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Feb. 6, 2019 - The Matt Walsh Show
39:14
Ep. 192 - Trump Gives Soaring SOTU Address, Democrats Embarrass Themselves

Today on the show, President Trump gives a very effective SOTU speech. Meanwhile Democrats embarrass themselves. Also, Kamala Harris engages in some inexcusable transphobic bigotry. Finally, I'll answer your emails and offer my take on the very bizarre Liam Neeson story that’s been in the news this week. Date: 02-06-2019 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Today on the Matt Wall Show, President Trump gives a very effective, powerful State of the Union address.
Meanwhile, the Democrats embarrassed themselves, made fools of themselves, so the night was a big win for Trump.
But we'll analyze it a little bit more, kind of dissect the events of the evening.
Also, Kamala Harris.
engages in some inexcusable transphobic bigotry, at least according to the standards set by liberals.
So we'll talk about that.
And finally, I'll answer your emails, including a question about the very bizarre Liam Neeson story that's been on the news recently.
So I'll give my take on that today on The Matt Wall Show.
It was good.
Good speech.
Trump did a great job with it.
I thought the speech was inspirational, soaring, well-delivered, hit the right notes.
Love the pro-life bit.
I'll talk more about that in a minute.
I like the part about the wall.
We'll talk more about that as well.
I thought he made the case for the wall very well.
Now, unfortunately, it's not going to matter in the long term.
It won't matter really by next week, because nobody is going to remember this speech.
By tomorrow, everyone will have forgotten and moved on.
Not because the speech was not memorable.
I thought it was memorable.
Or should be memorable, except that nothing is memorable in our culture because nobody remembers anything for more than 24 hours.
We just, everything moves on and everyone forgets everything.
Nothing lasts, nothing matters.
That is my cheerful thought to begin the day.
But still, you have to make the most of the opportunities that you are given, and even if they are fleeting, and Trump definitely did a good job with the speech.
As I have said many times, Trump is, the scripted version of Trump is vastly superior to the unscripted version.
There's no competition and it's just, I can't believe that anyone would dispute this anymore.
Something like the State of the Union address, or take really any of his scripted speeches, but look, take the State of the Union, compare that to how he is on Twitter, for instance, or to the kind of speech that he would give to a rally somewhere in Pensacola, Florida, or whatever.
Compare the two, and it's just...
There's no question that the scripted version is much, much more compelling, more coherent, just much more focused and everything.
It's just much better.
And I know that when I say that, it seems like an insult, because it seems like it's just another way of saying that Trump is only good when he's saying things that other people have written for him to say.
But that's not actually an insult.
And by the way, that's true for probably most people.
Most people, you're going to sound better with a speech written by a speechwriter than you will just off-the-cuff talking into a microphone.
I think pretty much everyone sounds better the other way.
So it's not really an insult.
And there's something else to it also, that the reason why I think Trump is compelling when he's giving scripted speeches is that he is willing to say things in speeches that other Republican presidents won't say.
And that's what that's why that's the really could be the very valuable thing about Donald Trump is that he is willing to put out a message.
Now, he needs help crafting it.
But if he gets help crafting it, he's willing to say this.
And so, for instance, as I mentioned, he talked about the wall.
And that whole chunk of the speech was very good.
It was also something that you probably wouldn't hear from any other Republican president.
We haven't heard from any other Republican president.
And this is where Trump is extremely effective.
When he's delivering a message that is his message, his unique message, but he's had help putting it all together.
So let's take a look at him.
Here he is making the case for the wall.
My administration has sent to Congress a common-sense proposal to end the crisis on the southern border.
It includes humanitarian assistance, more law enforcement, drug detection at our ports, closing loopholes that enable child smuggling, and plans for a new physical barrier or wall to secure the vast areas between our ports of entry.
In the past, most of the people in this room voted for a wall.
But the proper wall never got built.
I will get it built.
This is a smart, strategic, see-through steel barrier, not just a simple concrete wall.
It will be deployed in the areas identified by the border agents as having the greatest need.
And these agents will tell you, where walls go up, illegal crossings go way, way down.
Yeah!
San Diego used to have the most illegal border crossings in our country.
In response, a strong security wall was put in place.
This powerful barrier almost completely ended illegal crossings.
The border city of El Paso, Texas, used to have extremely high rates of violent crime, one of the highest in the entire country, and considered one of our nation's most dangerous cities.
Now, immediately upon its building, with a powerful barrier in place, El Paso is one of the safest cities in our country.
Simply put, walls work and walls save lives.
So the kind of wall, the kind of barrier that he's calling for now is so sensible and so modest that Democrats look like absolute lunatics being opposed to it.
And this shows, again, how effective Trump can be when he has help crafting his message.
Because during the campaign, when he was off the cuff, he was talking about the wall, Mexico's gonna pay for it, it's gonna be a big, beautiful wall, there's gonna be one door on the wall.
And so you had this image in your mind of this huge, 40-foot, concrete, towering, something that looks like from Lord of the Rings or something type structure, stretching across the entire border, like the Great Wall of China.
And that's the way he was talking about it on the campaign off the cuff.
And it was very easy for Democrats to oppose that because they could say, well, that's crazy.
Obviously, we're not going to do that.
It'd be a total waste of money.
It would take years to build.
It would be billions upon billions upon billions of dollars.
You'd be building a wall across stretches of border where nobody's even crossing anyway.
So it's very easy for them to oppose that.
But now that he's kind of crafted the message more, it's become something that you really can't oppose.
Well, you can, and you just look crazy doing it.
Because now he's talking about, all right, we're going to put strategically built, strategically placed steel barriers along the sections of the border that the Border Patrol asks us to put.
You know, we'll consult with them.
They're the experts.
They know what's going on on the border.
They'll tell us where they need the barriers, and we'll put them there.
As I said, it's modest.
It's completely sensible.
We already have stuff like that.
There are already sections of the border that have these kinds of barriers.
And so all Trump is really saying is, let's finish it.
Let's put those barriers in the other places where it's needed, according to the people who are experts in this kind of stuff.
Why would you oppose that?
There is no reason at all to oppose that.
It just doesn't make any sense.
Well, Democrats oppose it because they simply cannot support common-sense things anymore, especially if Trump proposes them, or if any Republican proposes them.
They just can't.
They can't support it.
Speaking of which, at these State of the Union speeches, the fun part, of course, is always to see what people stand to clap for and then what lines cause them to sit solemnly with their hands folded in their laps.
And you can learn a lot about a party or about a politician based on that.
So, here's just one example.
Here's a clip of Trump talking about putting an end to child sex trafficking.
Now, you would think When it comes to applause lines, that's the safest applause line you could possibly offer, is we're gonna put an end to child sex trafficking.
Right, I mean, everyone can applaud that.
Unless you are Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
Here she is.
Now here's the line, and I want you to watch her reaction to it.
Today he leads investigations into the scourge of international sex trafficking.
Elvin says that if I can make sure these young girls get their justice, I've really done my job.
Thanks to his work and that of his incredible colleagues, more than 300 women and girls have been rescued from the horror of this terrible situation.
And more than 1,500 sadistic traffickers have been put behind bars.
That's pretty remarkable.
She begrudgingly stands after a while and doesn't clap.
You could see her practically rolling her eyes, like, all right, I'll stand.
And then she just sits there with her hands folded, refusing to clap.
And I remind you, everyone else is clapping at the idea of fighting child sex trafficking.
AOC can't even stand for that or clap for that.
But if you really want to see the Democrats looking sullen, then let's check out their reaction to Trump talking about ending late-term abortion.
As I said, I thought this was the best part of the speech.
This was the most effective moment.
Once again, this is something that I think Trump needs help framing and coming up with the words to address this sort of issue.
But this is also a message that you're not going to hear it from other Republicans, especially at a State of the Union, and especially in terms this direct and straightforward.
Other Republican presidents maybe have spoken briefly about protecting the unborn or protecting life, and then they just quickly move on.
But Trump goes into more detail.
So, now what I'm going to do is I want to play the whole bit for you, but I'm going to play first just the beginning of him when he's describing late-term abortion.
And I want you to focus on Chuck Schumer's expression.
And then we'll play the rest.
So here is Trump describing the murder of fully developed infants in the third trimester who can feel pain.
And again, I want you to watch Chuck Schumer as he describes it.
Here it is.
Lawmakers in New York cheered with delight upon the passage of legislation that would allow a baby to be ripped from the mother's womb moments from birth.
These are living, feeling, beautiful babies who will never get the chance to share their love and their dreams with the world.
Okay.
I mean, the guy, he's literally turned into a Batman villain.
I mean, he is like the Penguin now from Batman.
He's sitting there with this evil grin as Trump talks about children being ripped from their mother's womb.
That's the phrase.
Children ripped from their mother's womb.
They never have a chance at life.
And Chuck Schumer is sitting there with this smile.
I mean, he's excited by the thought of it.
It's so creepy.
Schumer, he looks giddy about abortion.
I would call him a ghoul, but I feel like that would be unfair to ghouls.
And then here's the rest of Trump's remarks on abortion.
And as you watch this, I want you to watch, especially the white pantsuit brigade, all of the Democrat women.
I want you to watch how they react.
Here it is.
And then we had the case of the governor of Virginia, Where he stated he would execute a baby after birth.
To defend the dignity of every person, I am asking Congress to pass legislation to prohibit
the late-term abortion of children who can feel pain in the mother's womb.
Let's work together to build a culture that cherishes innocent life.
Thank you.
Now, he's not calling for an end to all abortion here.
He was just calling for an end to late-term abortion.
The killing of babies who can feel pain and are, in many cases, viable outside of the womb.
But the Democrat women are totally bummed by that.
You saw them.
They were sitting there completely bummed out about the idea of not killing babies.
Because they're so psyched about killing babies that anytime someone talks about not killing babies, they immediately start pouting.
They're on the verge of tears, almost, as Trump is just saying, hey, let's not kill babies in the third trimester.
You know, they can feel pain, and let's not do that.
And all the liberal women are sitting there like, no.
That's my impression of Democrat women.
No!
Honestly, if you were writing your own comic book and you decided to invent a political party as the villains of this comic book world, this is what you'd create.
The modern Democrat party is a comic book villain.
They are cartoonishly evil at this point.
That they would be scowling At the idea of protecting, you've got Trump saying, we have to protect all innocent life.
And these women are scowling about it.
Are you kidding me?
But it wasn't all sullenness on the part of the Democrats.
They did erupt in raucous applause one time.
And this was supposed to be an inspirational moment of unity or whatever.
But I found it pretty gross, to be honest.
So watch this.
All Americans can be proud.
that we have more women in the workforce than ever before.
Don't sit yet, you're going to like this.
And exactly one century after Congress passed the constitutional amendment giving women
the right to vote, we also have more women serving in Congress than at any time before.
So, we have a lot of women serving in Congress.
All right.
Now they're excited.
They're applauding.
Because why?
Because they're applauding themselves.
They couldn't applaud protecting babies.
They had trouble applauding the end of sex trafficking.
They obviously didn't applaud protecting the border, defending our laws.
But they'll applaud themselves.
Yay, we're women!
We got elected!
Great, good for you.
Yeah, awesome, okay.
Personally, I don't care that you're women.
I don't care that a bunch of women got elected.
I wouldn't care if no women were elected.
I wouldn't care if only women were elected.
If there were zero women in Congress or only women, it makes no difference to me.
I don't care at all in the slightest.
It doesn't matter.
The only thing that matters to me is, with politicians anyway, it's what laws What policies do they support?
That's the only thing I care about.
So excuse me if I'm not welling up with tears of pride and joy because a bunch of infanticidal, self-obsessed, identity-politic-pushing, egomaniacal women got elected.
Which is what most of them are this time around.
I mean, the vast majority of these women that were elected are Democrats, and they all fall into that category because that's what the Democrat Party is now.
So there is no, oh yeah, well, they're intent on killing babies, but at least they're women!
Okay, so they have two X chromosomes.
Who cares?
I don't.
Doesn't matter to me.
It's not progress, okay?
When you elect infanticidal people to Congress, it doesn't matter what gender they are, that is not progress.
That is a step back.
So yeah, if I could replace all those women with pro-life men, I would do it in a heartbeat.
Absolutely.
Call me misogynist, I don't care.
By the way, I don't want to belabor the point too much, but just by way of comparison, Here is the White Pantsuit Brigade applauding a 10-year-old cancer survivor.
Watch this.
When Grace completed treatment last fall, her doctors and nurses cheered.
They loved her.
They still love her.
with tears in their eyes as she hung up a poster that read, Last Day of Chemo.
Thank you very much.
You are a great inspiration to everyone in this room.
Thank you very much.
Okay, so they applauded.
Kind of unenthusiastic, polite applause, just sort of, you know.
The applause for, I just want you to compare, the applause for themselves was exponentially
more enthusiastic and raucous and congratulatory, self-congratulatory in their case.
That's what they're, that's why I say self-obsessed egomaniacs.
That's what they're excited about.
It's about themselves congratulating themselves.
So all in all, Trump came off very well and the Democrats, did themselves no favors.
So big win for Trump.
One other thing I wanted to mention, Kamala Harris reacted to Trump's pro-life message last night with a tweet.
And the tweet was your standard Democrat cliche.
She said, politicians should not tell women what to do with their bodies.
Okay.
Only it was one of those things that you see on Twitter where in between each word there's a clapping hand emoji.
I mean, you've seen that, right?
What is that anyway?
Who does that in real life?
Who in real life will clap in between each word to emphasize their point?
I've never seen that.
So how did that become?
What would that even look like?
Politicians should not tell women.
I mean, what is that?
Does anyone do that?
Putting that aside, I find it interesting that Democrats are still using this talking point, and you see how the Democrats, liberals, they just, they are not consistent, and they make no effort to be consistent, and they hold views that are so crazy and so delusional that they can't really apply them consistently.
So in this case, if they were actually being consistent, Well, they can't use slogans like this anymore.
Politicians should not tell women what to do with their bodies.
Well, according to them, men can get pregnant.
Isn't this transphobia?
Shouldn't Kamala Harris?
This should be a big scandal on the left.
Kamala Harris is a transphobic bigot.
Because Trump was talking about abortion.
And what does Kamala Harris do?
She immediately associates that with women, and she says, don't tell women what to do with their bodies.
Well, a man can get pregnant, can't he?
So this is not, you can't define, we are not defined, we make up our own genders, right?
We're not defined by our biology.
I'm not gonna have my gender assigned to me at birth.
So how dare you, Kamala Harris?
How dare you associate pregnancy and babies and reproductive health with only women?
That is transphobia.
So all this stuff, no uterus, no opinion.
If you're not a woman, you can't have an opinion about it.
Women's rights, women's health, all of it.
You have to get rid of all of that.
You can't say that stuff anymore.
According to your own ideology, that is all gone.
You can't do that.
Because it doesn't mean anything anymore, remember?
There is no women's health.
What does that mean?
If by women's health you're referring to abortion, anything that has to do with... then the phrase women's health is exclusionary?
Transphobic?
Right?
So you see, they can't even put all the pieces of their own agenda and their own ideology together, and they don't even try, because they know that everything conflicts with everything else.
It all contradicts each other, because it's all so crazy.
So when they're making this argument, then they'll make one argument over here, and then they'll put that argument down on the shelf and just leave it to the side.
Then they'll go over here and make a different argument that contradicts that argument, But they keep it all together.
They never put it together into one cogent, coherent system of thought, because they can't.
All right.
Let's check some of your email.
Go to the inbox, mattwalshow at gmail.com, mattwalshow at gmail.com, if you want to chime in with a question, comment, concern, whatever it may be.
Insult is fine too.
So this is from Ashley.
She says, Hi Matt.
One interesting thing I noticed about the Washington Post commercial was that they showed footage of D-Day and the landing on the moon.
Neither of which had journalists even present.
Such a dumb commercial.
Keep up the good work.
That's a good point.
Uh, the, yeah, the filming, how was, I didn't even notice that.
I, I, I'd have to go back and watch the commercial.
I'll take your word for it.
They had the, uh, The moon landing was filmed by the astronauts themselves.
So apparently the moon landing has become an instance of journalistic courage as well.
They had nothing to do with it.
All they did was just report it on the news.
Great point, Ashley.
Derek says, Hey Matt, I recall in an episode a few weeks ago you mentioned you watch competitive bass fishing.
Just curious if you are a bass fisherman as well.
If so, that's awesome.
I strongly encourage you to get involved in the sport.
Help spread knowledge of the awesome sport.
That's an American-made sport.
See you on the water.
I do.
I don't even know if I could call myself a bass fisherman because I feel like you have to get to a certain level of expertise before you can really describe yourself in that way.
Much like, you know, if you write a blog post once every two months, you can't really call yourself a writer, right?
You've got to write a lot more.
So, I don't know if I rise to that level, but I do try to get out on the water and fish, mostly for bass.
I can't say that I'm especially good at it, but if you have any tips, Derek, please let me know.
Curtis says, Matt, have you heard about the Liam Neeson issue?
I was wanting to get your thoughts on the subject.
Hi Curtis.
Yeah, I have followed that a little bit.
Liam Neeson admitted that many years ago, after his friend was raped, And she told him about it.
This is back in Ireland.
In a follow-up interview, he said this was 40 years ago.
And she was raped, told him about it, said that it was a black man who did it.
And then he admitted in this interview that he then prowled the streets for about a week looking to get into a violent altercation with a black man so that he could get his revenge.
And he wanted to take revenge on any person who looked like the rapist, not even just on the rapist himself.
So he says no violence occurred, but that's what he was hoping for for a week because he was so angry about this horrible thing that had happened.
And he admits that it was terrible.
He says it was awful.
He's remorseful about it.
He volunteered this whole story, which was not smart, rather a dumb move to do, but But he volunteered.
He said it's an awful, horrible thing.
He expressed great remorse for it.
So what's my take?
Well, I think there is no take, really, to have.
There's no opinion to have on it.
Yes, it's awful, of course, to consider taking revenge on any person who has the same race as a guy who did a horrible thing.
That, of course, is awful and terrible.
But Neeson knows that.
He said so himself.
It was a very long time ago.
He's repented of it, obviously.
So, what is there to say about it?
I know it's become this big thing, viral thing, and people are, I just don't know what opinion you can offer, because we could say, well, that's terrible, that's a horrible thing, you shouldn't do that.
And Liam Neeson says, yeah, I know, that's my point.
I was offering this as a story of a thing that I feel great regret and remorse for.
So, okay, all right, let's just move on with our lives.
I don't know what else to say.
This is from Patty.
She says, Hi Matt, I am familiar with the question of the eternal fate of unbaptized babies having been troubled by it for years, but I must add a few corrections to the way you presented it.
At least in the case of Catholic theology, mid-20th century catechisms explained it as One, a theological supposition that was not doctrine.
It did not have to be believed.
And two, that babies who died without being baptized would not go to hell, but to limbo, a place of perfect natural happiness, one such as Eden was before the fall, and to which the souls of the good went before Christ opened the gates of heaven.
It was not a punishment, and there was no torment involved.
Still, I always rejected the idea that God would not want all his children with him, and that he would have to withhold the beatific vision from souls who were unbaptized through no fault of their own.
A learned priest told me that the view of unbaptized babies going to limbo instead of heaven is no longer upheld by Catholic theologians.
Right, Paddy.
Well, I don't think you're correcting anything.
I didn't say anything that contradicts that.
I don't think I did, anyway.
As far as limbo, it was, as you say, a theological theory.
Based, in my opinion, on nothing other than the imagination of theologians.
They constructed this whole realm called Limbo, basically out of whole cloth.
There's no basis for it.
It's just something that they came up with.
So, in my opinion, we are not only not required to believe it, but I think that we should believe it.
Because it's not based on anything other than the speculations of medieval theologians, and I just don't know why that should really carry any weight in this case.
And the other problem is it also seems, so I know that if you speculate something like limbo, you think, well, you get around the whole hell thing there, because even though you've just made up this thing called limbo, in your mind, you've gotten around hell, because you're saying, well, maybe, you know, it's not active suffering and torment, but first of all, if it's eternal separation from God, not to mention from I mean, if it's eternal separation from God, not to mention all of your loved ones and everything, I don't know how that would not be eternal torment.
How is that not suffering?
But in any case, the other problem with it is that It kind of, it strips power from God.
It suggests that God is not powerful enough to figure out a way to get these babies into heaven.
That it sort of presents a problem to him that he can't fix, and so he has to cast them out somewhere else.
And the other issue is that it takes kind of a, it turns the atonement into some pretty weak sauce, doesn't it?
If it can't even cover dead infants?
If dead infants are not covered by the Atonement, then haven't you just severely mitigated the effect and the power of Christ's saving sacrifice?
So, anyway, I agree with you.
From Lenny, he says, Matt, I thought your reasoning as to why babies don't go to hell was not good.
You said that a just and merciful God wouldn't send babies to hell.
How is that your determination?
Isn't it possible that you just don't understand justice and mercy?
I just don't see how you could presume to make those kinds of declarations.
I think it's very possible that some young people, even babies, are damned upon death.
I would never presume to tell God he can't do that.
We are all sinners after all.
None are righteous.
None at all.
Well, Lenny, as I explained yesterday, And here you are talking about, you're not talking about some limbo that you've made up.
You're talking about babies going to hell to be tormented for all eternity.
That's what you're talking about.
You said damned, right?
Well, as I explained yesterday, if the word mercy has a definition that includes damning infants to trillions of years of torture, Then the word has no discernible meaning at all.
It just, it doesn't mean anything to say mercy.
I want you, come up, how about this?
I'll give you a challenge, Lenny.
Come up with a definition of mercy.
Come up with a discernible, meaningful definition of the word mercy that could possibly include torturing infants for trillions of years.
Can you do that?
Because if you can't, then that creates a logical problem.
So it's not about putting God in a box or anything like that.
This becomes more of like, can God make a square circle?
And the answer is no, because it's illogical.
It is a logical contradiction.
Can God make a boulder so big that he can't lift it?
No, it's a logical contradiction.
I would say that a merciful God damning infants To an eternity of suffering is a logical contradiction.
You've just put two opposite things together, and you can't do that.
When we call God just and merciful and loving, we must mean something.
These words have to carry some meaning.
And if, when we say God is merciful, if all we really mean to say is God is what He is, then again, the sentence doesn't mean anything, and we have no guarantee in that case that God is not cruel, and unjust, and evil.
If you're telling me that all we can say about God is, well, He is what He is, and whatever He is, that's what He is.
True, but if that's all we can say about God, then we have no guarantee at all that He's not a cruel monster, right?
Point being, if all we can say about God is that He is what He is, then we end up with a sort of, like, deism, right?
where God is this totally mysterious force that we cannot say anything about.
But if you insist, as I'm sure you do, and as I do, and as Scripture does, and as
Christianity has, for thousands of years, that God is merciful as opposed to cruel, then we must have some definition of mercy that excludes cruelty, right?
If we include cruelty, such as the cruelty of torturing infants, if we include that in the definition, then again we're back to this place of deism, where we can't say anything about God, because none of the words mean anything.
So, I say that God doesn't damn babies to hell, because when I say that I believe that God is merciful and loving, I mean it.
I actually mean, I intend for that sentence to mean something.
And so, that's all.
Now, I understand that the, well, a loving God wouldn't do that argument, is often used to fallacious effect.
Oftentimes you'll have atheists and others who use that argument in illegitimate ways.
So I understand that.
But there are certain things that we can say a loving God wouldn't do.
Because for the millionth time, if there's nothing that we can rule out, then calling God loving means nothing and stop saying it.
it. You don't mean anything when you say it. So there we go.
Another example that we could say, well, God can't do.
God can't lie.
I feel very confident saying that.
God, as an all-perfect, all-good, all-loving being, cannot lie.
So, am I putting God in a box?
Am I daring to tell God what He can and can't do?
No, I'm not telling him what to do, but I am making a declaration about what he does and doesn't do.
He doesn't lie.
Because that would be in contradiction with an all-loving and all-perfect being.
And I would argue that sending babies to trillions of years of torment is also in a contradiction.
It could contradict, now I say it contradicts his mercy.
The only other option is that it contradicts his omnipotence, his power.
Because if we're saying that there's nothing he can do, right?
For some reason he has to send them there.
He can't figure out a way to bring them in.
Well then now you've just taken power from him.
So by entertaining this idea, you either strip him of mercy or you strip him of power.
And I think that that is the presumptuous thing.
And also the very damaging thing, because when you go around saying this, it's very scandalizing, and I think it turns many people off of faith and God, and it gives them an impression of God as this utterly monstrous figure.
And I don't think that's a good thing to do.
All right, we'll leave it there.
Thanks for watching, everybody.
Thanks for listening.
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