be clear.
	When we say luck, here's what we mean.
	We mean, number one, you could have made a film, and let's say you made a marvelous film about the Middle East.
	But suddenly, there is an international crisis that involves China.
	Suddenly, that's everything that people are talking about.
	Your film, good as it may be, is decentered.
	It's off the radar.
	You can't get publicity.
	No one wants to talk about that.
	We're all talking about China.
	And your film is dead in the water.
	So that is an entrepreneurial risk that you take, that your topic will somehow just be blown with the wind, as they say.
	Yeah, and a lot of times, and this is what's so crazy, is political documentaries especially are subjected to this kind of thing happening.
	Because, think of it, When we were planning to do the Trump movie, right, we wanted to get an interview with Trump before the assassination attempt happened.
	Right.
	If we had gotten him before that, it would have really taken the air out of the narrative of the movie.
	I mean, it would have been completely a different movie and maybe not even a movie that would be worth salvaging, really, right?
	Totally.
	No, no, that's right.
	And I think, I mean, speaking of our Trump interview, I wanted to say this because I think that the The Trump interview was set up in a way beautifully by our first meeting with Trump in November of 2019.
	You put to him this question.
	You said, Hey, Mr. President, you are battered every moment of every day on every platform, every media outlet, just about.
	And you're like, how do you do it, right?
	And we both, I think, expected Trump to go, ha ha ha, it's crazy, these people are nuts, I enjoy it.
	But he didn't, you know?
	He was sort of like, gee guys, he's like, it gets to me.
	You know?
	Yeah, and that's when it got to me.
	It got to you.
	Because I saw that vulnerability in him that he has never shown and he's never going to show.
	He doesn't like to show.
	He doesn't like to show it at all.
	But I, you know, when I saw it, I was like, you know, he's real.
	He's a real person with real feelings and he's, you know, he's got everything that the media portrays as like non-existent, right?
	Because he doesn't allow the media or anyone else to see that side of him.
	Yeah, and what you're saying really is that the public Trump and the private Trump are not exactly the same.
	So for example, Trump, in fact, is not egotistical.
	He's actually, he's self-deprecating, but in a public way he is.
	He loves it when people compliment him.
	So the public Trump is egotistical.
	The private Trump is not.
	And so I think I set myself the task for this film.
	I'm going to get this one-on-one with Trump.
	It's 45 minutes long.
	Let's sit like right across, even closer than we are today.
	And let me see if I can bring out that other Trump.
	Which is, of course, it's not like that's Trump and what you see is not Trump.
	It's just that you want to see Trump in the round.
	You want to see the full dimension of the man.
	And there is an aspect of him that, like you say, I think it's because he was raised as a tough guy.
	He was raised in the New York construction lots in Queens.
	And he's like, oh no, I'm not going to show you my feelings.
	I'm not going to talk about vulnerability.
	When Dr. Phil tried to get it out of him, he would not cooperate.
	He was not going there.
	But somehow, I think, In this environment, he allowed me to control the interview.
	You had actually warned me how tough it would be.
	I thought it would be a lot tougher than it was, but even then, you know, and I don't want to give too much away, but even then the private Trump is different.
	It's true.
	Trump recognizes that he is on stage, even in a one-on-one.
	But I think I got closer to that.
	Yeah, you did.
	And not to mention the fact that this is not an interview where I ask him one question and he speaks for 15 minutes.
	Yeah.
	It's really a great interview.
	Here he listens and he reacts and he's asked questions that I think at least some of them he had not been asked before and you can see on his face the the mental processing of what he's hearing. It's a very interesting back and forth.
	It's really a great interview, it really is. Well it's a way of it's a way of showing because look in some ways I think this is an election that is a referendum on Trump.
	I mean, even look at the thing you quoted.
	What did that woman say?
	Did she say, I like Kamala Harris?
	No.
	Did she say, yeah, I agree, she is a godlike figure?
	No.
	She's like, it doesn't matter what she is.
	It's Trump who's... So, in other words... It's a vote against Trump.
	It's a vote against Trump, for sure.
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	It's D-I-N-E-S-H Dinesh.
	Guys, if you'd like to support my work, I'd like to invite you to check out and join my Locals channel.
	I post a lot of exclusive content there, including content that's censored on other social media platforms.
	On Locals, you get Dinesh Unchained, Dinesh Uncensored.
	You can also interact with me directly.
	I do a live weekly Q&A every Tuesday.
	No topic is off limits.
	I also have Dinesh's movie page up on Locals, a bunch of cool films.
	2000 Mules is up there, the film that came out last year, Police State, and the new film, Vindicating Trump, will be up there as well.
	Hey, if you're an annual subscriber, you can stream and watch this movie content for free.
	It's included with your subscription.
	So check out the channel.
	It's dinesh.locals.com.
	I'd love to have you along for this great ride.
	Again, it's dinesh.locals.com.
	Our latest film, Vindicating Trump, it's going into theaters nationwide.
	One week from now, so Friday, September 27th.
	See it if you can opening weekend.
	It makes a huge difference.
	In fact, it makes a huge difference if you buy tickets early.
	Why?
	Because the theater chains are all looking to see how the theaters are selling out.
	And also, we should mention that we are always in the process of adding theaters.
	So we've got 500 or so theaters up there.
	There'll be several hundred theaters going up on Monday.
	Well, I'm hoping we'll end up somewhere around a thousand theaters, which is a good number of theaters to have.
	So get your movie tickets, go see it in a gang or a group, take your book club, your Republican club.
	It will really inform you, inspire you, fire you up.
	I wish we could get more independents to see it.
	So if you know guys who are Democrats, you know, a family member, it's like, hey, listen, I'll buy your movie ticket and take you to lunch afterward.
	I'll take you to dinner afterward.
	Find ways to cajole people to go with you because I think that this is a film that can actually break through.
	And films can do that, I think, in a way that... I think the reason films are effective is because Under normal circumstances, when you are trying to make a case, you're telling someone about something, which is totally different than showing them something.
	It's kind of like if I were to say to somebody, I grew up in India and it was like this and it was like that.
	They have no clue of what that means.
	They've never been to India.
	They've never been to India.
	But if I say, listen, here's a video, here's a movie, and that's me as a kid, and that was my room.
	And then outside, that's the guy who sold bananas on the street, and that's the guy who brings along a monkey that does tricks.
	And then you're like, wow, I feel like I was there.
	I have a better idea of what it was like.
	So films, in that sense, because they appeal to so many of the senses, the eyes, the ears, the head, the heart.
	They engage you in a more, I think, full way.
	Yeah.
	Well, you know, films are great.
	But, you know, as we've talked about before, they're very expensive to make.
	Even a lower budget movie is expensive to make.
	And so I know that back when we did 2,000 Mules, people were like, why can't you guys show it for free?
	You should be able to show it for free.
	Why aren't you patriotic enough to show this movie for free?
	Why do you have to make money?
	And I guess what people just don't understand is it's not about that.
	It's that we can't stay in business.
	We can't do more documentaries.
	Right.
	We don't have a viable model.
	I mean, you know, first of all, not a single one of our investors is putting their money in to make money.
	I think that's fair to say.
	A lot of them have businesses that are far more profitable than investing in movies, which is somewhat risky.
	So what we assure them is we will try hard in the market to get your money back.
	We don't even promise that they're gonna make money.
	We basically go, we'll try to get it back to you so you can do it again, right?
	And so when someone says to us, hey, why don't you offer the movie for free right away?
	I say to them, Think of it this way, do you work for free?
	And you're like, no.
	I'm like, well, you can't work for free because that's not a viable model for your family, right?
	Even though what you're doing is useful, the country needs you.
	But I think the problem is they see us a little bit as activists because a lot of them are activists, but they have a job and then they're activists on the side.
	But imagine being an activist full-time with no job.
	Right.
	How on earth could we do that?
	How would you make it work?
	Yeah.
	No, I think the thing about it is that the mechanism that we've developed, which has been very successful for us.
	I mean, we've had investors that go back four movies and five movies.
	Why?
	Because the phrase I've used is recycled philanthropy, right?
	Which is basically this.
	Give me $50,000 or $100,000.
	I will work hard with this film, let's say Hillary's America, to get that money back to you So you can give it back to me so I can make Death of a Nation.
	And then I'm going to give it back to you so you can give it back to me to make Trump Card.
	And then mules and now vindicating Trump.
	So this is in fact a wonderful scheme because for the donor, for the investor, they're like, isn't it great?
	I can make the same dollar run around the block multiple times.
	Dinesh is not going to come up to me and go, I wasted your $100,000 last time, give me another $100,000 because they get it back so they can give it back to us.
	So we've made it work and we want to keep making it work because that keeps us being able to make good movies.
	I think the other point is there are of course people who do documentaries, they interview four or five people, they pull some footage out from the media like CNN and they slap it together and it's a documentary.
	Well, that's not our view.
	That's not our documentaries, even if you go to the first documentary.
	They're probably called more docudramas.
	Yeah, we take all the spectacular elements of a really good feature film.
	Comedy, situational humor, spectacular scenes of history or of contemporary politics.
	So we put money into making it and this is really why we urge people to see it in the theater.
	I felt very bad and I think you did too.
	A couple of our earlier movies after COVID During COVID, yeah.
	We couldn't have a normal theatrical, but now we do.
	We're like back.
	Yeah, we're back.
	And we're excited to be back, and we want to be a big success in the theater because that sends a reverberating message, which helps our films, but hey, it also helps the films of other conservatives trying to make films.
	What do you think makes this film, Vindicating Trump, If it is different from, let's say, our other films.
	The mood, the tone, the storyline.
	You know, I didn't so much laugh in the other movies.
	So we took a topic that is very serious because, as you know, this is dire for the country to make sure that they vote the right way.
	But we were able to ridicule the left like no one else.
	Well, you're talking about our recreations, and what we have in the movie are a series of war rooms, right?
	We have a media war room, we have a kind of like a war room of the intelligence community, the prosecutors who want to get Trump, a war room of the media, and it's almost like we're taking the viewer behind the scenes.
	So if Trump is indicted, what's the reaction?
	How are these plots against Trump cooked up and by whom?
	What do they talk to each other about?
	Are they in open collusion?
	Do they get on Zoom calls and talk to each other?
	All of this is sort of beautifully and wittily exposed in the movie now.
	We've had recreations in the past, but I think you know most of them are historical recreations.
	Andrew Jackson, slavery, segregation, and so on.
	This movie is 100% contemporary.
	We do have a little flashback to early young Trump, 2016, and the iconic Trump coming down the escalator.
	And in a sense, leaving behind his old world.
	I think that's the significance of that dissent.
	It also helps to explain, by the way, why the people who used to love him now hate him, feel betrayed by him.
	It's almost like he exited out of their world and joined in with the hamburger-eating, you know, construction-working ordinary citizens against the elite.
	Yeah, but do you think that he was ever really elite like that?
	Yes, not in the sense that he's a guy who would always, I think, have enjoyed a slice of pizza off the street or drink a Coke as opposed to, let's say, Pinot Noir, for sure.
	I've always noticed he's more likely to be at the boxing match or the UFC than he is to be, let's say, on the Lincoln Center Museum or Opera Board.
	So that's true.
	He was revered in pop culture.
	That means that he was... Ellen was cool with him.
	You know, Ellen DeGeneres and Oprah and Larry King and Charlie Rose.
	So all the sort of arbiters of popular culture Thought Trump was it.
	And the rappers thought he was it.
	Right.
	And I think Trump, a little bit of Trump, must have known that when he went down that escalator, he was saying farewell to all that.
	That was all gonna go bye-bye.
	Right, right.
	And so, to this day, I know people who speculate and think, well, you know, why did the people who were once thought he was so great, It's because actually Trump knew what he was doing.
	They knew what he was doing.
	And so this was a very fateful moment.
	I think Trump has had two fateful moments in his career.
	The first one, when he crossed the bridge from Queens where his father had made his kind of rent controlled apartment business into Manhattan.
	He bought the Commodore Hotel.
	He started building the New York skyline.
	That was crossing the bridge, number one.
	And the second one was descending the escalator out of the construction world and into the political world.
	And it's been, in a sense, crazy ever since.
	Debbie and I are back for the final segment of our Friday roundup.
	We're talking about our upcoming film.
	It's just a week away.
	Get your tickets at VindicatingTrump.com.
	By the way, there's a book of the same title, and you can order that also on the website.
	If you scroll down, right on the front page, you'll see a couple of tabs.
	Amazon, Barnes & Noble, you choose.
	You can order from wherever you want.
	You'll be one of the first people to get the book.
	And the two just go beautifully together.
	Let's talk about, I mean, Trump has now faced two assassination attempts.
	And we covered the first one in some depth in the film.
	Why?
	Because I think it is such a window into Trump's character and into Trump's almost superhuman courage.
	Because, I mean, you said to me, was it last night?
	You were like, Dinesh, if you were in this situation where like two people have got- I would make you quit.
	You would be- On the spot, buh-bye.
	Right?
	Because it's like, who needs it?
	Yeah, no.
	I mean, I think that 999 people in 1,000 would be like, I'm outta here.
	Yeah.
	And especially when you're Trump, you're a billionaire.
	Yeah, we don't need it.
	Number one, you have some years with your grandchildren.
	You don't need it.
	Number two, you've got Mar-a-Lago properties around the world.
	So it's kinda like that scene, right?
	In the Joe Pesci movie, my cousin Vinny, where he's like, you know, he's like, let's see, I get my butt kicked, I get $200.
	I think I'm going to go with the $200.
	Right?
	Same thing.
	A normal person would go for the $200.
	Trump goes, no, I think I'm going to take, I think I'm going to go for the...
	But let's come back to You had mentioned correctly that that the interview gets Trump to reflect on this in a very eye-opening way and and really the theme of this film in a certain sense is It connects Trump to Lincoln, and I think the connection is this.
	Not only, of course, did you have John Wilkes Booth who successfully assassinated Lincoln, so there's a connection there.
	Of course, John Wilkes Booth was a confederate, he was a democrat.
	And what was his motive?
	His motive was he had been poisoned against Lincoln by a southern democratic media and he wanted to revive the fortunes of the South.
	The South was, they had already been, they'd surrendered.
	Appomattox was over.
	So virtuous for the cause.
	He saw himself as virtuous for the cause.
	He saw Lincoln as a tyrant.
	In fact, he jumps on the stage, what does he shout?
	He essentially shouts a Latin phrase that means, that's what happens to tyrants.
	And I bet you that Thomas Crooks, the guy who took the first assassination shots at Trump, and the second guy, the Ukraine guy, they probably had the same motive.
	Absolutely 100%.
	We are soldiers.
	We are heroes.
	This guy's Hitler circa 1933.
	It is a noble act.
	Yeah, and we talked about how the media is very much responsible for that rhetoric and that hatred that people have because they want to normalize the hatred of Trump.
	They want to say, you know what?
	If you hate him, you have good reason to hate him because let me tell you, he's a misogynist, he's a dictator, he's a fascist, he's a racist, he's all these things that he is not.
	But for someone like these two characters, Oh, wow!
	That is signaling to me that I'm going to be a martyr for the cause, because obviously they know that they could be shot dead for attempting to do this, but they're willing, like Booth, to do this for the cause.
	I mean, you touched on, I think, a key point, and that is that the leading Democrats and the The powerful pundits on the left know that Trump is not Hitler.
	They do.
	They know that he's not Caesar.
	And how do we know that they know that?
	Well, here's a case in point.
	Recently, Kamala Harris, after the second assassination of him, calls Trump.
	They have a conversation.
	Trump is asked about it.
	He goes, we had a very pleasant conversation.
	Now stop right there.
	If Kamala Harris thought that Trump was Hitler, Do you actually make a sympathetic phone call to Hitler?
	Do you have a pleasant conversation with Hitler?
	Do you offer thoughts and prayers to Hitler?
	Do you say things like, I'm really glad that this guy didn't get Hitler?
	None of that makes an ounce of sense.
	It only makes sense if what they really mean is, I know you're not Hitler, but it benefits me to say you are.
	Why?
	Because you're actually a powerful, larger-than-life figure, And because you have this strong connection with so many Americans who listen to you and revere you, we're going to use that against you.
	They are not used to the populist conservative Republican.
	They're not used to that because I've never heard of a Republican being a populist.
	Maybe, you could argue, maybe Reagan was, to some extent.
	To some extent.
	But not like Trump.
	I mean, you're talking about my aunt from Venezuela that passed away last year.
	She revered Trump.
	She loved Trump.
	She was like, how's my favorite president?
	I mean, she adored him, as did my mom.
	But these women... Well, remember when Millet from Argentina... Oh my gosh!
	If you see him with this meeting with Trump, he's like a kid.
	Like a kid in a candy store.
	Right.
	He is so, you know, like taken by Trump.
	But, you know, so again, he's a larger than life figure.
	And the Dems just are not used to that.
	The Dems want, what they really want is they like the gentleman loser.
	Like the perfect candidate for them is Romney.
	Because what will Romney do?
	It's kind of like Romney will step into the ring.
	Well, yeah.
	He'll throw some air punches.
	Yeah.
	He will then get battered to the ground, even if the accusations against him are false, like, Romney, you're a crook.
	How did you make your money?
	He'll start apologizing.
	And then when he loses the election, he has a big smile on his face.
	And the Democrats are, you know, that's the kind of Republican.
	Yeah, exactly.
	Or like Liz Cheney.
	Exactly.
	Well, Liz Cheney, I think her motives are different.
	But here's the thing about, as we were talking, is that the Dems and the media and Hollywood and all those crazy lefties, They want someone that obviously is for abortion, and I mean for abortion if you know what I mean, right?
	Not for choice.
	They're not for choice but for abortion, okay?
	They are for forcing children to become the other gender when in fact children don't know that at that age, right?
	They're for that.
	They're for all these really horrific things that could take place in our society that are just not going to be good for our society or our mental health.
	But because Trump would never go along with these things, and maybe a Romney would, they have to, like, stop him.
	Yeah.
	And they have to stop him, like, no matter what.
	I mean, what you're saying, I think, is in a broad sense that the Democrats are the party of of Sodom and Gomorrah.
	And actually, they're worse.
	And here's why they're worse.
	Because we have no indication that in Sodom and Gomorrah, there was an element that was making a moral defense of Sodom and Gomorrah.
	They were engaging in all kinds of sick and twisted practices.
	But as far as we know, they weren't making the case for them.
	The difference with the Democrats is they're advocates of it.
	They don't say things like, like, you know, one could take the position, hey, I've got way too many kids and I'm, you know, I'm going to kill this eighth kid or sixth kid of mine.
	And, and that's a tragic necessity, but guess what?
	I got to do it.
	I can't, I don't see any other way.
	It's, that is an argument from necessity.
	You could be deluded about it, but you're not saying it's a good thing.
	You're saying I had to do it.
	It's kind of like you typically catch someone committing a crime.
	They never go, I think stealing is great.
	They always go, my family's hungry, man.
	Or the rich are stealing from the poor, so I feel.
	They make a rationalization.
	Robin Hood.
	Right, but where the Democrats are now, the sheer twisted perversions that they're in favor of, they are advocates of it.
	They want an androgynous society.
	They want Sodom and Gomorrah.
	In fact, they portray Sodom and Gomorrah as The sort of party of light.
	The model.
	Right.
	And the other society as the party of darkness.
	Yeah.
	But look at what Lucifer does.
	But this is what makes, and this is something we touch on in the movie and I go into more length in the book, what do you make of the Christians?
	Who essentially are saying, yes, the Democrats of the party of Sodom and Gomorrah, but we can't bring ourselves or yes, the Democrats of the party of, you know, of the Philistines, but we can't bring ourselves to support this guy, David.
	He goes around carrying a slingshot all the time.
	There's that Batsheba business.
	He needs to fight like us.
	Well, if David fought like you, he'd be in the same craven, miserable position that you find yourself.
	You found a fighter who's willing to, and knows how to fight, and has proven that he... And the crazy thing is that it is Trump, and only Trump, that brought us to make Roe v. Wade a thing of the past, right?
	And they don't even talk about it.
	It's almost like they don't even go there.
	And there are a couple of people, not too many, but some on the pro-life side who are like, I don't know if pro-lifers can vote for Trump.
	He didn't go far enough according to them.
	Yeah.
	I mean, Trump was better than Bush.
	Trump was better than Reagan.
	Trump delivered on the issue that you say is critical to you.
	So you can only imagine being Trump and listening to someone.
	It's almost like you find a guy drowning in a pond.
	You pull him out, right?
	And you've saved his life.
	This is the one thing that he needed you to do.
	And you got him out of there.
	And he gets out of there and he goes, Where's my sandwich?
	And you're like, I got you out of the pond.
	I don't have a sandwich.
	Aren't you feeling kind of happy that you're not thrashing around in the water?
	This is, I think, at least my reaction when I hear this kind of foolishness.
	It is, and let me just tell you, they're going to regret it.
	Either if they stay home or vote for Kamala and she wins, their worst nightmare will come true.
	Yeah.
	And that's not even a secret.
	That's something the Democrats have put into their platform.
	And they're going to make us, those of us that see the light, live through their nightmare.
	Horrible.

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