Ep. 2470 - "NO MORE WARS" Isn't A Solution. Victory Is.

Summary

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Podcast Summary: The Ben Shapiro Show, Episode 2470

"NO MORE WARS" Isn't A Solution. Victory Is.
Date: July 23, 2026
Host: Ben Shapiro (The Daily Wire)

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Main Theme & Purpose

In this episode, Ben Shapiro challenges the growing sentiment of isolationism and anti-war attitudes in America, particularly as expressed by Laura Ingraham and others on the right. He argues that "no more wars" is not a viable strategy—victory, when conflict arises, is. Shapiro analyzes the current state of Middle Eastern conflict, debates over U.S. military involvement, and the dangers of pacifism. The episode also explores related controversies, such as the National Defense Authorization Act's Section 219, left-wing influence on the Democratic Party, and contemporary culture war flashpoints, like the Sophie Cunningham WNBA controversy.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Roots and Dangers of Modern Isolationism

• Laura Ingraham’s Posts: Ingraham claims Americans are “done with war” and will not support, fund, or sacrifice for it ([01:01]).
• Ben’s Response:
  • Argues this position is “foolish and dangerous.”
  • “You may as well say that you will never allow the sun to rise because the reality is that the world will come to you.” ([02:25])
• Public Sentiment: Shapiro acknowledges why people are tired—economic strain, confusion over administration policy, and inconsistent messaging about conflicts abroad.
• The Three Choices:
  1. Victory: Win decisively when conflict is unavoidable.
  2. Antiseptic War: Limited, gradual, and endless tit-for-tat conflict.
  3. Isolation: Withdraw and hope problems don’t arrive on American shores ([00:28–10:00]).
• Key Quote:
  • “There are only three real possibilities. And those possibilities stack up to only one choice…you ought to win and you ought to win as fast as possible.” ([10:00])

2. Confusion and Division in U.S. Foreign Policy

• On the Middle East:
  • Contradictory statements from U.S. leadership about the Strait of Hormuz and Iran cause confusion.
  • President Trump says “we don't need straits…we cannot let Iran have a nuclear weapon.” ([03:40])
• Iran and Proxies:
  • The Houthi attacks signal increased Iranian proxy activity.
  • Trump’s tepid warning to the Houthis is seen by Shapiro as insufficient ([04:30–07:30]).
• Shapiro’s Analysis: Victory, not endless half-measures or withdrawal, is necessary. History teaches that “proportional” responses only prolong conflict.

3. Historical Reflections: Isolationism’s High Cost

• Pre-WWII Parallels:
  • Cites 1920s and '30s pacifism and the Kellogg-Briand Pact outlawing war.
  • “Isolationism and pacifism is a deadly combination because it turns out the world is a deadly place.” ([16:55])
• American History:
  • America has rarely been isolationist; even the early republic acted internationally—for commerce, for interests ([19:00–22:00]).

4. Responding to Modern Policy Arguments

• On Section 219 of the NDAA:
  • Critics claim it “merges” the U.S. military with Israel. Shapiro calls this “absolute sheer nonsense.” ([28:00–34:00])
  • Reads the bill language, emphasizing it calls for research and technological cooperation—not command structure integration.
  • “The idea here is that we are going to do joint R and D with Israel. Why? Because Israel's really, really good at R & D…all this feels like this would be useful, right?” ([32:00])
• On Supply Chains:
  • Points out U.S. military supply chains are already global.

5. Democratic Party Drift & Culture War

• AOC’s Rise:
  • Tracks polling showing a shift toward Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez as a leading Democratic figure ([34:48–36:14]).
  • Shapiro predicts she will continue to moderate her image while energizing the party's left.
• Democratic Socialist Arguments:
  • Critiques “rebranding” of socialist ideas by Zoran Mamdani and Jon Stewart as simply improvements to capitalism, not the outright opposition they truly represent ([37:32–43:00]).
  • Quote: “If the Democrats choose to do this, they are going to reap the whirlwind—or America will.”

6. Markets, Regulation, and Hollywood

• Paramount–Warner Brothers Merger Block:
  • Shapiro argues Democratic regulators are blocking private business for political gain, even at the cost of jobs and consumers ([44:27–46:03]).

7. Sophie Cunningham, Women’s Sports, and Media Bias

• Cunningham’s Stand:
  • Indiana Fever player Sophie Cunningham asserts importance of protecting girls in sports, stands by position that “biological men” should not compete against women ([48:24]).
  • Quote: “I said what I said. I think it's kind of common sense… I think it's really important to protect children, and that's little girls who are also involved in that category. So I stand on what I said…” – Sophie Cunningham ([48:24])
• Blowback:
  • Cunningham faces media backlash; Shapiro equates her courage with standing up for truth against political orthodoxy.
• Contrast with Megan Rapinoe:
  • Rapinoe frames Title IX and the trans sports debate as attacks on women, accuses opponents of bigotry ([49:53]).
  • Shapiro calls this “insufferable” and critiques the culture of the WNBA for its politics over performance.
• Media Accusations:
  • Analyzes USA Today’s suggestion that Caitlin Clark’s popularity and playing style are “white nationalist.”
  • Shapiro dismisses these arguments as “deeply, deeply problematic” and “ridiculous.”

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Highlighted Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the folly of “no more wars”:

  • “The idea we'll never fund, we'll never fight, we'll never allow anyone to declare a war, we'll never get into a war—you may as well say that you will never allow the sun to rise because the reality is that the world will come to you.” ([02:25]) — Ben Shapiro

• On the need for victory:

  • “War is bad. It is hell. It is awful. It always has been, it always will be. ... But war is also and forever a necessary tool in the American arsenal. ... You ought to win and you ought to win as fast as possible.” ([10:00]) — Ben Shapiro

• Explaining NDAA Section 219:

  • “There is nothing in this bill, nothing, nor would I support anything in the bill that merged the command structures of the United States and Israel or gave Israel control over America's actual military. That would be an absurdity.” ([31:00]) — Ben Shapiro

• On the Democratic Party’s leftward drift:

  • “If the Democrats choose to do this, they are going to reap the whirlwind or America will. Those will be the two choices.” ([42:55]) — Ben Shapiro

• On Sophie Cunningham’s stand:

  • “I said what I said. I think it's kind of common sense … and I think I'll always believe in that. I think it's really important to protect children, and that's little girls who are also involved in that category. And so I stand on what I said and I always believe that.” ([48:24]) — Sophie Cunningham

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Important Timestamps

| Timestamp | Segment Description | |-----------|----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | 00:00 | Ben introduces the episode’s main theme: the problem with “no war” mentality | | 01:01 | Quotes & rebuts Laura Ingraham’s and National Review’s stances | | 03:40 | Trump’s take on the Strait of Hormuz and U.S. interests | | 04:30 | Iranian proxies (Houthis) and the administration’s confusing responses | | 10:00 | Shapiro lays out three options: Victory, Antiseptic, Isolation | | 16:55 | Historical failure of pacifism and isolationism after WWII | | 28:00 | Section 219 NDAA controversy | | 34:48 | Democratic Party primary polling shift to AOC | | 37:32 | Jon Stewart & Mamdani discussion: socialism vs. reforming capitalism | | 44:27 | Defense of free markets: Paramount–Warner Bros. merger talk | | 48:24 | Sophie Cunningham on protecting girls in sports | | 49:53 | Megan Rapinoe’s response about Title IX and women in sports | | 51:25 | Media accusation: Caitlin Clark, flopping, and “white nationalism” |

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Final Thoughts

Shapiro concludes that American aversion to war is not new, but the demand for victory—rather than endless engagement or powerlessness—remains constant. He warns that calls for total withdrawal or appeasement ignore historical lessons and imperil American interests.
Culture war skirmishes—from the NDAA to women’s sports—further illustrate the polarization and bad-faith debate dominating media narratives.

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Summary prepared using Shapiro’s original language and tone, structured for clarity and insightful recall.

Transcript

[Ben Shapiro]

Laura Ingraham says the American people are done with war, won't fight it, won't fund it, won't support it. And that this new isolationism is going to win. And it might win, but that kind of thinking is dramatically wrong. It's the kind of wrong that destroys countries, that destroys America. Listen, I get why people feel the way they do. I feel that way. I get it, okay? Gas prices are high, families are stretched thin. Folks are looking at the grocery bill and they're rent. They're thinking, why on earth are we spending blood and treasure halfway around the world and not even getting to the end point? But this is why it's actually imperative that America wins and wins quickly. See, there are three options on offer here. One, we win. We do what we have to do in order to achieve our goals. Two, we fight antiseptically and the war goes on pretty much forever. Three, we go full isolationist and pacifist. And then we continue to fight forever wars, forever. Because that's what happens. The choice is right there in front of us, which means there's really only one choice. Victory. I'll get to all of that in a moment. Plus the idiotic controversy over Section 219 of the National Defense Authorization act.

[Guest or Co-host]

And.

[Ben Shapiro]

And Sophie Cunningham of the WNBA saying perfectly obvious things about men not being women and then getting yelled at over it. This is the Ben Shapiro Show. So last night, Laura Ingram, the Fox News host, I like Laura, but Laura put up a post on X that was referring back to an article by a writer for National Review named Michael Brennan Dougherty. And the article is basically a celebration of the fact that the Iran war has been, quote, unquote, restrained by the people. And Michael Brennan's already writes, Trump's ambitions are being checked by the American voter. The war is now unpopular and hemmed in not by Congress or constitutional checks, but by the people themselves. When Trump tells us that his favorite option is to take out Kharg island, but that he's not sure America has the stomach for it, he's admitting the sovereign he fears most is not Iran's supreme leader, but the American voter. That Iran war is restrained not by Congress, but by an American people who will tolerate a quick punitive spectacle, not an attempt to land Marines on a foreign oil depot where well under fire. And Laura Ingram followed that up with a tweet. That's not really a quote from the piece, it's kind of posed that way. But she says, quote, key point, the American people are done with war. They will not support war. They will not voluntarily pay for war. They will not make sacrifices to support war. They will not encourage their kids and grandkids to fight in wars. They won't vote for politicians who promise war, and they will punish politicians who get them into war. It's not Trump who's making America more isolationist. It's the American people, and they are going to win this fight. Okay, so maybe they win that fight if that is how the American people are now operating. If they do, it's horrible because it's a foolish sentiment. It's foolish and dangerous. The idea we'll never fund, we'll never fight. We'll never allow anyone to declare a war. We'll never get into a war. You may as well say that you will never allow the sun to rise because the reality is that the world will come to you. But I want to get more into the sentiment that's feeding this foolish point of view because. Because again, I get it. The American people right now are looking at the situation in the Middle east and they don't know what's going on. And I mean, frankly, kind of why should they? In some parts of the administration say the Strait of Hormuz is already open. We keep hearing that, that it's open already, which is not true. We know that the flow out of the Strait of Hormuz is not consistent. We know there are a lot of ships that are still waiting in the strait. Other parts of the administration are going on podcasts and saying that the strait can't be opened under any circumstances because there are too many IRGC associated goat farmers who can hide behind a rock and fire drones at shipping. So we can never open it under any circumstances. Again, part of the same administration. And then there's President Trump, who says sometimes that we shouldn't care about the strait at all, which, again, there's some accuracy to this. But here was the president yesterday.

[Guest or Co-host]

Millions of barrels of oil is going to Houston and Louisiana, coming to you indirectly. After it's refined, they're refining it. There's but millions and millions of barrels of oil. And also Venezuela is doing better than they've ever done before, too. The big oil companies are going in and they're signing up. We have Chris Wright working on it, Doug Burgum working on it. Scott is working on them. And it's been incredible, actually. What it's got serious oil. In fact, if you combine US and Venezuela, we have about 62% of the world's oil market. So we don't need straits. We don't need anything. We don't need the hormone street, but we do it because we have to do it because we cannot let Iran have a nuclear weapon.

[Ben Shapiro]

So again, the president is saying that we shouldn't care about the strait. So then Americans are saying, so why should we care about the straight. What are we even doing there? Why don't just hit the nuclear facilities and go home? So again, all this is discombobulated. The strait is open. No, the strait can never be open. We should care about the strait. It's important. No, we should never care about the strait. It's discombobulated. It doesn't feel like it moves us toward victory. And then things get more complicated because it turns out that in reality, Iran is in very serious trouble. In reality, Iran's economy is flat on its back. In reality, there are rifts inside the Iranian governing structure. In reality, Iran has no capacity to ship its oil out. They have no capacity to shoot down things, things that are flying over their country. And this is why they've been activating their friends, the Houthis. Well, the Houthis are about to get involved in this conflict as well. 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According to the Wall Street Journal and Reuters, the Saudi Arabian state news agency SPA saying an official source at the General Transport Authority said an attack caused a fire on the bow of the tanker and Cilia, but all crew members were safe. SPA did not say who had targeted the vessel. The Houthis put out a statement saying that they had attacked two Saudi tankers, the Ancillia and the Layla, saying that the vessels had violated a naval blockade imposed by the Houthis on Saudi Arabia in the Red Sea. The Houthis said they had targeted the tankers with a number of ballistic and cruise missiles as well as drones. Now, again, you'll remember a few years ago, the president wanted to go hard after the Houthis, and he was talked out of going harder after the Houthis by other members of his administration. Well, now the president is putting out a statement, quote, a year ago, the United States of America attacked very powerfully the Houthis for their interference with commerce and trade by shooting at ships. Since that time and during our conflict with Iran, they've acted very responsibly. I mean, not kind of really. I mean, they've been firing the occasional missile at Israel and then Israel's been pounding them. Unfortunately, now they are starting up again, shooting at two Saudi Arabian ships last night. Please let this truth serve to represent that if they do this again, the United States will hold Iran responsible in that the Houthis are a surrogate and or proxy of Iran. And major military punishment will be inflicted upon Iran. And of course, the Houthis themselves, who I'm very disappointed with, in that they have until now acted very professionally and smart. Thank you for their attention to this matter. So that's the president seeming to tell the Houthis, warning them off of this, you know, kind of wheedling them to stop. Now, again, I get why people are confused and upset. It feels like things are stalemated, that they're getting broader and more difficult. Why? Well, well, because what the American people want is victory. There's this bizarre notion in foreign policy that the American people are deeply worried about the immediate cost of war to the enemy, that the American people, that we can't handle the ugliness of war for even a day, that every Conflict has to be totally antiseptic. And here I'm not even talking about the American willingness to undergo casualties. No one in America wants American casualties. It's tragedy and a horror. We do understand that war does come along with casualties, and we are willing to undergo those casualties in pursuit of an end and a victory for America. But as far as the idea that, for example, America, we can't hit Kharga island because the Iranian people would then be deprived of oil resources, the American people are, I should say, not particularly concerned about that. We are far more concerned with why we're there. Not winning, right? The. You have to balance these options. We would like to be antiseptic and we would like to win, but victory wins over antiseptic every time. If antiseptic wins over victory, then you will get neither victory nor antiseptic. That is how this works in reality. Always and forever. There are only three real possibilities. And those possibilities stack up to only one choice. The first possibility is you go fast and. And you go hard and we win. That means that we bomb their nuclear facilities into dust. We bomb, carg bomb South Pars. We put the regime on its last legs. We destroy their oil fields and their capacity for refineries. We force open the strait. The president wanted to do this. Remember? He tried to do this for one day. Operation Freedom in this strait. Project Freedom in the Strait. It was one day. One day. And then the Saudi said no. Okay, well, we got to tell them, shove it. We're going to do it anyway.

[Guest or Co-host]

Okay?

[Ben Shapiro]

We could do that. Allies like UAE and Saudi should help us militarily. They should provide us. They have standing militaries. They should provide us for soldiers, not our boots for use on the north shore of Hormuz and on Kesham island and Har Islands. Now, listen, this may be uglier and it may be costlier, but it's faster and we win. Because here's the thing. War is bad. It is hell. It is awful. It always has been, it always will be. War is the infliction on pain of pain on the enemy to the point where they no longer want to undergo that pain. While you are able to withstand pain, that's what war is. It is a test of willpower and a test of pain willingness. But war is also and forever a necessary tool in the American arsenal. It always has been, it always will be. So you ought to win and you ought to win as fast as possible. And this seems to be what the Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, is trotting out as the Policy at an Asian summit in Manila.

[Guest or Co-host]

Guys, I saw Arachi, their foreign minister, who the other day say or something about their policies and eye for an eye. The president's policy is ahead for an eye. I mean, honestly, that's what it's going to be. I mean, they will pay a very heavy price for the things they're doing. They're already paying a very heavy price. You guys don't know because you don't cover it. You're not in Iran, you're not in the street. They don't have a free media. But they're going to continue to pay a very heavy price. Their industrial base has been decimated. Their defense industrial base has been decimated. They're losing launchers, they're losing radars every single night.

[Ben Shapiro]

So, again, this is right. It's not an eye for an eye, it's an eye for a head. Now, I think that doesn't even go far enough. I think that what we actually ought to do is say an eye for everything. Like, you touch a ship in the Strait of Hormuz, and we kill the head of the irgc, we kill Khalaba, we kill your entire leadership class again. We destroy South Pars and we destroy Kharg 1 drone, and that's what happens. That is the way you win in the middle, by the way. That's the way you win. Generally, it is not proportionate in a statistical sense. It is proportionate to the goal you seek to achieve, which is the Strait of Hormuz. Open. No nuclear program, no ballistic missile development, and no support of terror abroad. Those are the goals. Those always were the goals. They will always be the goals. Okay, that's option one, actual victory. Option two, go antiseptic. This, as we've been discussing, is the strategy of gradual escalation. We tried it in Vietnam. This is. We have to be as clean as possible. It's the strategy of an eye for an eye or tit for tat, or you hit a ship and we hit a bridge. The President put out a statement that was kind of along these lines the other day when he suggested that anytime Iran shoots a ship, we are going to hit one bridge or power plant, including those located next to or in the capital city of Tehran. What we actually should do, and then we should do it, is if you hit a ship or shoot at a ship in the Strait of Hormuz, all of them go away. Because here's the thing about the Iranians. They're perfectly willing to put out their own eye if it means you lose an eye. An eye for an eye is a thing they like to do.

[Guest or Co-host]

Right.

[Ben Shapiro]

He put out a tweet suggesting it's time to evacuate Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the UAE and probably Oman. Because the idea is that then they look what they're doing. What they're doing is we're saying Trump is saying an eye for an eye, and he's saying an eye for everything. Why is Iran doing that? Iran doesn't have the military capacity to do all of that. We do. Why is he making that threat? Because he knows that threat works. And it turns out that antiseptic and proportional in the statistical sense is very, very bad and foolish foreign policy. What you're relegated to if you end up with this sort of tit for tat strategy is a hope that eventually they just sort of collapse randomly from within. Listen, I never thought the administration would end up with this option. I didn't. That's because historically, this is not a thing that President Trump liked. He didn't like forever wars, these tit for tat, low level wars. He. He liked the big spectacular strike that was then over. He liked the let's kidnap Maduro and then we're done with the operation. He liked the let's kill Qasem Soleimani and then he's dead, or let's hit the nuclear facilities in Iran and then let's leave in Operation Midnight Hammer last year. But it seems as though one of the things that happened here is that the President wanted originally to go very hard. And he was talked out of it by Turkey and Saudi Arabia and by some of his own advisors. And then he kind of got stuck in this let's tit for tat gradual escalation, gradual de. Escalation routine. And now we're stuck here. It turns out the quickest path to a forever war is to not use overwhelming force. Okay, and then you get to option three. Option three is the one that Laura Ingram is trotting out. Give up on war. Give up on military optionality. Give up global power. Recede within your own borders. So again, let me read what, what Laura wrote there. Quote, quote, the American people are done with war. They will not support war. Sounds like Dennis Kucinich. They will not. Who was a guest on Tucker the other day. They will not voluntarily pay for war. They will not make sacrifices to support war. They will not encourage their kids and grandkids to fight in wars. They won't vote for politicians who promise war, and they will punish politicians who get them into war. It's not Trump, who's making America more isolationist? It's the American people, folks. In a second we'll get to the pacifism, isolationism. We've tried this before. Historically, it doesn't go particularly well. Speaking of things that don't go well, if you do not actually keep control of your time, things go extremely poorly for you. Now I have a very tight schedule. 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Candidates can tell you in their own words why they're interested in your job. No wonder ZipRecruc is the number one rated hiring site based on G2. Save time, meet great candidates sooner. With Zip Recruiter, 4 out of 5 employers who post on ZipRecruiter get a quality candidate within the very first day. Try it for free at ziprecruiter.com/daily wire that ziprecruiter.com/ daily wire meet your match at ZipRecruiter. So this ideology, the strategy, this sort of isolationist pacifism has been tried before. It is legitimately one of the great failures in all of world history. So after World War I, when the Allies had imposed a peace on Germany, the Allies then refused to actually hold Germany to that peace. You can make the case that the Treaty of Versailles was too strenuous in its desire for reparations from the Germans. Solid historical case for that. But there is no question that if France had stood up to Germany, if the Brits had stood up to Germany, if America had stood up to Germany in the interwar period, World War II never happened. Instead, Great Britain, France and the United States all attempted to pursue a pacifist and isolationist strategy. And this led to only the worst and most costly war in all of human history. And again, you don't have to speculate. This is what they were trying to do. They openly said they were trying to do this. In 1928, the United States Secretary of State and the French Foreign Minister designed the so called Kellogg Briand Pact. It outlawed war as an instrument of policy. Okay. The other signatories to that agreement again outlawing war. France, the US the uk Also Germany, Italy and Japan. You may notice that it didn't work out well. And again, it was not unique to the United States. This was the sentiment across the West. It is the theme of Churchill's Gathering Storm, the first volume of his World War II history. In 1933, the students at Oxford University famously voted in favor of the so called King and Country Resolution. That resolution said that the students would quote, under no circumstances fight for King and country. Right. That sounds exact. That is, that is almost word for word what Laura is saying. We're not going to support war. We won't, we won't fight wars, we won't vote for wars. We won't back politicians who are even putting on the table the possibility of war. And then all these countries followed that policy. Over the course of the 1930s, the United States slashed our military to the bone. By the time World War II broke out, the United States had the 19th largest military on planet Earth. We were stacked behind Portugal. One of the reasons that World War II took so long and killed so many people is that once the United States even got involved after December, 12-7-41, it took us fully three years to rearm and then four years to win. If we had had that weaponry at the ready, would Pearl harbor ever have happened? Isolationism and pacifism is a deadly combination because it turns out the world is a deadly place. Our enemies are not going to do any of that stuff. There's also this very ahistorical notion that American foreign policy was once truly isolationist and pacifist. And it's nonsense. It's just nonsense. If you look at the history of America's wars, America has been involved in conflicts all over the globe almost since its founding. We were fighting wars with the Barbary pirates under Thomas Jefferson. And if you're talking about wars outside America's exact borders, that was happening since the founding, since we were fighting the Indian wars west of the Appalachians, immediately remember, America wasn't always the United States of America, wasn't always the entire continent. It was a relatively narrow Strip of land along the eastern seaboard. American interests, our national interests, have always extended beyond pure physical threat. And I know there are people who are like, well, unless we get physically hit, we cannot get involved in conflict. That is stupid. That's stupid. We have interests that require us to defend them. And sometimes, hopefully as. As rarely as possible, that requires military force. But to pretend otherwise is to be stupid. Our interests include things like economics and commerce. This has always been true. The American Revolution was fought over economics and commerce. It was fought largely over the blocking of trade routes. There are lots of reasons that America might get involved in a foreign conflict. Hopefully it starts with diplomacy and ends with diplomacy. Sometimes it doesn't, but our interests include everything from trade routes to resource access. They include everything from the foreign occupation of Allied countries to military buildups among our enemies. We have lots of interests all over the world. All countries do. Under the rubric that Laura set out in that tweet, America has literally never fought a justifiable war, including the revolution. And here's the thing. There's this bizarre counterfactual that's promoted by isolationists and pacifists. The bizarre counterfactual is that America would still be a global power. You'd still be living the same lifestyle in the same country today without all the history intervening. If we'd never fought the Revolution or the Civil War or World War I or World War II or Vietnam or the Iraq War or any of this stuff, America would still look exactly the same. That is literally the least likely counterfactual. The least likely counterfactual. The reality is that if America had taken up because of the isolationist click, America would likely be an economic backwater or even a colony of Europe, because why would we have fought a revolution? I want to hear from the isolationists and pacifists why the American Revolution was justified. Truly, we are citizens of the British Empire at the time. America is great and powerful because we pursue our interests and we know that our interests are paramount. That doesn't mean war is always first resort. It should always be last resort. But sometimes war is both necessary and justified. So saying we can have no more war ever, that's not even a foreign policy. It's just childish. And more than childish, it's just a form of surrender. No more war ever is about as realistic as the socialists who say, no more work ever sounds great in theory. In practice, it's a total disaster. War is horrible and cruel and, yes, sometimes necessary. And you also can't remove the horror or cruelty from War, it's not possible to do that and win. Pacifism, isolationism, and even this sort of anodyne view of war is a pseudo philosophy of dols. Now, here's the thing. It's especially egregious and foolish right now because you can at least understand sentimentally why Americans would object to war in a time of, say, a draft. We have a volunteer military. You can understand why Americans would object to military action in Iran at a time when America was not militarily dominant. We are militarily dominant. America has fought legitimately dozens of conflicts since the revolution with military capacity that wasn't up to snuff, in some cases, almost zero odds in our favor. And we did it because it was in our national interest. So the idea that America right now is supposed to lose or surrender to a third rate regime that is shooting drones at ships, that is not a victory. And by the way, it opens the door to actual significantly larger threat. Money will pour into Iran from China and Russia. They'll rearm stronger than they ever were. China and Russia themselves will flex their muscle if you, if you choose this path. Americans are not pacifists. We're not isolationists. We just don't like to lose. We don't like to lose, which is why I'm critical of the discombobulated messages that have been coming out from the White House and why we actually need to win. And I think that President Trump gets this in his gut. He feels the same way that you do or I do on this sort of stuff. He would like to win and win fast. We haven't done it yet, but I don't think that that's because of, that's, that's President Trump's instinct. I think his instinct is go fast, go hard and win. So here is my recommendation. Let's actually do that. Let us be dominant, let us win in decisively and overwhelming fashion, and then we can come home. Because Americans are very much against losing wars, but we're very much in favor of winning them. Okay, this brings us to another form of stupidity. So there is a gigantic propaganda war that is apparently on to destroy America's forward capacity in the world, technologically speaking. We've seen this happen with regard to the alliance of left, horseshoe, right and China, Russia are enemies with regard to AI development. The idea is that America ought to stymie its own AI development. Meanwhile, China races ahead. This is quite counterproductive and stupid. Well, now this is extending to the National Defense Authorization Act. So yesterday, the House of Representatives in A very narrow vote approved the National Defense Authorization Act. One element of the National Defense Authorization act is called Section 219. It was voted against by seven Republicans and voted in favor by six Democrats. Section 219 of the NDAA is not particularly important. It is being treated as important by people who hate both America and her allies. As a general rule, some people think it's unnecessary. That's fine. Mean I can. I can hear that argument. That's not the overarching argument that's being made. The overarching argument that's being made is that somehow Section 219 of the NDAA merges the United States military with the Israeli military. This is. I believe the technical term for this in law is horse. It's just nonsense. I can read to you the text. We'll go through it. Aoz, who again wept when she voted for the funding of Iron Dome. That's who she is. She calls the NDA an existential threat to American sovereignty and democracy. Like she cares about America's defense. Says tomorrow the House will vote on the ndaa, which includes a provision to merge parts of our military with the idf. This amendment is an existential threat to American sovereignty and democracy. Every member of Congress must vote no. And the vast majority of Democrats did. Again, nonsense. But of course echoed by crazed lunatic Thomas Massie, who put out a similar tweet. Final vote today for the NDAA which tragically merges our military technology and supply chains with Israel's. Let's hope this version fails in the Senate because Section 219 is a betrayal of our sovereignty. Okay, well again the House lawmakers narrowly passed this. It was a 1.15 trillion annual defense policy bill. The tally was 216 to 212. Six Democrats voted for the overall bill. Seven Republicans voted against the overall bill. Naturally you have all of the usual suspects. Chenk Uyghur. Again, no one hates America's defense more than Chenk Uyghur. The Republicans are officially Israel's bitch party. Now, almost every Democrat voted against NDAA that had section 219 to merge our military technology with Israel. Every Republican except Thomas Massie voted to be subservient to Israel and serve that foreign country loyally. Okay, Representative Summer Lee went ahead and and pushed this as well. She was attacking also Representative Josh gottheimer by mixing him up with Representative with Governor Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania. Okay, but what does the NDAA actually say? Well, fortunately for you, and fortunately for me, maybe unfortunately because it's depressing to be literate in an age of illiteracy. Fortunately, however, I have the capacity to read English words and understand them. Apparently, this is not true of AOC or Thomas Massie or a wide variety of morons, online dolts and clods who are firmly convinced that if we cooperate with our extremely technologically advanced military ally, Israel, in developing technologies, somehow this amounts to a merger. Okay, now I'm going to point out, number one, there is nothing in this bill, nothing, nor would I support anything in the bill that merged the command structures of the United States and Israel or gave Israel control over America's actual military. That would be an absurdity. Of course the Pentagon maintains complete and total authority over all procurement decisions. The idea here is that we are going to do joint R and D with Israel. Why? Because Israel's really, really good at R and D. They're incredible at R and D. Actually, you know where we're lagging in drone technologies, in missile defense technologies, in rocket defense technologies. You know where Israel is really, really good at all of those things. Why? Because they're on the front lines and they are expending an extraordinary portion of their GDP every year to develop technologies to fight all of that. So if you'd like for America to have second rate weaponry, if you would like for America not to have access to this technology, by all means scream at the Jews. But let's be very clear what the NDAA does. And it does not in fact merge the United States with Israel or command structures. And if the complaint is that supply chains are now complicated, I would like to point out that if you believe that everything the United States military is developed that, that every piece of weaponry the United States military has is developed domestically and sourced domestically, you're just wrong. It's wrong. It's not true. That's stupid. In the microchips are in American military parts are not being produced domestically. They're being produced largely in Taiwan. It's one of the reasons why Taiwan matters internationally. Speaking in just one second, we're going to get into the actual text of the bill. I know. We're doing the thing. We're doing the thing. We're actually looking at the evidence. This is one of the reasons why we here at Daily Wire have developed a shockingly large fan base. It's fun to go to events and see people wearing fact hats or Daily Wire shirts or carrying around the fashionably wonderful Tumblr. Well, that is only possible because we have a great store and our store works on Shopify it makes buying our merch incredibly simple for our audience. Whether somebody is picking up one of my books or a fax hat or that leftist tier Tumblr, Shopify makes checkout fast and easy and behind the scenes. Shopify gives businesses everything they need to grow from beautiful storefront templates to AI tools that help write product descriptions and improve product photography. They handle inventory, payments, shipment analytics, and so much more all in one place. It's the same platform trusted by brands like Mattel and Gymshark, but it's just as useful if you're launching your very first business. Start your free trial right [e-mail] Shapiro. That's shopify.com Shapiro. To start that free trial again, you gotta look for shortcuts when you are running a business and Shopify is one of the best shortcuts available. It means that you can sell your stuff. It means they're gonna handle everything. Head on over to shopify.comshapiro and get started today. So I'm gonna read you the bill, okay? I understand it's boring stuff to read bills, but it's also boring to, you know, know things. Apparently it's much more fun not to know things and to be a stupid ass who spends your days online militating about bills that don't exist and then getting people to buy into the new incentive structure whereby. Well, we do have to. We will have to tut this thing. Here's the truth. I don't care very much about this provision other than I think that it's good that America ought to have access to the world's best military technology so we can blow the hell out of our enemies when we choose to do so. That doesn't seem all that controversial to me. But were this provision not in there, we would find other ways, I assume, to coordinate. But I'm going to read you the actual text of the bill now, okay. Because apparently this is now required in order to debunk the stupidity of an enormous number of human beings in the X space. Quote the Secretary of Defense shall designate an executive agent as such term is defined in the Department of Defense Directive 5101.01, responsible for synchronizing cooperative efforts between the United States and Israel to expand and accelerate bilateral defense technology research, development, testing, evaluation, integration and industrial coordination by one identifying jointly developed or Israeli origin technologies with operational utility for potential integration into U.S. systems and programs of record. Okay, you know what that means? What that means is we're going to find jointly developed stuff we developed with the Israel The Israeli, the Israelis or stuff developed in Israel that is going to be useful to us. 2. Ensuring collaborative research initiatives involving government, private sector and academic institutions in the US and Israel is done in a manner that protects sensitive technology and information and the national security interests of the US and Israel. So in other words, we are not going to pass on to them classified information. 3. Facilitating the transition of technologies from research and development into procurements and acquisition pathways. So actually making things. 4. Establishing frameworks for joint ventures, licensing agreements and U. S based co production and manufacturing partnerships with Israeli industry. In other words, Israel will be actually making things in the United States which is good for our economy. 5. Coordinating with relevant Department of Defense components including the Irregular Warfare Technical Support Directorate, Capability Development and Innovation Divisions, the Undersecretary of Defense for Research and Engineering, the Defense Innovation Unit, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, to align efforts and avoid duplication. Again, part of this is we don't want to do the same thing the Israelis are doing because it's a waste of money. 6. Promoting joint training exercises in informing sharing information sharing mechanisms to enhance operational readiness to deploy jointly developed technologies. So this is. We'll exchange information with you so that we have more information when we deploy the technologies. And then it lists a series of areas in which the United States will coordinate, including counter unmanned systems, including aerial, maritime and ground platforms. That would be things like shooting down drones, anti tunneling and subterranean threats. The Israelis are good in anti tunneling. They just had to do a bunch of this stuff in both Lebanon and also in Gaza. Missile and air defense technologies, AI quantum machine learning and autonomous systems, directed energy and advanced sensing. Again, all this. This feels like this would be useful, right? Like we could use more of this and better of this, could we not? Is the argument that we should have it worse now? Nobody's making the argument we should have it worse. They're just lying about what's there. They're saying this merges the US with Israel. Just absolute sheer nonsense. Totally unsupportable and unsupported. There will be interim progress updates. It'll be overseen, the entirety of it, by the Pentagon. Again, it's just nonsense. But again the nonsense wins online because it turns out that there are a bunch of either morons or nefarious people who are very much focused on breaking up America's military superiority and technological superiority. That's the only way you can explain this other than stupidity. So maybe it's just widespread stupidity, but it's weird how the stupidity all seems to run in the same direction. All right, now, speaking of stupidity, as predicted, the Democrats are moving very solidly toward Alexandra Ocasio Cortez. Someone predicted it. Who could it be? Anyone raising their hand right now? Oh, yeah. Yes, that's right. I predicted that AOC was a significantly more durable candidate than Democrats were willing to recognize. As of October 2025, according to a University of New Hampshire poll, the leader was Pete Buttigieg. Okay? Which, like. No, it never was. It never will be.

[Guest or Co-host]

Okay?

[Ben Shapiro]

Pete Buttigieg is not gonna be the candidate. If you think Buddha Judge is getting through South Carolina, you got another thing coming. If you go back to October 2025, here were the leading candidates in order. Buddha Judge, 19. Newsom, 15. AOC 14, Kamala Harris, 11. If you move forward to February 2026, it was Buddha Judge, 20. AOC 15. Newsome, 15, Mark Kelly, 10, Kamala Harris, 10. If you move forward to July 2026. Now, what you see is that some support from Bernie Sanders has bled off to aoc. Gavin Newsome has dropped rather dramatically in this poll, from 15% to 8%. It goes AOC 22, Buttigieg, 21, Mark Kelly, 9. Gavin Newsome, 8. Sanders, 6. Kamala Harris, 5. So you are starting to see movement toward AOC, not a shock. Why? Because at least one third of the Democratic Party is the Bernie side of the party. Those people are going to line up behind aoc, and AOC is going to try to pretend that she's a moderate Democrat who's just making room for the DSA as opposed to what she really is, which is a charter member of the dsa, essentially, without the card here she was yesterday talking about how, you know, we can't. We can't persecute the people in the DSA. They're. They're good people. Good, solid people. Should some DSAers have. Call themselves communist, like, educate themselves. Themselves as to what?

[Sophie Cunningham]

It's a free country.

[Ben Shapiro]

It's a free country.

[Guest or Co-host]

You've got people with all sorts of affiliations in this country. And the whole point is that we don't. We don't politically, you know, persecute people.

You can.

I mean, you have a bonafide, like

[Ben Shapiro]

all sorts of extreme groups.

[Sophie Cunningham]

It's a free.

[Guest or Co-host]

You can hold whatever views you have

in this country,

[Ben Shapiro]

and that's how America works. Oh, what a free speech activist AOC is. That's so nice. That's so nice. But her plan is to moderate and pretend to be moderate. Meanwhile, the entire Democratic Party apparatus will activate on behalf of this. If they feel the necessity to Zoran Mandani, who again, is very difficult to look on Zormandani and not just see the lie on his face. I mean, he is such a liar. He's very smooth at it, he's very smarmy at it, but he is just. He is such a radical in sheep's clothing. It's. It's insane. It's insane. So first he was on Jon Stewart joking about how he was a Muslim democratic socialist. The scariest words in the English language. Well, I mean, first of all, those are some fairly scary ideologies if you're doing it the way that Mamdani is doing it. But he was on with Jon Stewart. Jon Stewart trying to pretend that he's not that radical. And Mamdani talks about closing Rikers island with Stuart.

[Guest or Co-host]

We cannot have New Yorkers choose between safety and justice. And yes, I am, you know, doing the work with our police department and we have been able to deliver the lowest number of murders and shootings in recorded history. And at the same time, I'm doing the work to close down Rikers island and ensure that we are actually building the four smaller borough based jails. That brings an end to a horrible chapter in New York City history. And I think to your point, you know, when we're thinking about safety, there cannot be a hierarchy of safety where you experience it more or less depending on where you live in our city or how much money's in your pocket. And there also can't be a definition of safety that is purely after the fact. Meaning that how you respond to violence, we also have to do the work of investing so that we prevent violence.

[Ben Shapiro]

Guys, there can't be a hierarchy of safety. Everyone should be equally unsafe. And again, all this is, is just. They're going to keep putting Mamdani on this, on this glorification tour. The Jon Stewarts of the world pretending that they're moderate Democrats. This is the entire thing. How do you turn Zor Momdani from a psychotic left wing activist with ties to Islamism? How do you, how do you turn that into a moderate face? And the answer is you just pretend that normie stuff is commie stuff. So here is Mamdani explaining the libraries, fire departments and public schools are democratic socialist principles. Absolute, sure. Nonsense. This is one of the left favorite talking points. It's just crap. It's not true. Adam Smith wrote about things like fire departments and schools and the notion that you're a socialist if you believe in public schools because there is a collective action problem with regard to education or a collective action problem with regard to the fire department, because fires hop from house to house, that it's just, it's nonsense. But if you can pretend that Zormandani doesn't need nationalization of resources, the complete defenestration of all regulatory decency with regard to real estate, that he doesn't mean seizure of private property rights or confiscatory taxes on people, that all he really means is the fire department, then it's a great way of lying by omission.

[Guest or Co-host]

If you go back to some of the Democrats that we most admire, FDR, LaGuardia, you will see a lot of democratic socialist principles in their vision. And if you think about a lot of what we've come to accept as just the facts of life across our country, a lot of it is also still driven by democratic socialist principles. Now, if today you and I were to introduce the idea of a building that lends out books for free, we would be slandered in the same way that so many new ideas are slandered today. And yet that's the library. And the same thing with the fire department, the same thing with public schools.

[Ben Shapiro]

Okay, so, so first of all, you could have private libraries. Those exist. Second of all, if you introduce the idea of a library in 2026 when no one reads, that would be a gigantic waste of money. Probably worth pointing out at this point, especially with the price of books being it is. But put all that aside, like that's a different thing than when books were a rarity. The idea. And trying to compare a library in 1776 to a library in 2026 is really, really stupid. They, they, they do not serve the same public function in any way, shape or form. But put all of that aside again, what this is really about is not even mom Donnie. It's really about people like Stewart continuing to play defense for mom Donnie. Because Jon Stewart always wants to be the cool kid. Sure, he's 63 years old, he's 7 years younger than my dad, Jon Stewart, but he's still trying to pretend he's 40. And so he has to. Jon Stewart explains that actually it's not that that Mamzani hates cap, but Mamzani openly says he hates capitalism. He just don't want. What he actually wants is a reform movement for capitalism. He wants to reform capitalism. You see,

[Guest or Co-host]

people always say, oh, that's anti capitalist. And in some respects, I think it's, it's the opposite. You know, capitalism, I think would have faced A much stiffer opposition from communism and socialism in the 1930s. If the new Deal hadn't been instituted, if we hadn't had created a more robust social safety net, revolution would have been much more on the table without Social Security, without the, you know, better housing for people. And I wonder if that's similar today, that in some respects what you're doing is actually a reform movement for capitalism to some extent.

[Ben Shapiro]

What's hilarious is the cutaway to Mamdani, who's like, no, I don't want a reform movement for capitalism. I hate capitalism. Watching Stewart try to convince himself in real time that FDR and Mandani are exactly the same is wild. By the way, we should point out that FDR's New Deal policies lengthened the Great Depression by at least eight years. In the end, it's all about the friendliness. It's all about the chumminess. Here's mom Donnie joking that he's going to take Jon Stewart's show with Jon Lebowitz over here.

[Guest or Co-host]

The caricature is you're a communist who's going to nationalize the industries. You're going to take over Goldman Sachs.

I'm. I'm actually coming on this podcast to let you know that it's now my podcast.

Wait, what you rips? Here's what I love about that. You walk the walk. That's the important thing. Somebody had to seize the means of this production.

It was, it was this specific production that I was talking about.

[Ben Shapiro]

If the Democrats choose to do this, they are going to reap the whirlwind or America will. Right. Those will be the two choices again. When it comes to the markets, it is impressive to watch as the left just takes the single greatest wealth creating vehicle in the history of mankind and tries to destroy it. This is a point that Scott Besant was making with regard to Mamdani. He is right.

[Guest or Co-host]

Here's the Treasury Secretary Trump accounts are no government handout. They are a child's first claim upon the American dream at a time when too many people are taught to doubt it. Look around our campuses and classrooms today, apart from those here at Wheeler, of course, you will find that our students are being sold the seductive lie that government can solve every problem, redistribute every dollar, and supplant its judgment for our own. Our children are taught to romanticize an ideology, ideology that results in ruin wherever it is tested, to critique capitalism for every one of its flaws and to forgive socialism for every one of its constant failures. In New York, the current mayor rose to power by repackaging failed ideals of the past as a moral cause of the future. But in Georgia, you know that beneath that youthful veneer lies the oldest impulse in politics, which is to concentrate power and then call it compassion.

[Ben Shapiro]

He is right about all of this. Meanwhile, Democrats across the country continue to try to shut down the workings of the free market. A bunch of state attorneys general in California, New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Washington, Oregon filed a lawsuit to block the merger of Paramount and Warner Brothers. Again, the idea for Paramount was purchase Warner Brothers. Now it has a bigger library, and now you get more stuff for your subscription fee. Elizabeth Warren, of course, is very happy with this because anything that allows business to work more freely, she's against. Big shout out to the state AGs who stepped up to block the Paramount Warner Brothers merger when Trump's DOJ wimps folded. We know who really fights for the American people, and it's sure not Trump's doj. Well, Spencer Pratt properly points out that Democrats are perfectly willing to destroy Hollywood if it means that they can have control.

[Guest or Co-host]

That's all this is. Gavin and Banta are willing to sacrifice the film industry just for petty politics. Despite what this corrupt mimbo says, there is a ton of competition for the studios. This whole lawsuit is a scam. He needs to quit playing petty politics and crippling Hollywood. All this does is put production workers in the barrel as cannon fodder when they're already suffering enough with how much greasy Gavin has pushed this industry out of la. The film industry needs a shot in the arm. And Paramount is not only investing 110 billion into Warner Brothers, but David Ellison is slated to produce 30 theatrical releases in their first year. That would be a massive boom for an industry that's been hemorrhaging jobs. This lawsuit will make it even worse. Either Vanta loses or California loses. That's all, folks.

[Ben Shapiro]

He's right. That is right. But you know, again, the consumer losing is not really of interest to the Democratic Party at this point. Because consumers are bad, right? Why? Why do you even want to consume things? Just stop that. Just stop that. It's all about the nationalization and the unions and all the rest. All right? Meanwhile, the cultural conflict of the day has arisen over Sophie Cunningham. So Sophie Cunningham is the second biggest star in the Indiana Fever. So Caitlyn Clark is the biggest star on the Indiana Fever. Okay, wnba, time for some hot WNBA talk. So, as you all know, I am generally not a WNBA fan. Caitlyn Clark is is fun to watch. There's some Other players who are, you know, fun to watch, I suppose. I mean, I, I'd much rather watch college men's basketball, maybe high school men's basketball, certainly NBA. In any case, without ripping into the wnba, Sophie Cunningham has carved out a role for herself as Caitlyn Clark's protector. So she is a good player, but she's not scoring 20 points a game. But her big thing is on the court, she's not going to let Caitlyn Clark get beat up because Caitlyn Clark keeps getting manhandled, no pun intended, by a bunch of women. And the speculation is that it has to do with the fact that she's been given star treatment and she's white. And it's not all that speculative because some people have basically seen said that. Well, Sophie Cunningham has also now spoken out on some other issues, including the idea of men and women's sports. So there was an article recently with ESPN the Magazine where the writer says this. You say she's a MAGA Barbie, as some corners of the Internet have taken to calling her Projection. She says because of what she looks like and where she's from, she'll weigh in on how to protect women's sports, she says, because she's in that world and feels qualified to speak to that world. She said, I got a lot of negative feedback about me hating trans. And I'm like, I never once said that. I think I'm here to extend love, but I also think with that, with that love is truth, being honest. And I want to protect young girls in a locker room or young girls in sport who shouldn't have to go up against biological men. She also insists none of this is some Rosetta Stone to unlocking the true nature of her political worldview. She said, I'm very much in the middle. I agree with things on both sides, disagree with things on both sides. That's all I've ever said about my political beliefs. But some people love to assume. Again, this seems perfectly reasonable to me, like totally and perfectly reasonable. Well, this came to a head yesterday because a reporter, a left wing reporter, asked her about those remarks about saying that men should not play in women's sports. And Sophie Cunningham, to her great credit, said, listen, I am not, I'm not going to play this game with you. I said what I said. Deal with it.

[Sophie Cunningham]

I said what I said. I think it's kind of common sense and I think I'll always believe in that. I think it's really important to protect children, and that's little girls who are Also involved in that category. And so I stand on what I said and I always believe that. Do you see your advocacy on that, like taking any form going forward? You know, I don't know. I didn't. I'm not a very political person, but I do have beliefs, I have morals and I'll always stand on those and be true to who I am. And I think people are going to take it how they want to take it, but I've never even really said anything about that. And so when it comes just to protecting young girls in sport and women in sport, I feel very strongly about that. I think that's why you have Title ix. That's why you have some of the greats in women's sports. If Title 9 and women's sports weren't protected, then you wouldn't hear about any type of women in sport. And so I think in the future it's just really important to protect.

[Ben Shapiro]

I see you, Sophie Cunningham. I see you. I see you. Loving it. Loving it. Okay, So I mean, the difference between Sophie Cunningham and Megan Rapinoe could not be more strong. Megan Rapino would not be a famous person if men could play in women's sports. The women's soccer team was losing to 15 year old boys. But again, here's Megan Rapinoe saying all of the things that are necessary to keep her in the good graces of the left wing.

[Guest or Co-host]

Really, we're attacking women. We're saying if you look like this as a woman, you can play. If you look like this as a woman. There's a bill in Washington happening right now that's gonna require all girls just like full stop to go through a sex test. An invasive, like examining their genitals to see if they're a woman.

[Sophie Cunningham]

Yeah.

[Guest or Co-host]

And that has not worked out well

[Ben Shapiro]

historically for people to do that.

[Guest or Co-host]

Yeah, we know what that means. Black girls are, are gonna get questioned more and they're gonna get questioned first. Who's doing the examination? Who wants to subject themselves to that? And so they're gonna see a pullback. They don't like women in sports because it helps us with confidence and power. And we see so many women in the C suite played elite level sports. It's just great for you physically and all of it. But it's an attack on women in society. And I think the tie between the Heritage foundation now wanting to go after Title ix, it's just like so blatant. Like, let's connect, connect these dots. It's more than just a couple of trans kids in the Entire country and a couple in each state being able to participate in some youth sports.

[Ben Shapiro]

Man, she is insufferable. Absolutely insufferable. Megan Rapinoe. Truly ridiculous. And by the way, the sort of bizarre politics of the WNBA continues. There's a piece in USA Today by a crazy columnist who says that Caitlin Clark is a flopper. Now let's be clear about one thing that's happened in basketball. And it's just, it's happened in men's basketball, women's basketball, like all basketball, to draw fouls, people flop. It is deeply annoying. My son and I are NBA fans and we were watching the playoffs last year and watching the sort of controversy over SGA flopping all the time was deeply irritating, obviously. Well now apparently flopping is a white supremacist thing. According to a columnist for USA Today, it seems there is a white nationalist element to Clark's fandom and that is deeply, deeply problematic. Made even more so because the WNBA is made up predominantly of black women, many of them queer. When Clark claims fouls that don't exist, she goes on profanity laced tirades at referees. Those racists see her as a white woman in need of saving, take matters into their own hands. So first of all, she's complaining to the refs like every other player. But apparently when she does it, that means the KKK rides at dawn or something. It shouldn't need reminding. This country has an awful history of black people being harmed, even killed, in the name of defending white women. While it's incumbent on the WNBA to do more to protect its players, there also should be an expectation on Clark to recognize the wider consequences of her action. So when Clark is getting bullied on the court, which she routinely is, or even when she flops, the idea if she flops, then you know what that is. That's like when Robin d' Angelo talks about white women's tears. You can't have white women crying because that's dangerous for black people. Like, this is really where we're going. It's very funny. A long time ago, somebody who is WNBA associated, I met this person and they asked me because I, I made fun of the WNBA a lot and they said, what would you do to make the WNBA more popular? And I said, pretty easy, actually. What I would do is I would have a team that was located in a, in an area that was predominantly non NBA or basketball heavy, just generally basketball heavy. They had lots of tie ins to local universities where women's basketball is very popular, like Connecticut or Indiana. And then I would get a bunch of women who are not radical left wingers to play for the team who are kind of just generalized, patriotic. I would say it would be good if, if some of them were straight so they were not all lesbians. That would be probably a marketing plus. And then I would just play that team. And I'll bet you that people would probably respond to a baseline level of patriotism and rationality. Because of the politics of the WNBA have been labeled left for so long, it's very difficult for people to find buy in. Like, would I take my daughter to a WNBA game? Given the politics of the league, it would be very difficult. So make it easier. And the Indiana Fever just kind of did it. And now people are watching and now people are screaming at the Indiana Fever for doing it, which is kind of one of the reasons why you are where you are with the wnba. If you want more on the Sophie Cunningham of all of this, the Morning Wire has a great episode on it. By the way, just pointing out we are celebrating five years of Morning Wire 3000 episodes. This is just one way that we here at Daily Wire have worked to change the country. You know, they have the Daily for the New York Times or Morning Brew and NPR or Fresh Air on npr. We made our own version because we didn't like the left wing bias and it's been dominating in 15 minutes or less. You get the news you need to know every day. You can join the Morning Wire team and of course you can join the Morning Wire team as well in their special All Access today at 5pm Central, 6pm Eastern. It's available wherever you get your podcasts. Well, here's the Morning Wire host talking about it. We have a fun announcement.

[Guest or Co-host]

We are celebrating our fifth year anniversary of Morning Wire and our 3,000th episode. Although there's some debate about that.

There's some debate.

[Ben Shapiro]

But guys, it's the 3,000th episode. We're just saying it.

[Guest or Co-host]

So to mark the moment of we're going to host a special episode this evening for all of our Daily Wire All Access members. It'll start at 5pm Central and run for at least a half hour, maybe longer.

[Ben Shapiro]

The plan is to talk about the history and making of the show and to answer questions from our listeners from you guys.

[Guest or Co-host]

So we'd love to have you again.

[Ben Shapiro]

That's tonight, 5:00pm Central on Daily Wire dot com. All right, well go check it out. It should be fun. Alrighty folks, we have a lot more coming up, but you have to stick around. We are going to get to election integrity stuff. Plus we are going to talk about Jasmine Crockett on Christianity and President Trump putting some interesting provisos on that Saudi nuclear deal. If you're not a member, become a member. Use code Shapiro Check out for two months free on all annual plans. Click that link in the description and join us.

[Guest or Co-host]

Sa.