← The 47 Morning Update with Ben Ferguson
The 47 Morning Update with Ben Ferguson
What Dark Money is Funding the Anti-Israel College Protests, plus NPR's New Rabid Partisan CEO, who vocally OPPOSES the 1st Amendment
00:41:42
Loading summary
Transcript44 lines
- [00:01]
Nutrafol Representative
Hair thinning can happen for so many reasons, whether it's stress or hormones or anything. At Nutrafol, we've learned that real change starts below the surface.
- [00:12]
Ben Ferguson
Our hair growth supplements take a whole.
- [00:14]
Nutrafol Representative
Body approach and target the key root causes of hair thinning. So you can see visibly thicker, stronger.
- [00:20]
Senator Ted Cruz
Hair in three to six months.
- [00:22]
Ben Ferguson
Hair growth starts from the inside.
- [00:24]
Senator Ted Cruz
@Nutrafol.Com that's n u t r a.
- [00:28]
F o l dot com welcome. It is Verdict with Senator Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you. And Senator, I think it's time that we do a really nice job exposing the left and the dark money that is funding all of these anti Israel protests across the country.
- [00:49]
Well, that's exactly right. We're more than a week into these rabid anti Israel, pro Hamas protests that we're seeing at college campuses across the country. And a question that keeps coming up is where is this money coming from? More than a few people have noticed. Gosh, these protesters all seem to have matching tents. The tents are brand new. Who's paying for them? There's clearly real money behind that. We're going to do a deep dive into that.
- [01:14]
Yeah. You're not trying to hide it by the way, when the 10 smash.
- [01:16]
Yeah, there's no, there's no subtlety. It's like wearing matching uniforms. It's clear somebody paid for them. That's that that's happening. On top of that, we're going to do a deep dive into npr. NPR has a new CEO. NPR is supposed to be National Public Radio. It is funded in significant part by your and my tax dollars. And yet their new CEO is a hard left partisan activist. She has no pretense of being impartial, of being unbiased. She is a leftist, a proud, unabashed leftist. We're going to go into her record as well.
- [01:51]
Want to tell you real quick about a cool note I got from one of you guys and it said, ben, I'd heard you talk about Patriot Mobile. And then I did some digging and I found out that you really weren't joking about how radical Big Mobile has gotten in supporting Democratic causes and candidates. But I didn't switch because I've switched before and it took forever. And then finally I actually had enough with my cell phone carrier and I switched. And you were right. It is now really easy with technology. Yes, switching your cell phone provider is not hard like it used to be. And if you are sick and tired of the left, then stop funding them. Well, when you pay your bill to Big Mobile, there's A very good chance you're supporting Democratic causes, candidates, organizations that include Planned Parenthood. That's why I switched to Patriot Mobile and it's why I want you to switch as well. Because when you do 5% of your bill every month on average without it costing you any more money, actually goes back to support conservative causes. Like those causes that support our first and second amendment rights and the rights of unborn children. They also do an incredible job supporting our military veterans, our wounded warriors, our first responders, and those that have given the ultimate sacrifice protecting, defending this country. That's another reason why I'm with Patriot Mobile. I'm tired of my money being used against my family values. So join me. Switching is easy and I'm going to give you free activation as well. Call patriot mobile right now. 972patriot that's 972patriot or patriotmobile.com verdict that's patriot mobile.com verdict or 972patriot promo code verdict and you'll get free activation. Senator, when you look at all of these protests and you mentioned the matching tents, it's kind of hilarious. They're not even trying to hide it. This is exactly what we saw with Black Lives Matter as well. It seems that anytime we now have really well organized, whether it's shutting down the Golden Gate Bridge, the Memphis bridge or the New York bridge, it seems like it's orchestrated and now we're seeing these sit ins and these tent cities that are popping up. It's almost like a Black Lives Matter 2.0 playbook here. And it's coming from dark money groups that are funding bail, they're funding the legal support for any and every anti Israel agitator that's willing to come out and do this.
- [04:16]
Well, that's exactly right. There's clearly significant money that are funding these. As we noted a minute ago, their tents match, their tarps match, they come in fully provisioned. And we see them, you know, we're seeing at universities, it's not just students, it's not just spontaneous, they're outside agitators who are treating it as a job. So what do we know? Well, there was an article that came out this week in News Nation that says begins with the following. Columbia University is warning of potential outside agitators as students hold continued protests calling for a ceasefire in Gaza and a divestment from Israel. And it explains that the demand has its root in the BDS movement, the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, which has been going on for, for decades, attacking Israel. And if you look, there are several organizations who are funding this movement. On, on Tuesday night, one group that was called Within Our Lifetime held a protest outside the walls of Columbia calling for resistance, quote, by any means necessary. They were chanting Colombia. You will see, we are all SJP Columbia. You will learn, refugees will return. And if you look at Within Our Lifetime is one of what News nations describes as a, quote, vast network of organizations that have coordinated protests that have blocked highways, delayed trains and shut down parts of college campuses across the country for the past few months. And it's led, but it's a New York City based organization. It's led by an individual named Nirdin Kiswani, who's a 29 year old who founded the group nearly a decade ago. And if you look at what Kiswani says, he says, quote, I just support the Palestinian people as a whole and I believe that we have a right to resist. And if, if they're mad at it, they can talk to Biden, they can talk to the Secretary of State, they can talk to elected officials who keep funding wars abroad, who keep funding death and killing on our name with our tax dollars. And the group claims to not be directly associated with the protest on college campuses. They're intertwined with other organizations. One of the organizations is Students for Justice in Palestine, that's sjp, Jewish Voice for Peace, that's jvp, the Palestinian Youth Movement, that's pym, and the American Muslims for Palestine, that's AMP and, and, and these are part of the, of the whole network of anti Israel, anti Zionist, anti Semitic groups across the country. And, and several of the pro Palestinian organizations don't have public tax filings. NBC did an investigation Within Our Lifetime does not have any public tax filings. Instead what they use is a group based in New York. It's a nonprofit group called the Westchester People's Action Coalition foundation, westpac. And it's their fiscal sponsor to collect and process online donations. And tax laws allows them to be a 5oC3 status organization and they can collect money. We don't know for sure who's funding them. It's dark money. This is by design. This is to hide it. We do know one of the groups, if not now, has received $100,000 in the past five years from the Rockefellers Brothers Fund. We also, and that organization stated goal is quote, to end US support for Israel's apartheid system. The fund has also awarded nearly a half billion dollars to the Jewish Voice for Peace, another Palestinian rights organization. And what we're seeing Is. Well, here are the comments of Jonathan Schanzer, he's a former Treasury Department official who says that the organizing parties are cultivated by potentially dangerous groups. Here's the quote, quote, they're extremely organized. There are a lot of the Islamist leaning groups that I think many of us have come to expect here. They are not spontaneous, they are not necessarily organic. They are cultivated by groups that have an ax to grind. And in particular, Chancer called for more aggressive investigation of the ties between the pro Palestinian groups and terrorist organizations. He called for this in testimony to Congress. Here's what he said. Quote, individuals who have previously worked for Hamas charities are now a driving force behind the large pro Hamas demonstrations taking place in major cities across America. And in particular, he pointed to an individual named Hatam Bazian who is a lecturer at the University of California, Berkeley as an example. And Bozian founded the national branch of SJP to, to promote campus based activism. And later he launched amp. And Shanzer claimed that Bozian and his organizations are a part of a network that, quote, is providing training, talking points, materials and financial support to students intimidating and threatening Jewish and pro Israel students on college campuses.
- [09:40]
You put all that together and you see it, Senator, and it's like, this is pretty obvious. This is something that I think should probably be at some point investigated. In fact, Newsweek has a headline just now and it says, police investigating people behind the pro Palestinian protests. And that is something that I'm kind of shocked it took this long. But officials, quote, with the New York Police Department said that their department is looking to who may be behind the pro Palestinian protests that have rocked two universities in Manhattan in recent days. Several dozen demonstrators were arrested by police Monday night after students set up a pro Palestinian encampment on New York University's campus. The demonstration, which started around 50 individuals, know the Stern School of Business grew to hundreds of protesters before arrests were made. Spokesman from the university said that it believed many of the individuals who joined the rally, including some who breached barriers established by campus safety officers, were not affiliated with nyu. Therefore, they're now saying they are going to investigate it. I mean, this to me is a captain obvious, no brainer. Of course you should be investigating this.
- [10:48]
Of course you are. And I have zero confidence the Biden Department of Justice will investigate. I have zero confidence the Biden FBI will investigate. Why? Because as we've discussed at great length, the Biden DOJ and FBI have been thoroughly politicized and weaponized. And the people funding these anti Semitic protests are leftists. They are leftists who right now more and more are the base of the Democrat Party. They're funding the Democrat Party in significant respects. They are the radicals, they are the AOCs. They are the people who are chanting in Dearborn, Michigan, death to America and Death to Israel. And so the Biden DOJ doesn't want to know. They want to plunge their head into the sand like an ostrich and say, do not tell us. We do not care who's funding it. It is not our concern. And let me point out a there are a bunch of leftists, there are a bunch of Marxists, there are a bunch of communists who hate America, who are funding this, I believe, because they hate America, because they hate Israel. And I will point out those who hate Israel hate America. There is an overlap. One of the many reasons it is in America's national security interest to support Israel is the enemies of Israel are the enemies of America. There's a reason the Ayatollah chants Death to America and Death to Israel. The two are interconnected. But there's also a very real risk. And I just, just, just noted the congressional testimony laying this out that these anti American, anti Israel protests are literally being funded by our enemies, are being funded by Hamas, are being funded by Hezbollah or being, are being funded by Iran or the financial sponsors of Hamas and Hezbollah. And, and again, we see zero interest on the part of the Department of Justice to investigate whether those who support actual terrorists are funding the protests in support of the actual terrorists. And mind you, we play this.
- [12:34]
What does the law then say? Because this is the frustrating part. You look at this was on Good Day New York on Tuesday. The New York Police Deputy Commissioner of Operations suggested that law enforcement was looking into both instances for signs that the same individuals may be instigating the protest, adding that he believes some could be funding this quote unquote. In his words, he said, look at the tents, what you said earlier, they all were the same color, they were all the same type of tents, the same ones that we saw at nyu, the same ones that we see in Colombia. To me, I think somebody's funding this. He added that professional agitators have also joined the student led protests who are just looking for something to be. And I think he was trying to use calm words, agitated, somebody's behind this and we're going to find out who it is. But if you're writing this check, Senator, whether it's Soros Group, whether it's coming in from corporations, whether it's coming in from overseas, it seems like they're operating under the idea that hey, we've got a one degree of separation here. We're just given the money and whatever choose for. That's not us.
- [13:37]
Yeah, look, I mean, I mean that's right. I mean, I mean I've talked about before that for three months I've had every Saturday morning at 7am anti Israel, pro Hamas protesters show up at my house and it's the same 15 people, ironically now I don't know exactly what they look like cuz they all wear masks because as we've seen on campuses, these anti Israel and anti American zealots are also cowards and they want to hide their face. They're not actually willing to show who they are. But from the appearances, the people at my house, if there are any Palestinians among them, I'd be surprised. They look like a bunch of Hispanic and white liberals who are showing up. But what's interesting is they show up every Saturday at 7amthey leave about 8am they show up, they have the same cowbells, they have the same whistles, they're screaming, they're waking children up, they're disturbing the neighbors. But they show up like a job that there is a regularity to it, that I'm convinced somebody is paying them to do this, that it's not spontaneous, it's not driven by external events. It is, it is our job to show up and chant. And by the way, look, A, there is a risk that it is foreign actors who hate America and hate Israel. But B, there is also the very real likelihood that it is local players, anti American zealots. And the obvious one in particular is George Soros. And I want to point you to an article that Fox News published on April 16 called Left Wing Dark money Group funds Bail Legal support for anti Israel Agitators Blocking traffic. And what Fox News reported was quote, a left wing dark money group funded by billionaire George Soros will provide bail and legal support for anti Israel activists arrested after blocking major roads and highways nationwide this week according to an online fundraiser. And the demonstrations were largely organized by A15 Action, a recently created group that said it would quote create coordinate a multi city economic blockade on April 15 in solidarity with Palestine. And under the group's quote Resources section on its website there is a quote bail and legal defense fund hosted by Act Blue. Now understand Act Blue is the leading fundraising platform for Democrat candidates nationwide. It raises billions of dollars for Democrat candidates running across the country. Act Blue is essentially an extension of the Democrat party and it is Act Blue that is raising money for the Bail and Legal Defense Fund to bail out anti Israel pro Hamas protesters who have been arrested. And the threshold to being arrested is is pretty high, particularly in blue jurisdictions. And according to the website, the contributions, quote, will benefit Community Justice Exchange, which is a project of the Tide center that is funded by George Soros. And the fundraising page continues, quote, donate here to support community members who are criminalized in the US for their solidarity with Palestine. And it goes on to say, quote, should the actions of the state result in the need for it, these funds will be used for bail, legal defense and support for defendants. And the Community Justice Exchange describes its mission as to provide, quote, money, bail, court fees and fines to community based organizations across the country that are experimenting with bottoms up interventions that contest the current operation and function of the criminal, legal and immigration detention system. So bottoms up interventions, that's a euphemism for riots, for angry disruptive protests. And to give you a sense of the volume, in November it was revealed that the Soros backed Open Society Policy center had given $13.7 million through the Tide center to groups that have expressed support for Hamas or have justified attacks on Israel with with over 15 million donated since 2016.
- [17:53]
That's incredible. And yet they're basically aiding, embedding and advocating for people to break the law and advocating for them to get arrested. And this is all apparently still legal. Welcome to where we are in this country right now. Want to tell you real quick about my friends over at chalk. The 2024 election is upon us and the war on masculinity in America today is, well, more blatant than ever. And I want you to know that now is the time to choose strength and vitality over weakness and complacency. The problem is men's testosterone levels are off a cliff historically. They're now at an all time low. And isn't that what the liberal elites really want? A weak and docile underclass? Well, thankfully my good friends, the patriots at Chalk Choq are here to help real American men take back your right to proudly maximize your masculinity by boosting testosterone levels up to 20 over 90 days. Look, when I had 40, things just change. And I can tell you, I've been taking now chalk for over a year. It works. Manufactured right here in the US Of A. Chalk's natural herbal supplements are clinically proven to have game changing effects on your energy, your focus and your mood. So if you're sick and tired of just feeling tired, get back what you may have lost with low Testosterone. Maximize your masculinity today@chalk choq.com use the code verdict for a massive discount on any subscription for life. That's choq.com promo code verdict for lifetime savings on any subscription. Limited time offer. Subscriptions are cancelable at any time. One other question, Senator, I want to ask, and this goes back to the people that are running these universities that are allowing this anti Semitism to continue to grow. One of your friends in the House, Speaker Johnson, he went to Colombia and actually called for the Colombia president to resign. Here is what he had to say.
- [19:52]
Speaker Mike Johnson
Let me say this very simply. No American of any color or creed should ever have to live under those kinds of threats. That is not who we are in this country. Sadly, Colombia's administrators have chosen to let the threats, the fear and the intimidation of the mob rule to overtake American principles like free speech and the free, free exchange of ideas and the free exercise of religion. They have co opted First Amendment arguments to protect genocide and to elevate the voices of anti Semitism. They have proven themselves to be incapable of achieving their basic responsibility, which is keeping students safe. We just can't allow this kind of hatred and anti Semitism to flourish on our campuses. And it must be stopped in its tracks. Those who are perpetrating this violence should be arrested. And I'm here today. I am here today joining my colleagues and calling on President Shafik to resign if she cannot immediately bring order to this chaos. As speaker of the House, I am committing today that the Congress will not be silent as Jewish students are expected to run for their lives and stay home from their classes, hiding in fear in the House of Representatives. We've already acted to address anti Semitism on campuses. We have passed a number of statutes to address this matter and we call upon the U.S. senate to act upon our legislation.
- [21:20]
Senator Ted Cruz
He obviously came in with a game plan. And it's sad that the President of the United States of America isn't saying exactly what Speaker Johnson said. Immediately the media attacked him and other people that went to Columbia saying, oh, this was just a PR stunt, the publicity stunt. They don't really care about what's happening on campus as they saw an opportunity here. I couldn't disagree with that more, but I'm glad that we have conservatives that are saying enough is enough.
- [21:46]
Yeah, no, it was exactly the right thing to do. Joe Biden lacks the courage or conviction to do the same thing. And in fact, he's terrified to confront these radicals because more and more they're the base of the Democrat Party. I'll tell you, yesterday aoc, in response to the speaker of the House and several House Republicans going to Colombia, she tweeted out, let me quote her tweet. Quote, several here, like Representatives Lawlor and Desposito, are vulnerable New York Republicans in tight seats. They have played a key role drumming up pressure to crack down on students and asymmetrically police Palestinian human rights speech. Those campus hearings GOP led, they need to lose. And so I tweeted out in response, I retweeted her and I said, understand AOC explicitly supports the anti Semitic mobs threatening Jewish students at Columbia, Yale and nyu. But it's not just her. Joe Biden stood next to her as she praised their hateful conduct. The entire Democrat Party is terrified of their radical anti Israel base. And I'll tell you, AOC actually sent out another tweet and here's what she said. She said, quote, not only did Columbia make the horrific decision to mobilize NYPD on their own students, but the unions call the units called in have some of the most violent reputations on the force. NYPD had promised the city they wouldn't deploy SRG to protests. So why are these counterterrorism units here? And, and again, I responded to that and said between law enforcement and pro Hamas protesters who threaten Jewish students, tragically Democrats side with the anti Semites. That is the reality. But it's not just aoc. It's not just the squad. It is where Joe Biden is. It is where Chuck Schumer is. It is where Nancy Pelosi is. It is where the leadership of the Democrat Party is today. Now, taxes is 100% free when you file in the TurboTax app. If you didn't file with us last year. Oh, yeah, yeah. Just do your own taxes in the app by 2:18.
- [23:58]
Ben Ferguson
What if I have lots of forms.
- [24:00]
Senator Ted Cruz
All good, all 100% free. What if I had three jobs still 100% free. What if I once saw Bigfoot? That has nothing to do with taxes. So still 100% free. That's what I'm talking about. Now this is taxes. See if you qualify in the TurboTax app excludes TurboTax Live must start and file an app by 218.
- [24:20]
We talked about the media giving them cover. I expect some in the media to be liberal hacks. Right? But this brings up a big issue that we need to talk about with npr. The new CEO of NPR is someone that is paid by us taxpayers and someone who has described the First Amendment as The number one challenge she faces, our tax dollars are going to a CEO who's running npr, National Public Radio, saying the First Amendment really seems to get in her way. Really. That's where our money is going.
- [24:57]
Well, unfortunately, NPR has been profoundly corrupted and it's been made worse by hiring a CEO who is a brazen, blatant, unapologetic, radical leftist. And she doesn't pretend to be unbiased at all. Now we discussed in a previous podcast a couple of weeks ago the the Bombshell report from Yuri Berliner. Yuri Berliner was a 25 year NPR employee and was the former business editor of NPR. And he wrote an April 9th essay in the Free Press which resulted in NPR suspending him for publishing. How's that for free speech? If you criticize us, you're out of here.
- [25:37]
Yeah, you're gone.
- [25:38]
And ultimately led to his resignation. So he's gone. This essay cost him his job. But he laid out the incredible bias in NPR and the shift in NPR. So for example, he laid out in 2011, which was not that long ago, NPR's audience was 26% conservative, 23% middle of the road and 37% liberal. So it leaned left, but not dramatically so. By 2023, those numbers had shifted dramatically. It was now instead of 37% liberal, it was 67% liberal. And instead of 26% conservative, it was only 11% conservative. And Mr. Berliner laid out details of how they would stifle stories that were inconvenient to liberals. They would amplify stories like the Russia collusion story, even if they were not supported by the facts. He outlined at great length how NPR had no interest in being impartial, being unbiased. And then you take in the wake of this, in the wake of what should be real concern of, hey, we're National Public Radio, we're supposed to be nonpartisan. We're supposed to be down the middle. Now look, I for one have, have serious doubts why the taxpayer should fund any radio station. I think there are plenty of for profit radio stations. I don't know why the government should coercively tax you to pay for yet another radio station. But I'll tell you what, even if there's an argument they should do so for generic news, that somehow there's not a market demand for. There is no argument I know of that they should do so only for left wing propaganda. And the newly appointed CEO, Katherine Maher has been a hard partisan her whole life. So for example, in 2020, Mar referred to President Donald Trump as a, quote, deranged, racist sociopath. Well, then I'm confident her coverage of, of Donald Trump will be fair. As long as she introduces him as a deranged, racist sociopath, he's covered.
- [27:49]
How do you even get that job? And I'm being serious. If you're National Public Radio, how do, how does that automatically disqualify you from that position as soon as they see that quote?
- [28:01]
Yeah, and by the way, that that's not an outlier. In 2021, she celebrated Trump's banishment from social media, referring to him as a fascist. So she loves censorship. Okay. The former President of the United States elected by the American people. I'm thrilled that he's being silenced because I dislike his politics and I think he's a fascist. In May of 2020, right in the middle of the George Floyd riots, Mars suggested that looting represented a form of reparative justice for historic wrongs. And she remarked how white silence is tantamount to complicity and violence. She's also posted repeatedly in support of Democrat politicians, including Hillary Clinton, Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris, and Joe Biden. Now, listen, as a private citizen, she has a right to be an angry left wing radical and a hard Democrat partisan. But explain to me why on earth the American taxpayers should fund her partisan propaganda.
- [29:11]
Yeah, and yet that's exactly why she probably got the job, because they're like, oh, perfect, you're going to keep pushing this propaganda out there full speed ahead. Want to ask all of you listening right now to do me a favor real quick. I want you to place your hand over your heart if you can. Can you feel that? It's your heartbeat telling you that you are alive. It's the same for a preborn baby. Their heart begins to form at conception, and at just three weeks, it is already beating. At five weeks, a baby's heartbeat can be heard on an ultrasound. And that is why I am proud to say that I'm partnering with Preborn because we need to help those precious babies. Every day, Preborn's Network of Clinic rescues 200 babies from abortion. Why? Because when a mother with an unplanned pregnancy meets her baby on ultrasound and hears their baby's heartbeat, it is a divine encounter that doubles a baby's chance at life. By six weeks, eyes are forming. By 10 weeks, a baby is able to suck his or her own thumb. And for just $28, you can be the difference between life or death of that child. It is incredible, because what preborn does is they give the chance for A mother to hear the baby's heartbeat. Now all gifts are tax deductible. You can donate and you can donate easily. Just dial pound250 and say the keyword baby. That's pound250 and say the keyword baby. You can donate securely@preborn.com verdict as well. That's preborn.com verdict. Senator, if you are at NPR, can you imagine if you are lefty, a lefty, how much freedom I think it would make you feel like you had to then go out there and continue to push propaganda on the American people. If this is your CEO, I mean, it's a license to basically go all in on liberal propaganda at the taxpayers expense.
- [31:26]
Now that is exactly right. And I've got to say, listen, as you know, I'm the ranking member on the Senate Committee of Commerce, Science and Transportation. And part of my responsibility in that role, we've got jurisdiction over about 40% of the U.S. economy. And part of my responsibility is oversight. And I can tell you that I am actively engaging in oversight right now. Calling on NPR to explain, to explain why they're willing to put in place a hard left wing activist, not a neutral journalist, but someone who is biased, who is an active supporter of censorship, to violence, to silence the views she disagrees with. YNPR believes that that is an appropriate leader for their institution.
- [32:18]
Yeah, that's a really great point.
- [32:20]
And listen, don't necessarily take our word for it. I want you to listen to Kathryn Marr in her own words because it's going to show just how radical she is. And I want to play a couple clips. Let's start with her explaining that in her view the number one challenge that she faces is the First Amendment of the Constitution. Let's play that clip.
- [32:38]
Nutrafol Representative
The number one challenge here that we see is of course, the First Amendment in the United States is a fairly robust protection of rights. And, and that is a protection of rights both for platforms, which I actually think is very important, that platforms have those rights to be able to regulate what kind of content they want on their sites. But it also means that it is a little bit tricky to really address some of the real challenges of where does bad information come from and sort of the influence peddlers who have made a real market economy around it.
- [33:10]
Senator Ted Cruz
I mean, it's amazing. Senator, this is the woman running npr and I guess this is almost like the best thing you can put on your resume, right? You're like, hey, I think the First Amendment's a real problem. It's like perfect Perfect. We'd love to hire you at npr.
- [33:21]
Nutrafol Representative
Yeah.
- [33:21]
Senator Ted Cruz
And she actually says, well, the First Amendment is really important for platforms, but then what she describes as their First Amendment right is for their ability to censor and silence things they disagree with. So to her mind, what she cares about is the ability if there's a view that is right of center. As far as she's concerned, the First Amendment is all about silencing those views. There can be no dissent. All right, I want you to listen to another clip. This is a TED Talk where she's discussing truth when she was at Wikipedia, and somehow she has a different view of truth than I think you and I might have. Give a listen the hard things, the.
- [33:57]
Ben Ferguson
Places where we are prone to disagreement, say, politics and religion. Well, as it turns out, not only does Wikipedia's model work there, it actually works really well, because in our normal lives, these contentious conversations tend to erupt or a disagreement about what the truth actually is. But the people who write these articles, they're not focused on the truth. They're focused on something else, which is the best of what we can know right now. And after seven years of working with these brilliant folks, I've come to believe that they are onto something that perhaps for our most tricky disagreements, seeking the truth and seeking to convince others of the truth might not be the right place to start. In fact, our reverence for the truth might be a distraction that's getting in the way of finding common ground and getting things done. Now, that is not to say that the truth doesn't exist, nor is it to say that the truth isn't important. Clearly, the search for the truth has led us to do great things, to learn great things. But I think if I were to really ask you to think about this, one of the things that we could all acknowledge is that part of the reason we have such glorious chronicles to the human experience and all things forms of culture is because we acknowledge there are many different truths. And so in the spirit of that, I'm certain that the truth exists for you and probably for the person sitting next to you. But this may not be the same truth. This is because the truth of the matter is very often for many people, what happens when we merge facts about the world with our beliefs about the world world. So we all have different truths. They're based on things like where we come from, how we were raised, and how other people perceive us.
- [36:07]
Senator Ted Cruz
What utter garbage. Like every word of that. You want an indictment of the modern left? You want an indictment of the idiocy of media. You want an indictment of the academic world? You want an indictment of big tech? Good God, what utter garbage. Truth doesn't exist. George Orwell is spinning in his grave and laughing at the same time. Two plus two doesn't equal four. It equals five because we say it is. There is no truth. Listen to that quote. Our reverence for the truth might be a distraction that's getting in the way of finding common ground and getting things done. But don't worry, this is only for things that don't matter. The contentious issues. What does she identify? Politics and religion. When it comes to politics and religion, Look, Jesus Christ said, I am the way, the truth and the life. But no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Don't have reverence for truth. We're not interested in that. We are interested in set aside a truth that can be your truth, my truth, everyone has a truth. Maybe for you, two plus two is five. What utter garbage. You know what? A journalist is supposed to be interested in the truth. Now, do you have perfect truth? No. Do you have perfect knowledge? No. But you should get damn close to it. You should be trying to get to the truth. Remember what journalists used to learn? Who, what, when, where, how, why? Like what happened? What are the facts? Well, no, no, no, not according to her. According to her, there are no facts, there is no truth. It's your truth, it's my truth. And my truth from Catherine Mars perspective, is as a left wing partisan, whatever the orthodoxy is, and we will silence views that disagree. And the First Amendment is a pesky, pesky barrier. All right, I want to play one more clip. Yeah, one more clip where she's describing what she did at Wikipedia. Listen to this third clip.
- [37:48]
Nutrafol Representative
I started by talking about the idea of free and open as some of our founding principles. Sort of free and open source coming from the idea of the open source community. Well, I have come to the opinion and the perspective that free and open was a way of looking at the world that was inherently limited relative to what we were trying to achieve. Free and open has the best of intentionality. But in the end, what free and open often ended up doing, and particularly in the case of Wikipedia, was really recapitulating many of the same power structures and dynamics that exist offline prior to the advent of the Internet. And so what we ended up seeing was Wikipedia really rebuilt this idea of knowledge as a whole around what the Western canon, you see, the exclusion of communities of languages because of the ways in which Wikipedia is based on reliable sources. The idea of a written Tradition and something that is particular to many. I mean, not, sorry, the idea of a written tradition which is particular to some cultures and not to others. The ways in which we ascribe notability often really comes from sort of this white male, westernized construct around who matters in societies and who is elevated and whose voices. And so some of these ideas of sort of this radical openness really did not end up with the intention, really did not end up living into the intentionality of what openness can be.
- [39:12]
Senator Ted Cruz
I mean, that, that just is brilliant right there.
- [39:16]
God bless. So look, she's explaining at Wikipedia. They deliberately abandoned a quote, free and open approach. By the way, she's telling you what she's going to do at npr. NPR is not going to be free and open, according to her, because she doesn't believe in free and open. Why? Because free and open, number one, she says, well, that advantages cultures that believe in the written word because, you know, what good is book learning ever done anyone? Well, heck, you're forgetting those cultures that don't believe in that fancy learning stuff. Like, what utter garbage. I'm sorry, I thought actually a journalistic outfit should actually reflect, celebrate the best of education, of learning, of what we know. But she says, no, no, no, no. If it's actually free and open, it will recapitulate a white male, westernized construct. Let me ask you something, Ben. What the hell does that mean? Seriously? Those are the words Marxists use and typically the more syllables they use when they get polysyllabic, the less they're making any sense. So explain to me the phrase recapitulate a white male westernized construction that does not end up living into the intentionality of what openness can mean. Those words have no content other than I want the power to silence things I don't like. Am I wrong?
- [40:45]
No, you're right. And my question goes back to this for you. It used to be at NPR and others, they would at least fake it, like their bias. Now it's just flat out open and they're doing it with our tax dollars. Is there ever going to be a day of reckoning where NPR finds out, hey, good luck, do your own thing, because we're not gonna pay for this propaganda anymore.
- [41:08]
Look, if NPR cares at all about journalistic integrity, if they care at all about continuing to receive taxpayer funds, they should terminate Catherine Maher immediately. Her job should be done. They should not have a rabid left wing partisan who hates the First Amendment, who views it as an inconvenience, who wants to censor conservatives who is actively, explicitly and unabashedly opposed to free and open communication, who doesn't believe in truth, who believes truth is an impediment to what she's doing, that is not a journalist in any way. She ought to go and join Emily's List. She ought to go and join the dnc. She ought to go run for Congress and become a henchman to Nancy Pelosi. She should not actually be running a news organization, especially not a news organization funded by the taxpayers. And if we have to be honest, if you had a Democrat who had a shred of integrity, they would say, of course this is not appropriate for her to run npr. The chances of that happening are zero. But I can tell you I'm going to be pushing for accountability and I'm going to be pushing for oversight of NPR because it is brazenly shameless for them to put someone so wildly unqualified in that position.
- [42:15]
Yeah, no doubt about it. Don't forget, we do this show Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Make sure you hit that subscribe auto download button as well so you do not miss an episode. We also do our week in Review. If you miss something during the week, we do that on Saturdays. And on those in between days, make sure you grab my podcast. I'll keep you updated on the latest breaking news, the Ben Ferguson podcast, so download that as well. And the senator and I will see you back here in a couple of days.