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- [00:00]
A
Foreign what's up? What's up everybody? Welcome to a brand new episode of Part of the Problem. I am Dave Smith. He is Robbie the Fire Bernstein. How you feeling today, my friends?
- [00:16]
B
Oh, yesterday was a pretty brutal travel day, but I'm happy to be here with you now.
- [00:21]
A
Dude, we had such a great time this weekend. Tacoma was great, Spokane was great. But man, getting from Spokane back to the east coast is just. There's no way to do. That's not a pretty rough, pretty trip.
- [00:35]
B
I woke up at six in the morning and didn't get into my apartment.
- [00:38]
A
Till 3:00am Dude, I.
- [00:41]
B
That's got to be the longest single travel day I've had to date.
- [00:44]
A
Is. But how did you manage to not get until 3am because just.
- [00:49]
B
It's just JFK, man. It's like by the time you get your bag off your plane, you got to take a tram to your car. And then the Van Wick Expressway. True to Seinfeld, there's still traffic on it. And then you have a coffee before you leave the airport because you know you were drinking on the flight and you gotta get home and then you're just. It's been five days on the road and it's four in the morning. You're like, go to bed, buddy.
- [01:14]
A
I, well, I hear you on that, but man, what a fun weekend of shows and just a great time. I'm really looking forward to the, you know, the, the rest of the year. We got a bunch of dates coming up. I know. Here I should read these off because I do like to make a point to do that but.
- [01:33]
B
Well, while you find it, I'm back out of my house in all 10 minutes. Birmingham, Alabama, Atlanta and Anderson, South Carolina.
- [01:40]
A
Oh yeah.
- [01:40]
B
Go to porch tour.com and then I know what you and I have coming up working backwards later in the year, it's going to be Detroit.
- [01:46]
A
Well, here I got, I got the Tampa Vegas. Well, let me do it in order just because I got it up here. So it's not this weekend I'm off, but the next weekend I'll be. Me and Rob will be back out in Vegas at Wise Guys Comedy Club. Then it's D Dallas and Fort Worth Hyenas. Always a great time out there. Then we go back to Detroit House of Comedy, another great club. And then of course one of the best in the country, side splitters in Tampa. And then my final show of the year will be in in Poughkeepsie. Laugh it up. Which we we've has come to be a bit of A Thanksgiving tradition for me and you. We've been doing that, that club there for years now. Always a great time. So comicdavesmith.com for all those dates, porch tour.com for all of Rob's headlining dates. Let's get into the show. First up, I guess I should mention this. This is. I'm glad you're sitting down, Rob. This is going to blow your mind. Israel has been involved in an aggressive military action. All right? Take a few minutes to recover. Try to put back the pieces to the world. I know you're having a moment now where you're like, I had this idea of the world. Everything is in disarray now. How does this make sense? So, yeah, so Israel just launched an attack in, in Doha, Qatar where they claim they were targeting Hamas leadership. Hamas has come out and said that none of their leadership were taken out, but that some one of their kids was or something like that. Who knows? Exactly. We'll probably get more information as the dust, literally as the dust settles. But look, there's a few things about this and I guess we, you know, you can give your thoughts as well. But I guess just the few things I would say about this, obviously we don't have a tremendous amount of details. There's a strike that just happened. All you kind of know at this point is what the, what the Israeli government is saying, what Hamas is saying, what the Qataris are saying. But it seems to be confirmed on all end that this was an IDF attack inside of a sovereign country who Israel is not at war with, last I checked, who is also officially an ally of the United States of America, which is just, you know, in general, you know, you're just not allowed to do that. Like you can't just randomly attack countries that you're not at war with. But in this case it's. Israel seems to be able to do what they want to do. I guess one thing I would say is that there's. So this comes right on the heels of Donald Trump floating out this very loose idea of a ceasefire agreement. Trying to move to something like that so they can ramp up for whatever the next phase of the, you know, cleansing of Gaza is going to look like. And it there, let's just say there's a long pattern of like when any type of peace talks or ceasefire talks or negotiations are on the table, Israel then goes and does something to try to create a situation where that the other party is not going to be able to come and agree to, to whatever the proposal was. So that's part of it, of course, you know, negotiations with Qatar and, and with, you know, much of the Hamas leadership that is in Qatar have been. This has been how most of the hostage retrievals have been accomplished. There's also how other things like Benjamin Netanyahu propping up Hamas for many years were accomplished by negotiating with Qatar. And it just seems like one more clear example that if rescuing the hostages was the number one priority here, this would be the exact opposite of the way you would. You would go about this. But really the biggest point, I think by far out of all of this is just like you have this situation, generally speaking, where the United States of America, and I mean this almost like at every level, like, overwhelming majority of the people of the United States of America, I think even a decent portion of even the political class, even the president of the United States himself would would say that, like, look, we don't want another war in the Middle east right now. Donald Trump definitely feels that way on some level, and the American people overwhelmingly feel that way. Like, of course, like, it's. It's pretty obvious to go like that, that we could use another war. Like, we could use a hole in the head. You know what I mean? Like, that is not what we. We're not this far in debt and this many problems going on, like, the ideal, right? So maybe not quite as far as me and you, but they're more or less like, let's try to not get in another stupid war here. That's kind of our goal. Donald Trump has been on record saying he hopes that's the end of the conflict with Iran. He hopes the killing in Gaza stops soon. He hopes that everybody can get along all this stuff. And yet you now have Israel, has now in the last two years where this country that for whatever reason were married to the hip to has now, in the last two years, Israel has attacked. Well, I mean, they've attacked is an understatement. They have, they have erased Gaza, they have attacked the west bank. They have bombed Syria, they have bombed Yemen, they have bombed Iran, they have bombed Lebanon, and now they have bombed Qatar. They've bombed seven of their neighbors. They've had military action slash war, slash just destruction of a captive people with seven of their neighbors. Like, Jesus, like, that is just crazy. Normal countries do not do this. I'm sorry. This is not like, there's lots of problems in the world. You look around the world, it's actually pretty rare that you'll find a country that's just like, attacked seven of its neighbors in the last Two years. And, like, it's just one more example. Like, one more. Just. Just clear example of, like, why do we want to be attached to all of this? Why does it constantly have to be done with our weapons and our money and our reputation? And nobody seems to have a good answer for that. Like, why is that? Because we need. We need to see Qatar bombed. Does that help us at all? Anyway, your thoughts, Rob?
- [08:39]
B
Well, I guess the thing that most stood out to me about this is there's some debate online at the moment as to whether or not this was the Hamas negotiating team that was eliminated or if this was Hamas leadership. But what just stands out to me is at the beginning of this war, if I was running Israel and I was looking to get hostages back, I think my first move would have been, let's go assassinate the real Hamas leadership that lives out in Qatar and to cut off funding and figuring out how to exert leverage over people that actually have power and not flattening the buildings of innocent civilians. And so if this is true, that they're now taking out Hamas leadership, let's just go with the Israel explanation that it's Hamas leadership. Why is this now, three years into the. Two years into the war, this is now the time. Like, if that option's been on the table for two full years, why is it that after killing all these civilians and doing all the other things that you've done in Gaza, now is when you're first taking out, maybe they got an explanation that they didn't have intelligence on where they were or otherwise. But I'm just saying, if you want to go with the explanation that this was not the negotiating team, and essentially what you're saying, which is Israel making sure that they got a pathway to just continue doing what they're doing, if this is leadership, why now? Why not two years ago? Why wasn't that the first action that you took in this war?
- [09:59]
A
Yeah, I mean, that's a very good question, and as you said, a question that maybe there could be an answer for, but it certainly doesn't seem like we've gotten one or likely are going to get one. And it doesn't seem like too many in the media will be asking, hey.
- [10:14]
B
It'S important to go after the leadership, but let's flatten all of the civilian buildings and take out the hospitals and kill a bunch of kids first.
- [10:21]
A
Yeah. Well, the thing is, though, Rob, right. Is that this has always been kind of the dynamic that. So while. While Israel was screaming through the first two years of this thing, that we're just. We're not fighting a war against the Palestinian people. We're just fighting a war against Hamas. And then, you know, calling them Amalek, you know, in other. Out of the other side of their mouth. But there. The thing is that you do kind of have a difference. Like, there's what they'll call, like, the political faction of Hamas that's like the leadership that's in. In Qatar, and then you have, like, the militants who are in Gaza. And the. The truth is that the. The only way to get those hostages out was to negotiate with the political wing in. In Qatar, because that's. And that's. And that is how they did successfully get some of the hostages out. And so if that was your number one priority, probably you wouldn't even go after attacking the Hamas and Qatar. You just simply have to negotiate with them. But I also do agree with you that, like, if you were saying you're conducting this war because, you know, these were always the two justifications that they go back and forth from, like, even though they're not the same thing, and they in many instances conflict with each other. But yes, something like this. If you were saying we are taking out Hamas, then certainly it would. It. It is pretty crazy that you're saying only two years. Two. Not only. It took a whole two years for you to, like, start targeting, like, the rich one. Like, this has always been the talking point from the Israelis is like, it's like, oh, there are these rich billionaires, and they don't even live amongst their people. They just party it up out in Qatar or whatever. It's like, all right. And you're only now. Now that we're done with the babies or not done, but now that we're continuing this is. That is pretty wild. And you'd need, like, a really specific and good explanation for why you were only able to achieve this goal now after two years, which I have a tough time buying, is that there is an explanation for that. All right, guys, let's take a moment and thank our sponsor for today's show, which is Kalshee. I've been telling you about Kalshee for a little while now. Kelsey is a site where you can see betting markets on just about anything. So right now, what's very big is, like, the New York City mayoral race, and Mamdani is now the front runner with an 82% chance of winning, according to Kelsey markets. And you could see stuff like that all over the place. Like, what are the betting odds about the Democrats retaking Congress or who the Democratic nominee is going to be. I found all that stuff to be very interesting. Plus you can put down some money and have a chance to win. So head over to Kelsey.com and join the over 5 million users you can trade on politics, culture, even the weather. Go check them out now@kalshee.com all right, let's get back into the show.
- [13:16]
B
I also, maybe this, maybe I got a, every once in a while I call, call up Scott Horton or Kyle Anselone and I'll get some good details on this stuff. I guess I don't quite understand and this is just my dummy American brain, but if Hamas leadership lives in Qatar, but you tell me that that's not the same Hamas, then I feel like those guys just need to change their name.
- [13:36]
A
Yeah, probably not a bad idea. Well, there's, you know, look, they're, they're affiliated for sure. I mean they're all members of Hamas. They're different wings of the thing. But anyway, I did, it's kind of on, on a similar topic, but so there was a Ben Shapiro, friend of the program, America's leading, you know, political expert. He was on, he was on Coleman Hughes podcast. Now I should let our audience know that Coleman Hughes has reached out to me about doing his show. So we're going to try to set that up sometime soon, I think, which I actually think would be an like, I, I appreciated that he reached out. I think it was coming off me doing some episode, responded to his thing. And so I kind of appreciated that. And I actually thought, I was a little surprised that he reached out, but I actually thought what he did. I was like, oh, you know what, that might actually be like a really good conversation. Like I think, you know, we might, we might have an interesting talk about this stuff. So I just figured I'd preface with that. However, he did just have Ben Shapiro on and they, they, they started discussing the woke. Right. Which I am quite certain according to them we would be members of. And this is, I don't know, I just kind of thought this was interesting. It's, you know, what can you say? It's like where it's, it's kind of wild, like where the Israel propaganda is at, at this point and kind of how, I don't know, it just feels kind of desperate to me. I don't want to be insulting to Coleman ahead of us. You know, I want to be able to have like a good faith conversation with the guy and I have a feeling we will. But I did think this was worth playing and kind of responding to. So let's, let's check out a little bit of Coleman Hughes and our boy Ben Shapiro.
- [15:37]
B
People on what is called the woke right by some now that like to.
- [15:43]
A
Blame everything on, you know, the military.
- [15:46]
B
Industrial complex or global Jewry, this kind of thing.
- [15:51]
A
These, these are people that are.
- [15:53]
B
Have a fundamentally grievance based relationship to.
- [15:56]
A
Oh, so I just look bad. Isn't it hilarious that you go, these people, the so called woke right as some people describe it now these are people who have, you know, a fundamental beef with either the military industrial complex or global jewelry. Like that's quite an. Or like. Wait, what? It just seems like. Sorry, go ahead.
- [16:20]
B
How isn't that, how is that in the category of woke up? When did wokeness become being anti Jew? I mean, I'm just saying if you want to create a category of woke right and to pretend like it's like what we were describing as people being woke and that that's anti Semitism. Well, it just seems like it doesn't fall into the category of wokeness.
- [16:40]
A
I mean, look, I guess they can make some argument that like it's racialist, it's a different type of racialism, birds of a different feather or something. But I do think here, look, people, if you were going to say, which I've seen some people like point out and then try to like attack me. They're like, Dave, you, you say you think this whole woke right label is dumb. But then, and they had, it was like a Reason magazine interview that I did in like 2017 and I had said something about how you do what you see now reactionaries kind of like picking up some of the same tools that the progressives are using. And I was talking about the rise of white nationalism and like men's rights groups that were kind of like mirroring feminist groups. And they're like, see, that's the same thing you're talking about. And it's like, dude, look, everybody's made that observation. Yes, there are racialists on the left and there are racialists on the right. And okay, but the thing that they do that's so dirty every time, because this seems to me to be the whole thing of the like the dumbass James Lindsay woke right attack is that you use those people, then you shoehorn in a whole nother group of people who are not doing racialist stuff at all, lump them together with the vaguest possible umbrella so that you can just use a pejorative. I mean that's a, it's, it's oh, you know, Rob, People who blame the Jews for everyone. Also people who blame the military industrial complex. Wait, what? But that one's a totally real thing. Was. So I guess Dwight D. Eisenhower was really just a woke. Is that what WOKE means now? A five star general President of the United States of America. Right winger. Like what? Yeah, he's just basically a pink haired 20 year old now because he's talking about, oh, the military industrial complex. Like, well, are you arguing that such an industrial complex doesn't exist? Are there not giant weapons companies that make billions of dollars off of war? Do they not fund think tanks who happen to put together policy papers that advocate for more wars? Do members of those think tanks end up serving in our Defense Department and State Department and executive branch? Okay then, so what are you. And then at the end, you know this thing Coleman does, and this is what they all do. Whenever the, whenever the WOKE right term comes up, they go, they go, you know, some people blame the Jews, some people blame the military industrial complex, but it's all a very grievance based politics. Like you see where he's like leading you down a path but you're like, what the hell does grievance based politics means? You know another way to describe grievance based politics, Rob? Politics. No, you name me the political group. You name me, Rob. One political group where grievance isn't at the center of it. Left, right, libertarian, conservative, progressive, socialist, communist, fascist. Name me one. Oh, the one where grievance isn't at the center of it. Right now Coleman Hughes and Ben Shapiro are stating their grievances with the woke. Right? Like what does. So you say something. So, so here you go. Ok. There's the people who hate Jews. Ok. By the way, also connect everybody who just doesn't like stupid wars and it's grievance based. Now what does grievance based sound like to you, Rob? Well, that sounds just like the WOKE left now, doesn't it? Remember how they had grievances and these guys also have grievances? Whoa, you blew my mind, dude. Like, what, what does this mean? Like anyway, I just thought it's just like he's just in the opening, like in the framing of this thing. You just already see how flawed the whole thing is. Like, yeah, we, we have grievances. The non interventionist right has grievances with the interventions. That's why we're non interventionist. All right, anyway, any. Anything else before we, we get back to it, Rob, or you keep playing?
- [21:02]
B
No, let's continue with this stupidity, Western.
- [21:07]
A
Society, it's just that the enemies are different than the enemies.
- [21:10]
C
That's exactly right. I mean, on the right, it manifests as a lot of conspiracy theorizing. One of the things I talk about, I think manifests everywhere is a sort of conspiracy theory. And traditional biblical religion is actually in many ways sort of the anti conspiracy theory. So if you think about paganism in its original form, it was the idea that, as Gloucester says in King Lear, that the gods, you know, strike us down like flies for. For their sport. That is sort of the. The pagan ideology. And, and I would say the post God ideology is that things happen randomly, bad things happen to good people. You can't control any of that. And then that is then projected into a conspiratorial idea that there must be forces beyond your reckoning who are out to get you. And you can see that on both right and left, the biblical worldview is. Is actually quite.
- [21:53]
A
I mean, just there's. There's just like these examples in. In life where, like, when people. And some people are good at this, by the way, I. For any talent or quality that I have, I am not good at this at all. I am like the anti this. But, you know, people are really good at saying something that kind of sounds nice when they got nothing at all to say. You could almost like walk away from that and go, huh? Oh, the kind of interesting, profound thing. And then like, as you get a couple steps away, you go, hey, he said nothing. He just said nothing at all. Like what? It's like, it's like, oh, yeah. Well, what you're seeing there is conspiracy theories. Conspiracy theory, again, just like it's a term that means nothing, means nothing. Like you're. Look, there are people who put together sloppy theories, and there are people who put together airtight theories. The only, you know, the only thing that matters is whether you're being sloppy or whether you have a really good argument, whether you have a really good case. But the idea that it's a conspiracy. But again, Ben Shapiro was on, if you remember, I was mocking him last year for this when Joe Biden was still in and he said that Hamas was controlling the Biden administration. Is that not a conspiracy theory? Because everyone has conspiracy theories. Because, listen, it's just a fact of how society is organized that elites often conspire with each other in an effort to enact an agenda. This. Everybody conspires. The DNC conspires and the RNC conspires. And then sometimes they conspire with each other to keep out a third party. And then sometimes, you know, weapons companies conspire with think tankers. And sometimes, like, you know, like, there's all types of conspiracies. The question is, are they real or not? And then like, you know, Ben Shapiro. I mean, I guess it's kind of. It's a kind of maybe a somewhat interesting, like, discussion completely unrelated to anything they're talking about here and very sloppily applied as if that it fits to the thinking of whatever people they're describing. But I'd say most people today reasonably do not have either the belief that the universe simply just rewards good and bad God. If you're suffering, that's because you did something wrong against God. If you're doing well, that's because you did something good for God or something. Most people don't agree with that in absolute terms. We all kind of think like, oh, sometimes bad things happen to good people and it was no fault of their own. I don't think any of us really think that, like the kid who gets leukemia displayed pleased God in some way. And yet I also don't really think any of us believe that what you do in life has absolutely no influence on how you end up, you know, succeeding or failing in life. So anyway, I don't think either of those two frameworks are particularly useful. But it's not that there's like an absence of this feeling that you have any agency or that you can control your own life that leads people to. To being conspiracy theorists. The much more likely answer here is that the reason why conspiracy theories are all the rage these days is because our current government has been lying through their fucking teeth to us about the 50 most important crises that have just hit the American people, like every goddamn one of them. In the every major crisis of the 21st century, the elites, both the political elites and the media elites have lied through their teeth and gotten caught lying. So now people are wondering what else they were lying about. That seems like a more likely theory than Ben Shapiro's pagan versus Judeo Christian worldview. But I don't know, Rob, maybe. Maybe I'm missing something.
- [25:49]
B
Well, he's using some tricky language here. And like he said, I don't think he's actually saying anything.
- [25:55]
A
But.
- [25:55]
B
But if the idea that it's pagan to believe that there is evil forces in our world that are outside of God, that we have to combat, if you want to say that, that's not true, so then, should have America not have fought Hitler during World War II because hey, I guess that's God's plan is to kill a bunch to have a whole holocaust. And hey, to believe that we have influence or agency or free will or that we're supposed to combat evil and not just leave that to God. I guess Hitler should just, should he, because that's an evil force. And hey, belief in God. And by the way, I remember this stands out to me from, from my more faith driven days. But I like this because there, there was a concept that sometimes lurked around of well, you just have to have faith. And there was this guy, I think his name was the Khazanish. And they said, well are you telling me that the kids that were put into ovens at Auschwitz just didn't have faith? And his idea was that that's not how God works. Like God does not just leave things up to if you have enough faith in him, you're gonna have a good life. That's not what free will is. It's not to say that God, if you believe in him can't interject in your life or that prayer doesn't work. But we're not just on earth to leave everything to God. And I don't think that Ben Shapiro believes that or that he believes that it's pagan influences to think that you having to do good, make your life better or combat evil is some, is somehow a rejection of God.
- [27:17]
A
Yeah, yeah, no, I agree with you. I don't think anybody, I really haven't, I guess there are, I guess some people who really will bite that bullet and you know, like just be like, yeah, that's right, the kids of the Holocaust made a bad decision or didn't please God or something like that. Very few people I think actually are willing to go there. So I don't really know what the point of this is. But I also just you know, like again in a similar separate point from your point. But I did think that was all very well said. But it's like in the same way that they go, oh this is a grievance based politics. But then you realize that like you could apply that to what you say to. It's the same way Ben Shapiro says he hates identity politics, but then is a proud Zionist. You're like, this is like, you guys describe other people as this but it could easily fit you as well. But also wouldn't like Ben Shapiro. I mean I don't actually know. I, you know, to be fair enough, I don't consume for somebody who shreds the guy constantly. I don't watch that much of his stuff. I have seen a lot of his stuff over the years. But I'm sure Ben Shapiro at this point would admit that Covid was a conspiracy, right? Like, I know when it mattered, he was telling you to get the job dopes, and he was, you know, supporting lockdowns and was terrible on all the actual policies when it actually mattered. Unlike us, as we got it. All right, but wouldn't he admit at this point that that was a conspiracy of some sort? Like, so, like, what. What isn't a conspiracy? Was. Was the media and the Biden campaign like. Or the Biden administration? They were conspiring to make him look good, weren't they? I mean, wasn't. Like, were the Twitter files not a conspiracy theory? Like, you know what I'm saying? Like, there's. Like, you'd even. He'd have to admit. How about the Hunter Biden laptop? Would Ben Shapiro tell me that that wasn't a conspiracy? Like, that wasn't deep state officials interfering in a domestic election. Tell me I'm wrong. Like, would Ben Shapiro take issue with me saying that? Because there's no argument. I mean, there's just simply no argument against it. So I'm sure he would have to concede that. And also because he's Mr. Conservative, you know, Trump loyalist now after being a never Trumper. But so he'd have to. So then what are we even talking about anymore? We live in a country where the deep state conspires against the people to try to overturn the will of the majority of the people and interfere in an election. Yet the people are suspicious of their government. They have some grievances against them. Like, what? What are we saying here? All right, guys, let's take a moment and thank our sponsor for today's show, which is Brunt. Brunt Workwear. Brunt Workwear. You got to check them out. I love the Brunt boots. They sent me this amazing pair of boots. They're serious sturdy, great work boots. And the first time I put them on my feet, they were super comfortable, which is never the case with good work boots. You always have, like, at best case, you have a break in period, and usually they're just never comfortable. If you need a good pair of work boots that you want to feel like a comfortable pair of sneakers, make sure to go check out Brunt. You work too hard to be stuck in uncomfortable boots that don't hold up. So they built something better. And that something is boots that are insanely comfortable and built for any job. Site. And right now for a limited time our listeners will get $10 off at Brunt. When you use the promo code problem at checkout, just head to bruntworkware.com and use the promo code problem for $10 off. And after your order they'll ask where you heard about Brunt and make sure you mention that you heard about them here. All right, let's get back into the show. All right, let's keep playing Harsh.
- [31:03]
C
It basically says that if you fail, it's probably your fault. There's a God centered ordered universe. If you do the right things, good things will likely happen. If you do the wrong things, bad things will likely happen. Right. It' entire book of Deuteronomy. And so the, the, the movement away from kind of personal responsibility and, and duty that, that results in this very conspiratorial view of society in which again shadowy forces are out there and they're manipulating you. And if you don't understand that it's because you now have almost a Marxist false consciousness that that, that has to be, that has to be, you know, opened up. You need to be, you need to be black pilled, you need to be awoken.
- [31:37]
A
Pause it. I mean like again dude, I just want really. It's just, it's so. Even after all these years, even I've been through so many of these, it's stunning like the lack of self reflection, the lack of kind of self awareness like that. So that's the quality now that you feel like there's kind of forces out there who are trying to manipulate you. But like of course there are people who are trying to manipulate you. Who is arguing is your guys position that you have not been arguing that others are trying to manipulate you. Coleman Hughes and Ben Shapiro's rise to prominence was essentially off of condemning the entire university system that there's a bunch of propaganda being pushed into young people's heads. Is that not people being manipulated? Ben Shapiro's a bit again the liberal media and liberal entertainment and liberal Hollywood. This Ben Shapiro has been a huge critic of all of this. Is that not people trying to manipulate you? Like isn't it just a very human thing to know that? Like yeah, there are like again this is what's interesting to me about it is that what's almost revealed and this is why I put like on the, on the members only show the other day I was talking about this with Ben Shapiro where he always finds a way to run to like Israel is really open to gay rights. And you're like I thought you were an orthodox conservative, like, what, Gay rights is your deal now? I mean, I don't. Okay, square that circle for me. But they always become almost like fundamentally liberal. And I mean this in the worst sense of the word liberal. The worst, the worst sense of the word liberal, like, to me was almost like a ridiculous, a ridiculously like rose colored glasses way of viewing society, society and reality. I remember there was this one guy, I can't, oh, man, I can't remember who it was, but I remember we were, we were having a good time making fun of him, but it was somebody who was saying like, I think it might have been like around the Durham Report, but they said something like, they were like, look, like if there ever, if there was any wrongdoing or they said something, the, the line was, no, the President isn't above the law. Now if anybody at the FBI did any wrongdoing, then they should be held, you know, legally accountable. But the blood. And I remember just making fun of it where it was like, hey, those, those sentences sure do sound nice, don't they? But here in real life, the President is above the law. He's always above the law. And no one at the FBI is ever held accountable. You know, like, it's sounds nice what you're saying, but think about how goofy this actually is and the idea that, that Ben Shapiro and Coleman Hughes are sitting here mocking the idea. It's like, who's being naive now, K? You're mocking the idea that what? In society there are powerful people who try to manipulate the everyday citizen. Rob, there has never been one society in the history of the world where that was not the case. It is always, every time. 1,000% of the times. The way societies run is that there are elites and those elites use propaganda to manipulate the opinions of their citizenry. You think that's like a, that's like a weird view or something? It's the most realist view you could have. It's simply how things work. And it's. This is almost on the level of, of someone going like, oh, this guy is such a conspiracy theory. He thinks we don't live in a democracy, but rather the government is controlled by powerful people. What? Isn't this just 101? Yeah, of course, of course that's how it works. You should be embarrassed that you ever thought it didn't work that way. I don't know. Go ahead. Rob, you got anything?
- [35:44]
B
No, let's continue.
- [35:46]
A
All right, let's keep playing.
- [35:48]
C
Getting to the, to the, to the problems in society that you Never spotted before. It turns out maybe America was on the wrong side of World War II. Maybe the moon landing never happened. Because the normal kind of response to this nonsense is to say, well, America seems, like, pretty awesome. You have all these grievances against America, but, I mean, let's face it, America kind of kicks ass. I mean, we defeated the Nazis, we defeated the Soviets without firing a direct shot. We have created the single most prosperous era in the history of humanity with the broadest spread of wealth in the history of human. Were kind of great. And so the answer to that from both sides is no, no, no. You're totally misapprehending history.
- [36:22]
A
For.
- [36:22]
C
For one side, it's the 1619 project. And then, as some folks at Free Press have written, for others, it's the 1939 project.
- [36:31]
A
All right, all right. So here. What can I say about this? Okay, so, first of all, I would say that what Ben Shapiro really is. Is doing here is like, so it was Frederick Bastiat who really, truly one of the great minds of his time, a great man, and he was the one who wrote that. I forget exactly how he put it, because he was. Said it much more eloquently than I will, but he was basically talking about how the. The socialists intentionally conflate society with the state and society with government. And so. So, like. And. And look, you got to admit to a. In like, a crazy degree, we all do this. On some level, it's a mistake in thinking every time, but we all, you know, kind of do a thing where we'll be like, oh, did you hear India attacked Pakistan? You know, and in your mind, it's. It's like you go, like, the country of India attacked the country of Pakistan. But that's not really what happened, right? There's like, this group of people in the government ordered this other group of people in the military to attack this other group. Like, it's. And there you could. Could see a thing where you're like, if you say America, what is America? Is America the people and their tradition and their culture and their religion? Is it the, you know, the mountains and the, like, you know, farmlands and the beach fronts? Or like. Or is it like Joe Biden and Donald Trump in Washington, D.C. making decisions? So my point is just when he goes, you know, there's all these people, he's like, the problem is that America is actually pretty awesome. Like, we're actually pretty great. Yeah. I don't think anyone's denying there are really awesome things about America. You can believe that. And still believe that our criminal government in Washington D.C. as I said, has been lying about the last 50 crises that have wrecked this country. Like, those things aren't contradictory. And yes, it's true that, like, the, the market in America has, has produced all types of amazing things and there's all types of amazing people. And we, we live at a time of like, great technological wealth that was unimaginable to previous generations. But, like, that doesn't mean that I can't point out that, like, our government has bankrupted the country at the same time and has killed millions of people in unnecessary wars and is like, you know, propagandized a generation of young people to believe horrible things. So there's no contradiction in any of that. And then the final thing, and then I'll kick it to you. You could have the final word on this. But like, you know, the way they try to spin this, like, oh, they had their 1619 projects and these guys have their 1939 project or whatever that means. Exactly. But isn't the point there that, like, well, look, the country drastically changed after World War II, after World War II is really the creation of the military industrial complex, the creation of the CIA and the truly the deep state as we know it today. And yeah, you know, after a near century of that part of our government handing the American people nothing but catastrophe after catastrophe. Yeah, I don't think it's so unreasonable that some people might start questioning that once again. It's like, what's really sloppy about this whole woke, right, you know, line of attack? Like everything Coleman Hughes and Ben Shapiro just said, there is that. Look, there's a, there's a large swath of people who they're essentially throwing into this camp in their mind. I'm sure we would be in there too. But if you just notice, it's just. What is this? It's just a way to, what, not take on any of Tucker Carlson's arguments? Not, not take on anything that he's actually saying and to instead have some other, like, really, they're doing the wokest thing here, which is to be like, without responding to any of the very legitimate points that like, people like us are making when we respond to a bit like right now on this show, instead of responding to any of the legitimate points that we're making, they can just say, don't even listen to this person. Assume they have the worst, like, intentions and shut your brain off before you even deal with any. Because, see, what they are doing is really just another version of the woke thing. Like, I don't know. Pretty goddamn weak, if you ask me. All right, guys, let's take a moment and thank our sponsor for today's show, which is Hexclad. If you're looking to level up your kitchen game, you gotta check out Hexclad. They have completely revolutionized pots and pans by combining the performance of stainless steel with the convenience and easy cleanup of non stick. 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Make sure to let them know that we sent you. Bon appetit. Let's eat with Hexagon Clad's revolutionary cookware. All right, let's get back into the show. But anyway, final word to you, Rob.
- [42:44]
B
Yeah, I rescind my God theology comments because it sounds to me like he's just muddying the waters while engaging in censorship as you described, which is anyone with a different opinion than mine. Don't even listen to them. They're conspiracy theorists and America's great, and they're trying to undermine our greatness. And on the theory of just. Hey, well, America is great and questioning the system undermines our greatness. Ben, do you love our government debt? Do you stand by the Federal Reserve? Do you stand by the credit asset bubbles that we're gonna continue to create? Do you stand by all the money that we're spending on these wars? Hey, listen, don't question anything. It's a great system. I don't know. Do you stand by our entire science based medicine that exists in this country? Do you stand by what happened during the COVID regime, don't question anything because America's great and leave it to the people like us. And if you're listening to anybody else, it's just. They got dumb conspiracy theories.
- [43:38]
A
Yep. Yeah, no, that's right. And like, if you think about it, right, like how when Ben Shapiro was going around on his college tours and just slamming like the state of liberal arts academia, did that mean he hates America? No, Come on, you're criticizing American colleges. Do you hate America now? Or you like. No, he was criticizing one very specific aspect of America. You know what I mean? Like, why is he not allowed to do that? And you would obviously, if anyone ever said that, or you hate America because you criticize its colleges, you'd go, no, he, maybe he loves America and wants to improve it by changing American colleges. You know what I mean? Like, even if you say, even making it more specific, let's, let's just say, oh, Ben Shapiro, you were criticizing American universities, do you hate education? Like even. That's like so ridiculous, right? And so the same principle applies. Like if I'm criticizing the war party, what that means I hate America. Like what, like the grandmas and like the, you know what I'm saying? Like, what is, what exactly does that mean? That means like I hate the doctor who's doing a hip surgery to help a 70 year old lady because I hate stupid wars. No, right. That's, is, that's as intelligent as saying Ben Shapiro hates America because he criticizes American universities. It's all just it all. And like, I don't know, I guess I'm always just kind of amazed by these moments where you, you just have. Look, Coleman Hughes and Ben Shapiro are both like reasonably intelligent people. And these are people who are, you know, between one and two standard deviations higher than the average IQ at least. You know what I mean? And it is just interesting that you could have this conversation where you're kind of like, you're presenting it as if you're saying something intelligent here and just like with this the slightest little bit of like dissection, you go, you said nothing, literally nothing. And it's again, it's what I think, it's why this woke right thing really has failed. I mean, it's just like, has not, not taken off. And all of the, all of the people who have been accused of being woke, Right. I think myself included, but all of those people have just moved on without being harmed by it at all. Is because it's just kind of obvious. It's obvious that like there's no, there's just no sound or developed argument. It's. They're grievance based, they're conspiracy based. Again, like I said, I could. You could describe any political group this way. Any one of them. You give me the group and I'll easily demonstrate how there's a conspiracy, there's a grievance, that's always what it is. But it's just clearly like a tactic used to dismiss people without taking on any of what they have to say. I don't really know what else, what else to say there. All right, in the, in the remaining time that we got left, what do I think debate between. You know what, let's go with the, the, the cnn, Van Jones going after Charlie Kirk stuff. So I, I did kind of find this interesting. I, I'm sure you saw Rob, but there was this horrible murder in Charlotte. I guess it was on a train or it's. So what was the story exactly? Rob about it? Some black dude just like stabbed some white chick in the neck, I think.
- [47:12]
B
I didn't watch it. Yeah, I saw the storyline. I just didn't want to watch it. So I'm not, I'm not, I don't have a firsthand account of what happened.
- [47:20]
A
No, I don't want to. I didn't want to watch it either. I don't think I saw the exact video, you know, as you guys know. And I'm not like, you know, I'm not saying I understand, like people having reactions to such a horrific killing. I completely understand. And it's only human to have reactions to these things. I try my best to just not like jump on stories like this and then give my hot take about it, especially when they're like, it's like a, like a random act of violence. I just think it's very easy to manipulate people's emotions around topics like this. And I'd rather kind of like use. Make a sound, compelling, logical case to you if I'm going to make one. You know, it also just, I always, I'm not accusing anyone of anything. We're all human. I'm sure I'm guilty of this, you know, in lots of areas, but it does seem, you know, to be kind of in poor taste to me. When you come out like there's an event like this, like a horrible incident, and then you come out and your conclusion from it immediately is, hey, guess what? All of my prior beliefs are proven right by this event. Just seems a little convenient and maybe not the best thing to do. But it's something that people do all the time and something certainly that CNN would do in a heartbeat. But anyway, this I did think was kind of interesting on a lot of levels here because so we could get into it every plate. But CNN is reacting to Charlie Kirk's reaction to this crime. And there's just again almost on a similar theme of Coleman Hughes and Ben Shapiro, like kind of the lack of self awareness, the lack of self reflection here was obviously like the major theme that I thought was interesting about this. But let's start playing the clip and then we'll, we'll give our thoughts. A white Ukrainian refugee was murdered just because she was white. Everybody knows that. Obviously if a random white person simply walked up to and stabbed a nice law abiding black person for no reason, it would be an apocalyptically huge national story used to impose national sweeping political changes on the whole country instead. Megan Basham. No one seems to care when a white woman gets stabbed to the debt. Wow, he said white a lot. Well, we are talking about it here, so I guess I don't think that's fair. Look, being in the system because I have represented people who are mentally ill and here's the balance. The balance is taking away people's freedom versus evaluating their mental illness. And New York City, there are a lot of programs for people who are mentally ill, but they have to wanna be there and it's about forcing them to be there. When you are mentally ill, you have a hard time knowing that you are mentally ill. But also, I mean, people like Charlie Kirk van They've been looking for opportunities to make this some sort of like reciprocal George Floyd situation. And that's the part that I think he's almost giving away the game. And it's sad to see a lot of people going along with it.
- [50:30]
D
You know, let me just say a couple of things. One is what happened to that young woman was horrible. And it's everybody's nightmare. If you're in any public space, subway, whatever, that something bad's gonna happen to you or somebody you care about. So it does strike a chord. We don't know why that man did what he did. And for Charlie Kirk to say we know he did it because she's white, when there's no evidence of that, it's just pure race mongering, hate mongering, it's wrong. Then he says that if something like that had happened the other way, there would be sweeping changes imposed on society. Where is the George Floyd Policing Act? It didn't pass even when you had A white police officer murder a black man on live television. The whole world saw there were no sweeping changes. In fact, not one law was passed at the federal level. So that's. I think that's an important thing to point out. The other thing is you mentioned the thing about cashless bail. I think this is a big challenge that we have. Would you have felt better if there had been cash bail and the mom had come and put down $1,000 to let him out? It's not about cashless bail or no cashless bail. It's about the fact that we don't know how to deal with people who are hurting in the way this man was hurting. Hurt people. Hurt people. What happened was horrible, but it becomes an opportunity for people to jump on bandwagons. And then someone like Charlie Kirk, he should be ashamed of himself. No one mentioned the word race, white, black, or anything except him. What people mention is the. The horror of what happened. This young woman.
- [51:56]
A
Okay, let's pause it there. He'll agree with Van, of course. I mean, I just thought that was crazy that Van Jones would have the nerve to say that. Now, I'll. I'll let you get in here because I just got too many thoughts, and I don't want to rant too long, but just on the most obvious point, which is, like, there's a lot there, but the most obvious one is that you go like, dude, look, okay, Charlie Kirk does say there that he killed this girl because she was white. And everyone knows that. Like, I don't know exactly. I don't know that for sure. Does look like he picked a white girl to do this, too. But, like, I don't know for sure. But, like, it's so crazy how they'll use this standard and go. That's just race hustling. You should be ashamed of yourself. There was no racial. No one was talking about race except you. So, like, the standard is. The fact that this was a black guy and she was a white girl doesn't make it a racial incident. Like, okay, fair enough. I mean, that. That certainly could be the case. What exactly was racial about George Floyd? I mean, look, dude, there's no. Look, there was no point in the George Floyd tape where, like, the cops called him the N word or said, get on the floor, you black. Whatever. You know what I mean? Like, there was. There was nothing about it. That was. The only thing was that it was a white officer and a black guy there. There was an Asian guy. There was another black guy. There was another. The rest of the officers around him, many of whom also got charged, they, they were like, it was the United nations of all different, you know, racial groups. I, I literally think it was like an Asian guy, a Hispanic guy, and a black guy. Like, it was, there was, it was very diverse, the cast, but he was white and the other guy was black. This made it the biggest racial issue of the decade, right? So, like, dude, you can't turn around and then just go, oh, that's a ridiculous standard to say because they were different. Like, okay, this has been your model forever. All right, guys, let's take a moment and thank our sponsor for today's show, which is massive chips. Massa decided to do something about the problem with chips and all the garbage that's in them and all the bad stuff it does to your body. They created a tasty and delicious tortilla chip with just three ingredients and no seed oils. Organic nix tomatoized corn, sea salt, and 100% grass fed beef tallow. That's all that's in them. These chips don't only avoid all the bad stuff, they taste great. Masa is crunchier, tastier, and sturdier than other chips. Snacking on Massa chips is nothing like eating regular chips. With Massa, you feel satisfied, light and energetic with no crash, bloat or gross sluggish feelings afterward. And as an added bonus, that beef tallow makes the chips much more satiating, so you won't find yourself uncontrollably binging and still feeling hungry afterward. Massive chips are beloved by tens of thousands of customers and have been endorsed by industry leading health and nutrition experts like Ben Greenfield and Gary Brecker. And then if you're ready to give Massa a try, just go to Massachips.com Dave and use the promo code Dave for 25% off your first order. That's M A S A chips.com Dave promo code Dave for 25% off YOUR order. All right, let's get back into the show here. You go ahead, you give your thoughts. I got a few other things that I'll mention, but I have a feeling we might hit on some of the same things.
- [55:23]
B
This is the primary thing that I'm picking up on. The hurt people. Hurt people. Well, then I guess the guy who killed George Floyd should be off the hook too, because he engaged in violence and it must be because someone hurt him at some point in time. I think I read this in a book, man. What was the name of it? It was like, it was a contrarian book and they had this piece on mental illness and basically the defense for crimes of, hey, the person's mentally ill. And I thought they made an interesting point, which was every other day of their lives they didn't choose to engage in that crime. And so there was a choice there. And just as a thought experiment, I feel like if I, because this came up in my head when we were talking about homelessness recently and perhaps that we're just too accepting of the behavior. I feel like if I walked up to the craziest person in New York City, literally the craziest person, just think of the craziest yelling homeless guy you've ever seen. And I walked up and said, hey, I'll give you $100 if you walk to the end of the street, touch the street sign and come back nine out of 10 times. I'm going to guess that that homeless guy will do that. And the guy's crazy. But guess what? There's enough of incentive structure that all he has to do is walk there, touch something and come back and make a hundred dollars.
- [56:36]
A
He's capable of acting rationally in his rational self interest if there's an incentive structure.
- [56:42]
B
So the idea of, well, this person had mental illness and so that there should be any sort of, sort of a passion, well, listen, if you're too mentally ill that it leads you to violence, then you need to be locked up. And the conversation doesn't just need to be, how do we be more sympathetic towards people that have gone through hardship in their lives? If the hardship in your life is leading you towards being violent towards other people, there should be no sympathy for it. You've still engaged in violence and you're a risk to the rest of society. And I don't hear them introducing this when there's crimes going the other way. If anything, to me they're just talking to Charlie Kirk's point of that. And I'm not saying I agree, I don't agree with anybody here, but I'm just saying the inserting mental illness because it's a one off occurrence of a white praying person being killed by a black person going, well, what we need to look at is the hardship that people are going through. No, that's not how you fix crime 100%.
- [57:34]
A
And particularly, dude, when you, when you hear about the thing, I forget the exact number, but the guy was arrested like 14 times before.
- [57:41]
B
Yeah, well then that's a clear problem with our Justice Department.
- [57:44]
A
If people are going to like, come on, dude. If somebody has committed crimes this much and they are this Far gone that they're the type of person who's capable of doing something like this, then God damn it, our system should have a way of not letting that person back out on the street. So that's like, that's one major factor. But it's also like, you know, there. First of all, like I said before, like, you guys have already embraced the model that if it's a white cop on a black guy or if it's a white person on a black guy, therefore that's a racial issue. So why exactly is it that you're not allowed to say that in reverse? Now, I obviously like you when you made the point. There you go. I'm not agreeing with anyone here, like, because I'm saying there's an argument to be consistent on both and be like, no, it's not automatically a racial issue unless there's something racial about it, in which case then, then it is. But like, the, the onus is on you to demonstrate that it's not just de facto assumed because like, in the same way that like, if I just get in a fight with someone at a bar and then you go, he had blue eyes. Well, you don't just automatically assume that I hate blue eyed people. And the reason for the conflict is his blue eyes. There could be a number of other things that were the reason. In fact, there probably are in this example. Okay, that being said, the impression, which I know, like, you know, there's been like a million, like videos of people being exposed like this, but do you ever see, they actually did one poll on it where they would ask liberals, like in 2020, like, how many unarmed black people get killed by police every year in America? And they would like, be like, I don't know, you know, tens of thousands. And then they're like, the answer is nine. There were nine last year. And here are the stories of those nine. He was running at the cops and tried to beat him. He tackled the cop and reached for his gun, you know, because like, that's technically an unarmed guy too. So, like, it's just however you feel about it, they were making it out like this is something that happens all the time, when in fact, by the numbers, this is something that very, very rarely happens in a huge country of hundreds of millions of people. Now that, by the way, does not mean there's not a lot of problems with the way policing is done in this country. And that does not mean that the civil rights and natural rights of black people and just about every group of people are not systemically Abused by police. But in terms of the narrative of like police shooting unarmed black person, that actually does not happen a lot in this country at all. It's very, very, very rare. And they're very usually very high profile situations when they happen. Black crime, on the other hand, is not like that. And this is not a thing that's like, oh, this isn't a real statistic or something like that. This is, oh, this happens like nine times a year. Black crime, like, like, dude, black men are like 6% of the population and they commit like 50% of the violent crime in the country.
- [60:38]
B
It's because society hurt them. Dave.
- [60:40]
A
Well, look, dude, you know, it might.
- [60:42]
B
Be actually, but they're not responsible because society hurt them.
- [60:45]
A
Right, but there's a difference.
- [60:46]
B
We're looking at the wrong thing when we look at punishing.
- [60:49]
A
The thing about it is, is that the truth is that the black community used to be far less violently criminal than it is today. And so, yes, there are reasons, and some of those are from external factors that aren't black people's fault. Also, it should be pointed out that when you say, you know, 6% of the population commits 50% of the crimes, that's not really true. It's not the entire 6% that do that. It's a tiny percentage within that. And there's lots of black people, the overwhelming majority of them do not commit acts of violence like this. That being said, it's a real factor that this is where 50% of the violent crime in America is coming from. And that's like, so Charlie Kirk isn't allowed to bring that up and apply the same standards that CNN uses to the same dynamic. That's complete bullshit. And you know what happens is that events like these, they create, you know, it's terrorism in the sense that it terrorizes innocent people. They're now, and, and what ends up happening, which lefties have a tough time grappling with this because number one, they don't like talking about black crime. But the other, they're supposed to be like the champions of the working class. But the working class people are the ones who get terrorized and are stuck in those conditions. And the people who got a little bit of money, you know, like, look, I'll just say this. No woman in my family is getting on the subway anymore. No woman in my family is going to be in these situations because I have that option to keep them out of there. Other people who don't have that option are the ones who get stuck in these situations and terrorized by it and the fact that police are letting people who are violent offenders who have been arrested multiple times, in some cases dozens and dozens of times, and they're still sent out on the street so that Van Jones can then come along and go, well, you know, this person was hurting and we have to find out a way to how to reach these hurting people. It's like, dude, you're talking about a guy who you just saw stab of a woman in the neck, completely unprovoked. Completely unprovoked. Just senseless, horrific, violent crime. Forgive the rest of us, Van Jones, if our first thought isn't, we really have to find a way to reach that guy. And our thought is we have to find a way to remove that monster from society. That's how sane people are going to think about this. And like, you could say it has nothing to do with like a racial issue. But on some level, Rob, you know, Van Jones is saying it like this because we're talking about the black criminal attacking the white girl. Because if we were talking about, like in Charlie Kirk's example there, if this had been some white guy who just did this to like a little black girl, I mean, okay, she was an adult, but you know what I'm saying, like, it's like a young girl that just did this to her. I don't think Van Jones would be talking like that about it. I think he'd be talking about him like he's a monster who needs to be like, you know what I mean, like, just violently removed from society in whatever form. And so like, it's like, dude, you don't get to be tribal about this on your side and then blast tribalism on the other side, especially when that tribalism has way more of a legitimate case on their side. And then one other thing I'll say real quick, Rob, and then I really do have to wrap up here, is that, you know, he could say, oh, there was no national policy that was imposed. I mean, there were several local policies that really were disastrous in the wake of George Floyd. But like, I don't know, how about an entire summer long of the largest sustained riots in modern American history with billions of dollars of property damage and like the, the entire backing of the political and media class with while police are standing down. I don't know, that feels like a pretty big, pretty big change for America. Like that's what happened in the wake of George Floyd. And on some level, we all just know that won't happen in the wake of this. And so at least the spirit of the point that Charlie Kirk is making is 100. Right. And just undeniable. Like, it's just undeniable that, like, if the races were reversed here, CNN's attitude, the American people's attitude would be completely different about it. And I think a lot of people are really getting sick of that dynamic. Yeah. Last, last word to you quick.
- [65:08]
B
We can, we can call it there. Portstore.com comic Dave Smith come out for the live shows. It was a great run of five shows last week and still a lot more comedy coming this year.
- [65:17]
A
Hell, yeah. All right. Talk to you guys soon.