← The Victor Davis Hanson Show
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- [00:00]
Victor Davis Hanson
Fellow Americans, a shocking revelation from the Department of Government Efficiency demands your attention. DOGE investigators have already uncovered an astounding $115 billion in government fraud, with analysts suggesting hundreds of billions more will soon be exposed. This goes far beyond simple waste or mismanagement. We're witnessing the unraveling of systematic corruption that appears to have artificially inflated our economy for years. Reports indicate the previous administration channeled approximately $1.5 trillion through non governmental organizations, creating a facade of economic stability that was built on quicksand. Now, as this house of cards begins to collapse, financial experts are warning of an imminent short but deep recession that could devastate unprepared investors. Consider the sobering question, what will happen to your retirement savings when this fraudulent economic structure finally crumbles? Throughout civilization, across empires and economic systems, physical gold has consistently preserved wealth when currencies and paper investments failed. Shouldn't a portion of your retirement be held in an asset with a 5,000 year track record? 1 that can't be manufactured by government decree or manipulated through accounting fraud? American Alternative Assets is offering a complimentary wealth protection guide explaining how to shield your financial future from the coming downturn. You'll discover why current conditions may present the optimal moment to secure your wealth through precious metals. Don't delay until the fraud economy completely unravels. Call 8332-USA-YOLD or visit Victor Loves Gold.com now to request your free wealth protection guide. That's 833-287-2465 or Victor Loves Gold.com safeguard your wealth. Protect your future while there's still.
- [02:23]
Jack Fowler
Well, hello ladies and hello gentlemen. Welcome to the Victor Davis Hanson Show. I'm Jack Fowler, the man lucky enough to be the host. But you're not here to listen to me. You're here to listen for the namesake, Victor Davis Hansen, who is the Martin and Ely Anderson Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and the Wayne and Marshabusky Distinguished Fellow in History at Hillsdale College. He has a website, the Blade of Perseus. The web address is Victor Hanson. I'll tell you later on why you should check it out. And I know Victor for a lot of people. This is Jack. We've heard this a million times, but guess what? There are so many new listeners and followers of this podcast, it's kind of remarkable. So we must service all people, especially our new found friends. So thanks for joining us. We are recording on Sunday, March 30th. This particular episode will be up on Tuesday, April 1st. And as ever, there's just so darn much to talk about.
- [03:22]
Victor Davis Hanson
Jack. I should interrupt and say, never underestimate the power of a face that can alternate between Skeletor and Freddy Krueger. Victor.
- [03:33]
Jack Fowler
The face that will.
- [03:37]
Victor Davis Hanson
The face that launched a thousand Freddy Cougars. Okay.
- [03:43]
Jack Fowler
You're a pretty man.
- [03:44]
Victor Davis Hanson
Victor.
- [03:45]
Jack Fowler
I think so. Gosh, I wanted to make some cursing joke because you have a column about the vulgarity of Democrats. Maybe we'll get into that in the next show. But today you have more that you'd like to speak about on the how did Goldberg get on this signal intelligence call? We have Judge Boasberg, who seems like a lot of these judges have daughters that are very involved in left wing politics. And this federal judge does.
- [04:15]
Victor Davis Hanson
Judge Michon for sure.
- [04:16]
Jack Fowler
Right, Right. They'll all of them have.
- [04:20]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yeah, they either have daughters or they gave to Democratic candidates or they ham it up like Engoron or Kaplan. You name it. Jack Smith.
- [04:31]
Jack Fowler
Yeah, I'll tell a story about Judge Jim Buckley. Maybe if we have a little time, that we have issues with California water, Western ranchers getting tormented by the federal government declassifying the Crossfire hurricane documents, so much more. And vict. We will get to all of this and your thoughts on all of these things when we return from these important messages.
- [04:58]
Unknown
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- [06:32]
Victor Davis Hanson
We'll be back to our show in just a moment. But first, an important message for anyone concerned about their financial future. Have you seen the headlines? The Department of Government Efficiency has uncovered a staggering $115 billion in government fraud. With investigators suggesting this is just the tip of the iceberg, financial analysts are now confirming what many the previous administration's economic success was largely artificial, propped up by funneling trillions through NGOs and creating an economic mirage. As this corruption is exposed, experts predict we're heading toward a short but deep recession when this false economic support evaporates. What does this mean for your retirement savings? Throughout our history, when governments manipulate economies and currencies collapse, physical gold has been mankind's most reliable store of value. Shouldn't you consider protecting part of your retirement with an asset that governments can't create with keystrokes or devalue through corruption? American Alternative Assets is offering a free wealth protection guide to help safeguard your financial future from the coming economic correction. Call 833-2-USA Gold or visit victorlovesgold.com today for your free guide and learn why now may be the perfect time to to add precious metals to your portfolio. That's 833-287-2465 or victorlovesgold.com protect what you've earned before the fraud economy collapses completely.
- [08:18]
Jack Fowler
We are back with the Victor Davis Hansen Show. So Victor, I know you're by the way, you are now daily on the Daily Signal you do a video about six, seven minutes. I want to encourage our viewers listeners to check that out. There's probably roughly 4 to 5 some of the videos. You have over a million people checking them out. But you did talk at some length and one of them on this signal, Walsh Goldberg, the Atlantic editor, getting on there. And you have some other thoughts that you'd like to share, please.
- [08:58]
Victor Davis Hanson
Well, the poster Mark Penn made sort of a snarky but quite accurate remark. He said if you think and I had written an X earlier that why was it him and not some of the other 345 million Americans. And Mark Penn said that, you know, it was it was no accident. And so as we said earlier, it either had to be Waltz or his assistant. Is it Alexander Wong or something like that? I forgot his name. Andrew Wong. They knew him and they maybe they forgot or Waltz was not telling the truth. I think he's an honest person. But then you're down to two other alternatives. Either they were handed pre programmed phone signal devices, some indication that people said they were and somebody inserted in Alexander Vindman fashion this arch Trump hating reporter. And then they didn't, I don't know why they didn't have a staffer go around the entire room and check everybody's initials with their position and actual person. See the face on there, demand a face appearance or something or someone. The more nefarious choice, someone in that chat group's assistant deliberately tried to put him on there to expose this and either was feeling that Trump was either too paleocon or too neocon. I don't know which it would be. But they've got to get down to the. They have to find out or that's going to happen again. And they just, they've got have better staff work, they really do because that they don't have any margin of error. With a small congressional majority and the entire media, Wall Street, Silicon Valley still for the most part, the money, the campuses, the popular culture, they're all against them and they're still even in the polls, if not slightly ahead. And the country is 20 points in their favor of going in the right direction. So they've done a wonderful job but they don't have any margin of error is what I'm saying. So they've got to keep absolute discipline.
- [11:25]
Jack Fowler
On the margin of error. That's Elise Stefanik has her nomination to the ambassadorship, to the UN has been withdrawn. Do I have the right person?
- [11:38]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yeah, that was a smart.
- [11:40]
Jack Fowler
They don't have enough because of the margin of error.
- [11:43]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yeah, yeah. And they don't have enough seats. Maybe after the midterms. But usually, you know, I think the last president that won seats was George W. Bush. He won one or two seats and that has never happened before and that was because of 9, 11. So usually Biden thought everybody, I think it was in 2022. Everybody considered Biden was spectacular because he drained the Strategic Petroleum Reserve and he canceled student debts, he gave amnesty for marijuana convictions. And most importantly in that June July to the midterms there was the Roe versus Wade and they were all saying there was going to be followed by, you know, a national abortion ban. We're going to go back to back alley abortion, all that stuff. And he, he only lost nine seats. That was enough to lose him the House. But they thought he was going to lose 40 or 50. Right?
- [12:44]
Jack Fowler
Yeah, there was a the wave that never, never happened. By the way, that aide is Alex Nelson Wong.
- [12:53]
Victor Davis Hanson
Wong, yeah, Alex Wong. I you know, he's been ubiquitous around and I don't prejudice because his wife was a federal prosecutor that went after the January 6th but she was mentioned in context that were not connected to him that she was an especially, I don't want to use the word vindictive but ambitious prosecutor yeah, they seem of.
- [13:22]
Jack Fowler
A type of beltway couple that have their fingers in numerous pies of consequence to our nation.
- [13:32]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yeah, that's the problem. It really is. I mean, Donald Trump's brand is that he's talking right now to people in Texas, in the inner city, in the San Joaquin Valley. He, he's not. And that's why it's hard to do. It's much easier to court the in house media, to go to lunch with them, to have the power couples at the A list dinners. But he's not doing that. That's his brand. He doesn't do that. He speaks over their head, over the media's head, over the Democratic grandee's head. He's got to keep doing that. He doesn't want those people that are complete swamp creatures that gravitate in and out of NGOs and USAID and CBS and NPR and politics and the White House and they have no political ideology but power. That's not who he is. And I think everybody needs to take a deep breath at this point, Jack, and say, you know, and I think the Trump administration would benefit if they altered their messaging. It is very easy to break the law and let in 12 million people. It's very hard to secure the border and find 12 million people among 345 million. It's very easy to go on, get a photo op overseas, pal around with a euro or Canadian or Japanese prime minister and say we've just concluded a great trade agreement, we've done some defense. And then you find out later, six weeks later after the op ed that they're running a huge Turks trade surplus with us and we're subsidizing their defense. It's very hard to confront them and say, listen, you're our friends but you cannot run those trade surpluses with asymmetrical tariffs and you've got to honor your promises to rearm and help us out. That's hard. It's really easy just to overlook tariffs, say, well we have a, it's not going to fall, it's not going to destroy us. On my watch we have Menono 37 trillion in debt, 1.4 trillion dollar trade deficit. I'll just play musical chairs and the music will run out on my successor. But it's very hard to say I'm not going to borrow and give away, I'm going to cut and save. That is hard. And so they have an enormous task up front of them and they need to explain to everybody that they've got an unpopular course and you, you know what? I loved Ronald Reagan. But Reagan did not try to balance the budget and he did not try to get equal trade. And we ran up big budget deficits and trade deficits. His idea was cutting taxes, expanding the economy and deregulating the work. George W. Bush, Same way George H.W. bush. George W. Bush, same thing. John McCain, same thing. That's what he ran on. Romney, no Republican in the last 60 years has run on the agenda that I am going to slash government, eliminate agencies, try to balance the budget and try to force all these other countries to have symmetrical trade. Nobody's done that. And at the same time wage a cultural counter revolution and stop this madness.
- [16:57]
Jack Fowler
We're at a hinge moment for all these things.
- [16:59]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yeah. And that's hard to do all these. And what I'm saying by that is hard to do. When Elon Musk got on television with Brett Baer, that was a wonderful interview. And those Doge people, one guy was a rocket scientist, the other, I think he was the vice president or president of a B and B. They were all gifted people, they were sober, they talked carefully. That helps him a lot more than getting a chainsaw and stage, you know what I mean? Or tweeting that we're going to go cut another. That's what they need to do, that messaging that it's hard, it's difficult. They did not ask for it, but if they don't do it, the country's going to go broke and go broke and that's what the message has to be. It's a counter revolution that we've never seen before.
- [17:49]
Jack Fowler
I think complicating the importance of those issues is when we talk about taking over Greenland, which maybe has to happen or maybe some kind of agreement has to take place. But I think it distracts, personally, I think it distracts from these more oppressive.
- [18:06]
Victor Davis Hanson
We did take it over once in got to remember In April of 1940 there was no Denmark. The Nazis overran it in four days. And then this big near continent sized, call it an island that was near. It's a North American territory, not a European. So what happened to it? Well, the Nazis were ascending and they were eyeing it and they were thinking at the tip of Greenland we will put bases and we will interrupt British shipping and the North American convoys from Canada won't make it. And then when we declared war, Roosevelt, he just said we're going to put bases in there. And we used it as a base and we took over the entire continent, so to speak. We didn't, you Know, put bases everywhere. But it was very valuable in monitoring our convoys to go to Great Britain, especially up to Scotland and things. And then when the war was over, we just said to Britain, to Denmark, well, you folded pretty quickly. So here's this big, huge colony of yours, and we're going to give it back to you. And that's what we did. So when they start saying we don't, we resent this, no, you lost it, we saved it, we gave it back to you. And now we have not Nazis, but we have people that want to use it to explore the Arctic for natural resources exploitation and for national security. And if a missile comes from Russia or China toward America, it's going to come over Greenland and the Arctic Circle. So it is very valuable. And I think what Trump needs to do again is to be a little bit more carefully in the message. He's starting to do that. He doesn't need to say the US Wants it. He says that we're all western countries and somebody has to step up and make sure that this piece of strategic real estate is protected, defended and used to detour our enemies. And if that's the United States, we'll step up, but we'll let the people of Greenland, who are now semi autonomous, decide it's their choice. We're not. Vladimir Putin invades borders, but he needs to explain that the Panama thing, we haven't heard, because that was art of the deal chaos. And then all of a sudden, Panama says to us, you know what, you guys were kind of right about that. We were flirting with the Chinese, probably violating the spirit of the treatment, actual language. And China had only one interest, 6,000 miles away, and that was interrupting or adjudicating east west maritime traffic and north south land traffic. And we'll put an American company now at the entry and the exit. How's that? And that's what he achieved. So, Victor.
- [20:59]
Jack Fowler
Yeah, I know you don't want to travel anymore. I don't want to travel far.
- [21:04]
Victor Davis Hanson
That's how I got Covid twice and this flu.
- [21:07]
Jack Fowler
Well, you do have that dream of going to Sweden. So maybe one day we'll do a final Victor Davis Hansen or stop in Greenland on the way and visit Sweden.
- [21:18]
Victor Davis Hanson
Do cruise ship stop in Greenland, Mr. Cruise Master?
- [21:23]
Jack Fowler
I don't. I don't. I know some do.
- [21:26]
Victor Davis Hanson
It's a long way from Scandinavia.
- [21:28]
Jack Fowler
Yeah, it's possible on one of these cross you call me Mr. Cruise Master. Oh, my gosh. It is possible on a repositioning that. That it? But I've never heard of anyone going to Greenland on a cruise? So Victor, I need to say something about our friends@besthotgrill.com they make hot, fast solar infrared grills. With rising prices everywhere, you want to make sure your hard earned money is spent well. So here's what you get when you buy a 21 inch or larger Solaire Infrared Backyard Grill. American made, built to last with all stainless steel, welded design and commercial quality features. Radiant infrared burners that heat up to 1,000 degrees in just three minutes regardless of the outside temperature. High direct heat that results in the juiciest and most flavorful food you've ever had from a gas grill and limited lifetime warranty on the burners, grates and stainless steel. And when you buy a Solaire infrared grill@besthotgrill.com, you support our advertisers which help them keep our voices and values on the air. Learn more about Solaire infrared grills@besthotgrill.com including their try before youe Buy demo rental program. That's besthotgrill.com besthotgrill.com and we thank the good people Solaire for sponsoring the Victor Davis Hansen Show. Victor, before we you know what? I want to talk about Boasberg and his daughter, but let's distract a little before we go into our next break about something that happened recently with you. You've talked about on this podcast about the time you were stung by bees and how that affected you and you went into shock, et cetera, and you talked about that with somebody else and that led to some AI generation of you going through this really terrible event and it really wasn't a cool thing to do. So, Victor, maybe you talk about this as you want, but also about how AI can be unsettling when used in weird ways.
- [23:47]
Victor Davis Hanson
Well, I do a lot of I try to do two interviews a day probably. My assistant Megan probably gets eight or nine requests, but she has a group of people she really trusts and likes and so do I. I really like Megyn Kelly and I do hers anytime she asks and she's so professional. I like Mark Levin. He's one of my favorite people. I don't know if I ever told you, Jack, that my daughter, who passed away from leukemia, was working at the Kirby center, you know, with the Hillsdale Washington office, and it's right across from Heritage. And you know, she was a Pepperdine graduate student interning and her job was to meet people coming in to register to use. So there were politicians, celebrities, media people coming back and forth aei Congress, you know, just to go use the facilities. They had a wonderful studio there and everything. She once turned, so I asked her once and she said, well, I don't know these people. You know, I'm just a nobody, kind of like the person at the McDonald's window. I'm just an ordinary person. But Levin kind of gave. One of them was Mark Levin, and he kind of gave a Trump answer to, you're not nobody. And he. He said of all the people that he was the sweetest and nicest and most unassuming. I thought that was really interesting. So I really like doing this. I like doing John Anderson from Australia. He's wonderful. I like doing Steve Edgerton. He is with the GWB broadcasting. I think he's going to freelance now. And also all of them are professional. So there was a person at Stanford. I'm not going to mention his name because I don't want to bring any criticism to him. But he was starting out as a graduate student with almost no audience. Megan, my assistant, is always looking for young people to give them a chance. Not that I can do much for him, but I started to do maybe once every six months an interview with him, and it kind of took off. I think one of them got a million views. So he, over the last few years, got bigger and bigger, and he bought equipment and he hired engineers. But then three things started to bother me. One, I don't mind when John Anderson does it. He doesn't do it. He does it in a different way. But when you do, say 80 minutes and the host then cuts it up into three to five segments and just keeps issuing it as if, like you're in a series. I wasn't in a series, but I had people writing me and say, why are you working for this guy? And I didn't know what he was doing, but he was taking the interview and then just cutting it up. And then the next thing I knew, he was discussing all of these other people. So he was deliberately inviting the Stanford leftist community on the idea that they would be irritated that I was even given a platform on his. And he was kind of contextualizing it as if I defend you to these other people. But the best way for me to be defended to these people is not even be on it, because I could care less what they say. So I was being used as kind of a foil. But then the. And I didn't object. I still had been trying to help him. He was very professional. He's got all this equipment now. He has engineers it got really big. But the last thing was he started using AI to illustrate when he interviewed me. So if I. He was asking me about immigration and what to do with. I said in this election that the Mexican American community was going to split down the middle because a lot of them were impacted negatively and that they are becoming upper middle class. Upper middle class. Upper. Upper middle class. Upper. And I said, when you go. And I said I was just treated by three Mexican American paramedics. And I said they kind of saved my life because I didn't know that I had a lethal. I have immune problem, but I didn't know it had manifested itself with bee stings because we have an orchard of 40 acres and probably 7,000 trees, and there's bees everywhere. I get stung every year. Nothing happens but this. A year ago, I almost died. So I went into anaphylaxis. The last thing I did was call my wife. She called 911 and these three young paramedics came out and they were wonderful. That's all I said. The next thing I know, people call me and said, did you get stung by a wasp? You've gained weight. You're swatting. I thought you were old. You're standing up. Swat. And then I thought. So I looked at the thing they were sending me, and it was like I would. So my point is that he was taking artificial intelligence and creating false videos of me to illustrate anything I said or some things I said on his thing. And he never asked me for permissions to divide up these. I didn't really know that I was being a foil where he would have people come on and trash me, and then he would try to explain my point of view. I never knew. The point was that I thought in a way that Megan never does, or Mark Levin or Dennis Prager or John Anderson. They like to have conversations. This wasn't. This was a use of me and I thought was not fair. And I was a little paranoid anyway, because when I was away, we got swatted. My wife was here alone. Three sheriffs showed up, and I know a lot of the sheriffs, and apparently somebody had called in. There must have been an intruder. Luckily, she was out in the orchard walking the dogs because they were surveying or walking to find something in the barnyard, the packing shed, everywhere. And so I'm going to discontinue. And I asked him yesterday to take down all of those things. I don't know what the law is about artificial intelligence, but when you completely fabricate film and you. You glue somebody's head on it. And then you have an incident and you don't tell them that this is fake. Then you get a lot of people writing and say, victor, I thought you said that the paramedics came out and you were almost, you were just swatting it around. And I wrote back and said that's not me. And I didn't even know it was occurring. So I felt that he had abused trust. And I thought, you know, I'd said before in these broadcasts, I think everybody, when they get in their 60s and 70s, they have an obligation to mentor people and help. And I had mentioned in the past that people like John Keegan, the military historian, wrote the foreword to my second book and really helped me. So I was trying to help him as a graduate student and I didn't realize that that magnanimity would be interpreted in a different fashion, but it was. Has exploited you.
- [30:57]
Jack Fowler
The old line about no favors going unpunished. And the aforementioned Megan is just, she's not involved in this, but she is just one of the most terrific people. So I know you think that and I just want to put that as an exclamation point.
- [31:12]
Victor Davis Hanson
She is. And so anyway, I was. Oh, by the way, I have one last little off the cuff mark before we go to more serious business. Our mutual friend was just appointed the ambassador to South Africa.
- [31:27]
Jack Fowler
Who?
- [31:29]
Victor Davis Hanson
The media center. Mr. Buckler? Yes.
- [31:34]
Jack Fowler
Brent Bozell.
- [31:35]
Victor Davis Hanson
Brent Bozell.
- [31:36]
Jack Fowler
Oh, oh, so Brent. Yes. So Brent was appointed to the head the global media.
- [31:41]
Victor Davis Hanson
But I thought he was ambassador to South Africa.
- [31:44]
Jack Fowler
No, no, he's going to be. He has been nominated for the global media agency and that overseas agencies, Voice of America, Radio Free Europe, Radio Liberty. Unless it's another Buckley or another Bozell. But yeah. Actually the interesting thing is Trump wants these agencies essentially dismantled and Brent's been nominated to run this and I guess if anyone is going to dismantle them, he's the guy that can do it. It's kind of a shame that the Voice of America is. Is really the voice of leftists in today's day and age.
- [32:20]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yeah. And that's he. Yeah. It says that Trump four days ago. Leo. Brent Bazelle III as U.S. ambassador to South Africa.
- [32:33]
Jack Fowler
What?
- [32:34]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yes.
- [32:35]
Jack Fowler
Are you kidding me?
- [32:37]
Victor Davis Hanson
Well, I didn't know that. Reason I'm asking you and I didn't prep for this is because I didn't know what Brett's real. Is his first name Leo?
- [32:47]
Jack Fowler
Well, L. Brent Bozel.
- [32:49]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yes.
- [32:49]
So would be Leo as U.S. ambassador to South Africa?
- [32:53]
Jack Fowler
Could be. I don't know if Brent has A son who's also El Brent Bozell. Ivan.
- [32:58]
Victor Davis Hanson
But I think he was in bas, which brings up my advocacy that as I said before, one of the key places in the Mediterranean is Cyprus. We've usually had a career diplomat there. I don't think it's worked out all that well. We have the ideal Cypriot person. We have the ex president of usc, an engineer with a scientific mind who's an expert on energy issues, which is very opportunistic in Cyprus, given the East Med program with Israel, Cyprus and Greece. I think Trump will greenlight Biden, remember, said, oh, new green deal, you can't do that. Europe, you don't need any more natural gas. And of course he was born in northern occupied, what is now occupied Cyprus. So he's fluent in languages of the Mediterranean. He'd be the best ambassador. He's a loyal Trump supporter. He would be Donald Trump's best appointment in the ambassadors. I hope he can still do it. So there's my little advocacy.
- [34:07]
Jack Fowler
So Victor, just so I'm not. I'm late to the game.
- [34:11]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yeah, yeah.
- [34:12]
Jack Fowler
Brent was nominated for the U.S. agency for Global Media and that was withdrawn, I think maybe because of the impending destruction of it and elimination of it. And yeah, he has been nominated to South Africa. Not to take away from your. Your desire that Max Nikias. Yeah. Have.
- [34:32]
Victor Davis Hanson
Have Max Nikias. Yes. He would be the best ambassador in the entire Mediterranean.
- [34:38]
Jack Fowler
Yeah. So. Well, you live and you learn when you listen to the. Victor Davis.
- [34:42]
Victor Davis Hanson
Well, you know, it's funny because one last thing and then we'll get to back. One of my favorite people that I've ever met was Andrew Marshall. He was the head of the Office of Net Assessment and that was in the Pentagon, deep in the bowels of the Pentagon. They had guards at the door. And when I was a professor at the Naval Academy, you got a security clearance to go in there and you would sit there, he would invite you in and he would say, what if China does this? Or what happens in Iraq if this should occur? Or what would be Iran? How do we do? So they were theoreticals and then he had a team of experts, full time employees and they would write position papers and when they were done, they would present them at the table and then he would bring outside critiques. And I was one that went there, oh, about every six weeks in 2002 and three. And then Andrew Marshall used to visit me at the Hoover. He was a wonderful man. He lived into his late 90s. But anyway, that was his office and usually people tried to eliminate it that were on the left. But after he died, I knew one of his assistants who was a very nice guy, but he wasn't made director. And so under Obama, but especially under Biden, it became it's mentioned in Mark Moyer's book, whom we've had on a podcast about usaid. Mark was very prescient. Remember, he warned us that the whole USAID was contaminated, if that's the word, or nihilistic. But anyway, they're going to eliminate it. That's going to be eliminated. That was targeted by Doge. If that had happened 20 years ago, I would say that would be a mistake. But given the way that it's devolved, I don't think it'll be missed.
- [36:34]
Jack Fowler
Yeah, I think last episode we talked about these rallies, the AOC Bernie Sanders rallies and many of the occup. Many of the attendees, the professional protesters were with organizations that were being funded by usaid, so agreed to totally needs to get ditched. Now we need to hear from our sponsors and then we're going to come back and talk about Judge James Boasberg and his daughter. And we'll get to some rural issues also, which are of great importance to you, Victor, and to many of our listeners. And we'll do all that when we come back from these important messages.
- [37:25]
Victor Davis Hanson
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- [38:31]
Unknown
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- [40:31]
Jack Fowler
We are back with the Victor Davis Hansen show recording on Sunday, March 30th and this episode is up on Tuesday, April 1st. I am in gloomy Milford, Connecticut right now. It's kind of dark at the windows, all the windows open. Whatever I can do.
- [40:45]
Victor Davis Hanson
It's gloomy here too in sunny California. Oh wow.
- [40:49]
Jack Fowler
I thought it never rained in California.
- [40:53]
Victor Davis Hanson
Are you a global warmer?
- [40:55]
Jack Fowler
Well I was waiting to hear that global warming was the reason for.
- [41:01]
Victor Davis Hanson
Well as soon as Gavin and Jerry Brown announced that, you know I think it was Gavin said that we're stuck with climate change and every time in the summer I'm 71. I was born in this farm and it's not I can tell you in 1959 I remember it was my parents complaint it was 111 in August but every time it gets up to 105 they say global warming, global warming and we always have a drought every fourth year. Well and the big drought we had four years. It's. It's over with. California is over with and now we've had pretty much normal rain or excessive rain I think four out of last.
- [41:43]
Jack Fowler
Five years and no new reservoirs to no new reservoirs.
- [41:48]
Victor Davis Hanson
We last one was a 1983 new Malone is dam. Louisiana built one of course. But no, no when California pass we tell the people do you want to build new reservoirs and save water? And they say yes they vote for $7 billion which includes three huge earthen dam reservoirs at low elevation with very little environmental impact. At Temperance Flats sites reservoir Los Banos grandes 5,6 million acre feet of wet year. And what is Gavin Newsom do? He defies the will of the people. I thought you could get impeached for that at the federal level if you do not spend congressionally authorized money. But it would be even worse if you did not spend the people's plebiscite approved money. And they approved it. And what did he do with it? It wasn't just that Gavin did not build those three dams. He used a quarter billion dollars to blow up for on the Klamath river that provided about 80,000 homes with clean hydroelectric, flood control, irrigation, beautiful recreation. And he turned it into a mud flat. Where once he blew them up, the erosion, the water, it's just a mess. And now he wants to do the same thing in Marin County. Wonderful ranching, families, reservoirs that provide up to half a million people water. And I guess the idea is that if you're very healthy or you're very politically connected and you're not self employed and you're not dependent on battling nature to provide food for people or beef or whatever, then you can live in a utopia and you can other people that have no such protection. So they want to blow up dams, they want to drain reservoirs and they feel that this, I guess they feel California is not 41 people, but it's 1860 and there's about a million people here and therefore all the rivers should run to the sea. Or that Native American people today 10 generations later are 100% Native American. They're still owners of all the land and da da da da da da.
- [44:08]
Jack Fowler
Let's get to Boceberg. Next let's talk about the water. Here's a headline, Victor, from a site called unwon. Very interesting website that covers issues in the West. Headline at the Cloverdale Town Hall. Rural California community takes first step against dam removals. Cloverdale Fire Chief Jackson Jason Jenkins opened last, this is last week last night's town hall. By acknowledging the building was filled well beyond capacity, community members lined the walls, spilled into the entryway of the veterans hall, et cetera. It was one of the first attempts to rally Lake Mendocino and Sonoma counties whose survival and way of life is threatened by a massive dam removal project insiders say will cut water supply for 600,000 people along with fire suppression, economic well being, agriculture and natural ecosystems. Victor, this is demented that this.
- [45:14]
Victor Davis Hanson
We know who's behind it. Usually behind these projects, they have about five things in common. They either have an MA or a PhD. They're either working as advisors in tenured spots in environmental studies or water resources at universities or for the state Water Resources Plan Board, or they're Native American ethnic activists that want water. And then they produce an idea that they have ancestral fishing rights or something like this. But they have all one thing in common. And most of them, they don't get up in the morning and know that they don't have a check. So these ranchers and farmers, every single day, they borrow money, money to produce food or to produce beef. And nothing is known. But terrible problem with the regulations of California. They have a terrible problem with the tax code. They have a terrible problem with zoning. They have a terrible problem with radical environmentalists. And what they don't need are nihilist anarchists to blow up things. And that's what they're dealing with, with now. You know, when I was first, I came home from graduate School in 1980, and we had a packing house. My twin brother and cousin and older brother were packing our fruit. And this was during the Pete Wilson, you know, and George Dukmajian era. Reagan, George, Pete Wilson. But it was right, as you know, Jerry Brown was elected. So we had all the regulations for fruit on this big board. And when I came, there were two. You had to, by law, put them on about packing fruit. When I decided after 15 years that I could no longer be a professor, teach four classes, commute 70 miles, write books and farm full time, I told my brothers, I can't do it. But that wall had 28 of them. I counted them, 28 of them. And it was about everything. It was about paint, it was about lighting, it was about sound, it was about. It was just impossible to follow them all. And that's why I keep saying California is the most lawless place and the most lawful. They make so many rules that so few people follow. It's just insane. And why they would go after these old ranching families and farming families that have done. They don't understand, go up to that area in Napa or Mendocino counties or, you know, a place like Guernville or Sebastopol. There's these families out there, they're apple growers, they're cattle ranchers, their Vineyardists, some of them have been there for 100 years. And they're not just farmers. They create families. And these families have values. And that's what created America. The homestead farmer and the homestead agrarian ethos of Children that are hard working, they honor tradition. And just to blot all that out for some stupid tenured bureaucrat or apparatchik, it's just crazy. I wish they would do that with the universities. You know what I wish they would do, Jack? If they told all the faculty, we don't know how much we're going to pay you, we have no idea. You're all self employed with us. We're all self employed. So here's what's going to happen. Your teaching will depend on how many students are paying you. And we're going to have to evaluate to see how big your classes are or, or you're going to lose them. And your salary will be adjudicated. We'll give you a minimum little salary like a farmer borrows from the bank. And at the end of the year we'll split it up and it will depend on how well we appealed to the donor class and how well we were attracted students and how well the students actually paid us. And if we don't have the end of the year and they would say, well, I don't know how much I'm going to make today. Yes, exactly why. Can't plan. Yes, exactly why. Might be working all year and know that I didn't make any. Exactly. Just like the head of the land bank told me when I walked out the door. Hey, Victor, when I looked at your, in your application for next year, how did, how did it feel to pay $12 an hour to get on that tractor at 105? I said, I didn't do that. He said, oh yes you, you did. Yes you did. Given what you guys lost this year and how many hours it takes, you had a 40, 50 hour week added up. You paid $12 an hour for the privilege of being unattractive. We could tell a faculty member, hey, you know what? You went in there and taught 12 hours of class and you did another 12 hours of prep and you had six hours of office hours and you had, and you had, you didn't make any money because that's what they're talking about. That's what they're talking about. These cattlemen and these farmers, they have no idea what they're going to make and they have a very thin margin of survival. And to blow up water, the key life source of their entire entity, is criminal. And I hope everybody writes them and stops it.
- [50:47]
Jack Fowler
Well, we have another rural story to get to a little later, but, and I do, I'm going to get to Bosberg after this because folks, we need to talk very briefly about what's happening to our money right now. Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency just uncovered something shocking. 14 Quote Magic Money computers, end quote, at the Treasury Department that create dollars out of thin air. I think you probably wish you had one of those, Victor, when you were.
- [51:16]
Victor Davis Hanson
I do.
- [51:17]
Jack Fowler
This isn't conspiracy theory. This is what they're finding is they audit our government for the first time in decades. As Musk has said, if the government were a public company, it would be delisted immediately and the officers would be imprisoned. And while bureaucrats print money, unlimited money, what's happening to your hard earned savings? The US dollar has lost 95% of its value since 1913. That's not an opinion, that's mathematical fact. Meanwhile, investors are fleeing U.S. stocks at historic rates. According to bank of America's latest survey, we've just witnessed the largest drop in U.S. stocks and allocation in history. Americans are voting with their feet running from both our currency and our markets. So where is the smart money going, huh folks? Where? Well, it's going to hard assets. Physical gold, physical silver. Things that can't be created on a government computer. And that's why our friends, our friends, I should say at American Alternative Assets are offering a free wealth protection guide to help shield your retirement from what's coming. Inside. You'll discover how magic money computers are destroying your purchasing power. Why central banks are stockpiling physical gold at unprecedented rates. And a simple three step strategy to protect your wealth from currency devaluation. History is clear on this. When governments print money without restraint, those holding physical precious metals preserve their wealth. Those holding paper assets get wiped out. Don't let your retirement savings evaporate. Evaporate either. Call 8332 USA Gold or visit victorlovesgold.com right now to claim your free wealth protection guide. That's 8332- USA Gold or visit victorloveSGOLD.com protect your wealth. Secure your future before it's too late. One more time. Call 833-287-2465 or visit Victor Loves Gold to claim your free wealth protection guide. And we thank the good people at American Alternative Assets for sponsoring the Victor.
- [53:22]
Victor Davis Hanson
Davis Hansen, can I ask you a question personally? Have you ever had a root canal?
- [53:28]
Jack Fowler
Several and I need several more.
- [53:30]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yes. Well, I've had about because of a bike accident and I've had about eight implants and every other I found out when I went last every tooth I had. I have very soft teeth and I have a problem with my saliva Is overly acidic. But anyway, I'm fanatic about brushing three times, flossing water, but it doesn't do any good. But anyway, my point is this, that as you get older, the doctor, he would kid you. He said when you get in your 30s, you get fillings. When you get in your 50s or 60s, you get rooted canals. When you get in your 70s, you get implant false teeth anymore. I guess if you can have the money or put up with the pain. But when they just did one not too long ago, they took out a plant. No, I didn't do an implant. It was a new procedure where they go through. I had a root canal, but the tooth had got in a cavity on the side, you know, it wasn't complete. It's a long story. But anyway, they took out the gold crown and then they cleaned it all. What was left of the little. There wasn't much left. Right. It was a root canal with a little tiny spike. And then they put another. But this is my point. They gave me a little plastic bag and they put the gold. Did they do that to you and they hand you back the gold?
- [54:49]
Jack Fowler
No, I only had one gold filling. I never got it back.
- [54:53]
Victor Davis Hanson
Well, you know, about. I don't know, 20 years ago, I got a really bad case of mono and I had some immune problems. So the doctor decided to take out all the silver fillings I had. Man, that was painful. And replace them with gold and then replaced with this new white stuff, you know, hard porcelain. But anyway, I never thought about. But this time he handed me a little plastic bag and there was the little gold. It looked minute. So I said, well, what? I still have it. He said, well, you have to go turn it in. It's worth $75. So I was wondering what my head. I don't want to announce that because given my number growing number of enemies, I feel like somebody would come and.
- [55:34]
Jack Fowler
Tack a pair of pliers while they're at it.
- [55:37]
Victor Davis Hanson
I know it well.
- [55:39]
Jack Fowler
75 bucks. You can half fill up your gas tank in California.
- [55:44]
Victor Davis Hanson
No, not even. No, it's more like 100 and something.
- [55:50]
Jack Fowler
Okay, Victor Boasberg. So let me. I know folks tired of me reading, but suffer through it, folks offered up for the souls in Purgatory the daughter of D.C. district Court Chief Judge James Boasberg is employed by a nonprofit that receives million in government funding. This daughter opposes the nonprofit, opposes the Lake and Riley act and whose founder argued that the jurist rightly blocked the President Trump blocked, excuse me, President Trump from swiftly deporting alleged Venezuelan Gang members. Katherine Boasberg, the daughter of the federal judge who halted the Trump administration from using the 1798 Alien Enemies act to send alleged trend members to a megaprison in El Salvador, conducts, quote, capacity building work in public defender offices across the nation, end quote. For the nonprofit groups Partners in Justice. Victor, another child of another federal judge or a local judge even engaged in activist politics. The judge does not see this as grounds for recusing himself from, well, what.
- [57:01]
Victor Davis Hanson
Against Donald Trump on a normal there's nothing in the Constitution that talks about the lowest court district or the second tier circuit. It talks about a Supreme Court whose size is not even delineated and it says and a lower courts may be necessary. So my point is we have about 700 of these low ranking federal district judges all over the United States and then we have these appointments which we call circuit courts. I only know this because my mom was a state appellate court judge. So nobody knows these people. Nobody should know these people because they should be trying cases where somebody breaks into a post office or tries to steal from a federal armory or has a dispute with another state about water delivery. Interstate. That's what they were there for. But what's happened with the left with all of this money floating in these political action committees and these foundations and we got a taste of them with USAID support, they send out orders and they say you're going Donald Trump to put the background for everybody. And I think you know it as well as I do. They don't have the Congress, neither House. They don't have the Supreme Court. They don't have the White House. They don't have 51% plurality on any of the issues. So they have various strategies to stop this counter revolution which the people have approved. One is neo terrorism to firebomb Teslas, to key Tesla's car to swarm the dealerships and then have a buffoon like Tim Waltz brag about driving down the stock portfolio of Tesla of which he's the custodian of in many Minnesota like a buffoon that he is. Or they have the potty smutty, vulgar. What are you going to call it? The videos where they all say shit or they do the kickboxing or you then they unleash a moronic Jasmine Crockett and she talks about threatening people, hitting them. Then they get the asshol slur from Senator Kelly, except Waltz has used the same term. He said he's going to kick the. That was the funniest thing, Jack. He was going to kick the ass of the Republicans that roly poly guy that looks like he's 90 years old. I mean, I'm skeletor, but that guy is 10 years younger than I am. And anyway, that was the street theater. And then they have the congressional disruption where you have Al Green, you know, trying to disrupt and stop the speech, the joint session speech by Trump. You've got Jasmine Crockett screaming and yelling as a proud black woman, that stuff. And then you have the third leg of this resistance and that is this money coming from these well funded left wings funds and organizations to pick 700 of these guys. There's about 180 of the appellate district court. And you pick them and then you give them their marching orders. You say we're going to sue because of this and about 60% of them because there's been, I mean if you look at the judges there for 30 years and you look at the last 30 years, let's just say the last 25 years, we had eight years of Bush and four years of Trump, which is 12 in the new millennium. Right. But they had a, they had eight years of Biden and four years, eight, four years of Biden and eight of Obama following Clinton, because I should say, say it's a little longer than that eight years. So they had 16 years, is 20. And we just had Bush in the last 30 years, 12 plus Trump was 4, 16. So there is more, There are more. And then the other problem is of course the law schools turn out 90% left wing people, as do the big blue chip firms. So most of the lawyers are left wing that come judges. So unlike Democratic appointees that become conservative, that don't come become conservative, Republicans do become liberal when they get on the bench. So my point is that, that 700 judges, probably 400 of them are left wing and that's the pool who's going to run the country. And they have a list of computer printout. They know exactly every ruling they've done. So Judge Anna Reyes, the first Latina lgbq, she was cherry picked to stop the transgender ban in the Pentagon. And Mr. Judge Furman, he was picked to stop the deportation of Mahmoud Khalil, his brother I think is a, was a chief advisor to Barack Obama economic adviser. And Judge Bozberg was picked because he has a long record. I think he's also going to be repicked, isn't he? To rule on the signal documents and make sure that they're available to the public or they can't be deleted or something. But on these particular cases where he's stopping the enforcement. He's basically taking the point of view that if you come in for the express purpose of damaging the United States, which these gang members did, they were unleashed by their home countries, and you're here, you entered illegally, you're here illegally, and you're in a terrorist designated gang, then there is no legal impediment to that. But if you choose, unlike the Biden administration, to deport them, there is a legal impediment. There is a legal impediment to following the law, but there's no legal impediment to breaking the law. That's his theory. And he now has basically more clout in terms of national security and defense in matters of these dangerous aliens than the Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of State, the national Security advisor, the Vice president and the president put together. One man can stop all this, and it's gone to his head. Did we know who? Judge Boasberg. No. Did we care? No. Now, he is a megalomaniac and he's on every newspaper. He's everywhere. And as all these judges, they have these deep administrative state, political ties to the left, and then they hide behind the cloak. How dare you tap the judiciary. No one has attacked everybody. Got to remember, no one has attacked the judiciary like the left. It was the left that went to the homes of the Supreme Court justice. It was the left that an assassin came from, the left who was going to shoot Kavanaugh and was turned over by his sister to authorities. It was the left in the form of Chuck Schumer who called out Gorsuch Kavanaugh by name and threatened them and said, you don't know what's going to hit you and you're going to reap the whirlwind. It was the left that wanted to pack the court. It was the left that leaked the abortion illegally, the original draft. So it's not when everybody says, well, Trump shouldn't. He said, Trump is wrong to say he's impeached. That might have been politically unwise. But. But that pales in comparison to what these judges are doing. They have hijacked, They've taken a tiny sliver of one third of the power of the government that is a one person judge court. And they have decided that they can alter the entire elected government. And if they get away with it, we're not going to have a country left. So the Supreme Court has got to intervene quickly, quickly. And they've got to say, no district judge can rule on matters of national security. Enforcement of the Law and apply that one particular ruling to the entire country, way out of their jurisdiction. As I said on one broadcast, it would be. If academics are very vocal about this. But can you imagine a law professor who says, oh, here's my syllabus at Stanford. It's really brilliant, and I'm the most brilliant person. So I demand that every law school in the United States follow my syllabus or they're not going to be accredited. Nobody would do that. And that's exactly the principle that they operate on.
- [66:12]
Jack Fowler
Yeah, Victor, also on a geographical basis, you did have this. That judge out in Hawaii that was making rulings on, I think on health care. Make a ruling that pertains to the geographical district.
- [66:25]
Victor Davis Hanson
Do you remember the judge? I won't mention his name. I've met him and know him. But when we passed two ballot propositions, mostly due to minority voting in the 90s, suggesting that marriage in California would be only between a man and woman, and there were civil unions for people who were gay, but not traditional marriage, three days later, they had it all prepared. He ruled that unconstitutional. And there was an uproar that he nullified the will of the entire population of California, the majority population. And then his critics said, well, you're gay yourself, living with a man, you've got a conflict. And they said, how dare you mention that? How dare you mention that? And so that is now. That was the law. And I don't think this judge, I can't put. He doesn't care about what he's doing to the judiciary. He doesn't really care about the reputation of Jew. If you said 20 years ago, I'm a federal district judge, it would be like saying, I'm a professor of classics, an Ivy League school. If you say that today, if you go on to say Fox or something, and you say, I'm a professor of this at Harvard, there's some guy like Charlie Kirk or Megyn Kelly's gonna eat you alive. You know what I mean? If you go out because the status or the cachet of a professor has eroded considerably, as has judges because. Because of their arrogance, partisanship and empty titles. I hate to say. True.
- [68:09]
Jack Fowler
Yeah, I had mentioned this on the last recording, but this mindset. He could have been a district judge if you put him back 80 years and dictating, well, what could happen? Or not on D day, right? I mean, why not? If he can do this Powers to strange areas. And why not even now? Why couldn't he actually do things like order the US to be involved directly.
- [68:35]
Victor Davis Hanson
In Ukraine, you know, well, the International Criminal Court tried to have jurisdiction under the Biden administration on what we could do or not do in Afghanistan. But it's a pattern when Donald Trump's four years in the wilderness. And I don't know if it was 83 or 88 or 92. There's different about the indictments. But when you, you look at those judges, Judge Kaplan in the E. Jean Carroll case, he was a partisan Democratic judge and he said something that I think is going to reverse that settlement, that $80 million that she got with that preposterous case when he said rape. And they said, and remember, George Stephanopoulos had been sued successfully, ABC had suddenly settle because he said 11 times, I think that Donald Trump was a rapist and he wasn't. They said he had sexually assaulted. Sexually assault after the MeToo meeting can mean anything from eyeing somebody to patting him on the shoulder. And so they reminded the judge that he had not been convicted in his court of rape. And he said, it's about the same thing in most people's mind. No, it's not. That was the judge that said that. And then we had Judge Engoron and then Letitia James, remember him? He was the one that, I mean, we have a constitutional amendment. Is it the 8th amendment that prevents excessive bail and fines. He fined Donald Trump originally over $400 million for putting assets down on a loan that the Deutsche bank approved, analyzed, audited, gave the loan, he paid the interest back, timely trust the profit and without complaint to the Deutsche Blank who testified they would loan him again. And he got fined over $400 million because he said Mar A Lago was worth More than $17 million. And that judge was hamming it up for the. He was a hard leftist. And then we had the worst of all in the Alvin Bragg case that was bootstrapping a federal offense that federal prosecutors had passed on because it was redistributed and it was 11 year old non disclosure agreement. And supposedly Donald Trump did not do it to protect his family. He did it only for his selfish political reasons and therefore it should have been a campaign expense. He didn't report it. And Judge Mershawn, whose daughter, what would be the word? Grifted off the grifted off her father's name and many times expanded her political portfolio as an operative and a political consultant, made millions of dollars. Nobody thought that was wrong. He had donated a small sum, but to the Democrats. And then you've got the federal prosecutor, Jack Smith. He went after him for the Same thing. Biden had been excused by Robert Hur. And then we find out that he was getting, what, free legal help from a law firm and never reported it. I don't think he's under indictment now for that by the irs. Anyway, that's the whole background of these lawfare and judges. And the more that they keep doing this and it's spreading to Europe now, the Romanian High Court just eliminated the elected government. And now we see Ms. La Pen is leading in all the polls. She has the largest seats, number of seats in the lower house in France, and they are the judiciary. And a panel is trying to take her off the ballot. Yeah, well, and these are people who lecture us about democracy.
- [72:20]
Jack Fowler
Yeah, Dies in plain sight. Quickly, Victor, you know Jim Buckley, the late Jim Buckley, who was a federal judge and on the U.S. court of Appeals to the District of Columbia, the little suspension Supreme Court. But even as a retired judge, he lived up in Connecticut and his sister had a little political event at her house. He did not live in that house. He lived in another house on that property. And when that political event, small fundraiser for a guy who was thinking of running for Congress, that happened, he left. I mean, there were judges, many judges who were so, and you would know your own mother, were so believed to create an absolute wall of separation that there would be no sense even of impropriety or scandal or involvement in anything that came remotely close to politics.
- [73:11]
Victor Davis Hanson
See, what's different about all this, Jack, is that they have been doing this for a long time. Asymmetrical application of the law to go after people. And no one has really said anything about. They just expected that most lawyers are left wing, most law schools, the government lawyers are left wing and the judges are left wing. And they can use. They have filed more writs to stop Trump initiatives in one month than conservatives did in four years under Biden. So what's weird about Trump is he has no blinders, no gags. He just goes and he had what, three gag orders from three different judges and these things, he, he just goes out, he should be impede. And everybody says that's crude, that's an attack on the judiciary. And it got your attention, didn't it, that what you're doing is unconstitutional and is a threat to the stability of the entire government. When you have one low ranking judge try to what, take over the entire immigration policy of the United States, that's what he's doing. And yet you'll go after Donald Trump. He doesn't care. But he did bring attention to it. And he did that with all those judges. He told everybody. And today, ask yourself if Trump had not everybody said that. That was. I read so many articles from people that I know that are legal scholars, and I like when they were condemning Trump. This is so unprofessional. You never attack a judge. You don't do this. But the judges were acting in an improper and illegal way, and they were hiding their robes and their titles and their education, and they were so sober. They weren't. They were no different than Mark Elias or any. And that's where they came from. They were political activists that were rewarded by Biden or Obama for their donations or their activism. And they don't believe in what the Constitution talks about, the separation of powers. They don't. And so they're all going to be famous. They're all going to be. Their children will probably cash in, like Judge Mershawn's daughter. And you're not supposed to ever complain because that would be crude. That would be anti government. I don't know what it is. But that's the thing about.
- [75:33]
Jack Fowler
I'm an officer of the court. I take an oath to the Constitution. But big law is as much a problem as any other. Big, big pharma, etc.
- [75:41]
Victor Davis Hanson
It is, too.
- [75:42]
Jack Fowler
It's a very real thing.
- [75:44]
Victor Davis Hanson
Nobody wants to talk about big law, even conservatives, because they understand that these really, really big, the most lucrative, where you make 4 or 5,6 million a year and more, need token conservatives because, you know, conservatives will get. They'll need a lawyer or a conservative administration will be in power and they play. So they've been off limits, even though most of them are liberal. Not now. Trump is saying, you know what? No security for you people. Why would you ever give somebody a security clearance in the first place who was working for a big law firm just because he happened to have some job in a prior administration. That's the one thing that's been really needed to cut back on the security clearances.
- [76:28]
Jack Fowler
You know, that Paul Weiss, the law firm punished. And then they came to some agree. The head of the firm said that action he thought would have cost the firm $2.3 billion. So when you think of the revenue that the enormous wealth these places have, and of course, what do they do with the wealth as individuals? They donate it to left and they sue the government. They donate. Yeah, Right. So. Hey, Victor, we've got one other story to be in out here today. Promised a rural issue, another rural issue, and it's about the federal government torturing, tormenting some ranchers in South Dakota, and we're going to get to that after these final Important messages.
- [77:16]
Victor Davis Hanson
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- [80:42]
Jack Fowler
We are back with the Victor Davis Hansen show recording on March 30, a Sunday. This episode up on April Fool's Day, April 1, 2025. Victor's website, the Blade of Perseus. You'll find it@victor hansen.com when you go there. Links galore. Victor's weekly writings for American greatness in his syndicated column. His appearances as the aforementioned Victor's you know, on Megyn Kelly and other podcasts. Links to his books, ultra articles and appearances. What's that ultra? Twice a week, Victor writes an Ultra piece for the Blade of Perseus. And he does an exclusive video for the Blade of Perseus. So if you're a fan of Victor's writing, Victor's wisdom, you should be subscribing $65 for the full year. And that's discounted from 6:50amonth while you're on. If you're on X, Victor's there gallivanting every once in a while. Dhanson is his handle. I mentioned before the Daily Signal on YouTube. This podcast, you'll find it on YouTube and rumble. Now if you can stand the look of either of us, you can just listen, keep the screen blank. And then on Facebook, VDH's Morning Cup. And there's a great friendly group, the Victor Davis Hansen Fan Club. Check that out too. So Victor, I mentioned before UN1 that's this website that covers rural issues. And this is one of these stories about why we hate government. Headline Mother of South Dakota cattle rancher faces 10 years in prison for a pre 1950 fence. She's calling on Donald Trump for help. Her son and daughter in law are each facing 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. I hope I can make this very quick. There's a fence been there for ages. This family has been ranching there for ages. I think fifth generation, some hunter comes along, thinks the land's out of place. This is the department now of the Forest Service. And you and I always, I think the Forest Service is just, you know, who's the bear? I can't remember his name anymore.
- [82:55]
Victor Davis Hanson
Smokey.
- [82:56]
Jack Fowler
Smokey. Yeah, Smokey. And the forest fires. No, no, these guys are rat.
- [83:02]
Victor Davis Hanson
Di, Native American. Blow up dams. That's what they do.
- [83:09]
Jack Fowler
Yeah.
- [83:09]
Victor Davis Hanson
So they come say, let the fire burn.
- [83:13]
Jack Fowler
Well that's true. The fire side of things. Never mind.
- [83:15]
Victor Davis Hanson
Let the rotten trees feed the slugs.
- [83:19]
Jack Fowler
Yeah. They come check the land out, say, we'll give you an assessment of, we think you may be on federal land. And they come back a few days later, of course, armed, tactical gear and serving notice of violation. You have to have gag rule. Your husband and wife can't talk to each other. They're going to trial next month.
- [83:41]
Victor Davis Hanson
I mean, it's insane.
- [83:42]
Jack Fowler
This is. And this is South Dakota. I thought this was conservative territory. Doesn't South Dakota have John Thune, the majority leader?
- [83:51]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yeah, I think that's what is behind Doge, too. Everybody says, you know, Elon's talking about, he's still very. I think he's up to $200 billion in the first two and a half weeks, but he thinks he can cut a trillion. He can do that. But if he did, that's not just the point of Doge. The point of there's 3 million people for the federal government and it's an octopus. And if you can cut those agencies and those people, then you're going to have fewer abuses of your constitutional rights because there's going to be fewer people who have to justify their. Their existence, which is otherwise unjustifiable. And so they, they. It's kind of the way the federal government. Any law that those Forest Service administrators thought they were enforcing, I can guarantee it was never passed for this intention. Just like out here in the San Joaquin Valley, when Congress passed statutes with the Environmental Protection Agency, they never. And they wanted to preserve inland waterways from nitrogen pollution. They were not to talking about a low spot and a guy's grain field that would fill up with water after a torrential rain. And then some inspector said, ah, that's not an inland waterway, but we can tweak it. And as judge, jury and executioner, we can go out there and test that water. And then if it has too much nitrogen from his fertilizer, we're going to fine him and harass him because we have to be important and we have to lord it over these people in the private sector. They think they have more money, they think they have more freedom. We're going to go show them that. I'm the assistant administrator for inland waterways of the regional Southwest District. How's that? And I have a title and a car and a federal, you know, badge, and that's how they think.
- [85:46]
Jack Fowler
And a gun.
- [85:48]
Victor Davis Hanson
And a gun in some cases. And so they've got. That's. It's really important to cut back. You know what's very funny? This country has so much potential and we have just squandered it with this huge debt and this ESG DEI woke restrictions and regulations. But if Donald Trump were to be successful, I'm not saying it's possible, but if he were to get close to balancing a budget in two years with a trillion dollars in cuts, and then in addition to that money coming in from foreign investment. He says he has 3 trillion, he says 4. I think I've read 3 trillion coming in. I think every. There's a general. Every five to. I guess it's every 15 billion is a million jobs. You're talking about millions of jobs that could be created. And then there's going to be some tariff income. There's going to be some income from deregulating and extending the tax cuts. You could have a booming United States. You really could. I mean, economically. And if you close the borders and went to civic education, assimilation, integration on immigrants, you could end this recrudescence of tribalism and you could really have a. He calls it a golden age. You could do that. But he's got to get to the midterms first. But what I'm trying to say is that we're in the midst of a radical counter revolution. I've never seen anything like it. Everybody should appreciate that. And China, as I said, it's kind of. If you go nominal GDP, it's only about 6. I think we're 30 trillion and they're 20 with nominal GDP, not purchasing power, GDP, GDP, but nominal. And that really. And they have 4.2 times our population. So you have one American producing one and a half times the goods and services even at our nadir than China does. That's amazing that we can have 30 trillion with one quarter of the population of China. When you look at all of what they're doing, and I did that little video for the Daily Signal, but they're creating eight or nine nukes a month, Jack. Their goal is to have a thousand deliverable nukes by five years from now, at the end of the decade. But even if they were to do that, we have 5100, they want to get 2000 fighter jets. We're about 1500. But I think we have 500 fifth generation. They only have 80. And more importantly, when you put intelligence, planes, helicopters, logisticals, we have 3,500 planes. We have 11 carrier groups, all nuclear. They have two. We have 90 submarines, 85 to 90 submarines. Everyone is nuclear. They have about 60. I think six are nuclear. My point is that we're at the tipping point where their rate of ascendance is accelerating and they're going to pass us. But right now, given the legacy and inheritance that we were lucky to have from our grandfathers and parents, we are so far ahead of them and it's just a matter of re. Com. Rebooting, reinvigorating, reinvigorating, recalibrating and getting back to the essence and say, you know, nothing is for nothing is guaranteed. You get up every day, you have to prove yourself. But we're going to go to a radical free market, merit based, assimilationist model and this country would really take off with a secure border and America.
- [89:37]
Jack Fowler
But it is a revolution, Victor, and revolution means fight. I just saw today a headline in Virginia that I think it's Fairfax county where much of the fights of the school boards were with, with it's Women's Month. A is for abortion. I thought A was for. I saw that, I saw that demented people out there. So.
- [90:01]
Victor Davis Hanson
Well, there's one big obstacle we have and we have a fertility rate that's fallen from 1995 to 2.1 to 1.6. And I mean JD Vance, they hated him for saying it, but he said childless cat ladies. And what he was saying is we all have nephews, nieces, children of our own that we don't know what's gone. They, they bought in to go to University for eight years and take three units here and six units here and live in the basement, take out $150,000 loan. Housing prices are unaffordable. And they think, you know what, I'm just going to be an urban hipster. I'm going to go rent an apartment, three or four, four people. And I'm going to go out and go to the bars and have promiscuous sex and drugs and take some courses and think I'm smarter than everybody else. And then I'm going to get really angry because my master's in gender studies or my BA in environmental studies did not give me there's some idiot, it's a plumber or 711 that's making a million dollars a year. And that's our biggest problem right now, is telling these 20 something, 30 something people marriage is not bad, it's good. Children are good, they're stable. Buying a home as soon as you can is good for a lot of reasons and we're going to help you do it. And that should be our message. Instead it's every divisive, not normal outlet that we promote is normal. And you know, I don't know. I have nothing against trans people, I have nothing against their drag shows. But I can tell you mainstreaming drag shows is not going to increase the fertility rate, homeownership, families. And that's whether you like it or not. That has been the stuff of civil from the very beginning. It's pretty simple, everybody. You look at everything in the past and it's just a matter of a Did they have a defense budget? Did they have a good army? Number two, did they have fertility? They replaced? Number three, did they have a sound fiscal policy? And four, did they have food production? And five, do they have energy? And that was mostly, tell you the truth, until the industrial revolution would and if they had all of that and secure borders, they thrived. If they didn't, they vanished. And we should take note of that.
- [92:33]
Jack Fowler
Taking note, my friend. Well, we have come almost to the end.
- [92:39]
Victor Davis Hanson
I've talked too much today.
- [92:41]
Jack Fowler
No, Victor, you never talk too much and I know our listeners think that. So I have, you know, we have now on so many platforms to listen to watch again. Those who do it on Apple can rate the show zero to five stars and practically everyone's giving Victor five stars. So thank you for doing that. I have two comments to read here. One said somebody sent me on LinkedIn and others from YouTube. The YouTube one first is from WandaBrown4887 who writes very simply I've learned the only place to learn the real news is to listen to Victor Davis Hansen. So Wanda Brown. Yeah, short and sweet. Then I have this from my old friend Michael Flaherty. I never thought I would disagree with VDH on anything. He sent me this on LinkedIn. But given my unique experience, I feel qualified to make a suggestion about situations related to violent street crime. Never approach an adult where riding a BMX bike. This applies double if the person is wearing a full skeleton mask. Keep driving and don't engage in conversation. Now a few weeks ago, Victor.
- [93:52]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yeah. I was at the post office.
- [93:54]
Jack Fowler
Was this your trip to the post office? I just thought you encountered such a.
- [93:59]
Victor Davis Hanson
What could happen at 2 o'clock I had the flu. I was woozy. I thought I don't want to go and cough on somebody. So I went into the drive in 2:00 in the afternoon and they have the new in our town. It's not safe. I understand that. But they had people, you know that that were putting the little hooks in and pulling out the mail. So the post office, have you seen them? They have those New type, right. Very hard to drive up next to them. You have to kind of get out, stick them in. So I was getting out and I thought I was hallucinating. I still had a fever. And I looked up and this skeleton was coming right at me on a bike with a golden skull mask on gold with glitter on it. And he was all dressed in black with not one ounce of the skin showing on a bike. And he was going right toward me. And I thought, wow, you need to go get some more Tylenol.
- [94:54]
Jack Fowler
Sounds like Antifa Luca Libre.
- [94:57]
Victor Davis Hanson
I don't know who he was, but I was, I thought, and I had done about four years ago. I didn't even teleport. I put mail into the old box and of course it never got there. It never got there. I've had it stolen two or three times.
- [95:11]
Jack Fowler
I do want to say Michael, who just sent that note, he was a colleague at National Review a long time ago, and then he left and he went to work in Boston for Billy Bulger, Whitey Bulger's brother. And Billy Bulger.
- [95:22]
Victor Davis Hanson
Like him, not.
- [95:23]
Jack Fowler
He was a conservative on social issues. And I did a piece about him. Nashville, terrific guy. I love Billy. And then Mike started Walden Media, which produced all his movies. The Chronicles of Narnia movies, just. He's a terrific guy.
- [95:40]
Victor Davis Hanson
What year did he leave National Review?
- [95:42]
Jack Fowler
Oh, long time ago, 1993. For a long time. But we've stayed friends for years. He's a good man.
- [95:48]
Victor Davis Hanson
So I appreciate that advice.
- [95:52]
Leaving National Review?
- [95:54]
No, but I don't know what you do when somebody's riding right toward you. He rode by. I said, I look like that and he just went right by me. But that's not the strangest thing I have seen out here. I've been looking at a spray rig in a tractor park. I won't tell anybody where, but I've seen it now, five days with a key in it. So I don't know what's going on on the neighbor's place.
- [96:18]
Jack Fowler
You know, when you look in cars that are nearby, Victor, you might see flagrant delicto events. So watch.
- [96:24]
Victor Davis Hanson
One of the nicest things just to finish, Jack, is these Tesla security cameras. So you see these wimpy people and they walk by and they think they're going to be clever as they. Their hands is out, not in. And they just walk by and key and they've got their full on it. Yeah, I hope they do it. I mean, today is the Tesla protest day. And I'm gonna buy, as I said, my wife And I are gonna give our Tesla to my son. It's beautiful car, but we want another Tesla. We're gonna save our money because we want to support. I'm thinking we're gonna do that in May, buy another Tesla, listen to that.
- [97:06]
Jack Fowler
Elon Musk and then come on the show.
- [97:08]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yeah, Elon, you're invited anytime to come on. I've written a lot of columns about this renaissance character. He is a Renaissance person. He's done more. It really gets me angry when you get Tim Waltz that attacks him ad hominem and I. And then, I mean, not that he, he doesn't have a write. I know that Elon can. But when you see Tim Waltz and you say, what have you actually done? What have you done for your country or your state? Your state is a mess. You're losing people, they're leaving. You've done this radical crazy woke you probably single handedly. The only thing he's ever done that's helped the country. He was so buffoonish. He. And usually vice presidential nominees don't make a difference, but he was such a radical contrast with JD Vance and he was so inept. He was a force multiplier of her inability to articulate and speak. And when he extra layer of weirdo, that Adderall kind of, you know, going out there with that too tight suit. And then there was a fruity factor. This guy, I don't know what his problem is. But when he goes in there and he gets on I got an app and I'm hey, it's going down, down, down, you idiot. Why don't you just say, could Tim Waltz create a space X rocket? Could he create a whole EV industry? Could he give me Internet and give most people in rural America, rural the world, Internet? No. Could he open up social media so he can say no, no, no. So why doesn't he just be a little humble and say, you know, I disagree with Elon Musk, but he has a man of many talents. I can say that about Bill Clinton. I disagree with almost everything Bill Clinton did, but he was a natural politician. I disagree with a lot of things that Barack Obama did, but he had a rhetorical gift. He did. And I don't think I didn't like the way it was used. But you can at least acknowledge that people have particular talents. That's what I'm trying to say, Tim. He had none. None.
- [99:25]
Jack Fowler
Well, he has an interesting habit of talent of how he waves. Maybe some people might not like Jerry.
- [99:31]
Victor Davis Hanson
Brown had a lot of talent. That was. I didn't agree with him. He had certain talents. He really did you up in. He knew Greek. He knew Latin.
- [99:42]
Yeah.
- [99:43]
Jack Fowler
Well, Victor, we've come to the to the end. Except I'm going to say those who subscribe to Civil Thoughts, the free weekly email newsletter I write for the center for Civil Society where we're trying to save and strengthen civil society. I want to thank you. Many people write me they appreciate it. And if you're not getting Civil Thoughts, you can go to civil thoughts.com sign up again. It's free. You'll get 14 recommended readings every every week. And it's we're not selling your name so there's, there's no monkey business going on. All right. All that said, Victor, you've been terrific. Thank you so much. Thanks.
- [100:18]
Victor Davis Hanson
Thank you everybody.
- [100:19]
Jack Fowler
Happy April Fool's Day. And we will be back with another episode of the Victor Davis Hansen Show. Bye bye.
- [100:25]
Victor Davis Hanson
Thank you. Thank you for listening.
- [100:29]
Unknown
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