Tim Loses Will to Live in Crazed Piers Morgan Panel

Summary

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Bulwark Takes – "Tim Loses Will to Live in Crazed Piers Morgan Panel"

Podcast: Bulwark Takes
Date: September 22, 2025
Host: The Bulwark (Tim Miller)
Featured Panelists: Piers Morgan, Kerry, Eric

Episode Overview

This episode centers on Tim Miller's experience joining a heated panel on Piers Morgan's show following the political assassination of conservative figure Charlie Kirk. The conversation highlights escalating partisan rhetoric, the dangers of group blame, and the mental health and media factors involved in political violence. Tim expresses deep concern about rising extremism, the temptation to generalize blame, and urges for lowering the national temperature during a fraught moment.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. The Fallout from the Charlie Kirk Assassination

• Global and Domestic Impact: Piers Morgan comments on how the assassination became an international story, with people in the UK newly aware of Kirk and the polarized debate around his legacy.

  • [03:40]: “It’s a global story with real impact. And at the heart of it to me is this…Why did that guy become this hate figure so detested that a 22-year-old wants to kill him?” – Piers Morgan

• Radicalization and Mental Health: Tim Miller stresses that the shooter, Tyler Robinson, was radicalized online, drawing attention to the role of social media, isolation, and easy gun access, rather than ideology alone.

  • [04:48]: “If you look at the carvings on his bullets, like this guy was deep into gamer culture…deep in Discord chats…He’s seeing these clips of Charlie on TikTok…you become radicalized and you get easy access to guns, and he goes there to the school. And I think it’s part of a deep cultural issue…” – Tim Miller

2. The Dangers of Group Blame and Rhetorical Escalation

• Refusal to Generalize Blame: Tim repeatedly argues it’s wrong and dangerous to suggest one political faction bears responsibility for the actions of an individual extremist.

  • [09:30]: “I don’t want this country to become Yugoslavia where the Serbs hate the Croats and every Croat is bad...and every non-MAGA is responsible for Tyler Robinson’s actions...Come on here...[and] say that, oh, what did Kerry just say? Oh, that the liberals have become violent. The liberal, it’s a violent movement. It’s like, that is not true.”
  • [13:43]: “To say, oh, you’ve said mean things about MAGA so you’re responsible for this. That’s crazy.”

• Personal Toll on Panelists: Tim expresses his emotional exhaustion and the toll such debates take, describing this as among “the most depressing 35 minutes” he has experienced.

  • [00:52]: “I just think this is like one of the most depressing 35 minutes I’ve ever spent in my entire life.” – Tim Miller

3. The Role of Media, Social Media, and Language

• Where Radicalization Happens: The panel debates whether the cultural environment or fringe online communities are more to blame for influencing young people toward violence.

  • [13:05]: “If you have kids, you know what 22-year-olds watch. I don’t think there’s any reason to believe that this 22-year-old was like watching MSNBC or something...deeply concerned about social media companies…Why are we hiding the elephant in the room?” – Tim Miller

• Language, Hyperbole, and Their Effects: Piers Morgan presses the panel on whether comparing Trump and MAGA to Hitler and Nazis can catalyze violent responses from unstable individuals.

  • [16:00]: “How does it lower the temperature to compare Donald Trump to Adolf Hitler, to compare his supporters to Nazis?...when an impressionable, young, damaged mind puts on his bullet casings anti fascist slogans, he’s probably having that put in his head that Charlie Kirk and Donald Trump and all the MAGA right are a bunch of fascist Nazis.”

• Rejecting ‘Words are Violence’: Tim insists that while heated rhetoric is a problem, it’s not equivalent to violence—and blaming media critiques for murder is a dangerous logical leap.

  • [18:18]: “That same logic, right? That because somebody on the left has called Trump a Nazi…that means they’re responsible for this murderer. That same logic would rationalize any murder, right?...Speech is not violence. Charlie would have said that we all should be able to debate in the public square, sometimes intensely. But we shouldn’t then go and say, okay, that means you are murderers and we need to have literal civil war.”

4. Emotional Honesty and Calls for De-escalation

• Direct Appeals Against Escalation: Tim pleads for people to avoid inflaming tensions and resorting to mass blame.

  • [09:30]: “We should be able to come back together and engage on the merits of what happened…There were obviously a lot of Christians and MAGAs and conservatives that preached peace yesterday, including Charlie’s wife.”

• Panelist Frustration: Tim’s raw emotion underscores the stakes, as he distances himself from the combative framing of both left and right.

  • [09:30]: “I’m signing out from all this. I’m checking out from all of it…And I think that the way that we’ve all decided to treat each other on these panels, like we’re enemies and there’s some civil war, when the reality is as a deranged 22-year-old that got radicalized, did something really bad and we should all fucking condemn it.”

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Notable Quotes and Memorable Moments

• Tim Miller on the Toll of the Debate
  [00:52] – “I just think this is like one of the most depressing 35 minutes I’ve ever spent in my entire life.”
• Tim Miller Refuses to Generalize Blame
  [09:30] – “I don’t want this country to become Yugoslavia…Come on here…say that…liberals have become violent. That is not true.”
• Piers Morgan on Dangerous Rhetoric
  [16:00] – “How does it lower the temperature to compare Donald Trump to Adolf Hitler, to compare his supporters to Nazis?”
• Tim Miller on Words Not Being Violence
  [18:18] – “Speech is not violence. Charlie would have said that…we all should be able to debate in the public square, sometimes intensely. But we shouldn’t then go and say, okay, that means you are murderers and we need to have literal civil war.”
• Panel’s Disorienting Atmosphere
  [09:30] – “I’m signing out from all this. I’m checking out from all of it…It’s not frustrating, actually. It’s really sad. It makes me sad. I’m depressed by it all.” – Tim Miller

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Important Timestamps

• [00:52] – Tim’s introduction, decision to go on Piers Morgan’s panel, and his sense of futility.
• [03:40] – Piers Morgan frames the assassination as a global story, raises questions about political hate.
• [04:48] – Tim analyzes the shooter’s radicalization and cautions against making this about one political side.
• [09:30] – Tim’s raw reaction to the panel’s tone and group blame, pleads for personal accountability.
• [13:05] – Debates about young people’s media diets and radicalization.
• [16:00] – Piers Morgan confronts Tim about left-wing hyperbole equating Trump with Hitler.
• [18:18] – Tim clarifies his rejection of using heated rhetoric or assign broad blame for acts of violence.
• [19:43] – Tim’s closing warning on the dangers of collective smearing and escalation.

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Tone and Language

• Tim Miller is forthright, emotional, frustrated, and passionate about preventing further polarization and violence.
• Piers Morgan plays the contrarian, challenging panelists about the effect of rhetoric yet considering the complexity of mental health and political discord.
• Other panelists (Eric, Kerry) push the blame back and forth, representing the wider media and cultural tendencies to generalize.

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Final Thoughts

For listeners, this episode vividly captures the toxic spiral of blame and rhetorical escalation in American politics. Tim Miller serves as the emotional core, making a compelling plea for personal responsibility, nuanced understanding, and for resisting the drift toward seeing fellow citizens as existential enemies. The episode is an urgent call to reject the temptation of collective blame and to view disturbing, violent events through the lens of individual responsibility—before the discourse becomes irretrievably toxic.

Transcript

[A]

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[B]

I just think this is like one of the most depressing 35 minutes I've ever spent in my entire life. Hey, everybody. Tim. Oh, from the Bulwark here. I agreed to do the Piers Morgan show to talk the fallout from the Charlie Kirk assassination. And I don't, I don't know what I was thinking really. I guess I do know what I was thinking. I. I feel compelled to go into some of these spaces and try to bring some sense to people. I just, I feel like people have truly lost their minds in the fallout from Kirk. I feel like the right wing effort to just to tamp down on people's speech and to smear everyone as wannabe murderers and smear half the country as part of some violent plot against them. I feel like that is irrational and crazy and driving people to a very scary place. I should note, by the way, in the effort to take down the temperature. I just got news right before I started taping this that Jimmy Kimmel's gonna be back on the air tomorrow night, which is great news. And so it's like, you know, the effort by the right to stifle him hasn't succeeded yet. And we'll see what the fallout is from all that with the local stations, et cetera. But it hasn't succeeded with Disney. And the catastrophizing on the far left about how for the end of free speech is nigh hasn't come to pass. So I just think that, look, we are in very serious times. There are very serious threats from the Trump administration right now. They're very real concerns that in the wake of this horrible, horrible tragedy that, that it will be used as a pretext to crack down on people. And we at the Bulwark are fucking monitoring this as closely as possible. We are covering it. We are keeping you posted on what the administration is doing. At the same time, I just, I think that taking, making speed, running this country into becoming the Balkans is not good for anybody. And we can all try our best to try to make passionate arguments in the marketplace of ideas about who's right and who's wrong without trying to accelerate us into fucking hot war internally. So I feel compelled to be the person that is out there advocating for this. One of the spaces where people are trying to accelerate us into a hot war is these YouTube debate shows. So I agreed to go on and, well, you grade me on how successful I did. Here's me with Piers Morgan and just a cast of rabid characters who didn't really have much appetite for dialing things back.

[C]

There's been a lot of fallout from this Charlie Kirk thing. It's been a huge, huge story that we can all agree on. You know, the number of people here in the UK who've been talking to me about Charlie Kirk, someone that most of them had never heard of until 10 days ago, has been really fascinating. It's a global story with real impact. And at the heart of it to me is this, which is that Charlie Kirk may have had views that you might not have agreed with many of them. I'm sure you didn't. You know, he was a conservative Christian right wing person to his bootstraps. But he was also almost uniquely actually out there every week, deliberately going into places where many people didn't agree with him and encouraging open, free, democratic debate. Prove me wrong was his mantra. And when you watch those debates, he was respectful, he was polite, he tried to help the people. Why did that guy become this hate figure so detested that a 22 year old wants to kill him?

[B]

Well, Piers, I guess I don't completely agree with the whole premise of your question because this 22 year old, look, we have this deep problem in this country. It's something that you agree with. Piers, it's very easy for people who have mental health issues to get access to high powered weapons. And like this kid, this 22 year old, he wasn't watching cable news, he wasn't listening to Chuck Schumer probably. He's a 22 year old. If you look at the amount of hours that this kid was spending on social media. He is, like, deep in discord chats. He is deep in text messages with his various friends. He's playing these VR games. Supposedly he has this roommate that is transgender that he's in love with, based on his texts. And he's seeing these clips of Charlie on TikTok. And some of them are Charlie's own words that he expects to. Some of them are misleading. Some of them are taken out of context, and you become radicalized and you get easy access to guns, and he goes there to the school. And I think it's part of a deep cultural issue that we have to address in our country, is that for people who get radicalized online, for people who get, you know, who find themselves filled with hate towards someone either from a different political side or a different race, we've certainly seen this with racially motivated violence as well. We've seen, like. We've seen this from all stripes. Right? Like, to act like this is one particular thing I just think is wrong. What we have in this country is that people get radicalized, have easy access to guns, and they went after them. And, you know, like, I think it's horrible, and I wish that everybody would take more to heart what Erica Kirk was saying at the. At the memorial yesterday than what some of the other folks have said. And I think that, you know, by sometimes, because it's like a political talk show, you want to make. You know, people want to make this about us and, like, navel gaze about all this. But I think that Tyler Robinson was radicalized in a very different way. And I think we have to really think about, again, weapons, social media, what's happening online, how young people are consuming information, how young people are getting radicalized online. It's a real big challenge for the country, and it's just a tragedy that Charlie was a victim of it.

[D]

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[E]

I think college, just like Charlie, I think college is overrated. And in many cases. I know many, many of my friends have sent their children off to college. Loving children. They come back, they don't their family anymore. They've completely become politicized to a almost violent level. I stand by exactly what I said, but it goes a step further. Do you actually Republican, frankly, it's people like you who spread lies in the media who have done more damage to this country in the minds of young people. And you had a chance to apologize what you did yesterday. I didn't see it. Thank goodness. But Pierce just asked, did you think that was appropriate? I really, really questioned.

[C]

Let me ask Tim Miller because I can see you pulling a few faces here, but I'm just not entirely sure why. So explain what you're feeling right now about this.

[B]

I just think this is like one of the most depressing 35 minutes I've ever spent in my entire life being on with these people. And I think that this is a big tragedy. I think in a liberal democracy that we all should agree that people are responsible for their own actions. That people should be held, should be held accountable for their own actions as individuals. That we, we. This is not. I don't want this country to become Yugoslavia where the Serbs hate the Croats and every Croat is bad and every Serb is bad and every, every non maga is responsible for Tyler Robinson's actions and every Maga is responsible for David DePape's actions and we Come on here. And we shattered each other and we say that, oh, what did, what did Kerry just say? Oh, that the liberals have become violent. The liberal, it's a violent movement. It's like, that is not true. Or that wajahat comes on here and starts not answering the question, shouting like, why are we. What is the point of him? But okay, come back together. We should be able to come back together and engage on the merits of what happened. Every liberal is not violent. I know lots of liberals. I talked to a lot of liberals. Don't, don't own weapons, don't wanna have weapons, preach peace. There were obviously a lot of Christians and magas and conservatives that preached peace yesterday, including Charlie's wife. We're gonna come on here and smear everybody from the other side and incite and have Eric come on and say, I'm angry and I wanna go at war with the left. I'm sorry, I'm signing out from all this. I'm checking out from all of it. Tyler Robinson. What he did was horrible and he's responsible for his actions. People are responsible for their words if they're lying and they should be called out for it. But like, why are we doing this? I mean, Megyn Kelly yesterday was tweeting at me. Kerry retweeted it. She said, you, she said to me, you gleefully canceled all of us for five years. One of yours killed Charlie. And then you laughed at our pain. Kerry just said, they did this. She used the word they. I didn't do any of that. I didn't laugh at Charlie. I didn't kill Charlie. I don't take any glee in his pain. It's really affected me emotionally in a deep way. And I think that the way that we've all decided to treat each other on these panels, like we're enemies and there's some civil war, when the reality is as a deranged 22 year old that got radicalized, did something really bad and we should all fucking condemn it and say we don't want to become a country where people do political assassinations. Unfortunately, I just don't think that we're up for that. And I've got to listen to like this clown show and it's pretty frustrating, frankly. And it's not frustrating, actually. It's really sad. It makes me sad. I'm depressed by it all.

[C]

Do you know? That's very honest. That's a very honest thing.

[E]

Can I respond just a little bit to that? I mean, I think I got dragged there and I'm And I agree that the person who shot our friend is the one responsible. You came on and tried to blame it on guns and it is a madman who did a terrible thing. But where did he get indoctrinated? Where did he change his viewpoints? And it has been a constant. And Tim, you're in the media, I assume you would agree that you're in the media. I've seen you on all kinds of. On many different shows. You have espoused many, many viewpoints that have been very, very hateful toward the right. And so I think it's time to take responsibility for it now.

[B]

This is the thing, Kerry, and this is the game you're playing is like, is that people have said things and that we need to figure out where this guy got radicalized. That's true. We need to figure out where he got radicalized. I don't think that there's. If you have kids, you know what 22 year olds watch. I don't think there's any reason to believe that this 22 year old was like watching MSNBC or something. Like we should figure out where he got radicalized. I agree with that. If you look at the carvings on his bullets, like this guy was deep into gamer culture. Like this guy was deep. I'm deeply concerned about the social media companies and TikTok and YouTube and X feeding people very divisive stuff. Why would we. Hiding the elephant in the room? Why are we hiding the elephant in the room?

[C]

Can we say it?

[B]

To say, oh, you've said mean things about maga so you're responsible for this. That's crazy. That is not.

[E]

I do have kids though. I have a 21 and a 22 year old. So I have kids right at the age of the killer. And you know what my kids tell me, Mom? The garbage that's been in culture, what they've taught us at school, what they've taught us at summer camp, that has played into many people in their generation hating folks who are conservative.

[C]

They're probably not helpful in terms of lowering the temperature to brandy during memorial speech. Let me bring Tim Miller, Let me bring Tim Miller back in here. Tim, this is shameless.

[B]

Shameless, Pierce.

[C]

It's actually. It is shameless because you keep deflecting from any accountability for what you yourself.

[B]

Are me at the same responsibility.

[C]

All right, Tim, let me bring in Tim, let me bring in you do not ask Donald Trump and Stephen Miller. Okay? It's fine.

[B]

They are leading the country.

[C]

What are you doing here? Tim?

[B]

Yeah, I don't know. It's kind of hard to. I mean, that's been the same point several times. The. I just wanna respond to something Eric said. Cause I do think that it is important where Eric talked about how I go around in the media and I criticize Donald Trump and I criticize MAGA Republicans. Yeah, I do that. I have very deep criticisms of the policies that Donald Trump is putting forth. I have very deep criticisms of the policies that Kerry put forth. We've argued about that before in several different forums, not just here, we've had debates. But here's the thing, the game that is being played that I don't like, right? Which is like Charlie was able to go out and have these debates in public and that was good. And in those debates he smeared the left. He went at him hard, he went at him really hard. He attacked people from the left, he attacked Joe Biden, he attacked left politicians. And that was good that he was out there having those debates and that was a value that he was having those debates. And he didn't deserve to die because of that. And that is something I 100% agree with. But then you flip it on the other side and say, well, Tim or whoever is out there and they're criticizing MAGA and they use harsh words and they criticize MAGA harshly and that they're responsible then for the violence. And I just don't agree with that. That's kind of a leftist view really, that like words are violence.

[C]

But do you not think, Tim, but Tim, on that point, Tim, do you not think. Cuz I got into this, there's a political show in the UK called Question Time. It's the most watched political panel show. And I was on it last week with Bonnie Greer, who's an American political commentator who just has repeatedly called Trump Hitler and MAGA supporters Nazis in the last few weeks. And I simply said to her, you know, you're talking about lowering the temperature again, the sort of theme, which is fine, but how does it lower the temperature to compare Donald Trump to Adolf Hitler, to compare his supporters to Nazis? And so I think language, like you said, language does matter, right? I do think when an impressionable, young, damaged mind puts on his bullet casings anti fascist slogans, he's probably having that put in his head that Charlie Kirk and Donald Trump and all the MAGA right are a bunch of fascist Nazis. And Trump's Hitler, he's probably hearing that a lot because you know what, A lot of people on the left continue to call them that. And I think that's Wrong.

[B]

Well, okay, sure. I guess my point is that I don't think any of us would disagree with the fact that. That Charlie Kirk used some very heated, intense rhetoric and leveled some very extreme allegations at the left.

[E]

Can we stop trying to blame this on Charlie Kirk? He asked you a question, Tim. Are you going to take any risk? Are you going to take any risk? Whenever you're asked a tough question, it goes back to what Donald Trump did and what Charlie Kirk did. What about what we've all said and done, and do you take any responsibility? That's what people.

[C]

Because the point about the fascism, racism. Well, the thing about the Hitler. Look, Tim. Let me just put it this way, Tim. The reason I mentioned the Hitler Nazi thing and the fascist thing, this constant use of this language, is that it's entirely consistent, logical that if you're a damaged young mind and you genuinely think that Donald Trump is Hitler or Charlie Kirk is a fascist or, you know, maga supporters are Nazis, it's entirely logical if you're a disturbed mind that you might think, well, it's my duty to kill these people because they are the new Nazis. They are the new Mussolini, you know, And. And it's like, no, they're not.

[B]

I hear what you're saying, Piers, and I promise I'm gonna answer. I just. I got cut off when people saying I was trying to. When Kerry was saying I was trying to for this, I just want to be 100% clear. I was making the exact opposite point. Saying the exact opposite point. I think that everybody should be careful about their language and accurate. I don't support hyperbole and smearing people falsely. I'm not for that. Okay, but here's the thing. That same logic, right? That because somebody on the left has called Trump a Nazi, because people have called him a fascist, that means they're responsible for this murderer. That same logic would rationalize any murder, right? I mean, Donald Trump uses the harshest language about his opponents. He calls them the enemy of the people. He's called them communists. He's called them fascists. He's absorbed fascists. Fascists. He uses extremely nasty rhetoric all the time. Would that justify a right wing person killing a left wing person? Of course not. No. And that would be crazy to say that. So here's the thing. Speech is not violence. Charlie would have said that we all should be able to debate in the public square, sometimes intensely. But we shouldn't then go and say, okay, that means you are murderers and we need to have literal civil war. And that is what I'm starting to hear out there from people on both the right and the left, and I fundamentally reject it. Okay. Speech is not violence. We should all be more responsible. We should all be more respectful. I don't think we should. Sorry, Wajahat. I don't think we should have been live hate tweeting Charlie during his memorial. We can be more respectful.

[E]

Thank you, Tim.

[B]

Words are not violence. You're welcome. Words are not violence, though. And we shouldn't be accusing the other side and smearing everybody on the other side of being some evil enemy, like, because of one deranged kid's actions. This is going to end really bad.