Democrats In PANIC MODE Over Unhinged Trump Cheating Theory, Michael Moore Warns Trump Will CHEAT
Democrats In PANIC MODE Over Unhinged Trump Cheating Theory, Michael Moore Warns Trump Will CHEAT. Since 2015 they haven't stopped claiming Trump will cheat, is cheating, or will refuse to accept the results of the election.Now the New York times is telling us that Democrats are experience anxiety of Trump doomsday scenarios where he rigs the election or refuses to concede after losing.Democrats can't seem to learn from their past mistakes and have kept pushing the same narratives for the past several years even though data shows their strategy just doesn't work.Republicans on the other hand have their own theories such as Obamagate But for all of us who have seen that the Democrats russiagate theory was wrong we wonder what started it and why. Certainly those questions are merited much more that the unhinged theories pushed by Democrats and media allies.
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Ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to bring you into a world of the Democrats imagination, a world they view is coming this November.
And I'm going to start by just reading this snippet from The New York Times in October.
President Trump declares a state of emergency in major cities and battleground states like Milwaukee and Detroit, banning polling places from opening.
A week before the election, Attorney General William P. Barr announces a criminal investigation into Democratic presidential nominee Joseph R. Biden.
After Mr. Biden wins a narrow electoral college victory, Mr. Trump refuses to accept the results, won't leave the White House, and declines to allow the Biden transition team customary access to agencies before the January 20th inauguration.
Does that sound like a fictional reality?
It certainly does.
It's the same tired narrative Democrats have been pushing since before 2016.
And somehow, and for some reason, we have a pile of these stories.
Don't ask me why.
How about this one?
Michael Moore.
The only way Trump wins in 2020 is if he cheats.
The Washington Post.
We need to prepare for the possibility of Trump rejecting election results.
Market Watch.
Polls now show Biden defeating Trump in the 2020 election.
But what if Trump refused to lose?
We can even go back to February.
What would happen if Trump refused to leave office?
The unhinged conspiracy theories that were all over the place in 2016 are here to stay.
They've never gone away and they won't stop.
They're only getting crazier.
And yeah, far-fetched conspiracy theories, the New York Times ask.
That's exactly what they are.
And it's coming from mostly Democrats.
I am tired of saying the Democrats are in panic, but the reality is I just, it's true.
You know, someone asked on Twitter, or someone said on Twitter, if you keep reposting these stories about Republicans panicking, you're the mark, you're the rube, you're being taken for a ride by the same story written every single time with anonymous sources claiming that people within the Trump camp or the Republican Party are panicking over what's to come in November for some reason.
We see people saying, these stories are fake.
We know it's not true.
Who are these sources?
And what do we see in reality?
Well, we see the Republicans just winning two special elections and winning very, very well.
But where are the stories to pick this up, saying, you know what, maybe we're going to see a red wave in November.
Instead, what do we get?
We get Joe Biden on track to win.
We get Democrats on track to reclaim the House.
We get stories about Democrats on track to reclaim the Senate.
But the reality just doesn't seem to fit.
And then when it comes down to asking these very same people what will happen in November, they come up with insane conspiracy theories.
I assure you it will not be Donald Trump refusing to leave or contesting the result of the election.
It's been the Democrats doing it nonstop.
So here we are.
Republicans have a very healthy lead over the Democrats.
I'm sorry, Trump has a healthy lead over Joe Biden.
The Democratic candidates are actually doing fairly well, and there is a chance Joe Biden could win.
Trump supporters who refuse to recognize this, well, that will be your downfall, hubris.
The reality is Biden can win.
But why do we keep seeing these unhinged stories from the media?
I don't know, honestly, but I can speculate.
Perhaps they're hedging their bets in the event that Trump really does win, or Trump loses, or maybe it's Trump wins, they'll argue he didn't actually win.
That way, when he says, that's not a legitimate claim against me, they can argue about it.
I honestly have no idea.
I think the most likely reason is that it gets clicks.
They want to scare people.
The people who don't like Trump, they want you to be in fear.
They want to shock you.
They want to give you that sensationalist headline.
And you know what?
Around and around we go playing the exact same game.
Because as much as I'll criticize them for saying panic, panic, panic, here I am once again saying Democrats and Democrats panic.
And I gotta admit, I am kind of tired of it.
But this is a New York Times story.
And what am I supposed to say when we have a wave of stories coming out all within 24 hours arguing essentially the same thing that Trump is going to cheat?
They're freaking out over this, coming up with unhinged theories that I just don't believe are based in reality.
When you look at the poll numbers, when you look at Joe Biden's recent gaffes, the nationwide trend, and Trump's capitalizing off of these things, it looks like Trump is sitting pretty.
So maybe I'm biased.
I'll accept that.
And I'll tell you right now, you can see an inversion of these stories.
You will see people claim it's Trump who's panicking.
It's Trump who's in serious jeopardy.
And perhaps you could base that off of the polls showing Biden will win.
But when I go back to 2016 and see the polls showing Hillary will win, I don't think that's enough evidence.
When I look at the walk-away campaign, and more importantly, when FiveThirtyEight, the famous pollsters, say that California's 25th district and Wisconsin's 7th could signal a blue wave, but then we see a crushing defeat of the Democrats, I have to surmise.
It's looking well for Trump.
So everybody's trying to convince you their side is winning.
I'm sorry.
This unhinged conspiracy says to me they're freaking out.
So let's read it and see what they have to say and go through what's potentially really going on, at least from the way I see it.
And of course I could be wrong.
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But let's read the story.
The New York Times says Trump sows doubt on voting.
It keeps some people up at night.
A group of worst case scenario planners, mostly Democrats, but also some anti-Trump Republicans, have been gaming out how to respond to various doomsday options for the 2020 presidential election.
Now, it could just be that the New York Times knows I'll latch onto a story like this, and they're pandering to my biases.
Keep that in mind.
But this is something we've seen from many, many other outlets, and we've seen many Democrats and resistance-type lefties tweeting this stuff and posting this stuff on social media.
That's why I'm inclined to think these people have truly lost it, and it's not so much that we are being manipulated with sensational stories they know we'll read.
A little bit of that, let's be honest.
You know, the New York Times knows that they're gonna see a whole bunch of people like me saying, whoa, look at this New York Times story, they've really lost it.
Whatever gets shares.
It doesn't matter if it's a positive view or a negative view because a view is a view and money is money.
But let's read, with that being said.
So I did read this, but let's go over it real quickly.
In October, President Trump declares a state of emergency in major cities.
William Barr announces an investigation against Joe Biden.
And then Biden wins the Electoral College, but Trump refuses to leave.
Here's what they say.
Far-fetched conspiracy theories?
Not to a group of worst-case scenario planners, mostly Democrats but some anti-Trump Republicans as well, who have been gaming out various doomsday options for the 2020 presidential election.
Outraged by Mr. Trump and fearful that he might try to disrupt the campaign before, during, and after Election Day, They are engaged in a process that began in the realm of science fiction, but has nudged closer to reality as Mr. Trump and his administration abandon long-standing political norms.
And here we go, the New York Times jumping in very carefully, just dipping a toe in the water of the conspiracy theory to make sure they seem a bit more rational, but they're going to play the game same as every other freaky, unhinged weirdo.
The anxiety has intensified in recent weeks as the president continues to attack the integrity of mail voting and insinuate that the election system is rigged.
While his Republican allies ramp up efforts to control who can vote and how, just last week Mr. Trump threatened to withhold funding from states that defy his wishes on expanding mail voting, while also amplifying unfounded claims of voter fraud in battleground states.
Quote, In the eight to ten months I've been yapping at people about this stuff, the reactions have gone from, don't be silly, that won't happen, to an increasing sense of, you know, that could happen, said Rosa Brooks, a Georgetown University law professor.
Earlier this year, Ms.
Brooks convened an informal group of Democrats and never Trump Republicans to brainstorm about ways the Trump administration could disrupt the election and to think about how to prevent it.
But the anxiety is hardly limited to outside group, I kid you not.
They really believe this conspiracy unhinged nonsense.
I don't know what else to tell you, man.
It has been years, okay, since Donald Trump won, and it hasn't been the Republicans.
Well, I mean, they won, so they wouldn't be complaining.
Maybe they would be if they lost, but the Democrats haven't let it go.
Arguing to this day, Trump only won because of Russia, trying to impeach him over this nonsense.
They've not stopped.
There has been no legitimate... Well, okay, I shouldn't say no legitimate, but listen.
We have had very little real political discourse over policy issues because the past several years have been dominated by either the Ukraine gate scandal or the Russia gate scandal.
Please just stop the conspiracy theories.
But what do they say?
Oh, they claim it's Donald Trump's base.
Mike Baker of the New York Times says, I don't care about the Bill Gates stuff, okay?
Conspiracy theories are no longer relegated to the fringe.
44% of Republicans and 19% of Democrats believe Bill Gates want to use covid blah, blah, blah.
I don't care about the Bill Gates stuff.
OK, the point is there are fears that the right, the fringe right are spreading conspiracy
theories.
theories.
You know what, man?
You can take your insults towards the right over conspiracy theories, and place them neatly in a little box with the three years of Russiagate, and then ask me if I care.
You want to come out with all these stories complaining about right-wing conspiracy theories?
Hey, man, I don't like any of the conspiracy theories.
But you have no legs to stand on.
I'm sorry.
Because it was CNN, MSNBC, propping up this conspiracy nonsense.
And you know where the right-wing conspiracy stuff comes from?
Small channels, not super large political commentary.
The people who are sitting up on Twitter with hundreds of thousands of followers are conservatives with mainstream opinions that just so happen to like Trump.
But you guys, you pushed the nonsense for years.
Mark Elias, a Washington lawyer who leads the Democratic National Committee's legal efforts to fight voter suppression efforts, said not a day goes by when he doesn't field a question from senior Democratic officials about whether Mr. Trump could postpone or cancel the election.
Prodded by allies to explain why not, Mr. Elias wrote a column on the subject in late March for his website, and it drew more traffic than anything he'd ever published.
Just, you know what?
Hey, this is why we can't have nice things, I guess.
But I have a serious question on this, though.
If the left really is drifting this far from reality, that so much so that the New York Times even entertains the possibility, even though they've been the ones screeching this whole time, does it come to a point where there's no way to bring everyone together?
If Donald Trump wins in November, and the Democrats argue Trump really didn't win, then they'll look to these articles and say, see, this proves that Trump really didn't win, and he won't accept that he didn't win.
Will there ever be anything that the left and the right will be able to reconcile?
Like, what I mean to ask is, are they drifting so far apart they'll never trust each other, and that's it?
It's over?
Where do we go from there?
Look at this stuff, this is nuts!
The most traffic anything had ever published.
But changing the date of the election is not what worries Mr. Elias.
The bigger threat in his mind, he said, is the possibility that the Trump administration could act in October to make it harder for people to vote in urban centers in battleground states.
Possibilities, he said, that include declaring a state of emergency, deploying the National Guard, or forbidding gatherings of more than 10 people.
Trump can't do that!
How long, how many times have we heard them saying Trump doesn't have the authority to reopen the economy, but Trump has the authority to shut down the economy?
Which is it, man?
Does Trump have the right to supersede the governors, or doesn't he?
He doesn't.
Yet here we go.
When it's convenient for their conspiracy theory, it must be true.
Trump didn't do enough.
Then Trump says, I have absolute authority.
They say, no, you don't.
Trump can't mandate that churches reopen.
He can't tell the states what to do, but he might tell the states what to do when it comes to the election.
Man, welcome to the fringe conspiracy weirdo world.
Michael Moore certainly seems to think so, but guess what?
Michael Moore here, in my opinion, is lying.
This is what I love about today's media landscape.
There is enough space, there's enough going on to break down the lies from these fringe weirdos.
The only way Trump wins in 2020 is if he cheats, says Michael Moore, appearing on Real Time with Bill Maher and warning that Trump may be planning ways to boost his chances against Vice President Biden.
The only way they're going to pull it off is if he's able to cancel the election or postpone it.
That is what we're going to have to fight against, because I'm certain that is what's going on in his head right now.
Cheating.
OK.
All right.
Well, why is it then that recently Michael Moore said, quote, Biden does not generate the necessary enthusiasm that it's going to take to get people out?
The Democrats are cynically counting on everyone's desire to remove Trump.
All that all that gives more flashbacks to 2016, as do the anti lockdown protests erupting in those same Rust Belt states that sealed Clinton's fate four years ago.
Trump supporters, Moore said ominously, are more rabid than ever.
This story came out May 21st.
Two days later, Michael Moore says, nope, Trump's gonna cheat.
Okay, I get it.
Maybe Michael Moore's view on things changed in those two days.
Or maybe they're just lying.
Maybe because they want to get internet points.
Maybe because they don't really understand what's going on.
Maybe because they have, I don't know, memory, the memory of a goldfish.
Maybe they just don't remember anything that happened in the days before.
But why would Michael Moore switch from saying Trump's gonna win because Joe Biden can't muster the enthusiasm and Trump supporters are more rabid than ever, but then come out and say, no, no, no, he's gonna cheat.
He's gonna cheat.
And then we get all of these stories arguing that Trump wouldn't leave.
This one's from February 22nd, 2020.
This one's from February 23rd, 2019.
What if Trump refuses to accept defeat in 2020?
They've never stopped saying the same things over and over again.
I wonder how many times you could write these articles and get away with them.
I'll try to differentiate my view from their view because there is kind of a mirror image here, right?
This is what I brought up early on, but I think it's important to self-analyze.
How many times have I made a video talking about Democrats in panic mode or Democrats are panicking?
I get annoyed with myself over this kind of stuff.
And I'm sitting here trying to figure out, is there a better way to phrase this?
But listen.
When they've pushed the same unhinged conspiracy of which there is no basis in reality for years, and now they're actually having meetings where they're like, what if Trump does this?
And the New York Times even entertains it, and says they're feeling anxiety.
I'm sorry, that is a legitimate article with quotes and sources from people who say they are panicking over this stuff, and it's an informal group of Democrats.
Then you look at what happened in CA25, with Katie Hill's district going from 9 points in favor of the Democrats, swinging 21 points for the Republicans, and it all kind of adds up.
Now take a look at the stories they've been writing on the other side.
What if Trump refuses to accept defeat in 2020?
Hold on.
2020 didn't happen.
You have no reason to believe Trump would refuse to accept a defeat.
You just don't.
First of all, he won in 2016.
Most people believe he's going to win.
Why keep writing these stories?
Because I think they're lying.
I think Democrats are panicking, but I believe many of them are panicking because they keep reading this stuff.
They're panicking because they believe the weirdo opinions of people claiming Trump is going to cheat.
It's just not happening.
But we can go take a look at what really may be happening.
You see, Michael Moore is actually right, in my opinion, on May 21st.
Ask any left-wing populist Bernie Sanders supporter.
Will Joe Biden muster the enthusiasm to beat Trump?
They're going to tell you no!
No, because even they don't want to vote for the guy.
You ask a Trump supporter and they'll laugh, happy that Joe Biden was the choice.
So Michael Moore makes this point and I say this one makes sense.
Biden doesn't generate the necessary enthusiasm.
It's a real point.
It's been brought up in polls called the enthusiasm gap between Donald Trump and Joe Biden.
But talking about Trump cheating is just panic conspiracy theory nonsense.
And when you put these stories out, when you say it, you end up with panicked Democrats freaking out they're going to lose.
Trump supporters are overconfident.
That's their weakness.
This is the difference.
Democrats are panicking.
Trump supporters are overconfident.
Really?
They think they can't lose.
You really can lose, man.
Biden is running ahead of Clinton's 2016 pace.
Look, we can rag on Democrats all day and night.
You come to my channel.
I certainly do it on this channel a lot.
On other channels, you know, I'll talk about other stuff, but let's be real.
I talk about it probably too much.
But Biden is running ahead of Clinton's 2016 pace.
His fundraising, while not beating Trump, is comparable.
It's close.
And Joe Biden is leading in the polls.
That may mean nothing, let's be honest.
And in battleground states, according to one poll, Biden is actually down.
It's hard to know for sure, but to just discount Joe Biden outright would be wrong.
There is a chance he wins, and the betting odds over predicted have it pretty close.
And this is where Trump supporters need to get smart.
And honestly, Biden supporters need to get smart, too.
You can't just go around claiming Trump's going to cheat.
Sorry.
If you can't muster the support, well, then you don't win.
And Trump supporters, if you think you're going to win, that's when they sneak up behind you and they take that victory away.
Unfortunately for the Democrats, though, one thing that, you know, Michael Moore actually brought up that was spot on is that Democrats can't just rely on anti-Trump sentiment to win, which may be why they're pushing conspiracy theories.
Or actually, no, I should say this.
They're pushing conspiracy theories, perhaps to generate anger at Trump and anti-Trump sentiment. Get a bunch of
people thinking Trump is a cheater who will never give up trying to generate that. You know, you
want Trump to look sinister, nefarious, but even 538 acknowledges it won't work. You need to
actually have a candidate.
Here's what 538 says. Why anger at Trump may not help Democrats win. They write.
But if 2020 is an election driven primarily by anger, that might backfire on Democrats.
Take the 2016 election.
One reason former Senator Hillary Clinton was less successful in mobilizing Obama's base was because her focus on Trump's bigoted comments attracted some who shared her views, but did not resonate with non-white voters.
The Clinton campaign bet big on the strategy of highlighting the racist and xenophobic undertones of the Trump campaign.
But its basket of deplorables messaging appeared to engender more of a rise from Trump supporters than falling under this label than people of color feeling targeted.
It was a severe miscalculation of the way people of color respond to political threats.
That's right.
Take a look at the story about Joe Biden saying you ain't black and what Charlemagne the God of the Breakfast Club was asking.
For those that aren't familiar, big, big story on the Breakfast Club with Charlemagne the God.
Charlemagne was asking Joe Biden about what he's going to do for his community.
Biden said, I've got to go.
Then Charlemagne said, I've got more questions.
Biden's response was, if you're having trouble figuring out why not to support him, basically saying, if you don't vote for him, you ain't black.
That's what he said.
And Charlemagne-Nagant did not react the way these people think they would react.
This story from MarketWatch.
Charlemagne the God tells Biden that black voters saved your political life in the primaries and have things they want from you.
He wanted to say it was cool that Biden apologized for it, but you've got to really answer to them.
The Trump is bad, orange man bad, and the conspiracy stuff and the I hate Trump doesn't fly with the non-white voters.
And it really does make sense if you look at the data.
One study I really love highlighting is the Hidden Tribes More In Common study that shows progressive activists make up 8% of this country and they tend to be overwhelmingly white and upper-class, college-educated, over $100,000 a year.
Interestingly, this is the weirdest thing.
I was reading one poll showing that Trump is actually doing bad against Biden in the polls because he's losing white voters.
That's right.
Trump has actually made some gains within the black community and minority voters.
He's actually doing kind of well.
But somehow it's white people who don't like him, which flies in the face of everything the Democrats would tell you about Donald Trump.
But it takes me back to the story from FiveThirtyEight.
Hillary Clinton tried to accuse Trump of all these worst things, all these names.
I'm sorry, man.
The progressive activists who fall for this stuff are white.
So you're going to attract them, fine.
But you're not going to get the non-white voters you think you need.
It's not going to work.
And that seems to be what they're betting on.
Joe Biden apparently tried claiming that he was endorsed by the NAACP and they came out and said no.
They said yesterday former Vice President Joe Biden made a comment about the NAACP's endorsement.
We want to clarify that the NAACP is a nonpartisan organization and does not endorse candidates for political party, for political office at any level.
Vice President Joe Biden said during his Breakfast Club interview that apparently he had been endorsed by the NAACP.
It just doesn't work.
I wish the Democrats would try something beyond just complaining and acting like there's a big conspiracy and Trump is colluding with Russia or whatever.
The Russian collusion narrative.
Trump cheated to win.
It was proven false.
There are odd questions arising over Barack Obama's potential involvement, the weird circumstances around Susan Rice's emails, a bunch of really weird things happening.
And the best they can muster up is a second conspiracy, Ukrainegate.
And when that fails, the best they can muster up is some blank, nonsensical, unhinged conspiracy with no real basis.
Look, if you come out and say Trump, you know, colluded with Russia, at least there's substance to your argument.
Russia did this.
Trump was involved.
Ukraine.
Trump made a phone call to Ukraine.
Hey, there's substance there.
You're wrong.
Now there's nothing.
They're literally pulling nothing out of a hat saying, Well, Trump cheated last time and treated with Ukraine, and now he's just cheating.
How is he cheating?
Well, he's just cheating.
He's cheating.
Right.
That's all they have.
They've run out of ideas.
You know, they tried claiming that Trump was colluding with China, and then turns out that story was false.
Everybody immediately drops it.
So we get Russiagate.
What are we on?
Russiagate 4 now?
This is awesome.
I love it.
Here we are.
Russiagate.
Russiagate 2, Ukrainian boogaloo.
Russiagate 3, Trump's big trouble with little China.
Turned out to be false in like a week and now we're on Russiagate 4.
We got nothing.
Orange man bad.
There you go.
Russiagate 4, orange man bad.
It's the best they could muster up.
I think it's funny, right?
When this story came out from the Washington Post, we need to prepare for the possibility of Trump rejecting election results.
May 14th.
Many people were quick to point out, are we really gonna do this again?
They asked, are we really doing this again?
We did this in 2016, you gonna do it again?
Yes, we are.
Because following this, and I didn't do a lead segment on this.
I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah, I get it.
I don't want to touch this stuff.
But look, man, I'll tell you what.
When Michael Moore comes out, Michael Moore was right in 2016.
He predicted a Trump victory.
Then on the 21st, he predicted another Trump victory.
Now he's claiming, well, Trump's gonna cheat.
All right, man.
Okay, okay, okay.
Can I have some issues, please?
Can you tell me about what your policies are?
Look, there are very few people, I guess, who actually can talk about policies, but I'll tell you one thing right now.
I don't know a whole lot about what Trump is aiming for, for the most part.
He's going to make America great again.
He's going to keep it great.
He wants to bolster the economy.
Those things sound nice.
Joe Biden says he'll do the same thing.
I can give you one right now off the top of my head.
I could probably give you a bunch more.
Joe Biden's stance on immigration is untenable with the average American, and that's a fact.
Moratorium on deportations.
Benefits to non-citizens.
These are simple issues where Trump and Biden are divided.
Now, beyond that, let's be honest.
It's sports politics, man.
It's people want Trump to win because it's their team.
And then people want Biden to win because it's their team.
That's the anger that Democrats are hoping for.
They're hoping that they beat Trump because people will vote based on their team and not on their candidate.
That won't work because it doesn't work for minority voters.
As we heard from Charlemagne Tha God, he says, I want to know what you're going to do for my community.
Guess what?
Trump holds meetings for the black community, for Latino community.
He does.
And he says, here's what I'll do for you.
Unemployment's going to go down.
We're going to bring jobs back.
We're going to bring up your wages.
Those are real things you can offer.
Joe Biden says, vote for me or else, basically.
All right, I'll wrap it up there, because otherwise I'm going to rant on this forever.
But I'm fully expecting to see many more conspiracy theories as we get closer to November, and I fully expect the media to blame the conservatives for the conspiracy theories.
But I'll leave it there.
Stick around.
Next segment's coming up at 6 p.m.
at youtube.com slash timcastnews.
It is a different channel.
And I will see you all then.
We're approaching a devastating milestone in the coronavirus pandemic.
Nearly 100,000 people have lost their lives.
And yes, surely this is, it's a tragedy.
The New York Times has run a shocking front page.
U.S.
deaths near 100,000, an incalculable loss.
Nearly 1,000 names of COVID victims, COVID patients, people have lost their lives on the front page of the New York Times.
Well, the only problem right now is that at least one of these names isn't actually a COVID death, calling the whole thing into question.
And of course, we're seeing people desperately try to blame whoever they can.
And with this front page, the collective outrage of the journalist class and the resistance Democrat types is palpable.
They're sharing it far and wide.
They're blaming Trump.
They're saying, you know, what would have happened if it wasn't Trump?
They're saying he should have done things earlier.
Joe Biden appeared on Colbert saying, I told him he should have done it a long time ago.
No, nobody knew.
Hindsight is 20-20.
Stop playing these stupid games.
You know who's to blame?
There is one party that is to blame.
The Chinese Communist Party, not the Democratic Party, not the Republican Party.
Trump could have done some things better.
Hindsight is 20-20.
Cuomo could have done things better.
Hindsight is 20-20.
But when we are all operating off of incomplete data because China withheld that, come on, man.
We don't need to make this partisan, left-right, whatever.
We know why we had a bad reaction, why we were slow in many areas.
But of course they're going to blame Donald Trump and of course they're going to get called
out when they use this.
It turns out the Times was wrong and now the New York Times is like, oh no, we have to
remove this name.
Hopefully, they didn't print this already anyway.
It's funny to me when I see all of these tweets that are saying things like, you know, oh,
this is Donald Trump's fault.
Someone, some blue-checky journalist tweeted, everything you hear from Donald Trump today will be an attempt to distract from this, and then boom, here's the image.
Then when you realize that, you know, so far one of the names is wrong, it's like, dude, come on, man.
Other people are to blame.
Why is that?
Every single aspect of this.
Okay, let's remove China from the equation, right?
Then who's to blame?
Trump is a federal-level politician.
The governors were the ones running their states.
And it's funny that Donald Trump says things like he's gonna reopen churches.
What does the media say?
They run all these stories saying Trump can't enforce that.
Trump can't mandate that states allow churches to reopen.
Trump says, I have absolute authority.
He doesn't.
And even conservatives called him out for this.
So, how is it his fault if he literally can't do anything?
I'm tired of playing these stupid games.
You can criticize Cuomo for a lot, he's done a pretty bad job.
And we can criticize the media especially, and that's the main point.
As I've mentioned time and time again, you know, Ron DeSantis in Florida, they smeared him, they say he's lying, he's flubbing numbers, it's not as bad as it is in New York.
And you can certainly blame the governors.
I want to show you this story about the New York Times front page, give you some context, but I want to show you, listen, When will people start to take responsibility for themselves?
It's Trump's fault this is happening.
Excuse me, right now you've got field hospitals that were never used.
Okay, so what is that all about?
But more importantly, Memorial Day weekend crowds flooding Lake of the Ozarks.
And it's not just that.
It's all over the country.
Is there any responsibility for the individuals who ignored any kind of guidance?
You know what, man?
It's not Andrew Cuomo's fault if people in New York were flocking to beaches.
It is not Donald Trump's fault if people across the country are flocking to beaches.
They all know the rules.
They all know what was advised.
Certainly many of these governors who are trying to enforce unconstitutional provisions.
We can have a whole argument about that.
But it's just so annoying when I go on Twitter and it's like, here's the front page of the New York Times and what do I see?
All of these lefty journalists being like, this is Trump!
This is Trump's America!
Yes, yes, we get it.
Everything's Trump's America.
Except when the economy was doing really, really well.
That was Obama's America.
It's really annoying to me, too, that I'm constantly having to defend Trump because the media just frames everything this way.
So here's the story.
Let's read this.
As the U.S.
approaches the grim milestone of 100,000 coronavirus deaths, The New York Times has filled the entire front page of Sunday's paper with death notices of victims from across the country.
In a decision, the paper said, was intended to convey the vastness and variety of the tragedy.
The front page is a simple list of names and personal details taken from obituaries around the U.S.
The headline is, U.S.
deaths near 100,000, an incalculable loss, with a subheading that reads, they were not simply names on a list, they were us.
Now here's something really interesting.
For the longest time, I say for the longest time, but for the past couple of months, there have been concerns among mostly conservatives that hospitals were flubbing the numbers and putting COVID down on death certificates that weren't actually COVID because they get money for it.
Now, I don't know exactly how that works, but it is true.
Elon Musk tweeted about this.
Hospitals that list COVID patients get more money.
USA Today fact-checked this.
It's true.
And then we see this story.
In response to this going viral and everyone saying, oh, you know, Trump, blah blah blah, this guy Timothy says, um, here's the front page of the New York Times.
The next image shows Jordan Driver Haynes, 27, Cedar Rapids, Iowa.
Generous young man with a delightful grin.
Where did the New York Times get that information, I wonder?
An obituary, perhaps.
I don't know.
That's what they claimed.
Could it be that a local paper got it wrong or something?
Well, Here's image of some kind of news story.
Updated.
March 20th.
The Cedar Rapids Police Department says a man found in a vehicle along I-380 last week was murdered.
According to a media release, an autopsy on the 27-year-old Jordan Haynes ruled his death was a homicide.
No other information has been released.
Here we can see once again, they found 27-year-old Jordan D. Haynes in a vehicle, and it's a homicide.
But the New York Times put that on the front page.
Well, in response to this, we can see CNN's Brian Stalter tweeted,
Well, how does this happen? Look, pencils have erasers, man.
People make mistakes.
But do we now have to go through every single name?
It sounds like somebody is.
And if it's just one name, okay, fine.
Like I said, Pencils Have Erasers, right?
Well, that does call into question a lot of the information about all of these other deaths.
The New York Times says it's from obituaries.
Why was this guy's obituary claiming it was COVID when the news story was claiming it was homicide?
Something doesn't add up.
Now, I'm not trying to allege a conspiracy or anything like that, but I will point out the absurdity of blaming Trump for all of the people who have lost their lives when, again, he's a federal-level politician.
There's a lot of things he can do with the Defense Production Act, with PPE.
He does have responsibilities.
He is the leader of this country.
But come on, man.
There are all levels of responsibility for this.
And we have seen an extremely adversarial, belligerent media criticizing literally everything he does.
It's hilarious that Joe Biden would go on Stephen Colbert and say something like, I told you it was January 15th, I said we should do something.
That is an amazing lie from Joe Biden.
Amazing.
He did an interview with Colbert.
Amazing lie.
No, you didn't.
We didn't even know there was human-to-human transmission on the 15th because China withheld the information.
And on the 14th, the World Health Organization said no evidence.
So why would Joe Biden come out before there was any evidence of any human-to-human transmission and be like, we better take action?
No, he didn't.
He criticized Trump.
That's what they do.
Every single thing that comes out is Trump's fault.
Trump did wrong.
Listen, man.
We built all of these field hospitals.
Check out this story.
Another NYC field hospital is dismantled despite beds being needed to open up the city again as deaths in the state fall below 100 to 84 for the first time in two months.
The 670-bed makeshift hospital at Brooklyn Cruise Terminal in Red Hook is being demobilized before it takes a single patient.
It cost $20.8 million to convert and was not ready until May 4th.
Okay.
It's not the first field hospital to be shuttered.
needing an extra 420 hospital beds to meet one of state governor Cuomo's requirements
for the city to begin reopening.
Okay, it's not the first field hospital to be shuttered.
This is a trend across the country.
You know what's messed up right now?
When we're looking over at Japan, it seems that the lockdown was a mistake.
So you know what?
Maybe you can blame Trump for that, because Trump was fairly early.
I wouldn't be surprised if this is what we see from the left and the media moving forward.
Japan had very few cases.
They had a very light, you know, social distancing, you know, provision.
And now they're clearing up and they're like, we didn't really notice anything.
Perhaps it's because humans are really bad at calculating every variable to understand what comes next.
I talk about this very often, but think about it.
Early on, we heard that there was this sickness and people in China were getting sick and they started welding doors shut and they were panicking.
So then, you know, it comes to Europe, and Italy gets really, really bad, and we see a lot of lives lost.
And so then over in the U.S., we decide, 15 days to slow the spread.
We're going to shut everything down.
If everybody stays home, right, well then they're not going to be in contact with each other, so they can't get sick.
Wrong.
That was the mistake.
Turns out vitamin D deficiency plays a role in this.
It turns out being in close quarters with other people exacerbates or increases the likelihood you'll actually get an infection.
And right now, Dr. Birx from the task force has asked the CDC to investigate why it is that cities that are still locked down aren't seeing the infection rate go down.
It's simple.
When you have a person, when you have a group of people in a house, and they're all going out, there is a likelihood they could get sick.
But if they're social distancing, wearing masks, and taking other precautions, washing their hands, then there is a reduced likelihood they will get sick.
If you put everybody crammed into a tight space, And then you have people going to only one or two stores, you've maximized, it would seem, the likelihood of infection.
Think about it.
We closed down most stores, right?
So now what do we have left?
Walmart.
So everybody's going to Walmart, going home, touching everything, and the people in those homes are more likely to be in contact with the same surfaces and with infected, you know, saliva droplets or whatever in the air.
If people are going out and about, but social distancing, then they wouldn't all be going to the same places.
And now we actually can see, like in Japan.
They didn't need it.
And a JP Morgan study suggests it may have actually backfired.
So you know what?
Maybe we made a mistake.
So now we're shutting down all these hospitals.
We didn't need them.
Maybe it's time.
Like Dr. Fauci said just a couple days ago, it's time to reopen.
Well, there's some more collective outrage drumming up from the journalist and resistance class saying things like, you know, my God, what are we doing?
We're so idiots.
We're such idiots.
And I saw this really hilarious tweet.
From a woman literally named Karen, saying something about these being Trumpsters.
And I'm like, dude, the people flooding the beaches for Memorial Day are not Trumpsters, they're regular people.
They're... You know what, man?
They don't get it.
They don't understand they are the weirdos.
I'm sorry, dude.
If you're on Twitter, and you're going like, you know, you're shocked and outraged, oh, harumph, I say!
How are people doing this?
Getting in that water and drinking and standing next to each other.
Yeah, regular people are doing this.
They don't care.
They don't.
So it's funny.
I think Trump has his thumb on the pulse of what regular people in this country do.
It's why he got so many non-voters to vote.
People who never voted before.
I went to a ton of rallies, talked to a ton of people, and I heard a lot of people saying they'd never voted before.
And then if they did, they were kind of, you know, lean Democrat, but here they were for Trump.
Look at this story.
Memorial Day weekend crowds at Lake of the Ozarks appears to not be observing social distancing.
Now that's crazy to me, too.
Because, look, you can go to the beach.
You know, you can go party.
You can still social distance, right?
People don't care.
And Trump knows it.
And that's why Trump has been advocating for a long time to reopen things.
And every single time he says this, you get the resistance left doing the opposite.
Which is really funny.
Think about it this way.
Think about the reality in which Donald Trump is frequently correct.
Now Trump says a lot of things that aren't true.
You can call it a lie, you can call it him being wrong, just like not understanding or not knowing.
I think he certainly lies, like every politician, like every person, for a lot of reasons.
Everyone does.
But think about this.
Let's say 6 out of 10 times Trump is correct in his assessment and his assumptions about the American people about what they need and want.
That would mean the Democrats in the media are wrong six out of those ten times because they only ever come out against Trump.
There is like one time I have seen the media praise Trump, one time.
And do you know what it was?
It was when Trump fired 59 Tomahawk missiles into Syria.
Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating, being a little hyperbolic.
I'm sure there's been some positive press for the president outside of that.
But boy, it was funny to see all these news outlets say, like, Trump being very presidential here, firing missiles on a foreign country.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
You love to see it.
When the establishment gets what they want, they walk in lockstep.
They love it.
When the media and the Democrats only ever point the finger at Trump and say he's wrong, then they ignore what regular people are actually thinking, because Trump tends to know.
That's what I think.
And when you see these photos of people out enjoying the beach, look at this one.
Here's from the Daily Mail.
Hundreds of thousands of lockdown-weary Americans hit the beach to kick off Memorial Day weekend and mark the start of summer amid ongoing panic.
And look at this.
Americans flocked to beaches across the country on Saturday to mark the unofficial start of summer amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Let's see, the back porch, a surfside restaurant on Henderson Beach in Destin, Florida, was full.
The restaurant was operating at 50% seating capacity to ensure the chairs and umbrellas could be placed six feet apart.
So many of these places, they're doing social distancing, right?
But I'm seeing all of these angry people on Twitter saying, like, Americans are so dumb.
Oh, what do we do?
And it's like, listen, man, maybe, okay?
But when you look at what happened with Japan, When you look at how vitamin D affects this, when you look at the studies showing that people who stay at home are more likely to get sick, this ain't a bad idea.
Social distancing at the beach?
Sounds good to me.
I mean, nobody's wearing masks, but you're at the beach, I mean, what are you gonna do, right?
We saw a story, okay?
This was like a month ago.
It wasn't a month ago, several weeks ago.
The guy was paddleboarding, by himself, in the ocean!
And the Coast Guard came, and he ended up getting arrested.
I don't know, I think local police arrested him.
So this local news outlet got a quote from a woman saying something like, the virus could be vapor, you know, aerosolized in the water and be kicking up.
She said, I wouldn't go to the beach if you paid me a million dollars.
And it was the stupidest thing I had ever heard.
This obsession with Karening.
And then I realized it.
You know what I realized?
The media and many of these resistance Democrats are a collective of Karens.
Think about it.
They just want power.
Whether it's right or wrong, they're the person who says, you're not supposed to be doing that.
You're not supposed to be going to the beach.
The virus is probably in the water.
I mean, you're gonna get sick.
You're so dumb, you'll regret it.
That's what they're doing.
It's literally a Karen move.
Going out and trying to force people to do things Let people do their thing, man.
Let them mind their own business.
Guy was paddle boarding by himself.
Why would someone claim that it was like some marine biologist or something?
That the virus would be kicked up in the air from the water and like all across the beach?
Are you nuts?
There's no one there!
The water, what?
And it's stories like that that said to me, they are lying.
That's what it felt like.
They're lying.
And it's hard to know what's legit and what isn't.
Because no matter what happens, it always has to be, if you're on the side of Trump or freedom or free speech, you're wrong.
And here we are.
People flocking to the beaches, having a grand old time, and really just not seeming to care.
Now think about what happens with a devastated economy, with 36 million unemployed.
People are doing this.
But Donald Trump has been in favor of this, in favor of ending the lockdowns, of liberating these states, of allowing businesses to reopen.
And it's been the Democrats who have been in favor of keeping things shut down and extending the lockdowns.
With that being the case, I wonder what these regular people who didn't want to social distance or lockdown or whatever, I wonder who they're going to vote for.
Which brings me back to the front page of the New York Times.
When people see this front page, I don't think the average person, to be honest, I don't think they care.
I really don't.
If you show them this, a list of a thousand deaths, you know, omitting the fact that one of these was not legitimate, maybe some others.
When you show them this, what do they think?
I gotta be honest, I don't think they think much.
I mean, I'm sure the average person will be like, man, that's a bummer, those people lost their lives.
But this isn't stopping them from going to the beach.
They don't care.
You can slap a newspaper front page of the most prominent paper in the country, New York Times, a thousand people dead.
Look at these names.
And they're gonna be like, whoa.
You guys wanna go to the beach?
But what do you mean?
We got a pandemic!
You're gonna get sick!
Are you crazy?
Apparently, they are.
At least from the perspective of the resistance journalist types, the anti-Trump people, and Trump derangement syndrome people.
Or maybe they just never cared to begin with, and maybe we now know.
Maybe it's you who isn't paying attention.
Maybe many of these people go to the beach.
Maybe they read the news about the study coming out.
This was in the UK, I believe.
Actually, I don't know.
I think it was a US study.
Actually, it might have been like NYU.
That 66% of people who got infected were the ones staying at home.
Maybe they read the news about Japan and the other countries that weren't shutting down and were doing just fine.
Maybe there are other factors we didn't consider.
And ultimately, maybe it's just not affecting them at all.
So it could get worse.
It really could.
With all these people going to the beach, but I don't think so.
I think the data has shown it to be the case that getting out and getting in the sun is... it's better.
I mean, people need their vitamin D. Dr. Fauci has already said he wants a safe reopening.
You know, it's time because it's devastating to the economy.
And the only people who are ultimately going to be worse off for it are these blue states.
The blue states that have enforced these strict lockdowns, targeted small businesses and shut them down, they're going to lose the tax revenue.
Right now, another story just came out.
Young people are leaving New York City.
The wealthy have left.
The young people are leaving.
What will New York have left?
Let me tell you something about the problem of population growth and density with static costs.
Using Detroit as an example.
Actually, I'll just use New York as an example.
New York is a very, very complicated city.
Very complicated, right?
You got big buildings, you got five boroughs, you gotta get plumbing to all these buildings.
That means the cost of maintaining the city's plumbing system remains static.
It will stay the same no matter how many people live or don't live in the city.
Now, of course, they can shut off some mains at some areas, but for the most part, let's just use hypothetical numbers.
It costs $1,000,000 per year, let's say per month, $1,000,000 per month to maintain all of the plumbing as a whole for the city's infrastructure.
If you have a million people in a city, it costs them $1 per month in taxes.
Let's say half of those people leave.
Now their water costs have doubled.
Let's say half of them leave, it goes up again.
You get the point.
The cost of maintaining the system remains relatively the same.
So with New York now not only losing their wealthy but young people, And they're already facing a deficit.
Cuomo is already scared about this.
The MTA, the metro, the subways are already falling apart.
And now they're losing all of these people and all of that tax revenue.
The Democrats have hurt themselves severely by locking down the way they did.
And you know, I'm not going to blame them for it.
I'm really not.
There are Republican governors who have locked down as well, but they don't have as many, you know, the bigger cities are all blue.
I think China's to blame.
I think we did a lot of the best we could.
And I think right now, when you see many of these Democratic governors, they seem to be ignoring the latest data.
The data's out, man.
Okay?
Take it from Fauci.
It's time to reopen, and you need to do this quick, otherwise you're going to fall apart.
But of course, orange man bad, it's always Trump's fault.
Andrew Cuomo blames Trump for the nursing home fiasco, and there it is.
I guess we can only just wait and see how things play out, but I'll tell you what, with everybody just going to the beach and not caring, why would you think you're on the right side of this?
Maybe you're the smart one.
Maybe you're the smart one.
Everyone else is stupid.
Okay, that's fine.
And then they're going to vote against you and you're going to lose because you can't effectively communicate with these people.
Shaming them didn't do anything.
Maybe you need to reassess.
I'll leave it there.
Next segment's coming up at 1pm on this channel and I will see you all then.
As a member of the media, I am shocked and outraged that our president would retweet such offensive things.
In one retweet from the president, a man referred to Hillary Clinton as a... I can't believe I'm going to say these words.
Skank!
Can you believe Donald Trump would do this?
How could the president— I'm kidding, by the way.
But yes, the journalists are freaking out because Donald Trump once again does what Donald Trump always does.
He does not care, I guess.
Look, I'll tell you what, man.
If this is what you voted for, Trump is delivering, and he is delivering in spades.
He is just lighting a fire to all of this establishment whatever.
and he doesn't seem to care. He rolls with it. He likes it.
I think it's worthy of criticism.
I absolutely do. I mean, look, the president's supposed to be, I don't know, man, I don't know
how to describe it. There's got to be some professionalism, right? But I think many
people in this country who voted for the president, to be honest, stopped caring.
And I don't mean they don't care about America.
I mean they stopped caring about trying to vote in people who lied every single step of the way.
The way I've described it before is that Donald Trump is a bull.
And you've got, you know, the Bernie Sander was the leftist populist knocking on the door asking to be politely let in.
Please let me in the ivory tower, he said.
And they laughed at him from up above.
The populace on the right brought a bull to the door who kicked it in and rampaged full speed.
So what I mean is they don't care.
I think people deeply care about this country and they want to see it do better.
But when you spend, what, decades voting back and forth between presidents who are like, vote for me and I'll do this, and then they don't, and then vote for me and I'll fix it, and then they don't.
I remember that famous rant from Dylan Rattigan.
I don't know if you've ever seen it.
I think it was MSNBC.
And he just snapped.
I can't remember exactly what he said, but he said one party wants to burn it to the ground while the other party wants to kick the can down the road for another generation.
No one actually getting anything done.
That guy ends up leaving.
You know, now he like works on a farm or something.
Cool, dude.
I don't know a lot about him.
But I think when it came to Donald Trump, he stood up and said, I'm going to do these things.
And he was a nasty guy.
He was mean, right?
That's what he said.
Trump said, I'm a mean guy, but I work for you.
And this is exactly what you can expect.
Let's take a look at some of these tweets and we'll talk about the media, because boy, They are really, really salty about this one.
Trump shares sexist messages about prominent female Democrats in Twitter spree.
This is from Slate, mind you.
I've chosen a lefty publication on purpose because we really want to get to the core of their outrage.
After his round of golf on Saturday, it seems the president went back home and started scrolling Twitter.
President Donald Trump then proceeded to go on a spree that was bizarre even for his standards, as he retweeted posts mocking several big-name female Democrats, all while he peddled baseless conspiracy theories regarding MSNBC's Joe Scarborough.
In one particularly shocking message, the president shared a tweet by John Stahl, a conservative who got a whopping 4% in the 2012 open primary to represent California's 52nd district, that called Hillary Clinton a skank.
Listen.
Listen, my friends.
I've always been a bit of a liberal dude, growing up in big cities.
And briefly, you know, there was a brief period where I was like, maybe we actually can do something.
Maybe there is hope and change.
And then I quickly had that washed away.
Look, I grew up punk rock, you know, far left with a bunch of my skater friends.
Had a brief period of, like, maybe Obama's that guy, and then he went and blew a bunch of kids, and I'm like, that was not the guy.
I'm done.
I'm done.
And I don't care anymore.
So when I see the establishment elite, the liars, the manipulators, the... oh, man.
You know what's funny?
What I'm describing about this media class and the establishment Democrats, it's almost in line with this idea of the 1%.
It's the people sitting atop the ivory tower in their fancy mansions saying, let them eat cake.
It's not all rich people, right?
And that's the weird thing.
Everybody tries to figure out what this one group is they really, really hate.
And so everyone's got weird theories about it.
But it's, for me, I guess it's still, it's these elites.
They're upper class, you know, not even really liberal.
I mean, they don't care about freedom.
They just care about power.
They tend to be wealthy.
Look at these Hollywood celebrities.
Many of them born into wealth, just have money, think they're smarter than you.
They were given the keys to the castle.
And that's what many of these politicians were.
Even the Republicans.
Especially the Republicans.
Especially.
That's what I saw growing up.
You had the cool, hippie, lefty types.
And then you had the hoity-toity, suit-wearing, traditional family values types.
And then Trump came along.
And a lot of these established Republicans, they retired.
They backed off.
They're like, I don't wanna be involved in this.
And Trump just started tearing everybody apart.
And I didn't vote for it.
You know why?
Because, you know, I've been burned way too many times.
And I gotta be honest, it's not what I would want to represent me, so I'm not gonna vote for it.
But I laughed.
And I understood.
And I remember sitting there the day Trump got elected with my hands behind my head in a room full of, you know, Democrat Hillary supporters while they were all, you know, freaking out.
I was laughing as loud as I could.
It was hilarious.
It was seeing all of these elites getting what was coming to them.
The bull had been unleashed, and the look on their faces, you know, it's like they're atop this ivory tower looking down, laughing at the peasants who brought a bull to the door, and they're all laughing, and cheersing, and pointing, and then all of a sudden the bull kicks the door in, and then they're like, Oh, they knew it was coming.
Let me show you some of these tweets.
Of course, Maggie Haberman of the New York Times is outraged.
The president just retweeted someone calling the first woman nominee of either major political party in the US, quote, a skank.
A few hours after another Scarborough murder allegation on the weekend, the country closes in on 100K coronavirus deaths.
Yes.
Perhaps if they stopped to think.
They would understand why it is they represent something.
Look, OK, the people like what Trump is doing.
I mean, like Trump's voters, people may come out in droves to vote against him.
That's a possibility.
Biden seems to be doing better than Hillary.
We'll explore this later in my other segment.
If you're listening to the podcast, you've already heard it.
But when you look at someone like Maggie Haberman of The New York Times, does she think that she's speaking to regular working Americans?
Do any of these people really think that?
They're not.
Regular people like American Gladiators.
It's a Bill Burr reference, but I know it's an old show, but they like comedy.
They like entertainment.
They like Kanye West, and they like Donald Trump.
Not everybody.
A lot of people really hate him.
But before he ran for president, everybody loved the guy.
You know, it was like, he was the symbol of wealth and the American dream or whatever, for whatever, you know, your opinion is on the guy.
In reference to, like, his dad is alone and everything.
But people were like, you know, rappers rapped about being Trump, having golden toilets.
Like, that was the thing.
Trump is... He's not a regular guy, by no means.
I mean, the guy's grown up, rich.
But he's something to these people that's not what the New York Times is.
And I think what it really is, is...
It's like the... It's the people who think they're smarter than you, to be honest.
Like, you can be wealthy and successful and just be a bit humble.
You're not smarter than everybody else.
And I think that's one of the things that separates me from a lot of these other journalists, too.
Because politically, I certainly disagree with a lot of, you know, conservative political positions and right-wing, you know, I guess, cultural positions.
Sort of.
It's really changing, right?
So, freedom of speech being a right-wing issue has become strange.
But I think as long as you're willing to be, you know, humble, and recognize you're not always right, you're not the smartest person, that's all that anybody really wants.
So when you get a news media class, people like Maggie Haberman, freaking out, you know, harumph I say, that's the joke, right?
We've been selling Harumph I Say t-shirts.
It's not on this channel, it's on the TimCastIRL channel.
But that's the joke I'm making.
Trump is the guy who's coming in the room while they're all, you know, pinkies out drinking their tea.
How dare Trump say such awful words about the First Lady?
And regular people probably don't care.
They kind of just pretend, right?
Check this out.
That wasn't the only time Trump amplified Stahl on Saturday.
The president also retweeted two other messages by Stahl in which he insulted House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and mocked the way she looks.
And he also shared in another Stahl post in which he made fun of Stacey Abrams' weight.
To be fair, Nancy Pelosi did call Trump morbidly obese.
Trump is not morbidly obese.
He's obese.
So it's like, I'll be honest, man.
I thought it was hilarious the way Nancy Pelosi delivered that line.
She was like, you know, it was about hydroxychloroquine.
And she's like, we have to... She says something about being concerned about, you know, his age group and, let's be honest, weight class.
Morbidly obese.
It was funny.
I have a sense of humor.
So if Trump then comes out and makes fun of Nancy Pelosi's look, do you think I'm gonna be upset?
No, I'm gonna think it's funny too!
The funny thing about what really separates the two factions of the culture or whatever, you look at a subreddit or like a community like The Donald, I think it's really funny.
So for those that don't know what it is, Reddit, big social media network, the largest Donald Trump forum created its own site, the donald.win, and I frequent a variety of left and right culture war subreddits.
The funny thing is, you'll see the same post on both.
You'll go to a left-wing anti-Trump subreddit and they'll have that picture of Donald Trump playing tennis where he's like turning and you can see his butt and he's like out of shape and like kind of goofy looking.
And they share that laughing.
And then the Trump supporters share it in laughing.
I don't think the left really understands what it is the right cares about.
They think it's funny.
It's a joke.
It's a game.
They love this.
And they love it when the journalists get triggered saying, oh, I'm so angry that someone would make fun of Stacey Abrams' weight.
Well, Nancy Pelosi just made fun of Trump's weight.
So they don't care.
You know what I mean?
It's funny.
Look, Aaron Ruppar says, absolutely despicable.
It's a tweet from John S. Stahl, who said, We just got a look at the official portrait of the self-proclaimed governor of Georgia.
She fought a tough race, kissed a lot of babies, and visited every buffet restaurant in the state.
Wow.
Joe will be a racist if he doesn't pick her.
Aaron Ruppar, I'd be willing to bet you could go through his timeline and find him talking about Nancy Pelosi calling Trump morbidly obese, and he wouldn't be angry about it.
Yet when it comes to someone cracking a joke about the weight of Stacey Abrams, oh, despicable!
And that's what people are sick of.
Just have some consistency, right?
And that's a thing about, I think, about a lot of the Trump supporters.
They laugh.
There's a photo that went viral.
I shouldn't say went viral, but was upvoted on Reddit, of Trump with his hair blowing in the wind, and it looks ridiculous.
And the Trump supporters like stickied it on their forum, laughing, loving it.
They love the guy.
It's like, I don't think they understand that Trump takes these attacks against him and he turns them into jokes to rally his base.
I went to the White House, what was it?
The White House Social Media Summit.
I thought it was going to be more of a quiet, like, let's have a conversation about social media censorship, but for the most part it was a VIP Trump rally, to be honest.
And Donald Trump made a bunch of self-deprecating jokes that they like to make fun of him, and Trump rolled with it, and it's funny.
The dude's an entertainer, he gets it.
He knows how to make people laugh, and those people like it.
You don't understand.
You look at someone like Rodney Dangerfield, the dude knew it was all self-deprecating humor.
And it actually defeats the argument.
It defeats the insult.
Because you laugh and you shrug it off.
It doesn't bother you.
They don't get it.
Let's read a little bit more.
Look at this.
Aaron Ruppar says, The president called one prominent female Democrat fat.
Well, no, he didn't.
He retweeted somebody.
And another a skank tonight.
And it won't get nearly the coverage of Joe Biden saying something dumb because the bar for Trump is subterranean and we've normalized having an ignorant monster as president.
No, it's... They don't get it.
They really, really don't.
There is no bar for Trump.
That's basically the point.
And most people who voted for Trump know it.
In fact, many of the people I've talked to, you know, as I've traveled, have said they wished he wouldn't do stuff like this.
They're still gonna vote for him.
You don't get it.
You have this indefensible standard.
The Circular Firing Squad.
That's what Obama called it.
There's nothing you can do to not be offensive.
That's the huge problem.
I'm sure someone's going to claim Aaron Ruppar is a bigot or something.
So why bother?
And now you end up with two extremes.
You get the left that's like literally everything is offensive and Donald Trump being like skank, overweight, eating at buffets.
One's freedom, and one's got no solution.
That's the big problem.
When I look at Donald Trump tweeting, these retweets, I'm like, freedom.
Freedom of speech.
Personally, I'd like a president who didn't do this.
I understand why.
It's funny.
I think it's funny.
But look, I can think of guys really, really funny.
I have a friend, you know, who's very crude, very crass, very offensive.
I wouldn't hire him for a job where they gotta speak to the public all the time, you know what I mean?
I can laugh at it.
But that's just me, right?
I think regular people see Trump as freedom of speech.
They love that he's taking down these hoity-toity elitists.
It makes them feel good.
It's emotionally satisfying.
The problem is, I look at that and I'm like, I understand that.
That fits within a framework of principle.
I look to the left and I see nothing that makes sense.
It's like women with an X, Y, or an E. Which one is offensive?
I don't know!
I have no idea!
There was a story I covered where they said, uh, Womxn.
W-O-M-X-N.
I kid you not.
Womxn.
They said that's the right way to say it because it's inclusive.
And then some group came out, you know, feminists saying it was offensive because you shouldn't need a special word because trans women are women.
And then someone came out and said something about, like, that was exclusive because of women of color or something, and it was like, they were just attacking each other over which, to put an X or a Y in the word women, and I'm like, nothing here makes sense.
Trump being offensive, I get.
You can like it, you can hate it, but you know why he does it.
This?
I don't know what that is.
Here we go, we got more.
The president shared the mocking tweets in the same day as he continued to push a conspiracy theory that suggests Scarborough may have had something to do with the 2001 death of an intern who worked for him.
Keep digging, Trump wrote.
Use forensic geniuses.
This isn't the first time the president has peddled that particular theory, and it's unclear what exactly set him off this time.
But earlier in the day, the Morning Joe Twitter account noted there would be a special Sunday morning edition of the show as the New York Times dedicates page one to all those who have lost their lives in the pandemic.
Then Trump said, oh man, Trump tweeted about the Joe Scarborough story from 2001 and his intern.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Former Vice President Joe Biden also made a mention of the shocking front page that was devoted entirely to listing some of the almost 100,000 Americans who have died of COVID, calling it jarring and heartbreaking.
Trump's Twitter spree also came on the same day that Biden released an attack ad against the president, blasting his decision to play golf over the weekend as the coronavirus death toll kept rising.
The death toll is still rising, notes the ad.
The president is playing golf.
OK, first of all, Trump himself criticized Obama for taking vacations and golfing.
And yes, I think it's fair to call that out.
But you can't simultaneously be mad about that and then argue that Trump can't do anything anyway.
It's one of the biggest problems that they argue Trump can't dictate what any of these businesses do.
He can't force them open.
He has no power.
But if we shut down things sooner, we could have saved lives, and that is Trump's fault.
What?
Trump didn't have the authority to shut down the businesses.
The governors had to do it.
And when he came out saying he did have the authority, you told him he didn't.
You see, that's the problem.
You know what?
Criticize Trump for playing golf?
Yeah.
Yeah, for sure.
But you know what?
I really, really don't care.
I really don't.
I care if the job gets done.
I don't care what you do.
I'm not that kind of person where it's like, you know, if I was a manager at a shop and I came in and I saw someone playing on their phone, I'm not going to be like, why are you playing on your phone?
I'd be like, you get those papers done?
And when they're like, yep, you got it.
I'd be like, awesome.
Thanks, bro.
I'd walk out.
I don't care if you're playing on your phone.
I care if you're getting the job done.
The same is true for Obama, the same is true for Trump.
So, look, if Trump wants to go take a break and go golf, I really, really, really don't care.
Now, I think there's a point to be made about Trump and the amount of money it costs for him to go play golf all the time.
Yeah, it's a lot of money.
And then, meanwhile, Trump's donating his salary.
Fine, that's fine, but...
How much more is it costing in secret service, you know what I mean?
So, I think it's a symbolic gesture to donate a salary, fine, but he's still getting great benefits, so I'm not here to play any of those silly games.
That's the gist of the story, I guess.
Is that it?
They're angry?
Well, here's Axios.
Trump tweets baseless conspiracy theory accusing Joe Scarborough of murder.
Baseless?
I can't stand the media.
I can't.
Why would you add the word baseless?
It's a serious question.
Do I think the conspiracy charges against Scarborough are legit?
No, I don't.
I honestly don't.
I don't know enough.
So I wouldn't make an assertion.
But a journalist, a news organization, would just say something.
Trump tweets about Joe Scarborough and an intern who lost their life.
That's it.
Baseless conspiracy theory is a loaded term.
This is why people like it when Trump rags on everybody.
Because you do things like this.
You've never answered the questions about what, you know, well, they've answered some questions about the Joe Scarborough thing.
But a lot of people don't buy it and they want to talk about it.
And so, listen, it's very simple.
When I approach somebody that believes something I know to be false, do I laugh at them and insult them and say they're peddling baseless nonsense?
How stupid, the Trumpsters, the MAGA chuds?
No, of course not!
The story I have to tell people.
I was in, I think it was San Fran, and I got invited to this big, you know, it was a bunch of Trump supporters were getting together for like a dinner or something.
So I got asked, they asked me if I wanted to come, I did, for sure.
And I'm sitting down, and we're all talking, and I mentioned something about systemic racism, or like institutional racism.
And they all laughed about it.
And I was like, no, I mean this seriously.
And they were like, oh, but that's not a thing.
I'm like, no, no, no, it is.
There is such a thing as institutional or systemic racism.
The problem is the left doesn't actually try to communicate with conservatives to explain it to them.
Instead, you get these preachers of social justice dogma screeching that all white people are racist, which is not what it is.
And so, just to give you a quick context to understand it, St.
Louis County is where I did this documentary, and there are problems stemming back from the history of the city and the civil rights movement and racism, which results in negative consequences for mostly the black communities today.
So there are serious issues.
You had segregation, and because of this you end up with a bunch of different cities, and then you end up with poverty in certain areas.
And so the issue, what I try to explain to people, is not that the individual officer who's enforcing this ticket is racist, but that there are remnants of systems that came from racist institutions that still exist.
And I think the solution to them is to actually not talk about it from a racial perspective, but from a classed perspective.
When you approach someone humbly and honestly, and you say, I don't think I'm the smartest person in the world, but I can tell you what I did hear and what I did learn about when I went someplace, guess what?
They listen.
Instead, what do we get?
And this criticism goes for Trump as well.
When you point the finger at someone else and insult them and screech them and laugh, it just, you just, it doesn't work.
I don't like engaging in this kind of stuff on Twitter, right?
I really avoid this, but I see it all the time.
Someone on the left will tweet and then someone on the right will post something, you know, insulting them.
Not necessarily insulting, but it could be like derision or mockery.
I always try to make sure, for the most part, my responses to many of these journalists is, Normal, you know, honest and calm.
There was one instance where a journalist tweeted something.
I then tweeted in response, and people started attacking the journalist, but the journalist was quoting a paper.
And so I apologized for it.
I was like, that was not my intention.
I was actually highlighting the story you were highlighting as well.
But that's what I try to do, and I think everyone would be better off for it.
But the point of this video and what I'm saying is, it's how you can understand why the left is always freaking out, why Trump says the things that he does.
Whether or not we get through this and everything improves, maybe, or maybe we just devolve until everyone tears each other's throats out.
I'll leave it there.
Stick around.
Next segment's coming up over at timcast.net.
Go to that URL.
It's a different YouTube channel.
It'll be at 4 p.m.
I will see you there, and thanks for hanging out.
The latest press secretary, Kayleigh McEnany, has been going after the press and she's taken the gloves off.
She's brought slides in.
She repeatedly pulls out a book and asks questions and challenges the fake news media.
And of course, the journalists are furious about it.
In a kind of surprising story, Chris Wallace of Fox News invited a panel where they ended up bashing Kayleigh McEnany.
And it's funny, News Buster says, I've been watching some of these viral clips, and it is emotionally satisfying when Kayleigh McEnany throws the questions back in the face of the press, who you'd think would be able to report on this stuff, answer some of these questions, and understand what's going on.
They love to say things like, what is even Obamagate?
It's like, dude, If some, you know, middle-aged guy at home can pull up Google and get a quick understanding of Obamagate, at the very least, you could do the same before asking questions.
Actually look into this stuff so you know what you're talking about.
Too many journalists are in the... I guess I call it a toilet swirl.
Just spinning around.
It's a game of telephone between all these other journalists.
They're isolated.
They're insulated.
They don't do research outside of their bubble, so they have no idea what's going on.
And it's funny now, because we have to have the press secretary, Kayleigh McEnany, ask them questions, because that's how clueless these people are.
Let's take a look at what's going on in this specific instance.
From newsbusters, Wallace Goldberg bashed Twitter troll press secretary McEnany.
Fox News Sunday anchor Chris Wallace invited a panel to bash White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany because she dared to stand up to the opposition press.
Between Wallace taking it personally and the never-Trump editor-in-chief of the Dispatch, Jonah Goldberg, attacking her, it was like watching CNN.
Wallace's chief complaint was that McEnany had taken the White House pool to task for ignoring and downplaying the
revelations in the corrupt investigation of Lieutenant General Michael Flynn and how the Russian collusion
narrative was unraveling.
Quote, I have to say that if Kayleigh McEnany had told Sam Donaldson and me what questions we should ask, that would
not have gone well for her.
Wallace bristled as he addressed Goldberg. What is that supposed to mean? Why wouldn't it go well? She asked the
questions she wanted answered. So what's the problem?
You want to fire back and ask questions?
I'm sure she'd engage in that conversation because she wants you to ask those questions.
Goldberg took exception with former DNC Chair Donna Brazile, who he said was deferential to Kayleigh McEnany.
I think her behavior is indefensible and grotesque.
Oh, I love the collective outrage.
I don't care who it comes from.
Goldberg proclaimed against the press secretary.
After struggling to get his analogy out, he decried McEnany as, quote, a Twitter troll who goes on attack, doesn't actually care about doing the job they have.
Man, I could absolutely say the exact same thing about these journalists.
And there it is.
Kayleigh McEnany has presented the fun house mirror and placed it on the podium in front of the microphone, and the journalists are now seeing exactly what they do, and they don't like it.
That's all it is.
A reflection of what they're doing.
Now, to be fair, Kayleigh McEnany is doing a better job, but if you want to view her as a Twitter troll, how do you think everyone else feels when these journalists are literally just Twitter trolls?
I saw one journalist today, supposedly from a prestigious publication, Posting screenshots from one article and something from Trump.
Trump said...
Across the country, COVID numbers are going down.
Then they took this opposition research thing saying COVID cases are going up, and they were like, hmm, well, it's like, okay, dude, you screenshotted the stories, I get it, we all do that.
But you realize those are two different things.
If you want to argue that across the country, numbers are going down, that's a fair point.
Does it mean all numbers for the entire nation are going down?
No, it means that you've got cities across the country where the numbers are going down.
There could be other places where they're going up.
It's not the point.
But the journalists want to get hot takes.
That's what they want to do.
They want to go online and, you know, they want... I'm doing that thing where you lick your finger and then make the hissing sound because they're burning somebody.
That's what they want to do.
That's what they actually do.
And then you get Chris Wallace and Jonah Goldberg trying to do it on TV.
This is what I don't like about the current iteration of what I... You know what?
I was going to say journalism.
I don't want to call it that.
Because it's basically just everybody getting emotional digs at each other.
Like, I understand why Kayleigh McEnany pulls out the book and says, what about these stories?
I mean, I actually agree with doing this.
Someone asked her.
This is a story from a couple weeks ago or so.
They said, you know, in the past, you criticized Donald Trump.
You said these things.
And then she said, you know, basically, look, I stand by Trump.
But then she pulls out stories and says, if you want to ask me about taking back things I said, I would ask Vox, would you want to take back this story where you mentioned coronavirus wasn't that bad, or the Washington Post?
She then goes on to list all of these outlets where they said things they later went on to, you know, claim the opposite.
And that's what the media does.
They don't take criticism very well.
So when she says, oh, you want to ask me that question?
I'll give you an answer.
Okay, times change.
And now here's one right back at you.
They get all angry.
And here you go.
He added, Jonah Goldberg, and instead wants to impress really an audience of one and make another part of official Washington another one of these essentially cable news and Twitter gladiatorial arenas.
And it's a sign of the defining of deviancy down in our politics.
And it's only going to make things worse.
Have you ever met Jim Acosta, good sir?
I don't believe it was, you know, Sarah Huckabee Sanders or Sean Spicer who started the cable TV nonsense of the press briefings.
That, my friend, was none other than CNN's very own Jim Acosta, which is funny.
Watching, you know, reading about this Fox panel, it really does sound like CNN.
Jim Acosta turned it into a spectacle.
Now, I get it.
You can point the finger at Trump a bit.
But the thing about Trump is that he's the president, and presidents can be eccentric or not.
The press is supposed to be professional.
Ask questions, get to the bottom of things, ask for clarification.
They don't.
Jim Acosta stood up, grandstanding and ranting and arguing with the president, and when everyone realized that brought in ratings, they all did the same thing.
So when you get Kayleigh McEnany coming out and now challenging you and saying, what about this?
You want to play these games.
You don't get to now be mad and say, well, she's turning into cable TV.
Maybe if you came out and criticized Jim Acosta when the rest of us did, we would not be here.
And I'll tell you what, if you get rid of those people like Jim Acosta and the other CNN Caitlyn What's-Her-Face and that woman who pulled her mask down and she was like, why are you asking me about China?
You get rid of those people, then maybe I'll ask that we tone things down even in so far as Caitlyn McEnany would engage the press.
But you don't.
So to act like what Kaylee is doing is somehow the worst thing you've ever seen is just a lie.
A straight-up lie.
She's calm, she's professional, she brings up good points, it's- it's- that's it.
If the journalists want to play these games, then this is what they'll get.
And at the very least, they don't- they don't even have to have press briefings.
She doesn't even have to come out, and the journalists don't have to go there!
What are you complaining about?
It's optional.
It's like someone saying, how about I, you know, look, they could just shut the press briefings down like they did last time.
And then they'll complain, Trump should have press briefings.
Then Trump started having press briefings and they were like, no, no, shut Trump's press briefings down.
It's boosting his ratings.
So then Trump brings on Kellyanne Kennedy and now they're outraged.
Okay, I'll tell you what.
Maybe?
Just don't do it at all.
Because you'll never please these people.
I don't think they're really angry at her.
I don't.
I think what they're doing is a part of the performative political garbage.
So, look, I'd love if everything went back to normal.
I'd love if people were honest.
They're not.
And what we've gotten from just whatever this culture war is, is reality TV trash.
Trump didn't create it.
Trump is a symptom of it.
And that's one of the reasons he got elected.
People liked what he brought to the table because of what was budding up in our culture.
And Bernie Sanders represented a left-wing populist movement, but he didn't have the strength to win.
Donald Trump gets elected, he does his Trumpian thing, and that's no excuse for an entire industry to throw all ethics out the window and start playing this game.
A few examples.
I was at VidCon, the largest video conference in the world, a few years ago.
The president of NowThis News said that they were working with anti-Trump activists at the highest level in content production.
Why?
How about Brian Stelter?
When he said it's the job of the press to challenge the anger of the public.
What?
No it isn't!
It's your job to inform the public.
If Trump says something, by all means fact check him.
CNN doesn't.
They just play the game because CNN is being run by a guy who used to do reality television.
It is painfully obvious.
So what do I see from Fox News?
Oh, they want to get in on the game too, huh?
You know what, man?
I'm just... I'm just... I'm getting so over all of this.
I know, I know.
I'm part of the same thing.
The difference, I guess, is that, you know, I'm right now a dude in his house talking about his feelings.
When you have Fox News, which is a massively funded organization, when you have CNN, massively funded, they could be doing real news.
So I'll tell you this.
You want to criticize me for being a member of the media and playing the same game?
Oh, now I'm complaining about Fox, they're complaining about whatever.
Okay, okay.
That's totally fine.
I get it.
I'm actually trying to set up various news entities and fact-checking organizations so that from this, we create good news.
They do the opposite.
From their news channels, they create cable reality TV garbage.
Check out scnr.com.
You can see the link to the YouTube channel.
It's formerly Subverse.
Now it's called Scanner.
Check it out.
We've got awesome journalism.
Real on-the-ground reporting.
So, the people who are doing that, they do their own thing.
What I hope is that... Well, like I said, it's the inverse, okay?
I'll tell you what.
I like Kayleigh McEnany.
I like what she's been doing.
I like that these journalists are now getting challenged because they're not doing their jobs.
If you have a problem with someone challenging you, then maybe you shouldn't be in this industry.
If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.
Journalists have to ask tough questions.
And sometimes, you will be challenged.
That's the point.
Did you think you were gonna sit down and get to do whatever you wanted and no one would question anything you said?
That's absurd.
But I'll wrap it up with this.
I don't think Fox News even really cares.
I really don't.
I think Fox News is just playing the same old game, because they know I'll talk about it, and you'll talk about it, and that's all anyone wants to do anymore.
We'll see where we end up after this year.
I'm hoping that after the election, everything kind of chills out.
We'll see.
Stick around, I got a couple more segments coming up for you in a few minutes, and I will see you all shortly.
I wonder if people who work in the media have ever heard the phrase, give me liberty or give me death.
Let me say that one more time for all of you in the back.
Give me liberty or give me, all right, you ready?
Death.
Okay, okay.
Now that you really sat there and listened to what that sentence means, I want to present to you this story from Vox.
Is America too libertarian to deal with the coronavirus?
Okay, all right, man.
Our cultural history is liberty and individualism and freedom.
From there, we've slowly developed a collective, the American collective.
In this article, Sean Illing interviews, what's this guy's name, Keith Humphries, who penned an op-ed arguing that America is too obsessed with freedom.
They're not even trying to hide it anymore.
They're overtly calling for authoritarianism.
Okay, I get it.
You have a spectrum.
They do bring up a good point, right?
A point that many conservatives would actually agree with.
In this interview, Sean says that with libertarianism, we get a language of rights but not a language of obligations and responsibilities.
It's a good point.
A lot of people have brought this up to me that with your civil rights comes your civil responsibilities.
The only problem is many of these people on the left don't agree with either.
You've got a bunch of young, spoiled brats.
I'm not saying everybody, but the millennial generation.
Man, we sure do have them, don't we?
And maybe it's a part of every generation.
But they come out saying, gimme, gimme, gimme.
And they don't talk about what they're going to do in exchange.
What are you?
You know, what's the famous saying?
Ask not what your government can do for you, but what you can do for your government.
You have these people saying, we should have our needs met.
We should have housing, schooling, transportation, welfare.
What are you gonna do in order to ensure that?
Nothing!
They just complain on the internet half the time.
Well, let's read some of this interview and see some of the points they make.
Because I gotta tell you what, man.
I always lean on the side of freedom.
And you know what?
I fully recognize that that comes with risks.
That's right.
It's hard for us to respond properly to major pandemics because we have civil liberties.
I mean, anybody can look over at communist China and say we get why they were able to keep their numbers down two ways.
First, they were welding people into their homes, literally welding their doors shut.
And second, they're lying about the numbers because they're authoritarian and the journalists got kicked out of the country.
How hard is that to figure out?
Here's what they write.
America's public health experts are working to map out a plan to combat the coronavirus in America, and there are indeed many proposals, from academic centers, from think tanks, and from government.
While the plans differ, nearly all of them rely on some combination of surveillance, mass testing, isolation, and contact tracing.
Many of them point to countries like Singapore, South Korea, and Germany as examples of how to intelligently respond to the pandemic.
Okay, okay, okay.
To varying degrees, I say, whoa there, mister.
I've been to Singapore.
It's beautiful.
They have this really awesome casino on the top of, like, this hotel.
It's beautiful.
You'll notice when you go there, there's no gum on the sidewalk anywhere, because it's illegal.
They give people the death penalty if they bring drugs to their country.
I believe you can get arrested for not flushing a toilet.
You can get arrested for leaving food on the table at a fast food restaurant.
Singapore is very... Well, it's much more authoritarian.
Although, look, when I went there, I had no problems.
You walk around, you do whatever you want.
I went skateboarding.
It was fun.
It was fine.
It is a very, very beautiful place.
They go on to say, But what if the successful strategies in those countries just won't work in America?
The question was posed by Keith Humphreys, a Stanford University professor who works on addiction and public health policy.
In a viral Twitter thread last week, Humphreys argued that a lot of his public health colleagues weren't thinking seriously enough about the cultural obstacles that might undercut the country's efforts to test, trace, and isolate Americans.
He later penned a Washington Post column drawing out his argument in a little more detail.
Humphrey's basic claim is that any plan we adopt, no matter how wise, is useless without widespread political consent from American citizens.
And the obsession with individual liberties in America, coupled with a general distrust of government, poses an enormous challenge to even the best conceivable plan.
He goes on to say that he spoke to Humphries by phone about what he thinks public health experts are failing to recognize, and if he believes America is too libertarian to handle a collective action problem like the coronavirus pandemic.
A lightly edited transcript of the conversation follows, and we'll read some of this.
But, uh, too libertarian?
Man.
This country started out extremely libertarian.
We've drifted away from that.
The message is clear.
They're upset that we have civil rights and freedoms.
I mean, I was, uh, I just watched the movie Contagion.
It's like a second time I've watched it in a month.
Maybe you've seen it.
It's been going viral.
It's like on the front page of every movie network service or whatever.
And there's one part in it where the character of Lawrence Fishburne, who I believe is working for the CDC or something, he says, they've been talking about putting the vaccine in the water so it can mass medicate everybody like fluoride.
And I started laughing.
You don't have the right to do that.
I mean, I guess technically they do or whatever.
I don't know, Alan Dershowitz certainly said they did, but I'm not a fan of that, okay?
The idea of forced mass medication of a population.
It's kind of freaky.
I mean, look, look at fluoride.
It's in the water already.
That is, to an extent, mass medication.
And most of us just don't say anything about it.
But it's good for your teeth, they say.
I think, look, when it comes to something like public health policy, when it comes to how we respond to crises, We're an individualist nation.
We really are.
We have some collective principles.
And I do think it's very important we recognize our responsibilities to our community, America, when it comes to these problems.
So I'll be fair.
Keith Humphreys does bring up a really good point.
Think about war and conflict, okay?
I've talked to my, you know, super lefty anarchist friends about this, why anarchism never works, and there are many, many, many reasons why they fail.
Sometimes it's their fault, sometimes it's not.
But one thing you need to realize, with a fascistic, authoritarian, despotic, despotism, whatever you want to call it, you can move like that, boom, snap of the fingers.
With an anarchic society, where everyone's bickering amongst themselves and trying to have some kind of democratic decision making, You move very slow.
So take a look at... I'll put it this way.
Let's say you have two countries.
And one is very far-left, anarchic, libertarian.
And the other one is ultra-authoritarian.
I don't care if it's left or right, communist or fascistic, whatever you want to call it.
The dictator of the authoritarian country... I should say, too, for the other city, too.
I shouldn't say left.
I should just say libertarian, right?
Everything is based on some kind of slow process of decision-making or private purchase or something.
The authoritarian system has a bunch of people who are basically slaves, conscripted soldiers.
They're not very good, but they're forced to do it.
And then the dictator says, I want to invade that city.
Boom!
And they do it.
The other city then says, okay, this dude's charging full speed at us with a bunch of soldiers, what do we do?
And then they bicker and they argue and they debate.
And by the time they're done debating, they've been overrun and invaded.
It takes you too long.
This is why America was built in a very, very clever way.
The executive branch allows for action to be taken very, very swiftly and quickly.
If there's a problem, it can be challenged in the courts.
The legislative branch, which deals with, you know, our laws, is relatively slow and oftentimes ineffective.
But they debate.
They should debate.
They're supposed to debate.
They do.
And then ultimately make decisions.
But when it comes to matters of war and law enforcement, the executive branch just goes for it.
Therefore, we have a little bit of both.
It's pretty smart.
So let me read a little bit what he says.
Sean Illing says, lay out America's political cultural problem for me.
Why are you worried that we can't deal with this pandemic the way other countries have?
And Keith Humphries, the guy who says we like freedom too much, he says, I think we're different from the other democracies that have handled this well in our long term resistance to the growth of the state in general, but also in the domain of health.
Why is it that every other developed country has government-guaranteed healthcare and we do not?
The obvious reason is that there's an instinctive aversion to government power in the DNA of America.
This is the only major democracy in which a huge number of people have fought to prevent a government guarantee of healthcare for all citizens.
I gotta stop you right there, buddy.
First problem.
Guy doesn't know what he's talking about.
Why is it that every other developed country has government-guaranteed healthcare and we do not?
Do you know anything about why there's government-mandated healthcare in Europe?
It's called World War II, bro.
We weren't devastated by World War II.
We sent the weapons out.
They didn't come here.
The bombs were dropped on European nations, and afterwards—this is my general—I could be wrong about this, too.
My general understanding is that they quickly mobilized because they needed a way to take care of people who were injured, sick, or dying because a war broke out.
And it's evolved from there.
But it's far from perfect.
Another big factor is that the U.S.
pays a lot of the bills for a lot of other countries because we have our world police everywhere, and I'm no fan of that.
I think there's a lot of things we could fund if we weren't doing that.
Notably, universal healthcare isn't one of them.
The main issue is not, to a great degree, that people don't want people to have healthcare.
There is, to be fair, an issue of people saying, I don't want the government running this.
Here's what I tell people.
Imagine going to the DMV, right?
Imagine waiting in line at the DMV to get your license.
Now, instead of getting your license, you have to get the important life-saving surgery.
Congratulations.
Let me know if you want that or not.
You can't compare that to other countries.
You can't compare that to France or Germany or Switzerland or whatever.
We have a different culture.
So when we go to the DMV, people are lazy.
It takes forever.
It's a nightmare.
We all hate it.
Just because other countries can do it doesn't mean we can.
Also keep in mind, other countries are a lot smaller, particularly in Europe.
So this guy, already, already doesn't know what he's talking about.
I gotta make sure I keep this short, but let's read a little bit more.
He says, this aversion is especially potent now.
But it goes back to the very beginning of the country.
A country founded by people who lived in fear of a king.
Not really, no!
You know what, man?
He says, our constitution was set up with checks and balances out of fear of the power of the state, and that libertarian streak is with us through everything, and it also applies the domain of health.
Okay, fine.
Call it fear.
I don't think that's fair.
I think our founding fathers didn't have a fear of it.
They had a disdain for it.
They didn't like what was imposed upon them.
They certainly weren't scared of the king, even though we had a bunch of militia and farmers We went up against the British Empire and the regulars.
Americans weren't scared.
Some people were.
No, the Founding Fathers had a disdain for this system.
And they set up our country to prevent this system for which they hated.
Because it was oppressive.
It abused them.
All around was oppressive.
It's the easiest way to explain it.
So perhaps you could call it a fear.
Fine.
That's fair.
And because of this, we reject overwhelming government controls.
It served us very, very well.
I can't go on too much for this, so I'll just jump to the conclusion here.
Sean Illing says, you conclude your thread by saying we'll probably end up with something like a Swedish coronavirus policy by default.
What does that mean exactly?
And Humphrey says, one of the pushbacks I got was that our approach won't be as good as Sweden's because we don't have universal healthcare.
So I think what this means is the virus will continue to spread fairly consistently across the country.
I wouldn't be surprised if the death toll has doubled by Labor Day.
I would, of course, be incredibly happy to be wrong about that.
And there's really only two things that could interpret this.
One, That could interrupt this, sorry.
A vaccine, which is very unlikely for at least a year or more.
Two, increased development of therapeutics.
So maybe we'll have a breakthrough in our ability to treat the symptoms.
What I think is most likely is that a huge number of people will contract this virus, and we develop immunity over time.
If that happens, the virus will diminish over time, but it won't be because of our test, trace, and isolation efforts.
And let me now introduce you to the number one counterpoint to this entire problem, and I bring you Japan!
Doesn't Japan have universal health care, too?
They didn't have tracing or testing or lockdown, and they beat it.
So you're wrong.
I don't want to tell you, man.
You're wrong.
Freedom is a good, good thing.
I'll leave it there.
I got one more segment coming up for you in a few minutes, talking about defending that freedom, and I will see you shortly.
Turkish troops invade Greece and occupy small patch of land near River Evros.
Turkish troops have invaded Greece and occupied a small patch.
I don't know why the subheader had to be different.
It had to be the same as the header, but fine.
I saw this story from news.com.au, and I couldn't believe it was real.
Turkish soldiers actually invaded Greece?
That's alarming.
What's Greece gonna do?
I mean, Greece is part of the European Union.
What's the European Union gonna do?
I think this could lead to something Pretty scary.
At the same time, we've got a couple other stories.
Iranian fuel starts arriving in Venezuela despite U.S.
warnings.
All of this stuff that's going on.
I'm not necessarily here to talk about Turkey, but we'll read that story.
We've had confrontations in the South China Sea.
An elephant walk in Guam.
Basically, they have all the big planes and bombers come out.
U.S.
sending destroyers to the South China Sea, China claiming they chased them off.
It sounds like, it sounds like war.
When you add all of this together, and then you look at the story about the infiltration of Chinese interests in America, it really does feel like things are getting, I don't know, kind of scary.
There have been reports that China has been conducting nuclear drills.
We now have reports that the U.S.
is considering conducting nuclear drills as well.
That's the last thing we need as a planet.
And then I saw this story.
The actual story I think is particularly important.
The army is planning a mass recruiting drive this summer.
Wow, how incredibly convenient for everything and everyone.
Those who like war, I mean.
Let me break this down for you.
While we have something going on around the world and there are fears that a war is going to break out, and I've said we're on the brink of war with China, the army is looking to bolster its ranks.
You want to know why this is convenient?
First of all, for those that are very, you know, bullish on war, hawkish on war.
Well, you're going to get more ground troops.
Hey, you need it, right?
The next thing is the economy.
Now that the economy has basically collapsed and many of these jobs won't be coming back, what happens when the army says, we got jobs waiting?
People will take them.
That's amazing.
It's just perfect timing.
Now, I'm not alleging any conspiracies.
I'm actually alleging a perfect storm.
China is responsible for this virus.
Not because they created anything stupid like that.
No, because they didn't tell us.
So all the devastation that's hit us and all these other countries, they could have told us.
They lied.
This has led to U.S.
interests and Western interests being furious with China.
Australia wants an investigation.
So China imposed massive tariffs on Australia.
We've already got budding conflict.
Then, the lockdowns hit.
And in big cities, in many states, people are left unemployed.
Now we've got a real fear of war.
The Chinese Ministry of State Security issued a report, I believe this was in early April, straight to the president of China, Xi Jinping, saying you need to prepare for the worst-case scenario, a physical confrontation with the United States.
And that brings me to Thucydides' trap.
Are you familiar with this?
It states that I believe the analysis is, out of 16 moments in the past 500 years, 16 instances, of a dominant power about to be replaced by an emerging power, in 12 of those, there have been war.
And that's Thucydides' trap.
It's basically this idea that whenever a dominant power is challenged by an emerging power, they go to war.
So when I see a story about the army planning a mass recruiting drive, I have to wonder.
But let's stop for a second.
We're actually looking at something that may be a real spark of a confrontation.
Turkey invading Greece.
We'll see if this becomes anything.
As I've stated before, with the lockdown, we're looking at stories... We're more focused on stories.
It's not a whole lot happening, man.
I mean, before the lockdown, I was talking about movies.
You know, Sonic the Hedgehog and Birds of Prey.
Now that nothing's happening, we're more focused on whatever it is we can focus on.
And in the news, we hear stories like this.
These stories might be pretty normal, but because we're focused, we think they're more significant than they are.
But let's read and see what's going on, and then let's talk about the army recruiting.
And I'll put it this way.
The army is taking advantage of the economy.
They're gonna bring in a whole bunch of new enlisted, you know, members because people need jobs.
News.com.au says about 35 soldiers have reportedly marched onto a floodplain site on the east bank of the river Evros, near the town of Ferus, on the disputed border between Turkey and Greece.
Special forces and infantry set up a camp with a small Turkish flag flying from a tree and rejected Greek demands to withdraw.
Long-standing disputes over the position of the border arise from the fact the Evros River, which marks it out, often shifts its course.
The movement leaves land that is technically part of Greece to the river's east, and land that is technically part of Turkey to its west.
That's weird.
The incursion took place on Friday and was reportedly a response to a Greek army survey of the 1.6 hectare site as part of plans to build additional border fences.
Turkey currently hosts more than 4 million refugees from Syria.
Yeah, we get the point.
Now look, I don't know if this will actually result in anything significant because it seems like this problem is ongoing.
I highlight it only because maybe a lot of people are worried about it.
So I'll put it this way.
It may be significant.
It sounds like it's a disputed border, and it sounds like this is kind of an ongoing thing.
So I wouldn't be too worried about it.
Now, the Iranian ship's bringing fuel into Venezuela.
It gets kind of worrying because the US has made, you know, put a bounty on Maduro, for instance.
He's the president of Venezuela currently.
Technically, I think the other guy is.
I don't know what's going on, but they're really trying to get rid of Maduro.
And now we have this.
This is the more...
Well, I don't know how to describe this.
The army is planning a mass recruiting drive this summer.
It could just be that with a damaged economy, it's a great opportunity for the all-volunteer force to scoop about a ton of desperate people who otherwise wouldn't want to join the army.
Now they kind of have no choice.
I would say that's taking advantage of the circumstances, but that's actually a common tactic.
When the economy dips, army recruitment ramps up.
It's a guaranteed job.
The government's got money for you, right?
It's what you wanted.
You know, it's really funny.
You get all these people saying the government should provide these checks to them.
Well, here you go!
Here's your opportunity.
Join the armed for- Join the- Join the armed forces and you will get your guaranteed check and a job.
Army Times says, The General Helming Army Recruiting Command is preparing a massive virtual hiring event this summer after the Army's 245th birthday on June 14th.
Like the other military branches, the Ground Service is fighting the anticipated dent to manpower after the coronavirus shuttered recruiting stations across the country this spring.
The push will involve every person in every aspect of the service that Army Recruiting Commander Major General Frank M. Muth can muster, he said during a telephone call on Wednesday.
An intensive event between June 30th and July 2nd will tap senior leaders to visit with city councils, nonprofits, educators, and other pillars of local communities.
A supercharged version of the program that the Army Chief of Public Affairs already runs, which brings Army generals back to their hometowns to engage with civilians able to influence young people.
Now I'll stop.
You see right there, they may have just explained it.
Because of the lockdown, recruiting stations have been closed, so it looks like they're facing a dent to their manpower.
A shortfall.
Maybe this is just to make up for their losses.
They normally expected to recruit X amount of people, they shut down, they gotta make up for those losses.
Quote, we would do the same thing, but it would end up being on Zoom or Microsoft Teams, said Muth.
The secretary is from Chicago.
Maybe he engages with the Chicago leadership and the 101st command goes down to Nashville because he's right there.
And the 82nd command goes and he zooms with Raleigh.
There's all these different ways we can use these folks.
Muth pitched the idea two weeks ago to the Army's Service Secretary and Chief of Staff, calling it Army National Hiring Days.
It will be limited in certain areas based on where shelter-in-place orders are still in effect, but Muth intends for it to be a never-before-seen recruiting drive regardless.
Every person in the Army is involved.
Every asset is involved.
Everyone is on message.
We are engaging in the Focus 22 and we're driving our message for people to either go into the recruiting stations or to go to GoArmy.com.
Focus 22 is in reference to the 22 American cities like Chicago, Seattle, Los Angeles with large populations of Generation Z youths whose army leaders say have had minimal exposure to the service as a potential path in life.
Army recruiters were doing fairly well late last year and early this spring in sourcing candidates for service.
By March they had signed up 2,200 more recruits than they had by the same time last year.
But the pandemic dampened their efforts as brick-and-mortar stations shuttered and the recruiting enterprise was forced to move completely online.
Right now, the service is about 4,000 contracts short of where it wants to be.
It's more than we were last year, but at the same time, historically, we've had a year where we were behind that much too.
Adding that his recruits, recruiters, not been in a position to virtually recruit,
they would have done about zero new contracts over the past few months.
So, okay, okay, let me tone things down here, everybody.
It really just seems like they should have had more than they already did.
So, while it sounds like they're bolstering their forces, while it sounds like there are things happening around the
world, let me just stress, we're just hyper-focused on this.
That's what it really feels like.
I've been told by a lot of people that what we see in the South China Sea is just a tit-for-tat.
It's par for the course.
They've been playing these games, and maybe at one point it will boil over, but we've been hearing these stories over and over again.
This is not an outlier.
When you see stories like this, my first instinct for sure was like, oh man!
Oh, they're recruiting!
We got all this action happening!
And then it's like, oh.
It's just because everything's shut down, they gotta make up those numbers.
But, you know, I won't pretend like there isn't some concern.
This will lead to something, right?
We are seeing an escalation.
Donald Trump has taken a fierce stance against China.
Australia has as well.
And now many other countries are joining Australia's call for a deep investigation into what happened in Wuhan, what happened in China, and China is not happy about it.
Will China allow the international community to challenge them?
I think the answer is no.
And that brings me back to Thucydides' trap.
These may be blips, this story, army recruiting, Turkey, Iran, Venezuela.
It could be blips.
But it is true that we face a very, very real circumstance, a real potential for war.
Don't ignore it.
Who knows when?
I'll leave it there.
Next segment will be coming up tomorrow at 10 a.m.
