Ep. 1896 - He Actually Did It: Trump Set To Get Greenland
Trump mogs the liberal globalists in Davos, the UK promotes cousin marriage, and Fernando Mendoza gets even Michael to care about football.
Ep. 1896
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A busy 24 hours for President Trump in Davos as he announces a framework for taking Greenland, establishes a new international body that could replace the UN, and does his very best Asian accent after meeting Mr. Toyota.
Outside of Davos, the UK's National Health Service says that cousin marriage can actually be a good thing.
And Fernando Mendoza gets even me to care about football.
I'm Michael Knowles.
This is The Michael Knowles Show.
Welcome back to the show.
President Trump stole the show at Davos.
We'll get to the highlights.
There are actually too many clips to get to all of them, but we'll get to the highlights, what it means for America and for the world order.
However, there was a foil at Davos, a very weak, kind of villainous, foolish-looking foil.
And that would be Gavin Newsom who decided to spend his time babbling about sex fantasies regarding Trump with the Europeans at WEF.
We will get to all of it first, though.
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So heading into Davos, this is the World Economic Forum.
It's all the liberal globalists from all around the world, especially run by Europeans.
It's in Switzerland.
And the big topic is that awful, terrible Trump wants to take Greenland and Europe says no.
And the French say they're going to send an army to defend Greenland.
Obviously, I've got the flag of the French army right here.
And Denmark says we're going to double the security.
We're going to add another dog sled.
And this is supposed to be the big fight.
Trump, you are not getting Greenland.
This is a threat to NATO.
You're threatening a NATO country, Denmark, which for some reason controls Greenland.
And then the NATO general secretary had this to say about Trump's proposal.
So statements from me will not add anything here.
And when it comes to the Arctic, I think President Trump is right.
Other leaders in NATO are right.
We need to defend the Arctic.
We know that these sea lanes are opening up.
We know that China and Russia are increasingly active in the Arctic.
There are eight countries bordering on the Arctic.
Seven are a member of NATO.
That's Finland and Sweden and Norway and Denmark, Iceland, Canada, and the US.
And there's only one country bordering on the Arctic outside NATO, and that's Russia.
And I would argue there is a ninth country, which is China, which is increasingly active in the Arctic region.
So President Trump and other leaders are right.
We have to do more there.
We have to protect the Arctic against Russian and Chinese influence.
And that's exactly what NATO ambassadors decided to do in September.
We are working on that, making sure that collectively will we defend the Arctic region.
So much for a threat to NATO.
That was the story.
That was the story being published in the liberal media.
Trump's insistence that the U.S. control Greenland is a threat to NATO.
It will destroy NATO because it's a direct threat from one NATO country, actually the leader of NATO, America, on another one, Denmark.
Then you have the NATO Secretary General, or general secretary rather, saying, yeah, actually, yeah, we need to defend Greenland from Russia.
You got all these NATO countries.
There's just one who's not in NATO, but also Trump's even right about China aggressing in the Arctic.
So what?
What does that mean?
Are we splitting off from Europe or are we continuing to lead the West?
Well, it depends not only who you ask, but when you ask the person.
The Finnish president, in the span of just 11 minutes, managed to completely flip-flop on the question of whether or not Europe can defend itself without America.
First is a direct answer to the question of this panel.
Can Europe defend itself?
My answer is unequivocally yes.
Without the Americans.
Without the Americans.
I mean, how?
Well, look.
But you're relying on them for these key elements.
You've said earlier that Europe can defend itself without the Americans.
If it comes down...
Not exact.
My...
That's not a quote.
More or less.
More or less.
We'll go back to the transatlantic one.
More or less.
More or less.
I love journalists, not what do you mean not exactly?
That's exactly what you said.
That is exactly what you said 11 minutes earlier.
And the way he's trying to weasel out of it, you even see this in the community notes on social media.
They'll say, well, no, no, he said Europe can defend itself, but he wasn't totally explicit on whether Europe can defend itself without America.
Go back to the clip.
What did he say?
Give me just the first one.
First, it's a direct answer to the question of this panel.
Can Europe defend itself?
My answer is unequivocally yes.
Without the Americans.
Without the Americans.
I mean, how?
Look.
But you're relying on that.
I'm going to pause it right there.
As a direct answer to your question, can Europe defend itself?
Yes.
Without the Americans, without the Americans.
I mean, he goes on, and she's trying to prod because this is so ridiculous.
So he says that directly.
Even without that second part, though, without the Americans.
The question, can Europe defend itself implies that it would do so without the Americans.
That's the meaning of the word itself on its own, alone, without other help.
And then he's pressed on it.
He says, well, no, I never really, hold on, wait, what?
What are we told on?
I do not speak English.
What do you say, sir?
Because of course Europe cannot defend itself without the United States.
Since World War II, the agreement, this is not some secret conspiracy here.
This is the open agreement is that America will protect Europe.
Europe essentially demilitarizes and we protect Europe.
First during the Cold War and now just generally.
By the way, we had to protect Europe before the end of the Second World War II.
That's how the World War ended.
We went in and protected Europe.
By the way, that's how the First World War ended too.
So it's ridiculous.
Of course, Europe cannot defend itself without America.
Europe is, for all intents and purposes, a series of colonies of the United States.
Europe's older.
Europe gave birth to the United States.
England, the UK gave birth to the United States.
But now we're the big dog.
That's just how it works.
And Trump doesn't want anyone to forget it.
Not just the Europeans, but even the snow Mexicans who live in America's evil top hat of Canada.
Canada gets a lot of freebies from us, by the way.
They should be grateful also, but they're not.
I watched your prime minister yesterday.
He wasn't so grateful.
But they should be grateful to us.
Canada, Canada lives because of the United States.
Remember that, Mark, the next time you make your statements.
I love it so much.
Trump here does sound a little bit tired.
You got to remember, the guy essentially pulled an all-nighter.
He flies over to Davos.
He's, you know, in this other country whirlwind tour, just constantly running.
Certainly seems more sprightly than all the other guys at Davos.
But what I love about, you hear a little touch of lethargy in the voice, and it makes him sound like Don Corleone.
You should be grateful.
We never ask anything to you.
You come here on the day that my daughter is to be married, and you don't even have the courtesy to call me Godfather.
You better remember that I've been very good to you.
I cannot grant your request, Snow Mexicans.
You tell me not to take Greenland.
That I cannot do.
I love this because, not just because I'm of a certain, you know, a descendant of the Metzojorno in America, but because this is the reality.
We're the big dogs.
It's not the World Economic Forum and the United Nations and the liberal international system involves a lot of fictions, a lot of pretenses, a lot of what they might call noble lies.
One of them being that every country in the world is basically just the same.
You know, we're all basically equal.
But that's not true.
That's not how politics really works.
And that's never been true.
We've never really operated that way.
It's just a kind of a lie.
And so Trump wants to remind people of the truth.
And in a way, people are going to, people, myself included, are going to describe this as him talking kind of like a mafioso, like a little Don Corleone.
But really, he's speaking like an emperor.
He's speaking like the leader.
I'll put it even more precisely.
He's speaking like the leader of a great power, which we are.
And it's good that he's speaking that way because that is reality.
And this is a crucial point that a lot of utopians on the left and the right don't want to admit.
Politics works better when we acknowledge reality, even if there are realities that we don't want to admit, whether we're on the left or the right, even when they're realities that offend our ideology, such as the disparity in power between different nations, such as great nations pursuing their interests.
The left especially doesn't like that.
Or whether it's the reality that you can't have too much inequality in a democratic nation such as ours.
The reality, I'll go even further, that the palace is never safe when the cottage is unhappy.
That's a political reality that offends, especially libertarians and ideological free marketeers on the right, but you got to deal with reality.
Otherwise, you're going to have problems.
You're going to have revolutions.
You're going to have revolts.
You're not going to flourish.
So what's that all lead us to?
Back to the Greenland point.
Trump goes in.
They say, you're never getting Greenland.
You're never getting what you want.
This is outrageous.
It's going to dissolve NATO.
It's going to destroy the world.
What does Trump announce?
Less than 24 hours after being in Davos, we have a framework to get Greenland.
The USA gets everything we wanted, including especially real national security and international security.
How so?
Can you give us help anything else, please?
Well, the deal is going to be put out pretty soon.
We'll see.
It's right now a little bit in progress, but pretty far along.
It gets us everything we needed to get.
Will the U.S. still get Greenland?
Will the U.S. still get Greenland, sir?
Say it?
What did Mark Ruth say?
Well, he's a great leader.
I think he's fantastic.
The Secretary General was representing the other side, which is really us too, because, you know, a very important member of NATO.
I've done a lot for NATO.
And it's really nice.
I mean, it's a deal that everybody's very happy with.
Does it still include the United States having ownership of Greenland like you said you wanted?
It's a long-term deal.
It's the ultimate long-term lead.
I think it puts everybody in a really good position.
How long has the deal be, Mr. President?
Infinite.
Okay, wow, there's a lot here.
There's a lot here.
This is what I love about Trump's rhetoric, is you get all the bombast, all the stuff that gets the views, all the stuff that gets the clicks, but then keep listening.
There is a lot of sophistication going on here.
They say, are you going to get NATO?
Are you going to get Greenland?
He says, yeah.
Yeah, we are.
We're getting everything we need.
In other words, do we really want Greenland to become the 51st state?
No.
Are we really going to have, I've joked about this for days, are we going to have F-35s flying over piloted by Don Rumsfeld, you know, dropping bombs on Nuke?
No, obviously not.
But we need to secure Greenland.
We need to secure the Arctic from our geopolitical adversaries, especially as the prospect of regional or global war increases.
And we're the only power that can do it.
Denmark just can't do it.
So we need that control.
Who is ostensibly our adversary here?
I guess it's NATO.
It's the Secretary General of NATO, Mark Ruta, as you heard him reference.
Board Peace Initiative00:13:26
He says he's sort of on the other side, but he's sort of on our side because we run NATO.
Guys, come on, let's dispel with this fiction that NATO is just some entity outside of where it's the expansion of the American empire is what it is.
NATO was founded in order to organize the American empire against Russia, which organized its empire according to the Warsaw Pact.
And we're going to work it out.
Are you going to acquire NATO?
Are you going to acquire Greenland?
Sorry.
And he says, we're going to get what we need.
We're going to have the, it's not like we need to have it in name.
We don't need the 51st state, but we need the control.
And so it's going to be a long-term deal.
What does this mean?
We've already occupied and controlled Greenland.
The last time Denmark couldn't defend it because Denmark got overrun by Hitler.
And then we had to go beat Hitler to save Europe the first time, the second time, actually.
So we are where we are, guys.
This is the political reality.
But it's going to be a long-term deal.
Maybe that allows Denmark or Europe to save face.
How long?
And then he gets it in there at the end.
Infinite.
He says, guys, don't worry about the details.
It's that great description of Trump, which is don't take him literally, but take him seriously.
He goes, look, what do we really want here?
We're going to control Greenland.
We're just going to.
We're going to.
However, we need to gussy that up and describe it to make everyone feel good about it, whatever.
Just letting you know we're going to control Greenland.
And now NATO comes out and says, yeah.
Yeah, basically, that's right.
Basically, that's right.
So moving from Greenland, Trump then also goes further and rewrites potentially the world order by creating an organization that could replace the United Nations.
The United Nations, the most prominent liberal globalist organization in the world, he announces an organization that certainly could replace it at Davos, which is the annual meeting of all the liberals and globalists.
We'll get to that momentarily.
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He posted this to Truth Social, and it's another important little subtle thing that makes clear Trump's broader political strategy.
He says, look, had a great productive meeting with the Secretary General of NATO with respect to Greenland.
We have this great framework set up.
Further information will be made available as discussions progress.
Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, Special Envoy Steve Witkoff, and various others as needed and will be responsible for the negotiations.
They'll report to me.
Thank you.
Thank you for your attention to this matter.
The key four words here.
Vice President JD Vance.
That's the key.
Because as Trump is making these huge moves in the world, taking out Maduro and Venezuela, everyone has all the memes about Marco Rubio getting all these extra jobs.
Some of the enemies of the Trump administration have come out and tried to sow Discord.
This administration is working extraordinarily well altogether, but they're trying to sow Discord.
saying, well, Marco is kind of the face of taking out Maduro because he's the Secretary of State and he was working on this.
And even just because of presidential protocols, JD Vance wasn't in the room literally when it took place.
Ooh, maybe Marco Rubio will be the nominee in 28, even though Rubio has already endorsed JD Vance.
Maybe Trump is cutting out the vice president, even though Trump has expressed his confidence in him consistently.
What this is all about from the left is trying to sow division within the Trump administration.
And then sometimes when you're hearing these rumblings from the right, it's just the usual malcontents who are trying to jockey for power who don't like that MAGA beat them even 10 years ago.
So what does Trump do?
Just a few words in there.
He goes, yeah, yeah, yeah, we're going to take Greenland.
This is the next huge foreign policy move from the United States.
In many ways, much more significant than Venezuela.
And who am I going to put in charge of the negotiations?
And he goes, he doesn't cut out Rubio.
Why would he cut out Rubio?
Rubio is amazing.
But he just sets it up again.
The vice president.
I'm putting him in charge of the negotiations.
Followed by Marco Rubio.
In keeping with President Trump, what he said months ago on Air Force One.
He says, oh, I hope J.D. and Marco run as a ticket.
I don't want them to be in opposition.
I want them to work together.
I hope Marco stays Secretary of State forever.
JD, Marco, and Steve Witkoff, and it's a subtle little bit, but it corrects the messaging, makes it very difficult for Trump's enemies on the left to sow that division and even some of the malcontents on the right.
Okay.
So turn from Greenland to Gaza.
Really zoom out from Gaza.
Look at the entire world order.
Trump announces at Davos a new organization called the Board of Peace.
As part of this historic record of major peace initiatives, today we're announcing more details regarding the Board of Peace, so important.
This board has the chance to be one of the most consequential bodies ever created.
And it's my enormous honor to serve as its chairman.
I was very honored when they asked me to do it.
We had an idea to do it.
Okay, the Board of Peace.
He's announcing it.
He's going to be the chairman.
What is the Board of Peace?
This sounds like something out of a cartoon or a comic book.
The Board of Peace, it's so vague.
What's it really about?
Trump explains in the hallway.
Talks about being concerned, Mr. President, about Russia trying to come and take over Greenland.
If you're worried that Putin would do something like that, why invite him to join your Board of Peace?
Because we want everybody.
We want all nations.
We want all nations where people have control, people have power.
That way we're never going to have a problem.
This is the greatest board ever assembled.
And everybody wants to be on it.
But yeah, I have some controversial people on it, but these are people that get the job done.
These are people that have tremendous influence.
And if I put all babies on the board, there wouldn't be very much.
So he was invited.
He's accepted.
Many people have accepted.
I think, I don't know of anybody that hasn't accepted.
But it's going to be great.
I think the Board of Peace will be the most prestigious board ever.
And it's going to get a lot of work done that the United Nations should have done.
And we'll work with the United Nations, but the Board of Peace is going to be special.
We're going to have peace.
It started off with Gaza, the Middle East.
We've got peace in the Middle East.
Tremendous peace in the Middle East.
Nobody thought that was possible.
And that happened by taking out the Iran nuclear threat.
Without that, it could have never happened.
Ton of information here from the top.
Why would Trump invite Russia, which has been our geopolitical adversary, has ICBMs pointed at us?
Why would he invite them to be on the board of peace?
Because the board of peace is supposed to be a global body.
If we only invited our friends, it would just be NATO.
What would be the point of that?
We already have one of those.
What is the Board of Peace?
If we're inviting people like Russia to join it, the Board of Peace is an international body that even includes people who have long been enemies to try to establish peaceful relations.
That sounds a lot like the UN, doesn't it?
Pretty clear to me, the Board of Peace is a replacement UN.
The problem with the UN is not that we have an international body that is trying to interpret and enforce international law and establish the conditions of global peace.
That's all the good stuff about the UN.
The problem is it doesn't do it.
The problem is that the UN was founded as a fever dream as the successor to the League of Nations by the feckless leftist Woodrow Wilson, and it's just a liberal nonsense.
So we don't like them.
The UN tries to undermine American power and influence.
Forget about them.
We're going to found the good UN.
That's my read on it.
I don't have any insider info from the administration.
That's my read on it.
That's what the Board of Peace is.
So of course we want to invite Russia.
Now, Russia has said they might join.
Costs a billion bucks to join, but they have one big holdup.
They say that they can pay their initiation for using money that was frozen by the United States, by the Biden administration.
So they're saying, yeah, we'll pay up, but only with the money you already took from us.
But then they say, but you need to support Palestinian statehood, which is something that the UN has called for.
And that might be a little bit of a holdup because the United States does not support Palestinian statehood because the immediate realpolitik, very tangible cause of the Board of Peace is the Israel-Gaza conflict.
And why?
Because the Israel-Gaza conflict is in many ways, not in all ways, but in many ways, just a proxy for the great power conflict between the United States and Russia, as well as other powers.
Because in that conflict between the U.S. and Russia, the state of Israel is seen as an outgrowth, even a colony of the American empire, which it kind of is.
And the cause of Palestinian statehood is seen as a proxy or an outgrowth of the cause of Russian power, which it largely is.
This is one of the reasons why, as we talk about not the theological or the philosophical, historical, but the real, the realpolitik issues that come into play in the Middle East.
This is one of the reasons that Israel becomes such a flashpoint.
One of the reasons that the people like Greta Thunberg were Zakefia, one of the reasons that the people who protest Western imperialism and white supremacy and America and all the rest, one of the reasons they get so into the Palestinian cause is because it all just involves a common enemy.
This is how you get gays for Palestine.
And then we all joke in a sophomoric way.
We say, well, we should send those gays for Palestine to Gaza.
They'll get thrown off a roof in three seconds.
Yeah, that's not the point.
Yeah, they don't agree on almost anything except their common enemy.
So it's no surprise that that's the sticking point.
All the more reason to invite Russia to join.
And it looks pretty good.
Trump's done a good job at this.
You know, what's funny is a lot of Europe doesn't want to join this.
The UK has said no.
France has said no.
Norway said no because they want to protect the UN.
Ukraine is a likely no.
But a lot of the Middle Eastern countries are on board.
Israel is on board, though they couldn't show up because Switzerland says they'd arrest them and send Bibi Netanyahu to the ICC, the International Criminal Court.
But a lot of the Middle Eastern countries are on board.
It's amazing.
Trump got Qatar and Israel to the table.
And a lot of other Middle Eastern countries too.
And good European leaders like Viktor Orban in Hungary.
So it's good.
It's impressive.
It's a smart way forward.
I'm very into it.
And if this could replace the UN, all the better.
One point on it, though.
Apparently, the United States has invited the Pope to be a part of the Board of Peace.
I think that's a bad idea for the Pope to accept.
Not that the Pope asks for my advice, but I think it's a bad idea.
Because the Pope is not just one national leader among others.
He's not going to sit at the table even with good national political leaders.
The Pope's authority is chiefly a spiritual authority.
The Papal States don't exist anymore.
The Pope's temporal authority is quite limited.
It's limited to a few blocks in Rome.
But his spiritual authority is far greater.
It sits far above the musings and ideologies of the various political heads.
So I just don't, I don't think it makes a lot of sense.
Treasonous Behavior On Foreign Soil00:14:43
I mean, I go back to Dante when Dante writes in Monarchia on the split between the spiritual power and the temporal power.
He says, look, it's not that there's no relation between the two.
The political power, though, should be illuminated by spiritual authority.
The Pope should be able to provide a kind of illumination of these political issues that then the temporal heads of state can work out.
In any case, it's good stuff.
Now, before we move on from YEF, I have to get to Gavin Newsom's weird sexual fantasies about Donald Trump that he proclaims in Davos.
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Newsome shows up.
He has this to say in Davos.
This is before President Trump spoke.
This is yesterday morning or even the evening before, depending on how you score the time in Europe.
This is Gavin Newsom on an American governor just absolutely trashing the American president on foreign soil.
Do you have a message for Europeans who are concerned about the messages from the White House around Greenland this week?
Yeah, it's time to fuck up.
It's time to get serious and stop being complicit.
I've seen this in the United States.
The supine Congress playing both sides, you know, say one thing on a text or a tweet and another publicly.
People rolling over.
I should have brought up a bunch of knee pads for all the world leaders.
I mean, handing out crowns and handing out, I mean, this is pathetic.
Nobel Prizes, they are being given away.
I mean, it's just pathetic.
Diplomacy with Donald Trump?
He's a T-Rex.
You mate with him or he devours you.
One or the other.
And you respect the need to stand.
No, the Europeans could be if they continued down this path in the process.
They need to stand tall, stand firm, stand united.
Okay, before we get to the sex fantasies, notice from the top how unseemly this is.
This would have been disqualifying for an American politician even 20 years ago.
This guy shows up and trashes the leader of the United States on foreign soil.
That was a big no-no.
Some of the Zoomers in the audience won't even remember that.
That was a huge no-no.
That norm has been totally shattered.
But it's unseemly, nevertheless.
So he goes there, he trashes not only the American president, he tells America's negotiating adversaries to undermine the U.S. policy.
When it comes to whether or not the U.S. will acquire Greenland for the defense of the United States, he says, yeah, you better not give it to America.
Yeah, screw America.
America shouldn't get what it wants.
And by the way, it's not even that it's just a Trump priority.
The U.S. has been trying to acquire Greenland since the 19th century.
This has been a priority of the United States for purposes of national security since the 19th century, over 150 years ago.
We've tried to buy it multiple times throughout the 20th century.
This is a long-standing American interest.
And this anti-American scum shows up on foreign soil and tells the people that we're negotiating with, hey, don't give America what it wants.
Screw America.
Disgusting.
I mean, really disgusting.
I make fun of Newsome and sometimes I give him credit for being such a slippery, slick politician, but this is deeply unpatriotic.
This is treasonous behavior on foreign soil.
Now, back to making fun of him.
He then starts getting into this weird sex stuff.
So first he says, I should have brought knee pads for you people.
And there's a way to read that that's somewhat wholesome, and there's a way to read that that is obscene and sexual.
And it's unclear.
He's such a slippery politician.
It's unclear what he's going for at first.
Because you need to stand up.
You shouldn't be on your knees.
Well, you could be on your knees, you know, bowing before an emperor or something.
But then he makes clear that he's implying the obscene sexual connotation.
He says, you know, Trump is a T-Rex.
You either mate with him or he devours you.
First of all, what?
We're mixing a lot of metaphors here.
I didn't know that that's how T-Rexes interacted with people.
I don't think that's terribly characteristic of T-Rexes.
I'm not sure that anyone knows that.
But when he says, yeah, you know, he's just trying to copulate with you, then the implication of getting down on your knees, Europeans, is much clearer.
So it's gross.
It's grotesque.
He's a pervert.
He's treasonous.
It's just disgusting.
He's a disgusting person.
Then he shows up.
He has the audacity to get on stage.
So that was just in the hallway.
He gets on stage at the World Economic Forum and doubles down.
They're the new Trump signature series knee pads.
Yeah, and they are available online.
I told you, the last one sold out.
And I thought it was a serious moment.
But we laughed.
Anyway, these are available in bulk, too.
But I want to read you a couple of things the U.S. government has said about you in the last 20 years.
Now, notice what he's doing here.
He's not just going out and making fun of Trump personally or from the perspective of partisan domestic American politics.
Like, hey, I'm selling big dumb Trump hair wigs.
Go to davinwsome.com and buy this wig making fun of Trump's hair or something like that.
He's selling the knee pads because the joke is he's making fun of Europe for giving America what it wants.
It's not just a personality thing.
He's not just making a point that is particular to Donald Trump or even the Republican Party.
He is mocking Europe for potentially giving to America what it has desired as a matter of national security and grand strategy for 150 years.
This is treasonous.
I don't think it's really going to play.
Some of the jokes about Trump will play.
This, though, he looks like Jane Fonda, you know, sitting at the anti-aircraft guns pretending to shoot at American airplanes.
I mean, this is deeply traitorous, treasonous stuff.
And I look, it'll play with his base, I guess, because his base hates America, and they don't wave the American flag.
They prefer every flag on earth, the gay flag, the Palestinian flag, the BLM flag.
They prefer every flag to the American flag, and they often light the American flag on fire.
But is this going to play with moderates?
I thought he was supposed to be the moderate candidate.
He's going to be the new Bill Clinton.
I don't think so.
Scott Besson comes out, the greatest Treasury Secretary since Alexander Hamilton.
He shows up and just rips into Newsom.
I think it's very, very ironic that Governor Newsom, who strikes me as Patrick Bateman meets Sparkle Beach Ken, may be the only Californian who knows less about economics than Kamala Harris.
He's here this week with his billionaire sugar daddy, Alex Soros.
And the Davos is a perfect place for a man who, when everyone else is on lockdown, when he was having people arrested for going to church, he was having $1,000 a night meals at the French laundry.
And I'm sure the California people won't forget that.
And I can tell my message to Governor Newsom is the Trump administration is coming to California.
We are going to crack down on waste, fraud, and abuse.
You know what I love about Besson?
You know what I love about Besson?
He's extremely intelligent.
He's obviously extremely intelligent, very competent, a very serious financial professional.
So his IQ is several standard deviations above the average in Washington, D.C.
No doubt about it.
But he's also a very witty, tough guy.
He's like a tough guy.
He's the kind of guy who's a lot of economists, especially are just, you know, ivory tower kind of academic type scholar types who don't, you know, they've never been in a fistfight in their life.
Besson, you can imagine him alternately schooling you on economic policy and just punching your head in in a locker or something.
He manages both.
And he's got this kind of wry wit because he's intelligent and he turns it on you because he's brutal.
He says, yeah, he's Patrick Bateman meets Sparkle Beach Barbie, Sparkle Beach Ken.
But this guy, he's a joker because his economic policies are even worse than Kamala Harris.
And then he explains what he's achieving at the World Economic Forum.
Notice here, totally different situation from the governor of some state going and attacking the president of the United States on foreign soil and undermining long-standing American grand strategy on foreign soil.
All he does, he's a little tough, but this is a minor politician in America, smacks him for his looks and moves on.
It's appropriate.
It's brutal.
It's effective.
And Newsom clutches his pearls.
The Treasury Secretary described you as Patrick Bateman meets Sparkle Beach Ken, the White House Communications Director.
That was the U.S. Secretary of Treasury.
I have a couple more and then you can respond.
The White House Communications Director called you Gavin Newscomb and an official White House account, a federal government account, described you with a, that's a very online sexual slur that people here probably don't want to hear at 8.30 in the morning.
And you're in some sense responding in kind.
It's like, we got to be cat saddle.
We got to fight fire with fire.
Do you think?
Yeah, we ought to fight fire with fire.
So here he even contradicts himself.
Because first of all, this is the guy who rolls up making fellatio jokes about the president of the United States on foreign soil.
This is a guy who obviously is sick in the head when it comes to sex stuff.
He's the guy who said he wants to see more trans kids.
I think the very online sexual slur there.
I was like, what slur is he saying?
Is it, you know, the word for cigarettes in Britain?
Is it homo?
Is it what's he saying?
I realized, oh, I think it's groomer, but he is a groomer.
Newsom is a groomer.
He says, I want to see more trans kids.
Literally, verbatim.
You're a groomer if you want to see more trans kids.
So that's all true.
And so he clutches his pearls at first.
Can you believe the secretary would call me Patrick Bateman and Sparkle Beach Can and say, bro, you rolled up to Davos making fellatio jokes about the president.
And so then the interviewer says, well, hold on.
You've been doing that too in a more egregious way.
And then Newsome gets very serious.
Well, fight fire with fire.
Well, hold on.
Is it appropriate or is it inappropriate?
Is it seemly or is it unseemly?
This is Newsom's big political problem.
He doesn't know who he is.
This is always Newsom's problem.
One day, Monday morning, Newsom wants to be the moderate Bill Clinton, new Democrat, friends with Charlie Kirk and Steve Bannon.
Tuesday, he's calling Stephen Miller a fascist and calling for more trans kids.
He doesn't know what he wants to.
He's flipping back and forth because he's not really anything.
He doesn't really believe in anything.
He's an empty suit and some pomade.
But it's not going to sell.
At some point, he's going to have to pick Elaine.
Somebody's going to have to pick Elaine if he wants that nomination.
Now, speaking of weird sex stuff, the UK has just done something of a flip-flop.
The UK National Health Service has just proclaimed that marrying your cousin is actually a good thing.
Wonder why they did that.
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What was it like, Merlin, to be alone with God?
Is that who you think I was alone with?
Maradin, I knew your father.
I am yet convinced that he was not of this world.
All men know of the great Talies.
You are my father.
Are the gods war for my soul?
Princess Garris, savior of our people.
I know what the bull got offered you.
I was offered the same.
And there is a new pirate work in the world.
I've seen it.
A god who sacrifices what he loves for us.
We are each given only one life, singer.
No.
We're given another.
I learned of Yezoo the Christ, and I have become his follower.
He's waiting on a learner, and I think you can give him one.
Trust in Yezu.
He is the only hope for men like us.
Fate of Britain never rests in the hands of the Great Life.
Great light, great darkness.
Why Christmas Decorations Last00:03:00
Such things mattered to me then.
What matters to you now, Mistress of Lies?
You, nephew.
The sword of a high king.
How many lives must be lost before you accept the power you were born to wield.
So clinging to the promises of a god who has abandoned you.
I cannot take up that sword again.
You know what you must do.
Great light, forgive me.
The time has come to be reborn.
My favorite comment from yesterday is from the Don Palumbo says, been really wondering why the Christmas decorations are still up, lol.
Because it's not February 2nd yet.
That's why.
Why would I, I don't think, is it February?
Professor, are you there?
Hello, Mr. Davies.
Is anyone there?
Is anybody in the control room?
No, it's just me.
It's me and the audience today.
I'm here.
You're here.
Oh, that's good.
Professor woke up.
Professor Jacob, is it February 2nd?
Let me check my calendar.
No.
It's not.
So that's why they're still up.
Because some people mistakenly, they think that Christmas occurs during Advent.
That's not when Christmas occurs.
Advent is the awaiting, the coming of, we anticipate the coming of Christmas.
Then Christmas happens and it lasts in church for eight days, the octave of Christmas.
It lasts in Christmas carols for 12 days when my true love gives to me all sorts of fun things.
And then it lasts traditionally until Candlemas.
We want to hurry everything up here.
We want to start putting our Christmas decorations up at Halloween these days.
No.
Not appropriate.
And by the way, I just want, I know I've belabored this point many times.
It makes sense to put your decorations up later, obviously.
First the fast and then the feast, not first the feast and then the hangover.
Christmas begins on the 25th, so that's when we put our Christmas decorations up.
But even beyond that, we think, at least I do, I think of Christmas decorations with the snow and the fun and the winter.
So why would we put it up in November or even October in some cases and take it down, sometimes before the first snow even hits?
You leave it up through Candlemas.
Have I made my point clear?
I hope so.
Okay.
We turn now to weird sex stuff in the UK, which has just announced this.
Cousin Marriage Benefits?00:04:33
Britain's National Health Service says marriage and procreation between first cousins can be beneficial and the risks have been, quote, exaggerated.
New documents show that the NHS guidance to midwives states 15% of cousin couples have children that are affected by genetic conditions compared to just 3% of children born to unrelated parents.
However, the guidelines then go on to describe the benefits of cousin marriages, saying it can provide financial and social security and generate collective social capital.
Sickle cell disease, cystic fibrosis, and muscular dystrophy are some of the genetic issues more common among the children of closely related parents.
So the downsides is your kids are much, much, much more susceptible to a whole host of genetic problems.
But the upside is at least you've known each other a long time and you know the in-laws because it's your aunt and uncle.
So like you got to balance it out, right?
No, the downside is your kid is going to have a ton of problems.
The upside is we won't offend the Pakistanis who have taken over our country.
That's really what this is about.
Because upwards of half of Pakistanis in some migrant communities marry their cousins.
That's a cultural tradition that we in the West got rid of.
And we got rid of it because the Catholic Church told us to in the 11th century.
Cousin marriage has been a norm for all of history everywhere.
But we got rid of it for all sorts of reasons.
But one of the consequences is our just genetic population has been a lot healthier because of that.
So the church in the 11th century says, hey, you just got to stop marrying your cousins.
It's not good.
And then this is formally declared, more formally declared at the Fourth Lateran Council.
And that endured for a very, very long time until guess who?
Guess who?
Speaking of the UK and weird sex stuff, guess who first upended the ban on cousin marriage?
It was not the Pakistanis.
Don't blame the Muslims for everything.
It was not the Packies.
It was one of the worst men ever to live.
And one of the main causes of the collapse of Western civilization.
He was a big fat jerk.
Do you know who it is yet?
You probably do.
None other than Henry VIII.
Henry VIII is the one.
Henry VIII upended the ban on cousin marriage.
He did.
He did it.
Why?
Because he was a weird sex freak.
It wasn't even just that.
He was a weird sex freak in that he decided to destroy Western Christendom because he really, really wanted to have a divorce.
And Christianity, universally understood up until that very moment, said you can't get divorced.
Now some people who are baptized Christians say you can get divorced, but the long-standing tradition of the church and the understanding of our Lord's words in the gospel and the authoritative voice of the successors of the apostles is you can't get divorced.
And Henry VIII said, I would rather destroy Christendom than not get divorced.
So is it any wonder?
Is this like how the moment you start to weaken sexual mores, it's not that you just stop.
You're going to say, okay, we're going to redefine marriage and then we're just going to stop right there.
The minute you do that, then you get a whole host of other sexual degeneracy, like the thrupples and all the rest of it.
Anyway, not great.
Not great.
And obviously this recent announcement is pure politics.
They're not even trying to make a scientific or medical case for it.
They say, oh, it leads to some social benefits, like you get to hang out with your aunt and uncle more often, I guess.
But you can't only blame it.
The problem was caused by Henry VIII.
It was then helped along by mass migration.
It was accelerated by the Pakistanis.
And it's going to lead to lots more problems in the UK.
Matters Of Religion00:09:02
The physical problems afflicting the UK population will no longer just be the teeth.
There will be other issues.
Okay.
Before we go, I move from the UK back to America.
Still to matters of religion, though.
Fernando Mendoza.
I have to talk about this.
People have been coming up to me to talk about Fernando Mendoza for a while now.
And I don't, I had no idea what they were talking about.
And they're talking about Indiana and this and the SEC and this and a priest and a this.
And I have no idea.
I'm like a deer in the headlights.
What do I know?
First of all, I'm not the biggest athlete in the world, as I think some of you know.
And I do like sports.
I think sports are good.
I like them abstractly.
And I do like them particularly in as much as I like baseball, specifically New York Yankees baseball.
Other than that, though, I don't, I don't know.
I'm friends with some professional football players, and they're great guys, but I don't know anything about, I just don't know.
What do you want?
You want me to pretend?
You want me to pretend that I'm some Giga Chad athlete?
I'm not.
I don't know.
I don't follow it that.
But anyway, Fernando Mendoza has managed to get even me to care about football.
He won some big game, I take it.
And he's super duper Catholic and has priests like bless the field and he goes to daily mass.
And he had this to say at a presser.
I would say my family is a very Catholic family and to have them as role models and to see how they always circle back to their faith and how much God and Jesus has done in their lives and mine, especially this season, is this season is the season I've gotten the closest to the most religious I've ever been.
And I think it's also been reflected by the success and really not success, but also the platform to also praise God and to praise Jesus Christ.
And I would say this is a big part of myself and my identity.
And I really just got to think the man upstairs.
Love this.
This is awesome.
Now, football players for a long time have been like, yo, glory to God.
You know, they do like an point up in the sky during the end zone dance and everything.
But the way this kid's talking about it is way cooler, much more specific.
You can see humility and just kind of lightness radiates out of the kid.
He apparently goes to daily mass.
He leads team Bible studies.
It's great.
But the reason I find this politically relevant, one, you know, look, I hope this evangelizes people.
That's great.
But politically, too, people misunderstand something.
I think a lot of people look at this kid and they think of religion as an aspect of his life.
You know, he's a great football player.
And oh, isn't that interesting and quirky and eccentric that he's very religious?
He's very Catholic.
But actually, it's the opposite.
We think of that, we think, we tend to think of religion as something that makes you better at what you're really out there for.
You know, maybe his religion really makes him a better football player.
Maybe you being really religious makes you a better lawyer or doctor or dishwasher or I don't know, whatever it is.
It's the opposite.
And I think this kid is really showing that.
It's not that religion is some interesting aspect of his life that helps the football stuff.
It's that him being a great athlete is for the religious stuff.
He is doing everything that he does in his life, including be really good at football for religion.
We tend to put the cart before the horse, but that's what it's for.
And that's what it has to be for.
I'm not just Bible thumping here.
I'm not just, but you need to get this.
As a matter of reason, I don't care if you're a skeptic or you're an atheist or whatever.
You have to understand you are going to die.
We're all going to die.
We don't like to think about that in our modern life.
We don't even like to have funerals anymore and we like to hide the dying and the dead away from us, but nevertheless, you will die.
That fact is crucial when you're coming to conclusions about what your life is about.
Because if your life is about making a lot of money or getting really famous or being really good at football, if that's ultimately what your life is about, you will fail because your money will go away.
Unrighteous mammon will just flitter away.
You can't take it with you.
Your fame will dissipate and someone will be better at football than you or football will disappear.
So people will stop playing football in 200 years.
So if that's what your life is for, you're going to be a failure.
The reason that we can even think about these things is because we are hylomorphic.
We're body and soul and our body corrupts, but our soul is rational and eternal.
So your end has to be beyond physical death.
Or it's all fake and God doesn't exist and heaven's not real and hell's not real and you're just going to take a dirt nap and then, I don't know, I guess go be a hedonist or something.
But God does exist and we can know the existence of God with certainty from the natural world using human reason.
And so that's what you have to think about.
It's kind of like most people spend their whole day trying to avoid thinking about death.
And people take pills for that and they go to useless therapy for that and they do yoga or I don't know, whatever it is.
We're a very anxious society and it comes from the fear of death that we don't want to face.
You should wake up every single day.
I did it today.
And I do it most days.
You should wake up every single day thinking about the fact that you will die.
That will make your day better.
You will have a happier day.
I mean it.
I mean it.
If you wake up and you say, hey, I'm going to die.
I'm going to die at some point.
And it's probably going to involve some suffering and it's going to make people sad.
And it's, but I will die.
Maybe today.
I hope not, but maybe today.
Because it focuses you on everything else.
You have to say, okay, I'm going to wake up.
And what am I going to do?
From everything from how I eat breakfast to how I do my job to how I treat my wife and kids to how I say my prayers before bed, maybe, to how I, it all has to be in service of my ultimate aim.
If it's not, again, I'm not like being saccharin and Bible thumping here.
I'm being brutally realistic with you.
If the things that you do are not in service of your ultimate aim, which is to know God, to serve him in this world and to be with him forever, if it's not in service of your ultimate, which show me the, what's the alternative?
If you don't like that, if you don't like that answer, what's the alternative?
If what you do is not in service of your ultimate aim, you're just wasting your time.
That's what that kid is telling us in a delightful way, in not so many words, at this football press conference.
Okay, today's, speaking of today's Theology Thursday, the rest of the show continues now.
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What was it like, Merlin, to be alone with God?
Is that who you think I was alone with?
Marathin, I knew your father.
I am yet convinced that he was not of this world.
All men know of the great Taliesin.
Who are my father?
The gods should war for my soul.
Princess Garris, savior of our people.
I know what the bull god offered you.
I was offered the same.
And there is a new pirate work in the world.
I've seen it.
A god who sacrifices what he loves for us.
We are each given only one life, Singer.
No.
We're given another.
I learned of Yazoo the Christ, and I have become his follower.
He's waiting on an earl, and I think you can give him one.
Trust in Yezu.
He is the only hope for men like us.
Fate of Britain never rests in the hands of the Great Life.
Great light, great darkness.
Such things mattered to me then.
What matters to you now, Mistress of Lies?
You, nephew.
The sword of the high king.
How many lives must be lost before you accept the power you were born to wield.
So clinging to the promises of a god who has abandoned you.