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Feb. 4, 2025 - The Michael Knowles Show
48:11
Ep. 1666 - Trump Goes Nuclear On USAID

The libs lose it over USAID, Mexico and Canada cave to President Trump's demands, and anti-deportation protests shut down one of the busiest highways in Los Angeles. Click here to join the member-exclusive portion of my show: https://bit.ly/4biDlri Ep.1666 - - - DailyWire+: Now is the time to join the fight. Watch the hit movies, documentaries, and series reshaping our culture. Go to https://dailywire.com/subscribe today. "Identity Crisis" tells the stories the mainstream media won’t. Stream the full film now, only on DailyWire+: https://bit.ly/3C61qVU Order your Mayflower Cigars here: https://bit.ly/3Qwwxx2 (Must be 21+ to purchase. Exclusions may apply) - - - Today's Sponsors: Balance of Nature - Go to https://balanceofnature.com and use promo code KNOWLES for 35% off your first order PLUS get a free bottle of Fiber and Spice. Birch Gold - Text "KNOWLES" to 989898 or go to https://birchgold.com/knowles for your FREE copy of the Ultimate Guide for Gold in the Trump Era and FREE gold information kit. Done With Debt - Start building the life you deserve! Visit https://donewithdebt.com or call 1 (888) 322-1054 and talk with one of their strategists. It’s FREE! - - - Socials: Follow on Twitter: https://bit.ly/3RwKpq6 Follow on Instagram: https://bit.ly/3BqZLXA Follow on Facebook: https://bit.ly/3eEmwyg Subscribe on YouTube: https://bit.ly/3L273Ek

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Over the past two weeks, President Trump has, among other actions, deported thousands of illegal aliens, started trade wars with four separate nations, and threatened to invade another nation.
And the left whined about all of that.
Then Trump announced that he would restructure a single federal agency that most people have never even heard of.
And the left is now threatening to shut down the executive branch.
Sort of makes you wonder.
What the left was doing with that single federal agency, doesn't it?
Kind of makes you think probably maybe it might need some restructuring.
Let's take a look.
I'm Michael Knowles.
This is the Michael Knowles Show.
Welcome back to the show.
Anti-Trump deportation protests have shut down the 101 freeway in L.A. A ton of people.
Looks like pretty much all of them waving Mexican flags.
It's weird.
I'm told these are patriotic, assimilated Americans who just dream to be here.
But they're all waving a ton of Mexican flags, rather.
Not a single American flag in sight.
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There's so much more to say first, though.
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President Trump...
Is threatening to totally shut down and is at the very least restructuring the U.S. Agency for International Development.
Never heard of it.
Many people probably have never heard of this agency in their life, USAID. Some people might have heard of it, but they don't know much about it.
Well, staffers have been locked out.
Yesterday, staffers showed up to USAID. There was yellow tape around the building.
Do not cross.
The reason I'm hedging here on whether it's being totally shut down or just restructured is Elon Musk has announced they're shutting it down.
President Trump has not exactly announced that, but Elon Musk has said that Trump agrees with him that it needs to be shut down.
From what we've seen so far, though, it might just be a massive restructuring that's moving the agency underneath the authority of the State Department and whatever is happening to it.
The left is furious.
And I'm not talking about fringe, crazy, purple hair, marching the streets kind of left.
I'm talking about elite, at least formerly influential, serious, suit and tie, go to all the NGOs and the fancy lunches around Washington kind of liberal.
I'm talking about the libs who, until very recently, have had a lot of power.
Ben Rhodes.
Who was a speechwriter for Obama.
He joined the national security team at the Obama White House.
Big, big figure in the Obama administration.
He tweeted out, What is happening to USAID will cost untold lives around the world, devastate America's standing, and massively empower China and other countries.
There's no excusing it.
It's a shameful, stupid cell phone without excuse and a harbinger of even worse to come.
We have a Democrat senator, Senator from Hawaii, Brian Schatz, who is saying that he will stall all Trump nominees, all Trump nominees to the whole executive branch, and I guess judicial nominees, until USAID is back and functioning.
Hold on, hold on, wait.
This Democrat senator thought mass deportations, fine.
Multiple trade wars, fine.
Threatening to invade Panama, fine.
Trump threatening to invade Greenland, sorry.
He threatened to invade two different countries, fine.
All of these things, totally fine.
But you close down one federal agency?
No, that's it.
We're going to throw a wrench into the whole system of government?
Wait, what?
What is going on at USAID? Well...
A friend of ours down in Latin America, Nayib Bukele, the leader of El Salvador, thinks he has an answer.
Amid all of this hubbub, he posted on X, most governments don't want USAID funds because they understand where much of that money ends up.
He said specifically, at best, maybe 10% of the money reaches real projects that help people in need.
There are such cases.
But the rest is used to fuel dissent, finance protests, and undermine administrations that refuse to align with the globalist agenda.
Cutting the so-called aid is not just beneficial for the United States.
It's also a big win for the rest of the world.
This is telling you what the USAID money is really about.
Well, most of it is really about.
It's not about primarily helping hungry people.
It's not about just some pure act of charity.
This agency that has been protected from democratic control and oversight from even really the actions of the elected executive branch for many, many years.
USAID is used to promote the LIBS agenda all around the world.
With your taxpayer dollars.
That's what this is about.
You can't help but notice.
That the worst people in mainstream American politics, the Ben Rhodeses and these Democrat senators, the absolute worst people in the mainstream of American politics are all particularly outraged over the closing of this one single agency.
Must mean that they're hovering over the target.
Must mean that Trump and Elon and Doge and the new administration have identified a really important feature of the liberal regime.
And they're probably right, certainly right, to at least restructure it and maybe right to close it.
What specifically does USAID fund?
Here is White House Press Secretary Caroline Levitt just running down a brief list of projects.
Through USAID over the past several years, these are some of the insane priorities that that organization has been spending money on.
$1.5 million to advance DEI in Serbia's workplaces.
$70,000 for a production of a DEI musical in Ireland.
$47,000 for a transgender opera in Colombia.
$32,000 for a transgender comic book in Peru.
I don't know about you, but as an American taxpayer, I don't want my dollars going towards this crap, and I know the American people don't either, and that's exactly what Elon Musk has been tasked by President Trump to do, to get the fraud, waste, and abuse out of our federal government.
Thank you.
That's a brief list of examples.
I love Snoop Dogg coming at the end there.
Da-da-da-da-da.
There is Mrs. Levitt just absolutely beating the press into submission.
But the list could go on and on of the radical leftist programs that are being funded all around the world by USAID. The one program that people are really upset about being stalled right now is PEPFAR, the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief.
This plan began in 2003 under George W. Bush.
I believe President Bush said it was the accomplishment of which he was most proud from his whole presidency.
It saved lots of lives.
It's given a lot of medical attention to people with AIDS in Africa.
But there are downsides to it, too.
There are downsides and costs to anything in life, even as PEPFAR has saved a lot of people from AIDS and has given a lot of retroviral drugs, and that's all really good stuff.
The programs have intended and unintended consequences.
One of the unintended consequences is when you get a lot of U.S. taxpayer dollars to hire and pay top dollar to doctors in Africa, then all the medical resources are going to go toward fighting AIDS. But more people in lots of Africa, many parts of Africa, more people will die from diarrheal diseases than they will from AIDS. So why are we focusing on just one disease?
Particularly a disease that is absent cases of rape and being born with it, passed through birth, is a lifestyle disease.
It raises all sorts of questions.
Even with the great successes of PEPFAR, and I'm largely a big defender of PEPFAR, it's pretty impressive.
Biden kind of screwed up PEPFAR because Biden tied PEPFAR to the promotion of abortion and radical LGBT ideology, just like he tied all USAID to the promotion of abortion and radical LGBT ideology.
Do we want to promote that?
I don't want to promote those things in America, much less around the world.
What about the other programs?
Well, just to give you an example, just one example of how USAID operates.
USAID takes your money.
The IRS takes your money and gives it to the government.
It is the government.
Now, you elect parts of the government, but you don't really elect certain agencies of the bureaucracy, including USAID. So, you give your money to the IRS. The IRS is, in principle, controlled by people that you elect, ultimately at the top of the president.
And then the money goes to USAID. Then that largely unaccountable bureaucracy sends your money.
To various organizations around the world.
For instance, the Tide Center.
The Tide Center is a left-wing institution that then takes the money that you gave the government, that the government gave to them, and gives that money to groups such as Black Lives Matter.
So then Black Lives Matter takes money from the Tide Center, which took money from the government, which took the money from you, and it spends that money Murdering you, robbing your stores, setting your cities on fire, and shaking you down for more money.
Do you see the moral hazards of this kind of closed loop?
All sorts of problems with it.
Now, there are going to be all sorts of large ideological calls looking at the abuses in USAID to end all foreign aid and see this is why we never should spend anything on foreign aid.
That is the wrong conclusion.
I actually have a different view from most conservatives at the moment, it seems.
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The problem with USAID, the problem with foreign aid generally, is not that it spends money spreading American influence.
Yes.
The problem with USAID and American foreign aid, generally, is that our liberal elites have been using our money to spread their toxic influence.
The problem is not spending money to influence things.
The problem is what specifically we're doing with the money.
What specifically we're influencing?
These specific substantive values that we're spreading around the world.
That's the problem.
The problem is not the procedural norm of foreign aid.
The problem is the substantive good of promoting abortion and LGBT and upending good governments that we should be friends with around the world.
That's the problem.
Okay?
I hear these arguments sometimes.
We need to end foreign aid.
Why are we spending money on anything around the world?
Because we're the global superpower.
What do you mean?
What are we spending money?
Because we're a very powerful country, we have interests around the world, and we want to secure our interests around the world.
We want to promote our influence.
And when we wield power, as a superpower does, as any nation does actually, to wield power costs money.
So that's what it's about.
If you think about foreign aid as a purely charitable act, Then there's an argument for it, I think, but it's not going to be persuasive to a lot of Americans.
But if you recognize that foreign aid is a tool of empire, it is a tool really even of just any nation-state.
It's a tool of influence and statecraft.
Every nation does it in one way or another.
another.
We're always trying to influence geopolitics to be more conducive to our flourishing.
That's true.
It's been true of every little polis, every state, every major nation and every empire in the whole history of the world.
Then you say, okay, in principle I'm alright with foreign aid.
The question is, what are we influencing?
How are we influencing people?
So, I recognize there are people who say, we just need to end all foreign aid.
I'm not that guy.
I don't think that's a strong view.
And more importantly, for our discussion today, I don't think Trump is that guy either.
I don't think Trump is a guy who says, I don't want America to project any influence anywhere.
I just want to keep to myself and be a yeoman farmer and pretend that we're living in Thomas Jefferson's fantasy land in 1789. That ain't Donald Trump.
Donald Trump is a big guy.
Donald Trump is not a put your head in the sand and keep to yourself and just don't bother anybody.
Donald Trump is a big guy who wants to project power who's threatened to invade two countries in the last two weeks.
I strongly suspect that President Trump shares my view here.
And yet, we can have a ton of common ground with the people who ideologically want to end foreign aid right now.
Because we recognize that this is a tool of...
The liberals.
What we are seeing here is, it's one of the most interesting moments in politics in my entire life.
Because you're seeing an actual sea change.
You're seeing what seems to be an actual shift in power.
So, all of a sudden, the libs who are so happy to be promoting, using American power and influence all over the world, they're not the ones who have the reins anymore.
Now we do.
And so the question for us that I think is, do we want to just shutter this and not project influence anywhere?
I think that's the mistake conservatives made on the domestic front for many decades.
We're not going to wield power.
We're going to abandon the institutions.
We're going to give up on the schools.
We're going to give up on Hollywood.
We're going to give up on corporate America.
We're going to do our own thing.
Forget about it.
Left, you can have it.
Oh, great.
We gave the whole country to the left.
Look how that works.
We're going to give up on government.
We don't like the government.
Okay, now the government's totally populated by libs.
They're wielding it against our interests.
You might not care about politics, but politics cares about you.
That's one option.
Or you can say, oh, all right, we got the juice now.
Oh, we got the power.
All right, let's wield it for our interests, for our political vision.
And for the common good.
I think that's what Trump is doing.
Which is why I suspect it's not that USAID is going to completely disappear.
I think it's the art of the deal.
Or even if the agency disappears, there will be some new version of it.
The question now is, what are we going to be promoting?
If it ain't going to be abortion and LGBT LMNOP, what are we going to be promoting?
You're seeing the art of the deal working very well already.
Remember, things are happening so quickly, it's actually hard to keep track hour by hour of the last thing we were talking about.
I guess the last thing we were talking about on this show was that Trump was threatening massive tariffs on Mexico if Mexico did not fix its border.
And all the usual suspects were saying, oh no, this is terrible.
It's going to raise the price of avocados, which don't even taste like anything.
And this is going to raise the cost of Modelo or whatever, Corona.
Okay, alright, whatever.
It'll raise the cost of a perfectly mediocre beer.
That's fine.
Well, guess what?
Mexico already caved.
Mexico's president tweets out, we had a good conversation with President Trump.
With great respect for our relationship and sovereignty, we reached a series of agreements.
Mexico will immediately reinforce the northern border with 10,000 members of the National Guard to prevent drug trafficking from Mexico to the U.S., particularly fentanyl.
The U.S. is committed to working to prevent trafficking of high-powered weapons to Mexico.
Whatever, like that's a big problem.
Our teams will begin working today on two fronts, security and trade.
They're pausing tariffs for one month now.
Okay, what about Canada?
We were told.
We were seeing this all yesterday.
Oh no, we're offending our allies.
Oh no, this is going to lead to a trade war.
This might lead to an all-out war.
Oh no, this is terrible.
Well, what happens?
Justin Trudeau sends out almost the same message.
I just had a good call with President Trump.
Oh yeah, you guys are all speaking real politely about President Trump now.
I noticed you weren't all that polite about Trump six months ago, but now I had a good call with President Trump, says the leader of Canada.
Canada is implementing our $1.3 billion border plan, reinforcing the border with new choppers, technology and personnel, enhanced coordination with our American partners, increased resources to stop the flow of fentanyl.
Nearly 10,000 frontline personnel are and will be working on protecting the border.
Canada is making new commitments to appoint a fentanyl czar.
We will list cartels as terrorists, ensure 24-7 eyes on the border, launch a Canada-U.S. joint strike force to combat organized crime and fentanyl and money laundering.
This is good stuff.
And we're backing it with 200 million bucks.
Proposed tariffs will be paused for at least 30 days while we work together.
What's this about?
In part, it's about what it says it's about.
In part, Trump has now gotten commitments from Mexico and China.
I keep saying China.
That's a Freudian slip when I'm talking about Justin Trudeau and America's evil top hat, Canada.
He's gotten concessions from Mexico and Canada.
We're going to put more troops on the border.
We're going to restructure the government a little bit so that we can really pay attention to this.
We're going to designate the cartels as terrorist organizations.
We're going to make it easier to go after them.
We're going to do this.
We're going to do that.
Okay, that's all good.
It's in part about that.
But it's in part about showing that he can do this.
It was exactly the same as Colombia's response to Trump.
But notice the escalation here.
Trump sends a couple planes with criminal aliens down to Colombia.
Colombia refuses the planes.
Trump says, I'm slapping you with a 25% tariff.
I'm freezing your visas and your passports.
I'm going to sanction your elites.
I'm going to...
All of a sudden, what?
Immediately, Colombia sends the presidential plane up to America to get the criminal aliens.
Oh, we're working with America.
This is great.
Okay.
So he starts with Colombia.
Why does he focus on Colombia?
In part, it's what it was really about, the criminals.
But in part, it's to show Mexico and Canada that he's serious.
And he elevates it.
He tries the same trick with Mexico and Canada.
Why does he do it?
In part, because of what it's about.
In part, I think, to show the bigger players.
China, Russia, other people around the world.
That he's serious.
He's going to throw his weight around.
He's going to get what he wants.
And so Mexico and Canada, when they concede, even if they're not conceding all that much materially, they are conceding the principle that Trump is going to get what he wants.
He's going to bully people into the negotiating table, and then he's going to come to deals.
And that is a message that is not primarily for Toronto or Montreal or Tijuana or Mexico City.
That is a message for...
Beijing.
And Moscow, for that matter.
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What would men do if they begged you for advice?
Again, I'm not in the business of telling men what to do.
But I think you kind of are.
Well, what percent of women do you think are marriageable?
I think you're squirting the issue.
People are not going to return to marriage until you make the institution more fair.
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Do you want to get married?
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Even Denmark.
Okay, this is my last little button on President Trump and the art of the deal.
Colombia.
Caves.
Canada.
Caves.
Mexico.
Caves.
Even Denmark, which controls Greenland.
The Danish Prime Minister.
Meta Fredriksen says, I totally agree with the Americans that the High North, the Arctic region, is becoming more and more important when we're talking about defense and security and deterrence, and it is possible to find a way to ensure stronger footprints in Greenland.
So if this is about securing our part of the world, we can find a way forward.
But Denmark...
Greenland is part of Denmark and is not for sale.
Wow, man, what a shift.
Trump says, we want Greenland.
He's been saying this for months.
We want Greenland, we're going to take it.
Most people assume that Greenland was an independent nation.
Most people don't even realize that Greenland, this huge landmass right next to America, is actually owned by Denmark, this tiny little country on the other side of the Atlantic.
And then they discover, hold on, Denmark owns Greenland.
A lot of Greenlanders say they like America and they don't really care that much about Denmark.
And Denmark says, absolutely not.
You're threatening us.
France, speaking for the EU, says, this is a threat against your ally in the European Union.
How could you dare suggest this?
We are so offended by this.
Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
Now, after Colombia caved and Mexico caved.
And Canada caved.
And Trump's the president.
And he's doing what he wants.
Now, all of a sudden, we got a little change in tune, don't we?
Oh, no, actually, you know, I totally agree with Mr. Trump.
Actually, maybe we should increase the American presence in Greenland.
That's a good idea.
Please don't take my country.
It ain't your country, first of all, Denmark.
Greenland's a different country.
It's closer to us, and we have more interest in it.
And we're the global hegemon.
And I didn't exactly like your attitude the first time we talked about this.
Not even the first time.
We've been talking about acquiring Greenland since the middle of the 19th century.
This has been a U.S. State Department initiative and priority for 150 years.
After World War II, President Truman made a big effort to get it too.
But now, okay, good.
I'm glad you're coming to the negotiating table.
And that's what this is, by the way.
When the leader of Denmark, rather, it's confusing.
The Greenlanders really like America.
The Danish, they're coming around on America.
But when the leader of Denmark, which owns Greenland, says, look, we'll give America a lot, but it's not for sale, they are negotiating.
And that's what this is.
This is all a big negotiation.
And the libs who clutch their pearls when Trump says, we're taking the Panama Canal back.
When Trump says, we're going to acquire Greenland.
When Trump says, we're going to smack...
Huge tariffs on Mexico and Canada if they don't start enforcing their border better.
The libs remind me of, and excuse my blunt language ladies, you know I love the ladies, but they remind me of women trying to buy a car.
You know, when women, I know it's a stereotype, but stereotypes are all true.
They don't pertain to all the individuals of a group, but they're broadly true.
That's where they come from.
When women are buying a car, they get really Nervous.
They don't like negotiations.
They don't like the anxiety.
This is why women in practice actually don't often make as much money as men in corporate America.
One of the reasons is they just hate negotiating and they hate asking for raises and they hate really tough deal-making.
But I remember the last time I was buying a car.
I was sitting with sweet little Elisa and we were going to buy the minivan.
And it's actually pretty tight.
Automobile market right now, so there's not really much room for negotiating anyway.
But you've got to get something off, right?
You've got to get a little bit of money off.
And I'm sitting there, and we're going back and forth, and the dealership says, okay, well, here's the price, and we'll come down here for you.
We've got to add all this fake stuff onto the car, like some paint job or whatever, some ceiling wax and some stupid navigation system that no one wants.
And I said, well, you've got to take that off and this, and boom, boom, boom.
And we're going back and forth.
It's taking an hour.
But it's just the dance, you know?
And, oh, I've got to talk to my manager.
All right, you go talk to your manager.
He goes, pretends to talk to the manager.
Oh, this and that.
And I'm sitting there.
And Elisa, she's going, oh, she goes, I hate this.
She looks at me.
But you love this.
I said, I do.
I love this.
And men do.
Men love it.
Going in asking for a raise, it's fun, actually.
It's a little nerve-wracking, but it's fun.
You talk to a man, a man will say, you know what, it's fun.
I felt good in that negotiation.
You talk to a woman, a lot of the time she'll say, I didn't like that.
I felt uncomfortable.
I don't want to do it.
I'd rather not get the raise.
I'd rather not get the discount on the car.
That's how I feel about the liberals with these things.
Oh, please don't upset Justin Trudeau in Canada.
No, please don't threaten any tariffs on him.
He's going to be really angry with us.
Are you kidding me?
It's Justin Trudeau.
Who cares?
And by the way, he won't even be angry.
Because he gets it.
He knows what's going on.
He runs a country.
He knows how statecraft works.
He's not good at it, but he understands a little bit how it works.
Oh no!
We can't possibly threaten Mexico, what with their less than $2 trillion economy.
No, no, we, the global hegemon with a $30 trillion economy, we can't possibly ask them politely to get the face-tattooed Satan-worshipping gangsters off the border.
And to stop poisoning our kids.
We couldn't.
We don't want to offend them.
Let's just leave it be.
What if they raise the price of avocados?
Good grief.
You pansies.
Are you kidding me?
Chuck Schumer?
Give me a break.
Now, in the case of Chuck Schumer and the Democrats, what they actually want is to just keep the border open and keep all of these gangsters coming to the country because they think it'll help them politically.
But the people who are sincerely worried...
Oh no, we're going to upset the status quo by negotiating.
Good grief.
With these people at the helm of our government for 60 years, it's a wonder we still have a country.
This is good stuff, man.
This is fun.
This is going to be the difference.
Which way, Western man?
Are we going to go the way of people who hate negotiating for a car or the people who like it?
Not everyone is as resigned as...
Denmark, Mexico, and Canada to President Trump's presidency.
Anti-Trump deportation protests have shut down the 101 freeway in Los Angeles.
Take a look at some of these protests.
If you're only listening right now, I'll explain it to you.
There are about a billion Mexican flags.
Big signs that say stolen land.
Stolen land?
What has that been named?
Stolen land.
We conquered some of this land.
We purchased a lot of this land.
We're just talking about stolen land.
From whom?
Who are these people?
They say they're Americans.
The liberals tell us they're Americans.
They're undocumented Americans.
But I don't see any American flags.
You'd think if they were Americans, documented or undocumented, you'd think they were Americans.
And they were waving a flag.
The flag they'd be waving would be the American flag, but it's not.
It's the Mexican flag.
So I guess they're Mexicans.
They're shutting down American highways, waving symbols of another country, trying to subvert our political system in favor of political preferences of the aforementioned other country.
In what sense are they Americans?
They're not in any sense Americans.
Other than that they're a bit entitled and eccentric.
I guess maybe that's the most American feature about them.
But otherwise, they haven't assimilated much.
However, I have a solution.
Usually, when people on the left shut down highways, which happens frequently, you know, BLM and all that, when they do that, the environmentalists, the LGBT, LMNOP activists, all the rest, Usually I say, hey, cops, get them off the freeway.
Stop it.
You know, this is really bad.
It's slowing down traffic.
Imagine someone's got to get his kid to the hospital or something.
Get them out of there.
In this case, though, I have a different solution.
For this one particular instance, I would just recommend to the marchers that they keep marching.
You see?
Because it looks to me like they are marching south on the 101 freeway.
So, if my LA geography...
It doesn't escape me.
If they just keep marching south, eventually they're going to hit the 5, and then they should just get on that one, keep marching south.
Basically, just keep marching south until you reach a little town called Tijuana.
And then, once you keep going just a little bit further, and maybe the cops can give them a little push, and then you go from a growing problem to problem solved.
You know, folks, it's February, which means the usual crowd is claiming we don't do anything for Black History Month.
We have, okay, it's totally ridiculous to even claim that this year.
We have the number one documentary of the decade covering race in America.
It's called Am I Racist?
This was the surprise box office hit of the year.
And, well, it's not the narrative that the left wanted, of course, but it is available exclusively on Daily Wire+.
We are pulling back the curtain with the making of Am I Racist, where Matt Walsh and director Justin Folk and the whole team come together and discuss the movie.
Watch it right now, dailywire.com.
My favorite comment yesterday is from Dry Floater.
Now, I didn't pick this comment.
I didn't pick a comment yet.
So I deferred to the producers on picking this comment.
Let's see how they did.
Comment.
I just bought 5,000 pounds of avocados to prepare for the avocadopalips.
Well, I got bad news for you, Val.
You better really like avocados because you are not going to be able to resell those for a huge markup.
You are going to have to eat them.
And the problem with avocados is you buy them.
And then the moment you look at them, they start to turn brown.
Once you slice them, the avocados stay green for about 4 nanoseconds.
And then they turn brown and look gross.
So you better eat fast.
Now, speaking of Tijuana, I want to turn some attention right now.
To the old Tijuana tarragon.
You know what I'm talking about?
I'm talking about the old Peruvian parsley.
Are you catching my drift?
The old Haitian oregano.
You know what I mean?
Talking about pot!
Talking about marijuana, man.
Because there's a new report out.
Finds that memory problems from cannabis might last long after quitting.
And this is according to scientists.
Research out of the University of Colorado School of Medicine.
Researchers tracked brain changes in a major study.
We haven't seen a thousand-person study like this.
And the effects were noticeable in especially the part of the brain that is responsible for working memory.
According to the study...
Impacts on memory function, other mental tasks like emotional processing, language, and logical thinking were not significantly affected by heavy cannabis use.
However, working memory looks like it could be affected long afterwards.
These findings are published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
I'm not even going to get into all the highlights of the study.
You can read it yourself, or you can just read news reports about the study.
Duh.
Like, duh, of course.
Yeah.
I'm not the biggest promoter of the old devil's lettuce.
I'm not saying it's the single worst thing in the world.
I do think that it's worse than booze, and I think it's worse than nicotine.
In brief, the reason that it's worse than booze is you can...
Drink without getting drunk.
In fact, that's how you're supposed to drink.
This is traditionally in our culture, certainly in Christianity, we recognize that it's not evil to drink.
It's not sinful to drink.
I mean, our Lord's first miracle is to turn water into wine at a wedding for people who have been drinking for a long time.
But that it is a sin to get drunk.
Totally lose your wits and divorce your will from your reason and all the rest of it.
But, you know, to drink to be a little sociable or, you know, that's fine.
Okay.
It's very difficult to just smoke pot without getting high.
I guess unless you're Bill Clinton and you don't inhale, it's hard to do that.
So that's one reason why.
It's also...
Tucker made this point very well.
The left wants you to smoke a lot of pot so that you're fat, lazy, and stupid.
His words, not mine.
Send him the hate mail, not me.
Whereas the right tends to prefer nicotine, in particular cigars for me, but a lot of right-wingers now love the Zin packets, because nicotine focuses you.
It makes you more alert, more focused, you can be more productive.
So that's the difference between the left and the right in a nutshell.
Okay, all sorts of reasons why.
I don't think marijuana is identical to booze and nicotine and why I think that booze and nicotine, in moderation, are superior to marijuana.
But regardless, let's say you love pot.
A lot of people listen to this show.
They love the old sin spinach.
Okay, that's fine.
I'm not making a big deal about it.
My issue, my big issue, is with the people who pretend that marijuana is the one substance in the world that has no downsides whatsoever.
Cane sugar!
Cane sugar has a lot of downsides to it.
But no, no.
Water.
You can drink too much water.
You can die drinking water.
But no, no.
The one substance in the whole world that has no downsides, its only upsides, its magical herb, is marijuana.
And that's obviously not true.
It's a finite world.
It's a fallen world.
We have limits.
It's a drug.
Of course there are downsides to it.
Duh.
In this case, in the case of a study like this, Science and common sense match up.
When I was told for years that marijuana has no downsides, only upsides, not at all addictive, even though it obviously is, it's all just totally great, I thought, well, huh, that's the language of science speaking, but that contradicts my common sense.
Generally, science and common sense should go together, much like generally reason and faith, actually always, reason and faith go together.
They're not opposed, okay?
They complement each other.
That's how it should be here, too.
And so you could zoom out even past the jazz cigarettes.
When scientists tell you things that are totally outlandish, that contradict other things that you know to be true, you should be skeptical of that science.
This is true when Dr. Fauci is saying it.
This is true when Al Gore is making movies about it, about how the world's going to end in five minutes because of the sun monster.
This is true generally.
Because we think of knowledge as all divided up and compartmentalized and segregated.
That's not how it works.
There is just the truth.
There is the truth, and we're trying to know something about it.
And you can learn something about it through Science, and you can learn something about it through common sense, and you can learn through, you know, the inherited wisdom of the ages.
You can learn something about it through reason.
You can learn something about it through faith.
You can learn something about the truth through chemistry and biology and music and mathematics and anthropology and philosophy and English literature.
You can learn something, but it's all talking about the same truth, okay?
And that's an integrated whole.
Don't divorce your common sense for a supposedly higher sense.
Now, speaking of common sense, really, really good news and a huge cultural shift going on in my state of Tennessee.
Have you heard of covenant marriage?
Covenant marriage.
You're going to hear about it more and more.
There is a bill being proposed in Tennessee that would establish covenant marriage into law.
Other states have done this already.
It was introduced into the statehouse here, January 22nd.
It would establish covenant marriages in Tennessee as being between, quote, one male and one female who, quote, agree that marriage is a lifelong partnership.
The legislation would make it harder for couples who agree to enter into this kind of marriage to get a divorce in the state of Tennessee.
And the bill would go into effect July 2025. I love this.
The representative, Gino Bulso, who proposed this bill, and Chris Hurt, who originally proposed the bill before passing the sponsorship on, they have my full support.
Anything I can do to help them, I'm happy to do.
This bill is reality with a few extra steps.
That's what covenant marriage is.
Covenant marriage is reality with a few extra steps.
Because what this really is, is just what everyone understood marriage to be until relatively recently.
Until the Obergefell decision in, what was that, 2015?
Everyone, everywhere, understood marriage to be the union of a man and a woman.
Not because we don't like fellas who have different views and desires.
Not because we don't like ladies who have different views and desires.
Not because we're phobic or hateful or anything.
But just because that's what a marriage is.
If marriage is not that, there's no way to identify what distinguishes marriage from any other kind of relationship.
It's not hateful.
It's just reality.
Okay?
And then, this isn't just distinguishing covenant marriage from same-sex marriage or something.
This goes further.
His son does an error that began really 50, 60 years ago, which is the error of liberalizing divorce.
Marriage was understood for all of history, certainly in our civilization, but broadly speaking everywhere.
As the union of a man and a woman for life ordered toward the procreation and education of children, and as a secondary matter, ordered toward the mutual support of the spouses.
That sounds like a mouthful.
I'll say it one more time.
It's the lifelong union of a man and a woman for the purpose of inclined toward the begetting of children and the educating of children and also for the mutual support of the husband and wife.
That was it.
The reason for that is not oppression and it's not patriarchy and it's not heteronormativity.
It's that that is the only definition that marriage can have that would permit marriage to exist as a different kind of relationship, as a distinct kind of institution separate from boyfriend and girlfriend, separate from just as a distinct kind of institution separate from boyfriend and girlfriend, separate from just ordinary It's the only thing that gives marriage a definition.
And there are all sorts of downstream effects of that, especially as pertains to children.
But this is really good stuff.
I mention it, not just to call attention to a law in Tennessee, but to point out, I was so right, man.
You know, I hate to say I told you so, but I was so right.
I have said four years.
I've long predicted and I've been called crazy and backward and, I don't know, desperate, I guess, for saying marriage is not a lost issue for the right.
Marriage is not a lost issue.
So many people, so many conservative Republicans, so-called, told me, Michael, give up on the marriage thing.
It's just over, man.
And actually, maybe it's better that it's over.
No, just give up on it.
I said, I can't give up on it because it's reality and I can't lie.
That's why I can't give up on it, okay?
Because I can't say with a straight face that we can redefine marriage in any serious way.
We just can't.
It's just not a thing we can do.
No offense to anybody, no hatred to anybody, no people can live their lives, no one's saying they can't live, but you're telling me that we conservatives believe in enduring human nature, we believe in eternal truths, transcendental moral order, that reality reasserts itself in the end, but you're telling me that the fundamental political institution is...
Irretrievably destroyed because some random lawyer on the Supreme Court wrote romantic poetry during a decision in his majority ruling?
Are you kidding me?
I think that institution is a little more enduring.
I think reality is a little more enduring than all that.
This is what's happening.
You're going to see this in more and more states.
You're going to see this in more and more states because...
It reflects the truth and reality, and people desire that.
And even if we're taken to flights of fancy for long periods of time, ultimately, reality is going to kick back in.
Today is Tee Hee Hee Tuesday.
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