Can Trump Double The Size Of The US?

Summary

Ruthless Podcast Episode Summary: "Can Trump Double The Size Of The US?"

Release Date: January 9, 2025

Hosts: Josh Holmes, Michael Duncan, Comfortably Smug (Matt McDaniel), and John Ashbrook

Overview: In this engaging episode of the Ruthless Podcast, hosts Josh Holmes, Michael Duncan, Matt McDaniel (Comfortably Smug), and John Ashbrook delve into a range of provocative topics centered around former President Donald Trump's ambitious plans to expand American territory. The discussion navigates through Trump's recent press conference, his strategies regarding international territories, critiques of current political figures, and insights into the forthcoming Trump administration's agenda. Additionally, the hosts touch upon significant developments in the tech industry, particularly Mark Zuckerberg's stance on free speech, and share humorous segments highlighting President Joe Biden's alleged cognitive mishaps.

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1. Trump's Territorial Expansion Plans

Key Discussion Points:

• Press Conference Highlights: The episode kicks off with excitement over Donald Trump's latest press conference, where he outlined plans to rename the Gulf of Mexico to the "Gulf of America" and expressed intentions to annex territories like Greenland and Canada.

• Territorial Acquisition Strategies:

  • Greenland: Trump proposes taking over Greenland due to its strategic importance and minimal population ("There are only 45,000 people who live there" - [09:27]).
  • Canada: He suggests integrating Canada as the 51st state, emphasizing economic dependencies and trade imbalances ("Why are we supporting a country 200 billion plus a year?" - [10:29]).
  • Panama Canal: Plans to regain control of the Panama Canal, highlighting its military significance ("The Panama Canal was built for our military" - [06:40]).
  • Australia: A humorous mention of annexing Australia due to the absence of guns and historical defeats ("They lost a war to some flightless birds" - [12:31]).

Notable Quotes:

• John Ashbrook on Trump's ambition: "He thinks big, and that is what Americans want." ([01:06])
• Matt McDaniel on media's reaction: "Trump is like catnip for them... He's classic Trump." ([07:13])

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2. Media Dynamics and Free Speech

Key Discussion Points:

• Meta's Shift on Free Speech: The hosts discuss Mark Zuckerberg's recent announcement to end Meta's fact-checking program, aiming to restore free expression across platforms like Facebook and Instagram. They interpret this as a response to previous censorship and a move towards democratizing information.

• Tech Industry Alignment: The podcast highlights the alignment between tech leaders and Trump's agenda on free speech, suggesting that Trump's victory has empowered tech executives to champion more open platforms.

Notable Quotes:

• Michael Duncan on Meta's decision: "Meta is ending its fact checking program and lifting restrictions on speech to, quote, restore free expression." ([24:53])
• John Ashbrook on the impact: "This move is so big for regular people... it's one of the greatest moves." ([26:35])

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3. Biden's "Dementia Moments"

Key Discussion Points:

• Audience Engagement: The hosts feature listener-submitted clips showcasing President Joe Biden's perceived cognitive errors, such as forgetting key phrases and making inappropriate remarks.

• Humorous Commentary: The segment is interspersed with light-hearted banter and jokes, highlighting instances where Biden appears disoriented or forgetful.

Notable Quotes:

• Mark Bowers' favorite moment: "the Easter egg hunt at the White House when he went wandering off" ([18:07])
• Matt McDaniel on Biden's performance: "Biden doesn't even know when he goof. No, he needs a giant bunny to come over." ([21:19])

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4. Interview with Senator Mark Wayne Mullen

Key Discussion Points:

• Senator's Role: Senator Mark Wayne Mullen discusses his pivotal role in the Trump administration's first hundred days, emphasizing the importance of communication, setting agendas, and navigating legislative processes.

• Legislative Priorities: The conversation touches on key legislative areas, including:

  • Reconciliation Bills: Efforts to pass comprehensive legislation encompassing taxes, border security, and energy.
  • National Security Enhancements: Utilizing AI and advanced technologies to secure borders and combat cartel activities.
  • EPA Reforms: Proposing the reduction of the Environmental Protection Agency's overreach to bolster economic growth and manufacturing independence.

• Confirmation Hearings: Mullen highlights ongoing confirmation hearings for key nominees, stressing their importance in implementing Trump's agenda.

Notable Quotes:

• Mullen on legislative process: "We're going to eventually deliver for the president and for the American people. It's going to get done." ([47:52])
• Josh Holmes on Trump's work ethic: "He is such a production artist. He retail himself." ([37:23])
• Mullen on EPA overreach: "They have become basically missionaries for the climate 100%." ([56:15])

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5. National Security and Economic Strategies

Key Discussion Points:

• Border Security Innovations: Discussion on innovative technologies like Astro Technologies' virtual fences using AI to detect unauthorized border crossings, enhancing real-time security measures.

• Economic Independence: Emphasis on reducing dependency on foreign entities, particularly China, for critical resources such as antibiotics and rare earth minerals. Strategies include incentivizing domestic production and mitigating regulatory obstacles imposed by agencies like the EPA.

• Tariffs and International Relations: Mullen outlines the use of tariffs as a tool to pressure Mexico and other nations, aiming to dismantle cartel operations and strengthen national security.

Notable Quotes:

• Josh Holmes on AI-based border security: "It can detect instantly the difference between a human and an animal." ([51:07])
• John Ashbrook on energy independence: "They're involved in every agency. If the DOE has a permit that they're trying to do, EPA can overstep and stop it." ([55:36])

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6. Personal Anecdotes and Humor

Key Discussion Points:

• Hosts' Personal Stories: The episode includes light-hearted exchanges among the hosts about personal experiences, such as Michael Duncan's struggles with a sweater and Josh Holmes sharing anecdotes about his ranch and interactions with political figures like Tulsi Gabbard and Bobby Kennedy.

• Workout Group Banter: Humorous discussions about the physical strength of congressional members, showcasing camaraderie and playful ribbing among the hosts.

Notable Quotes:

• Josh Holmes on personal fitness: "I have three boys wrestling college, two in Oklahoma State, one right." ([60:54])
• Matt McDaniel on host endorsements: "You're a walking billboard for y'all." ([67:17])

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7. Concluding Remarks and Future Outlook

Key Discussion Points:

• Aspiration for Progress: The hosts express optimism about the Trump administration's ability to enact significant changes, emphasizing the urgency of passing key legislation and securing national interests.

• Community Engagement: Encouragement for listeners to subscribe, share, and engage with the podcast to support the show's growth and influence.

Notable Quotes:

• Matt McDaniel closing remark: "Until next time, Minions, keep the faith, hold the line and own the libs." ([80:21])
• Michael Duncan on community impact: "Subscribing helps us keep spreading the word." ([80:53])

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Conclusion: This episode of the Ruthless Podcast offers a comprehensive and spirited examination of Donald Trump's potential strategies to significantly expand U.S. territory, coupled with a critique of current political dynamics and media influences. Through insightful interviews, humorous segments, and strategic discussions, the hosts provide listeners with a blend of serious policy analysis and entertaining commentary, encapsulating the essence of next-generation conservative talk.

Transcript

[Michael Duncan]

He's doing to Canada what he did to Europe when he, you know, went to the UN and he was like, why is it that America has to subsidize the defense, the national security of all of Europe, and we get nothing but guff for it. All you do is criticize me and our country all the time. And we protect you for what? Yep. Right. And it's the same sort of playbook. And Trump, as a businessman, is just the best in the business of doing it.

[Matt McDaniel]

You got to carry your own weight to the agreed upon amount. And if you're not living up to it and you start complaining about getting called out, Canada's the same boat. It's like, if you're saying that your economy is dependent on America and then you're trying to play us, of course he should call you out on that. And I don't think it's any accident that Justin from Canada quit the day Donald Trump got certified. You know, January 6th. He knew the drill. Get out of the way, because Trump is here. He couldn't handle it, so he got out of the way.

[Michael Duncan]

That's it.

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah. He thinks big, and that is what Americans want. We should conquer Canada. We should conquer any place we want to conquer. To be honest with you, we're America. We're the best country in the world. And if somebody is in our way, we should.

[Michael Duncan]

Do you have any ideas here, Ashbrook? You want to add to the list?

[John Ashbrook]

Well, somebody tweeted, and I thought it was very astute that the Australians don't have guns anymore, so we could take Australia.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah. Didn't they lose a war to some flightless birds down there?

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah, the emus.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, the emu.

[Cash Patel]

The emu war.

[Mark Wayne Mullen]

I don't have to tell you, Americans are ready for what's next. Moving beyond the hardships of inflation and economic anxiety towards building a future, a better future for our families. Ensuring greater access to more affordable energy that powers daily lives. Reliable energy that fuels innovation and economic growth, and the abundant energy that keeps our nation safer and more secure. It's all within our grasp. We'll do this together, Building a brighter future for us. Powered by America's oil and natural gas resources. You can learn more about all of [e-mail].

[Josh Holmes]

Ladies and gentlemen, your attention, please.

[Michael Duncan]

Just a catching strays over here.

[Mark Wayne Mullen]

You're in for a hell of a show.

[Matt McDaniel]

Keep the faith, hold the line and own the lids.

[John Ashbrook]

It's time for our main event.

[Michael Duncan]

Welcome back to the Ruthless Variety Program. I am Michael Duncan. Joining me today, comfortably smug, Matt McTe Daniel and John Ashbrook, left to right across your radio dial. Not with us today, though.

[John Ashbrook]

Josh Holmes is out there working hard.

[Matt McDaniel]

On the road, putting in the work.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah, well, he's not in D.C. which is nice because we're still dealing with the aftermath of a single snow event that apparently closes down this city. But the big news today, and I want to get right to it because it's really important. This incredible Donald Trump press conference, wide ranging, lot of topics. We're talking Greenland, we're talking about renaming the Gulf of Mexico. Ton of stuff going on there.

[John Ashbrook]

I can't wait. I mean, this was really one of the greatest press conferences I've ever seen.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[John Ashbrook]

And I can't wait for four more years maybe if we're lucky, eight more years, I think.

[Michael Duncan]

So just then, you know, what I'm calling it is the Monroe Doctrine by Shitposting, which I think is kind of a synopsis of the whole strategy here when it comes to the Western hemisphere. The one clip I want to play for this is clip one. Can we get to that one Spaghetti.

[Donald Trump]

We're going to be changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America.

[Michael Duncan]

Let's go.

[Donald Trump]

Which has a beautiful ring that covers a lot of territory. The Gulf of America. What a beautiful name. And it's appropriate. It's appropriate.

[Michael Duncan]

It is.

[Matt McDaniel]

I mean, that's it.

[Josh Holmes]

He's not wrong, is he?

[Matt McDaniel]

He's 100% right. For so long it's bothered me thinking about it when you think, why is it called the Gulf of Mexico? It touches Florida and Texas and like those are two very major states and they define to a great extent what America is to begin with. That's our water. It's always belonged to us. Always. And so calling it the Gulf of America, I mean, again, it's called North America for a reason. Like, we're the centerpiece here. We don't need to start being like, okay, you can have a little bit of this. It's a little children on a playground.

[Michael Duncan]

It's a little presumptuous for Mexico to just claim it as theirs. I mean, I don't think that's fair. And it's not just the Gulf of Mexico here. We're talking Greenland, we're talking the Panama Canal. I mean, wide ranging. And we're going to get to all of it. We also have to talk about this incredible news at a meta. You know, the parent company of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, had a huge statement about sort of, you know, political speech on the platform, which I think is is a breath of fresh air across, you know, our politics and the whole industry of tech. We're going to go through a lot of the Biden dementia comments. Everybody left on the Tuesday episode, which are incredible. We got some clips on that. And we also have a great guest, Mark Wayne Mullen.

[John Ashbrook]

Oh, man, he is just the best.

[Michael Duncan]

He's the best. And he's kind of at the center of a lot of stuff that's going to be happening here over the next month in the first quarter of the Trump administration. So we're going to get to all of right after this.

[John Ashbrook]

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[Michael Duncan]

To get first to this presser. We referenced it at the top. A lot of stuff going on there. Let's sort of set the table here with this first clip. Spaghetti number two. Greenland and Panama Canal.

[Josh Holmes]

So what can you assure the world that as you try to get control of these areas, you are not going.

[Michael Duncan]

To use military or economic coercion?

[Josh Holmes]

No. Can you tell us a little bit about what your plan is?

[Michael Duncan]

Are you going to negotiate a new treaty?

[Josh Holmes]

Are you going to ask the Canadians.

[Cash Patel]

To hold the vote?

[Josh Holmes]

What, what is the strategy?

[Donald Trump]

I can't assure you. You're talking about Panama and Greenland. No, I can't assure you on either of those two. But I can say this. We need them for economic security. The Panama Canal was built for our military.

[Cash Patel]

I mean, we're back. We're back.

[Michael Duncan]

Well, we're back. But it seems like the media is falling into their old game where they try to think of the question. I get it. It's their job. But they're trying to think of the question. Question that's gonna have the most viral tweet.

[Matt McDaniel]

But that's the thing is, like, it's like Trump is like catnip for them.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Matt McDaniel]

And he's like rocket fuel for their page views and their ratings. So they have slipped right back into their old pattern of being like, everything Trump has said is the most outrageous and dangerous thing. It's a danger to democracy. And like, they're all like, it's like, you know, a junkie back on the smack. Right. So they've got their high, they're cooking, they're doing their, like, Chuck and jive dance. But it's Trump being classic Trump. He's like, no, I'm not going to tell you. Remember how they were like, why don't you tell us your secret plan for beating isis? He's like, why would I tell you? And like, how dare he not reveal it? ISIS gets decimated.

[Michael Duncan]

Right, Right.

[Matt McDaniel]

It's like, okay, well, maybe the guy.

[Josh Holmes]

Knows what he's doing.

[Michael Duncan]

Are you supposed to telegraph exactly what your strategy of negotiating something is before you actually do the negotiating? It's not President United States.

[Matt McDaniel]

Yeah, that's not how it works at all.

[Josh Holmes]

Right.

[Cash Patel]

I love it on the journo part though, that for the last four years it's just been warm milk. Like they haven't cared. Like Biden was slowly rotting away in front of us. And they're just, I don't know, nothing, Nothing's really going on. And as soon as Trump even says, oh, yeah, maybe we'll, we'll talk about the right idea of, for the 21st, for the 22nd century of adding Greenland. Oh, no, are you going to invade Greenland? Yeah, like that's, that's, that's the only step they can imagine. But I did want to make a comparison because everybody's saying Donald Trump is the new Reagan. He's the new Teddy Roosevelt.

[Matt McDaniel]

Yes.

[Cash Patel]

Because it's this idea of kind of a Rough Rider.

[Michael Duncan]

He's a pioneer.

[Cash Patel]

Pioneer Panama, you know, charge up San Juan Hill in Cuba, you know, looking out, what can America become? It's very forward looking. And I mean, I'm here for it.

[John Ashbrook]

Because he thinks big.

[Cash Patel]

Yeah.

[John Ashbrook]

We should have Greenland.

[Matt McDaniel]

We should.

[John Ashbrook]

It should belong to America. And taking it over would be very simple. You wait till the summer all the igloos melt. They have no shelter.

[Matt McDaniel]

They don't.

[John Ashbrook]

And then we just rol up in eternal daylight with helicopters and jets and boats and they'll give it away.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Matt McDaniel]

That's the thing is like, how much do you have to really negotiate with Greenland? Has anyone heard about Greenland's massive military? Like, oh, my God, watch out for Greenland. No, no. And they would welcome us as livery.

[Michael Duncan]

Kind of semi autonomous, but technically part of Denmark, I believe. Yeah. Right.

[Cash Patel]

There are only 45,000 people who live there.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Cash Patel]

I just, I do want to make another historical, like, comparison Here, back when we were considering buying Alaska. William Seward. Yeah, it was called Seward's Folly. Like, they made fun of him at the time for saying, why would you want to buy a lot? There's nothing in Alaska. Why would you want to buy Alaska? And yet when we went, we went through with it. And now Alaska's been, you know, it's.

[Matt McDaniel]

Full of golden oil.

[Cash Patel]

Gold oil. Yeah, yeah. And when you look at Greenland, it's part of North America. It's 45,000 people there. And in the 22nd century, it's going to be perfect for our shipping lanes.

[Matt McDaniel]

And I mean, there's lots of use. It's a very. Lots of frozen, desolate areas that you could send illegal, Build large camps for illegals, send them there for, like, processing and then shipping them to wherever we got to ship.

[Michael Duncan]

Yes. But Greenland isn't the only place that Donald Trump has his eyes on. Even though Justin Trudeau has said now that he's going to step down in Canada, Trump's still on it. He still wants Canada to be the 51st state. Spaghetti. Let's do clip three.

[Donald Trump]

Why are we supporting a country 200 billion plus a year? Our military is at their disposal. All of these other things, they should be a state. That's why I told Trudeau when he came down, I said, what would happen if we didn't do it? He said Canada would dissolve. Canada wouldn't be able to function if we didn't take that 20% of our car market. You know, we. Again, they send us hundreds of thousands of cars. They make a lot of money with that. They send us a lot of other things that we don't need. We don't need their cars. We don't need the other products. We don't need their milk.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah. I love it.

[Matt McDaniel]

He's not wrong.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah. Well, I kind of like that he's doing to Canada what he did to Europe when he went to the UN and he was like, why is it that America has to subsidize the defense, the national security of all of Europe and we get nothing but guff for it. All you do is criticize me and our country all the time. And we protect you for what? Yep. Right. And it's the same sort of playbook. And Trump as a businessman is just the best in the business of doing it.

[Matt McDaniel]

I mean, that's the thing. I think your example of Europe is perfect. Like, you got to carry your own weight to the agreed upon amount. And if you're not living up to it, then you start Complaining about getting called out. Canada's the same boat. It's like if you're saying that your economy is dependent on America and then you're trying to play us, of course he should call you out on that. And I don't think it's any accident that Justin from Canada quit the day Donald Trump got certified. You know, January 6th. He knew the drill. Get out of the way. Cuz Trump is here. He couldn't handle it, so he got out of the way.

[Michael Duncan]

That's it.

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah. He thinks big. And that is what Americans want. We should conquer Canada. We should conquer any place we want to conquer. To be honest with you, we're America. We're the best country in the world. And if somebody is in our way, we should.

[Michael Duncan]

Do you have any ideas here, Ashbrook? You want to add to the list?

[John Ashbrook]

Well, somebody tweeted and I thought it was very astute that the Australians don't have guns anymore. So we could take Australia.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah. Didn't they lose a war to some flightless birds down there?

[John Ashbrook]

They. Yeah, the emus, the emu war.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Matt McDaniel]

You've been to Australia, right?

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah. We're gonna get some negative emails about that, I'm sure.

[John Ashbrook]

What are they gonna do?

[Cash Patel]

They're coming at 2:00 in the morning. No one will see them anyway.

[John Ashbrook]

Again. We roll up, we surround the island. They're not gonna. What, are they gonna throw boomerangs at us?

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[John Ashbrook]

They can't stop us. We're America. We can have what we want.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah. There's a lot of other things that can go on a Barbie other than shrimp. Right.

[Cash Patel]

You know, on the. Canada. On Canada. Like, the biggest problem is their standard of living is so much lower than ours. They just don't know how good it is to be an American. We would be. Well, we would go in, we'd have to raise their standard of living. We'd have to invest in Canada. I think we only want Alberta. Maybe like the, maybe the Maritimes, but I don't, I don't know if we could raise the standard of living of British Columbia. I don't know if we want.

[Matt McDaniel]

They have lots of problems in Canada is the thing. I think that's a good point. Like, you should only conquer countries that you benefit from without having to put a lot of work into it. Like, in terms of, like, well, you need to build infrastructure here and you got to hope that democracy or whatever takes flight. No, we only find places that we can exploit that can be a part of the team that can bring something to The.

[Michael Duncan]

Well, Trump is doing what Trump does best and he has the whip hand right now. Right. He's coming in, you know, going to be sworn, and as President, United States, he's got all this momentum behind him, and so he's using that whip hand to get all the leverage he can for the outcomes that he wants. But it's not just Greenland, it's not just Panama, it's not just Canada. He had a message for Hamas, which is incredible. Let's go to that clip, please. Baguettes.

[Donald Trump]

We have to run it properly. It's going to be run properly. We want to get back those hostages for Israel and for us. You know, we do have people that are hostages being held. And I'll just say it again, if this deal's not done with the people representing our nation by the time I get to office, all hell is going to break out. Thank you very much.

[Michael Duncan]

Thank you very much. I love how that's how he ends. The presser. He's just like, thank you very much, Bye. You know, all hell will break loose. Thank you. Goodbye.

[John Ashbrook]

What a pro.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Matt McDaniel]

I mean, that's the thing is, like, he's not just talking the talk. Like, ask Soleimani what happens if he cross Trump. You know, like, great point. The thing is that we have had for four years in America that the world saw as being weak as, you can do whatever you want, you can take Americans hostage, they won't do anything. And now they're going to learn. They know. They've seen what happened the last time he was there. I mean, ISIS got decimated, there was peace in the Middle East. You had Iran bankrupted. None of this Hamas nonsense was going on because Trump took care of business. Because they know this guy, he's gonna follow through on it. If Biden issues a Trump to any or issues a threat to anybody, does anyone worry? No one cares if Biden says anything.

[Cash Patel]

Well, I mean, I think the era of American diplomatic nuance that has completely failed over the last four years is.

[Michael Duncan]

Over, especially in a place like the Middle East.

[Cash Patel]

Well, that's what I was going for. Like, when you say, when you follow through, people know when Trump was president, he followed through on his threats, but he's also not going to bomb people just for the hell of it. Right. I mean, there was that back and forth with Iran where he decided not to bomb them, but when Trump says, you know, fire and fury, the likes of which you've never seen that you don't really need a translator to understand what he's saying.

[John Ashbrook]

Yes.

[Michael Duncan]

It's a threat. It's a promise.

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah.

[Cash Patel]

I mean, and he will, and you know he will, and Hamas knows he will, and the Palestinians know that he's going to follow through. So when you're negotiating with Trump, it's very clear what he. What his goals are and what the consequences.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah. So that. So that brings us to our question of the day. And if you haven't subscribed yet to the YouTube, you got to do that, you know, and if you've watched just every single Tuesday and Thursday and you love this show and you're like, boy, we only got 80,000 subscribers on this channel. We'll take a second and share this with your friends and your family and keep spreading the word. Get them to like and subscribe so they can comment, too. But that question of the day is, which territory is Trump most likely to get?

[Matt McDaniel]

Good question.

[Michael Duncan]

What do you want? Do you want Greenland? Do we want Canada's the 51st. Maybe just Alberta. Who knows? We gonna take the Panama Canal back?

[Cash Patel]

Gotta get the Canal back.

[Michael Duncan]

Or, or, or is it Gulf of America, or should it be Gulf of Texas? I saw Senator Ted Cruz said maybe Gulf of Texas. I don't know. They got a lot of shoreline there. I don't know. Anyway, that's our question of the day. We're gonna be back right after this with your comments from our Tuesday episode. Biden's top dementia moments.

[Mark Wayne Mullen]

I don't have to tell you, Americans are ready for what's next. Moving beyond the hardships of inflation and economic anxiety towards building a future, a better future for our families. Ensuring greater access to more affordable energy that powers daily lives, Reliable energy that fuels innovation and economic growth, and the abundant energy that keeps our nation safer and more secure. It's all within our grasp. We'll do this together, building a brighter future for us, powered by America's oil and natural gas resources. You can learn more about all of.

[Michael Duncan]

[e-mail] I am very much looking forward to this, fellows, because I was reading all these comments after the Tuesday episode and, like, I forgot. I thought maybe I had dementia. I had forgot some of these incredible moments. And that's the great thing about the community of our show. And all of you listeners and viewers like having this huge network effect of people. Everybody had such great comments for this. And for the first one, we always go right to the Voice.

[John Ashbrook]

Okay, this first one comes from Mark Bowers. And Mark writes, fellas, I love the program. I've been a listener since day one. My favorite Biden dementia moment is the Easter egg hunt at the White House when he went wandering off and a handler dressed as the Easter Bunny had to go wrangle him. Mark, that is just a brilliant.

[Matt McDaniel]

I've forgotten about. There's so many.

[Cash Patel]

It was to prevent him from answering a question because he was trying to.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah, right. See, like, that's the thing, is you always assume the dementia moment is something where he talks, but a lot of times it's him simply not knowing where to be.

[John Ashbrook]

Exactly.

[Michael Duncan]

All right, so let's. Let's go to that clip, please. Baguettes. Here it is. The Easter bunny is trying to stop him and redirect him to go a different location.

[Matt McDaniel]

They have to have someone in a large bunny suit direct the President of the United States.

[Cash Patel]

I love that the bunny is still following him just in case he makes the same mistake.

[Michael Duncan]

And the bunny has to have waving of the arms to make it clear, like, hey, I'm not just coming over to be a prop here, pal. You got to get back over there.

[Matt McDaniel]

It's like he's guiding a plane into the gate, man. Like, holy moly.

[John Ashbrook]

And this was a couple of years ago, right? Yeah, yeah.

[Michael Duncan]

This guy is unbelievable. McDaniel, you want to do the next one?

[Cash Patel]

Yeah, sure. So comment 2 comes from Brad Wilkinson. My favorite Biden moment is, we hold these truths to be self evident. All men and women are created equal by the. You know. You know, the thing.

[Michael Duncan]

Let's do the clips. Baguettes.

[Josh Holmes]

We hold these truths to be self evident. All men and women created by. Go. You know, the. You know, the thing.

[Michael Duncan]

How. How. How do you get that so wrong?

[Matt McDaniel]

Man, that's like second grade.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah, it is.

[John Ashbrook]

That was real.

[Michael Duncan]

Not a joke. I thought. I mean, I think stand Up Chuck was bad or, like, take a vow, Jackie or whatever, but where's Jackie?

[Matt McDaniel]

At least he wasn't at the funeral crawling into her casket. Jackie, wake up.

[Cash Patel]

Oh, maybe tomorrow he's gonna ask, where's Jimmy?

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Cash Patel]

Oh, God, Jimmy Carter be so sad.

[Michael Duncan]

All right, smug. Give us the third one here.

[Matt McDaniel]

Best gaff. This was when Biden was still senator, but I swear this was a sign that his mind was already going. Senator Biden told wheelchair bound state senator Chuck Graham. Stand up, Chuck. Let him see you. I think he was always an idiot.

[Michael Duncan]

So this is a crowd favorite, you know, and it's near and dear to our hearts because it's just your sort of classic Biden moment. Let's go to that clip. Spaghetti.

[John Ashbrook]

Chuck Graham.

[Josh Holmes]

State senators here. Chuck.

[Michael Duncan]

Stand up, Chuck.

[Cash Patel]

Good to see you.

[Josh Holmes]

Oh, God love you. I tell you what, you're making everybody else stand up.

[John Ashbrook]

Thank you very, very much.

[Michael Duncan]

You know, the saddest thing about that clip is you can tell there because that's from 2008, I believe.

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah.

[Michael Duncan]

Biden's way more lucid, and he's able to get himself out of a jam a little bit easier because he's more cognitive faculties.

[Matt McDaniel]

Oh, that's a good point.

[Michael Duncan]

He realizes it immediately that he made a goof. Now Biden doesn't even know when he goof. No, he needs a giant bunny to come over and be like, hey, man, you got to get back with the program.

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah, yeah. I mean, you know, another one of my favorite moments, it was in 1988 and smug. And I always talk about what it takes. Great book. The COVID of the 1988 primary for Democrats. And remember, I think he was in New Hampshire. And he just starts getting into this argument. He's like, I have high iq. Do you have high iq? My. My IQ is higher than yours.

[Michael Duncan]

Like, he.

[John Ashbrook]

He literally, for his entire career has not only been an asshole, but somebody who doesn't quite have the same thing that, like, Bill Clinton had. Obama had.

[Matt McDaniel]

It was like when he was running and he called that guy fat.

[Cash Patel]

Look.

[Matt McDaniel]

Fat.

[John Ashbrook]

Look fat.

[Michael Duncan]

That he challenged him to a push up. This is just unbelievable. Oh, well, that was great. Thank you so much to everybody who submitted those comments. They're always fantastic, but especially when we could do a whole segment here on the show about it. So thank you so much. We're going to get to that news from Meta and Mark Zuckerberg. But first we got to talk about a great sponsor, one of our favorite sponsors here at the Variety Program. And I'm talking about Zbiotics, the best. I don't think I would have survived the holidays, fellas, without this stuff. It's a prebiotic drink. You take it before you have a big night. It helps neutralize a lot of the toxic byproducts of alcohol in your gut. Smug. I know you're a big fan of this thing, so why don't you tell the.

[Matt McDaniel]

I mean, I swear by it. Like I've told you gentlemen before, I keep my stockpile right there at my drink cart where I have my bourbons and everything. So I don't forget. Because you know the difference between when you remember to take that Zbiotics and not in the morning. You know the difference. And like Duncan was saying is it's not about, like, dehydration or all these.

[Michael Duncan]

Other things having the right Pedialyte, you.

[Matt McDaniel]

Know, yeah, if I take this Pedialyte before I go to sleep or if I drink three glasses of water, it's not the dehydration, it's the toxic byproducts in your stomach. And ZBiotics just breaks that down. And that's why it actually works.

[John Ashbrook]

And that's why we always like to say, there is no tomorrow without Zebiotics today.

[Michael Duncan]

That's exactly right, John. I'm glad you mentioned it. So go to zebiotics.com ruthless to learn more. And get 15% off your first order when you use Ruthless at checkout. Zebiotics is backed with 100% money back guarantee. So if you're unsatisfied for any reason, they'll refund your money, no questions asked. Remember to head to zebiotics.com ruthless and use the code ruthless at checkout for 15% off. Okay, let's get to this. Meta News. So it was really big on social media here this week, this big announcement that Mark Zuckerberg made, you know, direct to camera, talking about political speech on his platform and how things have sort of changed over time. And this notion of fact checkers, which I think is just, I think it speaks to a larger thing that's happening in our politics in our country writ large. But I just want to read here a little bit. Meta is ending its fact checking program and lifting restrictions on speech to, quote, restore free expression across Facebook, Instagram and Meta platforms, admitting its current content moderation practices have gone too far. This is from Mark Zuckerberg. We're going to get back to our roots and focus on reducing mistakes, simplifying our policies and restoring free expression on our platforms. God bless it.

[Matt McDaniel]

Yeah, yeah. I mean, again, I want to kind of take a victory lap. I'd said that Mark Andreessen was a man of the year. He's currently on the board of Meta. And this is. We all saw the fact that Mark had in the election helping encourage people in Silicon Valley of like, hey, it's time to step up for our rights, for our freedoms, for free speech in this country. And I would not be surprised if he had an impact in helping bring this about. Because beyond just so many Americans facing censorship, worrying about like, oh, you know, am I allowed to even say this of what ends up being the truth? Like, you know, things like hunter binds laptop. This was also a thorn in the side for Meta because they're having to deal with these lunatics, these like, left wing groups who are like, no, we get to call the shots. On your platform and you have to deal with the fallout from it.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Matt McDaniel]

So I bet for Meta this is like a huge relief too.

[Michael Duncan]

I think so. And I think it's an over simplification to say like, well, Donald Trump won and so now Mark Zuckerberg and Meta are going to be supporting more free speech on their platforms. I think the other side is just not, you know, a small little thing. It's probably the driving force, and that is after 2016, you know, a lot of these tech companies tried to play nice with the left and these or these orgs that were just trying to ban political speech on the Internet and find ways to monitor content and all these sort of things. And I think a lot of it was like in goodwill and trying to work with these people as partners. The problem is when you work with these lunatic left wing groups and all of these people, it's never enough.

[Matt McDaniel]

Never.

[Michael Duncan]

And ultimately they just want to work the refs and censor their opponents because.

[John Ashbrook]

What they actually want is power.

[Michael Duncan]

Right.

[John Ashbrook]

And this move is so big for regular people in this country who have lived at the mercy of the power centers on the east and west coast, rich people who think they're better than everybody else in this entire country. And now everybody gets a chance to have their voice heard. It's not completely, or the conversation is not completely controlled by the networks and Hollywood and the big finance and big government conversations are controlled by the people. And I just, I think this is one of the greatest moves.

[Michael Duncan]

That's why I also like the embracing the community notes function. Like on X, it's like, let's use the power of the user base and have a conversation about what we disagree. Like that's the whole point of social media. And the left and all these lunatics want to take the social part out of social media. Right. They want it to be a place where you put up a press release that's approved by some bureaucrat in Washington.

[Cash Patel]

D.C. i love the anger that's coming. They're trying to democratize fact checking, which is objectively a good thing because that gets more opinions in to actually find out what the truth is versus arbiters of truth, which is just, it's truth dictatorship.

[Josh Holmes]

Right.

[Cash Patel]

Which is a terrible, terrible model. I mean, obviously X learned that. And you actually had Elon put out a tweet praising Zuckerberg, which in this sort of industry, you know, you don't always, you know, Ford isn't always praising Mercedes. Right? Yeah, but a couple points on this, like this was the podcast election, right? This was the democratization of information election. And I think when you hear Zuckerberg's statement, he really got to the fact that that's what people are looking for, that people are not just want to be told what the truth is. They want to be able to see, you know, why, why is this true? What is this fact checker? Who is this fact checker? Who's paying this fact checker?

[Michael Duncan]

Right.

[Cash Patel]

And rather than saying, I think a lot of the left is freaking out that, that Metta has made the shift, I think this is back shifting back to the center. I don't even think that this is a shift to the right. I think this is a shift back to reality just the way it should be. Not. Not some right wing craziness. It's just a shift back to sort of the normal way the ecosystem should be working versus the way it was.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah. So we've got this great side by side, just to put it in context here, we've got Mark Zuckerberg back when he was getting grilled, you know, after he's getting all the blame that Facebook elected Donald Trump. And then we've got Mark Zuckerberg. Now can we put that up? Look at that glow up. Look at that glow up.

[John Ashbrook]

What a baller, that chain.

[Michael Duncan]

I think he's like living in Hawaii now.

[Cash Patel]

So, Duncan, I gotta get your take on this because of something we talked about earlier, but I've now been doing jiu jitsu for like four and a half, five years. And Zuckerberg also, probably for about four years, started doing jiu jitsu.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Cash Patel]

Which for people who don't know, it's like the, like wrestling and mixed martial arts, being a part of that community. It's not necessarily socially conservative.

[Michael Duncan]

Culturally.

[Cash Patel]

It's culturally conservative. It's real people. And when someone's trying to choke the life out of you, you're not really arguing about politics, the soy kind of nonsense. But like, this is a guy who. Can you put that graphic back up? So we're seeing the testimony guy. That's the guy who you want to choke out versus the guy who can choke you out on the other side.

[Michael Duncan]

That's right.

[Cash Patel]

That's a big difference because to me, it just speaks a lot about confidence. It's about what he's willing to be able to like. The guy on the right knows he's going to get incoming, he's going to get flack and he can take it. The guy on the left is terrified of speaking one like he's terrified of misgendering. Someone on the left, whereas the guy on the right doesn't give a crap. He's wearing an $850,000 watch. He doesn't care.

[Michael Duncan]

I think, I think Zuckerberg, when he went before Congress, you know, I think he was trying to play nice with these Democrats, thinking that they were coming from a place of good faith, which of course we all know that they weren't. And I think the ethos of the Internet and a lot of these tech companies and what got a lot of these founders interested in building things and disrupting industries was the ethos that is more sort of libertarian and culturally conservative. And I think that's the drive for people like him and so many in the tech industry. And it took Donald Trump running for president again, like you were saying with Mark Andreessen, and there's a lot of other ones to come out and say, this is what we believe in. We believe in these values of free speech. And just in Donald Trump, winning has sort of unlocked all of that.

[Matt McDaniel]

And again, I think it's very telling the way that Democrats in the Senate and the left had a freak out after Trump won 2016, and their first instinct was silence, all dissension. We need to have complete control over what people are allowed to see, hear and say online and everywhere. And so that's why they had this crackdown in the first place in 2016. And they're going right back to their old tricks. You hear them being like, oh my gosh, they're getting rid of the fact checkers that we put in place there to try and control speech. They the only way Democrats can get a victory in this country is if the American people are not allowed to speak their mind and not be free. That's what their whole goal has been this whole time, and accumulating power. Like you said, it's all about power for them. This scares them because the American people are once again going to be able to live up to the ideals I found in this country being free.

[Michael Duncan]

No more censoring the, you know, Hunter Biden laptop. Yep. You know, it's great. It's great. There's so much good news and we have a lot of good news about what's going on on the Hill right now and everything for this first hundred day agenda for Donald Trump. And so we brought in Mark Wayne Mullen, senator from Oklahoma, to tell us a lot about what's going to be happening here over the next quarter in Congress. And he's got a meeting with Donald Trump coming up. There's just A ton of great stuff. We got to get to this interview. I want to welcome to the program a man with the unenviable, or enviable, depending on your perspective, position at the nexus of everything we're going to get done in this next Congress. Senator Mark Wayne Mullen. How are you?

[Josh Holmes]

Good. That's a big title. And I think it's got a little bit too much in on that. I don't know. Everything's going to get done.

[Michael Duncan]

Look, I hear your phone is ringing off the hook.

[Josh Holmes]

It is. It is. It is crazy. And. But I'd rather be busy than not. So since November 6th, and it hasn't stopped, and I'm not complaining because I met with the President Elect, President Trump, last Tuesday. I flew down there, met with him on Monday and Tuesday.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

And Monday and Tuesday, mind you, was the 23rd. And. Or not the 23rd, but the 30th and 31st. Right. And the reason why I was going down there is because we were talking about some national security stuff and Mike Waltz was in the meeting. We were just visiting, but he was supposed to have the day off. I was his last 32 meetings that day. And this was his day off, mind you. The 31st was no different. And the guy is so high energy. I hate to complain when I say my phone is NonStop. He has two phones. That's nonstop. Plus Natalie, his assistant, she runs a phone, too, and she'll bring a phone, bring her phone into him occasionally, too. The guy is incredible. I mean, he's incredible. So it's really hard for me to complain, but I'm wore out. I mean, really, I just like. And I may get divorced. My wife, at some point, she's like, you're gonna have to turn that off. I was like, I can't. I don't know where you turn it off, but, you know, he sets the pace. He's, he's, you know, he's the leader right now of our party. He's the President United States, or he's acting as the President United States. We don't have a president in the White House right now. Right.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

And it is, it is just amazing at the level he's setting. And it just makes all of us want to work harder.

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah. I was just going to say the energy level that he's bringing is completely the opposite of what we've seen the last four years with Biden. I don't think. I mean, he probably didn't do 32 calls in a week.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, 32 meetings. Those aren't his, those aren't phone calls. Those are third. That was 32 meetings in his office.

[John Ashbrook]

Incredible.

[Josh Holmes]

And we, we, we finished at about 7, 30, 8 o'clock, walked him to his residence at Mart Largo, had continued conversations. Then Mike Waltz and I talked for quite some time afterwards too. And it's just all of us that had the privilege of being able to just see a little bit, little glimpse of what the president. I'm not as close to the president as a lot. Right. But just to see the little bit of a glimpse of the way he runs and how hard he works, it really puts that thing as his. No way you're gonna outwork me.

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

You know, you set that tone and you're living it. I'm. There is no way I'm not going to get up and get moving.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah. I mean, he has a motor, obviously, and he's gonna need to have that because he, he's pretty ambitious about everything he wants to get accomplished here, especially in this first, you know, quarter and.

[Josh Holmes]

Even on the campaign.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

I mean, I had the privilege of being on Trump Force 1 multiple times and Trump Force 2 with JD both of them are just working their tails off.

[Michael Duncan]

Right.

[Josh Holmes]

I mean, they were just, just absolutely working their tails off. It was very, very common. In fact, it was more common than not that we were at the hotel for less than five hours. Now, I'm talking about from the time we pulled up at the motorcade to time we're leaving with the motorcade was less than 5 hours. And from the time the president walked on the plane, which was a working office. I mean, Trump Force One is a working office. He didn't go to his living quarters. He, he, he literally, he say living quarters. I don't guess it's living quarters. He didn't go to the personal quarters. He sat in the middle of the plane. He would have a huge stack of papers. He would have people around him. He's dictating what needs to be said, what message he wants put on. Truth, social, going through his speech, talking to, making phone calls, because the plane obviously he can make phone calls on. And from the moment he walked on to the moment we landed at the last event of the day and we're going to go to the hotel, he was running, he was doing multiple town hall meetings. He was doing 11 or 12 town hall meetings for members of the House and members of the Senate every day, on top of doing three, four, five rallies a day. Completely sold out. Same energy level. But it was one thing that I found intriguing is he loves the Undertaker.

[John Ashbrook]

Oh, he does.

[Josh Holmes]

He really loves the Undertaker. He thinks he has the greatest walkout. It is, right?

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah.

[Michael Duncan]

Paul Bearer there with the urn and everything.

[Josh Holmes]

Right. Such a. He's such a production artist. And the president would be like, you know, that. That is. That's straight out of casting right there. I mean, the guy knows how to sell himself. That's. Advertisement. That's retail. He's retail himself. It was just so. Because most of the time when we're going into land for a. At least when I was with him, you know, we're going into land for. For a new rally. Some entrance from the Undertakers coming on. And I've never watched so much wwe, wwf, whatever it's called now, I don't know in my life. And it was just. But it was serious, but fun.

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

And it's because the energy that he kept.

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

And so that's. I mean, you cannot work the guy. That's why the American people love him.

[John Ashbrook]

You're exactly right. I mean, there's nothing more American than a work ethic like he has. And it is exactly what people want in the president. And every day is important. Every single day is vital. And today is no different. You are about to go into a meeting with President Trump and senators to plan out the next couple of months. And I wonder if you could talk about what you expect from that meeting this afternoon.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah. And mind you, I want to reiterate this, too. This is his second trip to the Capitol since he's been elected. Other than the State of the Union, I don't think Biden has made a trip to the Capitol or maybe when the president of Ireland was there and they're doing an event, but never to meet with members. Just zero engagement from the White House for four years. So the fact that the President of the United States is coming in, the future president, you know, the 47th president, former 45th president of the United States coming in to already talk to us because he's trying to make sure that we're moving in the same direction. And leaders have to communicate. That's one thing in our company, that was one thing that was always so important to me, is I had to communicate. Don't expect people to understand what you're thinking. It's the same thing with my kids, except when I'm working cattle. When I'm working cattle, my kids are just supposed to know where to be. I mean, I don't know why there's a different human for anybody's ever worked cattle with their dad, there's a different human that shows up the day you're working cattle. But I'm just saying, for communication in any organization is key because those that work inside that organization, be it your board members, be it your executives, be it your managers, your mid level managers or your lower level managers or just regular employees, have to know the focus and the drive of where you're trying to go. And the President understands this. That's why he's a successful businessman and that's why his value has almost doubled. Right when they were trying to bankrupt him, he was still able to outmaneuver him and almost double his billions. It's remarkable. But by communicating with what he wants to get done in those first hundred days is so important. He started with the House. And the way I describe the House, this is no disrespect. Love the House, love my friends over there. I still go over there all the time. I go to, I'd say at least half the House conferences. I go to a lot of the RSC meetings because I just have good friends over there. But it's a thoughtful but yet right now dysfunctional body. You can't argue with that.

[Michael Duncan]

I don't think they'd argue with that.

[Josh Holmes]

No. That's what I'm saying.

[Michael Duncan]

They don't.

[Josh Holmes]

But the President started with them, visiting with them on Saturday and was communicating with them on what we need to do with reconciliation. That's his big deal. The House has to get the budget, has to get reconciliation. Moving the Senate, we have to get reconciliation. And then we also have to do confirmations. I mean, today I was in a, in what we call the Murder Board for Pete Hegseth.

[John Ashbrook]

Oh, that's great.

[Josh Holmes]

Which is just where you just go up there. And I've played Jackie Rosen, I mean, since I look just like her and my voice is just like that. Right. And in ranking or minority member, ranking member Reid. And you're getting them prepped, getting prepared because the President wants us to held these confirmation hearings now. So on January 20, we immediately roll in to voting on these confirmation hearings. And the way he's moving the pace, he's moving. It's a little odd for the Senate to move this fast, but he's setting the pace.

[Michael Duncan]

Right.

[Josh Holmes]

So by coming here and laying out expectations and answering the questions and being accountable to the senators to make sure that it's clear, communication with him and while he moves into the White House is vital. And that's what he's going to continue to do.

[Michael Duncan]

He's just a leader Yeah, I love that. And it's also taking a lot of this campaign tactics to the official side, to the West Wing, to Congress, where, like, you have to drive the message every day and you got to be prepared for what the opposition's going to do, you know? And, I mean, I think a lot of lessons were learned in that first four years, the first Trump administration. So, I mean, I'm just so glad to hear that.

[Josh Holmes]

Do you know the biggest mistake that. That I've made with the President?

[Michael Duncan]

Right.

[Josh Holmes]

So we're setting down. This is a few weeks ago, I don't know, two weeks ago, three weeks ago, I don't know. I was down there and we were meeting with people and the President was in a good mood, and we're sitting there talking. He's really always in a good mood. Just sometimes he gets monotone because he's just focused, but he's always, honestly, never good. I've never seen him really in a rage mode at all. He's like anybody sometimes. He gets very frank, but he's in a good mood. We're sitting there talking. He's having a Diet Coke. I'm having a Coke in a bottle. About the only time I ever drink Coke is with him. And we're talking about the people that's come to see me, you know, all these social media CEOs. He's talking about Jeff Bezos that had been there for the second time. Mark Zuckerman's been there a couple of times while we were there. The CEO of Google was there, and he was going through the list of people that was there, just talking, and he was talking about how much he's enjoyed it. I mean, it seems different this time. And I said, sir, stupid mistake. I said, so stupid. I said, sir, if you would have made it to the White House in 2020, it would have been different.

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

He goes, what do you mean, if I would have won? I did win. I'm not saying you didn't win. Give that back to me, sir. Hold on, let me change that. What I'm trying to get to, sir, is because you didn't get to the White House in 2020 or 21, you. It gave the American people the opportunity to see what Wokeism does to the. To the American economy, what it does to the US Military, what it's done.

[Michael Duncan]

To some of these companies.

[Josh Holmes]

Yes. Well, that's part of the economy, right? What it's done and how are. How we're viewed around the world because of that, this unity that we're seeing with Athletes, mind you, go back to 2019-2018-2017-2020. And athletes, these CEOs that were all going woke and now they go woke. What's the saying? You go broke, Right? Yeah.

[John Ashbrook]

Right.

[Josh Holmes]

They've all seen that and they understand the value that the President Elect, President Donald Trump, brings to them. And now that you're coming in, and he said, he said, I believe that. I believe that. Although I'd rather been there in 21, I was like, sir, we would have rather had you in 21, too. But it gave us an opportunity, honestly, maybe a better opportunity for the American people to see it if we can just deliver it. And it's true, we have to deliver now, but the expectations may be high, but I think we do have to deliver. But, geez, government just moves so slow. It just is hard. I hope we don't over. I hope the expectations isn't overly exaggerated where we can't deliver and people get upset at us.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah, so. So you are sort of an official liaison here between the House and the Senate, trying to get on the same page for all these things like reconciliation. And I know, like, there's this point of contention, like one bill or two bills. Do you do border security? Do you do taxes as two separate things? Do you roll them into some huge bill that also includes energy and deregulation and all these sorts of things that are important to a lot of constituencies across the country? You know, Trump. It seems like, at least from my perspective, that Trump is like, whatever works fastest. Let's, let's all stay focused on the outcome here, and the outcome is success. We pass all these things. I'd love one. If it's got to be two, it can be two. But, like, you know, people in the House have concerns about doing two or what have you, and the Senate have their own, you know, issues. So where does this ultimately land?

[Josh Holmes]

It's, it's, this has got blown in proportion.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

And I've said this with the media. The media. I'm so sick of them saying it's.

[Michael Duncan]

Like, process, process, process.

[Josh Holmes]

It's like, hey, what is it? Why is there already contention? Does this signal that there's going to be contention between the White House and chambers? Like, no, hold on a second.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

We're two separate bodies. We're going to deliver. It's just the process. How do we get that done? What can the House do and what can the Senate get done? More than likely, if the House can get a reconciliation pass, it's going to be one bill. And the reason why is just real simple. And Chairman Jason Smith, chairman of Ways and Means, who's honestly, he's my best friend, really. It's like we're yin and yang, completely different in any aspect of it. But he said, yeah, he's very smart and articulate. And I mean, the guy can get into the weeds on taxes. That's why he's a chairman. And he's like the dynamics. And I was with him when he's talking with. With Thune about this is the dynamics is different for us. I mean, you have Chip Roy, right, From Texas. Chip Roy said he won't vote for any tax bill that doesn't raise corporate tax rates. Now, I don't know why any Republican in the world would say that they want to raise corporate tax rates. We saw that when we dropped underneath President Trump. When we dropped from. From 35% corporate tax rate to 21, the corporate revenue into the. Into the treasurer increased threefold. So obviously, it works when you give them more money to invest in the community, hire more people and increase the revenue. So why he's in that position, I don't know. But if you put taxes on a bill that has border for Chip, I'm just using Chip. I'm not trying to pick on him. I'm just using this for an example. Right. That Chip is from Texas. Border's important. You put energy on it. It's important. How does Chip at that point vote against it? Right. And then you have guys in New York that why we're all border states. Right. But salt's their biggest thing. Yeah. They may not support border and energy because they want to get salt done and they don't want to be pushed. Second, they don't believe that if you do energy and border first that you're going to be able to actually get taxes.

[Michael Duncan]

Got it. So you kind of keep everybody in the tent by doing it all in one.

[Josh Holmes]

And the American people hate big bills. Yeah, I get that. Okay. But that's part of negotiations you got to have, and it all has to be done. So it's not like this big Omni bill that's got a lot of fat in it. We're talking about things that through reconciliation, that has to get done. These are President Trump's priorities. So if we have to do two, fine, we'll do two. If we can only get one passed, then we'll get one passed. The thing is, is that we would like the House to move first, but the House isn't necessarily in reconciliation. They have to move first on the budget, they don't have to necessarily move first on reconciliation. So if they can't get it done, then, then we may move a simple package first, energy and border. But then it really puts us in a situation with taxes. I and the president has been very clear. He's, he's okay with one bill, he's okay with two. And people say, well, that's not very clear. No, his clear point is, is that he just wants it done right. He wants results. That's all. That's all he wants. So the difference between the two, it doesn't matter. The bodies are going to work their will and we're going to eventually deliver for the president and for the American people. It's going to get done.

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah. So, yeah, I like what you have to say about one big bill. You know, some people are like, oh, it's too big, it's too big, but the problems are big. You know, that's why he was elected to fix these problems. And so you've got taxes, the economy, you've got border security, you've got energy. What, what do you think is plausible on a bill like that?

[Josh Holmes]

Well, first of all, let's go back to, to why the president wanted one bill. I just, and I'll get to your question, but let's get back to where the why the president wanted one bill. Because he wanted to make his executive orders permanent. Because executive orders, as we saw four years ago, can be overturned like that and wreak havoc on the energy sector and on our border. So the president can go in on day one and reinstate those hundred executive orders that President Biden put in place in the first 96 days he was in office to that undid energy policy that president had that released a energy economic boom where we became an exporter of crude for the first time ever and saw prices at a very reasonable, some people sometimes very low, very reasonable price, which spurred the economy along. You saw a very secured border right before, right before you left office. We had the most secure border we had had in decades, decades. And so the president can go and enact those immediately. Then we have to have reconciliation to make them permanent. But they're permanent for only 10 years. And some of this stuff, the reconciliation is only 10 years. So you have to still go back in there and fix it to make it actual permanent to get to what's possible. Building the wall is still possible. The American people overwhelmingly want border security, but the technology, as we know, in four years has changed dramatically. In fact, the technology has changed dramatically in three years. There's a company down in Houston, I think it's called Astro Technologies. I haven't talked to Dave, Dave's the owner. Haven't talked to him in quite some time. But he has a technology that's a virtual fence. Right. It uses AI. Before AI was a word. Right.

[Michael Duncan]

I mean, think of how far AIs come in just the last year.

[Josh Holmes]

Well, but this is remarkable because you can bury it 30ft in the ground, which by the way, still receives 30 more feet. So it's 60ft in the ground, 60ft up. So detect tunnels if you try to dig underneath it. If you cut it, it's fiber. So it still sends a signal back. It can detect instantly the difference between a human and an animal. It can detect instantly how many humans, their approximate weight and size. And it can even detect the difference between a male and the female in most cases because of their stride, in the way they hit their feet. It has all this put in place immediately. At that point, it can put eyes on them by sending drones that are to that location that can be eyes on it in a matter of less than 60 seconds, depending on how far you place these out. So sometimes it may take longer than that. But then once the drone locks in on the target, it stays with the target. You cannot run that drone until we can dispatch people there. So securing the border that way is almost instantaneously, right?

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

When President Trump was in office, we passed a bill that funded where you had scanning equipment that scanned every truck and every equipment that came across the border. The technology is out there. Why wouldn't you do it? We scan ourselves. Every time we go through the airport, we know smuggling's coming in.

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

Why wouldn't we just scan it? And we don't. I mean, there's technology today to where we're having security for shoplifters, to where they're not having to. I mean, a lot of times that security cameras and the monitor to sit up there, nobody did anything. Right. Because you get bored looking at it. I, I have monitors on my phone and I haven't looked at them. And I don't know when you usually look at them, when you go back and check them. Right, yeah.

[John Ashbrook]

Like on X app.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah. But this has, this has technology that allows alerts if suspicious activity or a known shoplifter comes in. And it can be housed in El Paso, Texas, and they're looking at somebody in LA and can immediately alert security or the manager who's there on the activity that's going on. And they don't have to sit there and watch all of it. It just immediate alerts. Right. You can do the same thing with this equipment. It's possible to secure a border. Yeah, we just had a present last four years that wanted an open border. So you can get that done. Is it possible for us to have a huge impact on the cartels? Yes, but we can't just fight them at the border. We have to be more proactive on the fight. You know, if we're playing whack a mole, you're losing. Because they're better at it than we are. They can overwhelm the system. We have to have cooperation with the Mexican government. The president does that by putting tariffs in. Yeah, I mean, I'm sorry, some people are going to gripe about that. I've been hearing from companies all the time right now about tariffs, but we're talking about national security now.

[John Ashbrook]

Right.

[Josh Holmes]

So the president is giving us the ability to do it because he is able to enact those tariffs. 25% tariffs on Ford trucks coming across the border is big. 25% tariffs on equipment coming across, windshields coming across. You know, whatever it is, is big. Eventually, it's going to take a huge toll on the president that is currently in place. And there's questions if she's compromised or not. I'm not saying she is. I'm just saying there's been some reports that's raised a lot of questions about her connection with the cartels. But we have to get more proactive on there. The president and President Trump can work, first of all, initiating that, and then Congress can help codify that through legislation or whatever orders he needs. It's possible to do that. Energy independence, man. We just. We've got to neuter the epa. And what I mean by that is the EPA has a role to play. I'm not saying they don't. I mean, when they first came in and they started doing the Clean Water act and the Clean Air act, it was awful. I mean, rivers were contaminated, fish were dying, they were having fish kills. There was obviously chemical blooms happening with these factories. And so I'm not saying they don't, but they've overreached so far that it's affecting our ability to even increase our own manufacturing. They're involved in every agency. If the doe, Department of Energy has a permit that they're trying to do, EPA can overstep and stop it. They should be focused on their lane. Their lane is issuing the 401, or is it 404 permits? 404 permits. I think it's four or something. Permits for direct discharge into navical bodies of water.

[Michael Duncan]

Not a drainage, not, not a stream.

[Josh Holmes]

Not, not a, not a, not a stream or, or a ditch that may have it. It specifically said navigable bodies of water that the U. S. Coastal has. Or the, or the, or not the coastal, but the daggumit coast guard. Coast guard has. Has jurisdiction over you. You could go back and get them focused on the clean air permits that had to be pushed in. Put them back in their lane and allow the economy to go through. And just a real quick example.

[John Ashbrook]

It's so important because they've become basically missionaries for the climate 100%. They're not focused on doing the job that they're supposed to be doing.

[Josh Holmes]

You know, we used to make over 90% of antibiotics inside the United States. Just a few, just a couple decades ago. I mean, just think about how volatile the world is. Right, okay.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah. Talk about national security.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah. You can't, you can't fight a war without antibiotics unless you're going to go back to the, you know, Dr. Sawbone ages. Right. So you can't, you have to have antibiotics. We make less than 1% of the antibiotics now on the side of the United States. Do you know who makes the majority of it?

[Michael Duncan]

China.

[Josh Holmes]

China, not good by over 80%. There's a company that produces 70% of world's antibiotics. They're wanting to move to the United States. Worked on it for two years. The EPA came back to us and said, because the CEO of the company came, said, hey, we want to move. We actually found them because they can't have high humidity, but yet they still didn't have access to water. The reason why they were talking to us is because we had this thing called Porto catoosa inside. Inside Oklahoma. It's outside Tulsa. And people are like, you have a port that thought. You guys are like, no. There's this thing called the Arkansas river that runs into a burglar river that runs all the way down to.

[Michael Duncan]

You can tell people in Oklahoma, take.

[Josh Holmes]

This person to the Mississippi that eventually goes to the Gulf. Okay. So we're not landlodged. We just have to navigate it. And so we had the largest inland water port that's open 365 days west of the Mississippi. And. And they were like, it's perfect area for us. The EPA came back and said it would take over a billion dollars. Seven years of permitting, and they're not guaranteed to be able to get the permit for it.

[John Ashbrook]

And why are they even like, that's.

[Josh Holmes]

Just outrageous because they had to bring so much raw material up the navigational channel on a barge. And so they're saying, how do you contain it if you were to spill it? You can't possibly go against all scenarios. Right. You can't, you can't regulate human stupidity. You just can't. It's like water heaters. You have to raise them up 18 inches because people are stupid enough to store gas can beside it, an open flame. Sometimes stupid is just stupid. Right. And you can't overregulate that. And so they were saying that if it has a break, it could have a major fish kill. It could do all this. But we're used to containing spills. If we have to, we haven't had to, but we can, because we take crude oil, we take a fertilizer, we take LNG up and down that navigation channel every day. We're designed for it. But this is just a prime example how now the EPA stepped into a national security issue for us. Yeah. And the amount of, of the economic boost that would bring to that region, to Northeast Oklahoma.

[John Ashbrook]

Huge.

[Josh Holmes]

Would be massive. Would be absolutely massive. But the EPA's got their thumb on. And I can use example, after the steel industry, the, the, the mining would be reason why we don't have to be dependent on China to get our rare earth minerals. Yet. We are.

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

Right. I mean, you could just go through the list.

[Michael Duncan]

I mean, just sort of checking the administrative state, I think is going to be a huge priority for the Trump administration. And God knows we need it. Switching gears here for a second because I got, I got to get to this because I just, I'm desperate to know, but you got a little.

[Josh Holmes]

I'm happily married. I have six kids. You're not looking, even though your sweater's cute. Just not my style.

[Michael Duncan]

Hey, look good, feel good, feel good, play good. You know, I had to play good, get paid good. That's what Deion Sanders says.

[Josh Holmes]

All right. But I've never seen him in the sweater like that.

[Michael Duncan]

Hey, you hate the American flag.

[Josh Holmes]

No, love the American flag. It's the sweater. I mean, they have three quarter zips like that. I mean, you make that look, you know, decent.

[John Ashbrook]

Thank you. You know, Michael Duncan was a wrestler. I was back in the day.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah. It was his buddies make a lot of. You're attacking right now. Well, they would make fun of you. I'm just saying. Yeah, absolutely. Unless you're pulling weight.

[Michael Duncan]

You know, I'm pulling.

[Josh Holmes]

Cool.

[Michael Duncan]

I'm gonna tell my wife you don't like the sweater.

[Josh Holmes]

Did she pick it up for you?

[Matt McDaniel]

Huh?

[Josh Holmes]

Did she pick it up for you? Yeah, she's trying to keep you, you.

[Michael Duncan]

Know, we just had Christmas, you know, it's cute.

[Josh Holmes]

What am I saying? It's not cute. It's cute. I mean, I tell my. If she bought you skinny jeans, would you wear them?

[Michael Duncan]

I don't know. I guess maybe that's not enough.

[Josh Holmes]

Maybe if I. I don't know if I wap it. If my wife picked out skinny jeans for me, I'd be like, no, honey, there's a limit. There's a limit.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah, I see what you're saying.

[Josh Holmes]

Yes.

[Michael Duncan]

You're saying so, but you've got this congressional, like, workout group that you do, and what I want to know, and I don't want all the details, but I want to know, like, who's. Who in the group's like, pushing heavyweight. Like, who's who's there with a big.

[Josh Holmes]

Bench press other than myself.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

Really?

[Michael Duncan]

Like, what's going to surprise me now, don't say, like, Wesley Hunt, because that.

[Josh Holmes]

Guy Wesley doesn't work out with us. I mean, he does have a barrel chest. Yeah. I think it's just all show and tell.

[Michael Duncan]

What do you. What do you mention these days?

[Josh Holmes]

I. I threw up 385 for a couple reps all day.

[John Ashbrook]

Couple reps on 380.

[Josh Holmes]

So my. I got three boys wrestling college, two in Oklahoma State, one right. The one at OU is a big boy. He's. He's. He walks around about 190ish. You know, he wrestles at 174. And he came home the other day and he's like, hey, Dad, I think I got you on bench because this big thing, right? I got you on bench. I was like, okay, son, you go do. Take off. He got, you know, he did which315 is my last set of reps. So I'll do reps of five with 315. And he, like, threw up for 315. He put on 335. And he was struggling with it. And I said, you tell me when you're done and I'll go. And I said, you picked the weight. He said, 365. And I just threw it up. He put, he said, put 385 on it. And I put 385 up twice. And he got so mad. But the last time I maxed is 405. I don't know if I still do that. I mean, that was, that was two years ago.

[Michael Duncan]

Don't hurt yourself.

[John Ashbrook]

Four plates on the side.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah. Now, going to. Who would surprise you on their strength? Seth Moulton shocks me. He has. I mean, I don't have big legs. It's genetically just not part of. It's not that I don't squat.

[John Ashbrook]

Not.

[Josh Holmes]

I don't do deadlifts. I do it all. There's not a dead. I don't ever skip. Yeah, I don't ever skip leg day. In fact, I throw in legs every single day. But Seth has skinnier legs than I do. I mean, his calves would make tweety Birds legs look big. Right? But the guy's super strong in his legs. I mean, crazy, crazy strong in his legs. Totally not. Not what you think. Josh Gunheimer is pretty strong, but he has very short distance to travel with his arms. So I make sure I point that out. But he's pretty strong and he can throw up a couple plates. Bruce Westerman. Okay, now, Bruce Westerman is a guy and I get. He's a very close friend of mine. We've been friends since he showed up. Arkansas guy, obviously. He's been in the house multiple times. You know, he's just. My wife loves his family. And Bruce is this unassuming guy that when he told me he played for U of A football, I was like, cute. You didn't play for U of A. You fetch water.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

He's like, no. I mean, I wasn't actually a starter, but I got in the game quite a bit. His son, by the way, he has a son playing college ball right now too. And. And he's athletic is all, get out. He's quick. He has some of the quick explosions on his feet. He's the guy that pushes me when we're doing. We're doing yo yos or we're doing box jumps or we're doing. We're doing frog jumps or whatever. And then even when he's doing curls and stuff like that, the guy is very athletic. He is very. He's. He's the most deceptive build of anybody. You see, he's that guy that you walk into and if you saw him at a bar and he was mouthing, you'd be like, whatever, man. Yeah, I could take him and then he would whip the crap out of you. Yeah, that's Bruce. Watch.

[Michael Duncan]

I feel like guys like that sometimes run their mouth on purpose because they know.

[Josh Holmes]

But Bruce doesn't. He says it's quiet. He doesn't ever say, I give people, like a sweater. Right. If you're in my workout group, I'm giving you a hard time. I promise you.

[Michael Duncan]

Well, I'm gonna show up and we're gonna wrestle one day.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah.

[Michael Duncan]

And I'm gonna wear this sweater.

[Josh Holmes]

That'd be cute, too. I mean, by the way, your ears look great. I mean, you didn't. They don't look trashed at all.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah, no, I mean, you gotta wear the headgear, but if you look real close at me, you'll notice this earlobe is up higher than this one.

[Josh Holmes]

I have no intention of looking at. Well.

[Michael Duncan]

And that's. It's from being a right leg lead. And this year.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, I got that. My true story about my ears. My ears used to be like this. I mean, I had. I got cauliflower in the back of the ears. Had them in the front. And my wife, you know, love her. We've been together since third grade. She's just, you know, she's put up with me. She's the reason why I'm not in prison, probably.

[John Ashbrook]

Good woman.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah. Why she put us with me is. I don't know. You know, I'd like to point out that my wife has faults. You know, to be honest with you, her only fault was she picked me. I know that sounds really. I'm not trying to just suck up. I'm just telling you, she's just way better than me.

[John Ashbrook]

I can relate.

[Josh Holmes]

But she's brutally honest. And she goes, hey, your nose is bad enough. Could you at least do something? Ears. So this is when I was done fighting. You know, I was competing internationally in jiu jitsu and stuff. But I wasn't. I wasn't fighting anymore. And I looked at her, I was like, are you serious? She's like, yeah. So I went to just a country doctor. His name was Dr. Jim Coder. He's passed away now, but he was this guy that his role was, if it's under five stitches, don't even ask me to numb you, huh? He'd just sew it up, right? And he'd been my doctor since I was a little boy. And so that was just the way he was. He says, you know, all that is is blood collected in there. He says, I think I could scrape that out and just scrape the blood out of it. I mean, it's just dead blood. It's just, you know, I can. I can. I can get it. And I was like, okay. Well, so he numb my ear, which. My ears are numb anyways. It didn't matter. So I had, like, zero filling in my ears. I don't ever wear Anything around my ears because they'd be frostbite by the time I knew they were cold and. And he just started cutting on them. The sound was ridiculous. It was like. It was the worst sound you can ever say.

[Michael Duncan]

I bet.

[Josh Holmes]

And. And then he wrapped my head and I. He said, leave it like that for three days. All right, fine. And I had left it on there for three days. I unwrapped it. I didn't realize how much I couldn't hear. Just take your ears and pull them forward like this. Right. It's an echo chamber. I mean, when they. When he pinned my ears back and got all the cauliflower lease out of the back. I still have it, you know, some in the side, but I could not believe.

[Michael Duncan]

Now you got surround sound.

[Cash Patel]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

You've ever seen. You ever seen that movie Wild Hogs? Is it Wild Hogs?

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Michael Duncan]

The motorcycle, you know, the twins.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah. The one of them has his ear, you know, that's all that's gone. And he always talks to him. Talks about him on that side. And then he messed up one time. That's what I was like. I was like, guys, I can hear you now. You can't talk about my back anymore. I can hear you.

[Michael Duncan]

Oh, man, that's awesome. So you've also done our favorite thing here at the Ruthless variety program. You've brought tribute. These wonderful mugs. These are from Mullen Ranch. You know, I'm like a walking billboard for y'all. Like the hat you guys gave us. It's incredible. I love that thing. Blue and it's got that leather.

[Josh Holmes]

Send me your address. I'll send. I'll. I'll send you guys a vest.

[Michael Duncan]

Oh, I have a vest.

[Josh Holmes]

Oh, you do?

[Michael Duncan]

I have the black vest with the. Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

Did you get your vest, too?

[John Ashbrook]

I got it.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I wear a vest. Wear the vest all the time. Those mugs. So my wife is a big gift giver. I'm. I'm not. You're right. That's not my act. Was your. What's it called? Acts of service. You know, the love languages. The gifts is not mine, but she just. She. If you come to my office at my house, you're going to leave with a gift.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

You come to the ranch, you're going to leave with a gift. And she designs them and she just. And she. And I use them. You'll. You. I promise you, if you drink coffee, those are some of the best mugs you'll drink out of.

[John Ashbrook]

Well, they're big enough to hold the Coffee that we're going to need to keep up with President Trump over the.

[Josh Holmes]

Next couple of months.

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

And I gave up caffeine four years ago, so I'm in a mess.

[John Ashbrook]

But I'm glad you mentioned your ranch. Just real quickly, your home, your ranch, because I know there's a very, very important nominee who has been there from time to time. Tulsi Gabbard.

[Josh Holmes]

Yes.

[John Ashbrook]

Somebody you've got a great relationship with. And I wonder if you could talk about her chances to. To get over the finish line.

[Josh Holmes]

You know, I think all the nominees will get there. Tulsi is. Is my sister. She'll call me her brother. Her. Her husband Abraham is a remarkable guy. Just love the guy. I joke and say I have a man crush on him. The first time I ever met him, he. We were. We were surfing. I wasn't surfing. I'm not a surfer. I try. I get in the water, I fall. Okay.

[John Ashbrook]

He.

[Josh Holmes]

But he came out of the water and we're in. We're in Hawaii. And he has long hair and he shakes it. And I was like, that's like out of a movie. I mean, I'm not attracted to guys, but that was kind of cool, you know? And so from that point on, we just had a very good relationship. But Tulsi and I became friends because we came in as a freshman and she got to know my wife, she got to know my kids. My daughter wanted to go live with her in Hawaii. I mean, that was like, her goal to see Tulsi's development over the years. The way she has a backbone from day one, standing up to Pelosi, to making a conscious decision after the way she was treated in her presidential bid and in 2020, to saying, you know, the way that they had set that up for. I guess it wasn't 20. Was it 2017? What year was that she ran for president?

[Michael Duncan]

That was 2020.

[Josh Holmes]

The way that she had a fight, you know, every step of the way. And the way they basically set it up for Biden to be. Oh, yeah, you know, the nominee.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah. And they were calling her Putin's puppet and stuff. The same playbook they ran on Bernie in 2016.

[Josh Holmes]

Same blame book they ran on.

[Cash Patel]

On Trump.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, yeah. On anybody that disagrees on you, you're racist or you're a socialist or, you know, whatever. Domestic terrorist.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

So Tulsi, people didn't know her like I did and hadn't got to know her because she's a. No, nonsense. She's very funny, but she's a no nonsense. Very mission driven individual. So when you first meet her, you don't really know she has a personality. You get her out of politics and you get her out on the ranch or you get her out in the water. You know, she has a much different personality. But when she's on, she, she's on and it can be intimidating about it when every time I hear people sit down and talk to her, they always, they always call me back and say, wow, that's a great meeting. You know, the people are concerned about the Assad meeting with Syria. Right. I get asked that question, you know, what about. What about that? That was a big. What was that all about? You know, it was a bad situation that happened. Wasn't by design. It just happened. And then for people to say that she's compromised. She was a captain in the United States army when that happened. She's now a lieutenant colonel in the United States army and she's running the reserve units in Missouri and Oklahoma, which is why her and her husband are at her house all the time, because she makes rotations in every three weeks. I think if she was compromised, probably wouldn't been promoted twice. And definitely running our reserve units. And the readiness that she's over the readiness and over fires down at Fort Sill. You know, she knows what she's doing and it's interesting on how people, when they get to know her, see her. So I think, I think they're going to. Going to confirm her. I think Cash is going to get confirmed. I mean, I doubt if we get Democrat votes on Cash. You may see someone crossover like Fetterman or somebody with, with Tulsi Pete Hegseth will. It'll be tough for him to get anybody. And who knows, you know, Fetterman once again may come over. Somebody else may come over. You. You're going to see, you know, Chairman Cassidy has some concerns about Bobby, but the meeting today went really good with Bobby Kennedy.

[John Ashbrook]

Good to hear.

[Josh Holmes]

When you get to know Bobby. I had the privilege of getting to know him on the campaign trail. That's somebody you need to have in here.

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah. Serious.

[Josh Holmes]

He is funny.

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

And he can tell the best Irish jokes of anybody. It is. He is hilarious. And you're talking about a life.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

You look at this guy as being, well, he's a Kennedy. This guy worked on a dude ranch. He ran away from home when he was a teenager. He openly admits that he's had, you know, drug problems. He still goes to. He goes to AA meetings or whatever type of meetings every day. No matter where he's at, he says, I never miss unless I'm on my deathbed. I go wherever I'm at, I find a meeting. It's part of my sobriety. And he's been cleaning sober for decades. Right. I think he's been cleaning sober for 30 years or something like that, maybe 40 years, I don't remember. But it's been a long time. And he's just honest and open about that. When he starts talking about vaccinations, this guy is smart and whip smart, and people sat down and talked to him. And it's not a feeling, it's not an emotion for him. He's not just pulling this out. The guy has real questions and he's not dug in on like people say he is. He has real questions. Science should be questioned. And when he's asking the questions, he's not asking it from an uneducated perspective. There's probably, I bet you there's not doctors that has read more and studied more and had more meetings on these different types of vaccinations of what we're giving and meetings from all over the world than he has.

[Michael Duncan]

A lot of.

[John Ashbrook]

A lot of people in this country have questions and they love the fact that somebody is asking them. You know, it's not just, hey, shut up, and you sit down there and take it. You. You have somebody actually asking the question.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah. And if there's anything we could learn out of COVID and, you know, silencing of dissent and everything that happened, my.

[Josh Holmes]

Mom had, and the vaccine and the booster and the second or the third shot. Right. She's had multiple strokes since then. Now, strokes don't exactly run in our family, and the doctors don't understand what's causing it. Well, you go back and you look at the shots, it does cause strokes in some people. I don't even think you can abate that now. Right. But the questions that he's bringing up are legit questions. I have questions about it. I mean, why does my son or my daughters at 2 years old look like a pin cushion when they come out of their doctor's appointment? Why do they have to do it again at 5 and 6 and at 12 and 16? I mean, my daughter just had to go through another round of shots, and I hate it because. But she competes for USA Wrestling and she's required to compete, to be able to travel to have those shots. I don't like it, but it does ask questions. When he brings up the fact that when he was a child that it was 1 in 10,000 individuals had autism. Today it's 1 in 32, I think and 1 in 27 males. Those last numbers may be different, but it is 20s and 30s. So don't quote me exactly on that but I think is what he said. It was 20, 32. One in 32 children show some sign of autism after two years old. When do you get your shots? Right. One in 27. I think it's males. Males are a lot more to this have signs of autism at the age of two or three. Now why we're the only developed world that has that and the only person that's close to that is Ireland. And they have similar. And they're not even close but someone that has high numbers and they have similar vaccination rates that we have. The only population in the United States that doesn't have. They have zero cases of all times of autism is the Amish. And actually they have two cases and the only two cases were children that were adopted after their shots.

[John Ashbrook]

Oh, interesting.

[Josh Holmes]

Isn't that interesting? So why wouldn't you ask the question?

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah, why wouldn't you ask the question? Why wouldn't somebody try to get to the bottom of it?

[Josh Holmes]

And I'm not an anti vaxxer. Don't. Like I said, my kids are all vaccinated. But I think we should ask the questions. And one other thing that you go down this rabbit trail that Bobby, I've learned all this from Bobby, just talking to him. Right? Bobby. He said, he said when you ask for. Because they say that it's been studied but when you ask for a specific study on autism from any of the shots. Specific study on autism. I've never got one of them. They refer to their study that they got by the FDA from approval to give the shots to sell it. You know the process. That's what they refer to. But specifically targeting autism. He said you can't get it. So we asked the request for it. Can you show me? Because the reporters always say this, right? But it's already been proven. It's already been proven that it's already been tested. And I was like, well I don't think it has. I think it's been approved by the fda, but I don't think it was actually. I don't think the study specifically for autism has been done. And so you go back through and you ask for that specific study for the vaccinations. We haven't, we've got zero response from it. I'm not saying they may have them now. I don't know. But we have got.

[Michael Duncan]

They're important questions. And it's not just Bobby. I mean, you know, Hegseth a lot of questions about how we run the Pentagon better.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah.

[Michael Duncan]

I don't know. You know, why everybody's concerned with all of this, you know, media buzz around his nomination. And meanwhile, the. The Department of Defense fails seven audits and nobody seems to care.

[Josh Holmes]

And Secretary Austin's done a great job. Right. I mean, why would. What's the definition of insanity?

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah. Doing the same thing.

[Josh Holmes]

But evidently that's what. That's what Washington D.C. wants. They want somebody back in there. Like Secretary Curiosity are going, okay, recruiting numbers are down. By the way, I was quoted on this. I said, recruiting numbers down. DOD responded back to me and said. Because I did it on a national show, and they said our recruiting numbers are hitting targets. I was like, okay, that's not you. But lower. Yeah.

[Michael Duncan]

What are the targets?

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah. Well, we know because I said on Senator Armed Services. Right. And I was like, okay, that's not factual because you've lowered your recruiting numbers to hit those. The only exception to that is the Marines. The Marines always set their numbers. They're just. They're good at recruiting. They're everywhere. Right. But you have low morale where you have a Secretary of Navy that is bragging about the fight he's having with the Houthis in the Strait. And it said it's the greatest. It's the biggest sea war that they've had since World War II. And I'm like, they don't have a Navy. How is that successful?

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

There are people shooting rockets on the land, and you're calling it the great. This is what he said in a hearing. Right. You have people like that running our military, and you're like, why wouldn't you want to just change it up? And that's what the President represents. That's what the American people wanted. They want change. President Trump completely fills that bill. And everybody. He's putting it in, from Pete Hegseth to Tulsi Gabbard to Cash Patel to Bobby Kennedy, and the list goes on. They're all individuals that can usher in that change that the American people want.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

And I want it, too.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah, no, it's great. I hope we can get all of them confirmed and we can get onto this agenda and getting it passed. Senator Mark Moen Mullen, thank you so much for joining us. Really appreciate it.

[Josh Holmes]

And you can keep the sweater. You don't have to send it to me.

[John Ashbrook]

Thanks.

[Josh Holmes]

I do like that. Three Quarters. I could rock that.

[John Ashbrook]

Thank you very much.

[Josh Holmes]

Listen, thanks for having me on. I always love being on your show. You ever want me back, just let me know.

[Michael Duncan]

Absolutely.

[John Ashbrook]

Anytime. I love when you come on.

[Josh Holmes]

All right. Thanks guys.

[John Ashbrook]

Thank you.

[Michael Duncan]

Thank you, man.

[John Ashbrook]

I love when that guy comes on our program. He is such a good dude. Genuine, genuine person. And I mean, I can't wait to have him back.

[Michael Duncan]

He gave me a lot of shit about my sweater. He will. He didn't like the American flag.

[Cash Patel]

It is a good sweat. This is a good sweater. Yeah, we like your sweater.

[Michael Duncan]

Well, I mean, you only get so many cold days here in Washington D.C. you got to pull the sweaters out.

[John Ashbrook]

Very funny.

[Michael Duncan]

Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. So fellas, great episode. Good to have you. McDaniel.

[Cash Patel]

Thank you. I think we probably should just as sort of. The news is coming out, I think from all of us on the program. If you are in being affected by these wildfires. We are. Our hearts do go out to you. Obviously.

[Matt McDaniel]

Horrific.

[Michael Duncan]

Absolutely.

[Cash Patel]

We are watching it all the videos.

[Michael Duncan]

We'Re seeing and we're hoping, you know, once we know more about that here in the coming days, we'll talk about it more fulsome way. But other than that, I think it's a banger.

[Matt McDaniel]

I think so. Absolute banger of an episode. Gentlemen, thank you Senator Mark Wayne Mullen and thank you to the Minions. Again. Remember, if you have not yet subscribed, remember to do that and let your friends know to get in on the fun. So until next time, Minions, keep the faith, hold the line and own the libs. We'll see on Tuesday.

[Josh Holmes]

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[Michael Duncan]

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[Josh Holmes]

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[H]

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