The Megyn Kelly Show - 20230309_major-covid-lab-leak-revelations-and-harrys-therap
Aired: 2023-03-09
Duration: 01:37:03


=== Stephen Crowder Returns (15:04) ===

[00:00:50]  Welcome to the Megan Kelly Show, your home for open, honest, and provocative conversations.
[00:01:19]  He's here.
[00:01:20]  He's got big plans for the future of his show, which is very popular and people want to know.
[00:01:25]  We're going to get to that.
[00:01:26]  But we also have a lot of news to get to with him.
[00:01:29]  Stephen Crowder is the host of Louder with Crowder.
[00:01:33]  Stephen, welcome back to the show.
[00:01:34]  How are you doing?
[00:01:35]  Thank you for having me.
[00:01:36]  You know, I would say I'm doing well, but I'm not physically, mentally great.
[00:01:40]  But physically, I was in Florida.
[00:01:42]  You know, we just announced the relaunch of Monthly, which I know we'll get to.
[00:01:45]  But I got that red tide.
[00:01:47]  Did you know about that?
[00:01:49]  What's that?
[00:01:50]  See, exactly.
[00:01:51]  Okay, so I don't feel so stupid.
[00:01:52]  Not that you're stupid, but I don't feel so stupid.
[00:01:54]  I was going into the water, it was in Sarasota through Rumble is based.
[00:01:58]  And I was going into the water, and I was like, oh man, my throat is scratchy.
[00:02:00]  And I started getting hives and I had like asthma, you know, sort of attack kind of feeling, which I haven't had since I was a kid.
[00:02:07]  And then I noticed there's no one in the water.
[00:02:09]  And I was going, wow, screw me, that's a lot of dead puffer fish.
[00:02:12]  And then I found out, and I don't know if you've seen a dead puffer fish, but it's really big and it's bloated.
[00:02:16]  Gotta be.
[00:02:17]  And I found out it's red tide.
[00:02:18]  It's an algae that's toxic, but there was no sign.
[00:02:22]  And so I've been coughing and I've had a sort of so just beware that red tide.
[00:02:25]  I had no idea.
[00:02:26]  You know, it's like if it's not one thing, it's another.
[00:02:28]  I just had to go for my annual physical with my doctor and he wants me to get the shingles vaccine.
[00:02:34]  And I'm like, you know, I'm not sure.
[00:02:36]  Like sometimes people take that and it brings on weird symptoms.
[00:02:39]  But have you ever seen somebody with shingles?
[00:02:42]  You can get shingles on your eyeball.
[00:02:45]  You can get it on the end of your nose.
[00:02:47]  It's painful.
[00:02:48]  It's unsightly.
[00:02:49]  So I'm like, maybe I do have to get this shingle.
[00:02:51]  I mean, things start falling apart after like 45, basically.
[00:02:54]  Well, first off, your doctor must be thrilled to conduct those physicals.
[00:02:57]  Second, I didn't know that Richard Painter, remember Dumpster Fire, had shingles before I did a parody of him.
[00:03:02]  And then people were saying, hey, he has shingles.
[00:03:04]  I was like, well, what's done is done.
[00:03:08]  Well, I'll let you know if I get it and how it goes.
[00:03:11]  Good.
[00:03:11]  Because the last thing I need is a shingle in my eye.
[00:03:14]  And that's like, it was bad enough when I had my LASIK done.
[00:03:17]  I'll never have glasses off my face again.
[00:03:19]  All right, speaking of people who have seen better days physically, John Fetterman.
[00:03:22]  Now, I know you've been sort of launching your new business, which we'll talk about and all that.
[00:03:26]  But while you've been focused on that, Stephen, John Fetterman, newly elected U.S. Senator, went into the hospital at Walter Reed.
[00:03:33]  First, it was lightheadedness, they said something was wrong following the stroke.
[00:03:38]  Then it turned into, oh, he's got to go back in for an undetermined amount of time for depression.
[00:03:42]  Nothing wrong with that.
[00:03:43]  A lot of people suffer from depression, but his team has been playing a little like hide the salami on what his actual physical condition is for a long time.
[00:03:54]  I'm saying wait, I don't think you're Megan fully aware of what hide the salami means.
[00:03:58]  I don't know.
[00:03:59]  No.
[00:04:01]  Well, that's probably what you think.
[00:04:04]  But hey, you know what?
[00:04:04]  I'm sure he's doing it.
[00:04:05]  Those you have a bunch of crazy people in those wards and they get busy.
[00:04:08]  I mean, the highest STD rate in the country is ladies and old folks' homes.
[00:04:11]  Did you know that?
[00:04:13]  That's true.
[00:04:13]  The highest those old birds get around.
[00:04:15]  I mean, slowly, but they make their way.
[00:04:19]  But yes, no, I agree with you this.
[00:04:21]  With Federalman, he's been.
[00:04:22]  He's been transparent.
[00:04:23]  He hasn't been transparent.
[00:04:24]  So he's back.
[00:04:25]  But I want to tell you that today, courtesy of the Washington Post.
[00:04:28]  Oh, sorry, New York Times, Annie Carney, who really is just like his stenographer.
[00:04:32]  It's crazy how fawning her pieces are over him.
[00:04:36]  She wants us to know it's all going swimmingly in Walter Reed.
[00:04:40]  He hasn't missed a step, Stephen.
[00:04:41]  He is in a cheerfully decorated common room with floral paintings adorning violet walls.
[00:04:47]  He begins most of his days meeting with his chief of staff, carrying a briefcase full of newspaper clips, statements for him to approve, legislation to review, and other business, and goes on and on and on about he's made the wise decision to eschew exposure to cable television, the internet, and social media, and that he is firing off legislation and making decisions on farm bills and so on day after day.
[00:05:08]  And yay, this is something we should all be celebrating that he is there and so open and has been more transparent than any senator ever who struggled with mental health.
[00:05:17]  What do you make of it?
[00:05:18]  Well, I wouldn't be surprised if he wakes up wearing, you know, wearing an Enrique Iglesias beanie and his wife returns from Canada holding a pillow over his face.
[00:05:26]  So I don't know how this, look, here's the thing.
[00:05:28]  Like you said, and I've talked about having struggled with, you know, issues like depression in the past.
[00:05:33]  My heart goes out to him.
[00:05:34]  But it's relevant, just like with Joe Biden.
[00:05:36]  It's relevant if he's not fit for office.
[00:05:38]  And of course, just like with the Wuhan lab, right, leak theory.
[00:05:41]  Everyone said, well, that's racist.
[00:05:42]  You go, hold on a second.
[00:05:43]  This has nothing to do with the people of China.
[00:05:44]  We're talking about the Chinese government.
[00:05:46]  It's the same thing with Fetterman with Biden.
[00:05:48]  We're saying, hold on a second.
[00:05:49]  We're not saying that someone who has mental issues or might be suffering from some kind of neurodegenerative disease is a bad person, but it is relevant for someone who has to make a lot of executive decisions.
[00:05:58]  And when Fetterman was running, people were saying, hey, you know what?
[00:06:01]  This guy might not be fit.
[00:06:02]  And everyone said that's a low blow.
[00:06:05]  That's getting personal.
[00:06:06]  That's an unfair attack.
[00:06:08]  And I think now we see that it's relevant.
[00:06:10]  And hey, I don't know.
[00:06:11]  We can't know because the media is, as you said, running interference for him.
[00:06:15]  I mean, this reporter at New York Times, I mean, Carney is in the name.
[00:06:18]  I don't know.
[00:06:19]  Last name could be like first name snake, last name oil salesman.
[00:06:22]  I just, we can't know the truth.
[00:06:24]  We cannot know the truth.
[00:06:26]  And it is relevant.
[00:06:27]  And I hope if people have learned nothing these last few years, and I apologize from scratch again, it's the red tide, maybe some mad cow.
[00:06:34]  I hope if people have, if they've learned one thing these last few years, it's don't allow yourself to be silenced through those modes of attack.
[00:06:40]  No, the Wuhan lab theory was not racist.
[00:06:42]  No, hold on a second.
[00:06:43]  Questioning the CDC, questioning Fauci, the highest paid unelected official, is not anti-science.
[00:06:48]  No, no, saying that Fetterman has had strokes and seems to be speaking in a way that is inarticulate and in some cases unintelligible.
[00:06:55]  And this is back then.
[00:06:56]  No, that's not saying that you hate people who've had strokes.
[00:07:00]  These are relevant points of data.
[00:07:02]  And we need to, look, we need to look at those vectors when we're talking about someone holding elected office.
[00:07:07]  And for someone, you know, people on the left, they value experience so much.
[00:07:10]  And by that, they mean career politicians, right?
[00:07:12]  That was a big attack they used against Donald Trump.
[00:07:14]  He has no experience in office.
[00:07:16]  But you don't think being mentally fit, physically fit, just being capable on the same level that the average American, you don't think that's relevant?
[00:07:25]  You think it's more relevant that they've suckled at the government teat for 20, 30, in Biden's case, 50 something years?
[00:07:31]  It's a fundamentally different way of viewing the world.
[00:07:34]  And I wish and I pray for Fredderman to heal up.
[00:07:37]  I hope that he's well.
[00:07:38]  I wouldn't wish depression to my worst enemy, but it doesn't seem like he's ready to do this job.
[00:07:43]  It doesn't seem like he was ready to do this job.
[00:07:45]  And I do think that's also a lesson to Republicans.
[00:07:48]  Don't run the craz.
[00:07:49]  Well, not crazy.
[00:07:50]  Dr. Oz wasn't crazy.
[00:07:51]  He's not crazy, but he was a bad candidate.
[00:07:52]  That's all I'll say.
[00:07:53]  Don't run the crude detail loving candidate in a state like Pennsylvania.
[00:07:57]  So the thing about Fetterman is they're now, you know, now they say, oh, his decision to rush back to the campaign trail really set back his recovery.
[00:08:05]  We know.
[00:08:06]  Those of us who are watching this race said, what are they doing?
[00:08:09]  This is cruel.
[00:08:09]  They're just propping the guy up.
[00:08:11]  They're shoving him back out there.
[00:08:12]  Oh, you're an ableist.
[00:08:13]  You're an ableist.
[00:08:14]  Well, now they admit it in this fawning piece where they're, I mean, you've got to read it because they would never write like this about a Republican going through this.
[00:08:21]  They talk about, oh, and they actually have a quote from his chief of staff.
[00:08:24]  We were honest with people about what's going on.
[00:08:26]  We put it out there.
[00:08:27]  No, you did not put it out there.
[00:08:28]  And even the mental health problems were hidden from us until he had to be checked in for severe depression for an indeterminate amount of time.
[00:08:36]  And now they tell us the following.
[00:08:38]  The strict regimen he's on may be working.
[00:08:40]  People around Mr. Fetterman have said they've noticed a palpable difference in him in recent days.
[00:08:45]  His sense of humor has returned.
[00:08:47]  He is more sociable, sharing with the nurses some of the sweets that have been sent to him by fellow senators.
[00:08:53]  And then they go on to say, just in case you weren't sure, it's really not a thing if a senator has no faculties about him because his staff does everything anyway.
[00:09:01]  Here's from Deep in the Piece.
[00:09:04]  It is not unusual for lawmakers to be told by members of their staff, sometimes after the fact, what bills they're co-sponsoring.
[00:09:10]  With the exception of calls to cabinet officials or meetings with the chief executives of companies that are important to their states, there are a few meetings that cannot be handled by senior staff.
[00:09:20]  They go on to quote somebody as saying, even with a senator sidelined, a Senate office, particularly under an experienced chief of staff, would run pretty much in a normal way.
[00:09:30]  Who needs John Fetterman after all?
[00:09:32]  I feel like you get a kick out of enraging me, Megan.
[00:09:35]  I feel like you read that for slightly longer than you needed to so that the seething that's bubbling beneath the surface would find its way up.
[00:09:41]  I don't know.
[00:09:42]  I don't know what you've missed.
[00:09:43]  I want to make sure I give you all the goodies.
[00:09:46]  No, you're right.
[00:09:47]  Oh, he campaigned too quickly, so that made it hard for him.
[00:09:49]  So doing his job made it hard for him to do his job.
[00:09:53]  That'd be like saying, you know, Usain Bolt, really, he would have won that race if he didn't have to do so much running up to it.
[00:09:59]  I mean, what do you, yeah, campaigning is part of your job.
[00:10:02]  Campaigning is part of your job.
[00:10:04]  And maybe he does have depression.
[00:10:05]  Maybe there's something else going on.
[00:10:07]  Again, you read that to me.
[00:10:08]  I don't care that he's sharing his Sherry's berries with the nurse with the nurse practitioner.
[00:10:13]  I couldn't give less of a shit.
[00:10:15]  Okay.
[00:10:15]  And I know you gave up cussing for Lent.
[00:10:17]  And so I try and avoid it too.
[00:10:19]  But really, this is one of those situations where the media is, again, running interference.
[00:10:24]  And this is why I know we'll get to it, but we're talking about Mug Club and the network that I'm building.
[00:10:27]  I have a problem not only with the media, but I have a problem with the conservative, the right wing, the Republican lackeys also placing greater importance on going to cocktail parties with these people.
[00:10:37]  And you know this and I know this.
[00:10:39]  It is an incestuous cesspool of filth and sadness where dreams go to die.
[00:10:45]  My problem is not with Fetterman.
[00:10:47]  It is with Fetterman, I should say.
[00:10:49]  But, you know, you can't be mad at a snake for biting you at a pet snake for biting you.
[00:10:53]  My problem is with the people who present themselves as lambs and they're wolves.
[00:10:55]  They're wolves in sheep's clothing, whether that's the leftist media or people on the right who don't fight back enough.
[00:11:00]  There are people on the right who said it was an unfair attack to bring up Fetterman's, you know, bring up his mental fitness.
[00:11:06]  The same thing with Joe Biden.
[00:11:07]  Why?
[00:11:08]  We all know.
[00:11:09]  We all know that's the case.
[00:11:10]  For crying out loud, it was a comedic witch hunt, right?
[00:11:12]  With George W. Bush for eight years because he mispronounced nuclear.
[00:11:17]  Yeah, that's right.
[00:11:18]  And no, look what he's doing.
[00:11:19]  The guy who looks like when he's hard for him down with a what?
[00:11:22]  Remember when Trump had the watery hand when he was holding the wobbly hand when he was holding the water and when he went down that one icy ramp carefully?
[00:11:29]  They spent days speculating about his physical health and his mental health.
[00:11:32]  But you're not allowed to talk about Fetterman, who's like, he has pretended that he didn't have this problem until it gets revealed he's inpatient.
[00:11:39]  And can I ask you, how about the wife?
[00:11:40]  Because the wife, according to this article, like she posted, I had the ruthless guys on a couple of weeks ago and we were talking about how she went off to Canada.
[00:11:48]  I mean, think about it.
[00:11:49]  Like her spouse is hospitalized.
[00:11:51]  He can't see his wife.
[00:11:52]  He can't see his kids.
[00:11:53]  The house goes off to Canada in ziplines with the kids.
[00:11:56]  Okay, maybe they're trying to get a getaway.
[00:11:57]  But she films it all, puts it on Insta, yo, living our best lives.
[00:12:01]  And then the report today says she does visit him at least once a week, but really it's his staff that comes to see him in the hospital.
[00:12:11]  Oh, is it her staff who got, was that confirmed?
[00:12:13]  His staff.
[00:12:14]  So she goes to see him once a week, but it's really just his staff that comes to see him.
[00:12:18]  His small circle has mostly been limited to two staff aides and sometimes his family.
[00:12:24]  And that's sad.
[00:12:24]  You know what?
[00:12:25]  That makes my heart break for this guy.
[00:12:27]  I don't know what's going on in his family life.
[00:12:29]  I hope that his marriage is going well.
[00:12:31]  And yeah, I think it's obviously incredibly insensitive for his wife to do.
[00:12:35]  I also understand that it's in closer proximity that some people in the media have led on to believe.
[00:12:38]  I believe she's just kind of across Niagara Falls area, something like that, upstate New York.
[00:12:43]  But this is just, I mean, what about the, they don't even concern themselves with the optics at that point?
[00:12:49]  I mean, does she not realize that it looks bad when you flee the country and your husband is going to inpatient care?
[00:12:55]  Yeah, when he's depressed, especially when he's depressed.
[00:12:58]  It's like that's, that's when you need the people, your support system.
[00:13:01]  That's what you need, your support system around you.
[00:13:02]  Maybe you, maybe you come by with a kid for a visit.
[00:13:05]  He's at Walter Reed.
[00:13:05]  I mean, like, it is far.
[00:13:06]  Niagara Falls is far from Walter Reed.
[00:13:09]  I don't, if it were me and Doug were in the hospital, I'd be there.
[00:13:13]  I'd be making fun of him.
[00:13:14]  I'd be bringing his favorite movies.
[00:13:16]  I'd be putting on marathons of Arthur.
[00:13:18]  That's what Doug loves.
[00:13:19]  He would put on Wonka and My Cousin Vinny for me.
[00:13:21]  I don't know what would I be putting on your TV screen if you needed to pick me up.
[00:13:25]  Well, I'm sure that when you, every single doctor would be looking to give you another physical.
[00:13:29]  But do you mean Arthur the Deadly Moore, Arthur, or Russell Brandon, Arthur?
[00:13:33]  Yes, yes.
[00:13:33]  Yeah, that's one of my favorite films of all time.
[00:13:36]  It's great.
[00:13:36]  Are you a hooker?
[00:13:38]  I just thought I was doing well with you.
[00:13:40]  That's always an excuse.
[00:13:41]  No, I love our, it's one of my favorite top three all time.
[00:13:44]  I think it's the perfect comedy.
[00:13:45]  I don't think that it gets much better than Arthur.
[00:13:47]  That would be on there.
[00:13:47]  Everything you just named would be on there.
[00:13:48]  I'd probably add Slapshot, the film The Edge.
[00:13:51]  Yeah, I think that sounds like you're a good woman and he should hang on to you.
[00:13:55]  So, you know, hopefully you just don't, you don't out earn him because the stats on that aren't good.
[00:14:01]  It's funny.
[00:14:01]  You know, I once told Doug that Dr. Laura, you know, she's on Sirius XM Triumph channel too, and I love her.
[00:14:06]  She's like, just no bullshit.
[00:14:08]  You know, she gives it to you straight.
[00:14:10]  She has, she does, she talks about how, you know, it can be tough on some relationships where the woman is the primary wage earner and the man makes less.
[00:14:18]  And Doug and I talked about this.
[00:14:20]  When we first got together, he made more money than I did, but now obviously the situation got reversed.
[00:14:24]  And he, he was like, because, you know, Dr. Laura is very successful.
[00:14:29]  She's been like the number one radio host for years now.
[00:14:31]  And he's like, what?
[00:14:32]  Like, is she married to like a somebody with a last name Jobs or Rockefeller?
[00:14:36]  Because like, how did she find a partner who's making more than she is?
[00:14:40]  She lost her spouse years ago.
[00:14:41]  But the point is, I understand the dynamic.
[00:14:44]  It can be kind of awkward if you're with somebody who's like not earning as much as you, if they're leaving.
[00:14:49]  No, I was just talking about that statistically.
[00:14:50]  It's it's it's true.
[00:14:51]  You know, like now in this country, it's 80% of divorces are filed by women and 90% if they have a college degree.
[00:14:55]  And that's why, you know, this new stat just came out that young men are more single than ever.
[00:14:59]  But, you know, Dr. Laura, it's funny.
[00:15:01]  I didn't have AM radio when I grew up and I didn't have Fox News.
[00:15:03]  You know, I grew up in Canada, but we did have Dr. Laura.
[00:15:06]  And I used to listen to her on one of my, one of my, I had a disc man, the old Panasonic G-Shot, right?
[00:15:12]  With the anti-skip technology, which meant it still skipped, but for some reasons, it gave you like 40 seconds of, I don't know.
[00:15:17]  And I had shuffle, so there was a good chance.
[00:15:19]  You know, I didn't know which of the nine songs were coming up.
[00:15:21]  So that was a lot of fun.
[00:15:23]  But I also had a radio on there and I would listen to Dr. Laura.
[00:15:26]  And I remember just sitting there when people would call in to her.
[00:15:30]  And for people who don't know, right, she's a relationship advice kind of expert.
[00:15:33]  And she's very traditional.
[00:15:34]  And women would call in and say, you know, my boyfriend, I'm just wondering why he doesn't want to marry me.
[00:15:40]  We've been together for five years.
[00:15:41]  We've been living together for two.
[00:15:42]  And I'm sitting there going, do you know who you're calling?
[00:15:44]  She's about to call you a whore.
[00:15:47]  Like, there's no other way this ends.
[00:15:49]  I always wonder, like, why are you calling into this show?
[00:15:52]  And then I would have that when I was syndicated on radio or people would call in.

=== Choosing When To Be Offended (03:20) ===

[00:15:55]  And I'm like, do you know what show you're calling into?
[00:15:57]  Do you have any idea how badly you're about to be raked over the coals when you're endorsing Bernie Sanders?
[00:16:01]  And it's just a lot of people cannot be bothered to do a modicum of research.
[00:16:05]  And that's exactly how you end up with Fetterman in office or former Vice President Biden.
[00:16:10]  I completely agree with everything you just said.
[00:16:12]  She's so funny.
[00:16:12]  So one of the things I admire about her is sometimes you take callers and usually they're smart and they're quick and they make their point, they get up and down and move along.
[00:16:20]  Some go on and on and on.
[00:16:22]  And I'm too much of a bleeding heart.
[00:16:24]  Like I kind of let them ramble a little too long.
[00:16:26]  Dr. Laura, oh my God, if you ramble on her show, I mean, she will cut a bitch.
[00:16:30]  And it's happened to me on her show.
[00:16:32]  It's happened to other callers.
[00:16:33]  Well, one time I was listening to her and this woman calls in.
[00:16:36]  It was this like kind of sad, but also uplifting story at the same time.
[00:16:40]  The woman was like, I called you five years ago after the death of my child.
[00:16:45]  You were the one who gave me the advice that helped me through.
[00:16:47]  Nobody could help me but you.
[00:16:49]  And it changed my life.
[00:16:51]  And she's going, and Dr. Laura's like, Madam, what's your point?
[00:16:55]  Right.
[00:16:56]  Yeah.
[00:16:58]  Then she dropped the N-bomb.
[00:16:59]  You're like, that doesn't need to be done here.
[00:17:01]  What's going on?
[00:17:02]  No, no.
[00:17:02]  And by the way, if you really don't know, that was how she lost her career on radio where she was, she was quoting, she was talking about how she tuned into BET and she heard the N-word repeatedly and she used the word in that context.
[00:17:11]  And she was fired as a racist, one of the original people who was canceled.
[00:17:14]  Meanwhile, my home country, we have Prime Minister Blackface, who's done it 15 times.
[00:17:18]  This is the issue, right?
[00:17:19]  Is the weaponizing of information.
[00:17:21]  This is the theme that we're seeing, the weaponizing of information.
[00:17:23]  You can pick how and when you want to be offended.
[00:17:26]  And the left does that brilliantly.
[00:17:28]  So they were very offended at the idea of questioning Fetterman's mental fitness.
[00:17:32]  They were very offended at the idea that, hey, the communist Chinese party might be corrupt and might be lying about the COVID origin.
[00:17:39]  So they decided to label people racist.
[00:17:40]  Some people lost their careers, lost their contributorships for suggesting what we now know to be true by every available intelligence agency.
[00:17:47]  And Dr. Laura lost her career.
[00:17:49]  And by that, I mean she was taken off radio.
[00:17:51]  Of course, she's doing far better right now, but they tried to take her out for providing something contextually that you may say is inappropriate, but in no way would actually be indicative of her being racist.
[00:18:01]  That's where we are.
[00:18:02]  It's the weaponizing of language and it's the weaponizing of offense.
[00:18:06]  And I don't like it when people on the right do it either.
[00:18:09]  And I certainly hate it when people on the left do it, but both sides do it.
[00:18:12]  How about we just say, you know what?
[00:18:13]  Let's take people at their word and let's go from there.
[00:18:16]  That's what we have to do.
[00:18:17]  If we talk about resetting here in the United States, how do we pull this back?
[00:18:20]  Because it feels like we're at a point of no return.
[00:18:22]  It starts with everyone just has to say, okay, clean slate, like an Etcha sketch.
[00:18:27]  You just, okay, let's shake this up.
[00:18:29]  Let's wipe it clean.
[00:18:30]  Let's stop looking to be offended and looking for the worst possible outcome in people.
[00:18:35]  I don't know that people can do that because it's not lucrative, but you know, that's happened with you.
[00:18:39]  Of course, I well know it happens with me.
[00:18:41]  Happened with Dr. Laura.
[00:18:43]  And it happened with people who questioned Fetterman or the Wuhan lab leak or my God, January 6th, which I'm sure we'll get to.
[00:18:49]  And that's not what we do.
[00:18:50]  That's why we've gone independent.
[00:18:52]  Well, that's, I mean, it is, it's especially annoying to me when somebody like, you know, you or somebody like Dr. Laura, or me for that matter, when you're in the business of talking about really difficult, dicey issues, like, of course, you're, you're skating on the third rail.
[00:19:05]  There has to be a wider latitude if we're going to have those conversations.
[00:19:08]  We're going to have them honestly.
[00:19:09]  But, you know, yes, the left and its selective outrage gets pinned against certain people with certain backgrounds and not against others.

=== Free Speech On Rumble (10:28) ===

[00:19:16]  All right.
[00:19:16]  So let, I want to get to all those news stories, but let's talk about your business right now because people are excited to learn that you're coming back.
[00:19:22]  And it folds perfectly into what we were just talking about.
[00:19:24]  So what are you doing?
[00:19:26]  You left the blaze.
[00:19:27]  You had a big blow up with our friends over at the Daily Wire and you kind of went dark for a while as you got your next act in order.
[00:19:33]  And now it's in order.
[00:19:34]  So what are you doing?
[00:19:36]  Yeah.
[00:19:36]  Well, to be clear too, by the way, I didn't get into a blowup with Daily Wire, right?
[00:19:40]  They kind of outed themselves.
[00:19:41]  I talked about there were a lot of suitors.
[00:19:42]  And you know this too.
[00:19:43]  There were a lot of right.
[00:19:45]  And there were a lot of suitors.
[00:19:46]  There were a lot of contracts that were offered.
[00:19:48]  You can only discuss the ones, you know, or term sheets where there aren't NDAs.
[00:19:52]  But this is a problem that happens on the right.
[00:19:53]  And look, you know this because you've also worked at Fox News.
[00:19:55]  You've also worked at other networks.
[00:19:57]  These type of ownership contracts that are unfair and take control of your properties, your social media in perpetuity.
[00:20:04]  The issue that I always had, and yeah, I signed, just to be clear, I signed a contract with a company called CRTV in 2015, and then they purchased the Blaze or this whole thing, right?
[00:20:12]  Where they kind of, I don't know how to explain it, doesn't matter.
[00:20:14]  It's boring.
[00:20:15]  The point is, yeah, Mug Club is officially coming back March 20th, March 20th.
[00:20:20]  The price has been lowered to $89.
[00:20:22]  People can go to ladderwithcreditor.com slash Mug Club and we're adding twice the content.
[00:20:25]  So now it's a Friday show.
[00:20:26]  I'm telling you what that is.
[00:20:27]  Just explain what that is and the difference between Mug Club and Ladder with Crowder.
[00:20:30]  So people who don't follow you that closely understand.
[00:20:32]  Yeah.
[00:20:33]  Well, so what it is is, so we do a show, you know, Monday through Thursday.
[00:20:36]  We've been doing this for a long time and people watch an hour for free on YouTube.
[00:20:39]  And then there's an additional, or Rumble, by the way, and I highly recommend they watch with Rumble.
[00:20:43]  Rumble is the company that is powering Mug Club.
[00:20:45]  So that's, and I think it's the biggest sort of modern agreement, I guess, talent agreement.
[00:20:50]  We use that term loosely, but signing of a conservative talent in history as far as sort of these online mergers right now with Rumble.
[00:20:57]  And I'll tell you why we went with Rumble, but basically, Mug Club is, we don't have five, six, seven, eight, 10 live reads.
[00:21:04]  We've been demonetized on YouTube for a very, very long time.
[00:21:06]  It also makes us impossible to find on YouTube.
[00:21:09]  So we have Mug Club, and that's where people subscribe.
[00:21:11]  They pay and they get an additional full hour of show every single day, along with chats, along with perks.
[00:21:16]  And by the way, it's what keeps the free show going.
[00:21:19]  As we relaunch, we've signed now comedians to tape their specials.
[00:21:22]  Brian Callen, we're talking with three other people, Mr. Gunsengere, one of the biggest YouTube channels out there, really well respected in the space.
[00:21:28]  He's going to be doing a show weekly or bi-weekly.
[00:21:31]  We'll be adding a Friday show and we're signing new talent as we speak.
[00:21:35]  And the beauty of it is we framed the contract.
[00:21:37]  So people are out there if you're watching, if you're listening.
[00:21:40]  And we've had conversations with quite a few people.
[00:21:42]  I don't want any ownership over your platforms and I don't want any ownership over your subscribers.
[00:21:47]  If you decide this isn't the right fit for you and you want to leave, you leave.
[00:21:49]  You take your people.
[00:21:50]  You go on your merry way.
[00:21:51]  It's a new way of doing business.
[00:21:53]  And the real reason too that Rumble was such a great fit.
[00:21:58]  And I believe that you put some of your episodes, I don't know if they go on Rumble, but a lot of people.
[00:22:02]  Okay.
[00:22:03]  So Chris over there and Asaf, they're really great guys.
[00:22:05]  Here's the thing.
[00:22:06]  Rumble, we have not had, you know, like a professional working relationship aside from a friendship, really, when we started where we were just using them as a hedge with YouTube because, you know, we had two, three, four, five suspensions on YouTube beyond being demonetized.
[00:22:18]  So it ended up being a mirror of YouTube as a channel.
[00:22:21]  And then a lot of creators started doing that.
[00:22:24]  And then their user base started getting very, very large.
[00:22:27]  And then we saw on the election night where we were suspended, right?
[00:22:31]  Our entire channel was suspended off of YouTube completely.
[00:22:34]  And we crashed their servers because we had 400,000 live viewers at any given second that night, not including over on Mug Club at that point.
[00:22:42]  And I get excited when I see the transition from the live viewers on YouTube where it goes from, you know, 120,000 on YouTube.
[00:22:49]  And then the next day it goes down to 80, but there's 40 on Rumble.
[00:22:51]  And then all of a sudden, there's more on Rumble and less on YouTube.
[00:22:54]  Here's the thing.
[00:22:54]  No one should aim to be banned from YouTube.
[00:22:56]  That's not what we're doing.
[00:22:58]  But we need to be able to speak the truth.
[00:23:00]  And the issue that I ran into, and this is the kind of thing that keeps me up at night, is when you're knocking on door and you have people who are presenting these contracts with golden handcuffs and you realize that they are punishing conservative content creators on behalf of big tech.
[00:23:14]  I'm borderline obsessive.
[00:23:16]  The reason for my raison d'étre is to fight big tech and be a thorn in their sight, especially now when this new Mohan guy is a CEO on YouTube.
[00:23:25]  People don't know this.
[00:23:26]  You think, hey, it's out of the furnace into the fire.
[00:23:28]  Is that the term or is it out of the, I don't know.
[00:23:29]  I think it's out of the furnace into the fire, which doesn't out of the frying pan into the fire.
[00:23:33]  That's right.
[00:23:33]  There might be a salami involved too.
[00:23:35]  There could be a salami in some kind of a baloney bop or horizontal momo.
[00:23:38]  But the point is, we're getting all of our, all of our allegories wrong here.
[00:23:43]  What happened is this guy's going to be worse.
[00:23:45]  You thought Susan Wojski was bad.
[00:23:47]  This was a guy who was directly involved with creating the borderline content rule after us and the Vox adpocalypse on YouTube.
[00:23:53]  They're going, it's like Jack Dorsey leaving Twitter and until Elon came in, it got worse.
[00:23:58]  And so with Mug Club, what we're doing, it's decentralized, but the viewer, you, you get access to more content than pretty much anywhere else.
[00:24:06]  We've always tried to look at True North being the viewer.
[00:24:09]  Our audience, like I get it, $89 a year is a lot of money for someone to part with, right?
[00:24:14]  Their hard-earned money.
[00:24:15]  And you see the subscription fatigue that goes on and it's $12 a month or a tier of $24 a month.
[00:24:20]  Look, if you want the show to continue, you want access to all these other creators and to see this thing grow.
[00:24:25]  And that's one thing too, with what we do.
[00:24:26]  Critical mass is important.
[00:24:28]  We've never tried to squeeze as much money out of every individual subscriber.
[00:24:32]  We try to add value.
[00:24:34]  We're creating something that's an alternative that provides safety.
[00:24:37]  We're betting on ourselves.
[00:24:38]  And honestly, we launched just what, what are we today?
[00:24:41]  Are we Thursday?
[00:24:41]  Sorry, I've been traveling all around with that red tide.
[00:24:44]  Launched Monday.
[00:24:45]  And thank God we bet on ourselves and Rumble has our backs because it really does feel like a weight lifted off my shoulders.
[00:24:51]  If we get banned from YouTube tomorrow, we will be fine.
[00:24:54]  I hope it doesn't happen, but it could happen.
[00:24:56]  And Rumble's the only, they were the only people out there who cared and got it.
[00:24:59]  That's the beauty of Rumble.
[00:25:00]  I will say, you know, YouTube, it's huge, of course, and it's number one in its space, but it's much more constrictive than Rumble is.
[00:25:07]  Rumble's much more permissive of speech, of just a speech that you may find offensive.
[00:25:10]  You don't have to tune in.
[00:25:11]  You don't want to, you don't, then fine, don't do it.
[00:25:13]  But like it is difficult for somebody like you who just, you don't color inside the lines, you never have to exist on a platform like YouTube versus Rumble.
[00:25:21]  And I too find the guys over there very easy to work with, super nice guys, completely committed to the mission of free speech.
[00:25:27]  It's not like they're righties or lefties.
[00:25:29]  It's like, we just want free speech.
[00:25:32]  They're not much for censorship.
[00:25:34]  Yeah.
[00:25:34]  And they're not, and they're not saying that they're for free speech.
[00:25:37]  And then when it comes down to it, not actually putting their money where their mouth is.
[00:25:40]  There's a huge difference.
[00:25:41]  When a company like Rumble, and by the way, one of those guys is Canadian.
[00:25:43]  He was not conservative.
[00:25:45]  They told the entire French government to go fornicate themselves.
[00:25:48]  And they said, you have to take this content down.
[00:25:50]  They said, no, we're not going to do that.
[00:25:51]  You guys do what you have to do.
[00:25:53]  And I get it.
[00:25:53]  People initially are concerned with Rumble, right?
[00:25:55]  It's an IPO.
[00:25:56]  So I understand that comes with pressures, right, to shareholders.
[00:25:58]  But here's the beauty.
[00:25:59]  And Rumble, when I told them this, you know, usually this would be, oh my gosh, this would be terror in someone's eyes if you tell them you've boxed yourselves in.
[00:26:06]  When I sat down with Rumble and what they're really doing is they're handling the back end, right?
[00:26:10]  There's a vision to the company, which I'd like to kind of get into.
[00:26:12]  We'll be fundamentally changing the infrastructure of Rumble as it goes forward to make it more user-friendly, to make it something that can compete with YouTube as well as premium paid content.
[00:26:21]  But I told Rumble, I said, you guys have boxed yourselves in because if your company is going to be worth more, I think it's worth, I think it's a $2 billion company right now.
[00:26:28]  I said, you're only as valuable as your commitment to protecting free speech.
[00:26:33]  In other words, if they compromise protecting free speech on their platform, YouTube light.
[00:26:38]  Right, exactly.
[00:26:38]  Then no one would use Rumble.
[00:26:40]  So they've boxed themselves in willingly to be the company that is willing to take those hits, that is willing to pave the way and also bring in content creators with fair contracts that are transparent and allow you to keep ownership over your own platforms.
[00:26:55]  And that's the way you're going to grow.
[00:26:57]  That's the only way you can attract top talent at this point, right?
[00:27:00]  It's not like you're combing through television like you were once upon a time.
[00:27:04]  The top talent creators are online and they have their own platforms anyway.
[00:27:07]  The viewer, though, would love to have a place where those can be merged and they don't have to pay $10 here and $20 there.
[00:27:13]  And it's a start, but we're doubling the content.
[00:27:16]  I think we'll be probably at triple or quadruple very soon.
[00:27:19]  And I can't tell you how happy we are to partner with the company.
[00:27:23]  It's the first time where I've just felt, okay, I'm not going to be, I'm not going to be yelling at billionaires on the phone, which happened in the past.
[00:27:32]  Yeah, it did.
[00:27:32]  I tell you.
[00:27:33]  Don't you feel like it landed where it, this is, this is like, everything happens for a reason.
[00:27:37]  I don't know.
[00:27:37]  Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't.
[00:27:38]  But this is why all that bullshit happened with you and the Daily Wire.
[00:27:42]  And I realized it was ugly for a while.
[00:27:44]  Not Daily Wire, but you and Jeremy.
[00:27:46]  It landed in a better place.
[00:27:47]  This was my take on it when it happened.
[00:27:49]  I'm sure you were busy doing other things, but this was my takeaway as I watched it, which is Stephen's going to land in a better place.
[00:27:54]  That wasn't the fit for him.
[00:27:56]  And like now you have this opportunity to create the thing that you thought you were going to be getting at the Daily Wire and realized you weren't.
[00:28:04]  And like their business model is the way they want to do it.
[00:28:07]  You want to do it a different way.
[00:28:09]  No, no, no.
[00:28:09]  Here's the thing, though.
[00:28:10]  It's not about me.
[00:28:11]  I was always going to land in a better place.
[00:28:12]  Here's the thing.
[00:28:13]  There would be nothing, and you know this, would there be anything easier than me just collecting a check and going off into the sunset?
[00:28:18]  I don't need to bring on more talent.
[00:28:20]  I don't need to expand on that.
[00:28:21]  I mean, I know you're, I know, I know you.
[00:28:24]  That's less profitable for me.
[00:28:25]  It's about the next guy.
[00:28:26]  It's about some kid who then is told, hey, by the way, you're going to be penalized if you do not, if you are not beholden to the rules of big tech.
[00:28:34]  Can you imagine what our show would look like?
[00:28:36]  No, you would have our show would look like if we had to be monetized on YouTube.
[00:28:40]  And Rumble said, look, you do what you want to do.
[00:28:42]  And same thing with Mug Club, by the way.
[00:28:44]  It's a partnership with Rumble where it's going to be its own umbrella.
[00:28:46]  The idea, well, what's going to happen in the future is right now, for example, if you're on Hulu, right?
[00:28:51]  You're in Hulu Plus, Hulu Premium.
[00:28:53]  It just recognizes it and you get it ad-free.
[00:28:55]  It's the same thing with whatever it is, YouTube Premium.
[00:28:58]  So YouTube, Hulu, or in Hulu, you get access to Disney.
[00:29:00]  You get access to ESPN.
[00:29:02]  Eventually, Rumble is going to get to that point where as long as you are logged into Rumble, and if you are subscribed to Mug Club, you're going to get access to the entire catalog.
[00:29:08]  It's just going to recognize that you're signed in.
[00:29:10]  Right now, when people want to continue watching the show, if they're watching on Rumble starting March 20th, they just hit a button and they continue watching the show for an additional full hour.
[00:29:19]  If you're not, if you're watching on YouTube, just go to loudearthcreditor.com slash mug club.
[00:29:23]  It's going to recognize if you're not signed up, sign up, and then it's just going to start playing the show if you are signed up.
[00:29:28]  And by the way, if people are out there, check your email, mugclubforever.com, because a lot of people subscribed, you know, only a couple of months, a few months before a contract ended.
[00:29:36]  We had no way of really reaching them and doing right by them.
[00:29:39]  We've sent you a promo code where you're going to get, I think it's three or four months absolutely free for the same price.

=== Accessing The Entire Catalog (15:55) ===

[00:29:44]  So we're doing everything.
[00:29:45]  Your fan base is going to find you.
[00:29:46]  There's like, there's only one Steven Crowder.
[00:29:48]  You have a very unique voice.
[00:29:50]  This is why you have 6 million subscribers on YouTube.
[00:29:53]  They're going to find you over on Rumble.
[00:29:55]  There's nobody like Steven.
[00:29:57]  For better, for worse.
[00:29:58]  There's nobody like you.
[00:29:59]  Stand by.
[00:30:00]  It's worse in a lot of ways.
[00:30:01]  I got to squeeze in a quick break.
[00:30:03]  We'll come back with a red wave and more of Steven Crowder.
[00:30:10]  So Stephen, let's talk about you made a reference to the testimony on Capitol Hill yesterday.
[00:30:14]  Pretty extraordinary by the former head of the CDC, the guy who's the head of the CDC.
[00:30:19]  Now we've been stuck with Rochelle Walensky so long.
[00:30:21]  She's such a PIA.
[00:30:22]  Sorry, but she's in hysteric.
[00:30:24]  She's in hysteric running the CDC that we forgot about Robert Redfield.
[00:30:28]  Look it up in your little.
[00:30:30]  I'm going to look it up.
[00:30:31]  I'm going to look it up.
[00:30:31]  Go ahead.
[00:30:32]  Continue.
[00:30:32]  I'm going to look up PIA.
[00:30:33]  I have no idea what that means.
[00:30:34]  I'm not even joking.
[00:30:34]  What do you mean?
[00:30:34]  I've resorted to using letters now because of the Lenten vow to avoid swearing.
[00:30:39]  Oh, gosh.
[00:30:41]  I guess I need to understand acronyms better.
[00:30:43]  I don't know what because I'm- Come on.
[00:30:44]  Are you messing with me?
[00:30:45]  You don't know what PIA is?
[00:30:47]  I don't.
[00:30:47]  I'm thinking of Paella.
[00:30:49]  Pain in the.
[00:30:51]  Oh, well, why would you do that acronym for that?
[00:30:54]  That's why.
[00:30:55]  I can't believe I willingly took all that guff over Solani and you don't know PIA.
[00:30:59]  All right, let's move back to Robert Redfield.
[00:31:01]  Well, because I wouldn't need a censor, PIA.
[00:31:02]  I'm not a four-year-old.
[00:31:04]  I mean, you can say ass.
[00:31:05]  It's in the Bible for crying out loud.
[00:31:07]  You know what?
[00:31:07]  Even my mom said I was allowed to say ass.
[00:31:09]  She just said, just try staying away from the F word.
[00:31:12]  She said, that's the one she finds the most jarring.
[00:31:14]  Yeah.
[00:31:14]  Well, that's true.
[00:31:15]  That makes sense.
[00:31:16]  I mean, there are worse words than the F word, but yeah, it's definitely in there.
[00:31:19]  But the Bible does say ass.
[00:31:20]  So I think you're probably fine.
[00:31:21]  And damn, damn's in there.
[00:31:22]  Usually they're talking about a donkey.
[00:31:24]  I get it.
[00:31:24]  But yeah, I wouldn't worry about saying the word ass.
[00:31:26]  That's fine.
[00:31:27]  Okay.
[00:31:27]  Well, Rochelle Rolensky is an ass.
[00:31:30]  So Robert Redfield is now, he was the head of the CDC during COVID.
[00:31:33]  And he, I mean, he did, he quit, like he was basically forced out, but, but he's been telegraphing that he's got some real questions about Fauci and the lies that have been shoved down our throats for a while.
[00:31:45]  So yesterday he was called before the House committee and laid it bare.
[00:31:48]  And it was a thing of beauty.
[00:31:50]  And of course, the mainstream won't play most of this.
[00:31:52]  So we're going to go through a couple of the quotes because they're really interesting.
[00:31:55]  Here he is first talking about how he made clear early on.
[00:31:59]  It was clear to him this was a lab leak.
[00:32:00]  It wasn't natural origin.
[00:32:02]  And you know what?
[00:32:02]  The mean girls suddenly pushed him out of all the discussions.
[00:32:06]  Here it is, Sat1.
[00:32:09]  In early to mid-January, I did have multiple calls with Fauci, Farrar, and Tedros about how important I thought it was that science get engaged in aggressively pursuing both hypotheses.
[00:32:23]  I also expressed as a clinical virologist that I felt it was not scientifically plausible that this virus went from a bat to humans.
[00:32:35]  Why do you think you were excluded from those calls?
[00:32:37]  Because I was told to me that they wanted a single narrative and that I obviously had a different point of view.
[00:32:44]  Science has debate and they squashed any debate.
[00:32:47]  It's amazing.
[00:32:48]  It's just a reminder to the audience.
[00:32:50]  They were telling us and continued to tell us, Fauci and his virologist henchman, who he strong-armed into saying it couldn't have been a lab leak, that they went into it totally open-minded when they wrote that Nature article in February 2020.
[00:33:03]  Everyone was just an open-minded search, Stephen, for the truth.
[00:33:06]  They didn't have their thumb on the scale for natural origin at all.
[00:33:09]  And there you have the head of the CDC saying he was excluded from the conference calls, from the discussions, the head of the CDC, because he said, I think this is a lab leak.
[00:33:19]  Yeah.
[00:33:20]  Well, here's the thing.
[00:33:21]  First off, who could have thought that Fauci might not necessarily be on the up and up?
[00:33:24]  This is the guy who said that children could catch AIDS, right?
[00:33:27]  Airborne from their parents.
[00:33:28]  They live in the same house.
[00:33:29]  We've run that and actually run that reference quite a few times on the show.
[00:33:32]  How is this guy so wrong when he's the highest paid, or he was, I should say, unelected official in government?
[00:33:37]  He got nearly everything wrong on AIDS.
[00:33:39]  Here's the deal.
[00:33:40]  We were suspended for talking about the Wuhan lab leak, by the way.
[00:33:43]  And we also had some exclusive information on that with some people who spoke off the record.
[00:33:46]  So we were suspended from YouTube.
[00:33:48]  And this all brings us back to that same point, right?
[00:33:50]  The big tech oligarchy that exists.
[00:33:53]  Remember, you could not say, hey, there could potentially be some complications with the vaccine for people or myocarditis.
[00:33:59]  You couldn't say we were once suspended.
[00:34:00]  You can say this now, by the way.
[00:34:01]  So I know your people might have their finger on the button as far as YouTube.
[00:34:04]  You can say it now.
[00:34:05]  We were also suspended for, yeah, well, we have an o-crat button and basically it's, it's just white noise at this point.
[00:34:11]  But we also were suspended because Gerald, the nicest guy in the world on my show, who's in there in second chair all the time, we brought up the CDC numbers on the fact that far more young children are killed by the flu every year than COVID total.
[00:34:24]  Now, here's the thing.
[00:34:24]  Scientifically, that's interesting.
[00:34:26]  We never said COVID was a hoax.
[00:34:28]  We never said it wasn't deadly.
[00:34:30]  We said, isn't it interesting?
[00:34:31]  There must be something with the immune response that is conducive towards at least young people being able to fight it off more effectively.
[00:34:38]  It kills old people at a much higher rate.
[00:34:40]  And for some reason, young people, particularly infants, are far less susceptible.
[00:34:45]  We'd love to follow that science.
[00:34:47]  Give you an example.
[00:34:47]  When Stephen Hawking went out and said there is no God, he's the most respected scientist, right, as far as physicists out there.
[00:34:54]  He was, right, with his tenure.
[00:34:55]  Well, he's a lot of things, but he's no scientist.
[00:34:58]  That's not a scientific statement to say that there is no God.
[00:35:00]  The problem is not that these people are unscientific.
[00:35:03]  The problem isn't that Fauci is Fauci.
[00:35:05]  We know exactly who he is.
[00:35:06]  The problem is when YouTube, Facebook, and those who used to head up Twitter, you really have three companies who control 95 plus percent of the information.
[00:35:14]  You can toss Amazon and Apple in there.
[00:35:16]  When they all get together and say, you can't talk about the lab leak.
[00:35:19]  And then the real problem is when you have conservatives, when you have people on the right saying, okay, okay, we'll avoid talking about that because we want to be in your good graces.
[00:35:27]  That's why we were forced to go off and work with Rumble and work with ladderthcredit.com slash mugclip because we were running up against this all the time.
[00:35:33]  Megan, I'm talking three or five suspensions.
[00:35:36]  I looked back.
[00:35:38]  I know, which we did.
[00:35:39]  And we, whatever, I look back at the reasons you got suspended.
[00:35:42]  I'm like, what?
[00:35:42]  How?
[00:35:43]  Like, it's been absurd what's happened to you, and you needed to find a new platform.
[00:35:47]  I get it.
[00:35:48]  Wait, let's get to soundbite number two, because this is equally good.
[00:35:50]  So, Fauci, yes, you use the word lie.
[00:35:53]  Yes.
[00:35:53]  So, Fauci goes before Rand Paul, before Congress, before the U.S. Senate, before, you know, before the House Republicans took over in the other chamber.
[00:36:01]  And Rand Paul has been the best person on this.
[00:36:03]  I mean, he's amazing to watch him try to cross-examine Fauci or anybody else in this because he's a doctor.
[00:36:06]  He knows what he's talking about.
[00:36:08]  And Fauci repeatedly told him, We didn't do gain of function research.
[00:36:11]  We never did that.
[00:36:12]  We know it's not true.
[00:36:13]  The CDC and the NIH has now admitted it.
[00:36:17]  Okay, it's not a matter of Megan Kelly's opinion.
[00:36:19]  They've admitted that they were doing gain of function research through this Wuhan Luck.
[00:36:22]  So here's Redfield, former CDC director on Fauci and whether he's a liar saw it too.
[00:36:29]  Do you think that Dr. Fauci used this paper to hide the gain of function research created, that gain of function research created this virus?
[00:36:39]  I can't talk about Fauci's motivation.
[00:36:43]  Do you think that the paper does hide the truth?
[00:36:45]  I think it's an inaccurate paper that basically was part of a narrative that they were creating.
[00:36:51]  Remember, this pandemic did not start in January at the seafood market.
[00:36:55]  We now know there were infections all the way back into September.
[00:36:58]  This was a narrative that was decided that they were going to say this came from the wet market and they were going to do everything they could to support it to negate any discussion about the possibility that this came from a library.
[00:37:08]  Do you think that Dr. Fauci intentionally lied under oath to Senator Paul when he vehemently denied NIH's funding of gain of function research?
[00:37:16]  I think there's no doubt that NIH was funding gain of function research.
[00:37:19]  Is it likely that American tax dollars funded the gain of function research that created this virus?
[00:37:24]  I think it did, not only from NIH, but from the State Department, USAID, and from DOD.
[00:37:31]  Amazing.
[00:37:32]  It's just, I'm sorry, it's gratifying to hear a guy in his position actually say it.
[00:37:37]  Yeah.
[00:37:37]  And you know what?
[00:37:38]  Why aren't more?
[00:37:39]  That's my question.
[00:37:40]  I was just talking about this with Patrick Bett David.
[00:37:42]  You know, I travel the country and I still do stand-up shows to give you an idea.
[00:37:45]  And there'll be thousands and thousands of people at these shows.
[00:37:48]  I'm incredibly grateful.
[00:37:49]  I don't say that as a brag.
[00:37:50]  I say it because I get to interact with these people on a regular basis.
[00:37:53]  I've never once met a Lindsey Graham fan.
[00:37:57]  I've never once met a Mitch McConnell fan.
[00:37:58]  I've never once met someone who was enthusiastically voting for Mitt Romney.
[00:38:02]  And you ask yourself, how do these people always get to positions of power on the Republican side when the majority of the Republican Party is conservative, not just Republican?
[00:38:10]  And then how do none of these people get anything done when it comes to big tech?
[00:38:14]  Isn't it a layup right now when you have big tech censoring and removing content that we know beyond any shadow of a doubt is factually accurate?
[00:38:22]  Hey, hold on a second.
[00:38:23]  Are all those videos about Assange up there?
[00:38:25]  Are all those videos from Snowden still up there?
[00:38:27]  Think about that for a second.
[00:38:28]  There was that whistleblower.
[00:38:29]  I hope I'm not getting the name wrong.
[00:38:30]  People will say it's racist.
[00:38:31]  I think it was Lin Wen Liang early on.
[00:38:33]  What happened?
[00:38:34]  That person disappeared, right?
[00:38:35]  Why isn't the, where's the love affair with the media and this whistleblower?
[00:38:39]  And my anger, I'm telling you, you just said it's refreshing.
[00:38:42]  It is refreshing.
[00:38:43]  Megan, it shouldn't be refreshing.
[00:38:44]  Pardon me, it shouldn't fucking be refreshing to see someone say, hey, hold on a second.
[00:38:49]  You lied, right?
[00:38:51]  Hey, hold on a second.
[00:38:52]  Did we fund gain of function?
[00:38:53]  Which we all know.
[00:38:55]  It was obvious to everybody.
[00:38:56]  It shouldn't be refreshing to see, my God, there might be a conservative who actually tries to do something here.
[00:39:01]  YouTube, Facebook, at one point, Twitter, these guys should be in the hot seat.
[00:39:06]  Their tax protection, their tax protecting status with Section 230 should be gone so fast it'll make your head spin.
[00:39:12]  But guess what?
[00:39:12]  You're the senator, step out of line, or if you're the big conservative company to step out of line, they might just tack your content a little.
[00:39:18]  They might just tag your content with warnings a little bit more.
[00:39:20]  It shouldn't be refreshing.
[00:39:22]  It shouldn't be the exception to the rule.
[00:39:25]  It should be the rule for crying out loud.
[00:39:27]  And we have been here from the very beginning.
[00:39:30]  And I don't just say that to go like a psychic saying, oh, we saw it coming.
[00:39:33]  No, you know what happened?
[00:39:34]  The first two weeks of lockdown, we did this, by the way, and every other, including at Fox News and including at these networks.
[00:39:41]  And it made me sick to my stomach.
[00:39:42]  They were broadcasting from their basement or they stopped.
[00:39:44]  I went on air and I said, look, we don't know what's going to happen at this point.
[00:39:48]  We know there's a two-week lockdown.
[00:39:49]  I spoke with my employees.
[00:39:50]  I asked if they wanted to stay home.
[00:39:52]  I said, depending on how long you stay home, we might not be able to pay you after about a month or two.
[00:39:57]  We don't know, but I'm coming into work.
[00:39:59]  We started doing two a days because people were quarantined at home.
[00:40:02]  We did the show twice a day to try and serve the audience.
[00:40:05]  And by the way, that very first show, we did a parody called Kung Flu Fighting about the fact that it came from a lab.
[00:40:10]  And we were suspended from YouTube.
[00:40:12]  It shouldn't be refreshing.
[00:40:14]  We shouldn't be the only people here taking these hits.
[00:40:17]  Every single self-professed conservative should be out there doing it.
[00:40:21]  I'm a comic for crying out loud.
[00:40:23]  Senators, with the exception of Rand Paul, they can't do anything about this shit.
[00:40:27]  That's what angers me.
[00:40:28]  It shouldn't be refreshing.
[00:40:29]  We should be desensitized.
[00:40:31]  I really hope that, and I really hope YouTube uses this as an opportunity to look back at some of those decisions, not just you, but many others who had censored for similar comments and recognizes that it was wrong.
[00:40:42]  It was wrong on the merits.
[00:40:44]  It was wrong in its approach.
[00:40:46]  And it's cost them.
[00:40:47]  It's cost them talent like you.
[00:40:48]  It's cost them followers.
[00:40:50]  Like, I understand they've got their parameters that they want to play with.
[00:40:52]  And that's their business model.
[00:40:54]  But only the best businesses survive.
[00:40:56]  And the best businesses reevaluate their protocols.
[00:40:59]  And when they've been proven wrong, when they've been proven wrong, they re-evaluate.
[00:41:03]  I want to get back into YouTube because we already did that.
[00:41:04]  But let me just say that.
[00:41:05]  But I'm saying it's an illegal model.
[00:41:08]  This is the thing.
[00:41:08]  When people talk about like- It's not illegal for them to say we don't like what Steven Crowder says and we don't want him on.
[00:41:13]  No, no, yeah, it absolutely is.
[00:41:14]  It absolutely is for them to act as a publisher when they claim that they're a platform.
[00:41:17]  It absolutely is illegal.
[00:41:18]  It absolutely they either need to decide that you are a platform or you are a publisher.
[00:41:22]  And if you say that people are not allowed to even at that point, quote sources, references, and talk about a whistleblower in China saying that it came from a lab, lest you be removed and use your livelihood while they benefit from a tax-exempt status as a benefit of a Section 230.
[00:41:36]  That is not, that is not legal.
[00:41:37]  The only thing is no one has done anything about it.
[00:41:39]  That's the issue.
[00:41:40]  Well, it's being debated right now.
[00:41:42]  But let me go stick on Redfield for a second because here's the third thing.
[00:41:47]  He talked about, you heard him reference there.
[00:41:48]  And I don't want to skip over this because that is the first time I've heard anybody say this.
[00:41:53]  Just in the last line of that last soundbite, the question was, is it likely that American tax dollars funded the gain of function research that created this virus?
[00:42:04]  That's where all other officials have drawn the line.
[00:42:06]  Most people will say we were funding gain of function research.
[00:42:10]  No one's saying we funded the gain of function research that produced the coronavirus, this coronavirus.
[00:42:17]  And he said, I think it did.
[00:42:20]  I think it did.
[00:42:21]  American tax dollars funded the gain of function research that created this virus.
[00:42:24]  That is the first I've heard somebody as high as Redfield say that.
[00:42:27]  That's big.
[00:42:28]  So then he goes on to talk about how we know, we know what was happening in that lab.
[00:42:33]  They won't be transparent about it.
[00:42:34]  We won't hold China accountable.
[00:42:36]  Trump didn't do it.
[00:42:37]  Biden won't do it.
[00:42:39]  And he references back to that September 19th.
[00:42:41]  We were all living our lives over here, not thinking about COVID, and how he knows what was happening in that lab at that time, SOT3.
[00:42:49]  In September of 2019, three things happened in that lab.
[00:42:54]  One is they deleted the sequences.
[00:42:57]  It was highly irregular.
[00:42:59]  Researchers don't usually like to do that.
[00:43:01]  Second thing they did was they changed the command and control of the lab from the civilian control to the military control.
[00:43:08]  Highly unusual.
[00:43:09]  And the third things they did, which I think is really telling, is they let a contract to redo the ventilation system in that laboratory.
[00:43:16]  So I think clearly there was strong evidence that there was a significant event that happened in that laboratory in September.
[00:43:23]  My God.
[00:43:24]  All right.
[00:43:24]  Wait, let me shift this though to something that I haven't asked you about.
[00:43:27]  So we can see that they're corrupt.
[00:43:29]  The CDC misled us.
[00:43:30]  The NIH misled us.
[00:43:31]  Fauci misled us.
[00:43:32]  The media and big tech 100% assisted.
[00:43:37]  It's not totally dissimilar from what's happening right now at Fox with Tucker and January 6th, where we were fed one narrative by that January 6th committee.
[00:43:45]  And now Tucker's gotten his hands on these tapes and he's offering more perspective, more tape that we haven't seen it before.
[00:43:51]  And last night he revealed on his show that that tape of QAnon Shaman, who is spending 41 months in prison, he pleaded guilty.
[00:43:59]  I said the other day on the air, I'm sure his lawyers obtained that tape.
[00:44:02]  You would have to produce that as the government when you're going after a man like that because it's potentially exculpatory.
[00:44:08]  It shows the overall setting in which the alleged crime was committed, his state of mind, and why he might have misunderstood whether he had the right to be there or not and so on.
[00:44:16]  Tucker revealed last night it was not produced to his attorneys, to shaman's attorneys, and their outrage.
[00:44:23]  She had the lawyer on last night saying this is absolutely improper and unfair.
[00:44:27]  And the media's only response to all these tapes and so on, Stephen, is Tucker's bad.
[00:44:32]  Tucker's bad.
[00:44:33]  He's downplaying January 6th.
[00:44:34]  No one gives a damn that there's a whole side of this story that has not been aired, including by the very committee in which they put so much trust.
[00:44:41]  Yeah.
[00:44:42]  Well, it's almost like, and I want to be clear, this is not any kind of a call to action or any, or I don't think of this fondly at all.
[00:44:48]  I really do.
[00:44:50]  I look at it fearfully.
[00:44:51]  It's almost like if the media was trying to create so much civil unrest, there's some kind of a civil war in the future.
[00:44:56]  They couldn't do it more effectively at this point.
[00:44:59]  The way you do that is by gaslighting people, by telling them that what they're living, what they're experiencing isn't real, whether it's the economy saying actually it's better than ever.
[00:45:06]  I mean, I would one thing I know that you were right, that Trump wasn't able to do enough with China, but a lot of people, maybe at the beginning of that pandemic, for example, he shredded the WHO and said at the beginning that China, there was a high likelihood, right?
[00:45:17]  Chaita.
[00:45:18]  He kept saying a high degree of confidence that it came from the Wuhan Institute of Virology.
[00:45:23]  I want to hear the check.
[00:45:23]  Can you do the Trump imitation while you're there?
[00:45:25]  Because I just, it's just nobody knows it better.
[00:45:27]  I'm not saying it because it's China.
[00:45:29]  That's what it comes from, okay?
[00:45:30]  Chia.
[00:45:30]  And I would never say that's what people, they all say that it comes from Chaida.
[00:45:33]  Chaita.
[00:45:34]  And he said, he said that and people said, no, no, that's not true.
[00:45:37]  Here's the thing.
[00:45:37]  Donald Trump's not a virologist.
[00:45:39]  He's not.

=== Harry's Therapized Ego (10:52) ===

[00:45:40]  So he's relying on people to hopefully fight for America, to hopefully fight for the truth.
[00:45:44]  This QAnon shaman, by the way, seems like he seems like he might be a little bit touched, right?
[00:45:48]  He was given a tour.
[00:45:49]  He had people who were there who were supposed to fight for him.
[00:45:51]  They didn't.
[00:45:52]  This is why people, and this is why Trump may win the primaries, by the way, again, for all of his faults.
[00:45:57]  And by the way, he has pros, he has cons, so does Asantis.
[00:45:59]  I don't want to get into the pros and cons of each, but people felt like for the first time, even if it was out of ego, someone was willing to fight for them.
[00:46:07]  And that is what we are desperate for.
[00:46:09]  We all know that what's coming to light right now is true.
[00:46:12]  It shouldn't have to get to the point where it is absolutely undeniable, where they're caught with their schwans in a vice and they can't deny it any longer.
[00:46:21]  People, this guy should have lawyers fighting for him.
[00:46:23]  You know what happens if they don't provide that, if they don't provide that tape?
[00:46:26]  You make them provide it.
[00:46:28]  You push.
[00:46:28]  That's your job as a lawyer.
[00:46:30]  I don't know why.
[00:46:30]  I don't know why.
[00:46:31]  Maybe they're not very good lawyers.
[00:46:32]  I have no idea.
[00:46:33]  I know what my lawyer does.
[00:46:34]  I know what we do here.
[00:46:36]  I know we were talking about this from the very, very beginning.
[00:46:39]  And that's why our signups have been incredible.
[00:46:40]  I'm always so grateful for it.
[00:46:41]  And that's why a lot of people feel the same way about Donald Trump.
[00:46:44]  People are looking for folks to fight for them.
[00:46:46]  It shouldn't be refreshing.
[00:46:48]  It should be the norm.
[00:46:49]  And yeah, look, they're saying this about Tucker Carlson to go back to January 6th.
[00:46:52]  We did an entire episode immediately because they were saying, I don't know if you remember this.
[00:46:57]  They said seven officers died January 6th.
[00:46:59]  That's ridiculous.
[00:47:00]  Then they said five.
[00:47:02]  Then they said one.
[00:47:03]  It's zero.
[00:47:04]  It's zero.
[00:47:04]  And here's my question to you, as someone who's a lawyer who understands the law a little bit better than I do.
[00:47:08]  This is worse than entrapment when you watch.
[00:47:10]  And I get it.
[00:47:11]  There were some people, of course, there was vandalism.
[00:47:12]  There was trespassing.
[00:47:13]  I'm not saying that everybody there is innocent, but an insurrection, come on.
[00:47:15]  You show up with the weapon at least.
[00:47:16]  And I don't mean a flypoint.
[00:47:18]  That's what I'm saying.
[00:47:19]  My question to you is not entrapping.
[00:47:21]  No, of course it wasn't.
[00:47:22]  Entrapment is bad, right?
[00:47:24]  That's where you basically, for people who don't know, you lay a trap and you hope someone commits a crime.
[00:47:28]  And then you catch them with it.
[00:47:29]  But you have feds here who were not just entrapping.
[00:47:33]  They're committing crimes themselves on camera in order to get other people to follow them.
[00:47:38]  What do we even call?
[00:47:39]  Is that beyond entrapment?
[00:47:40]  What's the term for that?
[00:47:41]  Because that's on camera.
[00:47:43]  That's another thing that the January 6th committee chose not to focus on at all.
[00:47:47]  And it's not just because they didn't have any real Republicans on there.
[00:47:50]  It's because they had no interest in airing any of that.
[00:47:52]  That's why what Tucker is doing is important.
[00:47:54]  It's why Fox's decision to ignore Tucker's reporting is a mistake.
[00:47:59]  You don't have to agree with everything Tucker says about this tape in order to own the tape and be glad you got it and ride your exclusive and bring it in front of the world.
[00:48:06]  Nobody else will.
[00:48:07]  That's, I would venture to say that's a partisan move too, because they're worried bringing up January 6th is going to hurt the Republicans.
[00:48:13]  Well, that's not your job.
[00:48:14]  Your job's not to run cover for the Republicans.
[00:48:17]  Your job is just to tell the truth and cover the news.
[00:48:20]  And you have an exclusive and you should ride it.
[00:48:22]  Just like Stephen Crowder will ride the ratings of the Mug Club and rumble to king status yet again.
[00:48:29]  It's wonderful to see you back.
[00:48:31]  I can't wait to watch.
[00:48:32]  All the best to you, my friend.
[00:48:33]  Thank you.
[00:48:34]  You too, Megan.
[00:48:35]  All right.
[00:48:35]  See you soon.
[00:48:36]  Up next, Bridget Fetisy back on the show.
[00:48:42]  Our next guest is Bridget Fettesey.
[00:48:44]  She has a great show on YouTube called Dumpster Fire, in addition to her podcast, Walk-Ins.
[00:48:49]  Welcome and Substack Beyond Parody with Bridget Fettese.
[00:48:53]  She's busy.
[00:48:54]  She's very busy.
[00:48:55]  And we appreciate her making time for us today.
[00:48:57]  Bridget, welcome back.
[00:48:59]  Thank you for having me.
[00:49:00]  It's always a pleasure.
[00:49:01]  Yeah.
[00:49:02]  So you have a show on YouTube.
[00:49:03]  I have a show on YouTube.
[00:49:04]  Steven Crowder is not a fan of YouTube, but we should stay for the record that so far it's working out okay for us.
[00:49:09]  So far, our platform over here has been okay, though I totally get why it doesn't work for him.
[00:49:15]  I can't believe you could afford him, Megan.
[00:49:17]  How'd you even get him on your show?
[00:49:19]  Oh my God, I love him.
[00:49:20]  I like we go way back.
[00:49:22]  And his first interview on this show when we first launched, much like yours, was one of my favorite interviews.
[00:49:27]  We had such a long talk and he told me about how he was deeply hurt because we had gotten to know each other a little bit at Fox News.
[00:49:34]  And then he heard me reference him years later as like some YouTuber.
[00:49:38]  And he was like, what the?
[00:49:39]  And I had to explain to him that I have a touch of that Brad Pitt thing where you don't remember people.
[00:49:43]  I really don't.
[00:49:44]  Unless I've met somebody like 10 times, it's really hard for me to remember.
[00:49:47]  Anyway, love Stephen, and I'm really glad that he's found a new home that works for him.
[00:49:52]  All right, I've got to start with this breaking news, my lady.
[00:49:56]  Daily Mail exclusive palace expects Harry and Megan to attend the coronation.
[00:50:02]  The royal staff are drawing up seating and donning plans right now for the Duke and Duchess and presumably for their little prince and princess who have officially adopted those titles.
[00:50:12]  Not standing concerns, they would not be granted because the royals are racist.
[00:50:17]  They say it's not official, but that it's happening.
[00:50:22]  The negotiations continue around which events the couple will attend, where they will sit, what they will wear, and of course their security.
[00:50:29]  They think the negotiations will go right to the wire.
[00:50:32]  It could, of course, just be just in case, but it's clearly not a no.
[00:50:38]  And a second source with knowledge of Harry and Megan's thoughts tells the Daily Mail that the indication is that they are attending, although there's plenty that needs to be worked on first.
[00:50:48]  You're shocked, I'm sure, shocked that they have not turned down this opportunity to be on camera in front of the world.
[00:50:55]  I'm shocked.
[00:50:56]  I'm shocked, I tell you.
[00:50:58]  They just want to have their cake and eat it too.
[00:51:00]  They want to be able to be like, this is the most racist, horrible family ever.
[00:51:05]  But also, can we please attend all of the functions and get all the press and make it about us somehow?
[00:51:11]  It's, I can't take it seriously.
[00:51:14]  I can't wait until they're bouncing little Prince Archie and Princess Lilybette on their knees in front of their racist grandpa and their racist grandma.
[00:51:23]  It's awkward.
[00:51:24]  That's awkward.
[00:51:27]  Good on them.
[00:51:28]  They've figured out how to really monetize victimhood and still stay in the family somehow.
[00:51:33]  I don't understand how or why, but they've got a pretty good grift going.
[00:51:40]  Don't they?
[00:51:41]  So speaking of Grift and the royals, Harry, first of all, he does this weird therapy session with this guy who I saw you wrote something about this.
[00:51:51]  You know this guy.
[00:51:52]  I never heard of this guy before.
[00:51:53]  It's like a guru kind of guy who therapized Harry and in their live exchange, which you could watch for the lolo price of $33.
[00:52:01]  This is what the prince has been reduced to.
[00:52:03]  I diagnosed him with ADD.
[00:52:05]  So that's what Harry did on Saturday.
[00:52:07]  Then yesterday, he attended some, oh, it's like some summit where it's $1,000 ahead with the CEO of Better Up, this guy, Alexei Robicho, who urged business leaders in the room, Bridget, to reimagine work as a playscape.
[00:52:27]  That's what Harry and Megan are doing.
[00:52:28]  They are reimagining work.
[00:52:30]  All that ribbon cutting and helping the poor was boring.
[00:52:34]  Now they're in the new Montecito playscape so they can make partnerships with weird gurus for $33 a head and with people who run Better Up for $1,000 ahead and pat themselves on the back for being altruistic.
[00:52:47]  I mean, only people who don't work could reimagine work as a playscape.
[00:52:54]  That's just not a thing.
[00:52:56]  We, you know, I wasn't going to waitress as somebody who was like, how am I going to reimagine this as a playscape?
[00:53:02]  I just had to go do my job to the best of my ability with a smile on my face and go home.
[00:53:09]  And that's what everybody does.
[00:53:11]  Not everybody expects work to be this magical play place.
[00:53:16]  It's usually something we do to provide for ourselves and our families.
[00:53:20]  And then we have time with our families and friends outside of it where we get to play and enjoy ourselves.
[00:53:28]  So true.
[00:53:29]  It's called Job, J-O-B.
[00:53:31]  He's never had one.
[00:53:32]  So he should spend some time thinking about that.
[00:53:34]  But of course, at this meeting with Robicho of Better Up, Harry takes the opportunity to go woke on us saying, look, I've been lucky enough to be surrounded by strong, empowered, confident women all my life.
[00:53:46]  I wish that more women would have higher leadership roles, less testosterone in the room.
[00:53:52]  I think that would be a good thing.
[00:53:54]  Oh, please.
[00:53:55]  I'm so sick of his lecture.
[00:53:57]  Like, okay.
[00:53:59]  So what we need is less testosterone.
[00:54:00]  This is what Harry's going to sit there and diagnose how, I guess, backward we are here in America still.
[00:54:06]  And he's going to be our leader to take us out of it.
[00:54:10]  I don't, I cannot imagine a man who has been more emasculated than that than Harry.
[00:54:16]  I don't know what happened to him.
[00:54:17]  Something, he's brainwashed or something.
[00:54:20]  This is Stockholm syndrome.
[00:54:22]  Someone help him.
[00:54:24]  Someone help Harry.
[00:54:25]  This is a soldier.
[00:54:27]  What happened to you?
[00:54:28]  What are you talking about?
[00:54:29]  You used to be, you were in the military flying helicopters and now you're telling the world that there's too much testosterone.
[00:54:38]  That's so true.
[00:54:39]  I wish I had been in that room and I would have yelled, get out, get out, leave.
[00:54:45]  We're done with you.
[00:54:47]  Yeah, I don't understand like therapy as entertainment either.
[00:54:52]  The using yourself to be therapized.
[00:54:54]  And just to be clear, I don't know Gabor Mate.
[00:54:57]  I know of him and his work.
[00:55:00]  And I used to think some of his stuff was really good.
[00:55:03]  And then now I blame him for the reason that trauma is everywhere.
[00:55:08]  This little T trauma, everybody's traumatized.
[00:55:11]  You traumatize your child.
[00:55:12]  If you let them cry it out, they'll have scars on their psyche forever.
[00:55:17]  And we'll kind of trot these things out with very little evidence.
[00:55:22]  And that just drives me crazy because now I see everybody everywhere saying, oh, it's my trauma, it's my trauma.
[00:55:28]  And a lot of this I kind of blame on Gabor Mate, the guy who did his public therapy session, which also seems very unethical for somebody to be doing.
[00:55:39]  No, it does.
[00:55:39]  I agree.
[00:55:40]  Like, who, what kind of a therapist therapizes you and diagnoses you live for $33 a head?
[00:55:45]  It's very weird.
[00:55:46]  It's unethical.
[00:55:48]  If this person is actually traumatized, which I do believe he's had some trauma in his life, absolutely.
[00:55:54]  But why would you publicly try and put him under the microscope like that while you're diagnosing him?
[00:56:01]  This is not something any kind of therapist with any ethics would ever do.
[00:56:07]  Harry doesn't, he seems listless.
[00:56:09]  He doesn't seem like he knows what his next step is.
[00:56:12]  It's not sitting for $33 a head with his, with the guru or $1,000 ahead with the workplace needs to be a playscape guy.
[00:56:22]  He really like, to me, he doesn't have a clear mission.
[00:56:25]  You could say the same about Tom Brady, who's been kind of like kind of listless since he left, you know, the NFL.

=== Criminals In Female Prisons (08:21) ===

[00:56:32]  I almost said NBA.
[00:56:34]  The NFL, right?
[00:56:36]  Didn't he just postpone his Fox sports announcer contract to do like something else?
[00:56:43]  I don't know.
[00:56:43]  I just feel like these people who come from these huge institutions of power, they seem to struggle unless they have like really good advisors.
[00:56:50]  They seem to struggle figuring out where to land it.
[00:56:53]  Megan, we should start some kind of business to help these listless men find their way.
[00:56:59]  I know what they can do.
[00:57:00]  Women's sports.
[00:57:04]  That is the place for them.
[00:57:06]  Tom Brady will pivot.
[00:57:07]  He's going to join the WMBA.
[00:57:10]  He should totally join women's tennis.
[00:57:12]  I've been saying for a while now.
[00:57:14]  That's how we need to put an end to this nonsense.
[00:57:16]  Nonsense.
[00:57:17]  You need a male athlete with some talent to join one of the favorite women's sports.
[00:57:23]  And that will be the end of this nonsense.
[00:57:26]  There was just a story.
[00:57:26]  Well, hold on.
[00:57:27]  I had it here in my Steven Crowder packet about a weightlifter.
[00:57:30]  There's a weightlifter.
[00:57:32]  They're letting a male, biological male weightlifter says he's trans, compete against biological women in weightlifting.
[00:57:39]  I mean, what could possibly go wrong?
[00:57:41]  Hold on.
[00:57:42]  I saw this story and it makes me want to lose my mind.
[00:57:46]  This is embarrassing.
[00:57:48]  How are you not embarrassed, first of all, as the trans woman biological man who's taking on these women?
[00:57:56]  Do you not have any sense of shame?
[00:57:58]  It's so shameless.
[00:58:00]  I don't understand.
[00:58:01]  Okay.
[00:58:02]  Minnesota.
[00:58:03]  In Minnesota, it was a state court ruling allowing this.
[00:58:07]  USA powerlifting must allow male athletes who identify as female to compete against women.
[00:58:16]  The sporting body has been given two weeks to comply.
[00:58:19]  At the center of the lawsuit is someone named J.C. Cooper, a transgender powerlifter who's born male, identifies as female.
[00:58:26]  Cooper sued USA Powerlifting, arguing its sex segregation competition policy was discriminatory.
[00:58:33]  And this court agreed.
[00:58:34]  So now in Minnesota, they have to let the biological male men compete against the biological women or their bigots.
[00:58:42]  I used to live in Minnesota.
[00:58:44]  Have you seen those guys?
[00:58:46]  Proper Midwestern men.
[00:58:51]  This is not right.
[00:58:53]  At least we don't have to do it like, at least it's not a sport where they're not wrestling with other women.
[00:58:58]  It's like you lift your weights over on your platform by yourself so nobody gets hurt.
[00:59:02]  This is literally South Park.
[00:59:04]  South Park did an episode about this.
[00:59:06]  And it's it, I don't, I don't understand how we've got to the point where now people are suing for discrimination, sex segregation.
[00:59:15]  We, we just got sports.
[00:59:17]  We just got sports, Megan.
[00:59:19]  Like two minutes ago.
[00:59:20]  How long has it been?
[00:59:21]  Yeah, I know.
[00:59:23]  No, like two minutes ago.
[00:59:24]  And not only that, I mean, like, not to get on the soapbox, but Title IX was not fully lived up to in any event.
[00:59:28]  Girl sports.
[00:59:28]  I mean, take a look at girl sports at most high schools.
[00:59:31]  They don't get the kind of funding and support that boy sports do or colleges.
[00:59:34]  That's just the way it is.
[00:59:36]  So we're working on it.
[00:59:37]  You know, we're making progress for sure.
[00:59:38]  We're way better than we used to be.
[00:59:39]  But like to now, like, now the guys have to play in our lane too, like in everything.
[00:59:43]  And they have to get to do powerlifting.
[00:59:45]  And we're going to pretend they have no advantage over us in that.
[00:59:48]  I mean, it just happened yesterday that the Biden administration.
[00:59:52]  Okay, so they're not only playing in our sports, but they're winning our awards.
[00:59:56]  There is the International Day of Women, Kelly McGuire, or somebody tell me what page that is on because my packets are everywhere now.
[01:00:02]  I've lost my organization.
[01:00:06]  Hold on, I'm all over the place, Bridget.
[01:00:08]  That's all right.
[01:00:08]  It's all right.
[01:00:10]  I always joke that it's this is like the patriarchy so crafty.
[01:00:14]  Okay, I found it.
[01:00:15]  Um, Alba Rueda, a man who identifies as a woman, received an International Women of Courage Award from the White House.
[01:00:23]  It's an international women of courage award, isn't it?
[01:00:27]  International Women's Month.
[01:00:29]  And like, we can't even have that.
[01:00:31]  You're not even allowed to have that.
[01:00:32]  The men have to be in that too.
[01:00:34]  No normal man wants to be part of this.
[01:00:36]  I'm talking about people who just like, and not even normal trans people.
[01:00:39]  Most trans people, trans women, wouldn't they take the award?
[01:00:43]  They'd be like, you know what?
[01:00:44]  I'm playing in my lane.
[01:00:44]  Leave me alone.
[01:00:45]  It's these activists like this person, Alba Rueda, who says that he's a woman, who not only is getting an award, even though he's a biological man, but who campaigned to even change the name of the National Women's Conference, National Women's Conference 2.
[01:01:03]  Ready?
[01:01:04]  The Plurinational Conference of Women and Lesbian, Cross-dressers, Transgenders, Bisexuals, Intersex, and Non-Binary Persons.
[01:01:12]  I just, I joke all the time.
[01:01:15]  I have a whole stand-up routine about how this is a patriarchy so crafty.
[01:01:19]  I was not a feminist, never really believed in this idea of the patriarchy.
[01:01:23]  Then all this stuff started happening.
[01:01:24]  I'm like, this is how they stay on top.
[01:01:27]  They're just going to, they were mad.
[01:01:29]  Women started getting, started getting ahead, and now they're just going to turn themselves into women and they can still stay on top.
[01:01:36]  This is this is the patriarchy so crafty.
[01:01:38]  They will turn themselves into women to stay on top.
[01:01:42]  It's an interesting theory.
[01:01:43]  I had Britt and Carrie on our culture warriors, and we were talking about these are both former beauty queens, former Miss California, and Carrie was Miss USA, right?
[01:01:53]  She won or she was first run over.
[01:01:54]  I can't remember.
[01:01:55]  Anyway, she was right at the top.
[01:01:57]  And we were talking about how even in those pageants now, they're allowing trans women, they're like win the beauty pageants for women.
[01:02:07]  So there's really no space into which we will not allow the patriarchy.
[01:02:11]  No, they're in prisons now, women's prisons.
[01:02:14]  I mean, even more terrifying and infuriating.
[01:02:17]  This is this stuff has ramifications, but none so great as when you start letting criminals self-ID into female prisons like they do in California.
[01:02:29]  You know, that is one of the things, if memory serves, that Stephen Crowder got a YouTube strike for, ultimately leading to his either demonetization or whatever, punishment from YouTube.
[01:02:39]  He did a skit involving Alex Jones in which a male prisoner pretending to be a trans woman raped a female inmate.
[01:02:49]  And for a while, their left was like, that is not a thing.
[01:02:52]  That's not a thing.
[01:02:53]  Well, it is a thing.
[01:02:54]  It is a thing out in California for the female inmates.
[01:02:57]  And all the person has to do is self-identify as trans two seconds ago.
[01:03:02]  They don't have to have lived as a trans person.
[01:03:04]  It could be post-conviction as a rapist, a serial rapist of women.
[01:03:09]  You're suddenly a trans woman and you can go into the female prison.
[01:03:12]  It's insane.
[01:03:13]  I don't know if that skit was demonetized for Alex Jones or rape or it sounds like there's a lot going on there.
[01:03:21]  It's true.
[01:03:22]  It's a point of attention to an important issue.
[01:03:25]  No, it's definitely something that doesn't really get enough attention.
[01:03:29]  If you care about these minority women who are don't have a voice, you should care the most about this.
[01:03:36]  The fact that people can't conceive that a criminal would lie about being a woman to get inside a prison with women, criminals who have assaulted women and children is baffling to me.
[01:03:49]  This is, this is, I don't understand why there aren't more people speaking out about this all across the political spectrum.
[01:03:56]  This should not be just guys like Steven Crowder speaking up for them and me.
[01:04:03]  It should be, there should be liberals who care about this too.
[01:04:07]  It's like Gavin Newsom wants to lecture us about like LGBTQ, blah, like how progressive he is.
[01:04:13]  Everything.
[01:04:13]  His counterpart, his Canadian twin Trudeau, uses terms like she session.
[01:04:19]  This has been a she, this is good.
[01:04:20]  We're going to have a she covery from our she session.
[01:04:24]  Meanwhile, you're like basically the same person.
[01:04:27]  Meanwhile, Newsom's allowing, you know, male rapists to say they're female and go into the female prisons.
[01:04:33]  And we're supposed to look at him as some progressive warrior for us.
[01:04:36]  Yep.
[01:04:37]  Yeah, he allows a lot of stuff that is, I don't understand how people are clapping for him and think that he's some sort of hero for the voiceless and the victims, the true victims in our society.
[01:04:52]  Aren't you from California?
[01:04:53]  Weren't you?

=== Texas Homelessness Crisis (08:54) ===

[01:04:54]  You were living there.
[01:04:55]  I'm still here, but not for long.
[01:04:57]  Oh, yeah, that's right.
[01:04:58]  You told me this personally.
[01:04:59]  Now you do have a fun announcement to make.
[01:05:02]  Yes, I'm moving to Texas in like the next six weeks.
[01:05:06]  Yeah.
[01:05:07]  Good for you.
[01:05:08]  Where are you going?
[01:05:10]  Probably outside of Austin.
[01:05:12]  You know, like where specifically, what's your street address going to be?
[01:05:16]  Generally.
[01:05:17]  Okay, so outside Austin, all the cool kids are moving to Austin.
[01:05:20]  It seems that way.
[01:05:21]  I feel like I have a pretty strong set of friends and community there already.
[01:05:26]  And yeah, it just feels, it feels more, I'm just so excited.
[01:05:30]  I feel like ideologically, it'll be nice to be somewhere where it doesn't feel so uni party.
[01:05:37]  And also just here, it doesn't feel safe.
[01:05:40]  I have a kid.
[01:05:41]  Everything changes when you have a kid.
[01:05:43]  You know this.
[01:05:44]  Everything.
[01:05:44]  Totally.
[01:05:45]  Suddenly you look around at the neighborhood and I don't want her growing up looking at people.
[01:05:49]  This is the other thing, the homelessness problem here.
[01:05:53]  It's not humane.
[01:05:54]  I don't understand how this is being positioned as something that people should just think is the humane way to deal with this problem.
[01:06:01]  And you have to kind of shut a certain amount of your empathy down in order to even deal with it.
[01:06:07]  Because everywhere I go in my town, there's tents and people taking, defecating and shooting up and nodding out.
[01:06:16]  And I don't, I don't want to have to raise my daughter around that kind of, it's very unsettling and scary and sad.
[01:06:28]  There's just a lot of it that it doesn't seem like it's getting better either.
[01:06:33]  Yeah.
[01:06:33]  No, I remember coming back to New York City after the COVID lockdown, which we spent in Montana, which was smart.
[01:06:40]  Then we come back to New York City at the beginning of June, 2020.
[01:06:43]  And all the restaurants were closed.
[01:06:46]  Like you could eat outside at a couple of places.
[01:06:48]  But if you did, so you had no choice but to eat outside if you wanted to eat out.
[01:06:51]  Most New Yorkers can't cook.
[01:06:52]  So they do eat out.
[01:06:53]  They rely on the restaurant system at a disproportionate rate to the rest of America.
[01:06:58]  And we're sitting out there and you got these guys who, I mean, literally have their pants down entirely below their bottom, like entirely below their bottom.
[01:07:07]  I can see ass crack.
[01:07:09]  And there's many like milling about, coming over, spewing nonsense.
[01:07:13]  They're not even making sense.
[01:07:15]  Vulgarities too.
[01:07:16]  Not just like random nonsense, but like vulgarities in front of my kids who have no, they're just trying to eat their pizza, like leave my kid alone.
[01:07:23]  And it was one of those moments where you're like, we're getting out of here.
[01:07:26]  Like this city, this is not acceptable.
[01:07:28]  Nobody wants to live like this.
[01:07:31]  Yeah, my, my cousin just went to San Francisco and I was asking her if it was as bad as you always hear that it is.
[01:07:37]  And she said in some places where they were not really, but then she said, but we did see a guy taking a crap outside of a building when we were eating.
[01:07:46]  Like, so that's just that's that's not normal.
[01:07:50]  You know, we shouldn't.
[01:07:51]  That's it's happening in New York too.
[01:07:52]  Honestly, I went down to the subway with my daughter Yardley.
[01:07:55]  It was very clearly human excrement right there.
[01:07:57]  And they're like, you can tell if there's nothing more stomach turning.
[01:08:00]  You're just trying to get your kid to school.
[01:08:02]  Literally, you're trying to put your school, your child, you know, get her from A to B so she can go to school and she's got to step over human crap.
[01:08:08]  Something's gone wrong.
[01:08:09]  The city mayor is doing a shitboard job.
[01:08:12]  And when it goes on for years and years, it's policy.
[01:08:16]  It's not going to change.
[01:08:18]  I mean, the amount of money California has put into the homelessness problem.
[01:08:22]  And we voted.
[01:08:23]  All of us have voted every year to increase the money that we give to the homeless and to the problem.
[01:08:28]  And it seems like every year that people vote for more money, it gets worse.
[01:08:32]  And I think that's why it's frustrating because you'll have a conversation about this and you'll be accused of dehumanizing the homeless just for even bringing up the fact that they're living in squalor and that these conditions are inhumane.
[01:08:45]  Well, what are you supposed to, what are we supposed to do?
[01:08:48]  The people who are in charge who have taken billions of dollars for big homeless are not making this situation better.
[01:08:54]  They're not helping get any of these people off the streets.
[01:08:57]  I don't, I don't know what the solution is exactly, but I do know that it shouldn't be getting just worse and worse and worse every single year that basically I've been here.
[01:09:09]  It's not fair to the people.
[01:09:10]  It's not fair to them.
[01:09:12]  You're seeing little kids having to watch them shooting up as they get off the school bus.
[01:09:16]  We've seen those tapes courtesy of Michael Schellenberger.
[01:09:19]  That's mentioned in New York where I was, we were in Riverside Park, which is on the Upper West Side.
[01:09:25]  Central Park is sort of in the big in the center of the city and Riverside is over on the west side.
[01:09:29]  And it's a beautiful park.
[01:09:31]  And we're sitting there and it's maybe 4.30 in the afternoon in like springtime when that's still light out.
[01:09:36]  And there was a homeless guy sitting on a bench.
[01:09:38]  We were minding our own business.
[01:09:39]  I'm just walking out of the park with my kids and he gets up and like grunts like and chases us.
[01:09:46]  My kids are like, oh my God, we ran.
[01:09:48]  So, I mean, I don't, I'm sorry for the homeless who have fallen there through no fault of their own and, you know, bad circumstances.
[01:09:55]  But my experience of the homeless in New York is much more along the lines of that guy on the on the park bench who screamed at my kids and yelled at us and ran.
[01:10:03]  And another guy who did the same thing.
[01:10:05]  We were trying to get a dunk and donut.
[01:10:06]  Like that, it's a problem.
[01:10:08]  It's scary for the law-abiding citizens.
[01:10:10]  It is.
[01:10:11]  That's what, that's what I don't understand.
[01:10:13]  Why is there so little care for the taxpayers?
[01:10:16]  It seems like they, they are openly hostile to the people who are paying the taxes and the people with families.
[01:10:23]  And you're letting just people in Venice camp out and have meth labs out in their RVs outside of people who have children's homes.
[01:10:33]  This is why do you have so little respect and regard for the people who are also citizens and paying taxes in your cities?
[01:10:42]  It shouldn't be like the people who are homeless and on the streets.
[01:10:46]  They shouldn't obviously be dehumanized and treated below anybody, but they should, I feel like at least the taxpayers should be on level playing ground with them and they're not.
[01:10:57]  Enforce the law.
[01:10:58]  Enforce the law.
[01:10:58]  In New York City, they've gotten rid of, you know, like they don't enforce the public urination and the, they weren't enforcing jumping over the turnstile.
[01:11:05]  All those things lead to more crime, more crime.
[01:11:07]  I miss Giuliani.
[01:11:08]  I miss the old version of Giuliani and I miss New York under Giuliani and Bloomberg too.
[01:11:14]  Even with his big gulp soda band, he was way better than what we have now and certainly what we had under de Blasio.
[01:11:20]  Can I ask you before we move off of this?
[01:11:22]  I've only been to Austin one time and it was so charming.
[01:11:27]  It was like the main drag in Austin, as I remember it, had kind of an old West feel to it, but also, you know, it's been modernized, of course, but it just had, it was a good combination of kind of rustic, but also hip.
[01:11:40]  So what's it like there?
[01:11:41]  And what are the differences that you've noticed?
[01:11:43]  I'm sure you've checked it out, you know, before you decided to move there.
[01:11:45]  Yeah, there's, well, first of all, there's some of the same problems exist in Austin in the city that exist here, just not on the same scale.
[01:11:54]  There's definitely some homelessness, although they voted to start enforcing the ban on just camping on the sidewalks again.
[01:12:03]  So I think after the pandemic, it got real, it was pretty bad.
[01:12:06]  And then it seems like it's not as bad as it was.
[01:12:10]  Then I do, there's a large influx of tech and California.
[01:12:16]  So it does feel there's a little bit, if the, there's a little bit of that vibe there.
[01:12:23]  There's parts parts of town that feel like Echo Park here when it was kind of cool.
[01:12:29]  It's, it's like when LA was cool 15 years ago or so, or so, it has that vibe.
[01:12:36]  When I used to go to Austin 20 years ago, it was tiny.
[01:12:39]  And the amount of construction downtown and all around in the suburbs is I've actually never seen anything like it.
[01:12:47]  It is wild how much building they're doing and, you know, having to increase the roads because there's more traffic.
[01:12:55]  So, but it does have this very weird vibe that is still very Austin.
[01:13:02]  And there's a great expression that my friend who's lived there for many years told me.
[01:13:06]  They say, keep Austin weird, but keep Austin surrounded.
[01:13:11]  It's kind of a Texas, Texas phrase.
[01:13:13]  Yeah.
[01:13:14]  And people say, don't California are Texas.
[01:13:17]  And they do a lot of polling on this.
[01:13:20]  Most people who are leaving California and going to all of these other states, which is not just Texas, but Texas is, I think, number one, they are voting red, or at the very least, they're not voting blue.
[01:13:34]  They know what they left.
[01:13:35]  So when they poll the people and they look at, they look at all the numbers, it's not actually what they're doing.
[01:13:42]  They tend to vote more conservative than even people who live in Texas or who might be locals.

=== Playboy Brand Decline (08:40) ===

[01:13:48]  Wow.
[01:13:49]  Yeah, because people moved to Texas.
[01:13:50]  They moved to Florida.
[01:13:51]  They moved to Tennessee.
[01:13:52]  These are great states that are more red leaning in their politics with no state income tax, which is another benefit.
[01:13:59]  No, it's delightful.
[01:14:00]  I mean, I moved to Connecticut, as you know, and I have to say, it's like, it's not like Connecticut is perfect and it doesn't have homelessness problems in certain cities, but it's clean.
[01:14:08]  It's families.
[01:14:09]  It's people who are trying to put their kids through school.
[01:14:11]  You don't walk around and see any tent cities anywhere.
[01:14:13]  You don't see drug needs.
[01:14:14]  Literally in New York City, my daughter Yarny would play soccer and we'd go up to like 134th Street where there was a field right around there.
[01:14:23]  And there were hypodermic needles on the field, which we would, the parents would walk around and pick up.
[01:14:28]  We would pick them up and throw them away.
[01:14:30]  And then the only reason we got bounced out of that field eventually through the league we were in was a guy got shot there like two hours before one of her games.
[01:14:38]  So like, oh, okay, maybe we shouldn't play.
[01:14:40]  I mean, this is insane.
[01:14:42]  This is, why would parents stay there?
[01:14:44]  Why did we stay there?
[01:14:44]  You know, when we were there most of the years, it was safe.
[01:14:47]  It really was.
[01:14:47]  Like Bloomberg was a very efficient city manager.
[01:14:51]  And then that loser de Blasio got in and ruined, ruined New York, same as Lori Lightfoot ruined Chicago.
[01:14:58]  And then that moron thought he could run for president.
[01:15:00]  Then he really thought he could run for president.
[01:15:02]  And she's probably going to run for president if Joe Biden doesn't do it this time around.
[01:15:06]  Okay.
[01:15:07]  So I'm going to pause there.
[01:15:08]  I'm going to squeeze in a quick break and I'm going to come back.
[01:15:10]  And I have a lot to ask you about, including the return of the Victoria Secret Fashion Show.
[01:15:16]  You know, Bridget, she's right for Playboy.
[01:15:18]  She's got thoughts on this kind of thing.
[01:15:19]  So we'll figure out whether this is a force for good or a force for evil.
[01:15:23]  And FYI, it's not going to be the Victoria Secrets fashion show that you remember from the sound of it.
[01:15:30]  Stand by.
[01:15:34]  So Bridget, Victoria's Secret is bringing back its fashion show.
[01:15:40]  It was an annual event and it's been a four-year hiatus since it's been, since it was last on.
[01:15:46]  It was canceled after its lowest ratings ever in 2018.
[01:15:51]  And so they're going to bring it back.
[01:15:54]  And yet it doesn't sound like we're necessarily going to be getting like the Stephanie Seymour angels with the wings and the skimpy outfits.
[01:16:02]  I'm not sure because Victoria's Secret has gone woke.
[01:16:06]  There's Giselle since it was last on.
[01:16:10]  In 2019, they hired their first transgender model because of course, right, yet another space that women used to dominate and now no.
[01:16:19]  The Angels were later replaced by Victoria's Secret Collective, an unparalleled group of trailblazing partners who share a common goal to drive positive change.
[01:16:30]  Instead of Giselle, we have Megan Rapino.
[01:16:35]  Instead of Stephanie Seymour, we have, let's see, a refugee from South Sudan.
[01:16:42]  We have, of course, the plus size models.
[01:16:46]  We've got Priyanka Chopra Jonas because I don't know, she's diverse and she's married to a Jonas.
[01:16:52]  And they've been featuring women of all shapes and sizes as well as the various nods to diversity and inclusion.
[01:17:01]  As soon as they did that FYI, Bridget, their sales fell 8% and they went down another 4.5% in the last year.
[01:17:08]  So people don't seem to be responding particularly well to the heavyset models who are refugees and also men.
[01:17:17]  But you tell me whether this is going to work.
[01:17:20]  I mean, Rihanna does it so much better.
[01:17:23]  She basically destroyed their entire, their, their whole thing.
[01:17:28]  She, her Fenty, her like fashion show that she does, it was very always just diverse, but it wasn't forced.
[01:17:36]  It was just Rihanna being effortlessly cool and her Fenty brand is amazing and she had all kinds of people.
[01:17:42]  It was a whole artistic thing.
[01:17:45]  And then Victoria's Secret was getting there, just she was eating their lunch, basically, Rihanna.
[01:17:52]  And Victoria's Secret saw that they were losing in this space and they tried to pivot away from what they were.
[01:17:59]  But this is like when Playboy tried to stop having nudes.
[01:18:03]  You can't, you're Victoria's Secret.
[01:18:05]  We know you for the angels.
[01:18:07]  We know what you are.
[01:18:09]  So don't try and pivot away from that.
[01:18:11]  Just try and lean into it.
[01:18:14]  I loved the Angels.
[01:18:15]  I grew up with them.
[01:18:16]  Me too.
[01:18:17]  Loved them.
[01:18:18]  Did I think I could ever be an angel?
[01:18:20]  No.
[01:18:21]  Did that make me feel sad?
[01:18:22]  No, because I'm, you have to be a well-adjusted person.
[01:18:26]  You can't be everything.
[01:18:28]  That's just not realistic.
[01:18:30]  They were, they're gorgeous, superhuman models.
[01:18:34]  They, they, they're like aliens.
[01:18:36]  There's nobody who looks like that.
[01:18:38]  And it was so fun to see the pageantry around it.
[01:18:41]  And they were just stunning, stunning.
[01:18:44]  And then Rihanna started doing her thing and it was different.
[01:18:47]  It's different, but also amazing.
[01:18:50]  And she just naturally was herself.
[01:18:52]  I think why people don't respond to this is that it's, they're trying to be something they're not and they're trying to signal.
[01:19:01]  And it's just everybody sees through it.
[01:19:04]  People aren't stupid.
[01:19:05]  They see they're just trying to do this because they want to try and be woke or they want to try and, I don't know.
[01:19:12]  I don't, I don't really fox checking.
[01:19:14]  It's like you point with actual diversity because these are the people who she thinks look great and wants to promote.
[01:19:20]  But they're like, okay, we've got the Indian girl.
[01:19:23]  We've got the lesbian soccer player.
[01:19:24]  We've got the refugee.
[01:19:26]  We've got the skier.
[01:19:27]  We've got the heavyset, you know, plus-size model.
[01:19:30]  Okay, we're good, right?
[01:19:31]  It's not, they don't actually care about diversity.
[01:19:33]  They're just trying to appease different groups.
[01:19:34]  Oh, the trans, forgot the trans girl.
[01:19:36]  Like, we got to make sure that we check all the boxes.
[01:19:38]  Meanwhile, if you ask me, the reason that their brand was falling apart and the people weren't watching the shows back in 1819 is because of Lex Wex Wessler, the guy who ran it and his ties to Jeffrey Epstein, which came out, which caused some serious backlash at the company.
[01:19:52]  I mean, it's like, look what happened to Prince Andrew for being friends with Jeffrey Epstein.
[01:19:56]  This guy, Lex, what's his name?
[01:19:58]  Was way in the news for being way tighter with Epstein.
[01:20:02]  There was a backlash against the company.
[01:20:03]  I don't think they needed to get rid of the sexy bras and panties and the angels.
[01:20:08]  Right.
[01:20:09]  They were, it was already where they it's already something that people were pivoting away from too.
[01:20:16]  It was the Me Too era.
[01:20:17]  It was on the heels of that.
[01:20:19]  I mean, we saw what happened with Playboy during that time.
[01:20:21]  It was a very weird time to be writing at Playboy when I was writing at Playboy because it was 2015.
[01:20:27]  It was on the heels of Me Too, which really started in 2013.
[01:20:31]  And then you saw the fallout across all of these industries with Epstein and all, and like you said, with Victoria's Secret and all the people who had ties to this.
[01:20:41]  And you started hearing stories about all of these young women who are essentially being trafficked.
[01:20:46]  And this affected all of these industries.
[01:20:48]  They were not people weren't smiling at the idea that some of these models might have been trafficked by the guy who ran the company.
[01:21:00]  So yeah, I think it's easy to kind of hide and say, oh, we're not woke enough when actually you're just associated with a predator.
[01:21:08]  And it would be an easy way to pivot away from it.
[01:21:10]  Yeah, to dodge it.
[01:21:11]  And here, and like, why would Megan Rapino provide cover for the scandal of Les Wexler?
[01:21:17]  Like, why would she lend her name and brand to that?
[01:21:20]  Is it so important to her to see herself in a Victoria's Secret ad?
[01:21:23]  How about Priyanka Chopra?
[01:21:25]  She doesn't need to do that.
[01:21:26]  Like, why be associated with the brand at all, given those circumstances?
[01:21:29]  But in any event, that's what's happened.
[01:21:31]  So here's what they say: We needed to stop being about what men want and to be about what women want, which is so annoying, right?
[01:21:39]  Like, oh, right.
[01:21:40]  All we want is granny panties.
[01:21:41]  That's all we want, right?
[01:21:43]  Like, we don't like to look sexy.
[01:21:44]  That's only for a man.
[01:21:45]  Like, it's not that every woman I know has got a little of both in her underwear drawer, right?
[01:21:51]  You got your granny panties for that time of the month or whatever when you're out at home sitting on the sofa.
[01:21:56]  And then you got your sauce department for when you want to bring it.
[01:21:59]  Yeah.
[01:22:00]  Yeah.
[01:22:01]  I feel it's always this speaking on behalf of all people as if we I loved the lingerie, but it's not something I'm wearing every single day.
[01:22:10]  It's something you wear when you go out and you want to feel a little sexy.
[01:22:15]  And I don't, they, I don't understand too.
[01:22:17]  They'll say that women get dressed up for women.
[01:22:20]  They're not actually getting dressed up for men.
[01:22:22]  And then they'll also say, we want a brand that's for women.
[01:22:25]  And then it's like granny panties and kind of frumpy underwear.

=== TikTok Filters And Real Faces (10:56) ===

[01:22:29]  So which one is it?
[01:22:30]  More flannel.
[01:22:32]  There's a place for that.
[01:22:33]  I would not get my flannel from Victoria's Secret, by the way.
[01:22:36]  I really wouldn't.
[01:22:37]  They have amazing flannel, though, Megan.
[01:22:39]  They do.
[01:22:40]  They do.
[01:22:40]  They have amazing flannel.
[01:22:42]  Personally, I see Victoria's Secret as like a bit of a younger brand.
[01:22:44]  I mean, I was shopping there more when I was like in my 20s.
[01:22:48]  And now I'm an agent provocateur.
[01:22:49]  No, not really.
[01:22:50]  Doug would like shopping at agent provocateur.
[01:22:53]  I'm going to tell you a funny story.
[01:22:55]  I'm not going to name the name, but it's somebody I used to work with at Fox.
[01:22:58]  Okay, that's all I'm going to tell you.
[01:22:59]  And this person, I used to go over to her building.
[01:23:04]  I wasn't visiting her.
[01:23:05]  She and I weren't that close, but another person was in that building.
[01:23:09]  And I see the bags lined up in the lobby because, you know, when they, you get a delivery in an adorman building in New York, your bag.
[01:23:15]  So that the bags were all lined up and it was like agent provocator, agent provocator, agent provocator, agent provocator.
[01:23:21]  I was like, well, well.
[01:23:24]  And that's all I'm going to say.
[01:23:25]  It's a little tease for you, Bridget.
[01:23:27]  Got any guesses?
[01:23:29]  I don't have that many guesses.
[01:23:30]  I was not really watching that much Fox.
[01:23:38]  All right.
[01:23:38]  So I do want to ask you about TikTok.
[01:23:40]  So I don't have TikTok on my phone because I don't want to.
[01:23:42]  I don't either.
[01:23:44]  However, it's extremely popular.
[01:23:46]  And I see the filters that people use.
[01:23:49]  And they are, they do make you very attractive.
[01:23:52]  I mean, I have to say, you know, as somebody who just took a picture next to Margo Robbie, who is 20 years younger than I am, I'm in favor of a filter.
[01:24:01]  I would like a filter.
[01:24:02]  I wished I had one of the TikTok filters.
[01:24:05]  But you were making the point, I think, that they've gone too far.
[01:24:09]  It's getting weird now.
[01:24:11]  And I'll show the videotape that I think you were talking about so the audience knows what we're talking about.
[01:24:15]  But it's basically you cannot take off the filter.
[01:24:17]  You will be the filterized version of yourself, whether you want to be or not.
[01:24:21]  And here's a woman calling attention to that in this Soundbite 14.
[01:24:25]  Okay, so there's this new filter on TikTok and it's perfect.
[01:24:30]  Look at it.
[01:24:31]  You used to do that with an old filter and you'll see the lashes on your hand like it would glitch.
[01:24:37]  But look how perfect.
[01:24:39]  This is, I'm wearing no makeup right now.
[01:24:41]  This is all a filter.
[01:24:43]  And it's just scary because there's a lot of girls out there that don't realize when someone's got a filter on and they're chasing perfection because that's what they think everybody looks like.
[01:24:53]  And this is not what people look like.
[01:24:56]  All right.
[01:24:57]  Wait, now stand by because my crack team has cut some video where some of these TikTokers showed the talker, showed the difference between their real face and their filter.
[01:25:06]  All right, hold on.
[01:25:09]  Oh, wow.
[01:25:10]  Well, that's her real face.
[01:25:11]  Oh, people have to look at this on YouTube later.
[01:25:13]  Here she's filtered this gal.
[01:25:16]  And it's her real face.
[01:25:17]  All right.
[01:25:18]  This gal looks very cute.
[01:25:19]  Her filter is beautiful.
[01:25:20]  She looks awesome.
[01:25:21]  Oh, wow.
[01:25:22]  So she's still pretty with her real face, but my God, so different, Bridget.
[01:25:26]  And they're all still, they're all pretty.
[01:25:28]  This is like calamitous.
[01:25:31]  I mean, the one, the, the one that cracked me up, I think it was the second one you showed in that lineup.
[01:25:36]  She's like, oh, I'm going to take a hit.
[01:25:38]  My, I'm going to, I'm about, my self-esteem is about to take a hit.
[01:25:42]  And then they, and she takes the filter off and she's like, oh, and you can see her cringe.
[01:25:46]  And she's partially joking, but this is also partially true.
[01:25:49]  I mean, would I like to have a filter on your show right now?
[01:25:52]  So yeah, that would be great.
[01:25:54]  But it still is, you know, you look at the, I think Jonathan Haidt and a lot of people are talking about how depressed women in particular are, the young girls.
[01:26:03]  And yeah, I'd be depressed too if I was 14 years old and growing up and thought everybody looked like a Victoria's secret angel.
[01:26:11]  And I looked in the mirror and there was one woman in that, because that was a whole thread that I found on Twitter.
[01:26:18]  And one woman was a photographer and she was saying women were coming and they were, she was taking pictures of them and they were so used to looking at their filtered face that when she took pictures of them, they were upset and disappointed, even though they were in makeup and well lit.
[01:26:34]  She said, I'm a professor, professional photographer and I can't convince these women that they're beautiful because they're so used to looking at their filtered face.
[01:26:43]  And if you really want to get creepy about it, eventually there might be the time where we're all wearing kind of augmented reality lenses or glasses and we'll just be looking at everybody.
[01:26:55]  We'll never have to see an ugo again.
[01:26:58]  You know, it'll just go.
[01:27:01]  No, you're right, though.
[01:27:02]  Think about the young girls, like the one comfort when you're 13 and your face is totally broken out, you've got your braces on, and your face is just weird.
[01:27:10]  Like, my face was a lot rounder, you know, like it just thinned out and I got bone structure as I got older.
[01:27:16]  And it, yeah, I lost some weight too, but it just part of it is just you're younger.
[01:27:20]  And the comfort is everybody else looks like that too, right?
[01:27:24]  Like you didn't have to look at everybody with this perfect weird mask on and think, oh, I can't show my real face because I'll be the only unattractive one.
[01:27:36]  Yeah, it's not, it's not good for, I imagine, anyone's self-esteem.
[01:27:40]  And I think that it does, it definitely you see the studies that are depressed and anxious.
[01:27:45]  And I was saying I would be depressed and anxious too, if this is, this is what I was feeling like I had to compete with, even just on even in like the dating world, how are you feeling okay?
[01:27:57]  And what if you're going out there and it just opens up?
[01:28:00]  I'm more of a Luddite, though.
[01:28:02]  I know there are people who are much more like, this is progress.
[01:28:07]  This is the future.
[01:28:08]  No one will ever have to feel like insecure again because they can just always be their filter.
[01:28:14]  But I think it's, I find it unsettling.
[01:28:16]  Just the them trying to kind of take that face off that they all kept doing it because like she was saying, it used to glitch.
[01:28:24]  So you could see that there was a filter, but seeing them try and take that off, there was something about that action of trying to, you could see them trying to work out the cognitive dissonance of their face and their actual face.
[01:28:40]  There was just something really unsettling to me about it.
[01:28:44]  I got to tell you something now.
[01:28:46]  I believe in hair and makeup very clearly.
[01:28:50]  And I believe in spending some time in making yourself look like your best self, right?
[01:28:54]  The best, but yourself, not somebody else's version of you, not China's version of you, their weird filter of you.
[01:29:02]  And I will tell you, a lot of people ask me about makeup.
[01:29:04]  And one of these days I'm going to do a makeup tutorial and I'll put it out there and exactly how I do my makeup every day.
[01:29:09]  But can I tell you?
[01:29:10]  I learned it from some girl on YouTube.
[01:29:13]  I just, I was, I was like, I no longer have a makeup artist doing my face every day.
[01:29:16]  I do have a hair girl come a few times a week.
[01:29:18]  As you can tell, today was not one of them.
[01:29:22]  But so I do my own makeup and I learned it off of YouTube.
[01:29:24]  And I am just telling you, it's very easy.
[01:29:26]  It's like YouTube.
[01:29:27]  It's sort of another compliment for them.
[01:29:30]  They took a beating in the first hour.
[01:29:32]  They've got a lot of these tutorials that can help you make yourself look better, the real you.
[01:29:36]  You know, they can enhance.
[01:29:37]  Everybody's got a nice feature.
[01:29:39]  Maybe it's your lips, maybe it's your eyes, maybe it's your hair, whatever it is.
[01:29:42]  But you can figure out a way to enhance your very best feature for no money.
[01:29:46]  It's free.
[01:29:47]  That's how I figured out how to do my makeup.
[01:29:49]  And it was a game changer.
[01:29:50]  Once you learn how to do it, you can really make things pop and feel better about yourself in that way.
[01:29:55]  And it's the real you.
[01:29:56]  Yes, it's you made up, but that's still you.
[01:29:58]  It's not some weird fake version that you had to feel insecure about when you go walking on the streets.
[01:30:02]  God forbid you meet somebody who only knows you through your filter.
[01:30:06]  Bridget, I'll give you the last word.
[01:30:09]  What was that?
[01:30:10]  Sorry.
[01:30:10]  I said, I'll give you the last word on it.
[01:30:13]  Oh, yeah, that I was just thinking about that's actually the amazing thing about YouTube is you can learn anything.
[01:30:20]  I really, I find anything you want to learn, you can learn on YouTube.
[01:30:24]  And they have some of the best makeup tutorials.
[01:30:26]  Like you said, I just feel seeing those women and their crushing weight as they fell apart, realizing that that wasn't what their actually face looked like.
[01:30:36]  Because as the guy who did that thread was showing people in one of his videos, it actually changes your bone structure.
[01:30:43]  And it's based on what it looked at.
[01:30:47]  It looked like they, yeah, their cheeks were like and their eyebrows were like right like they would lower their eyes and raise their eyebrows, but lower their forehead.
[01:30:55]  He was showing all the things that it did to his face because it's based on computational models of beauty and it does weird things to your cheeks.
[01:31:03]  And then you take that off.
[01:31:05]  And I feel like for all of the talk about loving yourself and self-esteem and mental health and to better up and all of these things, you have to be okay with who you are.
[01:31:18]  You have to be okay.
[01:31:20]  This, you also can't be always looking outward likes.
[01:31:24]  And it's got to come from something inside.
[01:31:27]  You have to find a way to be settled with yourself when you're sitting alone, looking in a mirror, who you can't be, it can't come from your beauty.
[01:31:38]  Your beauty is going to fade.
[01:31:39]  It can't come from your money and your power and your number of followers that you have.
[01:31:45]  That will inevitably leave you feeling empty and always feeling like you're lacking and always chasing more.
[01:31:52]  And it's just, I feel like the emphasis should be placed on trying to be okay with who you are and not chasing all of this external stuff that is really not going to matter at the end of the day when you're sitting.
[01:32:08]  If you want to look better, you can do that.
[01:32:12]  You can do that.
[01:32:13]  You don't need TikTok.
[01:32:15]  You can make yourself look better.
[01:32:17]  It's so easy.
[01:32:18]  I mean, the way makeup is cheap.
[01:32:20]  Now, Bethany Frankl does a great thing where she gives you like the best makeups at like Walmart and CVS and so on.
[01:32:26]  Everything's been sort of democratized in a good way.
[01:32:29]  So I'm very much in favor of like making yourself the best version of you because I do think looking good gives you a level of confidence that you don't have when you feel like you look bad.
[01:32:40]  But this is absurd.
[01:32:42]  This is not you.
[01:32:43]  This is fake.
[01:32:44]  This is cheating.
[01:32:45]  And it's not even cheating that's going to get you anywhere.
[01:32:46]  It's going to make you feel like crap and make like they were talking about this at this thing I was at where they were like, people are starting to feel uncomfortable about meeting others in real life because they're only used to like having the fake version of them out there in the dating world, online dating.
[01:33:01]  Can you imagine you show up and they're like, where are your enormous cheekbones?
[01:33:06]  Oh, that was the, that was the TikTok version of me.
[01:33:08]  It's frankly, I hate to be mean, but it's like Chloe Kardashian.
[01:33:11]  It's what she does.
[01:33:12]  Every, every picture, right?
[01:33:13]  Isn't isn't it Chloe?
[01:33:14]  The one who's like constantly overfiltering herself and like shaving off all of her bones.
[01:33:18]  Then you see her actual picture of her and you're like, who is that?
[01:33:21]  Like, oh, that's the Chloe Kardashian, the blonde.
[01:33:24]  I don't know anything about the Kardashians.

=== Desantis Failing Expectations (02:33) ===

[01:33:25]  Okay.
[01:33:26]  I've already said too much.
[01:33:29]  Bridget, it's great to see you unfiltered.
[01:33:32]  Such a pleasure.
[01:33:33]  So great being here.
[01:33:34]  Thank you for having me, Megan.
[01:33:35]  All right.
[01:33:36]  I'll see you in Austin.
[01:33:38]  Before we go, we're going to open up the MK mailbag to end the show today.
[01:33:41]  You can email me at megan, M-E-G-Y-N at megankelly.com.
[01:33:45]  On 2024, Pat in North Carolina writes, I would love to see a Trump DeSantis ticket.
[01:33:51]  DeSantis as VP would get the feel of DC politics.
[01:33:54]  Trump knows all the bad guys in Washington and DeSantis would learn.
[01:33:57]  The only uncertainty is Trump's ego.
[01:33:59]  Would he mentor to save our country?
[01:34:02]  Hmm.
[01:34:03]  On the Murdoch trial, which we covered quite a bit, Jay writes in, remember how Alec Murdoch couldn't remember his last conversation with his wife or son?
[01:34:10]  I burst into tears when you stated that a person would surely remember the last words that they shared with a loved one.
[01:34:16]  I know I do.
[01:34:17]  It's been three years now.
[01:34:18]  Oh, Jay, I understand.
[01:34:20]  And don't you think that was so telling?
[01:34:23]  Just one of the many reasons he wound up convicted of double murder.
[01:34:26]  On the subject of swearing, I'm doing a very poor job of giving up swearing for Lent as I did last year.
[01:34:31]  I should have chosen something else.
[01:34:32]  I get it.
[01:34:33]  Hope springs eternal.
[01:34:34]  But Wendy writes in, I gave up swearing several years ago for Lent, too.
[01:34:38]  I dropped eight F-bombs.
[01:34:40]  I feel you.
[01:34:41]  This year, dark chocolate.
[01:34:43]  Wendy, that's what I should have done.
[01:34:44]  I already gave up dark chocolate and nuts a couple of months ago.
[01:34:48]  I could have just folded that into my Lenten vow and gotten credit for it.
[01:34:52]  You know why I gave them up?
[01:34:54]  Because I was getting styes in my eyes, and I found out those things actually can cause styes.
[01:35:00]  Can I tell you, I haven't gotten one since I gave up dark chocolate and nuts.
[01:35:04]  It's been amazing.
[01:35:05]  So, if you are a sty sufferer, FYI.
[01:35:08]  Elizabeth writes on career advice: I was laid out from my job at a consulting firm.
[01:35:12]  I've been looking for words of inspo to help me along.
[01:35:15]  I truly resonated with your philosophy to settle for more.
[01:35:17]  Any advice for a woman in her early 20s who's in the middle of starting a career?
[01:35:22]  Elizabeth, try, try, try, and get ready to fail, fail, fail, and embrace all the failures because that's the only way you ever learn.
[01:35:30]  You always do learn more from the failures than from the successes and the victories.
[01:35:34]  And also, just spend some time thinking about like, what am I genuinely good at and what fires me up?
[01:35:39]  You may not be able to have like the workspace be your play space, as Harry's buddy says, but what fires you up and what would make you look forward to going into the office all day and like, you know, spending your time doing this thing?
[01:35:51]  That's a good goal.
[01:35:52]  Spend some time thinking about that and how to channel your best skills toward that goal.
[01:35:57]  And then just keep throwing darts at the board.

=== Advice For Starting A Career (01:04) ===

[01:35:59]  Don't stop.
[01:36:00]  You know, if you fail, so what?
[01:36:02]  All right, you'll try again.
[01:36:02]  You're in your 20s.
[01:36:03]  This is when you should be doing all your failing.
[01:36:06]  But the secret is, even when you're failing, you're winning and you're getting stronger, you're getting wiser, you're getting better.
[01:36:10]  And eventually, you'll land it.
[01:36:12]  Thank you all so much for writing in.
[01:36:14]  Again, it's Megan, M-E-G-Y-N at MeganKelly.com.
[01:36:18]  While you're there, you can sign up for our American News Minute.
[01:36:20]  It comes out on Fridays.
[01:36:22]  That's when I send you an email with updates on the news and on my little Strudwick.
[01:36:26]  And of course, there's a juicy.
[01:36:28]  See you tomorrow.
[01:36:32]  Thanks for listening to The Megan Kelly Show.
[01:36:34]  No BS, no agenda, and no fear.
[01:36:58]  30 gigabytes for about 200.
[01:37:01]  One call, it's not a good idea.