Ep. 2196 - A New Pope…Plus Will Trump RAISE Taxes?!

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Ben Shapiro Show – Ep. 2196: "A New Pope…Plus Will Trump RAISE Taxes?!"

Release Date: May 9, 2025

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Introduction

In Episode 2196 of The Ben Shapiro Show, host Ben Shapiro delves into a series of pressing topics ranging from the selection of a new Pope to the intricacies of President Trump's economic policies. The episode features insightful discussions with Bishop Robert Barron and author Andrew Klavan, alongside analyses of current political maneuvers and societal issues.

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1. The New Pope: Pope Leo XIV

Timestamp: [03:55 – 20:20]

Selection and Significance

Ben Shapiro opens the episode by announcing the election of the first American Pope in history, Pope Leo XIV, formerly Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost from Chicago. This unprecedented event places 1.4 billion Catholics under his leadership and marks a significant moment in Western civilization.

Political Implications

Shapiro discusses the potential global impact of Pope Leo XIV's conservative stance. He emphasizes the Pope's influence not just spiritually but also politically, noting that "the direction of a Catholic Church moving in a far more progressive direction would be quite bad for the world" ([04:05]).

Insights from Bishop Robert Barron

Joining from Italy, Bishop Robert Barron provides a firsthand account of the conclave process and his impressions of the new Pope's intentions. He highlights the choice of the name "Leo XIV" as a nod to Pope Leo XIII, known for his "intelligent creative engagement with modernity." Barron suggests that Pope Leo XIV embodies a balance of tradition and thoughtful adaptation to contemporary issues ([13:38] – [20:20]).

Pope Leo XIV’s Political Stance

Shapiro examines the Pope's conservative views on social issues, quoting Leo XIV's criticisms of "homosexual lifestyle" and "gender ideology" ([04:05]). Despite media claims labeling the Pope as "woke," evidence points to his conservative alignment, especially regarding immigration and economic policies ([07:15]).

Notable Quotes:

• Bishop Robert Barron on the conclave: “[14:41] It was extraordinary... the announcement itself was amazing.”
• Pope Leo XIV on culture: “[09:15] ‘Western culture often seeks to promote sympathy for beliefs and practices that contradict the gospel.’”

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2. President Trump's Tariff War and the UK Trade Deal

Timestamp: [20:20 – 29:47]

Overview of the Trade Deal

Shapiro critiques President Trump's recent announcement of a UK Trade Deal, describing it as "really, really limited." The deal reduces steel and aluminum tariffs from 25% to 10% initially but leaves most UK goods subject to existing tariffs ([25:56]).

Market Reactions and Economic Impact

Using Benjamin Graham's analogy, Shapiro explains that the stock market's slight decline reflects uncertainty about the long-term effects of the Trump administration's inconsistent trade policies. He likens the current situation to an impending "hurricane" due to the elevated tariffs causing supply chain disruptions ([24:00] – [26:23]).

Industry Perspectives

Howard Lutnick, CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald, expresses optimism about the UK's stance, despite the trade deal's minimal impact ([25:56] – [26:14]). However, Shapiro remains skeptical, noting that the deal does little to alleviate the broader tariff regime affecting multiple countries ([26:23]).

Future of Trade Policy

Shapiro highlights the administration's fluctuating messages on trade, with aspirations to negotiate more deals but lacking substantive policy changes. He warns that without significant adjustments, the ongoing tariff war will continue to destabilize the economy ([26:49] – [29:47]).

Notable Quotes:

• Shapiro on the UK's trade deal: “[25:56] ‘So the perfect example of why Trump produced Liberation Day is that we could go from 0.5% on most goods to 10% on most goods and then leave it at 10%.’”
• Lutnick on trade relations: “[26:14] ‘I think we're going to have a very good relationship.’”

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3. President Trump's Tax Policy and the Carried Interest Debate

Timestamp: [29:47 – 40:10]

Raising Taxes: A Political Gamble

Shapiro critiques President Trump's private push to raise taxes, particularly targeting the highest income brackets. He argues that increasing taxes on top earners will stifle investment and undermine economic growth, contrasting this with the success of Trump's initial tax cuts, which benefited middle and lower classes ([29:47] – [35:00]).

Understanding the Carried Interest Concept

Shapiro demystifies the "carried interest loophole," explaining that it allows fund managers to be taxed at capital gains rates rather than higher income taxes, provided investments are held for over three years. Contrary to media portrayals, he asserts that this is not a simple loophole but a legitimate tax treatment aligned with investment principles ([35:00] – [40:10]).

Economic Implications

By increasing tax rates on high earners and closing beneficial tax provisions, Shapiro warns of reduced capital for investment, which is vital for economic expansion and innovation. He emphasizes that such policies could lead to a "repo" situation, where investment capital diminishes, negatively impacting the economy ([35:30]).

Notable Quotes:

• Shapiro on tax increases: “[29:47] ‘The Republican Party is now the tax raising party and the tariff party, we will see how that works out for them at the polls.’”
• Explanation of carried interest: “[35:00] ‘So here is the question. If you have a share of the profits, isn't that more like owning a stock?’”

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4. Surgeon General Nomination: Casey Means

Timestamp: [40:10 – 43:37]

Nomination and Controversy

President Trump nominates Casey Means as the new Surgeon General, replacing Jeanette Nuscherratt amid controversies over her vaccine views. Means, a Stanford-trained physician turned wellness influencer, has faced criticism from figures like Laura Loomer for her unorthodox practices, such as "praying to photos of her ancestors" and conducting "full moon ceremonies" ([40:10] – [43:37]).

Means’ Health Advocacy

Means advocates for a holistic approach to health, emphasizing foundational metabolic health over symptom treatment. She critiques the American healthcare system's focus on volume over outcomes, calling for integrated and preventive measures ([37:45] – [40:10]).

Administration’s Stance

Despite opposition, Ben Shapiro questions whether Means will implement her unconventional health recommendations as Surgeon General, suggesting her focus will likely remain on promoting exercise, nutrition, and preventative care ([40:10] – [43:37]).

Notable Quotes:

• Casey Means on healthcare: “[40:10] ‘Health is a tip of the iceberg of fundamentally like a planetary issue.’”
• Shapiro on Means’ nomination: “[40:10] ‘Are those going to be her recommendations? Or more likely, are her recommendations going to be things like, you know, you should probably eat well and get exercise and get sleep and all the rest?’”

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5. FBI and Jeffrey Epstein Investigation

Timestamp: [43:37 – 48:00]

Epstein’s Death and Investigations

Cash Patel, the head of the FBI, confirms that Jeffrey Epstein died by suicide in his cell, addressing long-standing conspiracy theories surrounding his death ([43:35] – [43:39]). Concurrently, the FBI is prosecuting New York Attorney General Letitia James for irregularities in her real estate transactions, revealing potential corruption within political offices ([43:39] – [45:22]).

Letitia James Under Scrutiny

James faces allegations related to her personal property purchases, with documents signed by government officials raising questions about the propriety of her transactions ([45:22] – [46:22]).

Notable Quotes:

• Patel on Epstein: “[43:35] ‘Jeffrey Epstein did, in fact, kill himself.’”
• Shapiro on Letitia James: “[43:39] ‘Now, the transactions involve her personal property purchases and loans processed in New York City and Virginia.’”

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6. Columbia University Protests

Timestamp: [45:22 – 47:40]

Violent Protests at Columbia

The episode recounts recent violent protests at Columbia University's Butler Library, where masked demonstrators forcibly entered and vandalized the facility. Columbia’s acting president, Claire Shipman, condemns the actions, emphasizing the university’s commitment to freedom of speech and peaceful protest while denouncing violence and vandalism ([45:22] – [47:40]).

Administration Response

Unlike previous administrations, the Trump administration praised Columbia’s decisive action in handling the protests by involving law enforcement, highlighting a shift from apprehensive responses to supportive enforcement of order ([45:22] – [47:40]).

Notable Quotes:

• Claire Shipman on the protests: “[45:22] ‘Violence and vandalism, hijacking a library, none of that has any place on our campus.’”
• Shapiro on administration praise: “[46:22] ‘The Trump administration praised Columbia's strong and resolute response to the protesters.’”

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7. Presidential Exchanges and Book Deals

Timestamp: [47:40 – 50:36]

Biden’s Book Deal Controversy

Shapiro touches on President Biden and First Lady Jill Biden’s impending $30 million book deal, which is expected to detail Jill’s diary from her White House years. Critics suggest the book could expose Joe Biden's cognitive decline and behind-the-scenes struggles during his presidency ([47:40] – [50:36]).

Trump vs. Biden on Election Results

In a segment from an interview on The View, Trump asserts that Biden lost the election due to low voter turnout and disagreements on policy, while Biden claims that Trump’s actions led to divisiveness and systemic failures ([47:40] – [50:36]).

Notable Quotes:

• Shapiro on Biden’s book: “[46:22] ‘Meanwhile, the Bidens are out there trying to clear more sacks of cash.’”
• Trump on election loss: “[48:16] ‘They are wrong... we had a circumstance where we were in a position that we... we did not sense a civil war.’”

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8. Trump Administration’s Middle East Policy

Timestamp: [50:36 – 64:35]

Nuclear Deals and Regional Relations

Shapiro critiques the Trump administration’s ambiguous Middle East policies, including negotiating nuclear deals with Saudi Arabia without requiring Israel’s involvement. He questions the strategic benefits of granting Saudi Arabia civilian nuclear capacity without reciprocal agreements ([50:36] – [56:28]).

Iran Nuclear Deal Concerns

The administration is also negotiating with Iran independently of Israel, raising concerns about the potential for escalating tensions if the deals are unfavorable. Senators Lindsey Graham and Tom Cotton oppose any nuclear agreement that does not ensure complete dismantlement of Iran’s enrichment programs ([56:28] – [64:35]).

Humanitarian Aid to Gaza

Shapiro expresses skepticism over the United States’ plans to distribute aid in the Gaza Strip, questioning its effectiveness given Hamas's control and past behavior in seizing aid ([64:35]).

Notable Quotes:

• On Saudi nuclear deals: “[56:28] ‘Why exactly is it in America's interest for Saudi to have civilian nuclear capacity?’”
• On Iran negotiations: “[56:28] ‘You cannot make a nuclear weapon that is non negotiable for us. Complete dismantlement.’”

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9. Andrew Klavan’s Interview: Kingdom of Cain

Timestamp: [56:28 – 64:35]

Exploring the Problem of Evil

Ben Shapiro interviews author Andrew Klavan about his new book, Kingdom of Cain. Klavan examines historical and fictional murders, including the biblical story of Cain and Abel, to explore how humanity confronts and transforms evil through art and storytelling ([56:28] – [64:35]).

Book’s Thesis

Klavan posits that the only viable response to evil is the creation of beauty. By analyzing how artists turn horrific events into compelling narratives and art, he argues that beauty serves as a conduit for understanding and overcoming suffering. He emphasizes the transformative power of storytelling in coping with the existence of evil ([56:28] – [64:35]).

Reflecting on Cain and Abel

Shapiro and Klavan discuss the story of Cain and Abel, highlighting its themes of repentance and the internal struggle between faith and unbelief. Klavan suggests that the narrative is a metaphor for the ongoing battle within individuals and the broader human condition ([59:24] – [64:35]).

Notable Quotes:

• Klavan on beauty as a response to evil: “[56:43] 'If you can take a murder... what can God not do of the entire experience of creation?’”
• Shapiro on storytelling: “[62:00] 'Anybody who tries to philosophize evil... cannot do it in the form of storytelling.’”

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Conclusion

Episode 2196 of The Ben Shapiro Show offers a comprehensive examination of pivotal events and policies shaping the global and domestic landscape. From the historic election of Pope Leo XIV and the complexities of Trump's trade and tax strategies to the philosophical exploration of evil in Andrew Klavan’s Kingdom of Cain, Shapiro provides incisive analysis and thought-provoking discussions. This episode underscores the interplay between tradition, policy, and personal belief in navigating contemporary challenges.

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Notable Quotes Summary

• Ben Shapiro on the Pope:
  • “[04:05] ‘There is, however, an important world leader... who leads the Catholic Church obviously has a massive impact...’”
• Bishop Robert Barron on the Conclave:
  • “[14:41] ‘It was extraordinary... the conclave itself was amazing.’”
• Andrew Klavan on Beauty and Evil:
  • “[56:43] ‘If you can take a murder like Ed Gein’s and turn it into a work of art... what can God not do of the entire experience of creation?’”

This summary encapsulates the multifaceted discussions of the episode, providing a clear and thorough overview for listeners and non-listeners alike.

Transcript

[Ben Shapiro]

Folks, we have a lot of stuff to get to. Today, the selection of a brand new pope will be joined by Bishop Robert Barron to explain exactly what about the new pope. We need to know. Plus, we'll be getting to President Trump's tariff war. Are we on an off ramp or is this all spin? And Andrew Clavin stops by to discuss his new book. But first, parenting is hard. Raising stable, responsible kids in this culture even more difficult. This Mother's Day weekend, we are giving you the trailer for Dr. Jordan B. Peterson's new Fortune 4 part series, Here is Parenting, coming exclusively at Daily Wire.

[Jordan B. Peterson]

Plus, there is nothing you'll do in life that's more challenging, difficult and rewarding than being a parent. Nothing with greater highs or lower lows. You have little kids for a very short period of time. It is a major mistake not to notice that and not to appreciate it.

[Ben Shapiro]

We're dealing with a pattern of misbehaviors with our son, who's three years old. Whenever we want to leave the house, he starts running away.

[Bishop Robert Barron]

We have to be places at certain times.

[Jordan B. Peterson]

When a disciplinary issue arises. You need to make space to master it. I have to not do what I thought I was going to do for 10 minutes to set this right.

[Ben Shapiro]

Our 13 year old throws tantrums quite often.

[Jordan B. Peterson]

When he doesn't get his way, we.

[Ben Shapiro]

Spoil the heck out of him.

[Jordan B. Peterson]

When you spoil a child, so to speak, you take away from them the opportunity to develop their own competence by doing too many things for them. The consequences of his abdication of thought is that other people think for him. That's what'll happen.

[Andrew Klavan]

Our daughter was bullied at her school. As this is happening, our son turned to some substance abuse.

[Jordan B. Peterson]

Look for mood changes and behavioral changes and then you can tell your kid, look, it might be an unpleasant conversation that we have to have, but I'm not gonna let you be miserable and drift away. Discuss the disciplinary. Discuss the rules. Discuss what it is that you want from your child. Talk that through so that you're the same person. The more effective you are in laying out these disciplinary rules, the more they'll like you. Rules consistently applied with minimal force and plenty of patience. You don't want to let your worry destroy the pleasures of the moment. Just because children know less about the world doesn't mean they're not paying attention. It certainly doesn't mean that they're stupid. They're not stupid and they're watching.

[Ben Shapiro]

Parenting with Dr. Jordan B. Peterson premieres May 25th only at DailyWire+.com also the news moves fast and bad news moves fastest of all. Every day it gets harder to tell what's real, what's manufactured, to control us, to discourage us. The world doesn't need more noise. It needs more wisdom, more facts. That's why, starting Monday, May 12, we are giving you more of the Ben Shapiro Show. Actually, two times the Ben Shapiro show, twice the analysis, twice the fact. Join [e-mail] subscribe well, folks, we do have a brand new Pope. We're going to get to all the details surrounding the Pope in just one second. Apparently. According to the Wall Street Journal, the Roman Catholic Church has now elected the first American Pope in history, placing 1.4 billion faithful in the hands of a missionary turned Vatican prelate who had been critical of the Trump administration's crackdown on immigration. Now, this is the way that the media are playing. This is that Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost, who's a 69 year old native of Chicago and a White Sox fan, which is great. There are like three of us. And so I appreciate him being in the club. He emerged on the balcony of St. Peter's Basilica, was introduced to the world as Pope Leo the 14th. Here is what it looked like when it happened. Yesterday.

[President Trump]

I announce to you a great joy.

[Ben Shapiro]

We have a Pope. Okay? So he said we must try together to be a missionary church, a church that builds bridges and dialogue, always open, like the square, to receive with open arms everyone who needs our charity and our presence. There's been a widespread debate over where he is politically, because for the faithful, obviously for people who are faithful Catholics, this means a different thing than for people like me. I'm Jewish, and so I have no stake in him spiritually, in terms of him being the leader of a church, of the Catholic Church. He is, however, an important world leader, a very important world leader, because so many people are, in fact, Catholic. And the Catholic Church has been a deeply important piece, a deeply important centerpiece of Western civilization since its foundations were laid 2,000 years ago. And so who leads the Catholic Church obviously has a massive impact not only on how people think, but how a lot of people live, because how you think impacts how you live. And so the direction of a Catholic Church moving in a far more progressive direction would be quite bad for the world because a progressive Catholic Church focused, as Pope Francis very often was on, say, environmentalism or economic redistributionism or a form of amorality with regard to foreign conflict, that has an impact on how billions of people think. And that could be a problem. On the other hand, a Catholic Church that is committed to the eternal biblical values to which it is wedded. That kind of church does an enormous amount of good in the world. And to pretend that the Catholic Church has nothing to do with how people live is, I think, a preserve of the fully secular. In my book, the Right side of History. There's an awful lot on the history of the Catholic Church and the Catholic Church's contributions to everything from the beginning of the university system to the beginnings of science. And obviously it matters an awful lot to enormous number of people across the world, Christian and non Christian. Who the Pope is. And so what exactly does the Pope think? Well, we have some evidence of what the Pope thinks. Some of it's indirect. So he was introduced by the name Leo xiv. The Pope gets to choose his name. He changed his name when he becomes the Pope. And so how that name is chosen may have some sort of reflection on what the Pope thinks, where he is, where he puts his emphasis. Now, when it comes to church doctrine, like true Church doctrine, is not going to change anytime. And that is the foundation of the idea of an eternal church, from what I understand from my Catholic friends. So if the Church were to radically switch its positions on say abortion or same sex marriage, that actually run up against the doctrine of the Catholic Church, and the Pope can't single handedly do that. What the Pope can do is decide where to put his emphasis. Is he going to put it on social issues or is he going to put it on economic issues where there's more wiggle room in terms of doctrine? Is he going to put it on environmentalism the way the Pope Francis did, or is he going to put it on the spread of values antithetical to Christianity, the way that Pope Benedict did? Well, by choosing the name Leo. According to the Washington Post, the 267th pope is joining a group of 13 other popes who took the name. The previous Leos were reformers, including Pope Leo XIII, elected in 1878. His encyclical Rerum Novarum spoke of human dignity and the dignity of labor. According to Reverend Christopher Robinson, popes have been selecting papal names for centuries. I know obviously my friend Michael Knowles, who is extremely Catholic, was very happy about the choice of Pope Leo's name, suggesting that it has a lot to do with the sort of values conservatism. Beyond that, the media are running around claiming that this Pope is woke again. This is, I assume, linked to the fact that he was very close with Pope Francis. With that said, the. The evidence so far suggests that he is extremely Conservative on issues, including social issues, that he is very liberal on guns, that he is very liberal on immigration. Like if you were going to gauge him as a political candidate, not as a pope, which I understand the problems with that. I understand Catholics don't see this the same way that everybody else does. But I'm talking about his political impact because that's one of the reasons he matters to the rest of the world, who's not Catholic. If we are looking at what he has said, for example, about culture and about social issues, this is a direct quote from him. Quote, western culture often seeks to promote sympathy for beliefs and practices that contradict the gospel. For example, the homosexual lifestyle and alternative families made up of same sex partners and their adopted children. Another quote from him. The promotion of gender ideology is confusing because it seeks to create genders that don't exist. Right. So they're indistinguishable from what would be rote Catholic doctrine. It was always funny to me that when Pope Francis would express support for the unborn, the media would run it as though it was a story. Nothing has changed would be the story there. Or when the Pope said that he was not in favor of same sex marriage, then suddenly that was run as like a front page story. Now the problem with Pope Francis politically is that he would then kind of play around the edges. Pope Francis had suggested that same sex couples could come and be blessed. It was kind of unclear whether he meant as individuals or as a couple. It probably was the former. It was treated as the latter. Obviously he was making some sort of overtures to the lgbtq. Plus minus, divided by sign activists. Whether this new Pope is going to do that or not is absolutely unclear. People are pretending that he is some sort of wild lib. I don't see the evidence for that at all. Apparently he's a registered Republican because again, he's from Chicago, so we actually know where he's registered. He's voted in some Republican primaries as well. He's also retweeted a bunch of material that is anti JD Vance and President Trump with regard to immigration. So, for example, according to Mediaite, he joined Twitter in 2011 and apparently he tweeted on April 14 a retweet of a Catholic blogger named Rocco Palmo that denounced the White House's illicit deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia and quoted Bishop Evelio Menjivar. Do you not see the suffering? Is your conscience not disturbed? How can you stay quiet? Other recent tweets from Pope Leo XIV take issue with JD Vance's comments about ordo amoris, the Catholic theological concept on the order of charity mans, you'll recall, in January had suggested that this should be interpreted as love your family and then your neighbor and then your community and then your fellow citizens. And after that, prioritize the rest of the world. So Pope Leo xiv, his predecessor Pope Francis, actually put out a letter addressed to American bishops chiding that particular view. And then Prevost, who's now the Pope, said J.D. vance is wrong. Jesus doesn't ask us to rank our love for others. So, you know, this has been used as sort of a, an excuse by people on the right to reject the Pope. Meanwhile, the left is always eager to embrace a Pope that it perceives to be a friend. For his part, President Trump put out a statement about how it was an honor to have an American Pope. Here was President Trump yesterday.

[Howard Lutnick]

They have already spoken to us and we'll see what happens. But again, to have the Pope from the United States of America, that's a great honor. That's a great honor.

[Ben Shapiro]

Okay, so again, obviously if apparently President Trump's tariff plans are working because we are now reshoring American Popery, we have decided that the Pope must be manufactured in the United States. And again, he's a White Sox fan, so that's a nice thing. And we will see where he is politically, where he chooses to put his emphasis. There's more on this in a moment. First, Pure Talk says I don't think so. It's $100 a month cell phone plans. That's just wasteful and irresponsible. Instead of they're offering America's most dependable 5G network at America's most sensible prices. Listen to this. Unlimited talk text 15 gigs of data plus mobile hotspot for just 35 bucks a month. The best part right now, you get a free one year membership to Daily Wire plus access the entire library of Daily Wire plus movies and documentaries, enjoy uncensored ad free daily shows and as always, your free leftist tiers, tumblr. And with PeerTalk's US customer service team, you can switch hassle free in as little as 10 minutes. You don't need Doge to cut the fat from your wireless bill. You need PureTalk. Go to PureTalk.com Shapiro Switch on over to [e-mail] Shapiro Get a year of DailyWire plus for free with qualifying plan. PureTalk is wireless by Americans for Americans. I'm using Pure Talk myself for literally years at this point. Their coverage is excellent. They're the people that I trust with all my most important conversations. And of course, they're not charging me an arm and a leg. Go check them out right now. PureTalk.com Shapiro + Get a year of DailyWire + for free with qualifying plan. Also, every time I go shooting, I think to myself, this is awesome. It could probably be a little better. And guess what? It can. Let me tell you how to make shooting more fun, safer, just overall cooler. If you've never used a suppressor before, you are missing out. Trust me, once you shoot suppressed, you're not going to want to shoot unsuppressed again. This is where my friends at Silencer Shop come in. They don't just sell silencers. They specialize in making sure your shooting experience is awesome. The experts at Silencer Shop will help you find the perfect silencer so you can enjoy your guns even more. And now is the perfect time to get one. Why not let your tax return work for you this year? Invest in a suppressor and completely upgrade your shooting experience. The best part, Silencer Shop makes the entire process ridiculously simple. They're the number one source for suppressors in America with the largest selection of top brands. Silencer Shop helps handle all the paperwork so you don't have to. With their nationwide dealer network and easy to use kiosk system, you can get started in minutes and have your suppressor faster than ever. Thanks to Silencer Shop for sponsoring this episode. Again, go check them out right now. Silencer Shop will help you through the entire process. They've got that nationwide dealer network. It's easy to use. Go check them out right now. Thanks to Silencer Shop. Well, joining us online is Bishop Robert Barron, Bishop of the Diocese of Winona, Rochester in Minnesota, the founder of Word on Fire Catholic Ministries, direct from Italy, where the new Pope has been selected, Pope Leo xiv. Bishop, thanks so much for joining the show. Really appreciate it.

[Bishop Robert Barron]

Thanks, Ben. Always good to be with you.

[Ben Shapiro]

So, first of all, what was it like actually being there during the Conclave?

[Bishop Robert Barron]

It was extraordinary. There was a lot of, you know, kind of tension beforehand. It's always you're sort of on tenterhooks during a conclave period, the interregnum, and we weren't sure. A lot of names were being bandied about, including the name of Robert Prevost, though most of us didn't take it seriously. And then I think leading up to the conclave, there was just a lot of anticipation, a sense of, you know, forces jockeying against each other. The announcement itself was amazing. It came so quickly most of us thought this would be a longer conclave that might last into the third, even fourth day. And on the second day we have the white smoke. And so most of us again thought, oh, it must be someone like Cardinal Pierolin or one of the really expected candidates. No one expected Robert Prevost and certainly not on the fourth ballot. So there was a lot of, I think, you know, both excitement, surprise, the wonderment about it.

[Ben Shapiro]

So when we talk about the new Pope, obviously a lot of political focus on the new Pope, because the Pope speaks for 1.4 billion Catholics and is interpreting 2000 year old tradition. And I think that first of all, we should discuss the distinction between how people like me would view the election of a new Pope, the selection of a new Pope, and how Catholics see it. Because obviously it's a very, very different thing. For me, I'm just looking at the political ramifications in sort of the secular world or even in sort of the broader spiritual. But for Catholics, this is a very different thing.

[Bishop Robert Barron]

Well, you know, I would look at him in terms of his name. I keep going back to his name, Leo xiv. It's very telling. You know, he could have chosen Francis ii, obviously, he could have chosen John Paul iii, he could have chosen John xxiv, in which case we would say, oh, he's clearly on, you know, this side or that side. Choosing Leo XIV was very interesting, going back now to a figure more than a century ago who represents, I call it, an intelligent creative engagement with modernity. So think of the 18th century revolutions and then the 19th century innovations in philosophy. Think of Kant, Hegel, Marx, the revolutions, et cetera. The Church's first response to that was an emphatic no. And indeed, the Church was very persecuted by revolutionary France, for example. But then by the end of the 19th century, you got a figure like Leo XIII who represents this intelligent engagement. It's both a yes and a no to modernity. I think that's what this new Pope was gesturing toward in choosing that name, that he was in the tradition of Leo xiii. You know, and conservative Catholics to this day find a lot in Leo XIII they like, liberal Catholics find a lot they like in him. So it was a very clever choice. Actually, even before you get to particular kind of political issues, just the general attitude toward the modern world, he was telling us a lot about that.

[Ben Shapiro]

So let's talk about the fact that he is an American Pope. What does that mean? What difference does it make where the Pope comes from?

[Bishop Robert Barron]

You know, I think in the long run it probably doesn't make that much difference. Maybe we're all kind of hyped up about it now because it's never happened before. This is a very international character too. You know, he's from Chicago indeed, but, you know, studied overseas, has been a missionary overseas, spent many years here in Rome. He's a very international sort of player. The standard line everyone's using here is he's the least American of the American Cardinals, which could be one reason why he attracted, you know, the super majority that he did. So I hope it's good for our church in America. I hope it, you know, revives a sense of the church and the faith in America. But I suspect Ben, in the long run, people will look at him. They'll look at, okay, what is he saying? What is he doing? Will matter much more than his where he was born.

[Ben Shapiro]

So now let's talk about the obvious sort of elephant in the room, which is all the talk about his politics. So obviously he has been mildly active on Twitter. He has some old tweets. He's a White Sox fan, which I'm pleased with. He and I are probably the only two White Sox fans currently in existence. But he also, it turns out, has some tweets, including tweets on immigration. And J.D. vance, of course, had made suggestions about a Catholic concept called ordo amoris, talking about the Order of Love. And apparently the new Pope had tweeted against JD Vance's interpretation of that concept. What do you make of that? What should our takeaway be on the new Pope, politically? Because obviously on matters that the church has never wavered on, like same sex marriage or abortion or transgenderism, he would be considered wildly right wing by American political standards.

[Bishop Robert Barron]

Yeah, I think that's true. You know, he's a man that worked in Latin America, much of his. Of his priesthood. And so he has a natural, I think, sympathy for empathy for people who've immigrated to this country, to our country. So I think you're sensing that natural sympathy he has for them. I would suspect that he fully knows Catholic social teaching defends a nation's right to maintain its borders. That's part of our social teaching, because as you well know, if we don't monitor our borders, that leads to all kinds of moral problems. That's not a xenophobic position, or that's not some jingoistic, nationalistic position. That's a considered moral. So, I mean, I'm sure that new Pope would affirm that. You know, it's. When you get down to brass tacks, you get down to the specifics of policy we can disagree about, okay, how much should you regulate immigration, etc. But in terms of the great principles, I don't think he would disagree with that. The famous Ordo amoris question, you know, As I read J.D. vance, he was just citing both Augustine, by the way. So this new Pope is an Augustinian priest. He was citing Augustine and Thomas Aquinas. I think what people tend to miss on that is they're talking about the kind of objective dimension of love, not the subjective. To say there's an order of love does not mean that subjectively I favor certain people and others I don't care about. It's not that at all. If to love means to will the good of the other, well, there's only so much that an individual or a nation can do. So the best example is, you know, if your family is under attack, well, yes, you're going to defend them first. If there's a fire going on in your neighborhood, your house is on fire, threatening your family, that's your first obligation. That to me is all the ordo amoris is saying. And we've kind of made it into, into this sort of co celeb or this, you know, point of controversy. So I don't know, I think if they got into a room of like J.D. vance and the Pope, I have a feeling they would probably pretty much agree on these things.

[Ben Shapiro]

Well, Bishop Barron, I really appreciate your time and your insight. Congratulations on the election of the brand new Pope.

[Bishop Robert Barron]

God bless you, Ben. Thanks.

[Ben Shapiro]

All right. Meanwhile, President Trump's big move yesterday was of course, this UK Trade deal. We now know the details of the UK trade deal and there's less to the eye than it appears. And this is sort of a problem obviously for actual policy. So the markets rebounded somewhat on the fact that President Trump had announced a UK Trade deal. And the markets right now, as I've said before, Benjamin Graham, who is the philosophical mentor to Warren Buffett, he used to say that the stock market in the short term is a voting machine, and in the long term it is a weighing machine. What he meant by that is that you're basically voting with your stock as to where you think things are going to go. You're trying to predict a prediction market. And so you could be wrong in the long term. The stock market over, over time weighs the actual value of things because it takes a while for prediction to become reality or unreality. Well, right now the markets are trying to respond and take in new information in real time from President Trump, and because President Trump is spitting out so much new information, because there are so many members of his administration who are sort of in conflict with one another over trade policy. The markets are roiling. They're going up, they're going down, they're going all around. And in the end, they're slightly lower than they were during Liberation Day, which is to say that since Liberation Day, the Dow Jones Industrial Average, over the course of, say, the last month or so is essentially even just before Liberation day, which was April 2nd, the. The stock market was at 42,000, the Dow Jones Industrial Average 42 to 25 on April 2nd. And today it's like 41, 400. So it's down about 700 points. And that is not a massive shift, obviously. The, that shift, however, is in fact indicative of uncertainty because the stock market was going up and to the right, and then when it evens out, that's because people don't know what to do next. So what do we make of the deal that President Trump just cut with the uk? So he made a big ballyhoon announcement about it yesterday, talked about in the Oval Office, suggested that it was a historic deal. And then we actually found out the details of the deal, and the details are not much. So President Trump said on Thursday that his administration and the UK had agreed to the outlines of a deal on trade. He said it's very conclusive. We think everyone's gonna be happy. Many countries wanna make a deal. Many countries are very unhappy that we happened to choose this one. Now, here is the problem. The deal is really, really limited, okay? So the actual deal here leaves most UK goods still tariffed at the global 10% tariff the US imposed on all countries. In April, there had been a 25% levy on steel and aluminum. That levy will now go away. Car tariffs had been put at 25%. They will be lowered to 10% only for the first 100,000 vehicles. Then they go back up. We don't import tons of cars from Britain. We import some, but not like a ton. In return, the UK is cutting some tariffs on US beef imports from 20% to zero, as well as cutting tariffs on ethanol. So this is really, really a limited deal. A very, very limited deal. So the reason the stock market responded positively is because any sign of any deal means that people are voting on what they want Trump to do. What they want Trump to do is to remove all sorts of trade barriers. And so when they see a sign that the trade barriers are going to be removed, the markets get really Happy. However, the real problem here is that if the underlying policy does not change, then the effects of the policy will be felt. Everybody sees this hurricane a coming. This hurricane is the global trade impact of a giant tariff regime placed on nearly every country, mostly on China, but yes, on every other country. It turns out that when you quadruple the tariff rate on the UK which is effectively what the United States did, that that's going to have some pretty significant supply chain effects. It takes a while for that stuff to be felt because it might take weeks for ships to leave their port and get to the United States. And that means that people have not yet made that their ships arriving now that are still full because the decision was made as to whether to send the ship before Liberation Day. Well, that's all gonna change in the very near future. The hurricane has not yet hit. I live in Florida. You check the hurricane map pretty much every day of the summer to see what's gonna happen over the course of the next five or seven days. And keep hoping, if you're on the east coast of Florida the way that we are, that the, that the hurricane is gonna swing up and back into the Atlantic Ocean. But that doesn't mean that the impending hurricane has hit yet. So if you haven't actually picked up and left the east coast of Florida to move into the interior or something as the hurricane approaches because you're betting that it's gonna move, that does not mean that the hurricane won't hit. It just means it hasn't hit yet. And so the question here is whether the hurricane can be averted by trade policy before it actually hits. And from what I see from the UK deal, I'm not, I'm not super complacent about all of this. Prior to the Trump administration, our trade with the UK was governed by most favored nation tariff rates under the World Trade Organization. Those were generally low. They averaged about 2.5% for most goods. The trade weighted average most favored nation tariff on non agricultural goods from the UK was almost 0, 0.5%. For agricultural goods, it was 9.2% after Liberation Day. And the following week, the UK tariff rate was placed at 10%. It remains 10% today. So if for non agricultural goods, the trade weighted tariff rate was 0.5% and today it is 10%, that is, if you do your math, 20 times higher than it was just about six weeks ago. And the deal didn't do anything to change any of that. Here's Howard Lutnick yesterday saying essentially that nothing has actually changed. Right. He said he's bragging about the trade deal and he says we were at 10% and we're still at 10%, which doesn't sound like an amazing trade deal to me.

[Cash Patel]

So we feel really good about the deal. You've heard the Prime Minister. He feels really good about the deal. Right. And we started at 10% and we ended at 10%. And the market for America is better. And this is a perfect example of why Donald Trump produced Liberation Day.

[Ben Shapiro]

Okay, so the perfect example of why Trump produced Liberation Day is that we could go from 0.5% on most goods to 10% on most goods and then leave it at 10%.

[Andrew Klavan]

And.

[Ben Shapiro]

And then we get slightly lower tariff rates on our products into the UK that's why, again, the question here is what the policy is actually going to look like. Right now, the Trump administration is spinning this policy. And so the spin has impact on the markets because we don't know which way the Trump administration is going to go. Every day the message seems to change. And right now, the administration keeps putting out very positive signals about wanting to do deals. So yesterday, President Trump said that they intend to make a deal with Europe, for example.

[Howard Lutnick]

We intend to make a deal with Europe. We have found that the European Union treated us extremely unfairly. They're very difficult and hurt themselves in doing so. And they very much want to make a deal. We'll be dealing with them. We are dealing with them currently. So that'll cover pretty much the rest of it.

[Ben Shapiro]

Okay, so again, whether he wants to make a European deal, obviously the market's gonna like it if he wants to make a European deal. But what that deal looks like is the thing that's gonna matter in the end. If you want to make a deal, you want to go buy a new car, and you go in saying, I want to buy a new car, and then at the end of the day, you don't buy the new car. The only thing that matters at the end of the day is whether you bought it or not or what price you paid for that new car. The content is going to dictate what happens next. Not the spin, not the talk about it, what the content is. So if these trade deals look like the UK trade deal, the hurricane is going to hit. It will. If these 10% tariffs are maintained on every country, there will in fact be supply line problems in if the tariff rate remains at 125 or 145%. The Treasury Secretary said it's unsustainable if it takes months to Negotiate that out with China. There will be significant supply line impact, supply chain impacts. Listen, every business person I know is being impacted by these tariffs in one way or another. And right now the markets are hopeful because they know that President Trump likes reality and lives in the business world. That Trump is going to avert the hurricane. I don't see a lot of evidence that he's going to avert the hurricane from this particular UK Deal. For example. Meanwhile, the European Union is saying it could target American cars, car parts, airplanes and other products with tariffs if negotiations with the United States break down. The European Commission, the bloc's executive body, on Thursday released a fresh list of about 95 billion euros worth of American products it says could face tariffs equivalent to about $107 billion. That includes American chemicals and plastics, electrical equipment, health related products, machinery and agricultural products. President Trump then said yesterday. And they expect a friendly meeting with China. Again, the markets like friendly meetings. The question is, how fast can you get to something that does not heavily impact the American economy?

[Howard Lutnick]

I mean, we're going to see right now you can't get any higher. It's at 145. So we know it's coming down. I think we're going to have a very good relationship. You know, I always got along very well with President Xi. That relationship was greatly disturbed by Covid when Covid came in. But we get along very well now. I mean, we, we had a. I mean, the relationship was hurt with a lot of people, a lot of countries when Covid came in. But I think we're going to have a very good relationship. I expect to have a very good relationship with China. Scott. I think it's very friendly meeting. They look forward to doing it in an elegant way.

[Ben Shapiro]

Okay, so again, this spin's fine. What is the actual content going to be? What is actually going to be inside the package when we open up the package? Is it just going to look like What Letnick said, 10% to 10%? Lutnick continues to be very high on the tariff war. He says we're going to roll out dozens of such trade deals.

[Cash Patel]

What we're going to start to do is we're going to start to have templates. You know, so we'll do a small country or two, then we'll have a template and we'll say, you know what, these 20 or 30 countries are economically similar. Let's go over their products, let's go get it right and let's go give them the money model of how they want to do it. And if they want to model, modify it a little bit, that's fine. But you're going to see over the next month or so, we're going to roll out dozens of deals because we'll find categories of countries that it'll work out just fine.

[Ben Shapiro]

Okay, so whether it will work out just fine, who knows? We're about to find out. Meanwhile, President Trump is pushing apparently for higher tax rates. This is a non starter. It just is the tax regime that President Trump put into place in his first term. The Trump tax cuts were a boon to the economy. They disproportionately benefited people who actually were middle and lower class. Revising the tax regime to pay for more kind of loopholes and tax breaks in particular areas by increasing taxes on the highest income earners. What that is going to do is sink investment capital. That's what it does. Okay. As somebody who has been in most tax brackets at one point in my life, I can tell you I will invest less if I have less money to invest. And that's true for everyone who's a high net earner. Increasing the income tax on the top income tax brackets in order to pay for more useless government spending. Because nobody has the actual balls to say in American politics that we spend too much on our social welfare programs, which we do, particularly our means tested social welfare programs. And those are going to break the American economy and shifting around deck chairs on the Titanic by increasing the marginal tax rates at the top by 2% or something, that's not going to save anything. This idea that you're going to get a repo. If the Republican Party is now the tax raising party and the tariff party, we will see how that works out for them at the polls. I do not think it is going to work out particularly well. We'll get some more in a moment. First, Made in America means something to our country's private equity investors. When you invest $700 billion annually in American companies and the 13 million workers and families they support, you're investing in the success of Main street. Over the last eight years alone, America's private equity investors have contributed $5 trillion to the American economy. That's money that powers growth in manufacturing, tech, energy, innovation. From strengthening supply chains to helping America lead in artificial intelligence. That kind of investment shapes our future. And it starts with private equity actually backing American ambition. Investing in our people, our businesses, our community is not just good for the economy, it's good for the country. Learn more about how private equity keeps American small businesses growing and [e-mail], paid for by the American Investment Council. Also, you might already own a firearm, but starting with a less lethal option to avoid financial legal, mental repercussions of pulling the trigger, that's essential. Enter Burna. That's by R N A. I'm about as pro second amendment as it gets. I own a bevy of firearms, but the thought of using lethal force, it's not ideal for everyone. 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And by the way, there are a lot of states where it's very difficult to get a firearm to defend yourself. Burna is legal in all 50 states. It requires no background checks, it can be shipped directly to your door, and it's trusted by hundreds of police departments and government agencies worldwide. Thank you, Burna, for sponsoring this video. President Trump apparently is privately urging Speaker Mike Johnson to raise the top tax rate and close the so called carried interest loophole. So what the hell is the carried interest loophole? You hear about this all the time. Very often the media will use a term and call it a loophole when it's not a loophole at all. So they'll say something like a gun show loophole. As though if you're a federally licensed firearms dealer, you can just go to a gun show and sell a gun randomly. That is not true. The so called gun show loophole means a private person who sells a gun to his friend doesn't have to necessarily go through all of the federal background check kind of stuff. And some people called it the gun show loophole, when in fact all it meant is that if you're not a federally licensed firearms dealer and you're a private Individual that these rules don't apply to you in the same way. So it's not the same thing. Is kind of true of the so called carried interest loophole. So what exactly is the so called carried interest loophole? It's not a loophole at all. So what is carried interest? So I asked my sponsor at Perplexity to explain. So carried interest works like this. Fund managers typically receive two forms of compensation. If you work at like a hedge fund or in private equity or VC venture capital. So you have two forms of being paid. One is a management fee, which is just income, right? You get paid a flat fee to handle people's portfolios. And then there's the so called carried interest which is a share of the fund's profits. So the fund makes a profit, you get a share of the profit. But in order for it to qualify for capital gains tax as opposed to income tax, the underlying investments have to be held for more than three years. It's like you just make a quick turn, turn and burn with regard to a stock, you sell it, you make a quick profit, you take the income and then you paid the capital gains rate as opposed to the higher income tax rate. You actually have to be making a profit off of a, an investment that held for three years or more. Management fees are taxed at the regular income rate. Carried interest is taxed as the long term capital gain at a maximum rate of 20% if the underlying investments are held for more than three years. So here is the question. If you have a share of the profits, isn't that more like owning a stock? Right, that's the reason why it's treated as actually not a form of typical income. It's more like selling a stock because you actually are getting a share of stock that was profitable and then it was sold. So it's more like a capital gain than it is like income. Now you can make an argument that capital gains should be taxed the same as income. But stop pretending that the carried interest loophole is actually just a form of normal income that's getting carved out for hedge fund managers. That that's not what it is. This sort of economic policy, this sort of populist left economic. It is, it's a populist left economic policy. Heavy trade restrictionism for the sake of trade restrictionism as a subsidy to particular areas of the American economy. Add on to that higher tax rates and I'm wondering what the difference is between that economic policy per se and Sherrod Brown's economic policy when he was Senator from Ohio. That is not the economic policy that President Trump enacted in his first term and that was so wildly successful in increasing the earnings of everybody from the bottom part of the spectrum to the top part of the spectrum. This is a mistake. Meanwhile, in other news, the President of the United States has now named a new nominee for his Surgeon General. That surgeon general nominee is a person named Casey Means she replaces another person, Jeanette Nuscherratt, who had essentially been ousted because of concerns about her views on vaccines. Laura Loomer was a big opponent. Turns out Laura Loomer doesn't like Casey Means very much either. President Trump, for his part, says, listen, this one wasn't me. This is probably Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy. Here is President Trump.

[Howard Lutnick]

Well, she said, yeah, because Bobby thought she was fantastic. She's highly, she's a brilliant woman who went through, through Stanford. And as I understand it, she basically wanted to do. She wanted to be an academic as opposed to a surgeon. I think she graduated first in her class at Stanford and Bobbi really thought she was great. I don't know her. I listened to the recommendation of Bobbi. I met her yesterday and once before. She's a very outstanding person, a great academic, actually. So I think she'll be great.

[Ben Shapiro]

Okay, so President Trump, of course, supporting her for this. Casey, me. Who is she? Well, she is a Stanford trained physician. She dropped out of residency. She went Stanford Medical School, and then she turned into a sort of wellness influencer, author, big pharma whistleblower. She had a bunch of major media appearances, including, of course, Joe Rogan, Andrew Huberman. Here she was, for example, on Joe Rogan talking about what she called the devastating state of American health.

[Casey Means]

And if you just kind of run through the list of what's happening, it's unbelievable. Like, we are getting destroyed and it's very recent and it's accelerating. The stats speak for themselves. You know, you know this very well. 74% of Americans are overweight or obese. 50% now of American adults have type 2 diabetes or pre diabetes. These were diseases where there was 1% of Americans in 1950 had type 2 diabetes. Now it's 50% of Americans have prediabetes or type 2 diabetes. Alzheimer's dementia are going through the roof. Young adult dementias have increased like three times since 2012. So early onset dementias. We're seeing, you know, this one in two Americans are expected to have cancer in their lifetime. Now one in two. And young adult cancers are going up 79% in the last 10 years.

[Ben Shapiro]

So again, these sorts of concerns are things that Americans are concerned about. They feel like they've been gaslit on American health for a very long time. You know, the reality is that America is obese. America does not exercise enough. America eats junk food a lot. And this is one of the things that Kasey Means focuses a lot on is this sort of holistic explanation of all disease. She says you basically have to stop treating the symptoms, which very often symptoms of specific diseases, and start treating what she calls the sort of underlying issue. And that underlying issue is supposed to be foundational metabolic cellular health. She says that government policy should focus on things like HDL cholesterol, triglycerides, blood sugar, blood pressure and waist circumference. Here she was talking about how one of the problems is how doctors basically get paid for treating symptoms, but they don't get really paid for fixing the underlying problem.

[Casey Means]

One of the biggest problems with the healthcare industry right now is that it's so siloed. We have over 100 different medical and surgical subspecialties. And the business model of American healthcare right now is volume. It's how many people can you see? And so that's what you get paid for. You don't get paid for outcomes, you get paid for volume. And so that has incentivized a structure of healthcare where it's most profitable to actually be seen by as many specialists as humanly possible. And that's what the average American is dealing with. They go to the primary care doctor with a list of issues and they get 8, 10 referrals and they spend their life going through revolving doors of these different healthcare offices and not actually really feeling better. And they feel disappointed. And that's why I think people are frustrated. So we've got all these doctors who are incentivized to really be head down in their specialty lane and not actually step out and look at the big picture of how things are connected, when in fact it's all connected.

[Ben Shapiro]

Now that isn't actually the fault of doctors. Very often if you're a primary care doctor, if you don't send somebody to a specialist and a disease develops, you get sued. So this is a real problem is sort of the system of liability and medical liability. It used to be that you had a family doctor, the family doctor would look at you. Most of the time, the family doctor would say, listen, this problem does not require a specialist. Now doctors, being risk averse, are sending people to specialists more often. All of that is true. She's correct, by the way. That most of the problems that are attributed to sort of disease, if you can treat far earlier the underlying problem with good health, getting exercise and all the rest, that is going to be a good solution to an enormous number of problems. She has suggested, for example, that you need to eat fruits and veggies, limit alcohol and drugs, get enough sleep, exercise, avoid environmental toxins. Here she was discussing fighting for life.

[Casey Means]

Health is a tip of the iceberg of fundamentally like a planetary issue. But like, the planetary issue is the tip of the iceberg of what I think is really, really going on here, which is like a spiritual issue. Like we, we, we are like not fighting for life in this world anymore. And I think that's more of a consciousness issue. You know, we talk about, why is no one covering this? Da, da, da. It's like, I think people see it. I think in some way we have, like, totally lost respect for, like, the miraculousness of life. That's what our actions are reflecting. Like, we know a lot. We have the technology, the money and the resources to fix all of this, the planet and health, and we're not. And that's why I think there's something darker happening on, like, the consciousness level.

[Ben Shapiro]

Okay, so she has been called out by now Laura Loomer for supposedly being kind of kooky. The reason that Laura Loomer is going after her is because she put out in her newsletter about when she was looking for romance, that she would pray to photos of her ancestors, that you do full moon ceremonies, that you would talk literally out loud to the trees, plant medicine, experience, and all the rest. But the question is, as Surgeon General, are those going to be her recommendations? Or more likely, are her recommendations going to be things like, you know, you should probably eat well and get exercise and get sleep and all the rest? And back in June 2024, NPR, which is no right wing outlet, published a very long interview with KC Means talking specifically about her thesis. And NPR said Means lays out her thesis for what is wrong in US Healthcare in her book Good Energy and How Patients Can Take Their Health into Their Own Hands. She and her co author, her brother, Callie Means, delineate how common diseases and symptoms that plague Americans are rooted in issues like poor nutrition, lack of movement, and problems with sleep. She says the most foundational level of health is how our cells get powered. You could have a Ferrari if it has no gas and won't run. So good energy is a term to help us understand what we're striving for when we're doing all these dietary and Lifestyle investments. Okay. All this sounds perfectly legitimate to me. Don't really see a major problem, but anything can be turned into a controversy inside the Trump administration. Meanwhile, in a piece of absolutely horrifying news to people who are bound to conspiracy theories, Cash Patel, the new head of the FBI and somebody who is widely liked on the maga. Right. Of course, he was asked about the death of Jeffrey Epstein by Congress yesterday, and he dropped the bombshell that actually Jeffrey Epstein did, in fact, kill himself. Did Jeffrey Epstein hang himself or did somebody kill him, Senator? I believe he hung himself in a cell in the Metropolitan Detention Center. Are you going to release all the.

[Bishop Robert Barron]

Information about that, Senator?

[Ben Shapiro]

We are working through that right now with the Department of Justice.

[President Trump]

When you think you'll have it done, Cash?

[Ben Shapiro]

I think in the. In the near future, sir. Okay, so there are a lot of people out there who believe there's a bunch of conspiratorial stuff happening with the Epstein files and all the rest. And the people who are in charge are the Trump administration. So if you have ir, that's the place you should be directing it. Cash Patel and company are going to have to, at some point, reveal whatever is there and then say what is not there is not there. This seems to me the best way to treat mysterious issues like the death of Jeffrey Epstein. Meanwhile, the FBI is, in fact, going after New York Attorney General Letitia James for her real estate and mortgage transactions. Now, you will see that Letitia James is the same person who declared that she had to go after Donald Trump because she was fighting corruption every step of the way. Well, now, as it turns out, James is a statewide elected official with offices in Albany. But the transactions involve her personal property purchases and loans processed in New York City and Virginia. One of the mortgage documents filed in connection with James's purchase of a single family residence was signed as a witness by Jennifer Levy, who was the first deputy Attorney General. The second witness was Sharona Parchman, an executive assistant with the Attorney General's office. So the question is why all these government officials were signing a document related to her purchase of a private residence. So, serious issues surrounding Letitia James. As so often happens, people who use their offices politically are, in fact, quite corrupt. That sort of stuff seems to happen all the time. Meanwhile, Columbia University fallouts. As we talked about yesterday on the program, Hamas Nix took over the Columbia Library. Columbia's acting president, Claire Shipman. Actually, this is different. Right, because Columbia has now been shellacked by the Trump administration. They're afraid Claire Shipman ripped into the Kamazniks.

[Claire Shipman]

Let me be clear. What happened today, what I witnessed was utterly unacceptable violence and vandalism, hijacking a library. None of that has any place on our campus. These aren't Colombia's values. Let me be clear. Colombia unequivocally rejects antisemitism and all other forms of harassment and discrimination. We at Columbia value freedom of speech, robust debate, and peaceful protest. Today's disruption of Butler Library was not that. We need to recognize that when rules are violated, when a community is disrupted for the sake of a few, that is a considered choice and one with real consequences. There's a line between legitimate protest and actions that endanger others and disrupt the fundamental work of the university. Today, that line was crossed, and I have confidence the disciplinary proceedings will reflect the severity of the actions.

[Ben Shapiro]

Okay, so again, this is a different note coming out of Columbia, and there's only one reason for that. It's because there's a different administration in charge. The White House, for its part, praised Columbia because they actually called the cops this time when people trespassed five hours after a group of about 100 masked protesters forced their way past security guards and pushed through turnstiles into the school's main library. They had their hands zip tied behind their backs and were being marched out the door by police, according to the Wall Street Journal. And Claire Shipman said, violence and vandalism, hijacking a library, none of that has any place on our campus. The Trump administration praised Columbia's strong and resolute response to the protesters, saying that Shipman, quote, has met the moment with fortitude and conviction. So, yes, all it took was actually enforcing the law. Who knew? Who knew? Meanwhile, the Bidens are out there trying to clear more sacks of cash. Apparently, they are considering a $30 million tell all book deal that is going to include details from a diary kept by Jill Biden during her time at the White House. The joint book deal is contingent on Jill, whom experts say could be worth $15 million on her own. Is, according to Breitbart. But Jill would likely be required to review details surrounding the fact that Joe Biden was, you know, losing his mind and also the terrible debate he had with Trump that basically forced him out of the race. While the Bidens were doing the tour, yesterday, they showed up on the View where Joe Biden explained that actually he could have won.

[Andrew Klavan]

Well, Mr. President, you had previously said that you thought that you would have won. Since then, Donald Trump won all the battleground states and made inroads with almost every major demographic from working class voters to Hispanic men to black men. Knowing what you know now, do you think you would have beat him?

[President Trump]

Yeah. He still got 7 million fewer votes.

[Ben Shapiro]

Yes.

[President Trump]

Okay. A lot of people didn't show up, number one. Number one. Number two, they're very close in those toss up states. It wasn't a slam dunk.

[Ben Shapiro]

So he seems like he's in the best of health. He seems like things are going really, really well. He was asked why he didn't get out earlier. And here was President Biden's explanation. Well, Mr. President, some have even argued that leaving the race and endorsing your vice president, Vice President Harris, a hundred, over 100 days before the election hampered her campaign. Well, you know, what do you say to those critics?

[President Trump]

I say, number one, that there were still six full months. She was in every aspect, every decision I made, every decision we made. And I don't think it sound the wrong way. I don't think anybody thought we'd be successful as you were.

[Ben Shapiro]

Oh, boy, oh, boy. The worst part of this interview with the View, by the way, came when he was asked about all these books that are now coming out, including Jake Tapper's new book about his cognitive decline. And Jill literally had to step in in the middle.

[President Trump]

They are wrong. There's nothing to sustain that, number one. Number two, you know, think of what we're left with. We left with a circumstance where we had an insurrection when I started. We did not sense a civil war. We had a circumstance where we were in a position that we. Well, the pandemic, because of the incompetence of the last outfit, end up over a million people dying, many people dying. And we're also in a situation where we found ourselves unable to deal with a lot of just basic issues, which I won't go into in interest of time. And so we went to work and we got it done. And, you know, one of the things that.

[Ben Shapiro]

Well, and Alyssa, you know, one of.

[President Trump]

The things I think is that.

[Ben Shapiro]

But the people who wrote those books were not in the White House with us, and they didn't see how hard Joe worked every single day. And there's Joe jumping in. Oh, boy, oh, boy. I can't imagine why the Democrats lost the last election cycle. All right. Meanwhile, the Trump administration is sending an enormous number of mixed signals about its trip to the Middle east next week. I say mixed signals. I mean, really, really, really mixed signals. So apparently, the Trump administration is now thinking of giving away the store to the Saudis without involving Israel in an Abraham Accord. I don't really see the upside of this for the United States. I'm not sure why exactly the United States has an interest in, for example, giving civilian nuclear capacity to the Saudis without requiring anything from the Saudis in return. That's. That seems strange to me. The Abraham Accords were largely predicated on the idea that the United States would help broker a broader regional peace. This is what the Camp David Accords were about in 1978. But with Egypt and Israel, this is what the Abraham Accords were originally about. Between the Israelis, the uae, Bahrain, Morocco, the United States played broker. The United States now seems to be, under President Trump, trying to speedrun the process by basically forcing Israel to do what the Saudis want by giving the Saudis everything they want and then saying that Israel can either jump on board or not jump on board. According to Israel Hayom. Washington has now abandoned its insistence that Saudi Arabia established diplomatic ties with Israel before nuclear cooperation talks can proceed, Reuters reported. The US has dropped its demand for Saudi to normalize relations with Israel as a prerequisite for advancing civil nuclear cooperation talks, according to two sources with knowledge of the matter. So here's the question. Why exactly is it in America's interest for Saudi to have civilian nuclear capacity? If we don't get anything and the region doesn't get anything in return, what is the upside? Precisely? Okay. Meanwhile, the Trump administration has now openly announced that the United States is negotiating with Iran over a nuclear deal without Israeli involvement, which seems like a pathway, actually toward conflict. Because if the United States were to sign a bad nuclear deal with Iran and Iran were to continue to develop nukes, Israel's not going to sit by idly while that happens. So that's a strange move as well. And of course, the Trump administration announced earlier this week that they were no longer going to be fighting the Houthis at all as long as the Houthis weren't attacking American shipping. Meanwhile, the Houthis are firing missiles at Israel. Now, again, it's not the United States obligation to act on Israel's behalf in Yemen anymore. That's Israel's obligation to act on behalf of the United States in Yemen. However, opening daylight before you go into a fourth round of negotiations with the Iranians, in which the Iranians almost certainly will attempt to play for time, stall for time, gain civilian nuclear capacity that is aimed at weaponization, this seems like very strange. These are strange policy moves. To be certain. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has also announced that he is no longer going to be going to Israel Next week, President Trump, of course, is traveling only to the Gulf nations. He is traveling to Saudi, he is traveling to uae, and he is traveling to, to Qatar as well. So again, there are multiple reports that there is strain in the relationship between Trump and Netanyahu, presumably because Trump wants Israel to get to the end of the Hamas war as fast as humanly possible along lines that he is laying. And Netanyahu can't do that. For whatever reason, the Trump administration wants to divest from the Middle east as fast as possible while apparently drawing closer to Saudi Arabia, wants to cut some sort of deal with Iran. A bad, a bad Obama to deal is not a win for the United States. So the sort of confusion in the region continues for sure. Meanwhile, GOP senators are saying they're not going to sign off on a treaty that basically gives Saudi civilian nuclear capacity if the United States doesn't get some sort of regional peace in return. The Senate is going to have a say on that. Senator Lindsey Graham and Senator Tom Cotton also said if they want the most durable and lasting kind of deal, they want to bring it to the Senate, have it voted on as a treaty. One of the reasons why the Obama deal was so weak. An agreement between the American president, whoever he or she may be, and a foreign leader can be reversed by future presidents. That's what President Trump did seven years ago. Here, Graham and Cotton announcing a resolution to ban Iran from enriching uranium entirely, saying there will be no Iran nuclear deal approved by the Senate that includes civilian nuclear capacity. That is a fraud, Senator Cotton. And I believe that the only way to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon is for them to completely dismantle their enrichment program without enriching uranium. You cannot make a nuclear weapon that is non negotiable for us. Complete dismantlement. President Trump said that this weekend and in our resolution we describe in granular detail what dismantlement would look like. Okay. Meanwhile, the United States is now suggesting that the US Will be part of distributing aid in the Gaza Strip. Mike Huckabee, who's the ambassador to Israel, he had him on the show last week, spoke about the need to transfer humanitarian aid to Gaza, saying there's a desperate need for humanitarian aid in Gaza. Hamas is not capable or willing to provide it. So presumably this now means that the United States or its partners are going to be providing. I don't understand why the United States any more than I understand the gossip here under Joe Biden. I do not understand why this is a good idea. It doesn't seem to make a lot of sense, particularly delivering more aid into the Gaza Strip that will, okay, so let's say they pass it out to civilians. One minute later, Hamas is going to take all the aid from the civilians. That's what Hamas does. They literally shoot the civilians to take the aid. The United States being involved in that process makes very little sense to me. I don't see what the US Interest is there. It doesn't free the hostages, including the American hostage. Idan Alexander. It doesn't facilitate the end of a war in the Gaza Strip. The signals that are coming out from the Trump administration on the Middle east are at the very least, incredibly puzzling. Joining us online, Andrew Clavin. He has a brand new book titled the Kingdom of Cain. It was released earlier this week and it's all about how to deal with with the problem of evil in a world filled with it. Andrew, thanks so much for joining the show. Great to talk to you.

[Andrew Klavan]

Good to see you.

[Ben Shapiro]

So let's talk about the Kingdom of Cain. You look at three murders in history, including Cain's killing of his brother Abel, in order to examine how exactly to deal with the problem of evil. So what's sort of the thesis of the book?

[Andrew Klavan]

Well, I took these, these murders, these famous murders, real life murders that artists continually turned into stories, movies, novels, even works of philosophy. One murderer had his hand mummified, and after he was dead, they mummified his hand, put it in a museum. Poets would write beautiful odes to his hand. These are murders that capture the imaginations of artists. And the thing about art is that it turns life into a creative, it's a creative response to life. And so I started to think, well, if you have a creative response to murder, which is undeniably evil, what are you finding that's beautiful in this? That actually feeds into our life, that speaks into our lives so that we can deal with the world. When you look around at it honestly, right, you can get very depressed. And yet the Bible tells us to rejoice and it tells us, you know, to live in this world in rejoicing. And so my thesis was this. If you can take a murder like the Ed Gein's murder of women in the 1950s in Wisconsin and turn it into a work of art like Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho, which is a brilliant, brilliant movie, where is the beauty coming from? And I just take a look at the way in which creative people transform evil into something beautiful and then ask the question in the second part of the book, how do you do that in Your own life? How do you take things in your life? What are the practices that you do, the rituals, the beliefs that you have, the ways you deal with people that transform this kind of dark world into something beautiful so that you can live joyfully? It's a really. I don't know, I think it's a book that'll actually capture people's imagination because these are movies we all love. I mean, it's. Silence of the Lambs is based on the Ed Gein murder. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is based on the Ed Gein murder. All the slasher movies and all of those movies, a lot of them obviously are junk. But every now and again you hit one that you think like, oh, wait, this actually understood something about evil that actually makes my life better. So that's basically the way the book works.

[Ben Shapiro]

So to go back to the original story of Cain and Abel, obviously there have been a wide variety of interpretations of what that story is supposed to mean. Every time I read it, my takeaway seems to be the reverse of many people's, which is that the book is. That story is actually in the book of Genesis about the redemption of Cain, that Cain is the first character in the Bible who actually repents of sin. One of the big stories with Adam and Eve is that they don't repent of their sin. God confronts them and they blame the snake. Adam blames Eve, Eve blames the snake, and so they have to be cast out of the Garden of Eden. Cain, by contrast, he's told that he's essentially earned the death penalty. And then he throws himself on the mercy of the court and recognizes that he's done something deeply wrong before God. And so it's actually the first, not only murder story, but the first repentance story. What do you make of the story of Cain?

[Andrew Klavan]

Well, the interesting thing about Cain is, unlike the other stories, I didn't go directly to works of art about it because it repeats. The story repeats in the Bible, especially the Old Testament, over and over and over again. Every generation has a brother battle in it in which the younger brother instead of the older brother kind of wins out, you know, so you have. You have the younger brothers continually triumphing over older brothers throughout the Old Testament. And I kind of took the murder of Abel by Cain as a trauma that feeds into the chosen people of God and repeats itself to train their hearts to something. This battle. I mean, every brother battle in mythology is looked upon as a battle between a person and his other himself, you know, because you're kind of like Your brother. And your brother is kind of part of you. And so I study the Cain and Abel story as a story of the inward struggle between faith and unbelief. And the idea, and a lot of the old rabbis writings about this are kind of deal with this, that the reason Cain's offering to God is not acceptable and Abel's is, is not because of the nature of the offering, not because of the quality of the offering. It's because of the quality of the heart that's doing the offering. And you're absolutely right. That is, you know, I mean, at first, when God comes to Cain, you know, he says, where's your brother? He says, am I my brother's keeper? And God has that incredibly wonderful response, what have you done? And that line, what have you done? Which echoes through Dostoyevsky, echoes through all of the Christian writings. What have you done? And in Dostoyevsky, the line is transformed into what have you done to yourself? That's what when there's a murder in Crime and Punishment, the woman who loves him says to him, what have you done to yourself? And I think that that's what God asks of Cain. And that's why that story keeps coming back until the Jewish people can kind of work this out into unifying the two parts of ourselves, the. The materialist part, the part that wants to control everything, and the part that lets go and understands this sort of incredible, beautiful creation that we're in. And I think that that resolution, you know, is expressed in the New Testament in the phrase, lord, I believe, help my unbelief. And it's that wonderful phrase of, yes, we walk. You know, faith and doubt walk hand in hand. And faith and doubt are in this conversation that makes faith grow. And it's a beautiful thing, and it's the thing that we can actually live in that Cain and Abel relationship that's inside. I think every one of us, we can actually live in this kind of. In this joy without fear, once we understand what it is we're fighting inside ourselves.

[Ben Shapiro]

Andrew, one of the things that I think you do so beautifully, and you do it in a lot of your work, is when you're talking about themes like the theme of suffering, you do it in the form of storytelling, you do it in the form of experience. And that is really the only way to deal with the problem of true evil or true pain in the universe. You can't do it in the form of philosophizing. Anybody who tries to philosophize evil, who tries to figure out on a sort of rational level, how do you deal with evil in the world? How are you, as a person supposed to confront evil in the world? You face the problem of Job. All of his friends keep coming to him and giving him sort of rationalistic responses for why evil has happened to him in the universe. And there is no real answer to that. Your book is much more about how to experience suffering and go through it.

[Andrew Klavan]

I think, you know, this is what the full thesis, the full theory of the book is that the only response to evil is beauty. And, you know, Dostoevsky said, beauty will save the world. And the reason I believe that to be true is because when you get into these conversations, how can there be a good God who's all powerful and all omniscient, and yet there's evil in the world? And this keeps a lot of people from coming to faith. It keeps a lot of people from believing. They look around. I can't tell you how many times people have said to me, oh, you're. You believe things, but I just see so much evil in the world. I can't believe. But. But the idea that there is an overall beauty to the design of the world and you can see it, you experience it when you see the world, rightly. And that only comes across in art. It only comes across. It only can. I can only communicate it to you in storytelling, in music, in painting. I mean, how many times have you looked at a painting in a museum of some horror? Even the COVID of this book, which is a beautiful painting of Cain killing Abel, it has a gorgeous painting of it. And you look at it and you think, that painting is so beautiful. But what I'm looking at is horrific. It's a crucifixion. It's Cain killing Abel. It's some terrible disaster that takes place in the Bible or in mythology, and yet some artist has found the beauty in it. My question, the book ends with the question, if human beings can do that with the evil that they experience, what can God not do of the entire experience of creation? And so this broken creation that we're in, this creation that's so full of things that we. That darken us is actually part of a design so beautiful that when we finally see it, I think we will understand that our joy was always joy, and our joy was always the reality and not our sorrow. And I think that that is. You're absolutely right. This is so true. Philosophy cannot deal with evil, but beauty can suggest a solution to evil.

[Ben Shapiro]

Well, the book is the Kingdom of Cain. You can go get it Everywhere by my friend Andrew Clavin. Andrew, congrats on the book.

[Andrew Klavan]

Thanks a lot. It's great to see you.

[Ben Shapiro]

Alrighty, folks, the show continues for our members. Right now, we're gonna jump into the mailbag, answer some of your questions. Remember, in order to watch, you have to be a member. If you're not a member, become a member. Use code Shapiro Checkout for two months free on all annual plans. Click that link in the description and join us.