Ep 72 | The Reign of the Libs Is OVER I Sen. Rand Paul

Summary

Zero Hour with James Poulos: Episode 72 – "The Reign of the Libs Is OVER I Sen. Rand Paul" Summary

In Episode 72 of Zero Hour with James Poulos, host James Poulos engages in a comprehensive discussion with Senator Rand Paul, a prominent libertarian-leaning Republican. The conversation delves into a range of pressing issues, including the COVID-19 pandemic, government accountability, free speech, technological advancements, cryptocurrency, and international trade. Below is a detailed summary of the key points, insights, and conclusions from their dialogue.

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1. Introduction and "Deception: The Great COVID Cover-Up"

James Poulos kicks off the episode by introducing Senator Rand Paul and his book, Deception: The Great COVID Cover-Up. He emphasizes the book's depth, noting its inclusion of endnotes and an index, signaling a serious exploration of the pandemic's origins.

2. COVID-19 Origins and Alleged Cover-Up

Senator Paul discusses his perspective on the origins of COVID-19, suggesting a deliberate cover-up:

• China's Initial Response: Paul asserts that China was embarrassed by the outbreak occurring in Wuhan, a city known for storing coronaviruses. He claims, “From the very beginning there was a cover up first in China” (01:52).

• US Government's Involvement: He alleges that U.S. officials, including Dr. Anthony Fauci, were aware of potential manipulation of the virus. Paul references leaked emails indicating Fauci's early concerns about a lab-leaked virus: “Even February 1st of 2020, Fauci was telling his colleagues it looks like it was manipulated” (02:32).

3. Accountability and Legal Remedies

Poulos presses Paul on the issue of accountability, particularly focusing on Fauci:

• Legal Consequences for Fauci: Paul contends that Fauci should face legal repercussions for allegedly lying to Congress and mishandling NIH funding. He states, “He did lie to Congress. He that is a felony. It's punishable up to five years in prison” (03:32).

• Justice Department's Inaction: Highlighting the Department of Justice's inaction, Paul expresses frustration over perceived political bias, suggesting that Fauci would have been prosecuted if aligned with political adversaries.

4. Peter Daszak and EcoHealth Alliance

The conversation shifts to Peter Daszak, head of EcoHealth Alliance:

• Daszak's Role: Paul describes Daszak as a pivotal figure who facilitated gain-of-function research, which Paul believes contributed to the pandemic. He accuses Daszak of deprioritizing safety protocols: “That alone is a decision that Anthony Fauci should go down in history as the guy who circumvented safety and allowed a pandemic to occur” (05:06).

5. Systemic Issues: Big Pharma and Gain-of-Function Research

Paul expands his critique to broader systemic problems:

• Ethics of Gain-of-Function: He argues against gain-of-function research, emphasizing its dangers and lack of substantial scientific breakthroughs: “But what has happened is this pandemic occurred from a lab leak” (07:35).

• Legislative Efforts: Paul mentions his legislative efforts to curb dangerous research, noting bipartisan support and the establishment of a presidential commission to veto funding for such endeavors: “I have now passed 13 to 1, was the vote out of committee, a bill that will create a presidential commission” (09:29).

6. Free Speech and Social Media Regulation

A significant portion of the discussion centers on free speech, especially online:

• Role of Elon Musk: Paul credits Elon Musk for championing free speech on platforms like Twitter: “Thank God for Elon Musk… he spent it to defend freedom of speech” (15:22).

• Government Regulation: He advocates for limiting government influence over social media, proposing legislation to prevent governmental coercion in content moderation: “What you can do is you can prevent government from colluding with Twitter, Facebook, YouTube” (15:22).

• Content Moderation vs. Censorship: Paul differentiates between combating illegal content and protecting constitutionally protected speech, rejecting government-imposed content fairness: “We have to be very careful about saying, oh, we'll set up a commission to decide whether or not they're being fair to the right or fair to the left” (18:14).

7. Addressing Anti-Semitic and Hateful Speech

Poulos brings up concerns about antisemitic and hateful speech, prompting Paul to reference legal precedents:

• Brandenburg v. Ohio: Paul cites this Supreme Court case to illustrate the complexity of regulating hate speech without infringing on free speech rights: “The First Amendment is incredibly important because it's how we have dissent” (20:21).

• Government's Role in Correcting Misinformation: While opposing censorship, Paul acknowledges a role for the government in correcting false information, such as election misinformation: “There is a role for people correcting information” (20:21).

8. Technological Advancements and Societal Impact

The duo discusses the rapid pace of technological innovation and its implications:

• Surveillance Concerns: Paul expresses skepticism about inevitable surveillance technologies, advocating for user choice and privacy: “People have to become more savvy and decide how much of their privacy do they want” (24:20).

• Market Solutions Over Government Regulation: He favors marketplace solutions over government mandates for technology fairness: “I don't think we should be so fearful that we relent and say, oh, we need a fairness doctrine” (24:20).

9. Bitcoin and Financial Independence

The conversation shifts to cryptocurrency, with a focus on Bitcoin:

• Government Non-Interference: Paul emphasizes the importance of keeping the government out of Bitcoin: “The number one thing is just keep the government out of it” (26:48).

• Bitcoin as a Hedge: He views Bitcoin as a valuable hedge against distrust in traditional currencies: “Bitcoin is valuable like any other hedge in the sense that, that people should be free to try to escape government money” (26:48).

• Critique of Financial Regulations: Paul criticizes existing financial regulations that limit ordinary Americans' access to investment opportunities: “I think we should widen that” (28:08).

10. International Trade and Economic Policies

Paul offers insights into U.S. trade policies, particularly concerning China:

• Benefits of Trade: He advocates for free trade, highlighting its role in economic prosperity: “Trade is a good thing. Trade is essentially the extension of the division of labor that Adam Smith talked about” (31:15).

• Opposition to Tariffs: Paul opposes tariffs, arguing they harm the economy and do not effectively protect American interests: “Tariffs is a big mistake. And the discussion of tariffs from both the Republican and the Democrat side is something that we should all look at and quickly reject” (31:15).

• Future of U.S.-China Relations: Addressing fears of escalating tensions, Paul discourages isolationist policies, advocating instead for lowering taxes and reducing regulations to bolster American competitiveness: “Lower the taxes, lessen the regulation, have the rule of law” (31:15).

11. Potential for Conflict with China

In closing, Paul expresses concern over calls for war with China:

• Opposition to Escalation: He warns against the rhetoric pushing the U.S. towards conflict, emphasizing the economic interdependence between the two nations: “I've been critical of them. But then when many in Congress say, well, why don't you then favor shutting down trade with China? It's because I care about America and I care about Americans” (31:15).

• Economic Realities: Paul underscores the tangible economic benefits Americans receive from international trade, arguing that war would disrupt these advantages: “The average American is $1,500 richer every year because of trade with China” (31:15).

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Conclusion

Throughout the episode, Senator Rand Paul articulates a strong libertarian stance, advocating for limited government intervention, transparency, and individual freedoms. He challenges established narratives around the COVID-19 pandemic, criticizes governmental and institutional accountability, and champions free speech and economic policies that prioritize American prosperity without heavy reliance on international adversaries. James Poulos facilitates a dialogue that underscores the importance of scrutinizing governmental actions and advocating for personal liberties in an increasingly complex global landscape.

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Note: The timestamps provided correspond to specific segments within the episode's transcript for reference.

Transcript

[James Polis]

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[Rand Paul]

Thanks for having me, James.

[James Polis]

All right, so let's talk about this cover up, the book's landing. This is a serious tome. It's got endnotes, it's got an index. This is the real deal, not just some pan pamphlet that someone else wrote for you. Tell us like, you know, there's a lot of talk over why the COVID up happened. Now it's sort of coming out. People are recognizing that this is what went down. Was it just to kind of COVID their tracks and make themselves look a little less terrible or is there something else coming right around the bend that they're trying to prevent us from noticing as well?

[Rand Paul]

You know, I think from the very beginning there was a cover up first in China. I think China was embarrassed that this happened in the city, a large city where bats typically aren't present, but coronaviruses are stored there. It's the greatest repository of coronaviruses anywhere in the world. We just happened to get a pandemic starting there. So the coincidences were a big deal from the very beginning. China covered it up, but really within a few days to weeks in the United States. There's evidence we now have from emails from a federal court has allowed these emails to be exposed that privately Anthony Fauci and his colleagues were all from the very beginning alarmed that they may have funded this research and that the virus looked to be a virus that had gained in function or a virus that had been manipulated. And we now know that even February 1st of 2020, Fauci was telling his colleagues it looks like it was manipulated. We know they're doing gain of function. He describes a research paper that his assistant had sent to him with the subject headline gain of function research. And yet a few months later when he comes before my, he steadfastly denies that he ever funded gain of function. So from the beginning there was a cover up. And I think their goal was to cover up any notion that NIH funding or Anthony Fauci's decision making had anything to do with funding the research in Wuhan that led to the lab leak. And so they were very motivated because once they began to see millions of people dying, they knew that some culpability would attach to their decision making process.

[James Polis]

Okay, so what's the accountability here? What's the appropriate remedy? Is it punishment? Is it jail time? What do you think for Fauci in particular?

[Rand Paul]

Well, you know, if he'd been a confidant of Donald Trump, he'd be in jail now because we have a justice system that seems to target people who are on one side of the aisle and not on the other. He did lie to Congress. He that is a felony. It's punishable up to five years in prison. I referred him for investigation and indictment to the Department of Justice. This may not shock any of your viewers, but Merrick Garland has done nothing. Merrick Garland may be the most political attorney General we've ever had, but also he would have probably sent the FBI to arrest him, you know, in the early wee hours with CNN watching, had he been a Republican. You will recall that a pro life minister who protested and was an opponent at an abortion clinic was arrested in the morning, early wee hours of the morning, in front of his children. That's what they've done at the Department of Justice. But Anthony Fauci, who committed millions of dollars to China without sufficient oversight, led to a pandemic, lied about it, nothing was ever done.

[James Polis]

And how about Peter Daszak? I mean, this is the guy who ran and I think still runs Ecohealth alliance, pivotal figure in all this. You cover this a little bit in the book. The guy's not even American. It was kind of crazy to see that you got a British subject who's right at the heart of what's going on with US policy around the virus. What do you think? How should we think about his role in this and what kind of accountability we can extend to him as well?

[Rand Paul]

Peter Daszak, I describe as sort of the bag man. He is a consigliere. He's a guy who puts on $20,000 cocktail parties to woo people like Anthony Fauci to try to convince them to give him more money. He's collected hundreds of millions of dollars, at least to the tune of maybe 10 million spent in Wuhan. But the research is done to take viruses and to try to see if he can doctor these viruses to make them more transmissible or grow more in human cells. A really bad idea. And this is what led to the pandemic. But he also is dishonest from the beginning in the fact that the nih, or specifically the NIAID subheading of the nih, were helping him basically to correct problems. But he was five years behind on his reports when he did find that he had created a gain of function virus. The NIH and their cronies over there, the Anthony Fauci cronies, simply said, here this is. We'll change the rules to let you do it if you promise to send us some more reports, but we'll allow you to grow these viruses even though they've gained in function tenfold. So, yeah, Peter Daszak's been at the heart of this from the very beginning, and Anthony Fauci knew about it from the very beginning. And the real disaster here is that there was a committee set up in 2016 to look at dangerous research. It was called the P3CO Committee. Well, the research in Wuhan never went there. So Anthony Fauci overrode the safety committee to say nothing to see here, you, you don't have to go for the safety review. I'm going to give you carte blanche. I'm going to give you an exemption to the safety review. That alone is a decision that Anthony Fauci should go down in history as the guy who circumvented safety and allowed a pandemic to occur.

[James Polis]

In situations like this that are so sprawling, it can be satisfying to pick out a couple guys and say it's all their fault. Obviously, these guys played a huge role. But just let's take a look at the bigger picture here. There's a whole system of. Here you mentioned gain of function research, Big pharma, sort of out of control. There's this incredible pressure and incentives to start messing around with viruses, figure out how to use them for different purposes. Potentially tons of money in that. And also, you know, uses as, as weaponry, as weapons, size up for us, the pharmaceutical industry. Give us a sense of the bigger picture here. How do we get a handle on this kind of technological development that pushes in such a dangerous direction that's so easy to exploit?

[Rand Paul]

This debate began probably a couple decades before COVID when some scientists were able to recreate the Spanish flu. The Spanish flu occurred naturally in 1918 and killed somewhere between 50 to 100 million people. It's the worst pandemic of the last couple of hundred years. So scientists recreated it and people became alarmed and said, maybe we shouldn't be doing this. In 2010, they took the avian flu and made it more transmissible among animals and potentially aerosolized. This was thought to be a disastrous potential calamity. And Anthony Fauci at the time was asked about it. And Anthony Fauci's response was, well, even if a scientist should be bitten, even if a scientist should become infected, even should a pandemic occur, the knowledge is worth the risk. Well, most scientists actually don't believe that the knowledge is worth the risk. There's never been a vaccine created from this type of research. There's never been a cure created. There's never really been any substantial scientific breakthroughs in this type of research. But what has happened is this pandemic occurred from a lab leak. But we also know in 1977, a Russian flu got out of a lab and spread throughout the world. And when they looked at the sequence of the virus, they discovered it was identical to a lab virus from 1954. That doesn't happen in nature. The only way it could be the same virus from 1954 means that it had to be the virus from 1954 held in a lab and escaped a lab. So this has happened repeatedly. It's very dangerous. But the one good news I can tell you is with the chairman of the Homeland Security, a Democrat. I have now passed 13 to 1, was the vote out of committee, a bill that will create a presidential commission that will have the ability to veto spending to this dangerous research.

[James Polis]

Do you have an expectation that if Donald Trump comes in and he's president again, he's gonna sign that?

[Rand Paul]

I think it's unknown. I think that it would be a limitation on some of this bad research, which I know Robert Kennedy supports and I believe Donald Trump will support. It doesn't really take away presidential power because the president actually appoints the members of this. So I think there's a pretty good chance he would pass it. My hope is actually to pass it this fall in the lame duck session, even before the next president comes in, because we have such bipartis support. It's taken me three years to get Democrats on board, but we finally now have them on board. So I'm going to try to get it passed as soon as we get back in Washington after the election. But we'll see. It's not always as easy as it sounds.

[James Polis]

No, it never is in Washington. But, you know, you mentioned rfk, and I think there's been such a groundswell across political categories of Americans who are just looking around, they can tell that people are spiritually and physically unwell, that there's a pandemic of sorts of just real unfitness in America, and that they're suspicious of their food, they're suspicious of vaccines, they're looking around. RFK stands up there, says, make America healthy again. That's a powerful message and it's resonating with Trump voters who might not have looked at RFK quite that way until that message connected so much. So when I'm looking around in America, I see ordinary Americans becoming very suspicious of the healthcare industry, very suspicious of vaccines. They feel like there's not much they can do other than just say no to things. Say no to the junk food, say no to the vaxes. Do you think that that's the right kind of attitude? How do you stop people from becoming too paranoid?

[Rand Paul]

Well, the government needs to turn over a new leaf and try being honest. Because of their vast dishonesty, people are hesitant. People don't believe the government anymore. And I'll give you an example of why they probably shouldn't believe the government. The vaccine committees that came forward to approve a booster vaccine for Covid, they really recommended only for over 65 or those who are at risk for Covid. The Biden administration, though, came forward and said, no, your six month old should take it. Everybody from six months of age and up should take this COVID vaccine. Well, when you do the investigation, you find that the vaccine is actually of greater risk to a young person, to a child, a toddler, adolescent teenager, young adult than the disease. We find that no young, healthy people, even when the virus was at its worst in 2020, young, healthy people didn't die from COVID But we do know that somewhere between about 2 and 6 out of 10,000 who take this vaccine will have an inflammation of the heart such that they present to the emergency room with chest pain and elevated heart enzymes similar to what happens in a heart attack. So it's a serious thing that can happen to a perfectly healthy kid. And we know that Covid doesn't kill kids, doesn't kill healthy children. And by now, a couple things have happened too. The virus has mutated to become less dangerous, and the immunity that is collective for all of us has increased over time because most people have had vaccines. Most people have had Covid, and they just haven't been honest with us. And they really need to tell us the truth. So, for example, let's say you are at risk. Let's say you're 75 years old and you're 100 pounds overweight and you've got other medical problems. Should you take the COVID vaccine? Well, what you would want to know first would be is anybody dying from COVID who's had it previously? That's one question. If I've already had Covid once, does anybody come back, get it a second time, and die from it? I think the answer may well be zero. But let's say you've had it once and you've had a couple of vaccines. Does anybody who's already had Covid once and had a couple of vaccines come back and get Covid and die? I think the truth of the matter is they don't. The government will not divulge that information because they don't. It appears as if the government perhaps is more concerned with the profit of Pfizer and Moderna than they are are actually with the truth. For example, with children, there never was proof actually with children or adults that the vaccine stopped transmission. But there also was never any evidence for children that it reduced hospitalization or death. Why? Because no children were going to the hospital or dying to begin with. How do you prove that it's efficacious if no children are going to the hospital? In fact, when Anthony Fauci was challenged on this, he said, well, they show that kids will make an antibody if you give them a vaccine. And I informed him that I could give your kid 100 vaccines. They'll make antibodies every time. It doesn't mean they need them. I can inject your kid with any kind of foreign particle, dirt, and they'll make antibodies to it, but it doesn't mean they need a vaccine to dirt. And this is the problem with these people is they're now advocating for things that seem to enrich a company, a billion dollar company, but don't seem to have factual evidence that it's beneficial to your child. So now people are distrusting them on everything. And actually there probably are things are vaccines that your kids should probably take and it still should be your choice. I'm a big person on volunteerism and choice, but at the same time, people are suspecting everything the government tells them. But because we've had such a spate.

[James Polis]

Of dishonesty, yeah, credibility gap is so bad. But you know, your leadership on this and just your expertise has been so crucial. Honest speech coming out of the government, obviously long overdue but let's talk about free speech a little bit more broadly because. Because let's face it, before Twitter became X free speech, not online, not what it was, and just that lockdown on what could be said and what couldn't was such a big part of how that Covid scam was put over on so much of America. You're a big free speech guy, Free speech defender. How close do you think we are to where we need to be on free speech, especially online? And how optimistic are you that we're going to be able to get there through whether it's Elon Musk or Donald Trump or sort of that coalition?

[Rand Paul]

All I can say is thank God for Elon Musk. When Elon Musk paid $44 billion for Twitter, people said, Really? $44 billion? And he said, Look, I didn't spend $44 billion for Twitter. I spent it to defend freedom of speech. And absolutely, he's been integral to that, not only just for Twitter, but it exposing what the government was doing. I'm one of those libertarian conservatives who believes that you can't tell Facebook they have to post your stuff. You can't tell Twitter they have to post my opinion. But what you can do is you can prevent government from colluding with Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and taking down constitutionally protected speech. So when I found out from the Twitter files, when Matt Taibbi and Michael Shackelford and others were revealing this stuff, what I discovered was it wasn't just them doing it voluntarily. It was the government coercing them. So I wrote a bill which had been in the works for quite a while. And this is a bill that says. And regulates government, says government cannot sit down with any. They can't sit down with Blaze tv, they can't sit down with cnn, Fox, but they can't sit down with social media either and coerce or cajole or pressure them into taking down constitutionally protected speech. The reason we describe it as constitutionally protected speech is the other side will say, what about child pornography or sex trade and all these things? And our response is those are illegal. The government's allowed to talk to people about taking down things that are advertising things that are illegal. And so by describing this constitutional speech, we think we have a bill that actually passes constitutional muster. But we haven't been able to get any Democrats on board. The Democrats who were once defenders of freedom of speech are lost. They don't seem to be president in the debate at all.

[James Polis]

Well, you know, there's a point where the Rubber meets the road. I think on the online stuff where there are some folks on the right in the GOP who are saying, look, we need to be more aggressive about protecting kids online. It's not just about free speech. You gotta take some other stuff into consideration. And I know this is a bit of fight that's brewing on the Hill as well. What would your message be on taking that more libertarian standpoint?

[Rand Paul]

You know, I think we have to be very, very careful that what we are doing is regulating the government, not private business. The First Amendment says Congress shall pass no law. It's all about what government can do and not the private business. So we have to be very careful about saying, oh, we'll set up a commission to decide, you know, whether or not they're being fair to the right or fair to the left. I'm not for that because. Because my fear is. My fear is in setting up any kind of government agency that would be determining what speech is. So I'm all into regulating what government can do, but I want to stay away from regulating content of individual broadcasters.

[James Polis]

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[Rand Paul]

Great.

[James Polis]

And we're just getting started. But we can't do it alone. When you subscribe to Blaze Media, you're helping us cut through the noise and reach Americans across the country with the clarity they deserve. We've won a big battle, but if we're going to win this war, we need to keep waking up our fellow Americans, one truth at a time. To celebrate this milestone, we're offering $40 off your annual membership. So if you believe in what we're doing, if you want to join this movement, now's the time. Go to blazetv.com 0hour and subscribe now. Don't miss this stand with Blaze Media today, and let's continue the fight to wake up America. One truth at a time. And what do you make of this controversy around antisemitic speech? I know a couple states have put up some state level laws. There's a real concern there. And you know, obviously things in the Mid east really teetering on the brink in some respects. But again, there's a section, a faction of the GOP that says, hey, we need to go beyond sort of those traditional free speech values and say we are gonna punish any speech that is hateful or sort of menacing or even just in some ways just critical of what's going on over there as far as the Israelis are concerned. Again, how do you present, how do you represent those kind of classic libertarian values in a way that's gonna connect with people who are just so worried about what's gonna happen to Israel in the Mid east that maybe they're willing to venture into? Hasn't been associated with the right in a very long time.

[Rand Paul]

Well, I would recommend reading Jonathan Turley's book, the Indispensable Right. It's a great book and really goes through the history of this. But the operative Supreme Court case is called Brandenburg, Brandenburg versus Ohio. And most First Amendment cases are difficult for people because the people being defended are despicable people. Brandenburg was a despicable person who. I won't even recite the things he was saying about Jewish people or black people because they're offensive, but he was saying these things. But interestingly, in Those days, in 1968, he was defended by the ACLU, two lawyers, Alan Brown, who was Jewish, and Elizabeth Norton Holmes, who was African American. They defended him not because what he was saying was pleasant, it was repulsive. But they so believed in the principle that they looked beyond the specifics. Interestingly, though, fast forward 40 years, and they asked Elizabeth Norton Holmes about Donald Trump, saying, go, fight, win peacefully and patriotically at the Capitol on January 6th. And she said, no, arrest him. That's not free speech. And that's too bad, because people became deranged with Trump so much that they can't see through to the principle. It's the principle. It isn't about what is said. You don't defend pleasant things. Nobody cares when you say something nice. It's the language that's on the edge of either a minority position or a position that is repulsive or repugnant. And so I think that the First Amendment for some people is more difficult. But the First Amendment is incredibly important because it's how we have dissent, it's how you express dissent, and it's how a fully functioning democracy works. But I'll tell you, I tried to get a Democrat on my bill and I thought he might be reasonable. And he came into my office and he said, well, what about misinformation? What if someone goes on the air right now and says the election is not on Tuesday, November 5th, it's going to be on Wednesday, November 6th? And I didn't say this, but I kind of to myself kind of laughed and said, well, gosh, if you're that gullible, maybe you shouldn't vote. But I don't mean that seriously. I. Everybody ought to vote. But I don't think people are that stupid either, really. And I mean, I do think that if the government. So is there a role for government? Let's say it's all over the Internet that they've canceled the election, it's going to be next week and you're worried about voter suppression. The government can correct that. The government can put out public service announcements saying, no, the election is really still on Tuesday, November 5th. You know, so there is a role for people correcting information. But the best correction to speech you don't like or you consider to be misinformation is more speech, not less. Yes, we've gotten away from that now and the left has become terrible. The left really, you know, you hear them all the time. You heard Hillary Clinton just recently talking about how we need more regulation. They call it content moderation instead of censorship, but that's what they're talking about. They are now openly embracing censorship. And that's sad.

[James Polis]

Yeah, I mean, it's naked. I think it was. John Kerry was up on stage at one of these things and, you know, the language is, the First Amendment's a problem and we gotta figure out a way to get around it. But I gotta say, you know, it's been fascinating. If you told me four years ago that libertarianism would be sort of right back at the heart of the national political conversation, I might have been surprised. But now that tech is at least in part coming around to support Donald Trump, there's a new divide there. Guys willing to step out and say like, you know what I mean, even Mark Zuckerberg sort of publicly identifying himself as libertarian. But at the same time, you got guys like Larry Ellison out there and Ellison is considered to be a pretty reliable Republican leaning or Republican supporting guy. But when he's got a mic in front of him, the kinds of things that he's saying now are basically saying like, yeah, well, social credit is kind of inevitable. We're going to have drones Everywhere we got to have AI, everyone's going to kind of be an open book and it's going to be a sort of total information awareness kind of thing, just because of the direction the technology is going in and how fast it's going in. What do you have to say to technologists who are moving right, but at the same time seem to be predicting that we're going to have a new social order that looks a lot more like China's?

[Rand Paul]

I don't think there's any future that's inevitable. I think there are have over time, particularly the Internet, you know, as far as the anonymity of your searches, sending advertising to you that we made this trade off, that you're going to be advertised. If you look at shoes, you're going to be advertised. You're going to get advertisements talking about shoes. And I think that, you know, we've accepted certain amounts, but then there are certain amounts that we continue to be concerned about. When you have private conversations with your spouse or somebody in your house and all of a sudden advertisements are popping up, there are still many of us who become alarmed by that, but also we have ways of getting around it. For example, I don't want to regulate Google, but I know Google is trying to direct me to read certain things and not to read other things. I know there's a Choice. I use DuckDuckGo. I don't know if they're a lot better, but I think they tend to not try to do some of the same things Google is doing. And there are other search engines as well. But people have to become more savvy and decide how much of their privacy do they want. Do they want YouTube took down? When I said, you know, cloth masks don't work, they took me down. I quit using YouTube. I went to rumble. So part of it, you vote by changing the channel or going to another place. But I don't think we should be so fearful that we relent and say, oh, we need a fairness doctrine. We need the government to mandate fairness. Once the government determines what is fair, you know, is Republican and Democrat enough? What about a libertarian position? What about another conservative constitutional position? So once you start limiting choices, say we're going to represent equally right and left. Really? Then you're still excluding other, smaller minority positions. So I'm not for the government getting involved in all. Other than the fact that I think we should regulate government and keep government out of content and keep government out of censorship.

[James Polis]

All right, I gotta ask you about Bitcoin. You know, this is another one of those things where four years ago, if you told me that bitcoin would mostly be held by big legacy financial institutions, I might have scratched my head a little bit. But it seems like, you know, regardless of where Gary Gensler and that crowd to come down on this stuff, obviously Elizabeth Warren out there doing the scaremongering thing, nevertheless, you know, bitcoin has gone mainstream. But at the same time, it's not ordinary Americans using it, by and large, it's. It's these legacy financial institutions. Is that concerning for you? And, you know, what do you think we need to do to ensure that bitcoin remains something that ordinary Americans can, can take full advantage of, rather than it being locked up by the folks who have created a rigged financial system system in the first place.

[Rand Paul]

The number one thing is just keep the government out of it. You don't want the government involved with regulating bitcoin or regulating it or getting involved with transactions of it. As far as government buying it or the government having it to own, I'm not really for the government owning it the same way. I'm not for the government being a fiat currency. I'm not for them backing it with bitcoin either. But I think bitcoin is valuable like any other hedge in the sense that, that people should be free to try to escape government money and free to try to escape the government's false promises. Right now you have a false promise that your dollar is backed by the full faith and credit of the United States. But the full faith and credit isn't very honest. We're running a $2 trillion deficit. Interest payments are a trillion. So for people who are worried and think that bitcoin is their hedge, where they want to buy, where they want to go for safety, that's great. They should have the freedom to do it. Same way some people still buy gold or silver, or some people buy land, Some people will buy stocks in companies. But really the main thing is just keeping government out of it. The marketplace will figure out whether it's a good hedge or a bad hedge. But I don't really want the government involved. I know some people in the bitcoin era want the government somehow to get involved with buying bitcoin and things. I don't want the government involved with buying bitcoin. And frankly, the government doesn't have any money. I mean, the government would just print up money to buy bitcoin. That doesn't sound like a good idea to me.

[James Polis]

Well, I think that's absolutely right. I'd Even go a step further and say, look among top tier technologies out there. Americans have come to feel really alienated and inept when it comes to working with their technology. They feel dwarfed by AI. They're looking for something that they can put their hands on and put to use to sort of, you know, defend their way of life, to protect their system of government, maybe even protect their humanity itself. Bitcoin offers that. And if it's not the American people taking advantage, someone else is going to swoop in and do it instead. You talked about the full faith and credit of the United States government and how that's on shaky ground. You know, you look at the dollar and that's, that's ultimately backed by the full face of the American people. Are you concerned that Americans are looking at the dollar even if it is the sort of the best house in a bad neighborhood neighborhood, and then comparing it to where we are with the deficit and the debt, do you think there's going to be a catastrophic crisis of confidence among the American people in our financial and economic system?

[Rand Paul]

You know, I don't know for certain. If I knew for certain, I'd be off making that investment right now. But I can tell you that when people are looking for a comparison, when they're looking at our country versus like all of European Union, we think of the European Union as being much bigger government, government, much more socialized, much more involved. But from a fiscal perspective, over half of the European Union actually balances their annual budget. So if you're thinking to yourself which country is more likely to have runaway inflation or have a catastrophe where all of a sudden nobody buys their bonds, I would say the US is more likely than the European Union, despite all the socialism of Europe. I'm not saying buy, buy the euro, but I'm saying that people are going to begin to question. And really the resilience of Bitcoin, I think is really attributed to people's distrust of the dollar and distrust of paper currencies. But also look at gold. Gold's doing pretty well as we speak. And look at land. One of the things we should do is free up for more ordinary people to be able to own things. For example, self directed IRAs, not many people know about them, but you can have a self directed IRA that buys real estate. We still regulate who's allowed to be part of these things. And we say you have to have income above a certain level. I think that's wrong. What that does is it take people out of, let's say you want to Buy an apartment, and the apartment costs $5 million. Most people don't have that much money laying around. But let's say you have $20,000 and you want to be one of 50 investors that invest in. Buy this apartment. We limit who are those people who can be. They're called trusted investors or whatever. They have to fill out certain forms and have certain income. I think we should widen that. Because buying into an apartment complex or buying into a building or buying into commercial property or buying rental houses is something where you're buying something real, you're buying something of value that will help to fend off the depreciation of the dollar. So I can remember even hearing the stories from my family's lineage, those who were left in Germany in the 1920s when they lost everything, and the only people in the family that were able to go on and maintain any kind of livelihood were those who had land. And they were always big believers in putting whatever money they had, whatever extra money back into the land so they owned something of value. Value, because they never trusted the government or the currency.

[James Polis]

All right, well, last question real quick. You're always out there reminding people that we do need to have, at least on paper, a declaration of war in order to wage a war. I know that's often been violated. Looking at the broader political picture here, I mean, such a big chunk of the COVID thing is this kind of competition, adversarial relationship between the US And China. Are you concerned that this regime in Washington, this federal government, is going to plunge America into a third world war over the objections of the American people?

[Rand Paul]

Yes. Every day I hear this drumbeat for war with China, and it very much concerns me. And people don't understand that you can be anti communist, critical of human rights in China, and still not want to have an embargo. So, look, I wrote a book, Deception, the Great Covid Coverup. And I talked about the Chinese government, the Chinese Communist government, government covering up the fact that the virus began in Wuhan and that they were doing this risky research. So I've been critical of them. But then when many in Congress say, well, why don't you then favor shutting down trade with China? It's because I care about America and I care about Americans. The average American is $1,500 richer every year because of trade with China. The average American is $7,000 richer because of international trade in general. Trade is a good thing. Trade is essentially the extension of the division of labor that Adam Smith talked about. When you don't have to make your clothes, make your shoes, grow your food, everything. When you divide that labor and people specialize, things become less expensive. But particularly as that division of labor and specialization extends to foreign countries, we all become richer. We are all the beneficiaries of it. And you think, well, what about Americans? Well, the $7,000, I say from international trade, a lot of that $7,000 is spent buying American stuff, too. So if you want to help American products, rather than tariffs, what I say is lower the taxes, lessen the regulation, have the rule of law, and guess what? A lot of things are still going to be made in America because your property is secure, your profit is secure, and it's just a good place to be. It's a safe place to be because of the rule of law. That's what you need to do. But tariffs is a big mistake. And the discussion of tariffs from both the Republican and the Democrat side is something that we should all look at and quickly reject.

[James Polis]

Well, I think we got a rough road ahead, but a long one, too. And I think you got a long road ahead as well. And that's a great thing for America, in my opinion. So stay at it. And who knows where we'll be soon enough. I think there might be some nice surprises in store. Dr. Paul. Senator Paul, thanks so much for joining us.

[Rand Paul]

Thank you.

[James Polis]

All right, that's all the time we got till next time around. I'm James Polis, this is Zero Hour, and may God have mercy on us all.