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April 21, 2023 - Dennis Prager Show
01:19:43
Hang Together
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Dennis Prager here.
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I'm picking up good vibrations.
She's giving me the excitations.
We hope to offer good vibrations and give you some type of excitation on today's Dennis Prager Show.
Hey everybody, how are you?
Mark Davis, I hope a semi-familiar voice, filling in for Dennis.
I have done it many times, and it has always been a joy, and I expect the same to happen today.
I'm going to be bringing a lot of joy, bringing a lot of trepidation, bringing a lot of things to talk about, and plenty to discuss at 1-800-PRAGER76. It's just a joy to be here at all times.
And anytime I'm here, filling in for Dennis, obviously everything Dennis at DennisPrager.com, DennisPrager.com.
Make sure that you are there.
And a fascinating time.
Just a fascinating time.
And so, as this week comes to an end, my goal, and I've just finished my...
There's no better preparation for the...
For the Dennis Prager show.
What's that?
1-8 Prager 776. Too many digits.
Too many doggone digits.
1-8 Prager 776. Don't confuse people right out of the box, fill in, boy.
And so what I've just finished doing is my own show right here on 660 AM, The Answer, in hot, thriving Dallas-Fort Worth.
And it's, boy, oh boy, did we have a time this morning.
So anytime I'm here for Dennis, I'm enlightened, energized, and...
And fascinated by the kind of back and forth that I've had with my own audience here in Texas.
Interestingly, as many of you know, if you're driving around listening to the Dennis Prager Show on your local affiliate, wherever it may be, whether it's 660 AM, the answer here in DFW, the answer station in LA, the answer stations in New York, much of the listening is done via app and done through smart speakers and et cetera, et cetera.
Meaning that...
Local radio is kind of an ever-changing concept because I have, for my whole career, been in various locales from Washington, D.C. to DFW to Jacksonville to Memphis, etc., etc.
But now I can sit here in North Texas and have listeners from Alaska to Indonesia because of this crazy online phenomenon.
And, of course, the video phenomenon, Salem News Channel.
Make sure you hop on there, SalemNewsChannel.com, and you can watch the spectacle.
And this very morning, I had all kinds of folks, obviously from here in Texas, but also elsewhere in the country, weighing in on the various things that were on my mind this morning.
So let me lay out what some of those are.
You may add to the symphony at 1-8 Prager-776, 1-8 Prager-776.
And as we share thoughts...
Let's keep in mind that if there's anything that I kept coming back to time and time and time again, it is that it is April.
It is April of the year before the election.
And there is something, there's a part of human nature that involves obsessing about the now.
Obsessing about this week, today, this month.
Look at this poll number that happened yesterday.
Surely that'll never change.
The only thing that's true and guaranteed in life is change.
Now, does that mean that there's enough room, enough latitude for DeSantis to catch Trump?
I don't know.
That's a formidable lead that Trump has right now.
It's the kind of lead that tends not to vanish.
But are there so many moving parts and so many variables?
And then one that's interesting right here in the Salem family, did everybody catch Larry Elder announcing for president last night on Tucker Carlson's show?
I did.
Larry is a longtime friend of mine, obviously was a colleague of mine.
I've been in the Salem barn here for about 12 years, about 10 years, excuse me.
And Larry, of course, is just legendary in the talk show world.
And ran this magnificent campaign for governor of California.
Now, it's California, so Larry was not going to win, dare I say.
But it was so noble and so great and attracted so many people and did so much better than a lot of people thought and so much better than a whole lot of other Republicans could have done.
And it's because Larry is a fighter.
And the Republican Party, the Trumpified Republican Party, requires fighters.
Absolutely requires them.
This is why I wonder why in the world Mike Pence is even thinking of running.
And God bless Mike Pence.
A good man.
Vice President Pence is a wonderful American, a strong Christian, a good conservative on so many things.
I know we can talk about whether he was up to the task on January 6th.
We can do that if you want to do that for the 500th time.
But I got nothing against Mike Pence.
But there is precisely zero constituencies, a massive constituency, a mass broad desire to have Mike Pence be president of the United States.
And I would think someone close to him would tell him so.
So that he could not waste a lot of his time and a lot of his money and a lot of other people's money running for a nomination that he has absolutely no chance of getting.
Mike Pompeo has said that he is out.
Nikki Haley is in.
Now, this doesn't mean that there is no reason for somebody to run for president except those who have a plausible chance of winning.
Some folks, they won't admit this.
They won't tell you this.
Some folks are running for running mate.
Or at least that's the way it's going to be.
Once we get to the end of this trail, about a year from now, it might take a little longer.
You remember in 2016, it took Donald Trump until the Indiana primary in the first week of May, I want to say, to dispatch his one remaining rival out of what we have, 15 or 16 to begin with.
I don't think we're going to have that this time out.
And then after that, it was Trump, and everybody knew that it was Trump, and off we go.
As we take a look at how this plays out, if let's say it's April, May of next year, and we have our nominee, and let's say that it is Trump, okay?
And let's say that Nikki Haley or Tim Scott...
Has run just a superb and honorable race, and maybe they've long since, maybe a couple of weeks or a couple of months earlier, folded up their campaigns because they simply were not going to be the nominee.
Maybe Trump, or whoever the nominee, or DeSantis, whoever happens to be, takes a look at a former rival.
We tend to like when former rivals join up and make peace and let bygones be bygones and unite for what Republicans ultimately have to be about.
And that is beating Democrats.
And this was a lot of the concern this morning.
This was a ton of the concern this morning about Trump v.
DeSantis, is that if these guys are going at each other and being all scrappy and there's a lot of blood on the walls, could there be enough healing where everybody, if DeSantis winds up...
Catching and surpassing Trump.
Would the Trump people go off in a huff and say, you know, we're never going to vote for that DeSantis guy after what he said about our guy?
And would they then be helping Biden win?
Well, the short answer is, of course they would.
Would DeSantis' people, if they just can't find their way to wrap their brains and their hearts around Trump, if Trump wins, would the DeSantis people go, no, I wasn't for him at the beginning and I can't be for him now?
Then we're going to be having conversations like I had with a lot of people in 2016 who could not handle Trump.
For some, just a little too spicy or just a little too controversial, a little too different, a little too unnerving.
And I heard from person after person after person after person, they had been for Cruz, or they had been for Christie, or they had been for Ruby, or they had been for whomever.
And Trump was the guy.
Indiana had come and gone.
Trump was the only guy left.
He was going to be the nominee.
Heck, I got these calls after the convention.
Where was our convention?
Cleveland that year?
And it's like, yeah, Mark, I just can't back Trump.
Well, really?
Why not?
And then they'd give me something about the stupid Billy Bush tapes or something about a mean tweet or something about something.
And then I would confront them with the immutable truth.
I'd say, okay, okay.
Does that mean that a Hillary presidency is okay with you?
Oh, no, no, no.
That would be the devil's work.
That would be an asteroid hurtling toward the Earth.
No, no.
Well, I'd say, well, listen.
Then get over yourself, pull your head out, and vote for Trump.
You have no choice.
He might not have been your guy.
But now, he's the only guy.
And that's going to be the case in 2024. Next year, at about this time, when we're in the third week of April in 2024, we may be done.
Trump may have dispatched everybody.
I think if DeSantis does semi-miraculously wind up nosing Trump out, it'll take all the way to May and maybe even June.
And one main premise I'm going to offer you today is I have no idea how that's going to go.
And you don't either.
You may have an idea how you want it to go.
You may be all in for Trump, and only his return will satisfy you.
I get it.
You may be all in for DeSantis.
Thank God for Trump and every day of his presidency, but time to turn a page.
I get that, too.
It's now famous.
Here's the catchphrase.
You ready?
I'm letting the game come to me.
And I highly recommend that for you.
That doesn't mean that I'm trying to peel you away from already jumping in from DeSantis or never detaching yourself from your constant love for Trump.
Go with your guy, by all means.
But I will tell you there's one thing that's a little weird in the water right now, is the notion that DeSantis shouldn't even run.
What?
What?
Who doesn't want that choice?
I mean, listen, maybe you're all in for Trump and DeSantis is a good, nice, shiny object, blah, blah, blah.
But you have no interest.
That's fine.
But give people a choice.
Let's see what that choice will look like.
And when we come back, we'll take a look at the prospect of Tuesday where it looks like Biden's actually going to run.
Holy cow.
Mark Davison for Dennis.
Stick around.
We've got much more to come.
1-8 Prager 776. Give us a call.
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AmericanFederal.com It's the Dennis Prager Show for this Friday, 21st of April.
Mark Davis filling in.
So, the notion of Biden actually running for re-election is something that I've approached in the following way.
I'll believe it when I see it.
I always held out some nugget of doubt that he would even run.
Because dude is 80. And looks 90 and acts 120. And maybe even Jill should get with him and say, honey...
There's ice cream on the porch.
Let's whittle.
Let's just do what people usually do.
Let's look back at an amazing career.
You got to be president.
That's awesome.
But running again, campaigning.
Of course, Biden showed us that you can campaign from your basement and win.
Or did he?
I know that's another whole talk show.
When you take a look at the various things that are at play in 24, can Biden run from the basement or from his campaign HQ? His announcement on Tuesday.
We'll absolutely be via video.
There's no way in the world that he's going to go.
They're going to put him up in front of even a crowd of 10,000 screaming fans if they can find 10,000 of them.
It's going to be a very safe multi-takes.
Let's see.
Let's sit him down.
Let's get him through some sentences coherently.
Let's see if we can actually have him make sense for 60 seconds, enough time to say, yes, I am running for re-election, and then just sort of see how this goes.
Let me hop some calls.
Guys, I've got some thoughts about Biden running again, some thoughts about DeSantis and Trump.
And the other Republicans and about just how this all plays out.
They asked Democrats, was this in New Hampshire?
It's a University of New Hampshire survey center, about their first, of Democrats' first choice.
Because one of the things we'll talk about today is the intriguing candidacy of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Bobby's son, who I guess is like 59 or so, is...
No, 69. Gosh, because he would have been about 14 when his father was killed in 1968. Positively youthful by Biden standards.
He gave his announcement speech the other day in front of actual people and had some things to say about Ukraine that a broad sector of people could agree with.
RFK Jr. has brought a certain amount of...
RFK Jr. was anti-vax before anti-vax was cool.
He's one of these guys basically been telling you all the vaccines are giving your kids autism.
Eh, not so much.
But on COVID, it makes his hesitancy and his skepticism and whatever attitude you want to bring it or call it, that's in line with a lot of what Republicans were saying.
So the RFK Jr. candidacy is, shall we say, interesting.
I have a feeling it's going to be an interesting get-together.
So, Mike, let's go to Detroit.
Say hi to you.
Hi, Mike.
Mark Davison for Dennis.
How are you doing?
Oh, hi, Mark.
Yeah, you know, people need to keep in mind, first and foremost, what we're dealing with here.
You know, we're dealing with a Democratic Party that, you know, practice mass incarceration, you know, without trial.
The Stalinist show trials, you know, January 6th trial was a Stalinist show trial and the defendants weren't even present.
They were in prison, you know, and you have the FBI, Gestapo tactics, you know, and new Green Deal fraud, you know, redistribution of the wealth and political power from the people that owned it back into their own hands.
And you can look at stacking the court and every dirty trick they played.
This is a criminally corrupt, politically corrupt, personally corrupt.
You know, please don't sexually mutilate our children.
That would be nice.
Now we're talking. - That's a reason, I'm just saying shit.
If we're making a list, and Mike, thanks.
If we're making a list, every election is about two things.
Two broadly defined things.
If I'm running against you, I have two jobs.
Tell you why it's a good idea to vote for me, and tell me why voting for you is a bad idea.
Mike just went through a number of things that are absolutely true of the left, absolutely true of Democrats, and some of the things on that list are things which will energize our own people, Biden crime family style stuff, where the young Republicans are the only ones who care about the border.
But in reaching out and getting some independence, which is what Trump needed in 2016, and what we're always going to need moving forward, is to energize not just hardcore conservatives, but to energize some people who might not be that ideologically wired.
And the way you do that is not by fudging on your conservatism, not by moving to the mushy middle, no, no, no, no, no, but by showing independent voters the insanity of voting Democrat.
The two big things on that to me are gender and crime.
The majority of Americans do not believe that a man can become a woman.
They simply don't.
And today's Democrat Party doesn't just believe that, but believes that you are the problem, that you are the hate monger, that you are the devil, that you are the scourge if you believe in the definitions of gender defined by science and created by God.
I think that is a loser in 2024, as is their incredible permissiveness on crime.
Today's Democrat Party does not, in fact, believe so much that people should be punished for breaking the law anymore.
So I don't think that's going to go over well, and I think we need to tie things like that to them like an anvil every day in 2024. All righty, in Kentucky, John.
Hi, Mark Davis in for Dennis.
How are you doing?
Welcome.
I'm doing good, Mark.
Thank you for having me on.
Sure.
I'm 72 years old, and I am a Trump supporter.
And I will be voting for Trump.
But the Republican Party needs something.
We need to do something different this time.
I do live in Kentucky, and they're getting ready to have thunder over Louisville.
I don't know if you've ever heard of that or not.
What is it?
But that's what we need.
We need thunder in our election this time, okay?
What is thunder over Louisville?
That's where they have this magnificent fireworks show and the Air Force is involved in it.
I mean, it's really, it's been going on for 20 years.
I didn't know if you knew about Thunder over Louisville.
But anyway, my point is, DeSantis is a good guy.
And if Trump wasn't running, I'd vote for him.
So my suggestion is, and I ask God to give me a lot of wisdom, okay?
And my thought is, Mr. DeSantis ought to set this one out.
Mr. Trump ought to have Mr. DeSantis as his vice president.
Now, that would be like thunder overload.
It would be thunder all over the place.
DeSantis has no interest in being anybody's running mate.
It's just not going to happen.
There's one way that it happens, and that's if they have a primary battle.
They're the last two guys running.
Trump wins like he did over Cruz in the last primary that matters.
And then turns to him and says, Ron, it's been a tough battle, but let's do some important work together.
And DeSantis grudgingly says yes.
The notion that DeSantis needs to sit this one out is something I just can't buy.
If Trump's fate is to win, then it is to win.
If he has the kind of 15, 20, 30-point leads that he has now, he may keep them.
If he doesn't, then there's a reason.
It means that people wanted to turn the page toward DeSantis.
I don't know how many people want to do that.
It may not be that many.
But I want conservatives to have that.
Yes, and one thing, Mark, I will agree with.
Whoever wins the nomination, I will vote for them.
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
That's so, so vital.
Because I remember all those 2016 calls I talked about, where we've got to unite, no matter how messy things are, we've got to unite and surround her, because our nominee will be the one human being that can prevent four more years of Joe Biden.
Mark Davison for Dennis.
Be right back.
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It is the Friday Tennis Prager Show.
Mark Davis filling in from North Texas here in hot, happy, thriving DFW. As we get ready to hop back to some more of your calls at 1-8-Prager-776, looks like Biden is running.
Holy cow.
He'll roll that out on Tuesday, whatever that'll look like.
So my questions for you include, A, does this mean he is the definite, presumptive Democrat nominee?
It is hard to primary an incumbent president.
Ask everybody that tried to take out, you know, Bush 41. Ask the folks who, you know, tried to run against Biden.
I mean, it's when you're the, you know, well, that, of course, was the incumbent vice president.
When you're an incumbent president and you're, you know, when people are looking to primary you, that's a tough bridge to cross.
So does that mean that, but these are.
That's a very different type of incumbent.
Biden is not particularly popular, maybe not even in his own party.
And again, in a minute, I'll give you the big long list of who some of the Democrats in a poll said their first choice was.
One of the names may surprise you, and you may start to write a bad political novel in your head based on one of those names.
All right, 1-8 Prager 776. Let us work our way over here to Northridge, California.
And Steve, that is you.
Welcome.
Mark Davison for Dennis.
Happy Friday.
How you doing?
Hi, Mark.
Thanks for sitting in today.
So my worry is I don't think Trump can win the general election because he lost last time.
What's going to change this time?
I just don't see a path.
I can hear a million people saying, did he?
Did he?
And your point, you have a strong point in the following way.
And that is when it comes to politics, people sometimes ask, what's the last thing you did?
A lot of people talked about Sarah Palin coming back and being a running mate for somebody.
And people said, yeah, but the last thing you did was lose.
And it's never good when the last thing you did was lose.
This may be one of the rules that Trump breaks.
The squirrely circumstances of that loss.
Are still so burned into the brains and hearts of so many people?
Do you know how many people there are right now that would walk through fire and crawl on broken glass to right the wrong of 2020?
So that may subvert what you offer, which usually is logic that when the last thing you did is lose, I mean, ask Nixon.
You can indeed come back from that.
But Trump may be a particularly special case.
Yeah, maybe.
I just, for me, I mean, I'll vote for whichever Republican is on, but...
I think DeSantis could beat Biden.
I just don't see Trump doing it because, like I said, the past and a lot of baggage, and he's turned some people off, and I just want to win.
I want to win.
I'm not pro or anti-Trump.
I'm not pro or anti-DeSantis.
I am pro-winning.
Let us roll to St. Petersburg, Florida, and Phil, that is you.
Hey, hang on a second.
Let me make sure that...
All right, that's a little weird.
Hang on a minute.
Hmm, that's a nut.
There we go.
Okay.
Hi, Phil.
Mark Davis in for Dennis.
How are you doing?
Hey, Mark.
I love it when you sub.
I'd like hearing from you.
Thanks.
I've been following politics since Stevenson ran against T. Falker in the 1956 convention.
Wow, that's awesome.
Exactly.
First time I voted was for gold.
But let me tell you something.
I've left several messages to Mike Gallagher.
I think they shut me off on voicemail.
There is no way DeSantis will ever run as vice president under Trump.
You know that.
Correct.
He's just not going to do it.
It's not in his DNA. He's not going to tie his...
True.
I mean, at least not...
I mean, a lot of people want Trump to call DeSantis now and say, let's have a unity ticket and form it right now.
There's no way in the world that DeSantis does that.
Yeah, let me, I've got to scoot like 30 seconds, so let me thank you enormously for the call.
But again, after a big, bloody mano a mano primary, and they're the last two guys standing, is it possible that Trump turns to DeSantis and says, hey, it's been tough, but clearly we're two people that America wants.
Why don't you run with me?
That's not out of the question.
We'll just see, like so many other things.
Mark Davis in Ford, Dennis, 1-8 Prager 776.
Stick around.
Wouldn't it be nice to live together in the kind of world where we belong?
Wouldn't it be nice if we were older, certainly timely, as we take a look at the Biden announcement for re-election coming up perhaps on Tuesday?
Is it possible for him, in fact, to be older?
Yeah, he is.
Well, I'll tell you what.
Let's talk about somebody who's older, who still has a certain impact at the Democrat Party.
And I also mentioned that there is somebody in this poll out of the University of New Hampshire Survey Center, and it's not just about New Hampshire, it's across the country.
They asked Democrats.
Who's your first choice for 2024?
Let me run through a couple of those.
We'll add that to the tapestries of conversation.
Mark Davis in for Dennis here from Dallas, Fort Worth, where we are loving life and loving Texas and wherever you are, we love you too.
So grab a line at 1-8 Prager-776, 1-8 Prager-776.
Follow me on Twitter at Mark Davis, M-A-R-K Davis.
Appreciate hearing from you.
Always appreciate being here.
So we have a landscape in which we as Republicans...
I have some interesting choices to make.
There's Trump gobbling up an enormous amount of the oxygen, and deservedly so.
There's DeSantis on the periphery right now.
Might be about to announce.
He said he wouldn't say anything until after the Florida legislature completes, until they adjourn.
And that's, I think, begins the second week of May.
So they'll go through the first week of May.
So we're still a few weeks away.
A couple weeks at least from a DeSantis announcement, if we get one.
And then we get to see whether this guy lives up to the hype.
He either will or he won't.
I do not know how that will go.
Neither do you.
As such, I don't know.
I have a certain curiosity.
Some of y'all don't.
A lot of the folks who are all in for Trump, and by the way, God bless you if you're all in for Trump, for some reason, fear the choice.
Surely you're not confident in your guy, is it?
If Trump is the greatest thing since sliced bread, and there's plenty of arguments that he is, he should be able to dispatch DeSantis with relative ease, shouldn't he?
The other fear that's a little weird is that if DeSantis does walk into the Trump buzzsaw, he will somehow be damaged for life, and he'll never be able to be our president because everyone will remember what happened in 2024. Guys, have you met America?
Are you aware that we have the attention span of a flea?
So I ain't worried about that.
I don't fear the choice.
I don't fear the contest.
I'm thrilled.
But you know what?
Now, with Larry Elder's announcement on Tucker Carlson last night, Let me talk about that for a little bit here in a minute, too.
We have three absolute guaranteed proven fighters who look like, well, we have two now, and that's Trump and Elder.
And if DeSantis gets in, we'll have three.
Look at that.
Three actual proven fighters in the race.
And that's a good thing.
It's a good thing for conservatives.
It's a good thing for Republicans.
It's a good thing for America.
Don't fear it.
It could get messy and awkward and weird.
Sure it could.
We'll do fine.
The only thing that's going to be a problem.
And I can help with this in my little show that I have here in Texas or any time I'm here, is to just make sure that we keep our eyes on the prize.
That once the primaries are done, and about a year from now they will be, you know, April, May, if it might take into June, if things are particularly close, that once we have a nominee, it will be vital to unify behind that nominee.
Okay, Democrats, get a load of this.
They asked a bunch of people, let's see, 700 likely voters.
Who's your first choice?
Your first choice.
How do you think Biden did?
25%.
He's at the top of the list.
However, everything's relative.
25% for your sitting president?
What?
So, here he comes.
Second place?
Making Biden look, well, not making him look youthful, but on the calendar at least.
One year older than Biden.
At 17%, Bernie Sanders.
Okay, Biden 25, Sanders 17. Everybody else has single digits, except for one person, who comes in at 10%.
Guess who she is?
Wait for it.
Wait for it.
This is either a bad political novel, to even think about this, Or it is something that we really need to think about and really need to be concerned about.
She's finally proud of America.
It's Michelle Obama.
Now, you may laugh.
You may drive the car off the road.
Don't do that.
I've talked about this for years.
The notion that the former first lady wants to get back into the bubble.
If you take a look at her book, her book tour, her pronouncements, her activism, it smacks of someone who wants back in the game, who enjoyed being a big deal.
And by the way, who doesn't enjoy being a big deal?
I'm blaming her for that.
I think this is something she might have some interest in.
So my prayer is that Barack has no interest in it.
He's been there, honey, been there, done that.
Nope, nope, nope, nope, nope.
Please let that be the case.
Please let Barack Obama, let him enjoy windsurfing with Richard Branson every day and enjoy it so much that he just forbids her.
Does the marriage work that way?
Draws a line in the sand.
Does the relationship work that way?
Listen, I don't think anybody should run for president with a spouse that...
She profoundly objects.
That's never, never a good idea, which means I hope that Melania is on board.
I think she is.
I hope she is.
So anyway, so Michelle Obama.
Now, why is this even a thing?
First of all, Democrats, they miss Obama.
Please understand how much they miss Obama.
Some of y'all are listening.
I appreciate so much on the show that I do or when I'm here for Dennis, there are people listening who don't agree with me or Dennis about anything, and you listen anyway, and I appreciate that enormously.
So, let me have a Democrat who would love Michelle Obama to run.
And I'll prove it to you.
1-8 Prager, 7-7-6.
Because I know why you would.
It brings the Obamas back into the bubble.
Because with Michelle, you get Barack.
He'd be back.
And the reason Democrats miss him, especially now, is he can complete a sentence.
And so can she.
And she's not 90. And here's the dirty little secret.
Would be harder to beat than you think.
Because what's the first thing that occurs to you?
Michelle Obama, what?
I mean, she was first lady.
Yes, that's a thing.
But in terms of actual experience or real-world job skills pertinent to the presidency, none of that matters.
None of that matters.
I mean, really, honestly, Trump had never had any elected office experience.
We just wanted him.
We wanted him badly.
And we got him.
And thank God.
A whole lot of people want him again.
We may get him again.
So it's not laughable.
It's not like she's, you know, almost said coming off a TV show.
She was first lady.
She, you know, knows a thing or two as a result of that.
And real easy to weaponize any criticism of her.
Anybody coming after Michelle Obama is a racist and a misogynist.
It's racism and sexism.
If you come after Michelle Obama, that is some high-gauge Teflon wrapped around her.
The good news here is that there is zero evidence right now that she has any interest in running.
And for the most part, people who are interested in running are starting at least to do exploratory committees, starting at least to...
Make a noise or two.
Talk to a supporter or two.
Talk to a fundraiser or two.
So right now there's no indication that Michelle Obama is interested in running for president.
Please, Lord, let that remain the case.
All right, you want the single-digit brigades?
Biden, 25. Sanders, 17. Michelle, 10. Among Democrats, who's your first choice for 2024?
9% Pete Buttigieg.
8% Elizabeth Warren.
4% AOC. 4% Amy Klobuchar.
3% Gavin Newsom.
2% Kamala.
Wow!
2% for the sitting vice president.
2% RFK Jr. 2% Gretchen Whitmer.
1% Stacey Abrams.
Sorry, I didn't mean to chuckle.
1% Raphael Warnock.
1% Marianne Williamson.
Other 2%, don't know, not sure, 8%.
And this was, when would this have been?
This was taken, poll taken, April 13 to 17. So we'll call it last week.
And this goes along with every other poll that we've been talking about in terms of how things can change.
Of course things are going to change.
Biden's prospects will either rise or fall.
Based on his ability to complete sentences in the English language, stay awake during campaign appearances, or whether he's even able to make campaign appearances at all.
His announcement on Tuesday apparently will be on video, which is simply an admission that he can't get out in front of a crowd of people and be trusted to even complete a sentence that says, I'm running again.
How in the world is that going to work out?
All right, we've been running through thoughts about this.
I also have some thoughts about environmental extremism on this Earth Day.
I love the planet.
I want to keep the planet as clean as possible while still providing an avenue for human productivity.
Call me crazy.
Call me crazy.
Just call me.
1-8-PRAGER-776 is where you do that.
Mark Davis in for Dennis Prager.
DennisPrager.com for all things Dennis.
and we'll see you back here in just a moment.
Because you're mine.
Mark Davison for Dennis.
This hits the ear a little easier than the original Screamin' Jay Hawkins version, although I gotta tell you, something about Screamin' Jay, especially around Halloween, that works pretty well.
Put a spell on you.
1-8-Prager-776.
1-8-Prager-776.
Let us roll to Michigan.
And Darren, that is you.
Mark Davison for Dennis.
How you doing?
Hey, Mark.
Great to finally get through to you.
Hi.
Hey, just kind of going back to, you know, your environmental thing, why do we need, what is it, a Bureau of Environmental Justice or a department when we already have the EPA that's supposed to monitor pollution and blah, blah, blah?
Correct.
The reason, the notion of environmental regulations, and thanks for a great question, especially on this Earth Day Eve, we're going to have environmental regulations.
And we should have environmental regulations, to some degree, so that we don't have, you know, factories that pay no attention and just belch horrific things into the ambient water and the sky.
Once we have those laws, then just obey them like other laws are obeyed and enforce them like other laws are enforced.
And I just don't see necessarily the need for a massive infrastructure of environmental regulators to regulate those environmental laws in the way that we have an ATF that does guns, that's another old talk show, or any one of a number of other specific law enforcement avenues.
The balance, and I think I've said this a couple of times already, is all of us, we all want As clean an environment as we can have while still having human productivity.
It seems that some people, especially some people who are in power, just don't care about that.
They just don't care about the human productivity part.
They don't care about the liberty and freedom part of your consumer choice.
Electric cars are awesome.
I may grab me a Tesla someday.
They're cool.
I may not.
Don't tell me I have to.
And don't tell me to give one dime of my money to anybody else so that they can.
No subsidies of any kind.
Not for electric cars.
Not for solar.
Not for wind.
Not for any of this.
We have a really diverse plate of things that people can have.
Matter of fact, if we got the...
You guys have the video, can I do this right now if I've got time for this, of the Interior Secretary back at HQ? Because this woman was, let's do this.
Here's what can happen.
What I've just described to you is sensible, right?
Would you like to see rank insanity before your face?
And it's from somebody who's currently the Interior Secretary, named Deb Haaland.
And just, if enjoy is the word, enjoy these few seconds and remember that these people currently have power.
All of this is because climate change is the crisis of our lifetime.
We have an obligation to future generations to make sure that we have a planet for them to live on.
And that's why I'm here, and that's why I'm working incredibly hard to make sure that we can realize that transition, that we can have differing energy sources.
We can't continue to be a one-industry country.
Are you kidding me?
I wish I were.
I wish it were some perverse joke.
This woman is the Secretary of the Interior.
I want a Secretary of the Interior that cares about pristine water and mountains and trees and critters.
I want all of that.
But not at the expense of human productivity and consumer choice.
And the crocodile tears.
Good Lord, climate change is like the existential crisis of our time?
That's the stuff of insanity, kids.
It's crazy.
Let me give you the Climate 101, just from my brain.
And you can agree or disagree with this.
Here's the deal.
Planet's temperature is always going to change.
Our planet, every planet.
Temperature, climate, they're all cyclical.
Temperature is going to go up, it's going to go down.
It's going to go up, it's going to go down.
When I was a young lad in the 70s, you know what the main concern was?
Global cooling.
We were concerned that if the planet continued to cool, would we be able to grow enough food?
Oh, my.
Well, then the planet started to warm up again, and everybody calmed down before they started to freak out again.
Now, keep in mind that the global cooling concern was in the 1970s, when we had only just begun.
The first Earth Day was 1970, right?
April 22, 1970. We had spent the previous decades belching some of the worst stuff.
Industrial Revolution, early 20th century, the 1920s.
Just think of the 20s and the 30s.
The imagery involves just smokestacks and foul air and just, let's take tons of stuff and just, where do you want to put it?
How about this river?
And that's just what you did because we just didn't care.
And so after decades and decades of that, We had global cooling.
Now, silly me, this tells me that man is not changing the temperature of the planet.
God is.
Now, the good news is, there's a logic to environmentalism that makes sense, and that is, let's...
Solar, wind, other things, that's great.
Renewables.
Let's have as much room for them in the marketplace as there are people who want to use them.
Let's have exactly as many electric cars on the road as there are people who want to buy them and drive them.
Not one more and not one less.
That's it.
The marketplace, human desires, human choice, consumer choice, guiding every single decision.
Imagine that.
What I've just described is kryptonite to the left because they don't want you to have that kind of choice.
They use junk science.
And their authoritarian instincts to try to guide you.
This weekend's Earth Day coverage is going to be enough to gag a maggot.
I just warn you.
I've already seen some of it.
Even here in Texas.
Red State, Texas.
Oh, we're going to have the biggest Earth Day celebration.
And there's going to be all kinds of speakers and exhibits on environmental justice.
Environmental justice?
What is environmental justice?
Well, I'll tell you what it is here in a minute.
Let me just...
Merge this in to the tapestry of things we're talking about today on the Dennis Prager Show.
It is Friday.
I'm Mark Davison for Dennis.
So glad to be here with you.
1-8-Prager-776.
Let's chat about things.
Oh, man, here in Texas, here in Texas, again, it's so funny.
Here in Red State, Texas, gun-loving Texas, gun-toting Texas, absolutely I'm a part of that.
Down in Austin, our legislature is meeting right now.
And I tell you what we've got, there's 30 seconds on this, because it's really important, maybe it's happening in your state as well.
We've got this stream of grieving family members, because Uvalde, hello, that's in our state, and it was terrible, and everybody knows it was terrible, and the reactions to that can range.
From, oh, we need more gun-grabbing laws, which is wrong, no matter who says it, to grasping the harder truth, which is that we don't have a gun problem, we have a people problem, we have a society problem.
And that's harder to address, takes longer, involves looking at the mirror, all of us looking into the mirror, our society looking into the mirror, realizing what a terrible job we're doing raising kids, what a terrible job we're doing on mental health.
And so many of these things don't involve anybody in government doing hardly anything.
And that's why it's hard to get elected officials to get hip to this, because they all want to hold some news conference and say, look at this wonderful new law that we passed.
Look at this wonderful new gun-grabbing legislation that we have.
So it can be emotional blackmail sometimes, and all I want to ever do, all I ever want to do to somebody who's lost somebody in a horrible shooting is hug them, love them, lift them up, pray for them, pray for healing, etc., etc.
But I've had to say this a few times this week, and feel free to cut and paste this if you wish.
If someone has suffered a horrible loss, and it makes them want gun-grabbing legislation, their loss does not make them right.
And I mean, it was pervasive this past week in Austin.
Just all these, and it just killed me.
It broke my heart to see what these folks have been through.
And so you've got to compartmentalize a little bit here.
I mean, I love them.
I lift them up in prayer.
I pray for healing and just all those things that you're supposed to do as a human being.
But when a whole bunch of them, you know, once again, and here are the two pernicious words, we have to do something.
That's what everybody says.
And those of us who are conservative and actually love the Second Amendment and want to go at this in the way that will work, the way to have fewer shootings is raise fewer crazy people.
Raise fewer dysfunctional people.
Watch your kids.
Pay attention to them.
Pay attention to each other.
Have some grown-up conversations about mental health, which has just slid right off the rails in today's Wheels Off Society.
That's where the problem lies.
But no, we've got to do something.
And whenever somebody talks about doing something, what they really mean is pass more laws that make it harder for you, a law-abiding gun owner, to get your next firearm.
And that is going to be a no, no matter where it comes from.
All righty, let us roll to...
Let me go to somebody who's right here in my great state of Texas.
Greg, Mark Davis in for Dennis.
Welcome.
How are you doing?
Happy Friday.
Happy Friday, Mark.
My surprise, I'm driving home from Stevensville to...
Well, first off, I'm finishing a PhD in psychology, so I'm going to jump on this point.
that we used to try to find middle ground, but now we have too many people whose middle has to be met versus meeting in the true middle, and there's no longer middle.
It's my middle, not your middle, but anyway, I digress. - But let's hang on to that for a second.
Hang on to that for just a second.
I don't want to say I hate the middle, but the middle often is...
If you have somebody who wants to take you...
If you're in Chicago...
And somebody wants to take you to Los Angeles and somebody else wants to take you to New York.
What's the compromise position?
There isn't one.
It's only to stay right where you are.
My whole, and I'm going to bog down on this, but my belief is to go all in with both feet for the best, most muscular conservatism I can.
I know I'll be met on that battlefield with people who are all in for liberalism.
Let the best ideas win.
And I don't send my elected officials to Washington to work with Democrats.
I send them their...
I'm just saying that common ground no longer exists.
There's no, I'll give you a little so you can get a little.
Did it ever?
Did it ever?
I mean, I guess on some things it did.
I mean, you know, because I'm tired of the search for common ground either.
I got conservative ground.
I'm going to defend it.
Liberals will, you know, so, but anyway, I think we had another point.
Go ahead.
Let me give you your final 30 seconds.
I was just going to ask, how come, like, our conservative buddies in D.C., when the liberals are pushing for, we can't drill, we can't invade this park, how come we don't tag on?
The answer is the same.
I've got to fly.
The answer is the same.
Conservatives talk a good game on the campaign trail, or Republicans do, and then they get to Washington and then tell you why they can't do the things they promised you.
you.
Back in a moment.
It is the Dennis Prager Show, Marlowe.
Mark Davis in for Dennis from Dallas-Fort Worth here on Texas' own 660 AM The Answer, where I host the morning show and where before I even sat down to do today's Dennis Prager Show, I knocked out my own program.
And we talked about some 2024, talked about the prospects of Biden announcing on Tuesday, talked about what the Republican choices are or should be, talked about the environmental issues because tomorrow is Earth Day.
And so we've got all of that just humming along on our phone lines at 1-8-Prager-776.
So grab a hold of one of those.
Let me knock through a couple of people here as we begin this hour.
And then I'm going to go there because it's just been a fascinating week.
Where we have a guy who leaked some things, this 21-year-old man-child.
Love the military.
Love young people in the military.
What is this kid doing with access to those kinds of secrets?
That's just bizarre.
And so he has these secrets.
And it's funny, he wasn't even a high-minded, self-styled whistleblower a la Bradley Chelsea Manning or Edward Snowden.
This guy was just trying to impress a bunch of...
Denizens of a Discord gaming server.
It's just all around.
Except some people just love this guy.
Oh, the leaker is a hero because he's a truth teller.
Real quick, we can't have individual members of the military deciding for themselves which, quote unquote, secrets we need to know and which ones we don't.
That is a path toward chaos.
Is there some pernicious secret that we are so ill-served by not knowing and we're being so deceived about by the people in power and that ignorance is so hazardous to us?
Again, that's a lot of conditions I've laid down.
Is there some situation where someone might be heroic and going rogue?
Well, maybe.
This is not that.
My dog knows that Ukraine is not going well.
And anybody of any species knows that by the time we get to the end of this calendar year, it's probably still a stalemate.
Now, since I've started down this road, I'll give you another 30 seconds and then hop back to your calls.
Here's where I've been on Ukraine.
It is a noble concept to help Ukraine oust Putin from their soil.
Are we going to succeed?
I don't know.
I don't think so.
Should we try?
Sure.
This calendar year of 2023, some money, jets, tanks.
If we're going to do it, let's do it.
Let's give ourselves the best chance of success.
Biden didn't even want to give him the jets.
Of course, I said at one point that giving Ukrainian Air Force our jets is like throwing your 10-year-old the keys to the car.
You think he might be able to drive it?
You're not quite sure.
So, I don't mean to be insulting to Ukrainian pilots, but hey.
So, I'm not hopeful.
But was it worth it?
Sure.
But here's the thing, man.
Exit ramp, exit ramp, exit ramp.
New Year's Eve, that's it.
12-31-23.
If Putin's still in Ukraine, too bad.
So sad.
Time to sit everybody down and let's have us an exit strategy.
Let's pressure both sides to sit down.
And I know Zelensky ain't going to want to do that.
Putin ain't going to want to do that.
Maybe he wants the whole country.
Well, we're going to say no to that, and Zelensky might want another, you know, trillion dollars in 47 F-16s, and we ain't going to do that either.
You know what he really is going to want?
And there will be Americans who want it too.
Democrat Americans and some of these hawkish, interventionist Republicans, they are going to want American troops.
Oh, they'll never ask for American troops.
Oh, no, they'll never ask for American troops.
Really?
There are words being used with regard to Ukraine.
A vital American interest.
It's not.
It's an American interest.
I've just told you I would love to see Putin shown the door out of Ukraine.
You've got the rest of this year to do it.
And let's go all in and do it.
But is it a vital, extended American interest?
Shoot, no, it's not.
Putin is not Hitler.
This is not the mid-1930s.
I'm way more jacked up about China than I am about the Ukrainian border skirmish.
But here's the deal.
Edward Snowden, Bradley Manning, this kid.
These are not heroes.
These are scoundrels.
These are traitors.
These are lawbreakers.
Period.
Give me a shot.
1-8-Prager-776.
Okay, that starts something.
Let us roll to San Antonio.
Scott, Mark Davis, welcome.
Happy Friday.
Mark Davis in for Dennis.
How are you doing?
Yeah, hey Mark.
How are you?
I'm good.
Yeah, good, good.
I enjoy listening to you guys.
But one thing I've noticed with you and Mike, I think you guys have totally misunderstood what happened in 2020. I hear a lot of people expressing concern, can Trump get elected and so forth?
You guys run ads all day long for a gentleman named Mike Lindell, who has spent $35 million trying to figure out what happened in 2020. Team of cyber scientists know that Trump won that election by about 15 million votes.
So, you know, the numbers of 2020 have never made sense to anybody.
We know Trump won that election massively.
So the question, Scott, so what do we do about that now?
What lessons are there?
Because I am quite...
I'm convinced that 2020 was not a reliable result, that there were norms shelved and rules broken on the altar of COVID panic.
There were votes counted that shouldn't have been and maybe some that should have been that weren't, etc., etc., etc.
And that's terrible.
We should work on doing better jobs in our elections in 2024. So what does this tell you?
What can you tell us?
Vital, important advice for 2024. What should the lesson be moving forward?
Well, I think it's hard, and I'll tell you why.
Because we're not just facing a political party, we're facing an ideology that will achieve victory by any means.
So now corrupting our elections is the new method of achieving their agenda of gaining power.
And one thing I remind my friends about, Mark, is don't forget the most powerful technology giants in the world have wrapped their arms around the woke agenda.
I mean, fixing elections with these people is complicated.
I think that this is child's play.
We should indeed be vigilant.
Absolutely.
Will Democrats cheat?
Yes.
What is our best strategy and view of that?
Two things.
One, as we've done here in Texas, as they did in Georgia, and everybody gave them holy you-know-what in Georgia for making it harder to cheat and easier to vote legally.
Various states need to shore up their protections against cheating.
And then the rest of it's up to us.
It is to show up in significant numbers.
As Hugh Hewitt's book once said, if it ain't close, they can't cheat.
I mean, they can, but their cheating becomes irrelevant if we simply show up enough.
And this is why I had a call today on my own show here locally in DFW. Somebody's just kind of slump-shouldered and dispirited.
Like, oh man, I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know if there's much hope.
So I turned it into a math problem.
With Democrat cheating likely to continue in some form, hopefully less than it was in 2020, does that create a challenge for us?
Yes, it does.
Makes it harder than it should be on a perfectly level playing field for us to win.
What is our likelihood of winning if we give up?
That would be zero.
So you pray hard, work hard, vote hard.
You don't allow any of this nonsense to weigh you down, to dispirit you.
To make you think that it's just not worth it.
It will always, always be worth it.
We are in Woodland Hills, California.
Walter, hey, that's you.
Mark Davis in for Dennis.
How you doing?
Mark, great.
Thank you.
I love you guys.
In for Dennis.
But I've got to get to this quickly.
I have talked to three of the talking heads on KRLA. And each one agrees that we support Ukraine.
Each one misses the point that this war is our fault.
We made a promise through Bill Clinton in 1994, along with Russia and Britain, that we would be their protection when they gave up their nuclear in 2012. I understand completely, but that doesn't make it our fault that Putin tried to occupy the country.
If you want to talk about duplicity and promises made and policies changing, sure, that's fine.
But that doesn't make it our fault that Putin is now ravaging Ukraine.
That doesn't mean he gets to do that.
Anymore than if you antagonize a neighbor, it makes it okay for him to come bust out your windows.
Mark, you're not listening to me.
I'm listening completely, and we obviously disagree.
So with that, let me go ahead.
And I love people.
It's fine.
It's all good.
And listen, there's a large...
And these are the folks who, I don't know, maybe love the leaker because there's some large truth.
I'm incredibly skeptical of the likelihood of success of our Ukraine operation.
New Year's Eve, man.
New Year's Eve.
If it's still a stalemate, we're out.
All right?
I'm out for a couple of minutes and then back with you on the phones at 1-8 Prager 776. Grab a line.
Glad you are here.
year.
Happy Friday.
Mark Davis, I'm here.
In for Dennis.
Dennis back on Monday.
Follow me on Twitter at MarkDavis, M-A-R-K-Davis as we head back to your calls.
Cole is in Los Angeles.
How you doing, sir?
Mark Davis in for Dennis.
Happy Friday.
Thank you, Mark.
I'm really happy when you're on the air for Dennis.
Thank you.
You're great.
Thanks.
I talked to you two a three months ago, Donald Donaldstrom.
I'll make it brief.
I voted for Donald two times, and I hear some great things.
However, he was up against, talk about collusion, the massive collusion between the Democratic Party, the big media, the big corrupt media, corrupt big tech, factions of the FBI and factions of the government.
Right, right, right.
Pardon me?
I said, right.
So where are we going with this?
He said, I voted for Trump twice.
I sense there's a but there.
But.
Well, yeah, you're right.
Basically, there's this massive collusion going on.
And my take is that a lot of people are over-focused on Donald Trump getting the nomination.
And I believe if he gets it, he will lose the general election.
So does this make you...
So who would you...
So if you...
Presuming you're interested in a Republican successor to Biden, whom would you like?
Definitely Ron Sanders.
Definitely Ron Sanders.
Okay.
So, let's take a second on this.
There are two things that are true of Donald Trump.
As I say, and I don't mean this to be flippant, because I think it's actually kind of brilliant.
Here's what I mean.
There are two kinds of voters that Trump energizes.
Conservatives and liberals.
And here's what I mean.
There is nobody in recent memory who has energized conservative voters like Trump has.
And there are folks who cling to that and still think he can do that.
And you know what?
He might well be able to.
In the way that he did in 2016. It ain't 2016 anymore.
We've traveled a lot of miles.
Some of them have been very helpful to Trump.
Some have not.
So one of the key questions is, can he still pull that conservative passion next year that he did?
When he won in 2016 and in 2020 where he got more votes than he did in 2016, if we're counting.
So the way in which he inspires Democrats, liberals, the left, my gosh, they are living for the opportunity to take him down again.
They will crawl on glass and walk through fire.
They will vote for Joe Biden on life support to beat Trump.
Aren't they going to be similarly mobilized to beat any Republican if it's DeSantis or anybody else?
Yeah.
I mean, no matter who we nominate, it's going to be Satan incarnate.
It's going to be the evil enemy.
It's going to be the focus of all Democrat fire and fury.
But just as there is something uniquely about Trump that stirs passion in conservatives, myself included, There's something about Trump that just drives the left insane.
And it's a compliment to him.
It's because of the results.
It's because of what he did.
Constitutionalist Supreme Court justices.
A strong border.
But I'll tell you what, here's the thing that Trump brings that makes the left hate him with a particular passion, is the degree to which he...
Trump destroyed them reputationally, destroyed the media, destroyed academia, destroyed so many parts of the culture that are so shackled to leftism.
Trump came at them with a fire and fury of his own that was certainly unmatched in any Republican before or since.
So, I don't know.
And here's the good news, I don't have to figure this out today.
I don't need to figure this out.
I don't need to figure this out this year.
Talking about the end of the year and when 2024 actually arrives.
By then, the primaries themselves will be on the horizon.
And it'll be time for real people to start voting.
By then, supposedly Trump and DeSantis will have run against each other for a few months.
Others will be yipping at our heels as well.
And we'll kind of have a really stronger sense.
Of who seems to be our best path toward victory.
Because as I've said, I think 12 times today, I'm not pro or anti-Trump.
I'm not pro or anti-DeSantis.
I have huge respect for both guys.
I am pro winning.
Whoever strikes me as giving us the best chance of winning, that is where I'm going.
All righty.
Frank, Mark Davis in Costa Mesa, California.
How are you, sir?
Nice to have you.
Happy Friday.
Well, thank you, Mark.
Hey, I just want to say, man, I dig the cut of your jib, man.
I used to catch you back in the aughts on the weekends in Bloomington, Indiana.
Thank you.
You're very kind.
Very kind.
Thank you.
So I just wanted to recall the late, great Rush Limbaugh used to tell a story about this time of year about the unicorn killer, a guy named Ira Einhorn, and he is credited as the inventor of Earth Day.
The punchline was that Ira Einhorn eventually murdered his girlfriend in his apartment and mummified her and put her in the closet and they found her and he went to jail for the rest of his life.
But the punchline was that more people died in the apartment of the inventor of Earth Day than actual people dying from man-made climate change.
Yeah, or the ozone layer, or acid rain, or any of that.
Listen, any invocation of the memory of our friend Rush Limbaugh is welcome, welcome here.
I'd say let's do, rather than give somebody short shrift, let's get ready to come down and hug the bottom of the hour break here, and then come back and welcome some more folks.
Let's do the plugs.
Always go to DennisPrager.com for things Dennis.
Follow me on Twitter, at Mark Davis.
There on Twitter, M-A-R-K Davis.
You can go to Amazon if you want.
You want me in book form.
That's always fun.
A couple of things I wrote about my great home state of Texas, Lone Star America.
And then a thing I cranked out in 2016 called Upside Down.
How the left turned right into wrong, truth into lies, and good into bad.
Every word still true.
It's a handy-dandy issue guide of why liberals are wrong about virtually everything.
Mark Davis, upside down, Google that, hop on Amazon and grab that if you wish as well.
All right, that ought to about do it.
Let's come back and do our final home stretch half hour of your thoughts and mine, all commingled in this delicious Salem Radio Network and Salem News Channel.
Go to snc.tv and watch the spectacle, which will continue in just a few minutes.
Mark Davis in for Dennis.
Happy Friday.
Who's doing this sweet cover of a Beatles classic?
Generational test.
How many of y'all are singing along?
Let's all get up and dance to a song that was a hit before your mother was born.
Your mother should know.
67-ish Beatle action.
Here in the homestretch of the Dennis Prager Show, Mark Davis, official old guy, hanging out remembering 60s records for you.
Oh, my, my, my.
Hey, it's all I got, man.
It's all I got.
We have a lot of things going on on the phones, though, and things going on in the news, too.
Let me give you an update on something while we're keeping track of trouble spots, which we should always do.
What the heck is the deal in Sudan?
Yesterday, a story about the State Department telling Americans that they should avoid going to Sudan.
Well, there went my summer travel plans.
I'm sure Khartoum is lovely in August.
But in all seriousness, it is a cluster, and we had, hang on, let me check, we had an American citizen die amid the fighting in Sudan.
U.S. military repositioning troops in the region, preparing for a possible evacuation of the embassy in the capital city of Khartoum.
Sudan's capital is under shelling as warring factions, led by two rival generals, vie for leadership of the country.
I'm sure that's going to go beautifully.
I always want world trouble spots to calm themselves.
I want rule of law to prevail and freedom, liberty, democracy, and people charting their own course.
There will always be bad people.
There will be tyrants.
There will be tin horns.
There will be authoritarians, etc., etc., etc.
But these days especially...
You know, with Ukraine front of mind and China looming.
I'll throw you something about China here.
And Taiwan?
I don't want you to drive the car off the road for this, but let me finish the Sudanese point first.
To what extent American involvement should be weighed against the degree to which any particular trouble spot is a direct, and I mean direct, American interest?
If we stipulate that there's some difference of opinion out there on Ukraine, we would all love for the Ukrainians to succeed in ushering Putin off of their soil.
That would be great.
Is it a vital American interest to dump endless billions and endless tanks and jets toward that cause?
New.
I've taken what I think is a reasonable course here by saying, look, we're there.
We're doing things.
Let's keep the pedal to the metal, crank it up to 11 for this calendar year.
Give Zelensky what he asked for.
With oversight, plenty of oversight, please.
And let's do it until New Year's Eve.
You've got until December 31st to get Putin out of Ukraine.
If there's success there, hooray.
If not, well, time to sit everybody down.
I guess I didn't define so much what that...
What that settlement might look like.
Maybe those eastern regions, the Donbas, maybe that just becomes Russia.
But that's all.
Ukraine gets to keep the rest of the country.
Putin will have to be satisfied with that, and Zelensky will have to live with it.
Because we ain't going to do 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 12, no more forever wars.
No.
Because this is not a vital American interest.
Now, you ready for this?
Deep breath.
Get ready for the debate over whether it is a vital American interest to defend Taiwan.
Now, this is communist China.
It's almost been a given.
Boy, if you go after Taiwan, those are our allies.
You go after Taiwan, we're in a shooting war with China.
Really?
I don't like the idea of letting China absorb Taiwan, you know, making Taiwan just a part of the CCP. I hate that.
Know what I hate more?
A shooting war with China.
So, and you know what I hate most of all?
The notion of going through these tensions with a doddering, cognitively declining Joe Biden as the commander-in-chief.
These are, and maybe that's going to be part of our pitch in 24. These are seriously troubling times.
And we need a serious president.
And I'll tell you what, we've talked a lot about Trump, DeSantis, Trump, DeSantis, Trump, DeSantis.
This can be a big feather in the cap for Trump.
Because as we sit here and look ahead to what we're going to need from an American president, it'll be a kind of toughness, a kind of resolve.
And could DeSantis have it?
Maybe.
But we don't know.
Because he's never had the job.
Guess who has?
That would be Trump.
And I don't want you to ever underestimate the value.
The contribution to a safer America that you get, whether it's Putin, whether it's Kim Jong-un, whether it's President Xi, when they think about the American president and they think, dang, I don't know what that guy would do.
That's what you want in the Oval Office.
That's what you want.
I want to talk to more of you on the phone.
We'll do it next.
Mark Davison for Dennis.
Stick around. Stick around. Stick around. Stick around. Stick around. Stick around.
Which, of course, means he must be cancelled immediately for daring to discuss the virtues of manhood.
See, this is what's kind of crazy.
Manhood is a thing.
It is uniquely valuable.
Only men can have it.
Womanhood is a vital part of humanity.
And only women can have it.
Only women can be mothers.
Only men can be fathers.
There's not just some watered-down definition of parent or birthing person or all of this nonsense.
The genders that God made and that science defines are an invaluable part of human nature.
And the left is trying to actually erode.
You know, they're not just trying to erode the concepts intellectually at the table of debate.
They're trying to actually destroy the tangible parts of what makes maleness and femaleness.
I almost wish that somebody could appear in this audience right now, appear on Earth, start listening to this show right now from some bygone year.
Wouldn't have to be 100 years ago.
Wouldn't have to be 50. It wouldn't have to be 20. And hear me say the following.
You ready?
We have in America right now some gender dysphoria.
We have some boys who think they are actually girls or want to be girls and vice versa.
We have parents who are going along with this, with the chemical castration of our boys and so-called top surgery, mastectomies for our teenage girls so that they can go pretend to be boys.
We have parents who will go along with this and think that they're doing something Gender-affirming.
We have doctors who will do these grotesque things and call it health care.
Now, if you're driving around on April 21st, 2023, it's like, yep, that's what we got.
We're going to fight it.
We're going to do our best.
But can you imagine the heads that would explode if people knew this from not so very long ago?
How far we have fallen.
And that's why we have work ahead.
We have a lot.
All righty, we're in Glendale, California.
Lynn, Mark Davis in for Dennis.
How are you?
Hi, there.
Hi, Lynn.
Hey, how are you?
Hi.
Fine, thank you.
I just wanted to say that technically this may not matter, and I know Ron DeSantis has the right to run.
Of course, he has every right to run, and I'm a big fan of his.
Big fan.
And I'll vote for whoever gets the nomination.
But I think it bothers me so much, and I think it bothers a lot of Republicans.
The ingratitude of Ron DeSantis.
How is he ungrateful?
How is he ungrateful?
There is no way on God's earth he would have ever gotten the nomination for a Republican governor.
No, no, no.
Trump was really important in helping DeSantis win, but how has he been ungrateful?
Well, then, just to turn around, and I'm sure he'd disagree with this, but then to turn around immediately after he gets re-elected, and basically...
I think a lot of people feel the way I do.
Stab Donald Trump in the back after Donald Trump was responsible.
I'm sorry, Lynn, I'm sorry.
How did he stab him in the back?
What are you talking about?
By running against him for the nomination.
Lynn, are you telling me that somebody, if I support you or you support me, that later on in life I have to shelve my life plans if you're running?
That's insane!
No, he doesn't have to.
I'm just telling you how a lot of people feel.
Outside of Trump headquarters, not many.
But that's just absolutely crazy.
I love you so much.
It's not later on in life.
It's a couple of years later.
I know, but I love you.
That's patently insane.
And I love Trump, but he kind of suggested it too, didn't he?
That he's kind of disloyal.
You know, what's he doing running against me?
It's called America, where everybody gets to run.
This notion that the DeSantis had an obligation not to run because Trump had supported him as governor when he first ran.
Good Lord, people.
Life is interesting.
Okay, we are in Knoxville, Tennessee.
Randy, Mark Davis in for Dennis.
How are you on this Friday?
Hey, real good.
Thank you, Mark.
I appreciate it.
Appreciate you.
Hey, thanks.
Trump is not beholding to giant money bundlers.
Now, you know, DeSantis, and I'm not throwing rocks.
I'm just talking.
I hope you don't think I'm crazy like you think that poor nice lady that just called me in Spain.
Well, then don't say anything crazy.
Go ahead.
I'm sorry.
Hey, thanks.
You know, his number one bundler is Ken Griffin.
DeSantis, I'm talking about.
I learned this from Sebastian Gorka.
He told everybody.
I listen to Salem all day long.
I love that.
Thanks.
He said Kim Griffin was Obama and John McCain's number one money bundler.
I'm going to suggest something to you.
I'm going to suggest something to you and everybody else.
If I give money to you or I'm helping you, does that mean I want you to be president?
I guess it does.
Does that mean you automatically agree with everything that I bring to the table?
It does not.
Here's what you pay attention to.
What DeSantis does.
What he says.
How he governs.
Period.
Pay attention to those things.
Hold him accountable on those things.
The only people throwing hissy fits and doing a lot of hand-wringing about DeSantis' bundlers and, you know, whether Jeb once said something nice about DeSantis.
I don't care.
If other people want to, they can.
And I can't tell you how much I love Seb.
He's my friend.
But let's put Trump, DeSantis, everybody else running.
Let's look at what they say, what they've done, what they stand for.
Because anything else is, frankly, a little bit of a waste of time.
60 seconds.
Greenville, South Carolina.
And John, that's you.
You've got about 45 seconds.
Make it count.
Go.
Well, listen, sir.
I heard you talk about gun control.
And, yeah, it sounds good to control mental health and all this and that.
But how would you begin?
What in the world would we try?
I mean, it sounds like a nice broad brush.
But what in the world would actually start that?
I mean, do you have any suggestions?
Well, sure.
And they're hard suggestions.
And they are, look at our society.
Look in the mirror.
Look at how we raise our kids.
Look at how we care for each other.
Look at how we do mental health.
We do not have a gun problem.
We have a humanity problem.
We've never had a gun problem in America.
In the formative stages of America, families would step over a huge pile of guns to get to the dinner table.
We didn't have problems like this.
We've always had guns.
What we haven't had is as many crazy, dysfunctional people.
We have a people problem, and that's harder to solve by definition.
So I suggest we start.
Mark Davison for Dennis.
Be right back.
Dennis Prager here.
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