Oct. 21, 2020 - Dennis Prager Show
05:53
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| Time | Text |
|---|---|
| Because this is what makes our country great. | |
| The fact that the American people care about these things. | |
| They care about corruption and cronyism. | |
| It's important to them because they expect and want their leaders to avoid it. | |
| You don't know this, but you said something, and I didn't interrupt you. | |
| I was tempted, but I didn't. | |
| Because, I don't know if you... | |
| Ever saw the Groucho Marx show, but when the guest would say the magic word, the bird would come down with a $100 bill. | |
| You said the magic word when you said that human nature, I don't know, I don't remember the word you used, corrupt or whatever, you'd fallen. | |
| Fallen nature, the fallen nature. | |
| Yes, the fallen nature, yes. | |
| This is the dividing line at the... | |
| If you dig and dig and dig to find the difference between left and right, that is the dividing line. | |
| We know what human nature is like. | |
| They don't. | |
| Therefore, we fear, as you put it, the concentration of power among very, very troubled natured human beings. | |
| Why would I trust people with human nature? | |
| With massive power. | |
| And that comes from, forgive me, just one more point, because you said another thing, which brought another bird on the Groucho Marx show, about you're a man of faith. | |
| So am I. And we are not the identical faith, however... | |
| We both have the same basis, which is this understanding of human nature that religious Jews and Christians understand and therefore have different politics. | |
| That's the whole point. | |
| Yes, I agree. | |
| I mean the Judeo-Christian tradition teaches us that we should not trust people with concentrated power. | |
| We know that sometimes in history, you're at war. | |
| Maybe President Lincoln needs added powers to preserve the republic. | |
| But in general, you do not want to concentrate power. | |
| And it really, you know, I have friends that are obviously on the political left. | |
| And, you know, it doesn't make sense to me, the fact that in some senses, they're distrustful of power for certain people. | |
| So, for example, I have friends that were very troubled, and I shared some of those concerns about the fact that the National Security Agency and other entities were engaged in surveillance in the United States. | |
| That was a big issue during the Bush administration, you remember. | |
| I talk to those individuals now who are in favor of a government takeover in healthcare, and I ask them, seriously, you're worried about the government monitoring your communications, but you're not worried about the government having access to your entire medical history? | |
| And it's a paradox. | |
| I think that if you understand that concentrated power is something to be feared and to be concerned about, that leaders... | |
| Can be sacrificial at times, but they can also be enormously self-serving. | |
| You are suspicious of concentrations of power, and that, I think, is the bottom line for me when it comes to corruption. | |
| The ultimate remedy for corruption. | |
| You're not going to find corrupt... | |
| What you can do is make sure that we have a balance of power, a check of power, divided power in the sense of the branches of government, and don't allow our leaders to have concentrated power. | |
| And when you look at the political parties today, there's a huge divide on that question, whether government should be given more authority in our lives or less. | |
| When they say Trump is a dictator, I wrote in my column, which comes out as it happens, on Tuesdays. | |
| So my column is out today, and it's a list of left-wing lies in which the society is drowning. | |
| One is Trump is a dictator. | |
| And I point out, it's almost inconceivable that a Republican or a conservative would be a dictator. | |
| Their whole platform is less government. | |
| Yes, that's exactly right. | |
| I mean, look, if you wanted to be a dictator's president of the United States, first thing you'd want to do is have government takeover of healthcare. | |
| Yes. | |
| Because then you could use the levers of government to punish your enemies and help your friends. | |
| The other thing you'd want to have is the mass confiscation of firearms. | |
| I mean, throughout history, whether it's Lenin, Stalin, Hitler, or Mao, you don't want individuals owning... | |
| I mean, so just from a policy level, The notion that Trump is somehow a dictator makes absolutely no sense. | |
| I've got to get to the latest revelations with regard to the Biden family and of course the email server. | |
| So I'll keep you on if that's okay with you. | |
| I just want to remind everybody that Peter Schweizer's book, Profiles in Corruption, is compelling reading. | |
| And I read it. | |
| We'll do maybe Kamala Harris another time. | |
| But before the break, I have one very quick question. | |
| What is the ratio of corruption on the left in politics to corruption on the right? | |
| Hard question to answer. | |
| I would say it's probably 65-35, but it takes different forms. | |
| Okay, all right. |
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