← After Party with Emily Jashinsky
After Party with Emily Jashinsky
“Happy Hour”: Hollywood Activism, Election Day Fallout, and "Unfortunate" Heritage Controversy: Emily Answers YOUR Questions
00:52:04
Emily kicks off this edition of “Happy Hour” with news about her new Megyn Kelly Wrap Up Show on SiriusXM channel 111. Then she dives into listener questions including thoughts on local politics and why so few people get involved, plus this week’s elections. She also answers a few questions about the Tucker Carlson-Nick Fuentes interview, why she’s chosen not to discuss it very much, why she doesn’t think she would have interviewed Fuentes herself, and a key moment from the interview that many people aren’t talking about. She also discusses the Heritage Foundation controversy, why it’s immoral to label people with terrible names if you don’t have proof if it, her big picture take on Israel, antisemitism, and thoughts on race rhetoric. Emily also dives into the “Arctic Frost” scandal and if she’d cover it on Breaking Points. Emily then takes questions on topics including Jennifer Lawrence and activist movies, affordability and what politicians should be focusing on to lower price...
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Ondac does not lend North Dakota all loans and amount subject to lender approval. Well, hello after party listeners. Welcome to another edition of Happy Hour, an even more casual version of an already casual show, but one where I get to chat with all of you through the great questions and comments that you send in through social media and through email. Speaking of that, by the way, if you missed the announcement starting next week. So on Monday, I'm actually going to be hosting the 2 to 3pm hour on SiriusXM channel 111, which you may now know as the Megan Kelly Channel. So every day when Megan signs off, I'll pick up the baton from Megan. Sometimes Megan will stick around. She'll keep going. I'll get to talk to her. We're going to have all kinds of great guests, but we'll also be taking calls. So if you want to call in if you have thoughts. The Megyn Kelly Wrap up show begins on Monday, 2pm SiriusXM Megyn Kelly Channel 1 11. So make sure that you are there for day one and all the days after, of course, because we are going to be having a blast. All right, now let's get to your questions. This is again, remember, I'm reading these live. I've discovered that's the most entertaining way to do this. Here's a question from Chrissy McShay, lifelong resident of Philly, why do only 25% of voters come out for local elections? Huh? Very interesting question. I think people, local politics are so often so granular and in the weeds, they're even more difficult to Follow. And what makes me sad, I was really lucky growing up that my dad in particular was pretty involved in our local government. And just through that municipal government and fairly small town, nothing big. But just through that, I got to see how important local politics are and how interesting local politics are. And I always, you know, I live in a very big city now, and I try very, very hard to pay close attention to local politics, but I find it really difficult. So it might be there's this barrier to entry. You know, if you don't know the hyperlocal dynamics, it's intimidating to try and understand local politics. And it's just so much work to follow as well. So that's my best theory. You know, there's a lot of apathy. There's a lot of we are lucky to live in a fairly comfortable, prosperous society. And I think we just kind of coast on the fumes often. So there could be a lot of different things going on. But I think that's a great question. I'd love to hear more from someone who follows it even more closely. Panthers 1566 says, do you think blue states winning some governor spots will be bad for the states? I'll always say I think these blue states in many cases could benefit from conservative governorships. And I don't necessarily just mean Republican, even like conservative Democrats, a little bit of fresh energy in some of these, you know, And I actually look at a state like Texas. I know we have a lot of Texans listening. Some of you may agree, some of you may disagree, but I think these states where increasingly they're polarized and one party has a monopoly on power. You know, people ask all the time, why do the reddest states have the most moderate senators? Talking about someone like John Cornyn or Thom Tillis. Texas and North Carolina, obviously, and we. Yeah, I mean, I think some of it has to do with just the parties are so strong in red states and blue states. You know, if you're a solid red state or a solid blue state, the party operation is so strong and so entrenched that they just end up not really spitting out the best because there's less competition. So I think, yeah, that'll. That'll be a real problem. I think blue states are. Are hemorrhaging people right now going to Sunbelt red states. And part of that is because they're doubling down on bad governance. So unfortunate, but probably true. Here we go. This is one. Emily, I'm sure you're getting lots of questions like this. I thought Andrew Clavin's response to this interview and whether we accept people like Nick Fuentes was brilliant. But you seem to have some disagreement and I would love to hear do you think TPUSA will continue to partner with Tucker after this, considering Charlie's firm stance on not aligning with anti Semites? As a Christian, this one is so tough for me. Really hard for me to see anything positive about this interview. This, you're right. I am getting lots of questions about this and I have tried to talk about it as honestly, as little as is possible because I think it's already being over discussed here in Washington. Just, you know, if you're, if you're here in D.C. it is the talk of the right. It's what everyone is discussing and has been every hour of every day for the last couple of weeks. And so one of the reasons I've tried to kind of touch grass on this is because I see my kind of perspective being valuable to the extent that it is. As somebody who doesn't come from D.C. or New York City or LA or, you know, these major metropolitan areas, but as somebody who tries to course correct insular Beltway chatter as best I can and just say here are things that matter to average Americans. And so it's not that I think the conversation is unimportant because I do think it's important, but when you're in D.C. i'm just in it so much. It's all I've heard anybody talk about and fight about. And it's divided some, it's divided some people that I really love, people who I've great friendships with and who I appreciate. And they find themselves on different sides of it. Some of them fight with each other, some of them have gone back and forth with me on it. And just the fact that we're on week two of, I know I said this on the show on Wednesday, but the fact that we're on week two of talking about Kevin Roberts reaction to Tucker Carlson's interview of Nick Fuentes and we're this many layers deep into it, I think is a troubling sign about where the right's head is at, at this moment. About the Tucker Carlson interview itself, I wouldn't have, I think I wouldn't have interviewed him, but I don't think that would say anybody shouldn't interview him. I wouldn't have done it because I think Fuentes is enormously difficult to understand for an outsider. I think the same thing about Hasan Piker. And they have this, they sort of speak the language of the streaming generation In a way that even if you are. I mean, I'm 32 and I actually think I have. I don't speak that language fluently. And so part of it is if you are not able to speak that language fluently, I just don't think it's. You're going to do the most valuable version of an interview. I actually thought Patrick bet David did a very good interview with Nick Fuentes where he grilled him on some of his. Some of his quotes. My overall takeaway, I just didn't think enough attention was paid. I'm curious if everybody who's upset about it actually watched the interview. I know some people did and are still upset about it, which is fine. But there was a moment that I'm surprised went pretty much under the radar because when I. I listened to the full thing after the controversy was already kind of raging and I heard this part in the middle where I thought there was a pretty interesting exchange. So there's this part where Tucker is waxing poetic about Paul, the Apostle Paul. And then Nick Fuentes goes back and says, quote, jews have a tribal, innate longing for Israel that basically amounts to this collective inability to be America first. But Tucker hits back and says, no, blood guilt is not a Christian concept. His religion does not allow him to buy into that. These traits aren't innate. That is not a Western and Western in the good sense of Western perspective. And Tucker heads back and says, there are Jewish people who are some of Israel's harshest critics. Humans are fundamentally equal. He repeats that, and Fuentes kind of agrees with that in real time. But I know that I left that interview and I know many other people's left that interview, obviously not believing. He really believes that and not believing. That's the message that he's spreading with most of his rhetoric. But if that's what he actually believes, it's definitely not what's coming across by constantly talking about how Jewry, in a way where sometimes it's explicit, but most of the times it's implicit, is incapable of. Of participating in America first. These are generalizations that are not reflective of a belief in fundamental human equality. And his conversation with Tucker on the Christian theological demand to believe there is no Jew or Greek, there is no Jew or Greek. As Tom Holland has written, that line and the teachings of Jesus Christ from which that line derived change the course of human history and is the predicate for the west, the system of government that has been built up around it. So I think that exchange should have gotten more attention. I don't think the interview probably should have happened to begin with. I know Kevin Roberts a bit. I. He's the president of the Heritage Foundation. I know lots of people at the Heritage foundation. And this entire controversy, I think is just deeply unfortunate. And people who are leaking from the Heritage Foundation, I think are exposing their own motives. I don't think Dr. Roberts handled it particularly well. That first video he released, if you've been following this, that first video he released, he was getting a lot of demands to sever Heritage ties with Tucker because they had simultaneously media partnerships going with Tucker and Mark Levin. And people were looking to, you know, that partnership with Tucker had recently ended. It was like a three month deal or something like that. And it naturally run its course. And still people were like, well, we have to disassociate the Heritage foundation with Tucker Carlson after this interview. I mean, it's just the whole thing is just exerting so much energy over a think tank and the president of the think tank that no normal American could name. So I think these questions were fine to be hashed out internally at Heritage and by some of other conservative movement groups who have partnerships with Heritage. If you want to fight this internally, debate this internally. But the people who were leaking the internal dynamics of Heritage, it was all leaks in one direction, which was to undermine and discredit Kevin Roberts. Some of the leaks were. One of them was a document from February. Kevin Roberts tried to take Heritage on a different foreign policy route. Stop taking defense contractor money, at least he said he would. And then even before all of this happened, he was constantly being undermined. Project Esther happened. That is the sort of antisemitism, campus anti Semitism task force, pro Israel task force within project within the Heritage foundation that started under Kevin Roberts. Kevin Roberts has been supportive of that. And, and you know, I just, I'm very, if you listen to me a lot, you know, I'm very, very sensitive about the definition inflation label inflation, because that was. Those were my formative years, you know, when I was in college getting called all kinds of names just for being like in a conservative student group, whatever it was sexist, bigot. And what I saw that do to the country in the Obama era than the Trump era was just then, the Biden era especially was just divide us and make it less and less possible to talk. And it's also immoral, right, to accuse someone of something that you don't have clear proof in one direction of in one direction or the other. So if you believe Mamdani is a good example, let's say you believe Zoram Mamdani is, is going to enable genuine anti Semites. Places like Columbia University or whatever say that. Don't say Zoramdani is an anti Semite. If you think Zoram Hamdani by dismantling potentially terrorist watch forces inside NYPD or inside the New York government is going to enable jihad, say that. Don't call him a jihadist, which is what Republican Congresswoman Elise Stefanik is doing. There's a huge distinction and it's not worth the political juice. Right? Like, obviously there's a political incentive to use that term because it's a, it's a bigger attack on your enemy, it's a more powerful attack on your enemy. But it is not worth what it does to our culture and to our discourse for politicians to continue using language like that. So I'm just very, very sensitive to this. I think the labels have been tossed around, you know, in ways that in the entire Israel discourse are so unhelpful. And I just like to be more, more careful about that. And, you know, my overall perspective on the question is that there's this slice of land that two faiths have eschatological relationships with. And that is very true of people in Israel who believe that they need to rebuild the Third Temple. That is their religion. That's okay. That's their religion. It's not, it's not my religion. It's not the state religion of the United States. The, the mosque is very important to Islam. It's like the, the second holiest site in Islam. They originally prayed to Jerusalem and that's not going to, that, that land is not going to be ceded peacefully, but it is not my belief. I do not have an eschatological interest in that land. It's not my faith. I know and love many Christians who do, and that's, that's their faith, but it's not the state religion of the United States of America. And so when our interests depart from the interests of Israel, an ally, then we should be able to have honest conversations about that. And sometimes they are going to depart, as I think they did towards the latter phase of the Gaza war. It's not always the case. We don't always, always have disparate interests. But that's kind of my, my big picture take. And I just, I know many, many people say this, but over and over again, but it's, this is pushing people. When Charlie Kirk did a focus group with young people about why there was anti Israel sentiment, a lot of that Anti Israel sentiment just boiled down to a sort of belief that you're not able to talk. People were, were souring on, on Israel not because of their foreign policies, but just because they felt like Israel was making it harder for them. And Israel's allies in the United States were making it hard for them to have open and honest discussions. So that's all the baseline is. I think we can have these discussions if we're a little bit more careful and a little bit more sensitive about how those labels land, because especially us on the right, we're used to over application of those labels. And if you're operating with someone in good faith and you're having a conversation with someone in good faith, you know, and you think they're enabling anti Semitism or downplaying anti Semitism, you should tell the person that jumping to accusations of bigotry is just something I'm personally very sensitive of. And so I do get a lot of questions about this. So that's why I, that's why I responded. And honestly, it's unpopular. But I think Tucker mostly operates in good faith. It's why he was the first guest on this podcast. He's an interesting thinker and you know, that's, I, that's, for me, the currency is if you're having these conversations in the media in good faith, it's hard for people to do it 100% of the time. And I'm sure Tucker's fallen short of that. As he said when he went and talked to our other friend Dave Smith about the interview, he apologized for saying he hates Christian Zionists. He said his anger got the better of him. And again, that interview is just completely being buried. People aren't mentioning those conversations that Carlson has had with Smith on that podcast, which was a pretty interesting listen. And he seemed also to regret not picking more at Fuentes, like weird love of Stalin fair. Those would have been, that would have been a great conversation because Tucker has studied Soviet history for a long time, so that would have, maybe they'll have that conversation at some time. I probably just, if I were some of the mainstream, right, like a, like a leader, you know, you're not going to solve the broader problem that Fuentes represents, which is angry, aimless, sad, miserable young men who have been truly victimized by the system in many cases, whether it's because we've enabled a easy divorce culture or we've enabled the proliferation of pornography or weed, or because there's been de. Industrialization in places like where Fuentes is from the, the Broader problem is actually probably not going to go away because you bash Fuentes or, or, you know, go after him personally over and over and over again. It's not to say that you, you can't be like, this guy is, is not coming at this with, with love in his heart and with, with a true belief in, a true American belief in, you know, fundamental human equality. Of course, say that, but then move on to the bigger problem of making sure that people aren't following him. He's already threatening to go into 2028 and into Iowa and New Hampshire and dog the candidates into following like, the Griper line, make sure that people don't have lives that don't, you know, it's still their fault. They have agency. But we can create conditions materially and spiritually that prevent people from falling into that because it's identitarian pornography and it's not American. That's what really worries me. And I started noticing that around 2012 with Trayvon Martin. You know, people who grew up in the 90s always look back on the 90s, but I'm sure it's true with 80s and 70s on race relations, maybe not the 70s, probably shouldn't have gone that far, but that, that era of colorblindness of the nine especially, I feel like it did peak historically peak in the 90s and early aughts. It faded around 2012, I remember, with the Trayvon Martin case, and we started speaking again in ways that feel very European or Eastern, like much more stark racial identitarian terms. And I don't like it when the left does it. I don't like it when the right does it. It doesn't mean that we don't have. It doesn't mean that there's nothing to talk about like crime rates, whatever, poverty rates, whatever. But it's the proliferation of that kind of rhetoric that I feel like is born of a. Born of a much more divided American kind of collective consciousness. And it's sad. It's just sad to watch it happen in real time. So I know that was a long answer, but it's a question that you can't really do in just like, with a quick hand wave. So. And I've been getting a lot, so I hope that was helpful. I could, I could talk about it for longer. Maybe we'll talk about it next week, too. Phil, 75, says, none of my liberal friends will ever know anything about Arctic Frost. So true. So true. Again, like, it's a story about something that happened years ago. So that probably explains some of the disinterest in it from the media. But it's, you know, a massive, massive revelation about a Hoover level. You know, if this were the era of the church committee, we'd look back on these documents like real historic, with real historic treasures and understanding a period in American history. And that's what they were. I mean, you just scroll through them. I recommend people do scroll through them because you just see the breadth of it and how insane it was. All right, Nicole says watched the first episode of the morning show, decided, nope, not for me. Life is way too short to waste any of it watching these horrible people, characters do horrible things to others. Nicole, very shrewd comment because that is what the media is, truly the media. The story of the media is summed up by what you said. Horrible people doing horrible things to others. Very, very. It's a very, very miserable profession at those major media outlets. I've really only worked in new media, did a little bit of stuff at the Hill for a while and Washington examiner is bigger, but it's not at all like abc, NBC, CBS or anything like that. And so those places are cutthroat. Cutthroat. And especially at the upper echelons, they do resemble what you see on the show. So I don't take any issue with anyone being too just depressed to watch the morning show and to make it all the way through it. This is from Regolith 1350. Jennifer Lawrence is not rejecting her political activism. She's lamenting how ineffective, even counterproductive, her activism has been at swaying anyone's opinion. So she's making a tactical decision to preserve her political power to safeguard, guard her art so films can achieve her political propaganda goals. This is an interesting comment because when I covered that on the show earlier this week, I sort of disagreed with it. And I look back on that was like. I don't think I used the most precise wording that I should have. But I also still disagree with this a little bit because there's a difference between activism and, you know, there's interesting, let's put it this way, activism. And what's the right word that I'm looking for? What I'm trying to say is a movie isn't necessarily an activist movie. Don't look up. That's a Jennifer Lawrence movie. That was an activist movie. What was that great first movie that she was in was like Winter's Bone. I don't even remember it. But like, I wouldn't call that. Or let's see, there's so many like okay, so the Hunger Games. Would we call that an activist movie? Some people might make the case that it has some type of direct Orwellian conditioning that, you know, that I'm going a little bit into the fever swamps here, but. Or Silver Linings Playbook, where I'm just trying to, like, name Jennifer Lawrence movies. American Hustle, Great movie. I wouldn't necessarily consider these activist movies in the same sense that Don't look up is an activist movie. I wouldn't consider, you know, a. Let's say there's like, soft activism and hard activism. And I don't think soft activism even captures what I'm talking about here. There's. There's political thought or cultural thought or that isn't. Is absolutely not activism. It's for the sake of the conversation, not for the sake of political ends. And that's probably a better way to put it. Activism is something that is done for the sake of partisan political ends. I think about this distinction all the time with some people's journalism, and it's a distinction I think about with myself all the time. Like, I do not have any partisan political interest in the Republican Party or the Democratic Party. I am a conservative, and my interest is in conservative values. Most conservatives see the Republican Party as the best vehicle to political ends. I'm not interested. Genuinely, I'm not interested in political ends, meaning elections. And I don't begrudge people who are. I just think of that as sort of activism journalism. And a lot of people are honest and open about that. And it's totally fine. That's a totally fine way to do journalism as long as you're open and transparent about it. But that's where I think what Lawrence was talking about. Wasn't this like, soft activism, but she was actually really talking about the power of just making good art that can be engaged in cultural political conversations, but isn't interested in a particular outcome. And I think this comment is saying that, you know, based on her Lawrence's comments, she does sound like she's still interested in it. And I think that rating is totally fair. I think she said she. I think that reading actually is totally fair, and it may be accurate. What I took from it was a little bit of her realizing as she was making the comment, almost maybe not quite, but as she was making the comment, that it can be more powerful elsewhere, if that makes sense. All right, here's a question from Che Jensen. This is so nice. Oh, my goodness, this is a. Such a nice email. And, you know, the question here is, it's a little personal. It's a very well intentioned question. I'm going to leave it at that. But it's a great question. It's a great question. I won't answer it on the podcast. Thank you so much for the kind words, Jay. Appreciate it. Hope I'm pronouncing your name correct correctly. This one is from Shannon, who says affordability is clearly the new buzzworders in politics as Republicans pivot to catch up on talking points here. In your opinion, what are the three top examples of what Republicans have already done to drive down the trend of rising cross or make life more affordable for their voters? And what are the next three things they should prioritize? Okay, so first I would say energy prices. When, whenever you are loosening regulations and drilling more, then you're going to take down those costs. Trump made a really conservative effort to bring down egg prices, which are important. So that's another one. And they're, you know, they've, it's kind of a counterfact, difficult, counterfactual. I don't know what the Fed would have been doing if Trump hadn't been kind of using his bully pulpit, but seems like we're going to get some relief there as well. That's a, you know, try astro about that actually, you know, if you, if you think this is one of the biggest issues with Americans, why not just, why not do it? You seem like you want to break all of the norms. Why not just fire Powell? And he said, well, I don't think it's the right thing to do. But I'm not advocating for that at all. I'm just saying he understands that that's an important one. So we'll see what happens with that next. Three things that they should prioritize student loans so the cost of a college education, the administration's efforts to push people into, you know, like tech schools, that type of thing I think is fantastic. Vocations, fantastic. And that helps college prices. It gives them, you know, they're losing some of their customers, people who would have gone otherwise and are deciding to become like really solidly middle class fulfilled welders, plumbers, etc. I think that's great. And what I would say though is there has to be a turning off of the spigot of the subsidies. There has to be an off ramp for the subsidies because more and more kids who are going to college for their ticket into the middle class class, people are still going to do that, of course. And we do still need people in some of these important white collar professions. We need great people in these important white collar professions. And they shouldn't have to, to get a, you know, an education at a liberal arts school, for example. I believe in liberal arts. I wish we could do it in high school before people, you know, become welders, carpenters, all that great stuff or going to college. But you shouldn't have to pay tens of thousands of dollars a semester to get a liberal arts education. The reason you do is because we poured subsidies into it and the federal government can start doing something about that. It's a tough one. And threatening the university's endowments and that sort of thing is helpful because again, it gives them the sense of they just don't have a marketplace. When the government is pouring so many subsidies into higher education, they don't have to compete, they compete with each other, but they have the subsidies, so they don't have to compete on price. So the competition is basically over. Like, you've seen this swimming pool, stupid stuff, how nice the dorms are, their fancy study abroad programs, whatever. And so they need some price competition. And that's a tough thing with loans. But there has to be an off ramp, obviously, housing affordability. It's not super easy for the federal government to do that nationwide, but that's huge. Huge, Huge. Huge. That is the biggest. I know that there are federal solutions to that. I don't know exactly what they are because I'm not a housing policy specialist, but that's one of the big ones. Just, you can't, you can't in a, you know, I live in a city, for example, and affording a house where you'd really comfortably be able to, you know, park your car in the driveway, you don't have to pay. My last apartment was like $250 a month for parking. That's familiar to many of you. You just have to get out system. You have to allow people to buy single family homes in cities or in the suburbs that are near where people can commute going back to the office. That's a good thing for many people. And so that, that there has to be something done about that. And grocery prices, I think, are still too high. Beef is what, over six bucks a pound? Trump keeps talking about that. So I think some of these, these costs are important. I could keep going on. There are a lot of things that are important, but those would be the top three that come to mind right off the bat. This is another nice email from Marlo, who said, I just caught yesterday's Megyn Kelly show and she mentioned your new serious gig with her. That's so wonderful. I don't subscribe it. Maybe I can catch it on YouTube. I don't think this one's going to be on YouTube yet, but it might be in the future. Otherwise, to catch it, SiriusXM. Head on over there. Grab a subscription. Thank you, Marlo. This is from James, who says, um, do I remember right that you went to a Haim concert a while ago and you're really into them? If so, you also. Are you into also the great lady trios like Boy Genius. I'm with her. Or Joseph? No. I do love bluegrass and Americana. This is what James says they've slot into. Oh, actually, yeah, I do listen to them sometimes. This is actually an interesting thing about streaming versus going to like a record store. Like what were those CD stores called? Where you would go in or Best Buy or Walmart or wherever, where you would go and buy the full albums, whatever. Like, I just listened to the Spotify. I'll listen to like the emerging Americana playlist or the Indigo playlist on Spotify. And yes, I have listened to these girls. They are very good. So, yes, thank you for mentioning that. That is a good recommendation. I do love Haim. Yeah. Oh, my gosh, it's crazy how much I love Haim. But I am. I typically am into more Americana, so. Good recommend. I agree. They're great. Chris says, what is a sot? I hear you and Megan refer to media clips as sots or. Or sots or something like that. What does it mean? I probably need to stop doing this, to be honest, because our producers are so good about just knowing what I'm talking about that I don't need to say, like, oh, SOT 7, SOT 8. But SOT actually is spelled S O T and it stands for sound on tape. So it's one of those. What do you call it? An anachronism. Sound on tape. That's what it means. And so that's what we're. Anytime I'm calling for a video, that's. I'll. I'll use the word sot for that. So sound on tape, it's just kind of what it sounds like there a clip. So we still go by the. The old lingo from the old media days or like tear sheet, all kinds of good stuff like that that we use. Joanna says, another really nice email here. I love your interview. Your episode last night, especially the interview did with Brittany Xavier. I love cultural commentary, especially making sense of the social history of social Media. Yeah, I can't get enough of that stuff. It doesn't always do that well, but it's just where my head's at a lot of times. So Joanna says, more, please. I will do my best, because I love that Patrick says, I think you need to throw your weight around and cover this on Breaking Points, referring to Arctic Frost or get Sager on board to do a monologue on it. So we didn't have a. We didn't have a Breaking Points Wednesday with Ryan and me this week because we were just talking about the election coverage. We did it from home. We have a Friday show tomorrow, so by the time this airs, that'll already go up. Yeah, the. The monologue is probably a good way to do it. I haven't had time to write monologues, honestly, in years. It's been years since I really did one. I think I did one a couple of months ago. That was kind of a report on Punchbowl, the news outlet. But other than that, I just don't get enough time. But that actually probably would be a good way to do it. It is like there is genuinely an urgency bias in media where I think that document came out on a Thursday, and by the time I got around to next Wednesday on Breaking Point, it just is, like, not a thing. So that's. It's. That's a little bit of an explanation. I obviously would love to cover it, and Ryan is always game to cover what I want to cover. But we haven't had. We honestly haven'. Had a good opportunity to do it. But there might be a point on the Friday show. Yeah, because if I'm remembering correctly, that stuff dropped on a Wednesday afternoon and then continued into a Thursday. So I have no editorial control, obviously, over Krystal and Sagar. That's all them. In the same way that Ryan and I are all us. We play in the show. So I get that sometimes, like, why aren't you talking about this? Why aren't you talking about that? But when you host a show with someone on the other side, especially when you're only doing it once a week, and then we have the Friday show from home that we do, which is more casual, there's so much balancing that's done with. You know, we gotta cover something that is important to the audience, something that is new, and then something that's a little left, something that's a little right. So that's. There's a lot to balance, and that's. But actually, the best explanation in this case is honestly that we haven't had a. It was election week and that came out on a Wednesday afternoon and a Thursday, and then we didn't have a show until next Wednesday, which was election week. So I'm sure Sagar has been following it. I haven't talked to him about that, to be honest. Joe says that he also liked Britney and Billy Halliwell. Yeah, Billy Hallowell. Totally. Like, that was so fascinating. I was so glad we got to have Billy on. So controversial. Of course, I know I did my best to make it not just a kind of. Just only for speaking the. What did Billie put it? Christianese. But something that's kind of talking about broader spiritual questions. So Billy was great. Brittany was great. My dad really enjoyed Britney's interview. I think it's just so interesting to hear someone who has this experience. Nobody in D.C. has this experience. Like, it is nobody here who has this experience of, you know, except for like, maybe some people who are not working in politics in D.C. which is not many people, but there are people there who have that part of their life, but of somebody who was transformed by the pandemic, by the culture and the politics of the pandemic. So Brittany was absolutely fascinating. Joe also says, I think there's potential for you to follow in the footsteps of Reese Witherspoon and Oprah and start Emily's Book Club, the first three nonfiction books that you would recommend if you had your own book club. Oh, and Joe says, loved you in San Antonio. Thank you, Joe, for coming and for the support. I appreciate it. I always recommend Coming Apart by Charles Murray. I recommend Dominion by Tom Holland. And since we're doing nonfiction, maybe Abolition of Man by C.S. lewis. But there are Devil's Chessboard. It's a giant book by David Talbot. That one is. It's like a encyclopedia of untold Cold War history. It's from the left. And you can sort of adjust for those biases as you read it. But man, that book is incredible. So thanks, Joe, for the question. P. Rivera says is wondering if I have any information on back pay concerning. For furloughed employees. I will just say I think people will get. I have a very close relative who is in exactly the same position as P. Describes their relative in. And that is, I think they will. There will be back pay for furloughed workers based on just my sense of the situation. I can't obviously guarantee or promise anything. I have no hard knowledge. I haven't heard people talking about that who would be in positions of power. But my sense of the situation is that Trump understands that Trump understands the politics of that, and so I think it'll probably be okay in that circumstance, and I'm hoping so for the sake of somebody who I love very much as well, who's dealing with that too. This is a question from Jesse, who says this is a question on last week's ama. You relayed the email of a woman last week whose son has seen Nick Fuentes as a positive influence and she concurs. She then discusses his conversion to Catholicism. I wanna preference the below by saying I think it's great. Turning towards God is always a good thing. I do, however, want to comment on this issue with a counter perspective. I'm a young man in his mid-20s. I consider myself conservative and have done so since about 2015. I was probably very similar to her son growing up and faced very similar social pressures. I have actually been pushed away from the movement by Fuentes and the Grippers. More largely, I'm Jewish and I believe that my opinion is common among many Jewish Americans in my demographic. I know tons of young Jews, men in particular, that fled the center of the left since 2016 and especially since 2023. They have been some of the biggest supporters of conservative causes and beliefs and flock to the right up and down ballot. Every single one of them spoken to genuinely, every single one has voiced unease with the right in the past month or two. They've expressed openness to consider a center, even left candidate moving forward. Further, I disagree with the woman's comment that she is not that he is a net positive individual, the same way that her son has found God due to a show. I know people listen to Fuentes often. They're now fully anti Semitic, do at least part to a show and will cite it as having such influence. This is a longer email, but I'll just say I think the the rest of it I'm not for asking for gatekeeping, eliminating free speech or anything of the sort. I'm just relating how many young Jewish conservatives view these developments because there are hundreds of thousands of us which feel lost right now. Goes on to say also I believe you have no connection with Judaism or don't really even care about it. You likely disregard anyone's anti Jewish tendencies around you, but it's not so for people who actually have to deal with it. Jesse, I'll just say thank you for the email and for expressing that experience, because I'm sure that's true. The way that Fuentes talks is of course intentionally alienating to Jewish Americans. He likes to Say he has a Jewish friend, his best friend is Jewish. And maybe psychologically he thinks that gives it cover or makes it okay, but he's obviously doing it on purpose because he believes that, quote, Jewry, as we discussed earlier on the show, is inherently handicapped in the America first question because they have like, an inherent tribal longing. Jews have an inherent tribal longing for Israel. So I think that's an entirely fair. The flip side of it is I would say I've talked to a lot of young Christians who are well intentioned and in good faith. And Jesse, you didn't say this at all. You said you're, you're not asking for gatekeeping or limiting free speech, and that's 100% fair. I would say I do know a lot of young, young Christians and actually some people who came into the gop, they're not really Christian, but came in under Trump and are just kind of centrist, secular centrist types who also feel alienated by, you know, for example, House Republicans insisting that anti Zionism is anti Semitism or some of the campus speech crackdowns. You know, Ramesa Ozturk was detained. She's fighting deportation over an op ed that was just pro bds. There was literally nothing in it that was overtly anti Semitic, unless you consider BDS anti Semitic, which I know many people do. But I would refer back to my earlier comments on labels and definition inflation and saying something enables anti Semitism versus saying someone is necessarily anti Semitic because they support bds. The overt structure of bds. Maybe you can make that argument about the broader political structure of it. But that's boycott, divest and sanction, by the way. But I think that's. Jesse, this is well said and I'm sure that's an experience many people have had because of the gripers. Some of them are actually like more overtly anti Semitic than Nick Fuentes is even. And that's saying a lot. But who will just come out and be like, yeah, I'm, you know, anti Semitic, et cetera. So that's, yeah, I, I totally get it. I think it's a balance to strike between Christians not feeling alienated for saying, you know, as many Catholics did, Michael Knowles for, for example, they didn't like when they saw churches almost certainly targeted. People are going to disagree with me for saying that, but I have a hard time believing that a church was not intentionally targeted a couple of times in Gaza over the course of that war. And people want to just be able to say, hey, can we use our pressure on the Israeli government, given the amount of funding and resources that we put in this war to make sure that doesn't happen again, to make sure all of those Christians are protected, that's a good reaction. A bad reaction is to say, you're a noxious anti Semite and Jesse didn't do this. But that's the flip side of the coin, and that's kind of why there's sensitivities around this. Damien writes, this is also about Nick Fontes. Do you think there's a particular event or turning point when things started to regress in American society after so much progress has been made? Yeah, that's a good question. I always think of it being the confluence of social media and smartphones. So that is why I tend to focus on social media and smartphones as, like my frame as I'm thinking about and discussing these things. To me, that is just. I was in high school at the time. I know some of you were in high school at the time. It just sticks out to me as. As the moment everything changed, because I think it rewired our conversations into a bad incentive structure and we stopped. You know, that's actually around the time of Trayvon Martin. Literally around the time of Trayvon Martin. It's where you start seeing anxiety rates go up and correlation doesn't equal causation and all of that. Yes, but I'm just. My perspective, somebody who was in the middle of it when it all was happening, is that even if the correlation doesn't necessarily equal the causation, I feel the correlation and the causation just in my own life and among the people that I'm friends with and in the culture that I grew up in. So I'm not saying the social science is settled. I'm just saying that's my perspective. And I think that's when we became less and less capable of sort of litigating some of these racial, sexual, religious, cultural disputes in a way that was moving us forward for the better. And I think it's because of the algorithms and because of what social media incentives do to politics and culture. And I think it's no surprise that since the Trayvon Martin case, you know, we've seen some backsliding. Americans perceive a backsliding if you look at polling on racial harmony. And I think we all sense that, and I know it was a few years before Trump came along. And I think that speaks to Trump being a symptom and not a cause of some of these. These really deeper questions. This is a super nice email Damien, I appreciate it. Lots of good thoughts in here. One of them is if I would reconsider going on Piers Morgan's show. I know like Anna Kasparian does it, and I respect that. It's not for me. I'm just not like a debatey, debatey person. I usually hesitate. Even sometimes I go ask to do debates at universities and that sort of thing. I usually hesitate. But I especially hesitate when you're in the kind of box format, in the almost cable news format, which I'm used to. I mean, I did it for a while, but I've just gotten spoiled, I think, with being able to talk into this microphone ad nauseam. David says he was also raised Missouri Synod Lutheran. Have I read CS Lewis's Space trilogy, referencing the Billy Hollowell episode and asking about increasing violence in our country, which I do believe, quote, is the result of demonic influences. According to actually, Audrey, who sent this email. I haven't read the Space trilogy. I know people who love the Space trilogy. I'm really averse to sci fi and I love CS Lewis, but my eyes glaze over and my brain stops when I read science fiction. Actually, when I read fiction, I'm so bad at reading fiction. I have a very hard time getting lost in fictional worlds. I watch like documentaries, reality television, and I read nonfiction. It's just hard for me to get into fiction for whatever psychological reason. Maybe it's because of smartphones and social media, but I get into a good novel or two once a year and I always am trying. But it's hard for me and science fiction is hard for me. So I probably won't read it. But I do love CS Lewis and I love Screwtape Letters, and I think that book gets at some of these same questions in a way that feels very current. All right, I'm going to do rapid fire here. It looks like we have three left. Tony says, can you speak on what the what the American obsession is with abortion? Why is it a constant talking point at every election and why is it a dog whistle to the left at every convention slash rally? Northern Ireland had really restrictive abortion laws until recently, and recently where anyone wanting to have one had to travel to England and receive one. And even then it was a minor topic conversation during election cycles. I've heard this from a lot of Europeans, genuinely, and I think part of it is just because the feminist movement, the second wave feminist movement in America was so successful with, with Roe v. Wade and then after Roe v. Wade that our restrictions and for whatever reason, that's another Interesting question. You know, maybe because there's this libertarian streak in the American kind of frontier culture that. That just gets passed down generation to generation and morphs into different forms. But the feminist movement's success, I actually think probably is due to that kind of that streak of libertarianism in the American mind. And because of that, we have very, very permissive abortion laws around the country, much more so than Western Europe and actually more so than a lot of the world. We have some of the feminist fantasy abortion laws in a lot of states, New York, Virginia. And I think that's why it's such, you know, that feminists are sort of attached to those achievements, but also because that is so, from my perspective, deeply morally abhorrent, that a lot of us talk about it frequently. I think Trump's political instincts on the question are correct, that there is this kind of libertarian streak in the frontierist American mind that people want some level of permissiveness, even if I deeply, deeply disagree with that. But it does. I think the reason that it comes up so much in American politics is that we swung so hard towards such a permissive structure. So that'd be my answer. Tony, appreciate the email. Thank you very much. I work at Unherd, so I have a lot of European colleagues and British colleagues, and I hear that a lot. Oh, actually, here's the last one. This is from Tiffany. Let's see. I really found. This is about Billy. I really found Billy's observation about aliens so interesting. I don't get into the whole alien thing. I had to call my dad and tell him what Billy said. My dad has been a Christian for many years. I am, too. I'm not very optimistic person, but I'm still so shocked about how people are glad Charlie Kirk is dead. It baffles my mind. People have traded humanity for politics. It's so evil. Keep the good work, Tiffany. Thank you. I think a lot of us listening to this agree. A lot of us listening to this agree. Man, it's a dark time, but always a good time for the holidays to come up, really, because it reminds us what matters and why we're here and brings us closer to people. I'll probably talk about this around Thanksgiving because I always talk about around Thanksgiving, but I hate the advice people give. Don't talk politics. Don't talk politics. Well, what a condemnation of you. And I know probably some of you disagree with me on this, but I think politics and religion are the things that we should be talking about, talking about with the people we care and trust, because those are the people with whom we can overcome the hurdles more easily to have understanding and trust because we have that baked in love and trust of being part of a family. And I'm not saying be provocative and push the envelope with people you don't trust. I certainly have cousins. I'm not going to be trying to push the button, trying to push their button on Mamdani or whatever. But you know, when it's natural, when you're having a good conversation, I say go for it because those are the conversations that challenge us. But in a healthy environment, don't ever lose family over that type of thing if it can be avoided. And I know I get emails about that. Some of the saddest and most heartbreaking emails I get are questions about how to deal that deal with that. So, man, it's tough. It's tough. But almost. We're almost to Thanksgiving. Amazing how time flies. So appreciate you all. Thank you for tuning in to this edition of Happy Hour. Make sure that you're tuned in 2pm on SiriusXM when Megan hands off to the Megyn Kelly Wrap up show on Monday. We are gonna be going every weekday live on SiriusXM channel 1112 to 3pm our Monday through Friday. Friday we'll be back with new episodes of Afterparty Mondays and Wednesdays. Afterparty is also going to be airing on the Megyn Kelly channel on SiriusXM111, so you'll be able to tune in there now as well. As a reminder, the email for the show is emilyvilmadcaremedia.com we'll see you back on Monday with more Afterparty. The holidays mean more travel, more shopping, more time online and more personal info in more places that could expose you more to identity theft. But LifeLock monitors millions of data points per second. 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