Knowledge Fight Interactive Search Tool

Nov. 28, 2017 - The Michael Knowles Show

43:48

Ep. 65 - The Swampy Shore: Reality TV Reality

The Jersey Shore has announced a new season, but who needs Snooki, Mike, and Paulie when we’ve got Donald, Chuck, and Nancy? Allie Stuckey, Elisha Krauss, and Jacob Airey join the Panel of Deplorables to discuss new discoveries about the tomb of Jesus, why Millennials say “I feel” instead of “I think," and the latest in Democrat sex scandals. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Large

Audio Only |

Scroll

Time	Text
	The Jersey Shore has announced a new season, but who needs Snooki, Mike, and Pauly when we've got Donald, Chuck, and Nancy?
	We will analyze our wonderfully entertaining reality TV reality.
	Then, Allie Stuckey, Alicia Krauss, and Jacob Airy join the panel of deplorables to discuss new discoveries about the tomb of Jesus.
	Spoiler alert, it's empty.
	Why millennials say, I feel, instead of I think.
	It's probably because they feel and they don't think.
	And the latest in Democrat sex scandals.
	I'm Michael Knowles, and this is The Michael Knowles Show.
	I am so excited that the Jersey Shore is back.
	I am as excited as anybody else is.
	In case you have never experienced this wonderful show, here's a clip.
	Ron, what's your mentality going down there?
	What are you going to do?
	I'm going to have a good time.
	I'm going to get creepy.
	And what is your name, sir?
	Situation.
	Huh?
	Situation.
	Cam's are here!
	I finally put some water on my face.
	I was like, we got grenades, man.
	It's hot.
	You trying to swish right now?
	Can I have a roll, please?
	Don't worry, you got a couple.
	Leave me alone.
	Get out of my face.
	Yo, shut your mouth, you dirty little hamster.
	You look like Popeye and Crack in my face, jerk off.
	Oh, my God.
	How many guys did you sleep with in 24 hours?
	Okay, whatever.
	That's mature to walk away, too.
	Boss seems to think that my hair is going to fall off and go into the ice cream.
	This hair ain't moving, my dude.
	150 miles an hour on the highway on a street bike?
	Does it move?
	What makes you think it's gonna move in a gelato shop?
	I love that show so much.
	I loved it in college.
	I used to go to the Jersey Shore all the time.
	When I was a kid, I would go to Wildwood with my family.
	One time I was at Seaside Heights, also known as Sleaside Heights, visiting a buddy in college.
	And we saw, we went to the house while they were filming.
	We saw a massive crowd down below because the situation was smoking a cigarette on the balcony.
	I actually, don't ask me why I know this, I was conceived at the Jersey Shore at Wildwood on the 4th of July of all times.
	Again, please, I sort of wish I didn't know that.
	So anyway, I love the show.
	But do we need it anymore?
	Do we actually need reality television?
	Yes.
	I don't know, man, because we have the swampy shore.
	We have the reality TV of one President Donald Trump and the Washington D.C. that is revolving around him.
	Plus, we have a great cast of characters that he's given us.
	It's extremely entertaining.
	And this should not be surprising at all, because it really does.
	Politics in 2017 more so than it did previously, more so than we've ever seen in the past.
	It resembles reality TV because we made the king of reality television president.
	This guy had a reality TV show, one of the defining reality TV shows on network television for 14 years.
	It was about him.
	It starred him.
	It was about his life and his company.
	It was basically a game show.
	So we had these constant celebrities and new characters who came by.
	This is the culture.
	I notice all of the people who for years and years have sat at Heritage Foundation lunches and have written in all of the elite publications on the right, they've called for a culture warrior in the White House.
	We have to wage the culture wars.
	Everything else is just accounting.
	And they seem to have had a vision of what that culture warrior would look like, and it didn't look like Donald Trump.
	So now that he is waging the culture of wars, they hate it and they're saying it's uncouth and they're running away from him.
	And they're commiserating with their friends on the left and at the New York Times and in left-wing outlets.
	And they're saying, oh, yes, isn't it so awful?
	I don't like that guy.
	He says strange words.
	But look, I'm for elite culture as much as the next guy.
	It actually occurred to me while I was writing this.
	I was listening to Abjoy et abjoven ma pais.
	It's if you listen to chanting or anything on Spotify, you'll see these ridiculous songs that come out of Provencal poetry.
	But guess what, folks?
	Provencal poetry is not the culture that we live in.
	It's a nice culture if you want to read old books and read old poetry and that sort of thing.
	I'm all for it.
	I like the opera.
	I like going to plays.
	But that isn't the actual culture.
	And if we have rich Uncle Pennybags become the nominee of the Republican Party and wear a monocle and talk about how great Don Giovanni is or how he only listens to Bach, that doesn't engage in the culture.
	He might be a well-formed fella, but that isn't the culture that the American people pay attention to.
	So...
	The NFL, that is the culture.
	Reality television, that is the culture.
	And we now have a guy who's constantly talking about the NFL, who's talking about celebrities, who's waging the war where it exists.
	Now we have these two characters.
	We have Chuck and Nancy.
	But that doesn't take into account my favorite character, which is Pocahontas.
	We'll get to Pocahontas in a little.
	Here's what Chuck and Nancy wrote.
	This morning, Donald Trump tweeted, quote, meeting with Chuck and Nancy today about keeping government open and working.
	Problem is they want illegal immigrants flooding into our country unchecked or weak on crime and want to substantially raise taxes.
	I don't see a deal.
	Don't you?
	After all, you know, this is poetic diction.
	Ben talked about an excellent book by Owen Barfield, Poetic Diction, on his show the other day.
	This is poetic diction.
	It offers us so much in just three sentences.
	He gives us the characters.
	He gives us the protagonist.
	That's Donald Trump.
	This is what I want to do.
	I want to keep our country open.
	I want to keep the government working.
	Then he gives us the antagonists.
	That's Chuck and Nancy.
	He doesn't say Senator Schumer and Congresswoman Pelosi, Leader Pelosi.
	He says it, even puts it in quotes, Chuck and Nancy.
	You know them.
	They come through your TV every night.
	You know them.
	They're like a sitcom character.
	They're like a reality television character.
	He then presents himself not only as the reasonable guy, but he's the innocent guy.
	It's almost laughable.
	It is laughable, this tweet, because he's saying, look, this is what I want.
	I just want these good things for the country, and so I'm going to meet with them today.
	You know, the only trouble is, the only thing, I suspect this might not go very well, because they're anti-American monsters who want to destroy your country for you.
	So I don't think there will be a deal, but maybe there will be, right?
	He presents himself as this perfectly innocent player, and he's forcing them into a corner.
	They can't come to the meeting now.
	He's just said that they want to flood this country with criminals and illegal immigrants, that they want to raise your taxes and destroy your country.
	So he doesn't see a deal, but hey, you know, maybe it'll work out.
	They can't possibly come.
	So if they don't come, then it just underscores the narrative.
	He wants to work together.
	He wants to reach across the aisle.
	He wants to do positive work for the country.
	But these obstructionists among Democrats will not do it.
	And not only that, but they're humorless.
	That's the other accusation, that he's constantly implicitly leveling against them.
	And so what happened?
	They canceled the meeting.
	Of course they had to.
	And then Sarah Huckabee Sanders sends out a press release and says, the president's invitation to the Democrat leaders still stands, and he encourages them to put aside their pettiness, stop the political grandstanding, show up and get to work.
	These issues are too important.
	It's exactly—it was ever thus the minute he wrote this tweet, and now he looks like the adult, which is crazy.
	He's written this—the sort of statement from the president that we've never seen before.
	He's written this, and then, ironically, he's the one who ends up looking like an adult.
	This is no surprise.
	This should come as no surprise to us.
	But many people on the left and the right are constantly scratching their heads or saying, what is he doing?
	How could he be doing this?
	If only he did something different, then it would all work out great.
	You know, you got to give this guy a little bit of credit.
	He has been manipulating people to do what he wants them to do.
	For decades, but he's done it explicitly on television for 15 years.
	This was his job, was to take regular people, not with a script, not with characters that he's written, regular people that he's met in life, and get them to do what he wants them to do to create entertainment on television.
	That was truly his job for 15 years.
	So this brings us to our next character, my favorite one.
	That would be Pocahontas.
	Here was Trump yesterday at an event honoring the Navajo Code Talkers.
	For the country.
	So that was the ultimate statement from General Kelly, the importance.
	And I just want to thank you because you're very, very special people.
	You were here long before any of us were here.
	Although we have a representative in Congress who they say was here a long time ago.
	They call her Pocahontas.
	But you know what?
	I like you.
	Because you are special.
	You are special people.
	You are really incredible people.
	And from the heart, from the absolute heart, we appreciate what you've done, how you've done it.
	The bravery that you displayed and the love that you have for your country, Tom, I would say that's as good as it gets.
	That is as good as it gets.
	It was perfectly executed.
	Those guys don't look too offended.
	For those of you who aren't watching because you haven't subscribed, go over and subscribe.
	But if you're just listening, when he says Pocahontas, they're smiling a little, they're laughing a little.
	It's not, they're not taken aback and saying how awful this is.
	And by the way, Pocahontas wasn't Navajo.
	Pocahontas wasn't Cherokee, as Elizabeth Warren lying said that she was.
	But he's mocking her.
	He's mocking her in this moment.
	Why?
	Because it's a little aside.
	He's honoring these guys at an event.
	He's obviously heaping praise on them.
	And then he gets his little joke in there.
	Why?
	Why is he mocking Elizabeth Warren?
	Elizabeth Warren deserves to be mocked.
	Elizabeth Warren pretended to be a Native American Indian.
	She is as white as can be.
	I am far swarthier than Elizabeth Warren ever could possibly be, even during the summer in the sun.
	And Elizabeth Warren didn't just say that she was Native American Indian on job applications.
	She didn't just talk about it in her life.
	She submitted a recipe to a cookbook called Pow Wow Chow, It doesn't get much more egregious than that.
	She is prostituting her fake ancestry, clearly for career benefit, but Donald Trump is the one who's offensive by making this joke and pointing it out.
	By the way...
	This event would not have been covered by the press had he not made that remark.
	He knows that.
	That's why he made the remark.
	We wouldn't have seen wall-to-wall coverage of the Navajo Code Talkers Honor Summit had he not made this line.
	So like catnip, the press can't resist.
	And once again, what are we talking about?
	We're not talking about Bob Mueller.
	We're not talking about Russia.
	We're talking about how Elizabeth Warren is a liar, and this clearly white woman pretended to be a Native American to further her career.
	So how did Warren respond?
	I think you guessed it.
	It is deeply unfortunate that the President of the United States cannot even make it through a ceremony honoring these heroes without having to throw out a racial slur.
	Look, Donald Trump does this over and over thinking somehow he's going to shut me up with it.
	It hadn't worked in the past.
	It is not going to work in the future.
	It's a racial slur.
	Didn't you know that Pocahontas is a racial slur?
	Did you know that, Marshall?
	I don't know.
	In my PC training, there are a lot of slurs that I was told not to say.
	Pocahontas wasn't one of them, because Pocahontas was a Native American Indian from the Northeast of America, and also a Disney cartoon.
	So it's not a racial slur.
	Ann Coulter once gave me tremendous advice.
	The first time I met her when I was in college, we were talking about how all the crazies at college would call you racist for saying that we ought to have lower taxes and less government in our lives.
	And she said, you know, Michael, when a liberal calls you a racist, you know you've won the argument.
	And that's true.
	She has no argument here.
	She can't answer for her fraud, for her decades of fraud.
	So what she has to do, she looks ridiculous in every sense of that word.
	To think that she is like Pocahontas, which she claimed to be, is ridiculous.
	It makes you laugh, it makes you laugh at her, but she can't laugh.
	She is humorless.
	It reminds me of that meme that was going around of Sandra Fluke who has her arms crossed.
	She was that Democrat contrivance who took the sacramental view of birth control.
	She had her arms crossed and frowning and said, that's not funny.
	That's what Elizabeth Warren looks like.
	She seems like a scold.
	She seems humorless.
	How did that work for Hillary Clinton?
	He's forced her into this corner to make her deeply unlikable.
	Not that I'm saying she wasn't unlikable before, but Donald Trump is making her look even more unlikable.
	And by the way, she says that he's doing this to shut her up.
	No, he isn't.
	He's doing it to get her on TV and to make her look as humorless as she is.
	He isn't shutting her up at all.
	It isn't to shut her up.
	It's to make her look ridiculous, which isn't.
	She is.
	You see this played out to yesterday.
	There was that drama at the CFPB, speaking of Elizabeth Warren, the board, the Consumer Financial so-called Protection Bureau that Elizabeth Warren promoted and helped to create even before she was a member of the Senate.
	The drama that happened at the CFPB is that the director resigned.
	He named his deputy, a woman named Leandra English, to take over.
	But he has no authority to do that.
	The president can name the head of his executive agencies.
	So instead of formally nominating somebody and taking care of this in paperwork, basically, what Donald Trump was was he named an interim director, Mick Mulvaney, his budget director, to walk down there with a bag of Dunkin' Donuts and take over the office.
	Why did he do it this way?
	He could have handled this much more quietly.
	Why did he have to send down a person?
	Well, if he had found some boring, bureaucratic solution on paper to do this, then it might have taken care of this particular problem.
	But it wouldn't have pointed out that this issue of the CFPB and all of these godless, headless executive agencies is not a boring, bureaucratic problem.
	I had the privilege of meeting Antonin Scalia.
	We asked him what the greatest threat to liberty was in the United States.
	He said it's these agencies, these executive agencies who have no accountability, certainly to Congress, and in this case, apparently not to the president.
	So he sent down a person, Mick Mulvaney, an outspoken critic of this agency, to have human drama, two heads, two directors of the agency duking it out, total catnip for the press, and we get to see...
	This issue brought into stark relief.
	Does a legitimately elected president sent there by the American people, does he have the right to run his own executive agencies?
	Or is some bureaucrat holdover who thinks that she knows better how to run your life than you do, who thinks she knows better how to run your government than you do, is she the one who should do it?
	It's a beautiful human drama.
	It pits people who represent different groups.
	And, you know, there was a commentator.
	I can't remember.
	I couldn't find his name today.
	There was a commentator in 2016 who predicted that Trump would win because we want to keep watching the show.
	We can't turn off this reality TV show.
	We want to see season two.
	America just wouldn't be able to help itself.
	A lot of people on the left and the right are saying Trump is doing horrible and he should abandon Twitter or Trump is doing fine but he should abandon Twitter.
	And Twitter is the key.
	Humor is the key.
	This isn't just bread and circuses, by the way.
	We're seeing a lot of great stuff happen in the federal government.
	We're seeing massive deregulation.
	An annual 13,000 regulations passed every single year by the federal government for the last 20 years.
	This year, zero net new regulations.
	Massive deregulation at the EPA.
	Scott Pruitt has been doing an excellent job.
	Judge Gorsuch, a supremely good nominee and now Supreme Court justice.
	A ton of other judges have been nominated.
	Some have been confirmed.
	You know, the humor has been really a great way to accomplish political goals.
	And rather than encouraging Trump to abandon all of that covfefe, we should encourage him to keep it up.
	This has been an immense help to him.
	And the show must go on, folks.
	We don't want to turn this show off.
	So to continue to discuss reality television, I have to bring on our excellent panel of deplorables.
	But before we do, and we have a great panel today, we have Ali Stuckey.
	We have Alicia Krauss, The Daily Wire Zone.
	We have Jacob Berry.
	All right, two out of three ain't bad.
	But before we do that, we have to make a little money, folks.
	We have to tell you about a great...
	A great help to your holiday season.
	Winter is coming.
	And one way to keep the lights on here and also to keep the lights on in your head and actually learn something and be able to digest a lot of the information and commentary that you want to digest is this great app called Texture.
	So Texture is a way...
	I read magazines.
	I used to subscribe to all the print magazines, but that's very expensive and they just clutter up your coffee table and it's kind of hard to work through.
	Instead, there's this great app which is called Texture.
	Whether you're looking for dependable political reporting, high quality storytelling, culture, entertainment, all of the above, you don't only have to listen to this podcast.
	You should probably be reading magazines as well.
	They deliver it all with beautiful writing, excellent prose, prose that you don't always find on just the news websites that we're all constantly consuming.
	And you can get it all in one place.
	It gives you access, texture, to unlimited access to over 200 premium magazines.
	It has leading titles, Time, The Atlantic, The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, Wired, The National Review.
	Right now you can try that app for free.
	It's especially good around the holiday season.
	I'd love nothing more than to cuddle up next to my Christmas tree with those gigantic incandescent bulbs.
	You know, the ones that almost set your tree on fire.
	And it just feels warm.
	It feels like you're snuggled up.
	And just read.
	I do it every night.
	And the texture is a really great way to do it.
	If you subscribe to all of these magazines, it would cost you a ton of money.
	But right now, imagine having it all anywhere, anytime, just right on your mobile device.
	If you want to start your free trial, which I recommend, go to texture.com slash Knowles.
	That's K-N-O-W-L-E-S, just like Beyonce, texture.com slash Knowles.
	If you choose to continue, podcast listeners will get the whole thing.
	For how much?
	How much would you pay for this, Marshall?
	That's a lot.
	I mean, you don't read.
	But if you read, you know, you'd have to subscribe.
	What is it?
	Every month it's $5 to $15 for any magazine.
	If you want to get unlimited magazines, what would that be?
	A million dollars?
	A jillion dollars?
	No siree, Bob.
	$9.99 a month.
	This is a really good deal, and especially it's a great deal to try it for free, which you should all do right now.
	That's 30% even off of Texture's listed price.
	Great gift options available for that loved one in your life this holiday season.
	Texture.com slash Knowles to start your free trial today.
	That's, what is it, Marshall?
	Texture.com slash notes.
	You got it.
	You got it.
	See, he's learning.
	Maybe we'll get him a trial.
	Marshall will read.
	We'll discuss our reading together.
	Go do it and let me know what you think of it because I think it's really excellent.
	All right.
	Let's get into our – we have a lot of excellent topics to discuss today.
	Let's begin with Allie.
	Allie, will anybody watch the New Jersey Shore where his politics made reality TV completely irrelevant?
	Oh, I don't know if it's politics making Jersey Shore relevant.
	I think it was probably already like that much before Donald Trump.
	I mean, I never watched this stuff, Michael Knowles.
	It seems like you might be an expert.
	You're much higher brow than me.
	Yes, I am.
	I am.
	No, I just, I never watched it.
	I watch other much more sophisticated reality shows like The Bachelor and The Bachelorette that, you know, things like Jersey Shore, they're just beneath me.
	What can I say?
	That makes perfect sense.
	On this reality TV show that we have in front of us, the Trump show, the Swampy Shore, Alicia, which is racist?
	Because Elizabeth Warren says calling her Pocahontas is racist.
	What is more racist, to call Elizabeth Warren a white woman who isn't Native American Pocahontas, or for Elizabeth Warren to pretend to be a Native American Indian and write a recipe for a book called Pow Wow Chow?
	Yeah, that was a crab recipe.
	Hailing from Oklahoma, southeastern Oklahoma specifically, there are no crabs there.
	We do have crawdads, though.
	Those mud bugs are way grosser than crabs.
	And she also hailing from Oklahoma, I guess she needs to apologize where she was raised because it stands for Land of the Red People.
	It's, like, ridiculous.
	It's, like, legitimately Pocahontas was somebody's name.
	And I do, I, like, it was cringeworthy yesterday when Trump said this in front of these American heroes that are probably pushing 100, let's be honest.
	But it's Trump.
	Like, I mean, that's just him.
	And the CNN and MSNBC wall-to-wall coverage about how he was racist is just, it's beyond...
	It is beyond.
	And those guys, I mean, you point out they are probably like 100 years old at this point.
	They seem to get a kind of a kick out of it.
	They smiled.
	They didn't touch their pearls.
	I mean, come on.
	It was awkward smiles, though.
	Well, you know, that's the thing I notice about this administration is it's always awkward smiles because you can't predict any of this stuff.
	You remember in 2012 when Clint Eastwood came to the RNC and he talked to an empty chair.
	And he just ad-libbed a speech to an empty chair.
	And a lot of people, it was very cringey.
	We didn't know what to do.
	Jon Stewart said he loved it.
	Jon Stewart said he loved it because it was unscripted.
	It wasn't the usual glossed-over, scripted political convention we see.
	It was a little awkward and a little weird.
	And you just, I don't know, to me, maybe it's like a car wreck, but you can't help.
	But watch it.
	Jacob.
	The Jersey Shore, you might not have watched it, I certainly did, and I believe it was Vinny on the Jersey Shore said that things were going to get filthy, creepy, and weird.
	That's how it defines itself.
	Certainly politics these days is filthy, creepy, and weird, what with all of the sex scandals and whatnot.
	Is there any way to add a little dignity to either our television, our popular culture, and our politics, or are we just on a straight train to decadence?
	No.
	I think we're on a straight train to decadence.
	That's fine.
	Decadence is kind of fun.
	I'm sorry to be a killjoy here, but I don't think the train ride is going to get any smoother.
	It's going to be bumpy all the way.
	And by the way, bull crawdads are way better than crabs.
	But anyway, that's neither here nor there.
	That statement is a nice way to typify how everything you say, like the opposite is true, and we shouldn't trust any of your opinions.
	I grew up Cajun.
	I grew up on crawdads.
	Yeah.
	Those things are so gross.
	Anyway, well, yeah, the peeling of them is gross, but, you know, once you actually get them in your mouth, they're delicious.
	Michael, you're such a New England elitist.
	By the way, this is how I feel about Trump.
	The peeling of it is gross.
	The kind of watching it the first time.
	Even the voting.
	You're like, ah, this is kind of, I don't know.
	But then once you're in there, oh man, it's so delicious.
	That covfefe is great.
	Okay, we have a lot more to talk about.
	But if you don't subscribe to TheDailyWire.com, I can't help you, pal.
	I guess you can listen to it on iTunes or something.
	But if you want to watch the rest of the show and help us keep the lights on, we really appreciate it to all of our current subscribers.
	It really helps us out.
	Do that right now.
	You go to DailyWire.com.
	What do you get?
	You get...
	No ads on the website.
	That's pretty big.
	There are so many ads on every website these days.
	That's a big deal.
	You get me.
	You get the Andrew Klavan show.
	You get the Ben Shapiro show.
	Yeah, yeah, yeah.
	I get it.
	Guys, Christmas season is coming up.
	It's the holidays.
	It's the holiday season.
	You could get your very own Leftist Tears Tumblr.
	Now, I would say this makes a great stocking stuffer, but that's not true.
	It would make a great main gift, main only gift, to any of your loved ones.
	But I know you're not going to give it to anybody.
	You're going to keep it for yourself, as you should.
	This season, the tears are pouring.
	That excellent vintage, that Native American powwow vintage of Elizabeth Warren's Pocahontas Tears...
	That is filling up vessels left and right.
	You are going to need this Leftist Tears Tumbler.
	Otherwise, you're going to drown in those tears.
	They can be hot.
	They can be cold.
	They're always salty and delicious.
	So go over to dailywire.com right now.
	Right now, we'll be right back.
	All right, enough reality TV.
	There is some good news just in time for Christmas.
	See what I did there?
	Scientific tests have offered new evidence that the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, where Jesus is believed to have been buried, though not for very long, does in fact date back to the Roman Empire, to at least the time of Constantine.
	Now, previous experiments only dated it to around 1,000 years old, but now we know it goes back to at least the time when Constantine started to renovate the place and make it a nice temple.
	A nice, what would eventually become a church.
	Alicia, everybody I notice on today's panel is Christian.
	Alicia, do scientific corroborations such as this one, do they do anything to augment your faith?
	Or do you draw some sort of hard line between your faith and other things you know about the world, between theology and things in natural science?
	I'm really sleep-deprived today, so of course you went to me with the esoteric question.
	I gotta say, in layman's terms, no.
	I mean, I think I kind of read articles like this, and I'm like, that's cool.
	But there's an aspect of, like, faith, and, like, you don't have to believe to see.
	Actually, I think that was something that, like, Jesus said, you know, to Thomas.
	Yeah, he said it to my confirmation statement.
	Like, good for you for not, you know, like, why are you doubting?
	And so I think that it is something that's cool.
	I'm somebody that has never been to the Holy Lands, would love to visit the Holy Lands.
	I've heard it's like a life-changing moment and experience.
	I have lots of friends and family that have done it.
	But I don't think that, I don't need to see, like, oh, is this exactly where the manger was?
	Is this exactly the hill that Jesus died on?
	Is this exactly the tomb that he was laid in for three days in order for my faith to be solidified?
	Because it's called faith for a reason.
	That's true, and he makes that point.
	You know, it's very nice to see and then believe, but blessed are those who have not seen and yet believed.
	And yet, as you say, I also haven't been to Israel, but everyone who goes is just stunned and bowled over by it and goes back many times, makes the pilgrimage.
	So there is something about Christianity that is unique.
	Unlike other world religions, Christianity is founded on fact rather than philosophy.
	It doesn't begin with some poetry or some philosophy.
	It begins with a journalistic account of a guy who lived in a place at a time who is performing miracles, who's doing things in which the physical and the metaphysical unite.
	So, Ali, that unique foundation of Christianity as journalism, basically, does that do anything to shape your political views or your views of the rest of the world?
	Yeah, I mean, I think so.
	I do think that all faiths to some degree, or all of the major religions to some degree, feel that they are founded in fact.
	And they usually are founded in some fact.
	Muhammad was someone who really existed.
	Although I think the unique thing about Christianity It was not the fact that it started, I guess, journalistically, but just that it's different in any other faith in our philosophy and what we believe.
	Every other faith tells you how to get to God.
	So if God is on the top of the hill, it tells you all of the ways that you have to climb up the hill in order to get to Him.
	Christianity is different in that Jesus came down the hill to us.
	We didn't have to do anything to get to God.
	I think that's the difference.
	And that's really what shapes my faith, is the offer of reconciliation through nothing of our own.
	I think that's really what makes the difference.
	Oh, I'm sorry.
	Go ahead.
	He just jumped into my lap.
	I don't know if y'all know.
	Hey, buddy.
	Isn't that bad luck?
	Well, maybe we'll get rid of superstition for Christmas.
	I want to know what the pastor's kid thinks, though.
	Well, I want to get to that, but on this point of Muhammad, it is worth noting, yeah, he's a guy who lived in time.
	Moses lived in time and a place, Abraham.
	But it's only in Christ that we see a guy who's saying, I am God.
	Even Muhammad doesn't go that far because, of course, Muhammad founded his religion after spending weeks with a heretical Christian monk over in Syria.
	Exactly.
	So that uniting, it reminds me, I was reading this book last month called Symbolism and Belief by Edwin Bevin that C.S. Lewis recommends, and he talks about how values and these ethereal ideas exist.
	For our lives, it's very easy to intellectualize them and just think of them as up here.
	But really, they're put into bodies.
	They only really matter when humans do something with them, right?
	We have to use them in space and time.
	The book in the New Testament isn't called The Ideas of the Apostles.
	It's called The Acts of the Apostles.
	It's the life of Jesus that we see.
	It's not just like the heretical Gospel of Thomas.
	It's not just random sayings of his life.
	We follow biographies through his life.
	And so that does shape my view of politics and it makes it less rationalist, makes it less just about sitting back and saying, oh yes, this would be good, but I'm standing for something.
	The rationalist always stands for something, but he won't walk, he won't move, he won't do things.
	Jacob, does it affect your politics?
	Pastor's kid?
	Pastor's son?
	Yeah, absolutely.
	And in fact, I remember when I was far away from my faith, I went through a period during my college years where I kind of backed away from my faith.
	I was questioning God.
	And that's when I became a liberal.
	That's when I started to experiment with leftism, was I was away from my faith.
	But then as soon as I rediscovered my faith, I guess you could say, that's when I went, oh, you know what?
	Children or babies in the womb are children.
	They are alive.
	They do have a purpose.
	So yes, definitely my faith in Jesus Christ has affected how I see the world as far as politics and just even in the way I live my life.
	We all experiment with weird stuff in college.
	There's a time and a place for everything, and that place is college.
	So speaking of college, there is an excellent professor, a law professor at Faulkner University named Adam McLeod, who insists that any student who uses the phrase, I feel, instead of I think, must cluck like a chicken.
	And if they use isms, you know, all of those ism, this ism and that ism, or if they use vague, trendy words like fair, diversity, et cetera, They must immediately stop and explain what they think.
	I noticed this in college, too.
	For comment, we turn to every millennial.
	Yeah.
	Okay, like right now, for example, the Hadeans need to come to America.
	But some people are all, what about the strain on our resources?
	But it's like, when I had this garden party for my father's birthday, right?
	That is so profound.
	That really changed the way I think about things, you know?
	Like, Alicia.
	Yes.
	You might have noticed this too.
	The language has changed now.
	People don't say I think or I believe.
	It's all about feelings all the time.
	It's all about, you know, I feel like it would be better if we do this.
	I feel like this was kind of interesting.
	Why the change?
	Why do millennials only use the phrase I feel?
	I blame the public education system.
	I also think that clucking like a chicken is not punishment enough, because let's be honest, drunk people do the chicken dance at weddings all across America.
	Get your cameras out of my apartment.
	Oh, you just do them in your apartment?
	Wow, are you like prepping a dance for your wedding?
	Telling tales out of school here.
	But I think that it is definitely something to do with what we see on TV, what our generation has read in media, what we, you know, romantic comedies even, that like women are raised seeing from the 80s and beyond.
	Not that romantic comedies aren't amazing, but it does kind of teach this or reinforce this belief that everything is about feeling versus facts, like our buddy Ben says.
	Yeah, I've heard that somewhere.
	Just somewhere.
	I think it might be a pinned tweet somewhere.
	Yeah.
	And I think that that has really continued over, and it's something that you see continually in the education system.
	I mean, I'm looking at schools right now for my four-year-old, and every single tour, the two questions that are given the most time is the diversity question, and what about the feelings of the students?
	And I'm like, no, not about the feelings of the students.
	What are you going to do to get my kid into Harvard?
	You know, a professor of mine in college had a theory on all of this.
	This guy, Charles Hill, he's a lifelong diplomat, ambassador.
	And his idea was that over time, students have become much more afraid to make any statements of fact.
	They're too afraid because they think that the facts can be offensive.
	So you used to say the sky is blue, and then you could say, well, I think the sky is blue.
	You know, that's just my opinion.
	And we used to, I believe the sky is blue because belief is a little more wish-washy.
	And then ultimately you get, I feel like the sky is blue.
	Even the word like, which we make fun of, the valley girl...
	Well, isn't it like this and that?
	Even that word like is distancing yourself.
	It's a simile.
	You're not saying the thing is what it is.
	You're saying it's like something else.
	And that gives you a lot of wiggle room.
	Now, Ali, you are a conservative millennial.
	I've read somewhere.
	Is it that millennials are afraid of making statements of fact?
	They seem hysterical in many ways.
	What is going on here with the relationship of millennials to objective truth?
	I do think it's what you and Alicia both noted, this kind of popularization of subjectivity and kind of shame about being objective.
	And it's not just objectivity, but we're so afraid of being judgmental.
	The worst thing you can be after being a racist and a bigoted homophobe is being judgmental.
	So if you say that anything is right or wrong, especially if you're on the right, then you're not only a bigot, but you are You know, you're morally wrong.
	And so I think in an effort to avoid being judgmental or being called a bigot or what have you, people start with I feel like or I think.
	It's also something that you learn in like conflict resolution or if you go to like premarital counseling, they always tell you to start with I feel because it takes the responsibility off of the person that you're talking to.
	It's like, I feel like you're being really rude.
	I mean, that's just my feeling, but I feel like it.
	So I think that's kind of what we're going for.
	We're so afraid of conflict.
	We're so afraid of objectivity.
	We're so afraid of being called a bigot or judgmental that if we're just starting with our own feelings, you can't get mad at me for that.
	It's kind of like saying no offense when you're actually being really free.
	People only say that when they're being extremely offensive.
	Well, no offense.
	Whatever you're going to say, don't say it.
	Can we get back to bless your heart, though?
	Yeah, bless your heart.
	I think it's also because people don't understand what an opinion is anymore.
	We learn this incorrectly in schools.
	People think that an opinion is a preference.
	I can say the sky is blue.
	That's a fact.
	I can say I think the sky is blue.
	That's an opinion.
	But it's a true opinion.
	Now, if I say I like the blue sky or the blue sky pleases me, I guess that's a preference.
	I prefer cheese sandwiches to ham sandwiches.
	That's a preference.
	But to say, "I think," and then a statement of fact, that's an opinion, but an opinion states fact.
	Now, Jacob, this is a very frustrating issue when you talk to millennials about this.
	They want conflict resolution, just as Ali has said.
	But sometimes you need to push arguments to their extreme to actually get to an answer, to actually see the world clearly.
	What is to blame for this?
	Why are millennials so afraid of conflict?
	Is it the helicopter parenting?
	Is it the anti-bullying campaigns?
	Why are we so afraid of getting nitty and gritty in arguments with people?
	I think it has to do with pop culture, honestly.
	I mean, even if you grew up in the 90s like I did and you had the greatest version of the Disney Channel original series, every problem is solved in 20 minutes or less, right?
	And so...
	Whenever a problem goes beyond that 20-minute mark, you're like, I need a commercial break right now.
	So I think that it has to do with, I just want to resolve this quickly, or it gets uncomfortable.
	And also has something to do with, what Ali said, being judgmental.
	We don't want to come off as judgmental, even if we know we're right.
	So when we say, oh, abortion is murder, and then a leftist says, well, that's judgmental.
	You're judging someone.
	You're like, well, I'm judging whether the fact that this We're good to go.
	It is totally an example of politics following culture, of the culture being so insidious in ways we can't recognize.
	I hadn't even considered that.
	And on the judginess, the don't be judgy, don't be judgmental, you hear this phrase sometimes now, which is don't yuck my yum.
	Right.
	Don't say that the thing I like is disgusting or something.
	And the logical conclusion of this is what happened in the 20th century.
	There's a major movement among leftist intellectuals to normalize pedophilia.
	And now, obviously, this is in the air with...
	They say that Roy Moore...
	I guess that wasn't pedophilia.
	That was probably...
	Close to pedophilia.
	It's a fibophilia.
	It's post-pubescent girls.
	But nevertheless, girls who are too young to be having sex with and you're picking them up.
	There was this movement to normalize all of that.
	And we should yuck that yum.
	If somebody finds that yummy, let's yuck it, man.
	We can't have too much of that.
	And speaking of sex...
	In true reality TV form, we have to close on that.
	The latest in Democrat sex scandals.
	Bernie Sanders, you will recall, years ago claimed that women fantasize about gang rape.
	Another woman has accused Democrat rep John Conyers of sexual harassment.
	Democrat rep Al Green, we've learned, once threatened to sue a staffer that he had had sex with because she threatened to go public.
	And I am, by the way, I'm not making any accusations, lawyers who are watching this.
	No accusations are being made.
	However, Keith Olbermann is suddenly, unexpectedly, and inexplicably retiring from political media in all forms.
	One wonders how long before the accusations start rolling in.
	I don't know.
	I'll begin with the man on this panel, and then I can be educated by the ladies on this panel.
	Jacob, is any man ever going to be able to hold political office again?
	Men are filthy dogs.
	That's almost universally true.
	Forget how are men going to hold office anymore.
	Why would they even run when all of their bizarre sexual experiences are going to come back finally and bite them?
	Well, I think that, yes, well, this is—we have to be careful what is part of the hysteria and what is actually credible allegations.
	And so as far as—as far as will men run against—I think so.
	I think we'll see more of the Pence role being adopted.
	You know, I'm going to— I'm going to go visit with this female staffer.
	I'm going to meet with this female colleague, but I'm going to always have a chaperone.
	But people are going to still say the Pence rule is uncool because it just sounds so uncool.
	But I honestly think that we'll see this being implemented more.
	And as far as Keith Olbermann goes, I think I'm expecting to hear him joining the Young Turks or RT. That's my prediction.
	I could be wrong about that, but that's what happened with Jesse Ventura, and I expect that's going to happen with Keith Olbermann.
	Well, fair enough, because he said he would retire from political commentary in all forms, but the Young Turks is just incoherent babbling and profanities.
	And RT is Russian propaganda.
	And RT is Russian propaganda.
	Alicia, this is definitely, the pendulum is swinging.
	We're quite in the opposite direction that we were in the 1990s.
	I don't know.
	Or Mitt Romney.
	I mean, don't throw Romney under the bus.
	I really think he was a good guy.
	And when we wanted to elect a good guy versus Barack Obama, people were like, no.
	He was too good.
	Binder full of women?
	What?
	What is that?
	It's true.
	He was unrelatable.
	He was too good.
	I do find it kind of fascinating how I have conversations with liberal friends, and now they're coming to the side of...
	Oh yeah, even though they won't call it morality kind of things or rules and regulations, they are now coming to the side of things like the Pence rule seem cool.
	I mean, look at all the praise that David Schwimmer got when he conducted that interview with the Chaperone and everybody during the hashtag MeToo movement was like, oh my god, he's such a gentleman, that's so amazing.
	But Mike Pence and David French do it and it's, oh my god, they're so anti-women, they're monsters.
	And I find it really weird this convergence of right and left or moral and, you know, people that tend to be non-religious and, you know, more immoral now saying that these old-fashioned rules can apply to 2017.
	That's the wonder about the new Victorian era.
	Allie, almost one in five married couples.
	Met at work, according to some study that, I don't know, it's somewhere.
	All those studies are probably nonsense.
	But they say, you know, we've seen this before.
	A lot of people who are married meet at work, possibly up to 20%.
	So now that we're in this new era where the pendulum has so flown the other way, will that lead to a neo-Victorianism where we can no longer make any comments about our co-workers or date at work or heaven for fend to get married to any of our co-workers?
	Is that where that's going to end?
	Well, I don't know.
	I hope not.
	I hope that 20% of people that met at the office didn't start their relationship with some form of harassment or assault.
	But I totally see what you're saying.
	But what's the harassment?
	That's the question.
	Where's the line?
	Exactly.
	As you lower the standard of harassment or assault, of course, anything like eye contact or asking someone out to get a drink could be considered harassment or assault.
	Maybe so.
	I think that there might just need to be some more creative ways in order for people to start relationships at work.
	I'm not too worried about that.
	I am kind of worried about the trend moving in the direction you talked about, the pendulum swinging, of us trivializing matters of Flirting that aren't really or trivializing sexual assault by talking about flirting or asking someone out for a drink or denying someone who wanted to stay over or something like that.
	I think that we need to be very clear with our definition of what sexual assault and sexual harassment is so we don't trivialize actual victims.
	And that's the direction that I see us going in, and I think that's probably what scares me the most.
	And I will say, when Marshall flirts with me every day, I don't take that as harassment.
	Maybe some people would call it harassment.
	I'm actually flattered.
	It's a compliment.
	Yeah, it's a nice compliment.
	There's the harassment.
	I hope HR was listening to that.
	But yes, one answer might be gentlemanliness, chivalry, crazy ideas, I know, but they are still out there, and maybe that's the direction.
	I know, I'm such a bigoted patriarch.
	Okay, on that point, since I'm the patriarch, get out of here, you.
	Get out of here, all of you.
	Allie, Stuckey, Jacob Berry, and Alicia Krauss, thank you for being here, as always.
	That is our entire show today.
	We have a lot more to talk about, but sorry guys, we're out of time.
	My movement watch tells me we're out of time.
	So we'll see you all tomorrow.
	Get in your mailbag questions.
	I know we missed it last week because of Thanksgiving, so make sure that you get them in and we'll maybe do a little extended one.
	I am Michael Knowles.
	This is The Michael Knowles Show.
	Come back tomorrow.
	Tomorrow we will do it all again.
	The Michael Knowles Show is produced by Marshall Benson.
	Executive producer, Jeremy Boring.
	Senior producer, Jonathan Hay.
	Supervising producer, Mathis Glover.
	Our technical producer is Austin Stevens.
	Edited by Alex Zingaro.
	Audio is mixed by Mike Coromina.
	Hair and makeup is by Jesua Olvera.
	The Michael Knowles Show is a Daily Wire forward publishing production.

▲