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- [00:00]
Dave Smith
Foreign. What's up? What's up, everybody? Welcome to a brand new episode of Part of the Problem. I am Dave Smith. I am rolling solo for this episode. I am about. As soon as we're done here, I'm gonna head over to the SoHo forum in New York City and meet Robbie the Fire Bernstein and doing my big immigration debate over there. So if you guys are listening to this, there is a. There will be a live stream of the debate tonight. I'm not sure, you know, in the past, Gene puts them up on the line a few days afterwards. So I'm not sure if it'll be up by the time you're listening to this. If you want to go check it out, if you're listening live because you're a subscriber over@partoftheproblem.com first of all, thank you very much for subscribing. And yeah, it should be available to watch live later on today. And then the. The debate will be up on. On YouTube at some point. Not sure exactly when. I'll find out more of that information and I'll post about it on Twitter. Anyway, looking forward very much to doing that. I have not been to one of the SoHo forum debates. Oof, man. I don't remember the last one I went to. I was unable to make the. When Scott Horton debated Bill Crystal, I was unable to make that because it was. I think it. It was like the day after my son was born or something like that. And, you know, I thought about telling my wife, like, hey, honey, you're on your own. I gotta go catch a debate with Scott Horton. But, you know, in life there are competing values. There are, you know, watching a debate with Scott Horton, maintaining your marriage. They're all. I'm not saying one is better than the other, but I made. I made the decision I made. And I can't change the past. I think the last time I went might have been the last time Gene Epstein was doing one of his socialist debates. I'm not sure. Anyway, I'm really, really looking forward to going back there because first of all, I love Gene Epstein. I love his whole team. And it's just always like a great group of people. So really, really looking forward to seeing some of you guys out there tonight. And I'll be hanging out. I'll be at the after party afterward. If any of you guys are coming out, come, come say hi. Okay, so for today's show, I did think it would be necessary and good to respond to what was really, truly, to me, really an incredible spectacle. I'm talking about my friend, my old friend Tim Dillon being interviewed by cnn, which really, in so many ways I just found this really interesting, obviously going into it. Like, I'm pretty biased on this topic and you know, I'm friends with Tim, I've been friends with him for years. Many of the people involved who they're talking about are good friends of mine. I am also it involved in this. Comedians talking about politics on podcasts, broader world and anyway, I just, I find all of this stuff to be very interesting and it's also, I think very consequential for the state of our society. Now I, I don't know if any of you guys had the same reaction that I had, but when I first like they, by the way, I should say to CNN's credit, they put the whole thing out, I believe unedited. And you know, Tim had talked about this, about, what was it? Oh, a little less than a month ago, I guess he was on Rogan and he was talking about how they wanted to put an edited version out and he was kind of like being like, no, no, no, put the whole version out. It does seem like perhaps that influenced their decision making. Typically in the past this was very often the MO for big corporate news networks and, and also for the, the comedy shows like this was, this was something that like Jon Stewart relied on for many years and all the other shows that were kind of imitating the Daily show where they would have, they'd have you come in, sit for 45 minutes, they'd end up airing three minutes of the interview. And of course they'd pick the parts that tried to make you look as ridiculous as possible. As I remember, they were, they were really, really unfair about this in many ways. But of course the corporate media would do the exact same thing. They have you sit for a long interview take, you know what I mean? They, they'd try to ask you a bunch of gotcha questions and then if there were any that you didn't give a really good answer to, they'd just play that part. And not. That is something that, you know, it's, it's very interesting because this, this tactic, which was obviously always a tactic, but it was somewhat defensible in the old order because you'd be like, well, I don't know. We only have so much air time. We got commercials, we only have. The show is only an hour long. This is only a 10 minute segment of the show. There's two commercial breaks in it. So all we could play is like two, three minute chunks from this interview. These days, of course, there's really just absolutely zero excuse why you can't put the whole thing UNEDITED on your YouTube page. And in, in this case, with something like CNN and someone as big as Tim Dillon, you put this on YouTube, you're going to get five times the viewership of your, of it being on television. So like, there's literally no reason why you can't do that. And so to their credit, I guess they did it. Now I noticed immediately when a couple of the clips came out and I wonder if anyone else had the same experience. But I went right away, I was like, this chick who's interviewing Tim Dillon, I was like, where do I know her from? I was like, I know I know her from somewhere, but where have I seen her before? And then comes to find out it's, she was the one who made like the big Vice documentary about Charlottesville. And she went and like interviewed like Christopher Cantwell and Richard Spencer and some of the guys who were involved in Charlottesville. And it's just, I just thought that was so funny because it's like I haven't seen anything of her since then. And then here she, like, this is her beat. It's like going and talking to the right wing extremists or however they view it. Anyway, the interview was, I found it fascinating. It's mostly like, it could almost be characterized as the, like the CNN worldview. Just meeting a common sense answer and then being kind of dumbfounded at this common sense answer. And Tim really, you know, one of the things that's interesting about Tim is that he's not obviously Tim's like, Tim's an incredibly talented comedian, one of the funniest human beings on the planet is just, just an incredibly unique talent. But he's very sarcastic and over the top and kind of bombastic. And he wasn't in this interview. He sat down and just gave like a real honest interview. And it was just very interesting to me to see that this world, you know, of, of the corporate media meeting, a very common sense response and kind of not knowing what to do with it. Anyway, I thought for this show we would play a couple of the clips and I would, I would give some thoughts on it. So let's, let's start that now. Here is the, the first clip that I'm sure a lot of you have seen has been going super viral all over the Internet.
- [07:32]
Tim Dillon
But do you, I ask because.
- [07:35]
CNN Interviewer
Yeah.
- [07:36]
Tim Dillon
Do you feel like you're part of a new establishment that's being created.
- [07:41]
Michael Knowles
I don't think I'm part of a new establishment. I think it would be pretty difficult to look at these podcasts. I know it's a popular thing right now, especially in certain media circles, to say that after running an incredibly unpopular candidate who is introduced very late in the race because an elderly man who could not be the president, who everyone told was functioning as the president for four years, decided to. This wind is wild, huh? Yeah, but. But this was very specific circumstance in which Kamala Harris ran for the president. She was somewhat unpopular and she was not a star in Democratic politics before this at all. And her communication strategy was. Was pretty weak. I think most people have admitted that. So to hang this defeat all on a few podcasts and to say that they were the problem, I never. I don't buy. I just don't buy the narrative. So I don't think I'm a new establishment. If you weigh again, a few comedians with podcasts verse all of the people that supported Kamala Harris, you know, Democrat donors, billionaires, big people. If the idea is that me and a few comedians have more power than multi billionaires, huge media institutions of whole political party apparatus, I just don't think most people are going to buy that. I think it seems like a great way to excuse running an unpopular candidate on a platform that American people weren't sold on.
- [09:21]
Tim Dillon
I think even beyond politics, though, even beyond the question of the election, like, again, I know the, like, liberal Joe Rogan conversation is so dominant and I think not, like, nuanced enough, but there is power in a massive audience.
- [09:38]
Michael Knowles
There's absolutely power in a massive audience. But if you're saying that that power is equal to the CIA or all of these other people that are been very critical of President Trump. Right.
- [09:51]
Tim Dillon
Yeah.
- [09:52]
Michael Knowles
So the idea that, like, the power that Theo Vaughn has would be equal to, like, the intelligence agencies or these massive legacy media institutions seems crazy.
- [10:06]
Tim Dillon
But you got way more audience than, like. Like when you're saying we're. We don't have power, we're not the C. C.I.A. well, you know, there's some gradations between that and also, I'm sure there's like.
- [10:16]
Michael Knowles
Well, just. You use the word establishment. Yeah, I didn't say that we didn't have any power or that audiences weren't powerful. But when you use the term establishment, I think that that's more than just having an audience. That's having an institutional component that I don't think we have. But I think legacy media does. I think the government and the intelligence communities do. I think Hollywood certainly does. And I think all of those people, all of those power factions have worked together for a very, very, very long time. So to say that a few comedians with podcasts equal, that seems crazy.
- [10:52]
Tim Dillon
I see why. Okay, I understand.
- [10:54]
Michael Knowles
That's the only thing I'm saying.
- [10:56]
Dave Smith
Okay, so that ends. She does say she sees what he means. Well, Jesus. Do you. You see what he means? That the CIA might have slightly more power than Theo Vaughn to. You do recognize that point is somewhat rooted in reality. Geez, I should hope so. I should hope that you would get that. And there's. Look, obviously what's going on here, to some degree, and I think in some senses, intentionally, is that the two of them are kind of speaking past each other. Like, you know, the thing that she's talking about, because, like, the term the establishment is somewhat vague. Like, if you're going to say, like, okay, there's this. There's this group of podcasts, very big podcasts that. That JD Vance and Donald Trump did, and they ended up winning the election. And so, hey, is this. Are these podcasters the new establishment? Well, Tim is making the very legitimate point that typically when people use the word establishment, what they're referring to is the people who control the power. And, you know, it's not. Again, he doesn't say there's no power in having a large audience, but, you know, there's other types of real hard power that say people who control militaries and police departments and taxation policy and, you know, control the money printers and control the public education and control the higher education. And could you. You know, there's a lot of power in that. That is a whole different form of power than anything that, you know, Tom Segura has. You know what I mean? Like, there's. It's just a different level of power and control. And so let's be very precise here. Like, what are we talking about again? I. I think this is an interesting. I wish almost they had drilled down a little bit more on this, because I think it's like, yes, that's. Look, if you're talking about in terms of controlling policy. Well, Theo Vaughn, right, he just went super viral for this really amazing clip of his. His podcast where he's, like, being very real and just being touched by the fact that, you know, as he says, we're living through a genocide in our lives that we're funding and arming, and we're just watching this happen. It's goddamn heartbreaking. Now, it seems to Me, if someone had power, you know, then they'd probably try to stop us from funding and arming a genocide. But obviously, as we all know, Theobald is powerless to do anything about that other than to talk about it on his podcast. So nobody here is really arguing that Joe Rogan has taken control of, you know, the Central bank or the Central Intelligence Agency or the Senate or the House or the Supreme Court or the presidency or anything like that. So specifically, what they mean is that you had the power to help someone win an election. You understand? Like, that's a very different power than actually controlling a system. But there is some argument to that. I think that they. But why is it. Why do they have that power? And. And the. The reason is because the people stopped believing your bullshit. That's the story of what happened here. Now, the. The reason for that is actually very, very simple. And it is unbelievable that almost no one in the corporate legacy media world seems to be capable of grappling with this most simple point. And the most simple point is simply that news, okay, the world of news, the commodity that you're trading in is your trustworthiness. I mean, that's the whole idea of news, is that I'm going to report to you information that's supposed to be the job of a journalist, to tell the story to their reader or their viewer. Once it's been demonstrated that you're a liar, I can no longer go to you for news, because it's a prerequisite that I can trust that you're not fucking lying to me when the whole business is to tell me the truth. And the corporate media has proven over and over and over and over again that they are liars. They are lying to the American people. And say what you will about Tim Dillon and Joe Rogan and Theo Vaughn, they are not liars. You know, they might be wrong about some stuff, but they're not liars. And their viewers know this. And so, yes, it is true that. That they enjoy more trust from their viewers than CNN or MSNBC or Fox News or someone like that does. Like, okay, but that. If that's what you mean. You see, the. The difference is between. If you just say, hey, you're the new establishment, well, then obviously it. It creates a situation. It creates a lens where the onus would be on you now. You know, if you're the new establishment, then, okay, you're the ones we should be focused on. You're the ones that we should be criticizing. You're the ones who we should be making sure are living up to their, you know, to the people's expectations or to the pledges that you've made or something like that. Because you're the establishment now. I mean, say whatever you will about these guys, but they're no longer the establishment. You're the establishment now. You're the ones we should be critical of. But when you're more precise and you say, okay, well, you guys have no real hard power, but the people have completely lost trust in all of the institutions and therefore the people trust you now. See, when you say, when you describe it more precisely, then you realize that, oh, no, our, our sites should still be on the. Those corrupt criminals who are still wielding hard power in our society. All right, guys, let's take a moment and thank our sponsor for today's show. Brand new sponsor I'm thrilled to have on board, and that is Quints. If you want to dress like an adult and still have a little bit of walking around money, you got to check out quints. 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That's Q, U, I N C E To get free shipping and 365 day returns. Quite. Quince.compotp all right, let's get back into the show. And you know, one of the things that I think actually in the next clip this might be better demonstrated. But one of the things that is, that is really fascinating that they almost, you know, it's like they almost find a way to overlook the fact that, okay, look, even if you want to say that, say Tim Dillon and Theo Vaughn and Joe Rogan and Andrew Schultz and guys like this, Tony Hinchcliffe, guys like this, they they supported Trump in this election. You could say they went all in for the Trump administration. It is still the case, just factually speaking, that this is a relatively small number of comedian celebrities who went behind Donald Trump. And then you had an enormous amount of celebrities who oppose Donald Trump. And I mean, from 2016 election, 2020 election, 2024 election, the list, you know, like, if, if you were to like, say, put out a list of whatever, you know, say a list celebrities. So let's just say I'll put Rogan and Tim Dillon as like a list celebrities. Now they're in the Internet world, but I certainly think they have as many, you know, fans as a listers. So I, I, I'd feel comfortable putting them in that group. Okay, but then still like your list of a listers. So let's say you, let's say you include like, really, really big, successful comedians who supported Donald Trump. So I'll give you like, Theo Vaughan, Joe Rogan, Tony Henchcliffe, Andrew Schultz, Tim Dillon, say Shane, even, I don't know, did Shane ever take a position. But whatever was that. Okay, that's six. Maybe there's, there's a couple that I'm missing that you think would qualify as like a list celebrities who supported Donald Trump. But maybe you could get to 10, 10. Can you imagine if you ran the list of a list celebrities who supported Kamala Harris? The list would be like, like, I mean, the entire, you know, it's, it's a notable exception when there's one person in Hollywood who isn't like a, you know, hardcore anti Trumper. And you, you know, so again, no one from CNN is sitting here and going like, well, hey, Taylor Swift, the person who just finished the biggest music tour in music history, went all in for Kamala Harris, Robert De Niro, you know, like, like iconic people who were all anti Trump. Okay. The complaint here is that, yeah, but what they did didn't work. What they did didn't work. People tuned them out and stopped listening to them. So it's not like the issue here isn't who is the establishment or who isn't the establishment. It's like, it's more something like who hasn't completely destroyed their own credibility. I think that's much more, that's a much more realistic lens to look at this through to actually understand what's going on here. Let's go to the next, the next clip because this one is pretty interesting.
- [22:09]
Michael Knowles
You know, again, I can name you very successful left wing or left of center comics who are playing in Theaters and arenas and have movies out, and then I can name you some pot. Which apparently, now there's five podcasters that dominate the whole world. This is a crazy thing.
- [22:31]
Tim Dillon
No, but.
- [22:31]
Michael Knowles
But this is every article that's been written since the election.
- [22:33]
Tim Dillon
I understand.
- [22:34]
Michael Knowles
Five guys now are the only people in comedy who make money or have audiences. It's the craziest narrative ever. And it's came off the heels of running one of the most unpopular candidates with a platform that the American people largely rejected. They largely rejected this platform, and they rejected it in 2016. And then everybody got together and said, it's actually these five guys who had podcasts. They're the most powerful people in the world. They're the new establishment, and they're the reason for this electoral defeat, not our unpopular policies. And our candidate who ran on a platform of joy, you know, again.
- [23:14]
Dave Smith
So there's. You know, again, it's. So there's. You know, I think Tim almost, in a way here, I mean, he's right about what he's saying, but he could make the point, you know, even further. And it's like, it's not just that they ran an unpopular candidate. I mean, obviously, like, that's a huge component of this here. There. You know, Kamala Harris was just uniquely terrible as a candidate. And it seemed like, as is often the case, that the kind of Democratic establishment and the corporate media who are essentially indistinguishable from each other, they. Their. Their strategy seemed to be to. To deny reality. And it was almost in an attempt to convince you that the reality you're seeing didn't, in fact, exist. But so rather than, like, say, grapple with the fact early on, like, Kamala Harris is terribly unpopular and probably cannot beat Donald Trump. It was. She's a rock star. She's Barack Obama in 2007, you see, which was all just made up. And so, like, there's a huge component of that, but I think what's actually much bigger than that, and this is part of the reason why Biden was in trouble and Kamala Harris was in trouble, is that the. Every. Every position, every major position that the Democratic establishment has staked out over the last 10 years has just. Not only is it unpopular, it's. It's demonstrably false based on lies. It is. It's so bad that none of them will even say the thing they were saying at the time right now. Like, nobody. Kamala Harris wouldn't even run on what she was running on in 2020 because it was all so unpopular. You know, is like she, she'd have to run away from every position because just a couple years later, you can't even defend the thing you were saying back then. And this is true on every major issue. Like they were all saying Donald Trump was involved in a conspiracy with the Russians. No one even mentioned that in 2024 because it's all just been proven wrong. None of them will defend any of the shit they were saying about COVID None of that. You know, they're all, now they have to walk it all back. Well, maybe school closures were a little bit too long. Well, yeah, you know, like, none of them with a straight face repeat the bold claims they were just making. You know, like, let's, let's, let's go through the list of like all the people who were arguing that if you get the COVID vaccine, you can't get or transmit Covid. None of them are saying that anymore because it's so obviously been proven wrong that you just got to abandon that and move on to the next thing. None of them are saying Joe Biden sharp is attack anymore because it's, it's just abandoned because it's so obviously wrong. Nobody is saying that Ukraine can recapture all of its territory anymore. Nobody. Like there's just all of these things, they all fall apart. And you can only do that for so long before you lose everybody's trust. You know, at a different point in the interview, she was, she, she grills him on that, like, are there left wing comedians? And it's like, dude, there's so many goddamn left wing comedians, it's insane that the question ever gets asked. It's insane. Look, you just think about it like this. There are. Because this really does go to the question of who's the establishment. Like, there are multi billion dollar networks, okay? There's a bunch of late night comedians who have network TV shows. All of them are Trump haters. All of them have just been carrying water for the Democratic establishment for at least the last eight years. You know, Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel are, are pushing vaccine propaganda at the height of COVID and demonizing the unvaccinated and, you know, making it very clear that they're, they're all in on being anti Trump. So it's not like, look, if, if Joe Rogan and Tim Dillon are the establishment, well, why aren't the giant multibillion dollar corporations getting behind them in that same type of way? And don't get me wrong, there's been a little, they've been kind of slowly Like Netflix has started having real comedians back on, but also that, you know, a big part of it is because they just dominated in the market and eventually Netflix lost and was like, well, I guess we got to go to where the audience is. So the point is that the establishment is still behind all of those guys. It's just that their audiences aren't. Their audiences abandoned them because they're, they're just. I don't know, it's boring and they're liars and, and look, there's the, the what happened is. Right, it's not that again, these guys had every advantage. These were the guys who were given multi million dollar contracts from multi billion dollar transnational corporations. These are the guys who, who were given every. Then there's some other guys who, who just went over here to the Internet and just started talking into a camera and the viewers flooded over to those people who were over here. Now, I don't think that makes them the establishment, I think because again, if you phrase it this way, it's really, it's pretty anti Democratic when you think about it, because you're almost like arguing that there's a problem with the people having another option of who to go listen to. Look, a lot of, A lot of what it comes down to. And I think the reason why, because like I, I think almost if you're trying to be as charitable as possible, you could say like that this, this girl, the thing she's touching on is that. Okay, yeah, it's true that like, you know, Sarah Silverman or, you know, I don't know any, you know, comedian who's been in movies over the last, you know, it, it's true that whatever Sarah Silverman or what's his name. Who am I thinking of? The, like the, the su. Seth Rogan. Right. Okay. So like, yeah, those guys all hate Donald Trump, but you know, no one's really, it's not really resonating with anyone. Like they don't really have juice like that. Like, they might be famous Hollywood people, but they don't have like the, the same type of like energy behind them that Rogan or Theo Vaughn or one of these gu. And like there is some truth to that. But again, it's not because the establishment is behind the other guys and not behind them. It's quite demonstrably obviously the case that it's the opposite. The establishment is still totally behind those guys. I mean, they, the establishment tried to cancel Joe Rogan and you know, they failed, but they tried. So what's really happening is, you Might ask yourself, it's like, why is it that all of the never trump liberal comedians lost all of their street cred? Why is it that, like, they don't. They don't connect to their audience like that? And even in some examples where maybe they do connect to their audience, like, the audience might still think their last movie was funny or something like that, they just, they're not interested in their political endorsements. They're not interested in, like, the ideas that these people believe in. Much like, look, Taylor Swift, I think, was a great example of that. I mean, look, she. This chick had the most successful tour in the history of tours, endorsed Kamala Harris, and it did nothing to move the needle because I think even her own audience, which still might really love Taylor Swift, just kind of tune that out. They're like, yeah, whatever. We're not really looking for your political advice. Thanks. All right, guys, let's take a moment and thank our sponsor for today's show, which is blackout Coffee. As you guys know, you've probably known for many years, I am a coffee enthusiast, a bit of a coffee snobby. You gotta check out blackout coffee. This stuff is absolutely delicious. It's roasted right here in the United States of America. And it's made by people who believe in liberty, believe in the Constitution and personal responsibility. They do all of the roasting, packing, and shipping in house. There's no middlemen and no compromises. And they have over 25,000 five star reviews for a reason. Because it's really excellent coffee. I have personally been drinking the cold brew nonstop. It's excellent. Love this stuff. Highly recommend it. Go check it out for yourself. Blackout coffee.com problem. That is the website. Go there right now and make sure to use the promo code problem. You will get 20 off your first order. Again, blackout coffee.com problem. Promo code problem for 20 off your first order. All right, let's get back into the show. Now, why is that now, specifically in the conversation with comedians? I think that, like, my, my feeling on it is that I think comedians are kind of like, they're expected to be gangsters in some sense. Now, comedians are expected to say the hilarious thing even when it offends people. They're kind of expected to not. They're expected to not bow down when pressures put on them. And I think there's almost no way you, you could. There's no way that you could maintain the respect of your audience after something like that. And what I think what we saw over between several different things, but it was really, it was the rise of Wokeism. It was Donald Trump getting elected, and it was Covid. And then there were other little stories after that that kind of all fell in line. But something in those years happened where it exposed the. The level of cowardice that a lot of these comedians had. And. And a lot of it is because, you know, a lot of people wanted to be successful more than they really believed in what they were saying. That's always been. It's like a. A fatal flaw in human beings in general. You have. You could have a really great politician say, and I don't mean like a skilled politician, I mean, like a really good person who wanted to get into politics. And maybe they have some issues that they really believe in, but maybe they want to be president more than they believe in those issues. Like, their major motivation is like, I want to have this power. And we all know that's going to ruin that person, because at some point, you're. Your principles and the desire for power are going to come into conflict. And if you desire the value for power more, you're going to end up compromising your principles in order to get that. Same thing with a lot of comedians. A lot of them cared more about being famous, more about being successful than about the craft. And when that happens, if those things come into conflict, you're going to go. You're going to take the easy path. We saw this a ton. I mean, there was. There were. There was so much that needed to be mocked and made fun of in Wokeism that so many comedians just refused to touch. Even as the most ridiculous thing is happening all around you, you refuse to make fun of it because you just don't want to get in trouble. And then when. When Trump got elected, it was like they just kind. A lot of them just developed what's known as Trump derangement syndrome. A lot of them, like, kind of shut down the funny aspect of what they were doing because they just wanted to fall in line and. And send the message to everyone that they're like a good little soldier. And then, of course, through Covid, they just, like, completely disgraced themselves. And to the point that when Jon Stewart went on Stephen Colbert's show and made the most obvious joke, don't get me wrong, it was hilarious. There's the most obvious joke about how this thing clearly came from the lab. At the time, you can see how uncomfortable Stephen Colbert is, and he's trying to talk over him. And at the time, it did really feel like a dangerous thing. Like, you were like, yo, is he really saying this. I mean, you'll get kicked off YouTube for saying this, but Jon Stewart's saying it on TV right now. Okay, but think about that. That was only a couple years ago, and now everyone knows he was right. And the expectation is that we're supposed to forget that Stephen Colbert was such a. Through all of that time, we're supposed to forget that. You know, it's like you just don't. That's just not going to happen. And look, even someone like Jon Stewart, at least when compared to those other ones, still has more street credit than any of those guys do. Because, you know, on some level, you got to go, ah, he kind of is a real one. He kind of is a real one. You know, Bill Maher also still maintained some degree of street cred because at least he didn't become a total throughout all these years. At least he'd still say a thing or two against the mob. By the way, Jon Stewart and Bill Maher, who are still, you know, I don't know what the, what the ratings on the, the Daily show are these days, but I have seen, I think, like, some of his video clips are still doing great numbers online. Bill Maher still has good ratings on his show, and it's still a relevant show. Bill Maher and Jon Stewart are, I mean, throw Stephen Colbert in there, the most consequential political comedians of the last 20 years. And so isn't it, like, it's kind of interesting. I remember one time when he was trashing the legion of skanks before he. He walked it back and did kind of apologize. So I give him credit for that. But I remember Anthony Jeselnik was talking about how Ann Coulter used to come hang out at the Comedy Cellar. And Ann Coulter was like, friends with a. I think she was friends with Shroud Small, and she might have been friends with Gnome, who owned the comedy club. So she would, like, come hang out sometimes. She was a comedy fan and, and Jeselnik was talking about how furious he'd be when he walked in. And Ann Coulter was at the table in the back and he's like, why are we even being friendly with her? Like, fuck her. She's the worst. You know, this awful conservative lady. And I remember thinking to myself that it really, it kind of demonstrated this kind of privilege, if you will, to borrow a word from the left that, you know, I think a lot of people, maybe, if you've never, if you've never been like a liberal who lived in a real red area or a conservative who lived In a real blue area. Maybe it's, it's hard for you to see as somebody who's like a radical libertarian who's from New York City and has done comedy for 20 years in the New York City area, that's just something that, you know, you, you get confronted with a lot more. But when someone. The thing that was kind of revealing to me about Jezel Neck's comments is it's like, oh, you don't even, you don't even recognize your own privilege here. Privilege. And I'm using it kind of tongue in cheek. But I mean that you don't recognize that. You just take it for granted that you should never be around somebody who disagrees with you because everybody else who would be at that back table are all fucking liberals or left wingers, 100% of them or 99% of them. So you're almost like miffed that there was this one time when there was a conservative around it. You know, from the perspective of like a libertarian in New York City, you're like, geez, one person, one time. I mean that's every, every time I go anywhere, everyone there disagrees with me politically. But like, okay, whatever. It's, that's not the end all be all in life. But so it is like, so you're going to imagine your perspective being that like there you have, you have Bill Maher and Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel and just all, and all the A list Hollywood people like all of them all in for the Democrats. Always like, that's just always the state of things. And then for the first time there's like a group of five comedians who have audiences who are like, you know, I'm open to the other side. Maybe the Democrats aren't the party to vote for. Maybe we should consider voting for this party. And you're furious about this change. It's like, okay, but that, then understand your issue is that you expected to have a monopoly on the entire thing. And, and that's just not going to be the case. And I think that hopefully one of the lessons that's kind of taken from all of this because we're never going to be, you know, we're never going to be a society that doesn't have liberals and leftists in it. I also, by the way, I think there's a, like a needed role for liberals and leftists in society. You know, you don't, you want to limit how much power they have. But there, there is like we're going to have the other like both Halves of America, speaking broadly, like the left half of America and the right half of America, they all have to out of their head. The idea that you're going to vanquish the other side, like that they will be eliminated and never, you know what I mean, be a part of society again or something like that. This is just. It's not possible to do that and it's not going to happen. But you would hope that as a result of whatever this massive cultural shift that we're living through is that people would recognize that it's like, oh, yeah, there is a price tag associated with burning your credibility to the ground. Like, if you just lie and lie and lie over and over and over again, eventually you won't be trusted. And if you're a comedian and you just bitch out over and over and over again, your opinion will not be valued. Because that's kind of like, that's an expectation that people have from comedians, and I think rightfully so, that if, you know, if you're saying something, if you're mocking the absurdities of the powerful, you're not going to bite your tongue just because you're worried it might make you look bad. You know, Lenny Bruce went to jail and George Carlin went to jail so that they could do their act. And the whole lore of those guys is that they wouldn't stop doing their actual. It's like even under the threat of actual violence, the truth is that Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel and all these guys, they never had a threat of anything like that. The threat was like, what, someone might say some mean things about you, and then you just have to go cry into your piles of tens of millions of dollars and that was enough to make you ditch out. Well, then how would, how would you have that energy with, like, your base anymore? And anyway, I just think it's been. It's been pretty interesting to watch. And it's again, you see, it's just one more attempt of CNN trying to grapple with something, in a sense, trying to overcomplicate it, when it's really actually very, very simple. It's like you had all the advantages. You had the culture completely controlled. You had the flow of information completely controlled. There was a mix of two things that happened. Two fairly straightforward, simple things. Number one, the technology evolved to the point where there was a much lower barrier of entry. People could get in to, you know, the. If you got probably a few hundred bucks, you could put together a little studio. Certainly for a few thousand dollars, you can. There's, you could put your, your stuff out there in a way where you didn't need networks, you didn't need billion dollar Cor generations behind you. And then number, number two was that with all of that control and dominance you squandered your entire reputation and trust in you evaporated. And people were looking for somewhere else to go and they found it. That's pretty much the story. And that is very different than becoming the new establishment. It's more like becoming the new voice of the people. Something much closer to that. Okay, let me, let's for, for the rest of the show here. I guess I got a little bit of time left, but let me, you know, I was thinking, I, I alluded to this on the last podcast and then after the show I was like, I probably should actually play this clip on the show because it is worth responding to. So let's, let's play this clip. This is of course what I was referring to is the, it was Michael Knowles over at the Daily Wire. I find it very interesting that it seems, there seems to be such a split between the, and I mean this on the right amongst Trump supporters, among, amongst Trump's base, there is this huge split over foreign policy. And part of it is generational. The younger generation is really just less supportive of Israel, less support supportive of, of war in general, whereas the older Republican voters are, are still more typically the way they, you know, traditionally were. But I do find this to be a very interesting kind of dynamic where you've got guys who are at the Daily Wire, particularly Matt Walsh and Michael Knowles, who essentially, you know, they're, they're, you know, putting themselves in the America first flag kind of in the non interventionist camp. They still, of course, cannot be critical of Israel because they work at the Daily Wire and the Daily Wire is owned by people whose highest priority is Israel. And so they're kind of stuck in this, in this weird position, but they, they realize that they have to find a way to play to the, the younger audience who just is completely opposed to all of this stuff there. Now look, I don't want to get this wrong. I don't want to be misleading here because it's not as if it's not. I don't think it's like 80% of the Republican voters are critical of, of the wars and critical of Israel or at least our support of Israel. I don't know exactly what the percentage split is. I know there has been a lot of interesting polling on this where it's very clear that the younger generation is really moving away from, from believing that the US should be funding and arming Israel. But there, there's no question that there's, there's a big split and there is one side is backed by the establishment and the other side is the dissident group, the establishment, there's no question about that, wants to continue the war, the war machine, and wants to continue, you know, funding and arming Israel's destruction of Gaza and then helping them in their next steps as well. Anyway, this was the, the, the clip that I was referring to on yesterday's show. So let's play it and, and we'll respond a little bit.
- [47:34]
CNN Interviewer
I have yet to hear anyone make a persuasive argument that the state of Israel is not justified in going to war against Gaza and even in continuing the war against Gaza. I sort of wish they wouldn't because I care about this more from the American national interest. And the longer this war goes on, the more volatility is created and the greater the risk of the United States being dragged into a war. So from the American perspective, I would kind of like the war to wrap up. But from the Israeli perspective, can someone please explain to me how the war is not justified?
- [48:04]
Dave Smith
Let's pause it already. So, ok, so Michael Moles, this is what I thought was so interesting about this. So he's going to start by saying, you know, I have not heard anybody make a compelling argument for why, why Israel was, was not justified in going to war with Gaza. Now obviously I disagree with that. We get into that in a second and I think, I think I've made some pretty compelling arguments about that. I will, I will try my best to, to do that again. But I did think this was the most fascinating moment where then even he has to admit that, look, from the American perspective, obviously this isn't good for us. We'd like this war to be wrapped up today. Right? We would. That would. As, as he says, it's creating a lot of turmoil for us over here. I mean, look, there's no question about that, right? And particularly, look, we're having massive protests in our country. That's never good, I think, particularly from the conservative point of view when you value order and stability. Now, again, just to be clear, I'm not saying that it's never a good thing to protest. I'm saying it's never a good thing to even have to protest. Like everybody should agree with that. You're better off if there's not even an issue that a huge portion of your, your population thinks is so goddamn awful that we got to get out on the streets and start agitating and creating problems. Obviously, everybody should agree it would be better to not have those issues. It's also just undeniably the case that this is the. Israel's destruction of Gaza has been dividing both major political factions. And this was a huge, huge problem in Kamala Harris's campaign. Obviously, you know, she was. She was interrupted by protesters many times at her events. She had to speak out of both sides of her mouth every time Israel, Palestine came up because she had this huge problem where like, you know, 50% of your base views this is a genocide. So they view your current administration as funding a genocide. And then you've got all these big money donors and you've got all these other voting constituents who are like, wildly pro Israel. Well, how the hell do you end up putting this coalition together to get enough votes to win? This was a major problem. It's a major part of the reason why Kamala Harris lost. I think. There's no question about this. It really, really hurt them. And it was also, as I talked about at length on the show, it was also part of the reason why there was no. There was no. There was no energy to protest Donald Trump. You know, the. The Democrats had counted on for many years that their. Their, you know, how do you. Their shock troops, the left wing protesters, the young kids who will get out there on the street, would be out protesting whatever the hell Donald Trump's doing. The problem was they spent the whole year of 2024 protesting what Joe Biden was doing. This was very bad for the Democrats. It was a big problem for them. It's also a major problem for Donald Trump. And look, the last thing you want, when you get into a situation where you have the greatest political comeback in the history of the United States of America, you come back into power, Donald Trump wins every swing state and the popular vote. You've got the House, the Senate, and the Supreme Court. The last thing you want is some major issue that your base is divided on. So, objectively speaking, as. As is acknowledged here by Michael Knowles in the tape, this is just bad. This is bad for America, okay? And then that's not. That's to speak nothing of the risk of us getting dragged into a wider war, which is, of course, a very real threat. All right, guys, let's take a moment and thank our sponsor for today's show, which is sheath underwear. Love these guys. I've been telling you about sheath underwear for many years at this point, because I Truly love them. 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All right, let's get back on the show. Okay. ST says okay. From the American perspective, I can. I. I want this to end very quickly, but from the Israeli perspective, I don't see how they're not justified in fighting this war. So before even getting into that, isn't the admission here just so profound? Because I'm sorry, but who gives a shit about the Israeli perspective? Why the hell should I care about that? I mean, it's just like, could not be more. We're Americans. You are an American, a Catholic American. You're an American talking to an American audience about American politics. Why the hell should we be funding something that is against our interests because it's in the interests of a foreign country. Could anything be more the antithesis of America first? So if your admission here is that this is against our interests, but for another country's interest, well, then, okay, it might make sense for that other country to pursue this policy, but it sure as hell does not make sense for us to fund it. And so if you're going to be making a comment in this time now, Michael Knowles might be out able to wiggle out of this by saying, oh, yeah, no, I agree. I'm also saying we shouldn't fund this. I'm just saying from their perspective, it makes sense. It's like, okay, fine, that would be fine to argue if we weren't funding it. But while we are funding something that is a, by your own admission, against our country's interests, and pretty profoundly so. Then how is it not incumbent on you to criticize the funding of that? Even if what he was saying is true, which it's not, but let's just say Israel was justified in doing what they're doing, but we're still funding something that's against our interest, then it's incumbent on you to be criticizing that, to be criticizing the fact that we're prioritizing the interests of a foreign country over our own. I don't see how you can get around this. You know, it's like a lot of these Daily Wire guys, they're trying to, to find a way to sit on the fence. They're like, look, I can't ignore like all the obvious good points here, but I also don't want to criticize Israel at all. The problem is that I just, I don't think it's possible to be in the middle on this one. I just don't see how you can, how you can even argue that. All right, let's. Here, let's play the, the rest of the clip.
- [55:37]
CNN Interviewer
The Gaza invaded on October 7 and killed a bunch of people and took hostages. The state of Israel responded and still has not gotten all of the hostages back. Furthermore, the state of Israel now is looking at Gaza and saying, okay, well, Hamas in power is an unacceptable security risk. We cannot tolerate that, so we have to do something to change it. Furthermore, the people in Gaza, when they had a modicum of self government, chose to elect Hamas, which carried out the attack. So if you're the state of Israel, it seems to me that pretty much all of the criteria of just war that we have understood from classical antiquity up through the Middle Ages up to the present are fulfilled here in going to war, ending continuing the war. Can someone explain to me, I have an open mind. I am, I am easily persuadable. If someone can make. I haven't heard anyone making the argument.
- [56:37]
Dave Smith
Okay, so let's see if we can't persuade Michael Knowles here. And I'll. I, I certainly have been making the argument. So. Okay, first of all, I would say that, yeah, if you want to look at things strictly from the Israeli point of view, once again, not exactly sure why the hell we should be looking at things that way, but if you want to look at things from the Israeli point of view and completely ignore all of the elements of the history that make them look very bad, then sure, you could come to this conclusion. But, you know, two quick things. Number one, just war theory doesn't. It doesn't give you carte blanche. It doesn't mean that you can now prosecute the war in whatever manner you want to, even if you were attacked by a foreign country and therefore you're going to argue you have a right to go to war with them. That doesn't mean, like, you have a right to go in there and just start slitting babies, throats and raping women or something like that. There are still expectations on how you ought to conduct that war. But tell me this. From the. With the entire history of like the just war theory being worked out, has anybody ever argued that you could occupy a group of people for 60 years, then intentionally fund a terrorist organization to prop them up and keep them in power so you can deny the people the right to ever get out from underneath your occupation? And then after the terrorist group that you funded launches a terrorist attack, use that as an excuse to slaughter the people in this tiny strip of land that you have occupied and dominated since 1967. Was that part ever included in the just war theory? No, I don't think it was because that changes the dynamic a little bit. Like, I know, like, everybody who wants to look at this from the Israeli point of view always wants to. Like, they want to tell the story as if these were just two neighboring countries. These are just two neighboring countries, you know, different governments, and then one government attack the other one, and then they do this crazy thing where they just hide amongst the civilians. So what are you going to do except start slaughtering people? But, you know, of course that's not the case. This is not the case. This is nothing like Mexico attacking the United States of America. This is more like, as I'm not the first one to make this analogy, but it's much more like an Indian reservation attacking Americans, but not in 2025, more like in, you know, 1840 or something like that. Okay, and now this isn't, say like the, the way we, you know, think of Native Americans in this country. Right? Like, okay, look, we all know that the forming of the United States of America involved, like, we do realize there were some people here before Europeans came over and that some not so nice things happen to those people. Okay? And we know that like with every, you know, like, expansion of the United States westward, that was kind of an issue that we kept dealing with, right? There were people there and those people aren't really there anymore. OK? However, in 2025, in America, yes, there are like Indian reservations, but, you know, they're allowed to come and go. Yes, there are Native Americans but they also have citizenship in the United States of America. So now imagine we did all the shit we did to Native Americans. We put them on reservations, but we never gave them citizenship. We don't let them leave the the reservations without permission. We don't allow them from the reservations with the rest of the world. We don't allow them to have a seaport or an airport. We don't allow electricity to get through or we control the amount of electricity, we control the water, we control their tax revenue, we control their currency. And then in a situation where they have no, you know, army, no navy, no air force, no nothing, no government, then a bunch of them broke out and killed a bunch of innocent people. It doesn't follow just war theory that you're allowed to now slaughter the reservation. Ok? There's like, it's not Mexico attacking America. It's a completely different situation. All right guys, let's take a moment and thank our sponsor for today's show, which is Ridge. We love the Ridge wallet here at part of the problem. It is, it is the coolest, sleekest wallet you'll ever get. I have a couple of them. All of their designs are awesome. It's a minimalist wallet. You hold your cash, your cards, everything you need and nothing that you don't. I will say I was an old school wallet guy for many years. Getting the Ridge was a game changer for me. 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You can get up to 40% off@ridge.com PotP10 just head over to ridge.com PotP10 to see their biggest sale of the year. After you purchase, they will ask you where you heard about them. Please let them know that you heard about them here on the part of the problem podcast that'll help out the show. Check them out. Ridge.compotp10 all right, let's get back into the show. Now, that being said, you could agree or disagree with that argument, but I certainly am presenting an argument now. Again, as I've said from the beginning of the war, if you want to just look at things from the Israeli perspective, again, not sure why we're doing that, but if you just look at things from the Israeli perspective, I'm not going to argue with you that, like, hey, look, if my, if one of my kids was like a teenager at that rave festival thing who got killed by one of these Hamas terrorists or something like that, I'm. I'm sure I could see myself being like flat in Gaza and totally support what they're doing. Not if I had a hostage over there, because, you know, that's actually not the best thing to get hostages out alive. But I could understand, sure. I put myself in that position where I'd be so goddamn furious like that we're going to kill all these people. However, if you're doing this, you might notice Michael Knowles, he hit the American perspective first, yada yada, over the fact that that perspective is we want the war to end and yet we're funding it to continue. Then he goes right to the Israeli perspective. There's one perspective missing here. You know, there's one. So now if we're going to do this, let's go to the perspective of Palestinians. And from their perspective, they've been dominated, controlled, slaughtered, ethnically cleansed, and kept in extreme poverty for nearly 60 years by this regime. From their perspective, it also might make sense to violently respond to that. The final point here is that we should be able to, like, look at the Israeli perspective, look at the Palestinian perspective, maybe gain some insight from that. Ultimately, we should only care about the perspective of the United States of America. That's the perspective that we should care about. And Michael Knowles already admits that from that perspective, we want the war to end. So why the are we funding a thing that is not in our interests? That's all. All right, let's wrap up the show there. I gotta head over to the SoHo forum. Thank you guys very much for listening. Catch you tomorrow for a members only episode 1pm tomorrow. Members only. See you then. Peace.
- [65:04]
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