We were promised bombshells in the whistleblower report. Did it deliver? Democrats and Republicans have switched sides on the impeachment issue since 1998, but the real problem is that the same Democrats and Republicans have been in office since 1998. Mattel established world peace by releasing a line of gender neutral dolls. And Rep. Rashida Tlaib makes crazy, anti-science claims in an effort to ban e-cigs. Date: 09-26-2019
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Step six, I impose the death penalty on everyone who FaceTimes in public or ditches their shopping cart in the middle of the parking lot.
Step seven, utopia.
That is our path.
I just laid it out.
Things look pretty dicey right now, but we could be headed towards really paradise on earth.
It is within our grasp.
So, that's my plan anyway.
Now, the whistleblower complaint is, as I'm sure you've heard, in the Director of National Intelligence, Joseph Maguire, testifying on Capitol Hill.
Lots of stuff going on, which we're going to talk about in just a moment.
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All right, first let's talk about this whistleblower thing.
And, look, one of the things I hate about these kinds of stories is that everybody becomes an expert.
Right?
I'm sure you've noticed.
Everyone's an expert.
Everyone, especially talking heads like myself, suddenly act like they have some sort of relevant expertise that will enable them to give meaningful insight.
They say, I've looked at this whistleblower report, and according to my experience, of which I have none, I admit that I have no expertise here at all.
I could only just read this stuff like you and follow the news reports and give you my general impression for what it's worth, which probably isn't that much.
So now that I've told you why my opinion doesn't matter at all and you shouldn't listen to it, I will move on to giving you my opinion.
First, I think, again, with this whistleblower report, just like with the transcript yesterday, or the Mueller report, or anything else, the Democrats have overplayed their hand significantly, which is a stupid move politically, obviously, because it can overshadow or blunt the impact of otherwise troubling revelations or allegations.
And that's why you don't hype things up too much beforehand.
Everybody knows that.
Everyone should know it.
So there's a classic blunder.
If you really think you've got something good up your sleeve, you don't need to tell anybody ahead of time.
Like the other night, just as an example, I made some absolutely amazing meatballs, but I didn't tell my family ahead of time.
Now, I knew the meatballs were great, but I didn't say them.
I didn't tell my wife and my kids, oh, these are great meatballs.
You're going to love them.
Instead, I just gave them the meatballs and I let them experience them and be brought to tears of joy over how great the meatballs were, which is exactly what happened.
No exaggeration.
So yes, I am comparing the whistleblower report to meatballs.
This is the level of commentary you can expect from this show.
I don't even know why you're watching it.
Now, what does the whistleblower complaint primarily consist of?
It seems it mainly consists of recounting the transcripts we already read and talking about media reports that we've already seen.
The only troubling part is the part that alleges what could be, if it were true, a cover-up.
Let me read from the Whistleblower Report.
It says, White House officials told me that they were directed, that's
in quotes, by White House lawyers to remove the electronic transcript from the
computer system, transcript of the call between the Ukrainian president and Trump, in which
such transcripts are normally stored for coordination, finalization, and distribution to cabinet-level
officials.
Instead, the transcript was loaded into a separate electronic system that is otherwise used to store and handle classified information of an especially sensitive nature.
One White House official described this act as an abuse of this electronic system because the call did not contain anything remotely sensitive from a national security perspective.
Now, and then there's a couple other references to that, and the claim here that's being made is that this is something White House officials have done on a number of occasions, not just with the Ukrainian thing, but with other politically sensitive material that they have put into, and they've stored in a separate server to keep it away from prying eyes.
I don't want to get into cliches about the cover-up is worse than the crime.
But, well, there you go.
It is.
And, yes, this is third-hand anonymous information.
This is an anonymous claim from someone who heard it second-hand.
So, therefore, for us, it is third-hand.
So, you take it with whatever amount of salt is necessary, and it probably is a pretty heaping dose.
But the claim that a computer system is being used as a means to hide politically sensitive material, well, the claim is there.
Might not be true, but it's there.
It's in the report, so now it's going to be investigated.
And I have no doubt we're going to hear more about this, and it will become maybe the key point in impeachment as we move forward.
But at any rate, that, as far as I can tell, is really the only relevant part of the complaint.
The rest of it restates what we already read, either in the transcript or in other media reports.
That should be something.
If you really want this whistleblower report to be true and to be an actual documentation of criminal activity.
Now, it's sad that so many people do want that.
They want the president to have committed a crime.
That's a totally separate discussion.
But if you do want that, it should trouble you that there are so many references to media reports.
Why would a whistleblower need to reference things that were in TheHill.com?
But Democrats aren't focused enough to home in on this aspect of it.
Instead, we get... Well, in fact, let's watch Adam Schiff in his opening statement before the DNI's testimony this morning.
I think he... This is pretty remarkable.
Watch this.
And so what happened on that call?
Zelensky begins by ingratiating himself, and he tries to enlist the support of the president.
He expresses his interest in meeting with the president and says his country wants to acquire more weapons from us to defend itself.
And what is the president's response?
Well, it reads like a classic organized crime shakedown.
We've been very good to your country.
Very good.
No other country has done as much as we have.
But you know what?
I don't see much reciprocity here.
I hear what you want.
I have a favor I want from you, though.
And I'm going to say this only seven times, so you better listen good.
I want you to make up dirt on my political opponent.
Understand lots of it.
On this and on that.
I'm going to put you in touch with people, and not just any people.
I'm going to put you in touch with Attorney General of the United States, my Attorney General, Bill Barr.
He's got the whole weight of the American law enforcement behind him.
And I'm going to put you in touch with Rudy.
You're going to love him, trust me.
You know what I'm asking, and so I'm only going to say this a few more times, in a few more ways.
And by the way, don't call me again.
I'll call you when you've done what I asked.
This is, in sum and character, what the president was trying to communicate with the presidents of Ukraine.
It would be funny if it wasn't such a graphic betrayal of the president's oath of office.
So you see what he just did there, right?
He gave a fictional retelling of the transcript.
That lengthy quote that he offered was not real.
That's not actually what was in the transcript.
He made that up.
I started my show yesterday as a joke.
Making up a Trump transcript, a damning Trump transcript.
It was a joke.
Adam Schiff, in this, what's supposed to be a very important hearing nationally televised, he actually did it!
He just made up his own transcript, which is pretty jaw-dropping.
And I'm sure it will have the desired effect for some viewers.
Pretty straightforward, really.
He did that because he knows that a lot of ignorant people watching Are going to have not done their own research, not have read the transcript themselves, and they're going to hear that, and they're going to say, oh my gosh, this really is damning.
I can't believe he said all that.
Instead of talking about the scandal itself, this is what Schiff wants us to talk about.
But it also gives Republicans a very valid deflection, which is why I think it's a politically stupid move.
Because now Republicans can talk about this outrageous, dishonest spectacle from Adam Schiff, rather than talking about the hearing itself.
So again, the only thing that really stands out is that bit about the politically sensitive documents being stashed somewhere on an NSC computer server.
But third-hand anonymous claims are a problem.
And we've seen enough of them, and we've seen enough of them not pan out, to be very, very skeptical of them.
Maybe the White House does have a file somewhere where they put records of all the stupid things Trump says in phone calls.
That wouldn't really surprise me.
It also wouldn't necessarily be criminal.
But I don't know.
And just reading that written in a document anonymously is not enough to assume that it's true.
And if we've learned nothing from the last three years, we should have at least learned that.
Something else I wanted to say here, because there's a separate issue related to this that's been on my mind.
Over the last week there have been a lot of videos floating around online, you've probably seen some of them, comparing what various prominent politicians are saying now about impeachment to what they said about impeachment in 1998.
Not surprisingly, the Democrats who are very much in favor of impeachment in 2019 were very much against it in 1998.
And then you can also find quotes from Republicans who were all about it in 1998 and now are saying that it's a terrible thing to do.
Here's just, this one I think is probably the most striking.
Here's one example of those videos featuring the lovely Nancy Pelosi.
Today the Republican majority is not judging the President with fairness, but impeaching him with a vengeance.
In the investigation of the President, fundamental principles which Americans hold dear Privacy, fairness, checks and balances have been seriously violated.
And why?
Because we are here today because the Republicans in the House are paralyzed with hatred of President Clinton.
And until the Republicans free themselves of this hatred, our country will suffer.
I rise to oppose these unfair motions which call for the removal of the President of the United States from office.
The Independent Council knew that the President was exonerated when Travelgate, Whitewater, and Filegate... This was not fair.
Indeed, it is the responsibility of any prosecutor to immediately release information that is exculpatory.
Therefore, today, I'm announcing the House of Representatives moving forward with an official impeachment inquiry.
I'm directing our six committees to proceed with their investigations under that umbrella.
I'll tell you what jumps out at me when I see videos like that.
It's that these people have been in power for way, way, way too long.
That's the thing that I notice.
It's all the same players.
I also saw a, there was another video I saw this morning, I won't play it because I'm not going to play all the videos, but Nadler.
Here's another video.
This is a video of him 20 years ago when he looked to be about 300 pounds heavier.
And he was talking about how impeachment is erasing an election and it's an attack on the voters.
It's all the same people.
It's all the same characters.
Still in there.
So if we take nothing else from this, we should take the need for maybe term limits.
That 20 years have passed between this impeachment scandal and the last one, and it's all the same people saying the same things.
Well, not the same things, really opposite things from what they said before.
That's sad, and that's not how a democracy is supposed to work.
All right, let's move on to, here's an important story.
Everybody else is talking about whistleblowers and impeachment, but to me, this is the thing we need to focus on.
Mattel is releasing gender-neutral dolls, and Time has a whole story about it.
They're very excited about it.
I want to read just a little bit of it to you, because it's funny, but also because there's a point I want to make here at the end of this.
Okay, so this is Mattel on the gender-neutral dolls.
It says, a child opens a box.
He starts jumping and screaming with joy.
Not an unusual sound in the halls of Mattel's headquarters where researchers test new toys.
But this particular toy is a doll, and it's rare for parents to bring boys into these research groups to play with dolls.
It's rarer still for a boy to immediately attach himself to one the way that Shia just did.
An eight-year-old who considers himself gender-fluid and whose favorite color is black one wink, pink the next, Shia sometimes plays with his younger sister's dolls at home, but they're girly princess stuff, he says dismissively.
I'm going to stop here for a minute, and I'm going to sound like a broken record, but an eight-year-old who considers himself gender-fluid, that sentence means nothing.
It means nothing, first of all, because the phrase gender-fluid means nothing.
Gender is not a... There is no gender fluid.
Despite what we are told.
Gender is an objective thing.
It's not a fluid.
It's not a spectrum.
But even aside from that, even if gender fluid did mean something, an eight-year-old who considers himself that, he has no idea what gender fluid means.
Well, nobody does, because it doesn't mean anything.
But he has very little clue what it even means to be a boy or a girl.
He doesn't really even know what that means.
If you ask this 8-year-old child to define what is a boy, he would probably have a difficult time giving you, especially a scientific definition.
Yet somehow he's decided that he doesn't quite identify as that.
Also, do you think it's a coincidence?
That his name is Shia?
That's S-H-I apostrophe A. And he identifies as genderfluid.
So he has this kind of ambiguous name, and then he ends up identifying as an ambiguous child.
What a coincidence!
That's not a self-fulfilling prophecy at all.
It says, this doll with its prepubescent body and childish features looks more like him, right down to the wave of bleach blonde bangs.
The hair is just like mine, Shia says, swinging his head in tandem with the doll's.
Then he turns to the playmate in the toy testing room, a seven-year-old girl named Jahase, and asks, should I put on the girl hair?
Shia fits a long blonde wig on the doll's head, and suddenly it is no longer an avatar for him, but for his sister.
And then it goes on from there.
Very lovely story.
Here's what the dolls look like, by the way.
Let me show you what they look like.
So those are the dolls.
I only really have one point I want to make here.
Have you noticed that, ironically, and these dolls capture it, ironically, gender-fluid, non-binary people, they all end up looking kind of the same, with same style and everything.
People identify this way so they can distinguish themselves and express themselves and be individuals.
But then they end up looking indistinguishable from everybody else who's trying to be an individual.
It's like when I was a kid, some people wanted to be different and unique, so they became goth.
That was the thing back when I was a kid.
It wasn't gender neutral or gender fluid.
It's the same basic idea, where it's just people who want to, I don't want to fit in with the crowd, I want to be different.
But then, the big joke with the goth kids is they all looked exactly the same.
They were wearing basically a uniform.
And that's what's funny, because if I said to you, if I said to you, picture a girl, just picture a girl in your head, not any specific girl, not someone you know, but just a girl.
You might have a general image in your mind of what a girl basically looks like, but a girl could look like so many different things, you're not going to be able to get very specific.
When you think about what a girl looks like, again, you have just a general idea.
But within those general parameters, a girl could look like many different things.
There could be a wide diversity of what a girl looks like.
Because there isn't really a girl uniform.
But if I said to you, picture someone who identifies as gender fluid, you immediately have in your mind an exact image of this person, down to the hairstyle, down to everything.
Because gender fluid is, ironically, a very rigid, specific kind of thing.
In their effort to be different and to be unique, they end up looking like everyone else who's making the same effort.
And that's because, actually, as it turns out, there isn't anything constricting or rigid about just being a boy or a girl.
There's a lot of leeway within those parameters to express yourself however you want.
But then when you try to leave those, when you want to be such an individual that you leave those parameters behind, that's when you end up in this very narrow box where you look like everybody else in the box.
Okay, I wanted to mention this too.
There was another hearing, this was a couple of days ago, not related to whistleblowers or impeachment or Trump at all, so just a little change of pace here, but I've got to play this for you because it's so weird and also funny.
It was a hearing on the dangers of e-cigarettes.
As we have talked about, there is an effort now, and this is why I always say, when you hear bipartisan, when something is bipartisan, that's when you should really be worried.
Whereas the media always tells us, oh, we need bipartisan agreement.
No, actually, that's when it's really bad.
If both sides are agreeing on something, now you've got to run for the hills, because you know it's something really stupid.
The e-cigarette thing is a good example.
This idea of banning e-cigarettes or certain flavors of them.
Trump likes the idea.
Democrats are on the same page.
Look, if the Democrats and Trump can agree, then you know it must be a really, really bad idea.
So, they were doing a hearing on it, and this is just to show you.
This is one thing that's very frustrating for people who, and I don't smoke e-cigarettes myself.
I guess smoke isn't even really the right term, but I don't use e-cigarettes.
It's a similar thing when we talk about marijuana.
The people who do use e-cigarettes or, you know, marijuana, they always get frustrated because it seems to them that the people who are opposed to it and want to ban it have no idea what they're talking about and don't know anything about it and yet they want to ban it.
And I think those people who are frustrated have reason to be frustrated, and we'll see why here in a second.
Rashida Tlaib, she was one of the representatives involved in this House Oversight and Reform Subcommittee.
And first, I'll play this clip for you, because this was just weird.
This was just a weird moment from Tlaib.
Watch this.
You call yourself a converted conservative and a reformed Marxist?
Are you a conspiracy theorist?
I think my politics are entirely irrelevant to this hearing.
Oh, okay.
Why were you winking at one of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle?
You winked.
Because I know Glenn Grothman.
Oh, that's what... So the winking... He introduced me.
He's a friend of mine.
Okay, I understand.
I didn't know what the winking was, because I thought maybe there was something, like a conspiracy...
You think there's a conspiracy in this hearing, ma'am?
May I address the truth?
You're still smoking, ma'am.
You're still smoking.
provide information. May I address the truth? No, no. Well the truth to you is very different
for the majority of people in this room who do believe that children are being targeted
by vagabonds. The truth for me is I quit smoking with these cigarettes and so did 8 million
other people. You're still smoking, ma'am. You're still smoking. I'm not smoking.
And I'm not lying under all of them.
Order, please.
And then, okay, so that's very strange.
But here's the part, and this is where it gets frustrating for, let's say, people who do vape.
Because here's the part where Tlaib makes a claim, a scientific claim.
This is the party of science, but makes a very anti-scientific scientific claim.
Watch this.
You know, I go in to speak to kids all the time.
You know, I do the second grade and third grade reading class.
They always ask, well, what do you do, you know?
And I tell them I work at the Capitol, and I show them the picture and tell them where it is, geography-wise.
And then I tell them, you know, when I was your age, I used to go to restaurants with my parents, and they say, you know, right now you go, and they say, how many people in your group?
When I was little, they said, non-smoking or smoking section.
And the kids are like, what?
And I was like, yeah, they would say non-smoking or smoking, Smoked in cigarettes in public places like restaurants, hospitals, schools, planes, and the kids' eyes are wide and they're like, what?
That's unbelievable.
And I said, yes, even though scientists, people were saying secondhand smoking was worse.
Was worse than directly smoking cigarettes.
And even though health experts and others were coming forward, you had big industry, corporate greed misleading information out there to the public.
What the real impact was on health.
And so it's so important that you all continue to speak truth.
She says scientists say that secondhand smoke is worse than directly smoking.
That is not true.
Scientists do not say that.
At least no credible scientists do.
That is absolutely not true.
Okay?
It doesn't even make any sense.
How could secondhand smoke be worse than directly smoking cigarettes?
When you smoke, you are inhaling directly from the cigarette.
You're also inhaling the secondary smoke too.
As the person who is smoking, you are going to be closer to the secondary.
I mean, unless, unless, maybe, if you're smoking and you've got someone tied down, like onto a chair, and then you're directly smoking in his face, just blowing it right into his face, maybe then.
But in a normal circumstance, if you're smoking, you're inhaling directly from the cigarette, but the smoke that comes out, you're also inhaling that too, because that's in the air around you.
So what Tlaib is claiming is that it's worse to only inhale some of the secondary smoke than it is to inhale all of the direct smoke and most of the secondary smoke.
Does that make any sense?
Now, is secondhand smoke good for you?
I don't think anyone's going to claim that it's a health benefit.
I don't think there's any studies showing that it's going to help you health-wise.
It is, though, an open question whether or not secondary smoke or secondhand smoke has any significant health benefits.
You know, has any significant negative impact on your health for people who are, you know, now if you have asthma, emphysema, something like that, bronchitis, then obviously being around secondhand smoke is a different matter.
But if you're basically a healthy person, the jury is kind of out on what kind of impact secondhand smoke is going to have on you, especially in a casual environment.
Now, if you're in an enclosed space with somebody smoking constantly for years at a time, then, again, that's going to be different from someone who's sort of casually around it.
But the link between secondhand smoke and cancer, there have been some studies that have found a link.
There have also been studies that have said that there's no link, there's no discernible link.
But putting all that to the side, this claim here is completely ridiculous.
It is not true.
And this, again, is exactly what is frustrating.
When you're someone who enjoys using a certain product, whether it's e-cigarettes, or regular cigarettes, or marijuana, or whatever, alcohol, and you've got other people advocating a ban on it, and then you notice that, or how about guns?
Maybe the number one example of what I'm talking about here.
Where famously, the Democrats who are the gun grabbers, when they get to talking about guns, you discover, you realize very quickly, they have no idea what they're talking about.
They've never probably even held a gun before, they don't even know the difference between the different types of firearms, they have no clue what they're talking about, and yet they want to ban it.
It would seem it would behoove you, it's your responsibility at a minimum, if you're going to advocate for banning something, at least learn what it is first, and what it actually does.
That goes from being funny to then when you think about it, it actually just ticks you off.
All right.
I have one more thing I need to discuss before we get to emails.
And I saved this for last, even though it's probably the most important issue of the day.
I don't make a habit of attacking my co-workers in public.
Mostly I attack them in private.
But one of my Daily Wire colleagues last night lashed out with the most bigoted attack I've ever seen.
And it was something that, well, Amanda Prestigiacomo, she's, if you read the site, you know the name.
She writes a lot of the articles.
She gets approximately 95 trillion hits a day on her articles, I think.
And I like her stuff generally, but this tweet crossed the line.
Essentially, it amounts to her coming out as a Nazi.
It's basically what it is.
So I want you to take a look at this.
And like I said, I'm very sorry that I need to publicly denounce someone who works for the same company, but what choice do I have?
She says, this is a really weird pet peeve of mine and it's probably crazy, but I really dislike men who are not on the beach wearing flip-flops.
What if a woman has a flat tire and you have to help?
What if there's some sort of altercation?
You can't react in flip-flops.
Now, underneath this outlandish, prejudiced, discriminatory screed, there are a bunch of women agreeing, you know, somehow, and insisting that, as men, we should forfeit our First Amendment rights to wear flip-flops.
Including, I should add, Allie Stuckey, a former colleague of mine at The Blaze.
And this, I'm just going after everybody now, but what am I going to do?
Generally, her stuff also is good, but she, and look at this, you aren't gonna believe it, she says, she says, no one needs to see man toes.
Apparently, Ali hasn't learned, doesn't realize, that body shaming is illegal in the United States.
Now, I need to speak up here, because sandal shaming has become one of the great crises of our time.
Men, like myself, Men who wear sandals, especially flip-flops, we are subjected to harassment, abuse, murder.
Yes, men are murdered routinely for wearing flip-flops.
It happens all the time.
And it has to end.
I'm not going to be ashamed of my sandals.
I won't be ashamed of my feet.
My feet, which are elegant and beautiful.
And if I wear socks with my sandals, which I do, it is not because I am ashamed of my feet, it is because I am proud of my socks.
Okay?
This whole notion that sandals are unmanly is absurd.
Unmanly?
Do your research.
Read a history book.
History of sandals.
Pick it up.
That's a real book.
I think.
You know who wore sandals?
The Vikings.
The Vikings were unmanly?
Really?
You think the Vikings couldn't change attire?
I mean, they probably couldn't because they weren't familiar with the technology.
But, I mean, you get my point.
Guess who else wore sandals?
Alexander the Great.
Gandalf.
William Wallace.
Aristotle.
Socrates.
Okay?
All of them, sandal wearers.
But sure, yeah, I guess it would have been better if they all were never born, according to Amanda.
Is that what you want?
You say, they shouldn't have been born at all.
That's what you said.
That's a direct quote.
So, how about this?
I'm going to end this debate right here, and then we're going to move on.
I'm going to show you something.
Look at this photograph.
Okay, you see this?
Who's in that photograph right there?
That's just someone named Jesus Christ, that's all.
Of Nazareth.
Although, by this picture, you'd think maybe he was from Minnesota, because he's pretty white.
He's maybe a lot whiter than you thought he would be, given that he's a Middle Eastern man, but that's not the point.
The point, I want you to zoom in.
Let's zoom in.
Now, what are on his feet?
You tell me.
What are on Jesus' feet?
Sandals.
Flip-flops, no less.
And what is he doing in sandals?
Oh, nothing but just walking on water.
So, I want you to think about that.
Anyone out there, next time you think of shaming a man for his flip flops, think about that.
WWJD.
That's all.
Alright, we'll go to emails.
MattWalshow at gmail.com.
MattWalshow at gmail.com.
This one from Lenny, I love this email because it's a pretty hilarious backhanded compliment and that's why I'm going to read it.
It says, Matt, I have to confess that I hated your show at first.
I thought it was preachy and boring and you seemed completely humorless.
I really wish that you would be fired for a long time.
But I came back to your show a few months ago and either you've changed completely or I have.
Now I find you hilarious and very interesting.
You're my favorite show on the Daily Wire now, the one I make sure to listen to every day.
Maybe I misjudged you.
I still think you're kind of a jerk and you get overly emotional about things sometimes and seem to ramble too much at points, but that's part of your charm.
I'm now a huge fan though.
There isn't another show out there quite like yours and I love it.
That...
There was just so much insulting and complimenting packed into one paragraph there, and I really appreciate that.
It's a little bewildering.
That's one of those things where someone says that, and your first reaction is, what?
And you're like, oh, OK, thanks.
But then when you leave, you're thinking, hold on a second.
Should I be happy now, or what?
Let's see here, this is from Maggie, says, Matt, your comments on Twitter about push presents were very dangerous for your health.
My recommendation, get your wife a push present, don't ask questions.
Yeah, so my wife, what she's referencing, my wife recently brought up this thing called push presents.
I don't know, have you heard of push presents?
Well, I had to Google it.
And my wife is pregnant, by the way, that's an important part of this.
Story.
But a push present is apparently presents that evidently the husband is supposed to buy for the wife as a congratulations, I guess, for the fact that she gave birth.
Here's my point, and this is what Maggie is referencing, and really this should be uncontroversial, but I think that the man should be receiving the push present because I think you could argue And I try to explain this to my wife.
You could argue that pregnancy is harder on the man than it is on the woman.
Now, yeah, she's the one who has the physical side effects to wrestle with, but I think, you know, the emotional toll on the man having to deal with... I mean, not deal with, deal with... But listen, all I'm saying is that sometimes it can tend to be, you know, trying.
Well, not trying.
I don't mean trying.
But, you know...
Women, when they're pregnant, can be difficult.
Not difficult, but you get... So... Anyway, I hope my wife doesn't...
Watch this show.
Let's move on.
From Aaron says, Hi Matt, a few times now I've heard you almost flirt with the lie of evolution.
You've never come out and explicitly said that you believe in it.
I'm wondering if you have the guts to do that if you really do believe it.
I'm sure you must recognize that evolution is called a theory for a reason.
It's just a guess made by scientists with an agenda.
They want to think we are descended from chimps because they want us to live in a godless world.
I hope that you have not been deceived, but I'm afraid based on your comments that you have.
Hello, Aaron.
First of all, and thanks for bringing this up, actually, because I think it's a really interesting subject.
But first of all, don't accuse me of flirting with evolution.
I'm married, I would never do that.
Second, you asked me if I believe in it.
Well, evolution is not a religious doctrine.
I don't know if believe in it is really the best phrasing.
I get what you're saying, I just... That phrasing seems weird to me.
Do I think that the evidence overwhelmingly points in its direction?
Yes.
Because it does.
It simply does.
That's all.
And I think any honest reading of the science behind it will lead you to that conclusion.
Now, let me try to clear up a few things here.
Because these are common misconceptions.
And there's a few things you said in your email that are factually incorrect.
And so I want to clear those up.
Because I really believe that There are a significant number of Christians in America who either flat out reject evolution or are skeptical about it.
I think maybe for a lot of them, if they understood what the theory really is, and I don't mean this as an insult, I think that a lot of people, they really don't know what it is.
They don't really understand what the claim is, and that's what I notice anyway when I talk to people about it, because they say things that are, well, no, that's not evolution.
Okay, so for instance, you say it's just a theory.
Which is like a guess.
Well, that's wrong.
That's incorrect.
It's a popular misconception again, but theory in a scientific sense is not a guess.
It's not what's meant by the word.
It's not how you define scientific theory.
It's not a hypothesis either.
Hypothesis is A separate thing.
It leads up to a theory.
So it might begin with a hypothesis.
But a theory in science, here's what it means.
It means something that is explanatory.
It is a tested, verified explanation for what we observe in nature.
That's what a theory is.
So I can't stress this enough.
The phrase, just a scientific theory, is absurd.
What you're saying is, well, it's just a tested and verified explanation.
The just in that sentence seems kind of out of place, you know?
Now, why do you think we still speak of the germ theory of disease, or the theory of relativity, or the heliocentric theory, or the theory of gravity?
Does that mean that gravity, germs, and the Earth's orbit are all guesses?
They aren't facts we don't know?
No, they are facts.
It is a fact that the Earth orbits around the Sun.
It is a fact that germs cause disease.
It is a fact that gravity is a fact.
But they are explanatory facts, and that's why we call them theories.
Okay.
Now.
Evolution.
Here's why it's a theory.
Which is to say, here's how it has risen to that lofty level of being a scientific theory.
Because Darwin came up with a workable model to explain the diversity of life on Earth.
And a workable, testable model.
And that's how real science works.
And I know the word science is thrown around a lot these days, and there are people claiming things that are science that aren't.
We just gave an example of that with Rashida Tlaib.
But if it's real science, that means it's testable.
You can go and test it.
You don't have to take anyone's word for it.
You don't have to take it on faith.
You can go and look at it.
Test it.
Ever since he postulated the theory of evolution, subsequent discoveries have consistently confirmed it, while nothing has disconfirmed it.
So I'll say that again.
Every relevant discovery, every relevant discovery since that theory has had the effect of confirming it.
There has not been one relevant discovery To have a significant disconfirming effect.
So his theory had predictive power, which is how you know it's good.
Keep in mind, Darwin, he came up, he came out with the origin of species.
It wasn't yet known that the Earth is 4 billion years old.
Which it is, by the way.
It's certainly several billion years old, we know that.
And he didn't know about genetics either.
Mendel was working on that sort of parallel to Darwin, but they weren't working together on it.
Yet, in order for Darwin's idea to work, the Earth would need to be billions of years old, and there would need to be some kind of mechanism whereby our traits are passed down through the generations.
And what do you know?
Subsequent discoveries in geology and genetics, as well as archaeology, paleontology, chemistry, cosmology, really every field of study, have confirmed that.
They've all lined up perfectly with what was originally proposed.
So that's really powerful.
You know, it really is.
It's just like the scientists who were able to, it's like the scientists who came up, based on mathematical equations, you had scientists who came up with this idea that black holes must exist somewhere in the universe, and then what do you know, a few months ago, we actually found one!
So that's a really good theory.
When you come up with it, when you say, OK, if I'm right about this, we're going to discover X, Y, Z, and then we do discover X, Y, Z, well, that is very powerful.
That is a very, very strong indication that the original idea was largely correct.
I focus on genetics because that's really where it's at.
People get caught up on fossils and everything, but fossils really almost don't matter.
The fossils do confirm evolution.
The stuff about how there's a missing link and we haven't found it, that's not true.
That's false.
We do have the fossils.
We have the links.
But the vast majority, I mean the vast, vast, vast, vast majority of life forms that have ever existed on Earth are not going to fossilize because you need a certain specific condition for fossilization to occur.
Most life forms will not fossilize.
And the small, small minority that do fossilize, the vast majority of those will never be found.
So what that tells you is that fossils are important, but you can only learn so much from that because the sample size is going to be so small.
And that's why genetics is so important.
This, to me, this is the whole thing.
According to Darwin, what he said, long before anyone could actually confirm this, but he said that we are most closely related to chimpanzees, and then further down the family tree would be mice and dogs and things like that, and then further away would be fish and other lower life forms.
And by the way, let me back up, because you had another mistake in what you said.
You said that we're descended from chimps.
That's not the theory.
No, that's not how the theory goes.
Nobody thinks we're descended from chimps, any more than you are descended from your cousin.
And this is why when people say, oh, well, if we're really descended from chimps, then how do chimps still exist?
That's like saying, if I'm really descended from my grandfather, then how does my cousin exist?
It doesn't make any sense.
The idea is that 7 million years ago, we shared a common ancestor.
It's not a direct line, like your great-grandfather was a chimpanzee.
We share a common ancestor a long time ago.
That's what the theory says.
And that's what Darwin proposed.
Well, finally, a century later, when we could look at the human genome, we found that, what do you know, we shared 99% of our DNA with chimps.
A little bit less with mice, far less with fish, and on and on down the line.
Okay?
What is that, a coincidence?
I think genetics just puts to rest any reasonable doubt on this subject, because we can look at our genes and we can see the familiar relationships.
So either Darwin was basically right, although he wasn't right about everything he said, obviously, but he was basically right, or, or God is trying to trick us.
God is playing a fun little trick by making our DNA exactly match what the evolutionary theory predicts.
What to you seems more likely?
Again, genetics, this is a testable, workable thing.
We know that it works.
Scientists can go into a laboratory, they can look at your genes, and they can tell you who you're related to, and they will be right.
Because you can establish relations through genetics.
And it's by that same system, in that same field of study, where they can establish relations between the species.
Which is exactly what you would expect if Darwin was right.
And it's exactly what you would not expect if Darwin was wrong.
If Darwin was wrong, then when we were finally able to look at the human genome, we should have discovered that there is no similarity at all between us and chimpanzees.
That's what we should have discovered, if he was wrong.
But we discovered the opposite.
And there have been many, many, many other confirmations of evolutionary theory over the last many decades.
You know, one of them is that we have seen it happen.
We have watched it happen.
We have observed evolution happening in real time.
For example, certain species of moths during the Industrial Revolution, over the last 100, 200 years, have turned darker.
Okay?
Why is that?
Because, well, because darker blends in more with the environment now, living in a concrete jungle with air pollution and everything else.
How does that happen?
Natural selection.
And this was really Darwin's innovation.
Evolutionary theory predates him.
Natural selection was his thing.
Actually, there was someone else who, at the same time, came up with a similar idea.
But in any case, natural selection is very simple.
Genetic mutations produce different traits In living things.
There's nothing theoretical about that.
We know that, right?
You would agree.
You have genetic mutations, and they produce different traits.
Okay?
Agreed, right?
We all agree.
Okay.
Now, those genetic traits are passed down through the generations, through reproduction.
You would agree, correct?
I mean, no one disagrees with that.
Okay, great.
Some traits, are going to be advantageous for survival, and some won't be.
The creatures that have those advantageous traits are more likely to survive, thus are more likely to reproduce, and so those traits are going to pass down, while the traits that are not advantageous for survival are going to die off, because the people with those... whatever creature we're talking about, whether it's moths or people or whatever, are going to die off.
So that's...
That's the whole thing.
That's it.
In 100 years or 200 years, it can produce mild changes, like a moth changing color.
So, that's my point.
No one thinks that it's, you know, you hear this analogy sometimes where evolution is like, it's like claiming that, you know, if you took a bunch of pieces of metal and jumbled them together, you'd end up with a Boeing 747.
That's not what evolutionary theory, of course, that's absurd.
That wouldn't happen, right?
It's not what it says.
It just says it's descent with modification.
You have certain traits advantageous for survival.
Those are going to live on while the ones that are not advantageous die off.
And then over time, you have gradual changes.
In a hundred years, we can see a moth change color.
We've seen that.
In a hundred million years, so a million times longer, the changes will be more significant.
That makes a lot of sense, doesn't it?
So what's the issue here?
It's perfectly sensible, confirmed by science, observable, testable, logical, no problem.
If people just understood what it actually is, I think a lot of this controversy would go away.
And when I say study it, To go on Google and type in how to debunk evolution or whatever, you know, and we all study things that way.
I think a lot of us, when we claim that we research something, that's really what we did.
Where we had our conclusion already in mind, based on our preconceived notions, and then we look specifically for talking points on the internet that would help us support that conclusion.
That's not research.
That's not what research is.
You have to look at the whole context of something.
And you have to try to find sources that do not appear to be propaganda, that don't have clear biases.
Everybody has a bias.
But if there's a clear bias, a clear vested interest in a certain conclusion, you gotta stay away from those sources as much as possible.
And at the very least, read both sides.
So, with evolution, don't just read some debunking website.
Without actually going to the scientists themselves and seeing what they... Read a whole book written by a scientist explaining what evolution is.
There's a lot of books out there like this.
Read it yourself.
Don't have someone else tell you what's wrong with it.
Read it yourself.
Read the whole book.
The whole thing.
Just one book.
I challenge you to that, Aaron.
I challenge you.
Find a book explaining evolution, not written by someone who's a skeptic debunking it, giving you a talking book, but a whole book explaining what it is.
Read the whole book.
That's it.
That's my whole challenge.
Now, how does this affect things theologically?
Well, not at all, as far as I can tell.
God has obviously chosen to create things in a gradual way.
So what?
That's fine.
God guides the formation and development of life, and he does it gradually.
I see no issue there.
I see no problem with it.
Does that mean that we can't interpret the Genesis 100% literally?
Yeah, it does.
But again, so what?
Some things in the Bible are not literal.
The Bible talks about the sun moving in the sky around the earth.
That's what the Bible talks about.
Now, we know that that is not literally true.
The earth moves around the sun, not the other way around.
A lot of people For hundreds, for many centuries, a lot of people thought that those verses that seemed to indicate a heliocentric model of the universe, thought that those verses were literal.
And that's what got Galileo in trouble when he came along and said, eh, no.
And so, a lot of people did what I think some Christians are doing today, where they're saying, no, there's no way to interpret this metaphorically, it's gotta be literal, and so therefore I insist that the sun moves around the earth.
Well, eventually, you just can't, it's a fact.
I mean, heliocentricism is a fact, you can't get around it.
And so, Christians were prompted at that point, To go back and realize that they had misinterpreted the verses that they thought were literal, apparently, were not exactly.
And that's fine.
And my point is simply that you can't really take this high and mighty pose of, well, no, I take God at His word.
I think we should take God at His word, too.
The question is, what is He trying to say?
We know the Bible is a book with many different genres, saying and doing many different things.
It's not one book written by one person with every page and every chapter and every book within it
trying to do and communicate and say the exact same thing.
That's not the case.
You had dozens of authors over a thousand years doing and saying different things.
The question is, what, what exact, how do you interpret it?
And that's one of the questions with theology and exegesis.
But you can't take this high and mighty pose of, oh no, I refuse to take any of this metaphorically.
You do take it metaphorically.
You do take this stuff metaphorically.
If we were having this conversation 600 years ago, you would be insisting that the sun goes around the earth.
And you would be saying that for me to claim otherwise is to call God a liar.
But now, you accept.
What was once a theological controversy, you accept, is there's really only one side to it.
Here's the cost of taking it literally.
Fine.
You can read Genesis literally.
But then, how do you read human DNA?
You know, God wrote that too, didn't he?
In fact, he wrote that more directly.
We don't believe that God literally reached down with his hand out of the sky and wrote the Bible physically.
He inspired the biblical authors.
DNA, though, he does direct.
He wrote DNA.
And it is quite a complex, fascinating, beautiful code.
Well, if Genesis is literal, then human DNA Which clearly points to familial relationships between species is a bit of trickery on the part of God.
God is fooling us.
God, knowing that the evolutionary theory would one day be formulated, knowing that, knowing that after the formulation of that theory we would be able to look at human DNA And draw these conclusions.
Knowing all that, God still made it seem as if we are related in some way to chimpanzees.
That to me seems like you're calling God a liar there.
You're telling us he's lying to us through our genetic code.
Or what?
Testing our faith?
What kind of test is that?
The test is, don't believe your lying eyes?
The test is, don't follow the evidence.
What is the lesson from God?
Don't look at the DNA.
You've gone too far.
I didn't want you to know about this.
I mean, it just gets ridiculous.
I think there's no problem with the DNA says what it says.
Genetics points where it points.
And that's it.
And God is telling us something.
And we can believe what God is telling us.
God is telling us something through Genesis as well.
I'm just suggesting that maybe, Aaron, you're a little bit wrong about what God is telling us.
Maybe you might have misinterpreted it.
It is possible.
So you can't come to me and say, oh, you're saying God is... I'm not talking about God, I'm talking about you.
I'm saying that maybe you have misinterpreted.
Alright.
But I do appreciate the, I really do appreciate bringing that up because I think it's a really interesting subject.
I find it fascinating, you know, and I really love to learn about the physical world and how life developed and all that.
I just find it so interesting.
And I think that Christians should not shy away from that.
I think we should embrace this because it's amazing and fascinating and beautiful and there's nothing to be afraid of.
All right, we will leave it there, and I thank everybody for watching and listening today.
Godspeed.
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The Matt Wall Show is produced by Robert Sterling, associate producer Alexia Garcia del Rio, executive producer Jeremy Boring, senior producer Jonathan Hay, our supervising producer is Mathis Glover, and our technical producer is Austin Stevens.
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