5/16/25: Soft civil wars and big pharma bribes

Summary

The David Pakman Show: Summary of May 16, 2025 Episode – "Soft Civil Wars and Big Pharma Bribes"

Released Date: May 16, 2025

In this thought-provoking episode of The David Pakman Show, host David Pakman delves into the unsettling trends of political normalization, the rise of authoritarian tactics, and the internal conflicts within the MAGA movement. Through a blend of insightful analysis and compelling discussions, Pakman explores how societal indifference is paving the way for democratic erosion and potential civil discord in the United States.

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1. Normalization and Hypernormalization of Political Collapse

Timestamp: 00:07 – 05:27

Pakman begins by addressing the concept of hypernormalization, a state where societal collapse occurs in slow motion, leading to widespread indifference. He explains how once-unthinkable political events gradually become perceived as normal due to persistent exposure and diminishing public outrage.

David Pakman [00:30]: "There is a point in every kind of slow motion collapse where people adapt, people stop reacting."

He emphasizes the danger of this normalization, arguing that it serves as a strategy for authoritarian regimes to maintain control without overt force, fostering an environment where the public becomes disengaged and accepts deteriorating democratic norms as standard.

2. Authoritarian Tactics and the Targeting of Democrats

Timestamp: 05:27 – 12:32

Pakman shifts focus to recent statements by Tom Homan, who insinuated the use of legal mechanisms to prosecute Democrats. Pakman criticizes this as a direct projection of Trump's attempts to undermine political opponents, highlighting a disturbing parallel between accusations made by both sides.

David Pakman [07:15]: "They put hands on law enforcement officers. ... This is a top Trump tool, openly bragging."

He underscores the peril of such rhetoric, noting that it blurs the lines between legitimate governance and political persecution, thereby destabilizing the judicial system's integrity.

3. The Prospect of a Soft Civil War in America

Timestamp: 12:32 – 22:00

Examining historical precedents, Pakman discusses the unsettling possibility of the United States edging toward a soft civil war. Unlike the overt violence of the 1861 Civil War, this potential conflict would manifest through societal fragmentation, political violence, and institutional decay without formal declarations of war.

David Pakman [15:45]: "This is not a hot war. We would be talking about a softer, cold civil war."

He draws comparisons to Yugoslavia and Rwanda, illustrating how initial denials and gradual escalation can lead to widespread chaos and division. Pakman warns that without vigilance, America's political landscape could similarly fracture from within.

4. Political Symbolism: The "Orange" Trump and Republican Responses

Timestamp: 22:00 – 27:00

The discussion turns to the symbolic aspects of political leadership, exemplified by Republican Congressman Brian Jack's evasive response to a high school student's question about Trump's distinctive appearance.

David Pakman [24:00]: "Even when you can't see it in any numbers, ... they don't know what to say."

Pakman interprets Jack's inability to address the superficial yet emblematic question as indicative of a broader reluctance within the Republican ranks to confront or critique Trump's persona and by extension, his policies.

5. The Future of MAGA and Trump's Central Role

Timestamp: 27:00 – 36:44

Pakman explores the evolving dynamics within the MAGA movement, questioning whether Trump remains its linchpin or if the movement has transcended his individual influence. He posits that MAGA has become a self-sustaining system, capable of persisting beyond Trump's direct involvement, potentially increasing its authoritarian capacity.

David Pakman [32:30]: "MAGA Trumpism has become a system that is bigger than the man."

He discusses JD Vance as a potential successor who embodies the disciplined continuation of MAGA policies without Trump's erratic leadership, raising concerns about the movement's longevity and inherent dangers.

6. Big Pharma and RFK Jr.'s Controversial Claims

Timestamp: 36:44 – 40:53

A significant portion of the episode addresses Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s claim that Trump accepted $100 million from Big Pharma. Pakman vehemently criticizes RFK Jr., labeling the admission as blatant corruption and equating it to a corrupt protection racket.

David Pakman [38:00]: "This is politics anymore. ... it's a protection racket."

He further elaborates on the implications of such alliances between political figures and large pharmaceutical companies, arguing that it undermines public trust and perpetuates systemic corruption within healthcare policies.

7. Internal Conflicts Within MAGA: The Casey Means Nomination

Timestamp: 40:53 – 50:00

Pakman discusses the contentious nomination of Casey Means as Surgeon General, highlighting the infighting within the MAGA faction. The backlash against Means stems not from her extreme views but rather from dissatisfaction among hardline members who deem her insufficiently radical.

David Pakman [42:30]: "It's a betrayal. ... she isn't crazy enough for some."

This internal strife exemplifies the fracturing of a once-cohesive movement, where even dissenters within can undermine the broader goals of the faction, leading to an unmanageable and chaotic political environment.

8. Public Perception and the Breakdown of Shared Reality

Timestamp: 50:00 – 60:00

In a broader analysis, Pakman addresses how the erosion of a shared epistemological foundation in America has led to irreconcilable differences in perceiving reality. He critiques the rise of misinformation, echo chambers on social media, and the collapse of trust in established institutions.

David Pakman [55:00]: "Once we lose this shared sense of reality, democracy becomes impossible."

He emphasizes the necessity of re-establishing common grounds for factual discourse to ensure the viability of democratic processes and societal cohesion.

9. Audience Engagement and Feedback

Timestamp: 60:00 – 70:00

Pakman engages with feedback from listeners, addressing questions about the effectiveness of debating MAGA supporters and the strategies for winning elections. He advocates for a dual approach of exposing flawed reasoning to the broader audience while also attempting to influence individual perspectives.

David Pakman [65:00]: "We do need education, communication, and, yes, voting like hell and some empathy even when it's exhausting."

This segment underscores the importance of both grassroots and broad-based strategies in countering authoritarian tendencies and restoring democratic norms.

10. Growth of the Show and Changing Demographics

Timestamp: 70:00 – 75:00

Highlighting the show's expanding reach, Pakman notes an increase in female viewership and overall audience growth, challenging the typical male-skewed demographics of online news programs. He attributes this success to the show's commitment to addressing pressing issues and providing in-depth analysis.

David Pakman [72:00]: "We're seeing some really, really optimistic numbers there as far as that is concerned."

11. Tariffs, Rand Paul's Honesty, and Economic Policies

Timestamp: 75:00 – 80:00

The conversation shifts to economic policies, with a focus on Senator Rand Paul's honest critique of Trump's tariff strategies. Pakman commends Paul for his straightforwardness, contrasting it with the often misleading narratives propagated by both sides of the political spectrum.

David Pakman [78:00]: "Rand Paul is correct. Trump shouldn't accept a $400 million gift from the Qatari government."

He discusses the long-term economic implications of tariffs, such as increased costs for consumers and the challenges of reshoring manufacturing, while advocating for transparency and honest communication with the public.

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Conclusion

Throughout this episode, David Pakman meticulously unpacks the intricate web of political maneuvers leading the United States toward potential authoritarianism and internal division. By dissecting key events, critiquing influential figures, and engaging with audience perspectives, Pakman provides a comprehensive analysis of the current political climate. His emphasis on resisting normalization, fostering informed discourse, and maintaining democratic integrity serves as a clarion call for vigilance and active participation in safeguarding democratic values.

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For more in-depth discussions and resources, listeners are encouraged to explore Pakman's publications and subscribe to The David Pakman Show for ongoing analysis and commentary on pressing political and social issues.

Transcript

[David Pakman]

I want to talk to you today about normalization, hyper normalization, getting used to all of this. You know, there is a point in every kind of slow motion collapse where people adapt, people stop reacting. Outrage at what's going on around us starts to wear off and the shock fades. And things that were once unthinkable kind of become normal. And then we get back on TikTok or we go bowling or we do whatever it is that we do. Presidential frontrunner says he wants to root out the vermin and it doesn't affect his campaign and he becomes president. A top aide to the president says, we are looking at suspending habeas corpus and doing away with due process. A sitting mayor is arrested for protesting at an ICE facility. Trump gets a free private jet. And everybody just kind of goes, oh, that's crazy. And then you keep scrolling and you shrug. And that's the way it is. And it's really important every once in a while to be reminded that this is not supposed to feel normal, but that's the strategy. Where are you down until you stop blinking? And this is what I've referred to, and others have referred to before as hyper normalization. This is when the body and the mind enter a state where the system around us is so obviously broken and so absurd and dysfunctional that people know it, but you keep going anyway because nothing makes sense and everything sort of keeps functioning and an absurd new baseline is established. I struggle with this. I maybe even more than you, because I'm steeped in this stuff every day. I read it, I report about it, I talk about it for a living. And sometimes even I start to feel like, I guess this is just the way things kind of are now, and that's the danger. And I recognize it in myself, and I know from what I've heard from some of you, you recognize it in yourselves as well. And the minute you accept that this is just the way things are and they're going to be, we've lost. They don't need a coup. They don't need a civil war. Although we'll talk about civil war in a little bit. They just need your resignation. They need you to shrug and say it's crazy, but it's not immediately my problem. And this is the end game of authoritarianism. It's not mass support and the country going, we love authoritarianism. We love no due process. It's not necessarily a violent takeover. It's widespread indifference and just enough of it for people to tune out and make space for everything to continue. So you are not supposed to get used to it, but they want you to be. So how do we fight it? We fight normalization by refusing to forget how it used to be before it got this insane. We repeat the truth even when it's repetitive. When Trump says, for the hundredth time, we were losing $1 trillion in trade to China, we go, no, we were giving them a trillion dollars and they were giving us $1 trillion worth of stuff. You bring up the past, even when we're told you've got to move on, you connect the dots. Even when the dots are exhausting between ignoring courts and suspending habeas corpus and mass deportations and no due process, we connect it and we tell the whole story. And the goal really is to not allow the propaganda to go unchallenged. We speak plainly and not in euphemisms, and we reject the. Well, both sides do. When only one side is dismantling democracy, we stop pretending that it's a both sides thing. And then finally, and this one's harder, we make people feel the insanity again, not just think, oh, yeah, this is bad. This didn't used to be this way. People have to feel the appropriate emotions. And so if outrage and fear and urgency are appropriate, then we need people to feel that, because the whole end game here is numbness. It's about making the absurd feel boring. So you get back to whatever. Pickleball, Right. Pickleball is great, by the way. It's about overwhelming you until your instinct is, I've got to disengage. So let's stay engaged. Let's. Let's stay human. You can't stop every abuse of power, and we're not, but we have to refuse to go numb to it. And that is where we get this robust opposition. And there are many good reasons to mount it now. And I want to talk about one of them next. They are now looking at prosecuting Democrats just for kicks. Tom Homan went on Fox News and casually said he is in conversations about turning Trump's own former lawyer, Alina Haba, who's now acting U.S. attorney, into a weapon against Democrats. A weapon against Democrats. Take a look at this. We will ask the attorney general to prosecute you. You can't cross that line.

[Tom Homan]

Have you talked to AG Pam Bondi about this, Tom?

[David Pakman]

No, I've talked to Lina harbor, the acting attorney in that area. Lena is taking it serious, you know, going through a lot of videotape, talking to a lot of witnesses, and we'll see where the investigation falls. But I saw the Video. I think the members of Congress are very inappropriate, unprofessional. They put hands on law enforcement officers. This is a facility. We got really dangerous people. We got to control that facility, not only for the safety of the officers, but the safety of the detainees and the safety of the general public. This was not the way to conduct oversight. There's a proper way to do it. This was not the way. This is not vague. This is not hypothetical. This is a top Trump tool, openly bragging. He's having conversations with attorneys about polarization, political prosecutions. They are not even pretending otherwise. And the kicker is that Trump spent years screaming that Biden's weaponizing the Justice Department. Biden's going after political enemies. But let's be honest, this is projection. Trump isn't mad that the DOJ is politicized. He was mad that under Biden, it wasn't under his control. We what has he accused Biden of doing? That which he is planning himself to do. JD Vance says we're going to go after the deep state. Stephen Miller wants to purge the DOJ and FBI and suspend habeas corpus. And Trump, Trump's deportations are, which is a vomitus term. Tom Homan is talking about locking up Democrats. So law and order, forget about it. This is about power. This is about punishment. The conversations that I've had with Democratic officials are they know this is what they're planning. And the question is, what sort of infrastructure, defense infrastructure, can you build to be prepared? Because they are making it clear this is what they want to do. All right, let's talk about civil war. Not the civil war, but let's talk about civil war. I keep getting emails from people saying, are we headed for civil war, David? And it's asked as if it's a yes or no question, like, the civil war will be starting on, you know, May 22nd. What if we are asking the wrong question on this civil war issue? Because in a lot of places, if we look historically around the world, civil wars didn't start with uniforms and, and declarations. They started with denial. They started with little things that people thought were isolated until it became too late. I'll give you some examples. In Yugoslavia, it started with politicians demonizing ethnic groups on tv. That was really the start of a civil war. We then got local militias, more organized disinformation, random violence that seemed like it came out of nowhere. And. And by the time people realized what was going on, cities were on fire and neighbors were killing each other. So it was a slow start. In Rwanda, which I've read about probably the most of any of the examples I'll talk about today. It started with radio hosts calling people cockroaches on the basis of their perceived or believed ethnic background. It didn't feel like war. It kind of was like, oh, it's talk radio. But then came the lists and the mobs. And then came the genocide in chile in the 70s. It was rumor and paranoia that started it. They're planning a coup. They're destroying the country. The military stepped in to restore order, and then tens of thousands of people were disappeared. And so in the United States, it's unlikely that. That a civil war would look like 1861. It already doesn't. First of all, it looks like death threats to school boards and judges being stalked, election workers fleeing their jobs and federal workers being laid off, and state legislatures threatening cities with policies that they don't like, Presidents talking about suspending the constitution, habeas corpus, etc. So. So this wouldn't be a hot war. We would be talking about a softer, cold civil war. Probably no marching bands. Although Trump's birthday parade, you know, is promising a lot. Maybe there will be marching bands there. No formal battlefield. It would be chaos and political violence and institutional collapse, one headline at a time. This goes back to the story we started with about how this is not supposed to feel normal. And unfortunately, this civil war may feel very normal, one side replacing school boards and banning books and rewriting laws to stay in power, and the other side saying, don't overreact. But a lot of times, that's how it starts. It starts soft. And by Pete, by the time people admit that it's happening, it's already here. So we have to, obviously, on the one hand, hope it's temporary, believe the fever will break and that reason will return. But look at everything we went through in the last 10 years, and Trump's back in power. So this is why I started the show talking about hyper normalization. When things get so absurd and surreal that it all starts to feel normal, that's how people stop resisting, and that's how democracies die without a single shot fired. I'm steeped in this stuff every day, but I'm feeling the authoritarian slide, and I'm also feeling sensitive to the temptation to tune it out. So the important thing here is if people really do stop paying attention, then not only might we not notice the start of the soft civil war, it might be lost before we even realize that it's going on. Those are my thoughts on the Civil war thing. I don't expect declarations of war. I don't even necessarily think that such a civil war would be violent in the streets the way many people are thinking. But that doesn't mean that it wouldn't be taking place. All right. Apropos of nothing, a Republican Congress congressman was asked why is Trump so orange by a high school kid. This is not serious politics. This is, call it maybe a moment of Zen or something like that. A group of high school students went to D.C. visited the Capitol and Republican Congressman Brian Jack, who's a former Trump White House aide, got the question of the day from a kid, why is Trump so orange? And Congressman Jack's response, I don't really know anything about that. Take a listen to this. Go ahead. Yeah, please, please, please say why. That's, you know what, it's your perspective.

[Tom Homan]

They asked why is President Trump so orange?

[David Pakman]

Well, that's your perspective. I don't really know anything about that. It's not a policy question. Ok, this is teenage trolling, but it worked perfectly. The second Trump world gets asked anything off script, even something as unserious as why does the president look like a Cheeto, they don't know what to say. And so it is symbolic. But what I was thinking about was, you know, you can lie about the economy, you can go, well, no, the tariffs are actually good. And even though you can't see it in any numbers, it's going to be good once we figure, okay, you can lie about elections and go, well, we had 63 court cases and I don't care that, okay, you can't lie your way out of it being painfully obvious that Trump is a very strange orange color and he's making himself that color on purpose. It's right there in broad daylight in every mug shot and they don't know what to say when they are asked about it. So good for that kid. Listen, could have asked about tariffs, would have gotten some bullshit answer from the Republican congressman. Instead he was asked, why is Trump so orange? And he didn't have an answer. We've got a great show for you today. Stay with us. We'll take a super quick break and be right back. Today's show is sponsored in part by Lucy Breakers. This is a tobacco free nicotine pouch capsule that can be broken to release extra flavor. Such a better option than smoke or vapor. Lucy breakers come in 4 or 8 milligrams strength. You can choose mint, apple, ice, mango, berry, citrus. Also check out Lucy's regular nicotine pouches and nicotine gum which come in their own varieties of flavors and you can subscribe for convenient home delivery. If you're not completely satisfied, lucy offers a 30 day money back guarantee. Try a tobacco free nicotine alternative. Join the countless people who Lucy has helped. Go to Lucy co. Use code PACMAN for 20% off your first order. That's lucy.co. then use code PACMAN for 20% off the link is in the podcast notes. Lucy products are only for adults of legal age. Every order is age verified. Warning. This product contains nicotine. Nicotine is an addictive chemical. The David Pakman show remains an audience funded program. The primary funding source for this show are viewers and listeners like you. People who listen to the podcast and like it well enough. People who watch clips on TikTok or YouTube and say this isn't bad, this is worth supporting. Many people don't know that if you have cable, you're sending Fox News a few dollars a month. It's just the deal Fox made. They don't have to earn any one of your dollars with our show. We've got to earn it. And it's been a building sustainable business model now for a while. If you like the show, if you believe independent progressive media should be supported, consider getting a membership@join pacman.com you can read about all the perks and you can also save about 50% off of the cost of a membership by using the coupon code. It will end soon. All one word, all lowercase. It will end soon. Here's a sort of uncomfortable question that not a lot of people are asking, and I want to phrase the question correctly to open up our discussion. What if Donald Trump doesn't need to finish his term? Now you might be saying, david, what do you mean if he doesn't need to finish his term? Well, here's what I mean. Not because Trump gets impeached, not because he's voted out. I mean, he's not going to be voted out short of the end of his term. But what I mean is, if everybody around him gets what they want before the end and they are done with Trump, what happens effectively to this presidency? I'm not saying Trump keels over or resigns in disgrace. I'm just saying that those who had things they wanted from Trump, the massive donors who dumped money into his election campaign like Elon Musk and you know, the billionaires, the strategists, the think tank guys, the we've got to fight the Deep state people, they don't need him around forever. They never did. Because Trump has been a vehicle this entire time, not really the destination. And if we're honest, people like Elon Musk and Peter Thiel and whoever else, the Heritage foundation, none of them ever cared about Trump as a person. They cared about what would Trump let us do and what would Trump do for us? Because Trump causes chaos and he distracts the press, and he says windmills cause cancer. And they go around rewriting laws they don't like or ignoring laws that they don't like, deregulating industries that help their bottom line, stacking courts. And we seem to be in a situation where they are already getting a lot of what they wanted. They've gutted a bunch of environmental rules. They've kneecapped the federal workforce through Doge firings and layoffs, and they've got a bunch of judges. Look at the stuff the Supreme Court is considering now, which 10 years ago, a Supreme Court would never have dreamed of. They've defunded watchdogs. They're continuing to move forward on these deportation plans. They created their own Department of Efficiency, which was this Trojan horse for deregulation and data access, which now they've got the data access through 2029, even though Elon's leaving and Doge is dissolving. So the question becomes, what will they continue needing Trump for? Is JD Vance a vp, or is he a backup plan in a more tangible, sort of strategic way? Because when we look at Vance functioning as MAGA with a working memory, he'll sign the same orders, he'll enforce the same policies, he'll carry out the same cruelty without, I guess, the rants and the indictments and the social media meltdowns, Trump brings the cult with him. Vance brings the discipline. And if Trump starts to flail, if he's no longer useful, if he gets too erratic, J.D. vance is ready. Now, I know that many of you are saying, I'm not really sure that J.D. vance really is MAGA. I mean, at one point, he says Trump is America's Hitler. He said he disagreed with Trump. He was an anti Trump Republican. But the point is, how is he functioning right now? And he has been fully sucked in to the MAGA universe. So this is about a transition which may not necessarily be visible to the public, although it might be, which is that this was never about Trump. And once they get everything they need, it's not 2016, it's not 2020. Trumpism isn't a person anymore. It's a system. And the movement really doesn't need Trump to govern anymore. They needed him to break the doors open. And he did it. And so where we find ourselves today is with the real power players operating behind the scenes. They've got their loyalists, they've rewritten their rules, they've drained federal agencies of people who can push back. And the second that Trump truly becomes inconvenient, this is not 2019, where he's probably running for reelection. The party, the system, rather, can run without Donald Trump. The real danger is that he doesn't have to be there for this thing to keep moving. And that should actually terrify us because there's two ways to interpret this. On the one hand, lame duck Trump no longer of use to people. Once he gets his main, his primary means of destruction done, they don't care about Trump, they'll dump them. Ok, we could say, well, that's good. There's a different perspective, which is, that's actually really bad. Because what used to be, I mean, listen, if you looked at what was MAGA Trumpism during the 2016 primary, it wasn't very much. It was Trump. And if Trump had gotten knocked out of the 2016 Republican primary, MAGA Trumpism is dead because it was just one person. It grew and grew and grew into this cult cult of personality and more of a literal cult over time. It is now such that you have the acolytes, you have the Cash Patel's and the Charlie Kirk and the fill in the blanks. Right? And so in a sense, the fact that they don't really care that much about Trump, the insiders, should be terrifying because it means that MAGA Trumpism has become a system that is bigger than the man. It's a machine at this point. And if the, if Trump flames out, if the machine operator flames out halfway through, it's not a problem because they've got the blueprint. The people they want in power are in power. And losing Trump could even make the movement more dangerous because the next guy probably won't be as distracted as Trump, probably won't be as feeble and diminished as Trump, probably won't be obsessed with toilets and water pressure. He or she probably, he would just get it done. So the question I leave you with again, is kind of where we started. What if they don't really need Trump for the full term? Let me know what you think. Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Stood next to Donald Trump this week and casually goes, Trump took $100 million from Big Pharma. What? And Trump nods, nods in agreement. Yes, I did. I took $100 million from big Pharma. This came as a surprise to a lot of people. Did Trump know what he was nodding along with? Take a listen to this. And this. I want to talk about what point RFK was trying to make and whether it actually backfired. Who is a man of his word? Who has the courage? President Trump was taking money from the pharmaceutical industry, too. I think they gave you $100 million. But Trump nods and he goes, that's right. They were good. The pharmaceutical industry gave you $100 million. That's right, says Trump. So let's start with the facts, and then we're going to build this out, because there's a lot here. Trump admits the pharmaceutical industry gave him $100 million. And the takeaway that RFK wants us to have is despite getting the hundred million, Trump can't be bought. He thinks it's a flex, but it's not really the flex that Bobby Kennedy Jr. Thinks it is. If you are saying that a corrupt industry gave the President $100 million and the only defense is, but Trump didn't do what they wanted him to do, it's still bribery. And what I mean by that is we've talked about this so many times. We talked about it with the Ukraine stuff. We need you to open to say you're opening an investigation into the Biden family. This was back in the first term of an attempt at bribery that fails to come to fruition is still bribery. It may just not be successful. Online, there are people saying this was a Freudian slip. That's. That's all this is. They didn't mean Trump was confused and RFK was confused, and it was a glitch, a verbal glitch, and it didn't mean anything. I don't think so. I believe that this is what it looks like when politicians are so emboldened by the Supreme Court that they help to stack that. Now they say the loud part out loud on camera into a microphone. Taking the money is accepting the bribe and Trump has been bought. And we really need to understand the context here. The whole reason for this press conference where RFK spoke and said this was to announce an executive order to lower prescription drug prices, in theory, bad for big Pharma. And right after the announcement, pharma stocks surged. They didn't drop, they surged. The translation being the industry isn't worried about Trump's executive order, and they shouldn't be, because as we talked about yesterday and we talked about the day before this executive order on lower lowering big pharmaceutical prices it's both vague and toothless. At best, it's symbolic. At worst, it's another piece of toilet paper Trump can flush down his toilet. Analysts are looking at it, saying it's not going to do anything unless there are individual deals with each company, maybe over each drug, which, by the way, that's what Biden was working on. It just gives Trump room for backroom corruption to even do that. But otherwise nothing's going to happen. And then they're on stage pretending we're the big fighters of Big Pharma. House Republicans are trying to gut Medicaid. So how is all of this not bribery? He took the money, he acknowledges it, he makes an announcement, and it looks like it's completely toothless. Everybody's profiting. And RFK Jr, his own secretary of Health and Human Services, is bragging like it's some kind of moral victory that Trump took the hundred million, but he didn't give him anything for it. It's so nakedly corrupt that it's hard to even call this politics anymore. And we should really be calling it what it is, which is a protection racket. And for all of the talk about this industry is not going to like us, and that industry is not going to like us because it would be so serious and they're going to be quaking in their boots. The themes continue to be as much deregulation as possible to let industry do whatever the hell it wants, American people be damned with toothless executive orders, which at best do nothing and at worst put Trump in a position for corrupt backroom deals with pharmaceutical companies. But Bobby Kennedy sure looks proud, doesn't he? What a world. Did you know that countless commercial databases and people search sites are storing your personal information? 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And the reaction from some wings of MAGA has been immediate and it's been vicious. And they are calling her a Manchurian asset. They are. It's wild when they you get a conspiracy theorist nominated for a role and then conflicting conspiracy theorists come out of the woodwork and go, no, she's terrible. For all these reasons, some are accusing Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Of Secretly Working for Big Pharma, saying Trump was duped by the big, by the deep state and got tricked by RFK working for Big Pharma to bring in Casey Means. And it's not like this is a political disagreement. It's sort of like a gang warfare among people who no longer know what's real. They only know who's on my team. What are the things I'm supposed to say to Virtue Signal which team I'm on? And this is what happens when the machinery of truth collapses. In my book, I talk about not the disagreement over what the facts are, but the incomprehension around what sort of statement even qualifies as a statement of fact. And we have a machinery of truth that has completely collapsed. You look at social media for profit news, unregulated influencer grifts, and they have trained people, some of them have trained people to distrust anything communal science, consensus journalism, public institutions. We've got to distrust all of it. And instead they elevate gossip that gets passed around their peer groups, Facebook groups and the like. We've gone unfortunately from being a country that used to argue about policy to one that has adults yelling taunts about vitamins on TikTok. And our national epistemology of sorts has been completely shattered and destroyed. Why look at an FDA label when you've got a podcast guest telling you I've got a longevity elixir with turmeric and cordyceps spores and a coupon code. And this is not only a MAGA problem, it's a systemic failure. Because for decades the FDA and the DOJ have kind of let the whole supplement industry run wild in a legal gray area, which we've talked about before. You've got real drug makers strictly regulated about what they can say on labels and how manufacture happens. And then separately, you've got this entire sort of gray area space lacking regulation, without oversight, without consequences, without science, just kind of like hashtags and influencer recommendations. And unfortunately, Americans who have been increasingly priced out of a broken health care system fall for it because they're desperate for I've got the one strange hack, and they prefer that rather than going bankrupt over a doctor's visit in a country that has this thing called medical bankruptcy, which you don't see almost anywhere else. Now I think it's also important to consider that when a broken health care system makes actual medical care inaccessible or unaffordable, it's natural that the free market would come in and fill the vacuum with snake oil. And because this garbage isn't technically against the law, thanks to these regulatory loopholes that have been carved out by supplement lobbyists, there's really no filter left between this is an evidence based treatment and this is a delusion, and there's a bunch of different stuff in between. So one problem is people don't even realize that they're being marketed to. It's really not a marketplace of ideas. It's more like a flea market of false hope that's that's being used to target people who are trying to figure out what to do in this broken health health care system. So it's become a profitable idiocracy. It's propped up by legal loopholes, it's weaponized by low grade cyber war and all of it. And it's a sort of tragedy that our enemies didn't even need tanks, they just had to inject chaos. We invited it in and we bought using the promo code. And this is how we end up eating ourselves alive. Now we get back to the Casey Means thing. You know, you. It's not uncommon in the MAGA space that they become victims of the monster that they created. You feed people lies for a decade and eventually they demand purer lies. The fringe becomes mainstream, conspiracies become mainstream, and suddenly you've got a surgeon general nominee, Kasey Means, who's not being attacked for saying Covid was a Darwin Darwinian moment. She's being attacked because she didn't go further. She's not wacky enough for some. And there used to be kind of like a basic social contract. We could disagree about the solutions, but we're at least arguing about the same problem that there was a period during which that was the case. That's gone. Because today Americans don't just disagree on politics and they disagree about reality. Whether vaccines even work, whether the surgeon general should be a licensed doctor, whether the earth is flat. It just all sort of winds up kind of in the same space. And once we lose this shared sense of reality, democracy becomes impossible. I've talked about this in the context of Plato's predictions that there are problems with democracy that include that eventually uninformed people elect terrible politicians. We've talked about it in the context of the medical space and vaccines and all of this other stuff. You really can't negotiate with, compromise with or find a middle ground with delusional hallucinations. You just can't. Once you convince people that medicine is a scam and facts are just a plot and science is tyranny, how do you negotiate with that? And so what we have now is a culture. And eventually the cult turns on its own. And as wacky as it was for Trump to say, we're going to replace Dr. Jeanette Neshawat, who by the way, also had no business being Surgeon general, with KC Means, who really has no business being surgeon general, you then have this other group that comes in and goes, it's not that she's too crazy, she's not crazy enough. And now you've got a mini MAGA civil war over exactly that. There's a Republican senator who is occasionally correct. He has principles, many of which I disagree with, but that sometimes get him to the right answer. And his name is Rand Paul. He's a Republican senator from Kentucky. And Rand Paul, after we were told there's a 90 day pause on the Chinese tariffs, Rand Paul went on Fox News and, and to Jesse Watters smug smirking face, he said, you know what? We're still keeping way too high a tariff on Chinese imports and that will be passed on to American consumers. And of course, on this issue, Rand Paul is completely correct.

[Tom Homan]

When he has successes with trade I've said I will compliment him if he succeeds in lowering tariffs and lessening the obstacles to trade. I'll be right there. I think it's unknown with China. We started out at 145%, then we went to 80%. Now we're at 30%, but that's 30% more than we have on currently. So this will be a 30% rise in any goods who are coming from China and somebody will pay that. It will be the consumer. If the consumer is happy to pay more when they go to Wal Mart or more when they go to Target in order to get fairness or to teach China a lesson, then so be it. But the proof is in the pudding. We'll see what happens over the next six months to a year.

[David Pakman]

He is exactly right. And thanks to our friend decoding Fox News for this clip, he is exactly right. As I've said before, we can organize our economy any number of ways. We could say, hey, you know what, it's valuable enough to us to secure our supply chains domestically, to know that we don't have Chinese slave indentured or child labor. And to do that, it's worth paying more for stuff. So we will completely reorganize our economy, which has been organized for 50 years on the idea that we actually prefer the cheap Chinese goods. We're going to change all that around. We'll take eight to 10 years, bring a bunch of these supply chains back home and pay way more for stuff. We can do that, but we've got to be honest about what we're doing. And this is what's missing. When Trump says tariffs on China will make us strong and we say, well, they'll just make us pay more for stuff bringing manufacturing back home, it will make us significantly less reliant on Chinese supply chains. That's great. I mean, I'm not going to say that that's a bad thing. I think that's a good thing. But things are going to cost way more. And by the time that those manufacturing capacities are built domestically, six, eight, ten years from now, things are going to cost way more. As Rand Paul says, if we want that because we say it's worth it, it'll feel better to know there's no child labor from China going into my tchotchkes, it'll feel better to know that no matter what winds change politically in China, it doesn't matter because we're manufacturing domestically. I'm with you. But it's going to cost way more. And we have to be honest with the American people about that rather than just say it's all upside. No, things will cost way more. Another example of Rand Paul just being honest. This is basic stuff. Rand Paul, as a Republican, says Trump shouldn't accept the plane from Qatar. He just shouldn't do it. They have a history of human rights abuses. Take a listen.

[Tom Homan]

So should we be putting out our gimmes, Senator? Well, it's a little bit different than a gimme, but. And the constitution in Article 2 talks about the President can't take them all or gifts from foreign leaders. And so there is a provision in the Constitution says you can't do this. And so the question is, can you do it? If it's only for official purposes, if it came to someone in Congress, they can vote and the Ethics Committee can look at it with his. There will have to be some kind of adjudication. This has never been done. And it's not like a ride on the plane. We're talking about the entire $400 million plan. I think it's not worth the appearance of improper. Whether it's improper or not, I don't think it's worth it. The other problem with Qatar is, see, I've spent time trying not to sell weapons to Qatar because they have human rights violations of their people. Many of their people are prevented from participating in the government, and some of the minority religious folks in Qatar are treated poorly. And so I really haven't been a big fan. And I wonder if our ability to judge their human rights record would be clouded by the fact of this large gift. So I wouldn't take it. That's just me. I don't think it's a good idea. Cutter does give it to him and he says, hey, Rand, you want to hop on a jet down to Palm Beach? You'll say no. Yeah, I've always wanted to ride on the Emirati jet, you know, where you have a shower and a bathtub and all that stuff too, and, and a bar and a dance floor. But I've never been able to fork over the 20 grand, I think, each way, so I probably won't be riding on it. But no, I think it's a mistake.

[David Pakman]

Listen, he's correct. Rand Paul has said some really dumb stuff over the years. Like, remember when he said any single payer health care system makes the doctors slaves? Painfully stupid. Painfully stupid. But sometimes his principles point him in the right direction. And Rand Paul is correct. Trump shouldn't accept a $400 million gift from the Qatari government. The Qatari government does have a history of human rights abuses, and it's hard to imagine that after taking a $400 million plane from them, Trump is going to be as well positioned to say the things he said about the Qatari civil rights abuses, human rights abuses in 2017. Trump is no longer saying that Rand Paul on this issue is completely correct. Is the tide starting to turn with even Republicans increasingly willing to criticize Trump? Rand Paul's been sort of willing to criticize Trump in certain areas for a long time, so I don't know that Rand Paul saying this is a sign the tide is turning. But maybe we will see more of this. We can only hope Many in the audience know my first language is Spanish. I learned English later when I moved to the United States, and these days I do a fair amount of traveling and I always make an effort to learn some of the new language before I get to the country. I've tried a bunch of methods for this. I keep coming back to the app Babbel because with Babel you really can start speaking a new language in just three weeks instead of paying hundreds of dollars for classes or fooling yourself with language apps that are basically just simple games. Babble is designed by real people for real conversations. All of Babel's tools are approachable. They are rooted in real life situations. They're delivered with conversation based teaching you might have seen on my Instagram. I was recently in France. Babble got me ready. Last minute I got to France. I was ready to order food, ask for directions, talk to at stores and hotels without having to use my phone to translate. There are studies from Yale, Michigan State University and others that continue to prove that Babble is better. One study found that using babble for 15 hours is like a semester of that language at College. With over 10 million subscriptions sold, Babble is real language learning for real conversations. Here's a special limited time deal for my audience right now. Get up to 6 60% off your Babel subscription, but only for my audience at babel.com/pacman rules and restrictions may apply. Get up to 60% off at babel.com/pacMan spelled b a b b el.com/pacman rules and restrictions may apply. The link is in the podcast notes. All right, let's get into Friday feedback for this week. You can always email feedback, thoughts, questions, ideas, criticisms, trolling to info at David Pakman Dotcom, but will also feature YouTube comments or Spotify comments, Twitter replies, Reddit posts, and all of it. All right, let's start with Enrique GP who says my family genuinely believes that Trump's big tariff strategy and the brief economic pain it inevitably brings will be worth it. And how many people be convinced of this tariffs will bring back jobs strategy? And then goes on to explain the details of what his family believes. You know, my, my thought on approaching this is if tariffs brought back jobs, we would all have been rolling in cash from the last time that Trump tried this on a more limited scale. What happened last time, we did not get the jobs as a result of tariffs. We saw Trump have to bail out farmers as a result of tariffs. We didn't get a golden age of whatever in the United States. We didn't get manufacturing back. We didn't get any of it. So this really isn't policy. It's let's do the thing that didn't work last time to every country instead of only to some countries. And to a degree, it's become a loyalty test. And you know, what Enrique's is talking about here is that there are people in his family that are trying to pass the loyalty test, which is that even though they can't defend any of what Trump is doing economically, even though I'm sure they were screaming for Biden's head when eggs hit five bucks under Biden, now they're down to suffer voluntarily because they're showing, they're, they're, they're passing the loyalty test and whatnot. So I don't even know that I encourage you to engage with these people directly, but if you decide that that's what you want to do, try to ask them for when such a policy brought economic prosperity. And if they go all the way back like Trump does to 1870, where he goes, we had no federal income tax, but we had tariffs and we were doing great. Consider that the economy then bore no resemblance to the economy today. The government wasn't doing almost any of the things the government does today. Inequality was outrageous and we had no services. So my real recommendation is don't even get involved in the conversation. All right? Ham Berger, 1975, wrote on YouTube, the time to debate MAGA is over. It's a complete waste of time. Focus on winning elections. I have two thoughts on this. It is obviously true. As I said to our last commenter, trying to reason with a lot of these MAGA people is like trying to explain gravity to someone who thinks it's a liberal hoax. It's a worthless experiment. Try to convince them. But here's the deal. Sometimes when we do debates on the show, I'm not necessarily arguing with people to win them over, I'm exposing the nonsense way that they think to everybody else who's watching. And of course we have to win elections. But information is what gets people off the couch and into the voting booth. So from a show perspective, I'm trying to do both. Now, I've spoken about this before as far as, like, a retail versus a wholesale strategy. And as I've said, if you're arguing with your MAGA uncle at Thanksgiving, that's the retail strategy you're doing one to one. Is that a way to win elections? No, it's not. Is it a way to engage with people and, you know, maybe change one person's mind? Yes. And if you want to do that, if you can tolerate the depravity and frustration of trying to convince people one by one like that, then do it. I think what I'm trying to do on the show and when I do a Tic Tac live and a bunch of Trump supporters call in or whatever, what I'm trying to do is show others the lapses in reasoning from the MAGA people. It's not necessarily for that one person. So something to keep in mind. We've got to win elections, and we've got to convince people we've got to do all of it. Okay. Julia Tano says the David Pakman show is my new favorite. I am going to check out the Echo Machine. The Echo Machine, right. It's the Echo Machine. And get on the newsletter. Welcome, Julia. Great to have you here. The newsletter is where we go deeper than we go on the show with a lot of these issues. The book is where we go even deeper than we go in the newsletter, sort of on how this whole mess got built. And just big picture. I am thrilled by a couple of things. Number one, we're seeing the most growth we've ever seen on the show, which, by the way, I'm going to address in a moment because there's some haters who are coming out of the woodwork once again to say, David, you're circling the drain. The show will be gone soon. I'll get back to that in a moment. I'm flattered by the growth we're seeing, but also just anecdotally, because Julia wrote in, we are starting to see more women get involved with the show. And the reason this is relevant is I don't know how many of you are necessarily up on the demographics of online news shows. Shows like this one, whether they have a male host or a female host, it actually doesn't matter. Shows like this one online progressive newstape shows, we have audiences that skew significantly male. And one of the amazing things we've seen is that on all platforms, the balance has shifted a couple of points back in the direction of female, which I think is great just to have more gender diversity in the audience. And also on TikTok, it's the closest to 5050 in terms of gender split on any platform. So the takeaway is we want to reach as many types of people as possible, and we're seeing some really, really optimistic numbers there as far as that is concerned. Okay. Avery wrote in. Avery says, hey, David, I'm only 12 and I love your show, but I have one question. How will the nation come together to see the threat they are up against if, like you said, they are people who relentlessly support Trump? Our nation has been divided into two political groups who see differently on almost everything. How would you go about solving that problem? Well, first of all, Avery, I love that you're 12 and you're asking questions and following what's going on in the world around you. So you're already more thoughtful than like half of Congress. That's phenomenal. Now here's my answer to the question. We don't have to agree on everything, but we do need a shared basis for reality. If half the country thinks facts are optional, it's impossible to progress unless we completely exclude them from the political system. And the way we solve that, I talk about that in the book. This is a big topic in the Echo machine. I guess I don't have to hold the book up. I can just point back here and down here. We do need education, communication, and, yes, voting like hell and some empathy even when it's exhausting. But at some core level, if we're still arguing not over what the facts are, but what are facts, we are in real trouble. And even 12 year old Avery is figuring out that it is very difficult to productively move forward on that basis. All right, let's go to something a little different. Here's an attack. Darryl says, you insignificant little twerp, if you never had Trump to discredit, you would be unemployed. Now go and crawl under a very small rock because we know you will fit. I love this. I love this because the, the argument here is if it weren't for this one thing, you'd be finished. People said the same thing when, when Biden won. No more Trump. You're done. In fact, we can go back further. When Obama won, people said, you don't have George W. Bush to attack anymore. Your show's going to end. And we grew more under Obama than during any previous period. When Trump defeated Hillary, after Obama's, when Obama's term ended, people said, now that you don't have a friendly administration on your side, every, the whole country is going to change under Trump. No one's going to want your left wing drivel. And during Trump's first term, we grew more than at any previous time in the show's history. Then when Trump lost to Biden, people said, you're not, you don't have Trump anymore. You're done, the show is done. What are you going to do? And the show grew more during Biden's four years than under any previous president. And then now, once again, with Donald Trump in power, as authoritarian as ever, we have seen the fastest growth of the show in history during Q1 of 2025. And you know what the theme is? The bigger the show gets, the more able to grow it is. Number one. And number two, we adjust. The show is never about one idea or one person. It's about what's broken and who's benefiting and why it keeps happening. Trump makes it easier to explain to a degree. But the folks saying, with this new president, you guys are done. Fortunately, they've been wrong every time so far. All right, Anxious Scholar wrote on Reddit, why do you think Trump seems way more unhinged this time around? I think it has to do with the staged assassination attempt and Elon rigging the election by throwing out legitimate votes. I think that after he committed and got away with such public and ludicrous acts of treason, he feels more privileged than untouchable. Truly unhinged behavior at every moment. Listen, I don't know about Elon rigging the election by throwing out legitimate votes. I just, that's not something I'm confidently able to weigh in on right now. But what I can tell you is the reason Trump seems more unhinged is because he is. Last time he flirted with authoritarianism. This time he feels completely untouchable. And he has gone full blown authoritarian. He dodged impeachment, dodged criminal charges, dodged consequences for four years as president, four years as not being president while Biden was president, and now he's back with a vengeance. It's not a mystery. It's unchecked power with access to social media. He has no more races to run. He legitimately has reason to say to himself, they can't do anything to me because they haven't so far. And so the reason Trump Seems more unhinged. Is he is. And he also has far more unhinged people around him who are not restraining him in any way. Okay. Irene Phillips wrote on YouTube, Charlie Kirk is like that guy who graduated three years ago but hangs out in the high school parking lot to look cool to younger kids. Yeah, that's true. And it's not just Charlie Kirk. There's this whole genre of mostly guys who figured out that if you yell about masculinity and pretend to care about free speech and throw in some, you know, light religious apologetics, you can build a brand off of insecurity and moral panic. And when you see Charlie Kirk do these events at colleges, it's kind of like high school debate club energy. And I don't want to diminish high school debate club. It's high school debate club energy, but without actually sticking to logical statements and instead having a bunch of funding from rich people come in to help you set up the entire thing. It does not project strength, that's for sure. And Irene is correctly identifying that chuck commented on YouTube. People are so freaking dumb. The economy was bad, so Biden had to go, but now the economy is bad and that's actually good. It's literal insanity. Well, you know, this is the playbook right now. When the economy was bad under Biden, it was because Biden was doing the wrong things. And of course they couldn't actually find any metrics to say the economy was bad. Now that the economy is bad under Trump, and to be clear, most of the metrics are still okay. It's the forward looking stuff that's a concern. But we are told there's going to be pain and now we're told it's good. The economic pain we are now going to suffer is because it's a control. We're setting fire to the economy. But this time it's a controlled burn is what we are told to believe. I know not many people in my audience believe it, but the double standard and the hypocrisy is stunning. Now, I'll be honest, I think Trump recognizes it because he's also now trying to figure out how to off ramp this tariff fiasco before it really does start to torpedo the economy. But a very good point. Significant double standard, bad economy under Biden, which we can't identify is bad, bad economy under Trump. We're all doing our part. We're all patriotic. It's all going to be great. We've got a great bonus show for you today. Sign up atjoin pacman.com. we'll see you then. And I'll be back on Monday.