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- [00:00]
A
Foreign. I told you last week that it was time to be suspicious about Donald Trump's latest medical report. Why? Well, the report from his third annual physical in 13 months was due out within a day of the physical. I'll remind you of the timeline, the physical last Tuesday. The White House said on Tuesday the report is going to be out in a day or so. A day or so from Tuesday would be Wednesday, maybe Thursday, if for some reason they go with the or so instead of just a day. When I recorded Friday's show midday, the report hadn't come out on Wednesday, it hadn't come out on Thursday, and it hadn't come out up to that point on Friday. And I told you at the time, this is not a random delay. They are in a dilemma at the White House about this medical report. You basically have two options. You release the real report or you release a fake one. Those were the two options we were considering. Of course, you could just not release anything. But assuming they knew they had to release something, you release the report, the actual medical report, or you put together some kind of a propaganda document. The real report, we knew would undercut Trump's claims that were repeated by the White House, that this is the most perfect health that anybody's ever seen. Everything is awesome, despite Trump being days from turning 80 and obese and doesn't exercise and terrible diet okay. So even if he's doing okay for his age, he's obese, and there's this growing list of concerning symptoms. He can't stand without swaying back and forth. He can't walk in a straight line, the ankles, the bruises. The real report might be fine for his age, but way worse than the cult leader image that they've published for years. So that would be a problem. The real report, if it was an honest report. So then you've got the fake report option, which is you put together a propaganda document that says things that aren't true or it excludes things. It's not a full medical report. They've done it before. You could do it again. But as Trump ages, as his health is more obviously not perfect, and it becomes really difficult, the document they would have to release to make it seem as though the physical was perfect is not a realistically believable document right now. Whatever people were previously willing to believe about Trump's bogus propaganda medical reports just wouldn't be believable today because Donald Trump's health has visibly deteriorated objectively over the last several years. So it's the real report, which is bad or A fake report, which maybe no one will believes they did ultimately Release it at 11pm on Friday night. 11pm on Friday night is not when you release stuff you want people to see. Okay? If you want a big audience for this awesome medical report, you do it Monday at 10am, Wednesday at 1pm you don't do it at 11pm on a Friday. And that's exactly what they did. When you see the report, you realize it is total and utter garbage and it only raises suspicions even more. Now, I'm going to give you the highlights and the key points. You can look at the report. It's only. It's not even a report. It's a letter. And it's just three pages. You can check it out. Now, of course, generically, it says, Trump's in insanely good health. He's just so fit. Why? Whatever we expected it to say that. But a couple interesting things. Number one, they're acknowledging that Donald Trump gained 14 pounds in the last year. In the two physicals ago, they said he weighed 224. We didn't believe it then. Now they say he weighs 238. They realized clearly that insisting that Trump weighs 224 is a fantasy. Nobody's going to believe that. So they're saying now his weight is 238. Is that really Trump's weight? I. I don't know. Again, for Trump's alleged height, which is also a lie, 238 puts him just below obesity. If Trump's not really 63238 puts him at obese. And of course, if Trump weighs more than 238, then obviously that puts him well into the obesity category. Even what they're admitting, a 14 pound gain in 12 months is more than gaining a pound a month, which is not exactly awesome. Now, one notable thing is they did a bunch of extra testing where it was to their advantage, but they didn't at least talk about extra testing when it wasn't. I'll give you an example. The report says Trump's hearing is intact. It's a pretty low bar. We know Trump regularly can't hear a damn thing. He asked, can you speak up, please? Can you repeat that? Melania repeats the questions for him. Trump is having problems hearing. It's okay. That's not a huge deal. But they don't do a full audio test where they could say, actually, Trump's lost 35% hearing in one ear and 45 in the other. They just go, trump's hearing is intact. He can hear if someone stands next to him and yells, he hears it. That's suspicious. When they have so much extra testing available and when they did so much extra testing in other areas, they could say his hearing is a little bit diminished. He's almost 80. It's okay. They can't admit it. But then on the other hand, they go, we did AI enhanced ECG, an electrocardiogram. And that AI test estimated Trump's cardiac age as 14 years younger than his real age. He may be 79, almost 80. But this AI enhanced test determined that he's really 65. From a cardiac perspective, that's not standard. A I. ECG is not standard. The entire concept of using AI right now is shaky. It might be something great in the future. It is not standard right now. Why do they include that? But then they just go, his hearing is intact because of what's convenient and what's inconvenient. Then we get to the cognitive tests, the MOCA Montreal Cognitive Assessment. How many times has he taken this? Why is he taking it so many times? He's bragged about acing it three times, but we don't actually know how many times he's taken it. Has he aced it every time or only the times he mentions? Why is that test being repeated at short intervals when you are regularly tested cognitively so often? Usually it's because a doctor says, we need to be doing this test. There's a reason to be concerned. And Dr. Barbarella's report mentions that he got a 30 and he was tested, but it doesn't explain why is he being tested so often. All right, one other thing. The report from last week about Trump's tree trunk legs, the swelling, the edema, which they've said is from chronic venous insufficiency. The new report, the 2026 report, says Trump's slight lower leg swelling was noticed and it improved from last year. What's the problem with that? Last year it wasn't on the report. So what they want you to now believe is that this is something because everybody can see it. His ankles are swollen like tree trunks. But it's gotten better since last year. Well, let's compare to last year's report. Last year's report mentions nothing about it. They mentioned this year improvement to something which wasn't even mentioned last year. So if it was worse last year, why didn't you mention it? Doesn't make any sense whatsoever. They have no option now not to mention it because it's become so visible. More realistically, they didn't mention it last year because it wasn't yet visible when Trump was wearing pants. This year it is visible when Trump is wearing pants. They've got to mention it that they always have to put a positive spin, which is it's gotten better than last year. Final thing, remember the neck rash that Donald Trump had? Trump was pictured videoed with a neck rash. And when asked about it, the White House says he is on a prescription cream for a common condition or something like that. They never told us what the cream is. They never told us what the condition is. So there were questions. Is this a sort of treatment for early skin cancer? What is it? We don't know. That is not even mentioned. The report doesn't explain did that resolve. Why was he treated in the last year? What's going. Just no mention of it whatsoever. Presumably he's off the drug and it's like it never happened to these people. So 11pm Medical report, including things that are weird to include, skipping things that are notably absent. And we're supposed to look around and just go, healthiest president ever. I'm struggling to believe it. Donald Trump's ego just got crushed by a legal bomb. And I'm going to admit that I love this. You can inject this stuff right into my veins. I am taking pleasure at this. Trump just got hit with a legal ruling that cuts to the center of what he cares about the most, which is his ego. It's not about tariffs, it's not a polling bit of news. It's not legislation, it's not about early voting rules, or it is about Trump's name. This is what matters the most to him. We've been talking about how in Donald Trump's increased, increasingly failed presidency, he's more and more worried about what kind of legacy can I leave, can I acquire land, can I slap my name on stuff? And that's what he tried to do with the Kennedy center, where he said it is going to be the Trump Kennedy center and we're going to shut it down for renovations. And a federal judge has ordered the Kennedy center to remove Donald Trump's name within two weeks. And the ruling also blocks the plan to close it for this huge renovation project. I'm less concerned with the renovation project part of it. I want to focus in on what is going to drive Trump absolutely crazy. The judge said, you got to pull his name off of the building. Think about what makes Trump tick. He doesn't just like having power. He wants visible power. That's why he's obsessed with military parades and all of these things that are essentially substitutes for penis size, proverbial penis size, if that's the way you want to go. The twig and berries, his apple bags, for lack of a better term, the judge says you got to take his name off. And that to Trump, he. He loves putting his name on stuff. You've got, let's see, Trump Tower, Trump National, Trump Doral, Trump International, Trump Golf Club, the Trump Winery, Trump Steaks, Trump Water, Trump Airlines, Trump University. Okay, you get the point. The brand of Trump has been built around the idea of put his name everywhere, convince people that that means success. Forget about the fact that he's had the bankruptcies. Forget about the fact that a lot of the buildings his name is on are licensing deals. And then the residents go, yeah, let's vote to change the name. We don't want to be called Trump anymore. The whole point is he wants that visible and the building. For Trump, who really is a real estate guy, he doesn't care about the presidency in terms of what it requires. He just cares about the idea of being president. Trump has had these giant billboards for himself, which are buildings with his name on him. And now you've got a federal judge hitting him below the belt and saying, take the thing down. And you know that this just absolutely crushes him because it's about the building, but it's about his legacy. Now, here's a reminder. When Trump found out the trustees he appointed to the Kennedy center have decided we're going to change the name to the Trump Kennedy Center. Trump had the gall to pretend as though this was completely their idea. What a nice thing for them to do. Remember this insane moment. Board members of the Kennedy center voted unanimously to rename it the Trump Kennedy Center. What is your reaction to that?
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B
Well, I was honored by this. The board is a very distinction, distinguished board, most distinguished people in the country. And I was surprised by it. I was honored by it. You know, we've. We're saving the building. We saved the building. The building was in such bad shape, both physically, financially, and every other way. And now it's very solid, very strong. We have something going on television, I guess, on the 23rd December. I think it's going to get very big ratings. And the Kennedy center is really, really back strongly. Is a very bad shape.
- [13:17]
A
All right, you get it. It was. I was so surprised. I'm flattered that these people I appointed decided to put my name on the building. Trump knows his presidency is a failure. He knows that the economy is a shambles. He said he was going to be anti war, and he's starting wars and gas prices up. He knows it's a complete and total mess. He's not going to be remembered as the guy who brought back affordability. He's not going to be remembered as the guy who ushered in an era of widespread economic prosperity for the average American. He is obsessed with how is he going to be remembered? Rankings and marks and who had 100% approval from MAGA. Who was the worst? Who built what? Who got credit? Who got their name on something? The Obama Iran nuclear deal. The problem wasn't what it did or didn't do. The problem was that it was Obama's deal. And so Trump got out of it. And now he's desperate to get back into something which wouldn't even be as good, but it would have Trump's name on it. And that is what this is about. And that is why he is, you know, can I get my face on Mount Rushmore? Can I get my face on a $250bill? And this is why he compares himself to presidents from centuries ago. He wants the military parades and the celebrations and buildings with his name on him. He doesn't care about governing. It's laughable. He wants to cement his name in history. And I love that a judge looked at this and said, not legal. The Kennedy center isn't like a random office building or some condos with a lot of gaudy gold in them. That Trump, Trump can slap his name on it is one of the most sort of culturally recognizable institutions. It was created as a memorial to President John F. Kennedy. Trump's allies pushed through this decision to slap his name on it, and a judge said, no. Even calling it the Trump Kennedy center makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. And now a judge, fortunately says, Trump's name has got to come off. Now. This is. It's not happening as a procedural ruling or a disagreement over federal review requirements. Trump was simply told, your name doesn't belong here. I love this. I am taking pleasure in it. And we are now going to see, hopefully, if and when Trump becomes an even lamer duck after Republicans lose the House, that's it for legislation for him. Trump is going to be left without an economic legacy. He's going to be left without a cultural legacy, which he would. He wants to be culturally relevant. He is going to be left with a headache in his name being pulled off of this thing. And it's incredibly ironic that Trump wanted one of America's premier arts institutions to have his name. And instead he may go down as the president whose name was ordered removed from stuff by a federal judge. It's like when they take, you know, a McDonald closes down and they take the golden arches of off, but you can still see the outline of the golden arches because the sun wasn't hitting. You see that outline there? It's the same thing in the idea of removing and purging Trump from a legacy in the United States. And we're probably going to see the equivalent of the outline of those arches for a while, but these are real losses from how Trump evaluates performance. I love it. He'll appeal. It'll be a mess. And when that happens, just remind yourself, Trump focusing on putting his name on it in the first place, not helpful to the average American. Trump focused on appealing the ruling to take his name off. Not helpful for Americans. Doesn't bring the price of gas down a penny. Doesn't bring the price of beef or eggs or or broccolini down a penny. Remember that when you go to vote in November. I'm excited to tell you about the world's number one expanding garden hose and their brand new product, the pocket Hose Ballistic. I used to go through cheap hoses all the time because of the kinks and the leaks and the tangles. This is on another level. 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The White House is physically in ruins. And. And Donald Trump's health is in ruins to the extent that we know anything about it. So let me explain. The presidency is in metaphorical ruins, whereas the White House is in literal ruins. And then we'll get back to the Trump's health stuff. Trump has spent the last sort of year and a half tearing apart one of the most iconic buildings in American history. The front lawn is now a construction zone for Donald Trump's absurd ballroom and for the UFC fight that will be taking place on Trump's birthday. Mass destruction at every corner while Americans can't afford to fill up their gas tanks. Tanks because gas is up 65% instead of being down 50%, which is what Donald Trump promised you. Ask Americans about the ballroom. 56% are against it, 61% of independents are against it. You even got a bunch of Republicans, some of whom we hear from today, who don't like what's going on. But Trump stands out in front of the rubble last week and struggling to speak, says to Americans, be patient, it won't be much longer. This is great. Look at this, look at that. And at the same time, they're building an outdoor UFC arena for a fight they're going to. There's going to be a fight at the White house on Trump's 80th birthday, which is also, by the way, a corruption story. All of the. The Venn diagram overlaps in so many different ways. It's a corrupt handout to Trump's friend Dana White, who owns UFC and is going to make a boatload of money off of this thing. So that's the White House in ruins. Then we have the presidency in ruins. Trump is now the most unpopular president since this type of Polling started in 2009. Net approval rating is negative 24, down nearly 2 points in a single week. Last week, 58% of Americans disapprove the job he's doing. Three quarters say the economy is in fair or poor condition. 63% say it's getting worse. In a different poll, 80% expect the economy to be worse. A year from now. When so many people expect the economy to be worse, or at least no better, that affects their spending habits, and that's not good for the country or for the economy either. Some of the underlying factors here. Gas was under $3 a gallon. In fact, before the Iran war, mid January, it was 273. It's recently been 450. The approval rating on inflation is minus 43 points. That's the lowest of Trump's entire term so far. And then we look at Iran, where the peace president, remember, Tulsi told us and Trump told us, and they all told, if you want peace, there's one choice. It's only Trump. Trump's team, his envoys, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, real estate guys, they've been negotiating a deal which would not even be as strong as the Iran nuclear deal that Trump got out of because it was supposedly terrible, but it would include. Here we go now. A $300 billion post war investment fund to help rebuild Iran. Sounds profitable. So the same Iran that we just went to war with, Trump is trying to now do business with in a way that will certainly enrich the people around him, if not Trump himself. Now, meanwhile, Iran is still saying there really aren't negotiations taking place here. After Trump negotiated and was just about there, what, eight times now, Iran is going, nothing's been agreed to, just this isn't happening here and nobody knows what is really going on. So from a political opportunity standpoint, from the standpoint of political, Democrats have a, a big chance of taking back the House in November. Senate remains a toss up, slightly favoring Republicans. Right now, the White House lawn is torn up and the law is torn up. Polls are in freefall, the Iran deal is a mess, and Trump's building a ballroom. So you have symbolism that is not only a symbol, there's the symbolic nature of the White House is all torn up while Trump's in a war and the economy is struggling. And then there is, quite literally, the White House lawn is torn up. Trump inherited a functioning economy. Not perfect, but a functioning economy, a functioning White House. Was there a lot of gold paint in the Oval Office? No, but it didn't need gold paint. It was fine. And now, 18 months later, both the economy and the White House are disgusting. Construct construction sites. I was Also thinking over the weekend, the ballroom is kind of a metaphor for Trumpism. Endless focus on appearance, spectacle and branding, while bigger problems remain completely unsolved. And Americans are being told by people like Scott Besant and Kevin Hassett and many others, be patient on gas prices, as soon as this thing is over, they're going to come down. We hear that Kevin Hassett said there's going to be a gusher. By the way, that I don't exactly love the idea of Kevin Hassett using the term a gusher, but that's a different story. He says there's going to be a gusher of oil once this thing is over. And you've just got to give him time and. But what Trump is focused on is building a ballroom. What Trump is focused on is UFC fights in the White House lawn not making progress here. And so when you look back at legacy, and I believe this is really what underlies Trump's desire to do a lot of this stuff, you look at the legacy of past presidents. Franklin D. Roosevelt left Social Security, LBJ left Medicare. I think, I hope I'm getting that right. Trump wants to leave something. The health care Bill has been two weeks away since July of 2020. It's not going to happen. So instead, Trump is focused on the physical. Can we acquire land? That was his obsession about Greenland and Venezuela and Cuba. We'll see where all of that lands. Can I put my name on stuff? The Trump Kennedy center, which a judge said illegal. He wants to put his face and signature, I guess. Would his signature be on it? Or maybe it's. Maybe it's best in signature. His face on a $250 bill. It's not going to happen. If I were a betting man, I would say it doesn't happen. Can we change the physical structure of the White House? And unfortunately, what he's been able to do at the White House so far mirrors the condition of the presidency. It's chaotic, it's destroyed, it's unfinished and it's increasingly unpopular. And then we've got the third pillar, which is that we talk about. Trump's health is in ruins. The White House is in ruins. The presidency is in ruins. Trump's health is in ruins. I don't think we're going to get the answers we deserve. I don't think we're going to get the sorts of answers we got from every other president. Trump claiming to be healthier than ever, as his hands appear to be rotting, his ankles look like tree trunks, he's unsteady, walking, he's unsteady standing, he's unsteady talking, he's unsteady thinking. So the theme after we're going to make America great again, again. That's what was promised. It'll be great again, again. We don't have that. And what we do have is an entire federal government in ruins thanks to Donald Trump. Am I missing anything here? Let me know in the comments. Send me an email info@david pakman.com all right. Donald Trump was interviewed by his daughter in law. Now there are two main stories here. Number one, in a lot of countries you turn on the TV and you see the president or the world or the national leader, prime minister, etc. Interviewed by a family member. You go, oh, this is the sort of thing that's done in dictatorships. So like top line, the concept of news outlet hire, news outlet friendly to the dear leader, hires one of the dear leader's family members, has the dear leader's family member interview the leader. This is just the sort of brazen co opting of media that we see in dictatorships and the sorts of countries that whether they are nominally left wing or right wing, we say, wow, that's not the way in a democracy things work. That's number one. But the number two is when you get the easy interview with your daughter in law and and you fail. Like it still goes terribly wrong. And that is exactly what happened when Lara Trump interviewed her father in law. Donald Trump. The first topic, the timing of the Iran war, an optional war and Lara Trump brings up. It's not really great timing given the forthcoming midterms. Take a look at what Donald Trump says. I'd imagine if you could have time things perfectly. Having a conflict just in front of the midterm elections at a time like this isn't ideal.
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B
So if you wanted to play that game, then you would wait till the midterms are over and then the following hour you'll attack Iran because they cannot have a nuclear weapon. Most people agree with me on that. But then it gets maybe carried into, you know, the next election, whether it's a midterm or not. So you have a very short window.
- [29:47]
A
So the concept here is predicated on the idea that this was going to be a very short war. We're in week 14 of the three week war. But also that Donald Trump really doesn't give a damn about Republicans. We've talked earlier and we're going to talk later about the growing obsession with legacy that Donald Trump has and Trump's legacy doesn't Include a calculation about whether Republicans get absolutely brutalized and slaughtered under Donald Trump's watch. It's more, what can I do right now to see. To see if I can get some kind of favorable approval results, even though it's going down, down, down. And there is no question that if Donald Trump did care about the future of the party after him, he would be behaving differently. It's fine that he doesn't, but we should just acknowledge when all of these Republicans. Republicans. Continue sucking up to him, that they're sucking up to a guy who doesn't give a damn about them. Okay. Donald Trump reveals during this interview that the red line that Iran would have to cross to push the United States into resuming its military offensive is pretty wacky. Okay, let's take a look at this. Is there a line that they would cross for you to go on the offensive again militarily?
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B
Well, a deal that wasn't going to be good for us is the line ultimately, because. Because, you know, I'm playing it out and we're going to see. And that's what I do. I negotiate. They negotiate. They're very good negotiators. They're crafty. But in the end, we have all the cards because we've defeated them militarily. Look, they have no Navy. Every ship. They have 159 ships. Every one of them are at the bottom of the sea. Every single one. We take pictures of them. We have people going down, taking pictures of hundreds of ships. Their navy is totally gone 100%. Their Air Force is totally gone 100%. Their military, we've sort of left it alone because we think that their military is somewhat, Somewhat moderate. They have other people that aren't moderate. We've taken them out. We've taken different forms of leadership out. We've actually left their military alone. People would be surprised to hear that, because mistakes have been made in wars where you wipe out everybody and then you have a country that's, you know, for 40 years can never rebuild. You look at what happened with Iraq. We did so bad. That was such a foolish thing, what we did. Shouldn't have been there in the first place, by the way, and shouldn't have been in Iran. But Iran has the capability. If we didn't hit them with the B2 bombers nine months ago, they would have a nuclear weapon right now, and it would be a whole different story.
- [32:34]
A
You know, one of the most interesting and maybe disturbing things that I see about the entire Iran war, is it that it's terrible for The American economy? No, that, that's. That is a disturbing thing, but we've talked about that. Is it that Donald Trump doesn't seem to really even have a clear sense of what it looks like to get out? Well, he kind of does. He kind of does and increasingly looks like Trump would be willing to get out if he could just get something approximating the original Obama Iran nuclear deal in place. What's fascinating is that we have been told eight times that this thing is over and yet hostilities continue. And at the same time, we have been told 8, 10, or 12 times that we are really close to it being over. And the new one is that we are being told multiple times that if Iran doesn't behave correctly, we're going right back in. Now, what's the truth? Is it over? Was it over? Did it resume? Cesar, the truth is Trump has no idea what's going on. The truth is that Trump has delegated the negotiations to incompetent people. And his only concern is, what can I say today to look strong, number one, and to try to make the stock market have a pop, Number two. And on the days that the stock market goes up, Trump goes, thank God I did this Iran thing. Stock market is up. Are people falling for it? Well, we're going to find out in November. Lara Trump bringing up that this ridiculous, corrupt UFC fight that is destroying the White House lawn and handing millions of dollars to Donald Trump's friend, Dana White, the president and owner of UFC is on his 80th birthday. Lara Trump brings that up. Trump goes, well, I hate to hear that. I'm turning 80. Take a look at this. Away, you can see outside, the construction is happening from this amazing, historic UFC event. It's obviously right outside on the White House lawn. It coincides with your 80th birthday, which is incredible.
- [34:40]
B
I hate to hear that. And that's on June 14th. And it's the hardest ticket I have never been asked people everybody wants, I'm going to make more enemies. And it's about 4,000 seats, and then they're going to have close to 100,000 people in the back where they're putting up eight massive screens. And it's all free. It's all free. It's really a contribution from UFC to 250, meaning the 250 years. Our country, our great country. So it was a great thing for ufc. And then we have, Roger, you know,
- [35:12]
A
we talk about, in other countries, if we heard X, we would assume Y. And like I said, if we found out that the president or prime minister or dictator's daughter in law was interviewing them, we would go, wow, that's brazen corruption. That's a co opting of the media. Similarly, if we found out that, take your pick, okay, my birth country. If we found out that Argentinian President Milei was having a polo match on the grounds of the pink House, the equivalent of the White House, we would go, what kind of a corrupt handout is this? Which friend of his has an interest in polo? And yet here in the United States, Trump has convinced a whole bunch of these MAGA Republicans that this is cool, that this is fine, that this is just a cultural touch point. And the context of all of it is insisting that thank God Biden isn't president. Thank God it's Trump. Thank God it's not Kamala Harris. And yet when the topic of his predecessor comes up, Trump and Lara Trump are completely united. The auto pen. Biden didn't know what was going on. Take a look at this. But I think we got to acknowledge everyone's favorite one.
- [36:32]
B
Well, you have Barack Hussein Obama, who's we give a description and you have the guy with the auto pen.
- [36:39]
A
So these two are definitely favorites. This one gets a lot of attention though.
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B
I'll move over here. So, so this one is sleepy Joe Biden and that's the auto pen. And use that because he signed almost everything with an auto pen. He didn't sign it himself because he wasn't capable enough to do it. And it's a disgrace that that could happen to our country. A real disgrace. So we talk about it here. And here's your new walk.
- [37:06]
A
You know, there is, you can say a lot of things about Joe Biden, fairly fair criticisms, but that he didn't know what was going on under his administration is not one of them. There is no evidence that under Biden's administration he wasn't aware of what was taking place or that things were being done in his name and he didn't know about them, understand them or approve of them. That's the auto pen scandal, which is all this stuff was happening and Biden had no idea. Whenever Biden was asked, hey, what's your comment on X? He had a comment. It regularly happens that Trump is asked about things that have taken place around the world and he says, oh, this is the first I'm hearing about it right now. We're going to have to get back to you on that. And it's a reminder that not only is this a corrupt administration, of course it is. Not only is this a nepotistic administration? Of course it is. But the things that Biden was accused of by Trump when Trump was out of office almost exclusively and completely apply to this very administration. Interviewed by your daughter in law and you still can't keep it together. Dear God. Most scams do not feel random. Scammers may know your name, your city, a relative, where you work, and suddenly the message you get sounds a lot more believable. And a lot of that information is found online and it's just sitting there waiting for bad actors to use it against you. This is why our sponsor Incogni works to remove all of that information from hundreds of websites and databases that have it so that scammers have nothing to work with. Incogni automatically sends removal requests to hundreds of sites that have your personal info. They will follow up again and again until it's gone. My favorite feature is custom removals with the unlimited plan. You find your info anywhere, strange directory, obscure website, not on their master list of databases. 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So let's talk about data centers. The focus here is how these data centers are getting approved when seemingly nobody wants them. You know, there's. Whether AI exists or is going to exist, I don't think is even worth talking about. I mean, quite frankly, AI exists and I believe it will exist, even if somehow the United States bans it, which I don't even know that the United States could. Somehow other countries are going to have it. People will have access. You'll get a vpn, you'll get a proxy. I don't think that that's worth exploring right now. Also not up for debate. I will consume resources. Electricity, water. That's not going to change. So this, once again, is huge corporations and greedy opportunists against local communities. And the tactics that are being used to push these data centers through are understandably and correctly making people very suspicious. For example, companies that are building data centers use pseudonyms. They don't even use their real company name. They assign shell project names. So people living nearby often have no clue who's even behind the data center. That's number one. Two, they go in and start working with local officials, and the local officials sign NDAs nondisclosure agreements. The local officials often can't even talk about the data center projects. And when locals finally do find out what's going on, the timeline is supposedly urgent, like Trump's reflecting pool liner or whatever the they claim urgency. The agreements have been signed, they're well underway, and we're long past the time to debate the project, even though there was never really an opportunity to do so. Now, if it were only about AI concerns, okay, if it were about environmental impact, water, power, land use, okay, I would argue that it's even worse because residents are finding out about these data centers when it's too late. And they are the ones who end up funding the projects in many of these cases. How? I'll explain. When the utility company hears there's a data center coming, they say, well, we've got to expand the grid, we need to do transmission upgrades, or we've got to add electrical substations. Maybe we then are the ones who end up paying for it. It might be logical to say, well, I'm sure the data center will pay for the buildout that's required. Right? And the answer is wrong. Often it's the residents who pay higher utility costs to fund the upgrades that are necessary for the data center to come in and to make money. This is a classic in the United States. We've seen it in North Carolina. This was years ago. Now, I believe it was with fracking or coal ash or something like that, where it's capitalism for the profits, screws a bunch of stuff up and then in comes socialism, either for the infrastructure or for the cleanup that is required. If you live near one of these projects or proposals, you would be right to ask, why the hell am I subsidizing one of the richest industries in the world? Let's look at a specific example. In Utah, Shark Tank millionaire Kevin o' Leary has become one of the loudest public defenders of these projects. And o' Leary is going about it differently than a lot of the country. Instead of kind of moving very quietly in, residents finding out late, o' Leary is out there saying, hey, listen, these projects need resources. Companies want incentives. Companies want tax breaks. Communities should accept it because this is where things are going. If you don't like it, too bad. Now, I'm going to play a clip from Tucker Carlson's show here as I disagree with Tucker about a lot of things. I don't think Tucker is an ally of the left, but this data center issue is actually becoming bipartisan in a sense. Here is Tucker talking to Kevin o' Leary about the data centers, and the conversation is quite revealing. Take a listen, for sure. Let me ask, though, about why taxpayers should have to pay for this. If it's a private business and your tenants are some of the richest companies in the world, why would taxpayers be required, as they now are, to subsidize this? They don't, they don't necessarily have to do that. They just won't win any contracts. It's, it's a, it's a competition. But why are you getting tax breaks is my question. Everybody, you go back and you say, what, what incentives can you give us to invest $15 billion in the first 1.5 gigs? That's what it takes. I have to go raise $15 billion. That's just. But anyone who starts a business, why should taxpayers have to pony up for that? They don't, but of course they do. If you, if you, I mean, if you're getting a tax break and they're not, they're making up the difference. There's a state budget that's no problem. That's no problem. I can build it in Texas. I can build it in Jacksonville, Mississippi. They're. But why, if it's such a good business, would you be asking taxpayers to help pay for it without giving them equity in the company? Are you giving taxpayers shares? No, the investors get the shares. But here's why they would do it. Why would the taxpayers have to. If you want to start a business, why. Why am I, as a taxpayer, forced to pay for your business? I don't, I don't get it. Well, let's forget about data centers. Let's go any manufacturing, let's say you're going to build, let's go to something else. Now, in most situations, the residents aren't even hearing about it ahead of time. In Utah with Kevin o', Leary, at least they're hearing about it ahead of time. In Festus, Missouri, for example, big Trump country, half the city council got booted out because of drama and anger over a data center. And they're trying to recall the mayor as well right now. So the backlash here is bipartisan. In many cases, you find it in blue areas and you find it in red areas in the country. And everybody is basically arriving at the same question. Who is the local government really working for here? Now, maybe there are people in my audience who like the data centers. Maybe there are people in my audience who are against the data centers. At minimum. Can't we all agree that the public should have plenty of time to know these deals are being made? Here's who's going to pay, here's who's going to benefit financially. Here are the infrastructure costs that are going to be shifted onto you through some kind of special assessment through the utility company or in other ways. And here is what the local officials are agreeing to or have agreed to on your behalf, but that's not happening. Between the NDAs and the companies doing business in these data centers, often using pseudonyms and shell companies, people are finding out, wow. People who can't talk about it have signed deals with companies using fake names for me to now fund additional infrastructure for a data center. And a whole bunch of other parties are going to be making a killing off of this stuff while I'm sitting here just funding the infrastructure. I think we could all agree that that's wrong, at minimum. And a lot of people have never heard. Have you heard of this? I want to hear from you. Leave me a comment. Info@david pakman.com does this all sound completely foreign to you or did you know that it was going on. Let me know when we talk about privacy online. Your email account may contain more detailed information about your life than anything else. Your purchases, work conversations, account logins, medical updates Most big tech email providers do scan your inbox. They build advertising profiles around your activity, and then they target you using that data. I recommend Start Mail, our sponsor. Start Mail is a platform that functions just like the email services you're used to. No learning curve. But unlike the big tech email providers, Start Mail does not scan your email, it doesn't track you, it doesn't sell your data, and you also get privacy tools that the other email providers do not offer. You can create unlimited email aliases so you don't have to give anybody your real email address when you sign up for stuff super useful. You can also send PGP encrypted emails even if the recipient doesn't use encryption. Switching to Start Mail is really easy. You migrate your emails and contacts with a few clicks. Go to start mail.com/pacman to get 50% off your first year. The link is in the description There is panic in Trump world as more and more pro Trump content creators are turning on Donald Trump. Now there are other people covering this and talking about it, but I think they're mostly missing a big part of the story. It's not like the real story is they're getting part of it right. A lot of the coverage about know, Candace Owens or Alex Jones to some degree, Joe Rogan and Andrew Schultz, Tucker Carlson. The coverage of them turning on Trump is getting one part of it right, which is they don't like what Trump's doing. So now they're going, hey, we didn't vote for this stuff. I don't like it. I'm against Trump. That's part of the story. I don't really think that's the big enduring part of the story, though. We when Rogan goes, this immigration stuff is nuts. Like, I think he means it. I think he's honest about that. When Candace Owens says whatever she's saying about Trump lately and it changes quickly, I think she means it. When Alex Jones goes, hey, we need to do a 25th Amendment on Trump, I think, I think he means it. But the biggest story is that a lot of these people are realizing that their personal brands may not survive going down with Trump's ship. And so they've got to get a helicopter ride off the sinking ship because the lifeboats won't have the room for them to use some metaphors here, and suddenly they're going I need to distance myself from Donald Trump. Trump is becoming toxic to the personal brands of a bunch of these people. This takes us back to our talk about cults and cult leaders and authoritarianism. The MAGA media world was built on loyalty to Trump. That was above all else. That's the most important thing. But these people weren't loyal to Trump for the reasons that you might think their primary loyalty was. We want attention. We want to be attached to whoever has or is likely to have as much power as possible. We want to build an audience, we need to build revenue, we need to build relevance. And they're now coming around to realize a couple of things at once. The things we supported Trump for aren't happening. That's one part. Trump's off the rails. So for a lot of them, it's the immigration stuff. You know, for Candace Owens, maybe it's Trump's not coming to Charlie Kirk's. He's not investigating the true motives for the killing of Charlie Kirk or whatever. So that's one aspect of it. The other one is also, I'm not sure it's good for me to be associated with Trump anymore, that that's the other side to why they are doing this distancing. We've got Candace Owens distancing from Trump. Tucker Carlson is a straight up antagonist of Trump at this point. Alex Jones, like I said, calling for the 25th Amendment on Trump. Rogan becoming less predictable, less. Less willing to defend everything and even criticizing a bunch of stuff. Various influencers who are like, hey, we got to ask some questions here about what's going on. People who are now concerned at least about what Trump's up to. These are small criticisms that would have been very difficult a couple of years ago when Trump was riding much higher. And some of them are much bigger criticisms, like Tucker Carlson, for example. Now, here's the key thing. The permission structure has changed. Now you might say, David, what are you talking about? Permission structure? That sounds like cult language. Exactly. It is a term from cult psychology. The permission structure means once a few influential figures start criticizing Trump publicly, others feel safe doing it too. And this is the way that cults work. People are looking at others to figure out, where are we in the permissions for doing this. The bigger idea that I think is also worth considering is that MAGA media was never really a political movement. And this is why it's actually not so much about the policy. The MAGA media space that kind of was built as the Trump plane was starting to fly in 2015, 2016, into Trump's first term is it was an attention economy ecosystem. That's the most important insight, I think, in understanding this. The creators survive by maintaining engagement, maintaining audience trust and staying culturally relevant. Look at Ben Shapiro, whose audience is down 85%. He didn't maintain engagement. Some of his audience doesn't trust him anymore. Some because he's stuck with Trump on some issues, some because he's abandoned Trump on some issues, which is interesting, and he's increasingly culturally irrelevant. They are beginning to realize we are attaching ourselves to erratic behavior that isn't helpful. The Iran stuff, do they support it or not? Different ones are picking different things. The, you know, Trump's AI Messiah imagery, which some defended and others said it's a little bit too much. The publicly unstable presence of Donald Trump, the escalation tendencies from Trump, they are realizing, damn, I got to figure out whether I'm on the ship or off of it because this might destroy me. And it is a big part of why you are seeing these MAGA content creators bail. This is also panicking the Trump White House because if we think back, you know, the greatest analogy we could think of to such a criminal president, and it almost seems quaint compared to Trump, is if we think back to Richard Nixon. Nixon ultimately resigned because he lost his political party. Republicans famously came to him and said, it looks as though there is the support for impeachment and we are going to have to support it. It is not going to be viable for us to defend you once it goes in that direction. It's better if you resign. And that is a big part of why Nixon resigned. Had Nixon had all along Fox News and Benny Johnson and the botched twins and all of these right wing content creators supporting everything Nixon was doing, I don't know that the Republican elected officials ever would have felt, all right, it's time. And so I think that this is the real panic. The content creators are trying to position themselves for what the post Trump, right. Looks like Trump is trying to figure out how do I survive my last two years, especially if I lose everything in November or at least the House. And Trump needs the content creators on his side now. One of the really interesting things is I've been getting emails about exactly this. But on the left, oh, you know, people are trying to figure out what was who do I need to attach myself too? But the difference is on the left, people were never attached to Biden or Harris in the same cult like, emotional way. Many of us just asked the question, who's the better choice and here's who I support. I'll tell you why. If things change, I'll tell you that the cult like support on the right for Trump is very different. I'm getting questions like what? What are you going to do when Trump's gone? Who, who are you going to attach yourself to? We criticize those in power and that can happen no matter who's president, whether it's a Democrat or a Republican. I think we're going to be fine. It's the right that I believe is going to be in trouble. They're starting to imagine, man, what does come after Trump who inherits this movement is are we going to be big supporters of a J.D. vance cult? That. That doesn't sound. I mean, the guy's got no charisma. Hard to imagine him building a cult. Is it going to be Marco Rubio? What is this going to look like? They don't know. They don't know whether Trumpism can even survive without Trump. Can they survive without Trump? So the White House is panicking because they seem to be losing their independent media support from podcasters and others. And then the content creators are unsure, who do we need to attach ourselves to? Should it. Would we have been better off more strongly defending Thomas Massie, even though that would have crossed Trump? So it's panic all around. For now. We need to make sure that we take advantage of this in November. Once we're beyond that, we'll start talking about 2028. A viral image of Donald Trump is making the rounds online. It's become the latest source of questions about his health and what is happening behind the scenes at the White House. Now take a look at this image showing a sort of slack jawed Trump with what is sometimes known as dementia face. Now, before we go any further, I want to be very upfront with everybody and establish something that I think is important. Nobody can diagnose dementia from a photograph. We can't diagnose Parkinson's from a picture. We can't really diagnose any neurological condition from a single frame captured of Donald Trump in his limo. That's not really what this is about. This is about the political problem that this raises for Donald Trump because this picture is not going viral in a vacuum. If this were the first weird image, strange physical appearance, first question about Trump's health, and he otherwise was confidently presenting as healthy as he claims to be, nobody would really care. But that's not what's going on. This photograph is landing in the middle of this growing pile of questions that the White House keeps insisting everybody should ignore a president who tells us he's in perfect health. Put out a very concerning, unusual medical report at 11pm after his third physical in 13 months. Not looking particularly healthy, not even looking particularly healthy for a lot of the circumstances, including the best health care anybody can get or any of that stuff. He insists that he's perfect and that everything we, and yet everything we see raises different sorts of questions. He's bragging about cognitive tests that he thinks are intelligence tests. And we've got the ankles and the hand bruising and I'm not going to repeat all of it endlessly. But we have an environment here where after years of claiming Biden didn't know where he was. Biden's got dementia. Biden's confused. Biden can't, can't govern, can't do anything. Trump all of a sudden has a growing list of health issues and problems. Questions around his health. And he appears with this slack jawed look that sometimes, this is what can sometimes happen to people as they age and particularly when they have dementia, is that they lose muscle tone in the muscles required to hold the mouth shut. You might not think of it, but if you sort of just put your face at rest to keep the mouth closed, that does actually require some muscle. And sometimes you see that ability diminish in people with dementia. So this image comes out and it's another sort of medical mystery. And the questions are starting again. Was this taken out of context? What explains this? We have it happening at the exact same time as the delayed medical report. And when you zoom out, you see that the explanations we get for stuff never really satisfy and make us go, okay, yeah, that's, that's what that is. That makes sense. We were told the bruising on both hands is from shaking hands and taking aspirin. Trump doesn't shake hands with his left hand. So it doesn't really make sense. We're told you shouldn't be speculating, you shouldn't be asking questions. This is not right. And then this image appears. They made health, age and virality a central part of their political brand and a central attack against Joe Biden. So then we have to be able to hold them to the same standards. Now, I think it's also important to mention Republicans established this standard. They said, even back before Biden was president, when it was Biden versus Trump, Trump running for reelection in 2020, they said Biden has the facial express suppression of dementia, which is what we're talking about here. Biden is making verbal Mistakes, many of which were Biden's stutter. Biden, we need more transparency from Biden's doctors. And there are all these signs of aging and what the primary issue around presidential health is that it's the most important thing. We need to know that the president is healthy. If you apply the same standard to Donald Trump, you have to come away concerned. And they told us, Americans have a duty to scrutinize the health of every candidate and every president. If that applied to Biden, it has to be applied to Donald Trump as well. It's called consistency. And I want to try to be consistent now in being as charitable as I think Trump deserves. Maybe this photograph is nothing, but maybe the photograph was taken sort of at a weird moment or the angle made Trump look confused and I don't know, maybe there's a completely ordinary explanation. Maybe he was chewing a piece of saltwater taffy and it was getting stuck to his teeth and I don't know, it looked like his mouth was hanging open in what some people call dementia face. It's possible, but when you combine the image with the administration's obsession with controlling information about Donald Trump's health, it's hard to assume there's nothing here. I start with, we've got to think about what this is rather than let's not even think about it because it's probably nothing. The picture doesn't prove dementia. I think if anybody's out there diagnosing because of this picture, it's a mistake. But the story is the administration is insisting and they have for 10 years with propaganda documents that Trump is in perfect health. And every couple of days something new happens that makes us say, what on earth is going on? Corporate media will not touch it. They are terrified. They are terrified of getting sued. They are terrified of negative attention and they just aren't going to do it. And so it's left to others to ask these questions. And you know, there were many of us saying about Biden he shouldn't run for reelection. This is not only a one way thing, it's just to what degree does the evidence support concern. I said Biden shouldn't run for reelection and he didn't. I thought it was a mistake and it ended up in a disaster. And even after Biden's disastrous June 27 debate performance, when I said, the pressure has built, he's not going to be able to stay in, some in my audience were angry, saying, David, you shouldn't say that. You've got to just stick with it. But I always tell it to you like I see it. And this picture in and of itself is not dispositive, and it doesn't allow us to make any particular diagnosis, but it does add to the growing list of areas of concern. And importantly, we don't know what's going on until there is genuine transparency. And I don't know if we will ever get that until it's too late. These questions are not going to go away.