WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.720 --> 00:00:06.040 Is not a euphemism. Ask not what your country can do for you, 2 00:00:07.000 --> 00:00:13.800 ask what you can do for your country. Mister garbachof tear down this wall. 3 00:00:15.080 --> 00:00:19.079 It's the Ricochet Podcast with Peter Robinson again and Rob Long again. I'm 4 00:00:19.160 --> 00:00:22.399 James Lylx. Today we're all going to talk to Ion here'ci ali, so 5 00:00:22.519 --> 00:00:26.480 let's have ourselves a podcast. This is an attack on diversity. This is 6 00:00:26.519 --> 00:00:32.479 an attack on multiculturalism and on many of the values that a lot of us 7 00:00:32.520 --> 00:00:36.439 will dear. The fact that she's a black woman and the first person who 8 00:00:36.520 --> 00:00:42.840 is a Black American to lead Harvard only added to their thirst to dethrone her. 9 00:00:43.479 --> 00:00:48.159 America is a nation that can be defined in a single word. How's 10 00:00:48.200 --> 00:00:53.679 the foot him? Excuse musical? Welcome everybody, It's the Ricochet Podcast number 11 00:00:53.679 --> 00:00:57.640 six hundred and seventy three. I'm James Lylyx in Minneapolis, joined again finally 12 00:00:57.679 --> 00:01:00.079 after this fortnight of their absence by Peter Robinson or Rob Long. Guys. 13 00:01:00.079 --> 00:01:03.640 Welcome, Happy New Year, Happy New Year to night. I mean it's 14 00:01:03.640 --> 00:01:06.920 a together Christmas week. You know, see, what are you gonna do? 15 00:01:07.400 --> 00:01:08.959 Right? Yeah? Well, you know somebody showed up and did a 16 00:01:10.040 --> 00:01:12.439 Ricochet podcast there for a couple of weeks, and I'll say that nice to 17 00:01:12.480 --> 00:01:15.599 you. By the way, those are very good. I'm worried that those 18 00:01:15.640 --> 00:01:19.879 are more popular. Well. It has encouraged me to bring back the solo 19 00:01:19.920 --> 00:01:23.280 podcasts, previously known as The Ramble, but now I'm branding it as The 20 00:01:23.319 --> 00:01:27.799 Diner, which has been my podcast name for many years, broadcasting live from 21 00:01:27.799 --> 00:01:32.200 the Diner every week on Thursday. Probably released on Friday, Saturday, Sunday, 22 00:01:32.200 --> 00:01:34.359 Monday, I don't know. Something like that was still working it out, 23 00:01:34.400 --> 00:01:38.760 but another addition to the Ricochet Audio network. So did you guys leave? 24 00:01:38.879 --> 00:01:42.280 Did you go away? Did you find yourself on some sunny shore or 25 00:01:42.280 --> 00:01:47.120 did you just spend the holidays with your family? Of course, everybody's dying. 26 00:01:47.599 --> 00:01:51.200 The one thing we all know about the beginning of January is everyone's really 27 00:01:51.239 --> 00:01:55.400 eager to hear all the recaps of the holiday season. You no, it's 28 00:01:55.760 --> 00:01:57.760 gone. We're all looking ahead. But I hope you had a good time. 29 00:01:57.840 --> 00:02:01.359 So let's look ahead. Let us look ahead. Any resolutions another tiresome 30 00:02:01.400 --> 00:02:07.199 topic for the year to come, Peter. I've grown to admit it. 31 00:02:07.759 --> 00:02:13.319 I ground to admit it because it's the same resolution as always, except that 32 00:02:13.360 --> 00:02:15.159 this time I'm putting money behind it. I's just spent one hundred bucks on 33 00:02:15.199 --> 00:02:21.120 a smart scale and devoted an hour and a half to trying to make my 34 00:02:21.159 --> 00:02:27.360 way through the absolutely mystifying. Excuse me, I'm totally recovered from a bad 35 00:02:27.400 --> 00:02:31.919 cold, but my throat is lagging behind totally mystifying things. You have to 36 00:02:31.719 --> 00:02:35.639 touch this button, do this, do that on the computer to sync it 37 00:02:35.759 --> 00:02:40.159 up so that the weight automatically showed. Anyway, after all of that, 38 00:02:42.400 --> 00:02:47.280 I have to lose weight this year. Okay, well, it's sort of 39 00:02:47.319 --> 00:02:52.080 funny that you have to get a scale that sinks through your computer. Is 40 00:02:52.120 --> 00:02:57.680 that necessary? Because why? Because your computer then talks to your phone and 41 00:02:57.719 --> 00:03:02.360 tells you to put down the Hershey's chocolate barn because it costs one hundred bucks. 42 00:03:02.800 --> 00:03:07.080 And I now have Rob understands this immediately. Not that, not that 43 00:03:07.159 --> 00:03:10.159 Rob isn't already as felt as any man could be. But Rob is the 44 00:03:10.199 --> 00:03:15.120 one who's famous for using the phrase skin in the game. And now I 45 00:03:15.199 --> 00:03:17.120 have skin in the game of my own skin, so to speak. And 46 00:03:17.199 --> 00:03:21.919 you'll because it costs one hundred bucks, right, okay, good? Well, 47 00:03:22.800 --> 00:03:24.000 how are you going to achieve it. Now that you have the means 48 00:03:24.039 --> 00:03:29.759 by which to measure it, how are you going to achieve this loss of 49 00:03:29.800 --> 00:03:32.199 weight? You actually want me to go into this, I've actually I have 50 00:03:32.360 --> 00:03:37.919 given it thought you. Intermittent fasting, Yes, I have doing that fasting. 51 00:03:38.280 --> 00:03:42.840 I'm going to do that, and then I'm doing the mathetone method of 52 00:03:42.879 --> 00:03:46.759 working out, which is working out according to your heart rate. And you 53 00:03:46.800 --> 00:03:52.000 actually keep your heart rate almost frustratingly low, and only one day a week 54 00:03:52.039 --> 00:03:55.280 do you permit your heart rate to go above a certain level. Apparently I 55 00:03:55.319 --> 00:04:00.360 didn't know this science. Apparently, if your heart rate is a above a 56 00:04:00.360 --> 00:04:06.080 certain level, it's burning all the glycogen or sugars in your body, and 57 00:04:06.120 --> 00:04:10.960 it will make you ravenous afterwards. But if you keep your heart rate down 58 00:04:10.960 --> 00:04:15.759 to a certain level, your body kicks into fat burning. And this is 59 00:04:15.800 --> 00:04:19.240 a way of making sure that you're burning fat. It builds up some sort 60 00:04:19.279 --> 00:04:24.279 of oxygen capacity in your lungs that I don't understand it, although I've read 61 00:04:24.319 --> 00:04:29.160 it three times in a row already. And this will interest you, gentlemen, 62 00:04:29.199 --> 00:04:32.000 because we are all of a certain age, it's a much say, 63 00:04:32.199 --> 00:04:36.720 you are much less likely to overtrain. If you follow Maphatoon, you're just 64 00:04:36.879 --> 00:04:44.000 not going to overdo it. Over mean, I'm never in that danger zone. 65 00:04:44.360 --> 00:04:46.000 I let you know. I am never. No one ever said, 66 00:04:46.079 --> 00:04:48.600 yeah, you know what, Rob, you gotta get to stop training. 67 00:04:48.879 --> 00:04:54.040 You got you're going to hurt yourself. That never occurred, has ever occurred 68 00:04:54.040 --> 00:04:57.480 in my life? Interesting, well, the way my life works. I 69 00:04:57.519 --> 00:05:04.040 go to a Stanford gym and some twenty year old giant finishes working out with 70 00:05:04.040 --> 00:05:09.160 his weights, and I go over and figure out it's just too much trouble 71 00:05:09.199 --> 00:05:12.800 to change the weights right, and I try to pick them up and my 72 00:05:12.879 --> 00:05:16.759 back goes out just like that. And the humiliating old man as I hobble 73 00:05:16.800 --> 00:05:20.040 out of the gym and drag myself home. That has happened to me. 74 00:05:20.519 --> 00:05:24.959 I'm surrounding I have three sons who are I try to keep up with them. 75 00:05:25.240 --> 00:05:29.439 Terrible mistake. I'm surrounded by Stanford students trying to keep up with them. 76 00:05:29.680 --> 00:05:33.879 Horrible mistake. So I get this idea of slow and steady old man, 77 00:05:34.160 --> 00:05:40.319 just calm down, don't hurt yourself. Interesting well, as somebody who 78 00:05:40.360 --> 00:05:44.160 did the weight loss gym thing last year, I have some advice we can 79 00:05:44.199 --> 00:05:46.959 perhaps take that off the show. But I mean I go to the gym 80 00:05:47.040 --> 00:05:51.639 every day, and my objective this year is to increase all of my weights 81 00:05:51.680 --> 00:05:56.839 even more and more and more so that I can come in behind that twenty 82 00:05:56.839 --> 00:05:59.600 five year old and sort of smile to myself, take the pin from the 83 00:05:59.639 --> 00:06:02.360 weights and moved them down fifty pounds. Ah, take that. You have 84 00:06:02.439 --> 00:06:05.199 never been overweight a day in your life, have you, James? That's 85 00:06:05.240 --> 00:06:08.680 just not a problem for you. No, I was a fat kid. 86 00:06:09.360 --> 00:06:11.920 I was a fat kid who got teased for it. I hated gym class 87 00:06:11.920 --> 00:06:14.759 and all the rest of it, and the psychological trauma from that has driven 88 00:06:14.800 --> 00:06:17.199 me for forty to fifty years now. So it's a good thing. I'd 89 00:06:17.199 --> 00:06:19.519 like to go back and thank all of those bullies who made fun of me 90 00:06:19.560 --> 00:06:24.480 in the in the locker room, because now you know, I've got my 91 00:06:24.480 --> 00:06:28.639 final revenge. It's of course noticeable to nobody because it's not like I'm a 92 00:06:28.639 --> 00:06:31.759 swimsuit model or anything. But yeah, so anyway, that is that. 93 00:06:32.279 --> 00:06:36.040 So good luck, Good luck with that, Rob Luck. Are you similarly 94 00:06:38.079 --> 00:06:41.160 looking forward to the new year with something new to do? You're going to 95 00:06:41.399 --> 00:06:44.240 I assume that You're going to probably want to go back and run a computer 96 00:06:44.480 --> 00:06:47.279 algorithm on every single script that you ever wrote to make sure that you didn't 97 00:06:47.319 --> 00:06:53.279 lift from somebody else. No, I don't have any resolutions, James. 98 00:06:53.360 --> 00:06:57.079 I feel that I'm I'm done. I'm perfect as you are. I'm in 99 00:06:57.439 --> 00:07:00.040 I'm the thing that I'm going to be, and I'm not going to just 100 00:07:00.120 --> 00:07:04.319 have to learn to convince everyone else of my own confidence in the fact that 101 00:07:04.360 --> 00:07:09.879 I'm about as perfect as a person can be. Yeah, well, you'll 102 00:07:09.879 --> 00:07:14.279 get no argument here. Yeah, you know, I know. I It 103 00:07:14.360 --> 00:07:18.240 is funny though, the since you mentioned the plagiarism thing. You know, 104 00:07:18.360 --> 00:07:26.439 Robin Williams used to go to comedy clubs a lot, and and then he 105 00:07:26.439 --> 00:07:29.720 would just absorb the jokes. And then when he was in one of his 106 00:07:29.759 --> 00:07:34.759 improvisational you know, the fugue states on the car Center or something, they 107 00:07:34.959 --> 00:07:42.360 sometimes he would steal them and and people get really mad and and you know, 108 00:07:42.399 --> 00:07:44.680 you don't. I mean, it's what you're allowed to do it. 109 00:07:44.720 --> 00:07:46.680 I mean you're not allowed to do it's not cool to do it, but 110 00:07:46.720 --> 00:07:48.920 I mean they can't you in jail. But Robin Williams was a stand up 111 00:07:48.920 --> 00:07:50.560 guy. He said, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to do that. 112 00:07:50.600 --> 00:07:55.560 Here's fifty thousand dollars. He was very successful at the time, so he 113 00:07:55.600 --> 00:07:57.639 would you know, if if he stole a joke from you, he would 114 00:07:57.680 --> 00:08:01.560 give you lots of money. And I don't think there's any comedian alive, 115 00:08:03.000 --> 00:08:05.600 especially at that point, who was like working in the comedy clubs, at 116 00:08:05.600 --> 00:08:11.120 the comedy stores, the improv in la who who begrudged Robin Williams the theft 117 00:08:11.279 --> 00:08:15.879 because he eventually made good. But you know there are I mean, I've 118 00:08:15.879 --> 00:08:18.759 been called up. I mean I have friends who are friends semi text or 119 00:08:18.759 --> 00:08:22.759 something and said, did you see this? And they'll give me a little 120 00:08:22.759 --> 00:08:24.879 clip of something, or they'll they'll point me to something or some movie or 121 00:08:24.879 --> 00:08:31.240 some show like this person stole your line or your joke or your or your 122 00:08:31.320 --> 00:08:33.480 character. I mean, that's happened in a couple of movies where it's like, 123 00:08:33.480 --> 00:08:35.720 well wait a minute, I know that that that happens a lot, 124 00:08:35.840 --> 00:08:39.279 right, So and you have your choice. You can either you know, 125 00:08:39.960 --> 00:08:43.000 moan and complain about it, or you can, you know, move on. 126 00:08:43.080 --> 00:08:46.919 I mean, it's it's show business, is what it is. Because 127 00:08:46.919 --> 00:08:56.799 we don't have an elaborate system of citation and scholarly ethics to guide us in 128 00:08:56.840 --> 00:09:01.440 show business? Doesn't the skill have rules of kind? Aren't Aren't there? 129 00:09:01.559 --> 00:09:05.200 Some offered, Yeah, there's something, there's something. Obviously you can't lift 130 00:09:05.240 --> 00:09:07.840 something directly, but you know, you you look at a scene, you're 131 00:09:07.879 --> 00:09:09.360 like, I know you guys saw my thing, or you read my book 132 00:09:09.440 --> 00:09:13.879 or come on now, I mean like there is more than a I can't 133 00:09:13.919 --> 00:09:18.679 even tell you how many times that's happened. I actually had to go back 134 00:09:18.720 --> 00:09:26.159 once and just to because I thought I had an insight uh into politics at 135 00:09:26.200 --> 00:09:30.840 that someone else was claiming as their insight, and I was like, wow, 136 00:09:30.879 --> 00:09:35.360 wait a minute, am I insane? I think that's mine? Wait 137 00:09:35.399 --> 00:09:41.399 a minute? And I had to go back and google it and find it 138 00:09:41.879 --> 00:09:48.679 and googling it was hard because it had been missed whatever I don't know, 139 00:09:48.720 --> 00:09:52.240 and it's this is so long ago that the archives that had been sort of 140 00:09:52.279 --> 00:09:54.399 like so, but I found it and I realized, oh, wait a 141 00:09:54.399 --> 00:09:58.399 minute, no, I'm I'm right. I was. I was the first 142 00:09:58.399 --> 00:10:01.120 with this one. Uh. And then I had a little private, satisfactory 143 00:10:01.120 --> 00:10:07.240 moment. But but although occasionally I've been cited it's nice to be cited. 144 00:10:07.240 --> 00:10:09.080 I was cited in a couple of books. It was almost like, so 145 00:10:09.120 --> 00:10:11.960 it's kind of yeah, it's kind of like cool thing and excited. Well, 146 00:10:11.960 --> 00:10:15.559 did you turn up on any of Claudine Gay's work by NHL? I 147 00:10:15.600 --> 00:10:16.200 don't know. I don't. I haven't. I haven't gone through it. 148 00:10:16.240 --> 00:10:20.440 I don't think so. I write mostly intentional comedy, and her work was 149 00:10:20.440 --> 00:10:24.799 mostly unintentional comedy. I mean, that was the weird thing about Claudine Gay 150 00:10:24.840 --> 00:10:26.120 stuff was that I actually decided just to read a little bit of it, 151 00:10:26.159 --> 00:10:31.240 just so I knew what you know. I was not surprised at the subject. 152 00:10:31.519 --> 00:10:35.200 Obviously, the subject was exactly what you'd expect Professor Claudie Gay to be 153 00:10:35.240 --> 00:10:41.159 writing about. But I did try to read some of it, and it's 154 00:10:41.279 --> 00:10:48.200 absolutely impenetrable. I mean, the idea that she stole those words without translating 155 00:10:48.200 --> 00:10:54.279 them into English first is another thing you can say is wrong with academia, 156 00:10:54.879 --> 00:10:58.039 right. It is impenetrable, and it doesn't have any meaning, and it 157 00:10:58.039 --> 00:11:01.840 doesn't have any impact, and it doesn't move any needles anywhere. It's just 158 00:11:01.840 --> 00:11:05.759 simply the academics talking amongst themselves about things who can do whose whose outcome is 159 00:11:05.759 --> 00:11:07.759 predetermined? But she's fighting back, of course. In a New York Times 160 00:11:07.879 --> 00:11:13.639 editorial that she that she wrote, she was called what just happened to Harvard 161 00:11:13.679 --> 00:11:16.799 is bigger than me, because we all should be worried of the many lines 162 00:11:16.879 --> 00:11:20.840 that you can pull this, she wrote, quote, this was merely a 163 00:11:20.840 --> 00:11:24.759 single skirmish in a broader war to unravel public faith in pillars of American society. 164 00:11:26.000 --> 00:11:28.679 Wow, well, you know, I think the auto unraveling has been 165 00:11:28.879 --> 00:11:33.360 manifest for some time. She goes on. Campaigns of this kind often start 166 00:11:33.360 --> 00:11:37.600 with a tax on education and expertise, because these are the tools that best 167 00:11:37.600 --> 00:11:41.879 equipped communities to see through propaganda. Well, I'm not sure that. I'm 168 00:11:41.919 --> 00:11:46.159 not sure that education or expertise is necessarily manifest in the works that she was 169 00:11:46.200 --> 00:11:50.559 doing. I mean of a certain sense, yes, in the sense that 170 00:11:50.759 --> 00:11:54.120 educate, that that that people at that level will write these these esoteric, 171 00:11:54.519 --> 00:12:00.480 utiliated works that mean nothing and don't have any impact whatsoever, and that their 172 00:12:00.519 --> 00:12:09.080 expertise is simultaneously sort of useless and not applicable to anything in particular except maybe 173 00:12:09.120 --> 00:12:13.879 reading or judging one of these other papers. But no, nobody's attacking education 174 00:12:13.960 --> 00:12:18.080 and expertise. What we are attacking and concerned about is what the educators are 175 00:12:18.080 --> 00:12:22.600 teaching the kids and how they're Their claims of expertise actually are supposed to shield 176 00:12:22.600 --> 00:12:26.799 them from criticism. Who are you to tell the you know, the elementary 177 00:12:26.840 --> 00:12:28.519 school teachers what they can do, what they can do. They they got 178 00:12:28.519 --> 00:12:33.320 they have a degree in education. Well, you know, I'm sorry. 179 00:12:33.559 --> 00:12:39.679 The the the lack of faith in the credentialed class has been self inflicted, 180 00:12:39.200 --> 00:12:43.360 not by some people who are you know, knuckle dragon yahoos or saying don't 181 00:12:43.360 --> 00:12:46.519 trust these folks who are smart book learning, but because they seem disconnected from 182 00:12:46.559 --> 00:12:50.720 society and they don't seem to be particularly smart to begin with, reciting an 183 00:12:50.799 --> 00:12:56.879 endless series of cliches and and and tropes about which coincidentally all happen to be 184 00:12:56.919 --> 00:13:03.600 from progressive modes of thought. So yeah, so like bears repeating that the 185 00:13:03.399 --> 00:13:09.080 or noting that the the right, the conservatives didn't fire Claudie Gay, they 186 00:13:09.120 --> 00:13:13.080 didn't have any power to do so that she was fired by the Harvard trustees. 187 00:13:13.720 --> 00:13:18.399 So that Harvard leadership fired her. And at no point did anybody have 188 00:13:18.480 --> 00:13:22.519 any any any and the last time this happened in an American university was at 189 00:13:22.600 --> 00:13:28.120 Stanford, where the Stanford president was found to be plagiarizing in or academic ethical 190 00:13:28.159 --> 00:13:33.840 violations of academic standards, and he was fired. I mean, the idea 191 00:13:33.879 --> 00:13:35.759 that there's anything going on here. Look, if you if you've written eleven 192 00:13:35.799 --> 00:13:41.159 papers, and you've and you've plagiarized fifty times, keep your head down when 193 00:13:41.159 --> 00:13:46.159 they when the lady asked you, hey, what do you think about genocide? 194 00:13:46.200 --> 00:13:48.879 Say I don't like it. That's what you have to do, right. 195 00:13:50.320 --> 00:13:54.480 The alternate side of it is the the idea that, okay, well 196 00:13:54.519 --> 00:13:58.919 now you know that I saw this yesterday, people come saying, good threatening, 197 00:13:58.080 --> 00:14:03.080 We're going to go after right wing academics, right wing university presidents. 198 00:14:03.200 --> 00:14:05.919 See what happens. Then it's like we have at it. I mean, 199 00:14:07.799 --> 00:14:15.000 you can find that. Send me a postcard. It's Ben sass and and 200 00:14:13.200 --> 00:14:16.919 uh and that's it. Larry Arn, that's it, you got, that's 201 00:14:16.919 --> 00:14:20.679 it's all. You got it. 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And we thanks 223 00:15:56.960 --> 00:16:03.120 Shopify for sponsoring this the Rigighet Podcast. And now we welcome to the podcast. 224 00:16:03.120 --> 00:16:07.559 Iron Heresy, Ali activist, author of Prey, Immigration, Islam, 225 00:16:07.679 --> 00:16:11.399 and the Erosion of Women's Rights, and a research fellow at the Hoover Institution. 226 00:16:11.600 --> 00:16:15.679 So happy to have you here today. Let's step back a little bit 227 00:16:15.679 --> 00:16:18.039 and set the stage for some people who are coming to this, perhaps not 228 00:16:18.080 --> 00:16:22.000 with the knowledge that we have. You emigrated to Europe a little over thirty 229 00:16:22.080 --> 00:16:26.360 years ago. A lot has happened since nineteen ninety two. But for the 230 00:16:26.360 --> 00:16:30.440 people who don't know your story, just remind us briefly why you left your 231 00:16:30.480 --> 00:16:37.320 home and how you decided that the West was your destination because the West was 232 00:16:37.679 --> 00:16:42.720 different, was special. Well, okay, thank you. That's a lot, 233 00:16:42.799 --> 00:16:47.879 and I'll try and squeeze into the shots of time we have, so 234 00:16:47.919 --> 00:16:52.080 the fast time I left my home I was a child under ten years of 235 00:16:52.120 --> 00:16:55.919 age, maybe eight or nine years and I was born in Mogadishu, Somalia. 236 00:16:56.639 --> 00:17:02.360 We left because our country was seized by a member of the military to 237 00:17:02.480 --> 00:17:07.519 establish a dictatorship. So there you have us that phenomenon that was very common 238 00:17:07.559 --> 00:17:11.640 in Africa at the time and in later decades, someone comes out of the 239 00:17:11.640 --> 00:17:17.759 blue and says, am, your president and establishes a dictatorship. And then 240 00:17:17.880 --> 00:17:22.079 my family went to Saudi Arabia, which was a theocracy. And for the 241 00:17:22.119 --> 00:17:26.640 first time, I actually thought I was oppressed as a girl when I was 242 00:17:26.680 --> 00:17:29.319 in Somali, until I went to Saudi Arabia and thought, oh no, 243 00:17:29.400 --> 00:17:36.359 we're not oppressed. This is real oppression. Women were covered from head to 244 00:17:36.359 --> 00:17:41.519 toe, separated from men. It was just something very very bizarre, even 245 00:17:41.559 --> 00:17:45.440 for someone like me who grew up a Muslim. And I was fortunate enough 246 00:17:45.440 --> 00:17:48.920 for my family to be departed from Saudi Arabia and we landed in Ethiopia. 247 00:17:48.920 --> 00:17:56.559 Ethiopia was another dictatorship from by Mengistu Hailo Mariam. We were there for eighteen 248 00:17:56.599 --> 00:18:00.799 months and my mother had had enough. She said because we were Somali and 249 00:18:00.799 --> 00:18:04.920 Ethiopia were at war with one another, and my mom was extremely prejudiced against 250 00:18:04.920 --> 00:18:08.519 the Ethiopian since she wasn't going to live in their country. So we had 251 00:18:08.559 --> 00:18:11.920 to find a place to go, and my father found Kenya for us. 252 00:18:12.000 --> 00:18:17.920 So I was about ten years old when we landed in Nairobi, Kenya. 253 00:18:18.519 --> 00:18:23.839 It was a one party state. They held elections the same party one all 254 00:18:23.880 --> 00:18:30.279 the time. I went to school in Kenya. That's where I learned English. 255 00:18:30.359 --> 00:18:33.880 It was a former British colony, so the British had left a system 256 00:18:33.920 --> 00:18:37.599 of schooling. And again I was fortunate enough for my father to send me 257 00:18:37.680 --> 00:18:44.440 to school and argue with my mother that I should stay in school. It 258 00:18:44.599 --> 00:18:48.720 was a poor country, but compared to the others, we had relatively a 259 00:18:48.759 --> 00:18:53.920 little bit more freedom. My father left us in nineteen eighty one to go 260 00:18:55.039 --> 00:18:59.559 back to Ethiopia. He was part of a movement that had a militia and 261 00:18:59.599 --> 00:19:06.720 there the mission was to throw out the Somali dictator who had taken hold of 262 00:19:06.759 --> 00:19:11.920 Somali in nineteen sixty nine. So I was there with my mother. I 263 00:19:11.960 --> 00:19:17.400 know the experience of growing up with a single mother and with my brother and 264 00:19:17.440 --> 00:19:22.440 my sister going to school in Nairobie. My father is gone and I go 265 00:19:22.920 --> 00:19:30.640 my secondary school or what you call high school in America. I was fifteen, 266 00:19:30.799 --> 00:19:37.200 sixteen seventeen, and I remember my classmates being removed from school and being 267 00:19:37.240 --> 00:19:40.359 married off to men they had never met, so they never finished school. 268 00:19:40.759 --> 00:19:44.119 Now you were still in a Muslim environment, is that right Kenya as I 269 00:19:44.160 --> 00:19:48.160 recalls about half Christian and half Muslim. Yes, Kenya when we were there 270 00:19:48.240 --> 00:19:52.400 was actually officially a Christian country. But now, as you say, maybe 271 00:19:52.440 --> 00:19:56.519 it could be half half. But my mother ensured that my sister and I 272 00:19:56.559 --> 00:20:03.680 went to the Muslim girls secondary schoo all right, which I started school there 273 00:20:03.680 --> 00:20:07.039 in nineteen eighty four and eighty four eighty five. It was Muslim light, 274 00:20:07.119 --> 00:20:12.160 but after eighty five it started to be Islamized. We had these Muslim Brotherhood 275 00:20:12.279 --> 00:20:18.119 missions coming from Egypt and there was more missionary work coming from Iran. So 276 00:20:18.279 --> 00:20:26.440 it was it went from being Muslim light to real Islamists outposts. But I 277 00:20:26.480 --> 00:20:30.119 remember my classmates fifteen years old, fourteen years old, sixteen years old being 278 00:20:30.160 --> 00:20:36.240 married off, and I understood that the reason why I wasn't married off was 279 00:20:36.279 --> 00:20:41.400 because my father was gone, and my father was gone from our house until 280 00:20:41.759 --> 00:20:45.839 nineteen ninety one is when he came back. A civil war had occurred in 281 00:20:45.880 --> 00:20:51.680 Somali, and come from Somali, they came to Kenya. So that is 282 00:20:51.799 --> 00:20:55.920 when my father got the opportunity to come home to us, even though he 283 00:20:56.000 --> 00:21:00.440 was gone for a decade, and decided, I'm now the mass of this 284 00:21:00.519 --> 00:21:04.119 household, and oh, my goodness, my daughter is you know, twenty 285 00:21:04.279 --> 00:21:08.759 two and time to find a husband. And then I got married off, 286 00:21:08.880 --> 00:21:15.039 and of course by then I had matured, you know, at the age 287 00:21:15.039 --> 00:21:22.559 of twenty two, my twenty two. I was immature in ways that I 288 00:21:22.559 --> 00:21:27.039 think Western gals are very mature, but I was mature in ways that Western 289 00:21:27.039 --> 00:21:30.400 girls are not mature. I understood fully what the future held for me if 290 00:21:30.400 --> 00:21:34.319 I went with this man that my father married me off too. And from 291 00:21:34.359 --> 00:21:41.400 the time it happened until I was able to escape, I worked on trying 292 00:21:41.440 --> 00:21:47.000 to find a window of opportunity that I could call out. I don't want 293 00:21:47.000 --> 00:21:48.960 to jump the timeline a little bit, but and I don't expect you to 294 00:21:49.039 --> 00:21:56.319 remember this, but you and I met now almost twenty years ago in an 295 00:21:56.400 --> 00:22:03.880 event in Los Angeles, and it was a conversation about Islam, and it 296 00:22:03.960 --> 00:22:07.759 was between you and Reza Aslam, who was a wonderful writer, a nice 297 00:22:07.759 --> 00:22:11.319 guy, but had written a book in which he's sort of what he was 298 00:22:11.319 --> 00:22:15.559 trying to do. He is a very academic attitude, and you were very 299 00:22:15.599 --> 00:22:18.079 polite as he explained that no, no, no, you don't understand you 300 00:22:18.119 --> 00:22:22.400 people here in the West. The Quran is a text, and a text 301 00:22:22.400 --> 00:22:26.119 tests its own meaning, and it's on undermeaning and really we shouldn't be frightened 302 00:22:26.119 --> 00:22:27.519 of the Koran. We shouldn't be frightened of Islam. It's really it's a 303 00:22:27.720 --> 00:22:30.039 it's a text. It's a text. And you kind of looked at him 304 00:22:30.640 --> 00:22:34.200 and and said, well, that could be that that is true, although 305 00:22:34.279 --> 00:22:44.039 I I have bodyguards and they're not protecting me from words and always struck me. 306 00:22:44.160 --> 00:22:49.480 Is like, that was incredibly brave that you because you were you were 307 00:22:49.519 --> 00:22:55.960 young then I mean you're still and so I guess my question is twoful One 308 00:22:56.079 --> 00:23:02.519 is how's that going? Because I know that you were under threat for a 309 00:23:02.559 --> 00:23:07.680 long time, And then at a larger perspective, how is it all going? 310 00:23:08.200 --> 00:23:12.880 In the what we thought then was going to be a cataclysmic struggle between 311 00:23:12.920 --> 00:23:19.119 the forces of radical fundamentalists, sort of backward Islam and the twenty first century. 312 00:23:21.599 --> 00:23:26.440 Where are we in that war? So in terms of you know, 313 00:23:26.920 --> 00:23:33.759 the personal threats, I I'm of the mindset these people don't forget, they 314 00:23:33.759 --> 00:23:41.119 don't forgive. What happened to Solomon tush D He lets his gout down and 315 00:23:41.839 --> 00:23:49.319 in August of twenty two he was he was attached. Yeah, fortunate that 316 00:23:49.359 --> 00:23:55.000 he survived. So I never let my guard down. The bodyguards are still 317 00:23:55.039 --> 00:24:03.480 there, the framework of freedom constraining security is still there, right. But 318 00:24:03.599 --> 00:24:11.440 the wider question, the confrontation between radical Islam on the one hand and the 319 00:24:11.440 --> 00:24:19.079 West, where is that it's ongoing. I see scenarios where maybe there is 320 00:24:19.359 --> 00:24:25.960 a lights at the end of the tunnel. I thought that moment when the 321 00:24:26.000 --> 00:24:30.440 Abraham Accords were reached, when some of the you know, the important Arab 322 00:24:30.480 --> 00:24:36.960 countries like Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the UAE were willing to recognize Israel, 323 00:24:37.359 --> 00:24:41.160 to modernize, to move on, to diversify their economies from oil to and 324 00:24:41.279 --> 00:24:47.000 join the wider economy, free their women. I thought, well, there 325 00:24:47.160 --> 00:24:49.720 is maybe a coming together. It's going to take a long long time, 326 00:24:49.759 --> 00:24:56.519 but eventually I could see a scenario where the West and these Arab leaders could 327 00:24:56.559 --> 00:25:03.200 work together to fight against the radical is elements that they had spawned and funded 328 00:25:03.240 --> 00:25:07.839 in the past. But now I see a setback which I think the seventh 329 00:25:07.839 --> 00:25:17.680 of October Hamas attacks on Israel and absolutely gruesome and heinous attacks on women and 330 00:25:17.799 --> 00:25:22.400 children and babies and gang grapes and branning of people that I think has taken 331 00:25:22.480 --> 00:25:26.079 us back to the reality of the face of the evil we are fighting what 332 00:25:26.200 --> 00:25:32.799 radical Islamism is, and for now it looks like those that process of coming 333 00:25:32.799 --> 00:25:38.039 together has paused. Question is is it a pause or is it permanent? 334 00:25:38.880 --> 00:25:42.160 Is there any are you? Are you maybe I'm just a Polian? Here 335 00:25:42.160 --> 00:25:47.119 are you hope? Does this give you any hope at all? The idea 336 00:25:47.160 --> 00:25:52.400 that this the most I mean, the most deadly and the most shocking attack 337 00:25:52.519 --> 00:26:00.160 on Israel before this, before our coverer seventh led to a regional war and 338 00:26:00.200 --> 00:26:06.519 this is not. To date, it has not. It does look like 339 00:26:06.640 --> 00:26:11.559 as fragile as the past twenty years have been, thirty years have been in 340 00:26:11.279 --> 00:26:21.440 larger Middle East peace it's holding it is fair or not? I just want 341 00:26:21.480 --> 00:26:23.119 to do one step back and think, you know, in terms of, 342 00:26:23.240 --> 00:26:30.240 you know, the confrontation between radical Islamism in the West. I think radical 343 00:26:30.519 --> 00:26:33.839 Islam as a force is a force to be reckoned with and should not be 344 00:26:34.000 --> 00:26:41.079 underestimated. Ever, But the problem we are seeing now is that within the 345 00:26:41.119 --> 00:26:47.759 West, our value system, our foundational principles, these things are being undermined 346 00:26:47.799 --> 00:26:52.880 from within, and that makes it easy for forces like radical Islam and other 347 00:26:53.079 --> 00:26:59.359 external enemies. I'm thinking of China, I'm thinking of putting. It makes 348 00:26:59.400 --> 00:27:04.599 it easy to penetrate the West, to divide and weaken us. And so 349 00:27:04.759 --> 00:27:11.839 in that sense, I'm absolutely more worried about what we are doing to ourselves 350 00:27:12.160 --> 00:27:19.880 to weaken our own structures and our own power than what an external enemy might 351 00:27:19.920 --> 00:27:22.720 to do to us. They'll take advantage of that, they'll exploit that. 352 00:27:22.920 --> 00:27:26.960 But right now I think we're our own worst enemy. How are we doing 353 00:27:26.960 --> 00:27:30.880 that? What? What? What? What's the worst thing we're doing to 354 00:27:30.920 --> 00:27:45.200 ourselves right now? We have abandoned the value system that and this Judeo Christian 355 00:27:45.480 --> 00:27:55.240 principles that led to these fine institutions that are envied and were envied by the 356 00:27:55.359 --> 00:28:03.079 outside. The concept of democracy, the concept of free speech, freedom of 357 00:28:03.240 --> 00:28:10.799 religion, the separation of religion, from politics, the you know, due 358 00:28:10.799 --> 00:28:21.960 process, fairness, equality, all of which all of which are incompatible with 359 00:28:22.160 --> 00:28:29.400 identity politics exactly. And so we've invented identity politics. We have we have 360 00:28:29.519 --> 00:28:33.000 learned, we have let it run amock in our vest and now in our 361 00:28:33.039 --> 00:28:37.720 schools and everywhere else. And we're now dealing with a generation, a young 362 00:28:37.799 --> 00:28:45.039 generation that has been somewhat cut off from these grounding principles and their institutions. 363 00:28:45.039 --> 00:28:48.759 They have been made to believe that America and the rest of the worst is 364 00:28:48.799 --> 00:28:56.039 all about exploitation, and our history is just really only bad slavery, segregation, 365 00:28:56.279 --> 00:29:02.039 exploitation, colonialism. This is what they are caught in the finest institutions 366 00:29:02.200 --> 00:29:04.559 at Harvard, at Stanford, at Yale, everywhere else, if come to 367 00:29:04.599 --> 00:29:08.720 believe this about themselves. And there's this sense, I think that they don't 368 00:29:08.759 --> 00:29:15.680 think that there is anything to fight for, and there's this stance of you 369 00:29:15.720 --> 00:29:22.440 know, if you look at diversity, equity and inclusion, this I call 370 00:29:22.480 --> 00:29:27.319 it a menace, but it is a program that is supposed to advance a 371 00:29:27.359 --> 00:29:34.359 bureaucracy to take root within all of our institutions, to bring down the standards 372 00:29:34.359 --> 00:29:42.200 of merriage, to basically to implement this idea that we have to tear everything 373 00:29:42.240 --> 00:29:49.440 down and replace it, and what we are replacing it with just terrible ion. 374 00:29:49.559 --> 00:29:52.799 Peter here, forgive me, my voice is very rough. I'm getting 375 00:29:52.799 --> 00:29:56.200 over a cold. I actually feel fine, but my voice doesn't know it 376 00:29:56.319 --> 00:30:03.519 yet. You put up a post a few weeks ago that got the attention 377 00:30:03.880 --> 00:30:07.519 of the whole world, and you said that you have become a Christian. 378 00:30:07.839 --> 00:30:12.200 Now I know that you're writing a book on this subject, and I can't 379 00:30:12.240 --> 00:30:17.519 wait for the book because I would like a thorough explanation. And I also 380 00:30:17.680 --> 00:30:22.279 know that it can be tricky to talk about something when at the same time 381 00:30:22.319 --> 00:30:26.920 you're writing about it. So if I ask a question that you just don't 382 00:30:26.920 --> 00:30:30.960 want to deal with right now because you're going to be writing about it later 383 00:30:30.039 --> 00:30:37.279 this evening, go ahead and say so. But here's the way. Here's 384 00:30:37.319 --> 00:30:41.359 the way. I think Christopher Hitchins, our old friend, Christopher Hitchins, 385 00:30:41.680 --> 00:30:45.000 would have looked at your progress, and he would have seen it as progress. 386 00:30:47.039 --> 00:30:52.000 You were raised in the Muslim world, you withdrew from it, you 387 00:30:52.160 --> 00:30:57.119 escaped it, you land in Europe, and of course become you become an 388 00:30:57.160 --> 00:31:03.240 atheist because you see that Europe itself has been through something like what you hope 389 00:31:03.240 --> 00:31:08.200 the Muslim world will eventually go through. That is, it has emerged from 390 00:31:08.519 --> 00:31:18.680 ancient superstitions to embrace a purely rational view of the world, embracing the scientific 391 00:31:18.759 --> 00:31:22.599 method. We only permit ourselves to believe in what we can demonstrate to be 392 00:31:22.720 --> 00:31:29.440 true by all kinds of rigorous analysis. And this is the way the West 393 00:31:29.480 --> 00:31:33.920 itself is going. Christopher Hitchens, of course, viewed it as a kind 394 00:31:33.960 --> 00:31:37.759 of triumph of the human spirit and the human intellect. And here goes Ion 395 00:31:40.119 --> 00:31:45.440 and says, no, Christopher, I have decided to become a Christian. 396 00:31:47.039 --> 00:31:52.759 Now, why are you not engaging in a kind of staggeringly retrograde action here? 397 00:31:52.839 --> 00:31:57.000 Why does that strike you as progress of any kind instead of a rejection 398 00:31:57.160 --> 00:32:07.440 of the Enlightenment? Because I'm working on a book and it's a long answer 399 00:32:07.480 --> 00:32:14.799 to the question that you've just posed, where there's my personal evolution from being 400 00:32:15.240 --> 00:32:17.799 a Muslim, and at one point I was a radical Islamist, and then 401 00:32:17.880 --> 00:32:27.599 coming to Holland and then gradually adopting the lifestyle at first of you know, 402 00:32:27.920 --> 00:32:31.720 of my surroundings, and then after the eleventh of September two thousand and one, 403 00:32:32.680 --> 00:32:36.559 having to be confronted with am I really a Muslim? Ifore, I'm 404 00:32:36.559 --> 00:32:40.720 so critical of what those who are who say they are true to the faith 405 00:32:42.400 --> 00:32:46.240 in its most peole form. If I oppose that, how could I possibly 406 00:32:46.279 --> 00:32:51.839 be a Muslim? And so I left Islam. And I didn't leave Islam 407 00:32:51.880 --> 00:32:59.039 for another religion. I left Islam for atheism, And you're absolutely right. 408 00:33:00.799 --> 00:33:07.240 Back then was it's a burden, a load that has lifted off my shoulders 409 00:33:07.359 --> 00:33:15.279 that I don't have to deal with superstition and to enter the realm of enlightenment 410 00:33:15.359 --> 00:33:19.519 in reason, I'm going to be surrounded with just people. Anybody who lives 411 00:33:19.519 --> 00:33:28.240 religion almost immediately becomes rational and is enlightened. And of course we've seen people 412 00:33:28.319 --> 00:33:30.240 who are older than me, more but sure than I am, who have 413 00:33:30.319 --> 00:33:35.960 lived, you know, even as far back as the nineteenth century, eighteenth 414 00:33:36.000 --> 00:33:44.400 century, nineteenth century understood that's not necessarily the case. And I think we're 415 00:33:44.400 --> 00:33:50.160 now living through a period where people have left religion, and when they leave 416 00:33:50.240 --> 00:33:58.039 religion, they find themselves in this void, and the void is filled by 417 00:33:58.319 --> 00:34:02.519 different kinds of superstition, and some of them very very superficial, and so 418 00:34:02.599 --> 00:34:08.840 I've come to think, even rethink the sources of the Enlightenment, and I'm 419 00:34:08.920 --> 00:34:17.400 today more persuaded that the Enlightenment was really still on its judaeo Christian premises. 420 00:34:19.519 --> 00:34:27.719 Then you know something that is completely separate and opposed to Christianity. I don't 421 00:34:27.719 --> 00:34:31.440 believe that anymore. But again, like I said, I'm details to follow, 422 00:34:31.679 --> 00:34:35.880 right, details to follow. And one thing I'd like to say. 423 00:34:35.920 --> 00:34:38.519 It's hard to speak for the dead, but I really think that if Christopher 424 00:34:38.639 --> 00:34:44.239 Hutchins had lived today and he was able to see what you and I see, 425 00:34:45.719 --> 00:34:47.480 I think he might have come to a different conclusion. I think he 426 00:34:47.559 --> 00:34:53.079 might have reflected on his writings, and at least I know he was intellectually 427 00:34:53.159 --> 00:34:59.159 honest enough to as he was, Yeah that he probably he may have been 428 00:34:59.159 --> 00:35:02.599 wrong about something. If he'd converted and gone into the pastorship, he would 429 00:35:02.639 --> 00:35:06.840 have packed the pews every Sunday. I would go to hear Christian religions. 430 00:35:07.239 --> 00:35:14.840 Europe has left religion behind and has filled the void with notions of transnational equity 431 00:35:15.000 --> 00:35:17.320 and global warming and the rest of it. We see where that's heading for 432 00:35:17.360 --> 00:35:22.320 them. America less so, but we are becoming less religious all of those 433 00:35:22.320 --> 00:35:28.440 things that you mentioned that characterized the West as having derived from Judeo Christian ethics. 434 00:35:30.039 --> 00:35:37.360 Do you think it's possible for those things to maintain without a Christian community 435 00:35:37.800 --> 00:35:40.639 that characterizes the general population of the United States? In other words, can 436 00:35:42.239 --> 00:35:45.880 everybody be sort of just diagnostic and maybe only go to church once or twice 437 00:35:45.880 --> 00:35:50.760 a year and we can still have the same faith and power of these institutions 438 00:35:50.840 --> 00:35:57.280 or is Do you believe that there's a necessary connection between a religious population and 439 00:35:57.280 --> 00:36:01.679 those ideas that permitted us to flower and prosper I think that there is a 440 00:36:01.719 --> 00:36:08.119 clear connection between again Judeo Christian with the emphasis on that, on those values, 441 00:36:08.239 --> 00:36:13.440 and the outcome of that, which is the civilization that we have Western 442 00:36:13.480 --> 00:36:19.239 civilization. The father we move away from these foundations, the more we weaken 443 00:36:19.320 --> 00:36:23.360 ourselves and then become something else. I'd like to point out, if you 444 00:36:23.440 --> 00:36:30.719 look at right now, almost all conversations into twenty twenty three twenty twenty four 445 00:36:30.280 --> 00:36:37.639 are about the mental health crisis underway. And some people say, oh, 446 00:36:37.639 --> 00:36:40.039 there was always a mental health crisis, but because of social media and internet, 447 00:36:40.119 --> 00:36:43.760 we know more about it. I disagree with that. I think it's 448 00:36:43.840 --> 00:36:49.599 different. And why is it different? Because I am looking at communities that 449 00:36:49.679 --> 00:36:57.840 are still charged, going and faith based, and those communities are functioning very 450 00:36:57.880 --> 00:37:04.360 well. And mental health, especially among gods, is very very law compared 451 00:37:04.400 --> 00:37:07.559 to those that have drifted off and cut everything off. And this is this 452 00:37:07.760 --> 00:37:13.960 is some of the questions that our organizations Standford, Harvard, m I T. 453 00:37:14.440 --> 00:37:20.400 You know, all of these social science departments in these schools should be 454 00:37:20.480 --> 00:37:23.360 asking and answering these questions. But they're not asking these questions and not answering 455 00:37:23.400 --> 00:37:27.639 it again because of the issue we talked about. But this are some of 456 00:37:27.679 --> 00:37:31.400 the things that I'm seeing, and these are very very, very important observations. 457 00:37:32.280 --> 00:37:40.599 So you went from Somalia to Saudi Arabia and then you discovered what ack, 458 00:37:42.880 --> 00:37:46.360 my good lord, I didn't realize I had it so well. Isn't 459 00:37:46.400 --> 00:37:50.880 that I mean? Is there is there a way of describing this is my 460 00:37:51.000 --> 00:37:52.840 these are my priors, is a way of describing the way things are now. 461 00:37:53.360 --> 00:37:57.800 It always seems to me that, I mean, the word decadent isn't 462 00:37:57.840 --> 00:38:02.519 quite right, but it's the there's something about the West. We're so rich 463 00:38:04.840 --> 00:38:08.920 an astonishing amount of I mean from from reagan s second year, third year 464 00:38:09.039 --> 00:38:17.639 eighty three, eighty four to today. That's forty years. Astonishing amount of 465 00:38:17.719 --> 00:38:22.480 wealth in the world. I mean, good for the world in the West, 466 00:38:22.119 --> 00:38:24.880 in the West, but I mean even even the emerging way. I 467 00:38:24.920 --> 00:38:29.320 mean, if you're you know, more people out of poverty in India, 468 00:38:29.360 --> 00:38:37.719 more people out of poverty in China. Have we lost our problems today that 469 00:38:37.800 --> 00:38:44.519 we just forgot how first of all, how good we have it, how 470 00:38:44.559 --> 00:38:52.599 fragile that is, and that we still have to work at it. I 471 00:38:52.639 --> 00:38:58.719 think we've reached that generation. If you think of a nation state the way 472 00:38:58.719 --> 00:39:02.440 you would think of an organized I love to make this comparison of you know, 473 00:39:02.519 --> 00:39:07.039 these family businesses that were built, you know, the pioneers, they 474 00:39:07.079 --> 00:39:13.559 were very poorly built it out nothing, and then two or three generations follow 475 00:39:14.079 --> 00:39:17.719 that expand and create this enormous wealth. But sooner or later you get to 476 00:39:17.760 --> 00:39:22.320 a generation that just inherits it and has nothing to do for it with it, 477 00:39:22.400 --> 00:39:27.639 and just spend and wonders. And I think that we have reached in 478 00:39:27.760 --> 00:39:37.159 the West that place where we've inherited all these amazing institutions and we're spending it. 479 00:39:37.960 --> 00:39:43.599 And when I came to the Netherlands in nineteen ninety two. I think 480 00:39:43.599 --> 00:39:49.440 there was still as sense that we had to do something to keep it going. 481 00:39:50.360 --> 00:39:54.320 But over time I think we've lost it, and this has become clearer 482 00:39:54.400 --> 00:39:59.480 to me ever since I came to America. I came to America. I 483 00:39:59.559 --> 00:40:02.360 moved to American in two thousand and six and started work for the American Enterprise 484 00:40:02.480 --> 00:40:07.880 Institute, and my colleagues in Washington, d C. When we talked about 485 00:40:07.679 --> 00:40:15.079 the concept of multiculturalism, moral relativism, the sorts of decadence that was ongoing 486 00:40:15.199 --> 00:40:19.280 in Europe, my American colleagues would say, that's not going to happen in 487 00:40:19.280 --> 00:40:25.519 America. We have faith, we are a much younger country. We as 488 00:40:25.559 --> 00:40:34.760 you know the remaining here Germany. We are constantly aware of these external enemies 489 00:40:34.920 --> 00:40:39.360 that want us down. So Americans in general, compared to Europeans, are 490 00:40:39.480 --> 00:40:46.840 way more patriotically were comparing Europe to an open air museum. And so it's 491 00:40:46.920 --> 00:40:52.239 hard now nearly twenty years on, to look at my American colleagues in the 492 00:40:52.280 --> 00:40:57.559 face and say, so, what do you think, are we really that 493 00:40:57.639 --> 00:41:02.679 much better than Europe? Is that I'm trying to maneuver this conversation. So 494 00:41:02.840 --> 00:41:08.800 you say something optimistic. That's how That's how I roll here, you know 495 00:41:09.480 --> 00:41:14.079 Churchill. Churchill said that America always does the right thing after exhausting all the 496 00:41:14.079 --> 00:41:15.920 other things. Right, I always chooses the right option after exhausting all the 497 00:41:15.960 --> 00:41:20.360 others. Are there any green shoots of hope here? I mean I see 498 00:41:20.360 --> 00:41:25.639 some in American culture. I see some in European culture actually, but I 499 00:41:25.679 --> 00:41:30.719 see a lot of obviously a lot of challenges, but something there's something refreshing 500 00:41:30.800 --> 00:41:35.760 about having the challenges out in the open. In just my own personal experience, 501 00:41:38.440 --> 00:41:46.159 I remember going to Silicon Valley in the early two thousands or early part 502 00:41:46.159 --> 00:41:52.760 of this of the century, and it was universally thought that all of this 503 00:41:52.920 --> 00:41:57.159 technology was going to make the world great. It's just how could it not 504 00:41:57.320 --> 00:42:04.159 be? How could this interconnected Facebook not make everybody happy and free and the 505 00:42:04.199 --> 00:42:09.039 flourishing of ideas. And we look back on that now, and these are 506 00:42:09.079 --> 00:42:13.320 very smart people and just think, oh, I can't believe you believe that 507 00:42:13.400 --> 00:42:16.360 nonsense? Of course not. Are we waking up now? Are we still 508 00:42:16.400 --> 00:42:21.800 sleep? I guess my quick question. I think we are waking up, 509 00:42:21.880 --> 00:42:29.119 and I think I am optimistic. I mean, it's our job at the 510 00:42:29.119 --> 00:42:36.159 HOOVA Institution to talk about and reflect and meditate on what's wrong and figure out 511 00:42:36.199 --> 00:42:42.920 ways of making propositions for change. But I am optimistic and that's also why 512 00:42:43.079 --> 00:42:46.920 I do what I do. Number One, I don't think that technology, 513 00:42:47.079 --> 00:42:53.760 generally speaking, was net negative. I think it's net positive. And remember 514 00:42:53.800 --> 00:42:58.840 technology, like old tools, it's just a tool. It is what you 515 00:42:58.960 --> 00:43:05.039 use it for. So I think technology has given us a great deal of 516 00:43:05.039 --> 00:43:08.199 abundance. And you just talked about how a lot of people were lifted out 517 00:43:08.199 --> 00:43:15.960 of poverty and technology contributed a great deal to that in many ways, democratization 518 00:43:15.039 --> 00:43:22.000 of wealth, still knowing full well that the gap between the haves and the 519 00:43:22.039 --> 00:43:27.280 have nots is still quite wide, too wide, in my view, technology, 520 00:43:28.599 --> 00:43:34.760 you know, net effect is good. What makes me optimistic, especially 521 00:43:34.800 --> 00:43:39.119 in America, maybe to build on the Church quote, is that for a 522 00:43:39.199 --> 00:43:45.320 while we experimented with terrible ideas. We let these things get out of control. 523 00:43:45.679 --> 00:43:49.840 But now I think there is an awakening. Look at what's going on 524 00:43:49.920 --> 00:43:57.280 after that congressional hearing with the three universitys and I think what that is just 525 00:43:57.760 --> 00:44:02.679 a moment like that, it's brought into the open my husband, Neil, 526 00:44:02.800 --> 00:44:07.480 and I and a lot of people at Hoover and other places. We were 527 00:44:07.519 --> 00:44:14.719 trying to sound the alarm about the things that were going on inside academia, 528 00:44:14.760 --> 00:44:21.159 inside universities that had then also spread K to twelve. And there were moments 529 00:44:21.199 --> 00:44:22.800 when I thought, nobody is going to hear. We just have to give 530 00:44:22.880 --> 00:44:28.119 up. And then a moment comes like that, that congressional hearing, that 531 00:44:28.239 --> 00:44:32.079 confrontation, and the presidents of the three leading university haven't give an answer, 532 00:44:32.639 --> 00:44:37.480 and that has then put us in this place in America where everywhere you go, 533 00:44:37.639 --> 00:44:44.199 every boardroom, every classroom, every birthday party I go to, everyone 534 00:44:44.320 --> 00:44:49.360 is talking about what is wrong, how divis a hurt are wide? What 535 00:44:49.400 --> 00:44:52.239 are we going to do about it? And I think the next bit is, 536 00:44:52.320 --> 00:44:54.440 you know, stay awake, Let's stay awake, and let's stay focused. 537 00:44:54.719 --> 00:44:59.480 Ion. I have a closing question for you, and it concerns a 538 00:44:59.639 --> 00:45:02.880 very old friend of mine who happens to be listening right now, and his 539 00:45:04.000 --> 00:45:09.880 name is Rob Long. And Rob has decided, I don't think I'm breaking 540 00:45:09.920 --> 00:45:15.079 any confidence here. I think it's at least semi public. Rob has decided 541 00:45:15.639 --> 00:45:20.719 that he may very well in the next year or two attend Divinity School. 542 00:45:21.559 --> 00:45:23.800 Now, as he first began talking about this, it has had the feel 543 00:45:23.840 --> 00:45:29.239 to me as a kind of ornament on his career, an interesting thing to 544 00:45:29.280 --> 00:45:37.079 do with this dornumental life. But in more recent conversations it seems to me 545 00:45:38.320 --> 00:45:43.880 that he's actually becoming quite serious about it. I would like to ask Ayan 546 00:45:44.280 --> 00:45:52.199 here's cli to give advice to Rob Long and to tell him what are the 547 00:45:52.360 --> 00:45:59.880 questions to which he should he must find answers in Divinity School? What qu 548 00:46:00.039 --> 00:46:05.400 questions should he ask? Oh, my goodness, you're putting me on the 549 00:46:05.559 --> 00:46:16.039 spot. When I left Islam, and the question for me was is there 550 00:46:16.119 --> 00:46:22.039 a God? Or is there no God? And now that I've evolved, 551 00:46:22.039 --> 00:46:31.679 I think that's actually the wrong question. And the right question now is how 552 00:46:31.800 --> 00:46:40.960 do we make amends to God who has given us all these gifts? You 553 00:46:42.039 --> 00:46:46.400 know? How do we find our way back and anchor? And he is 554 00:46:46.480 --> 00:46:53.119 I think where it starts to get tricky. There are all kinds of people 555 00:46:53.360 --> 00:47:00.480 and groups of people who make claims to divinity and the divine and use that 556 00:47:00.400 --> 00:47:07.079 as a tool for oppression and for doing really bad things. And how do 557 00:47:07.199 --> 00:47:14.280 we walk this walk, this tightrope of on the one hand, finding God, 558 00:47:15.000 --> 00:47:21.000 the real God, having understanding him and his promise, and at the 559 00:47:21.079 --> 00:47:28.920 same time avoiding these pitfalls. I'm not sure I've given you the right question. 560 00:47:29.079 --> 00:47:32.920 I difinity to ask. But oh no, I think that you are 561 00:47:34.159 --> 00:47:39.079 busy. Let me think more about it. Well, I think that's a 562 00:47:39.119 --> 00:47:43.239 good question. I mean, not that I would want to paraphrase that, 563 00:47:43.360 --> 00:47:49.920 but I you know, how to find your way back? Yeah, not 564 00:47:50.159 --> 00:47:52.639 to back where you came from, obviously, because you don't need we don't 565 00:47:52.639 --> 00:47:54.679 want god to go back. But how do you find your way back to 566 00:47:54.760 --> 00:48:04.719 the to what home? Meant? Yeah, in the larger sense without you're 567 00:48:04.760 --> 00:48:09.679 regressing and turning back the clock, but saving the you know, keeping the 568 00:48:09.760 --> 00:48:14.119 tablets. I guess it's the one of the phrases people use. I mean, 569 00:48:14.159 --> 00:48:15.840 that's a big that's the question. That's definitely a political question people have, 570 00:48:16.000 --> 00:48:22.159 right, I mean, you know the reason you don't without abandoning reason, 571 00:48:22.559 --> 00:48:27.760 but also acknowledging the spiritual hunger and the spiritual need and the fact that 572 00:48:27.920 --> 00:48:32.960 you can be spiritual and religious but not irrational. Sounds good to me. 573 00:48:35.119 --> 00:48:38.400 It's a very It's a good question for the eve of Epiphany, that's for 574 00:48:38.480 --> 00:48:45.239 sure. The good news is we don't have to invent the wheel ourselves. 575 00:48:46.800 --> 00:48:51.960 That is good. I would know how to do it. That's pretty true. 576 00:48:52.519 --> 00:48:54.719 That is very true. Yes, well, you know, Rob, 577 00:48:54.760 --> 00:48:59.320 you if you do go to divinity school and you get a degree out of 578 00:48:59.360 --> 00:49:01.679 this, this will mean you have expertise. So what you say then about 579 00:49:01.800 --> 00:49:05.719 the existence of God and you know the elements of such, well, well 580 00:49:05.800 --> 00:49:09.639 we'll have more authority than than anyone else. So I will come to you 581 00:49:09.719 --> 00:49:14.000 with some of the searching questions that I have after you've completed this. Since 582 00:49:14.039 --> 00:49:17.960 you have that, I am, of course kidding, but no, I 583 00:49:19.000 --> 00:49:21.519 mean, we'll have talks about it. But you know you're not going to 584 00:49:21.519 --> 00:49:23.000 be able to pull out the degree. Well you know I went to I 585 00:49:23.719 --> 00:49:30.239 say unto you fairly, I say unto you right, Rob Longer James is 586 00:49:30.320 --> 00:49:34.239 greater than that which can be conceived. Mizzoli, thank you so much for 587 00:49:34.360 --> 00:49:36.920 joining us today. We would like to talk to you again when your book 588 00:49:36.960 --> 00:49:40.760 comes out, which will be a fascinating account, and and we thank you 589 00:49:40.840 --> 00:49:45.119 for the time that you've spent with us today and for all the contributions that 590 00:49:45.159 --> 00:49:49.760 you've made thanks and hope to speak to you again. Thank you, thank 591 00:49:49.800 --> 00:49:52.039 you very much, and happy New Year. I am Happy New Year, 592 00:49:52.199 --> 00:49:57.039 Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, our best to your boys, including Neil. 593 00:49:57.320 --> 00:50:00.320 Thank you, thank you very much. Bye bye. That is going 594 00:50:00.360 --> 00:50:04.079 to be a great book, I got to say, And well, why 595 00:50:04.079 --> 00:50:06.960 don't you tell people what it's about, because we didn't really talk about it, 596 00:50:07.920 --> 00:50:10.880 not because well we just didn't because it wasn't the subject of the interview. 597 00:50:10.920 --> 00:50:17.360 But it is about well, it's about her conversion to Christianity, so 598 00:50:17.400 --> 00:50:21.239 it's I think it's really a sort of larger story, but I think it 599 00:50:21.360 --> 00:50:24.440 begins. I mean, she had a sort of a political consciousness journey, 600 00:50:24.480 --> 00:50:27.639 which she's talked about and written about it, and I think this is more 601 00:50:27.639 --> 00:50:30.280 of a spiritual consciousness journey, which I think is going to be fantastic. 602 00:50:30.320 --> 00:50:34.800 She's a really really brilliant, thoughtful thinker. And it was I know I 603 00:50:34.920 --> 00:50:38.880 started I mentioned this anecdote, but it was one of those things you rarely 604 00:50:39.039 --> 00:50:45.480 see actually take place in real life in front of you, which is a 605 00:50:45.639 --> 00:50:57.840 person quietly and utterly without rancor demolishing someone else's argument, someone else's long verbal 606 00:50:58.159 --> 00:51:07.559 verboth complicated sophisticated, intellectual argument was utterly demolished in about eleven words, and 607 00:51:07.920 --> 00:51:15.119 the silence that overcame a very loud group of arrogant, mostly liberal, mostly 608 00:51:15.199 --> 00:51:21.239 progressive Hollywood insiders was I could still hear it. I could still hear that 609 00:51:21.360 --> 00:51:30.800 silence. It was silence born of a epiphany, or silence born of seething 610 00:51:30.039 --> 00:51:35.039 rage that they actually couldn't construct their proper comeback that they had been I think 611 00:51:35.079 --> 00:51:37.960 it's shown something they didn't want to believe, that they couldn't believe that something 612 00:51:38.079 --> 00:51:42.960 like this was coming from somebody whose presence on the intersexual pyramid would determine otherwise, 613 00:51:43.840 --> 00:51:45.800 I know, I think yes. I don't know if it's raged so 614 00:51:45.880 --> 00:51:52.639 much as I think sometimes when you present an argument that is so inarguable to 615 00:51:52.800 --> 00:51:59.559 people, but it's foundationally revolutionary for that meaning that if they accepted it, 616 00:51:59.719 --> 00:52:04.360 they a lot of other things that have to change. Their response is either 617 00:52:04.400 --> 00:52:07.920 to scream and shout and plug their ears and sing. Right, we see 618 00:52:07.000 --> 00:52:10.840 people do that on the left end the right, or to disappear it, 619 00:52:13.440 --> 00:52:15.599 and I think that's mostly what the that's kind of the technique of the left 620 00:52:15.599 --> 00:52:20.800 because they have they have the ability and the levers to do that to just 621 00:52:20.880 --> 00:52:23.679 to make it go away, and so you go, right, So what 622 00:52:24.000 --> 00:52:25.960 she was what she was saying in that argument, what you're saying is that 623 00:52:27.079 --> 00:52:31.400 no, actually it is dangerous. It isn't something that we can iradical Islam, 624 00:52:31.480 --> 00:52:35.960 and in the Islamisist movement, isn't something that we can just kind of 625 00:52:36.119 --> 00:52:42.679 like negotiate away or redefine in some way that makes it makes it sound pretty. 626 00:52:43.719 --> 00:52:46.760 We can't put lipstick on it. It's dangerous and it's going to kill 627 00:52:46.840 --> 00:52:52.000 us. And as my evidence is, they're trying to kill me right now, 628 00:52:52.960 --> 00:53:00.159 right, And that that was that that kind of quiet moral voice was 629 00:53:00.280 --> 00:53:04.000 really important. I mean, and I don't know if I don't think anyone 630 00:53:04.119 --> 00:53:07.079 left the drove home in their BMW's had thought, well, you know, 631 00:53:07.079 --> 00:53:12.159 I got to I got to rethink my my belief in the basic multiculturalism and 632 00:53:12.280 --> 00:53:16.599 my anger at the whatever, you know, the the Islamophobia that swept the 633 00:53:16.679 --> 00:53:21.440 nation, which didn't really happen after nine to eleven. They didn't, They 634 00:53:21.599 --> 00:53:28.280 just they just didn't have anything to say. I don't know that that's my 635 00:53:28.400 --> 00:53:30.519 memory of it, and that's why I think people like her. But so 636 00:53:30.840 --> 00:53:34.599 so powerful because but eventually, eventually, right, right, but eventually they 637 00:53:34.719 --> 00:53:37.199 replaced this with a certainty that there are Christian nationalists out there, hundreds of 638 00:53:37.239 --> 00:53:40.960 thousands of them who are training in their would backwards cabins, who pose most 639 00:53:42.199 --> 00:53:45.159 more of a threat than anything else, and that will enable them to go 640 00:53:45.280 --> 00:53:49.079 on with the rest of the progressive mindset, which says that you know, 641 00:53:49.199 --> 00:53:51.440 Hamas what you gotta say. You got to hand it to him. You 642 00:53:51.519 --> 00:53:53.719 know, that was pretty effective, and I didn't do any of the bad 643 00:53:53.760 --> 00:53:57.800 things these Israelias are saying, and they were living in an open air prison 644 00:53:57.920 --> 00:54:00.599 and now they're being genocided, and ergo, it's oddtcetera, etcetera, because 645 00:54:01.880 --> 00:54:07.920 that's just plainly what the whole power dynamic over there says, right we all 646 00:54:07.960 --> 00:54:12.000 they have to do is look at a presser and who's the oppressed and they 647 00:54:12.039 --> 00:54:17.559 got to figure it out. I mean, it's that curious mixture of intelligence 648 00:54:17.639 --> 00:54:25.840 and yet astonishing stupidity that they've they've they've just offshore. They're thinking about so 649 00:54:25.960 --> 00:54:30.079 many things to an ideology that explains every of course, you know, just 650 00:54:30.559 --> 00:54:34.800 not exactly newer novel, but it's been the case for hundreds of years when 651 00:54:34.800 --> 00:54:38.199 we do it on our side too. But it's just the way that anti 652 00:54:38.280 --> 00:54:43.880 Semitism, prohomous profile Palestinian pro narratives have flourished, especially amongst the youth, 653 00:54:44.039 --> 00:54:46.639 who you would think I dot to know better. Why would I say this 654 00:54:46.760 --> 00:54:49.920 something that stupid? Is that? Well, Peter, we got a couple 655 00:54:49.920 --> 00:54:52.920 of minutes here before we go anything to add do? We head out, 656 00:54:53.039 --> 00:54:57.880 and again, for those who remember the top of the show, we're really 657 00:54:58.000 --> 00:55:02.840 rooting for you to get this scale working. I think it is working. 658 00:55:04.320 --> 00:55:07.639 It's just that I kept standing getting on it and getting off and getting on. 659 00:55:07.880 --> 00:55:13.239 I felt like the joke about oh no, I'm wandering into territory here. 660 00:55:13.719 --> 00:55:17.800 The definition of a certain kind of person, a certain gender is that 661 00:55:19.639 --> 00:55:22.639 that is the kind of person who keeps asking a question until you give her 662 00:55:22.679 --> 00:55:25.239 the answer she wants. And I kept getting on the scale, wanting to 663 00:55:25.280 --> 00:55:30.320 see numbers that were lower than it insisted on giving me. I'm sure it's 664 00:55:30.360 --> 00:55:35.920 working, it'll work fine. Just remember cut out all carbs and eliminate all 665 00:55:36.320 --> 00:55:39.599 processed sugar from your diet. Move around a little bit more and it'll fall 666 00:55:39.719 --> 00:55:44.920 off. Have eggs and sausage for breakfast, have a big thick steak, 667 00:55:45.159 --> 00:55:47.960 not many potatoes, but skip the French fry. Just carbs, forget bread, 668 00:55:49.119 --> 00:55:51.639 forget cereal, all that stuff, no gone, It's off the table. 669 00:55:52.079 --> 00:55:55.639 And then I eventually to the quick mass. I know, I know, 670 00:55:55.760 --> 00:55:58.880 but eventually we'll come back to it. And one morning you will have 671 00:55:58.960 --> 00:56:01.320 yourself in English muff that will be covered with cream, cheese and jam, 672 00:56:01.440 --> 00:56:07.079 and it will it will be like a combination of heroin and and bourbon and 673 00:56:07.280 --> 00:56:14.800 every great and toxic dam hero that's like, you know, not exactly speaking 674 00:56:14.840 --> 00:56:17.039 from experience here, but all I know is when I finally love myself some 675 00:56:17.119 --> 00:56:20.480 of these things after losing the amount of weight that I wanted, it was. 676 00:56:20.800 --> 00:56:22.599 It was great, and you can go back to them. You just 677 00:56:22.679 --> 00:56:25.880 can't sort of live on bread like we used to before. Staff a life 678 00:56:25.920 --> 00:56:28.960 and all that. I know, But there you go, you know, 679 00:56:29.039 --> 00:56:34.199 And I don't want to turn this, twist this into a right wing argument, 680 00:56:34.719 --> 00:56:39.639 you know, another right wing talking point. But this is not new, 681 00:56:40.079 --> 00:56:45.519 the idea that you should cut down on the carbs and starch in order 682 00:56:45.519 --> 00:56:50.760 to lose weight. I start, I make myself a little vulnerable. I 683 00:56:50.840 --> 00:56:54.159 tell them truth, what's happening. I'm telling you you jumped down eleven or 684 00:56:54.320 --> 00:56:59.480 nineteen oh nine or something. The US Navy, like after the Spanish American 685 00:56:59.559 --> 00:57:04.559 War, when American warships are going to south the Pacivic and they issued these 686 00:57:04.880 --> 00:57:09.679 dietary guidelines for US Navy personnel. This is in the beginning of the twentieth 687 00:57:09.719 --> 00:57:15.719 century, and they said, avoid all that starchs, don't eat that TOI, 688 00:57:15.519 --> 00:57:19.960 don't eat that tire tarot route. These people eat a lot of stars. 689 00:57:20.000 --> 00:57:22.760 Don't do it. You'll get fat, stick to meat and fish yep. 690 00:57:23.679 --> 00:57:29.199 And the US government then decided no, no, no, no, 691 00:57:29.239 --> 00:57:30.960 no, no, well, credit, We'll create a food pyramid. We 692 00:57:31.079 --> 00:57:35.519 know what you should be eating, and you should eating more bread and pasta 693 00:57:36.880 --> 00:57:42.920 and not as much meat. And everybody just got fat. That's what happened. 694 00:57:43.119 --> 00:57:45.280 And our generation was raised on that food pyramid. And it was a 695 00:57:45.440 --> 00:57:51.440 lie or was yes, it was it was fakes. I was, you 696 00:57:51.519 --> 00:57:52.639 know, one of the one of the main you know, I know you 697 00:57:52.920 --> 00:57:57.519 run well, it was one of the uh you know we're doing we're trying 698 00:57:57.559 --> 00:57:59.360 to do this long form podcasts. And one of the ones I had been 699 00:57:59.400 --> 00:58:01.519 brew and kick around. I haven't called Peter this is my you know, 700 00:58:02.320 --> 00:58:06.880 co founder director of this. I should probably be I shouldn't be pitching you 701 00:58:07.239 --> 00:58:09.320 podcast ideas right here, right now. But one of the things that I 702 00:58:09.440 --> 00:58:14.239 had dinner with an old friend of mine was a kind of a nerd genius. 703 00:58:15.079 --> 00:58:16.519 Uh. And he and his family, his dad and his partner and 704 00:58:16.559 --> 00:58:21.159 business partner have had family business for a long time, which is they're nuclear 705 00:58:21.239 --> 00:58:27.519 scientists. They're nuclear physicists. They make measurement equipment and they have a lab 706 00:58:27.599 --> 00:58:32.079 and he does work. And he remembers as a young man the cops coming 707 00:58:32.159 --> 00:58:38.639 to his door, knocking on there and saying, we need you. It 708 00:58:38.760 --> 00:58:44.639 was an emergency in New York State, three Mile Island, and they went 709 00:58:44.800 --> 00:58:46.519 to three Mile Island, and he says, do you understand what happened at 710 00:58:46.519 --> 00:58:49.960 three Mile Islands? Yeah? I think it was like the core or something 711 00:58:50.000 --> 00:58:53.519 and there's leak and the blah blah blah. Because nothing happened a three Mile 712 00:58:53.559 --> 00:59:00.559 Island nothing. We went, we tested it. It was fine. There 713 00:59:00.679 --> 00:59:07.760 was no leak, there was no discharge, there was no radioactivity. It 714 00:59:07.639 --> 00:59:15.199 was fine. But it has been twisted and turned into the symbol of the 715 00:59:15.320 --> 00:59:22.440 disaster of nuclear power that has led us directly to our absolute energy dependence for 716 00:59:22.480 --> 00:59:24.639 the next thirty years. And you know, you can make you could draw 717 00:59:24.639 --> 00:59:30.719 a direct line between that and the economic necessity of our looking the other way, 718 00:59:30.280 --> 00:59:37.320 as certain kingdoms in Middle East who supply US with oil, support radical 719 00:59:37.480 --> 00:59:40.480 Wahabi, you know, terrorism. It was a lot. We didn't trust 720 00:59:40.519 --> 00:59:45.079 the science. There was no trusting the science. Even today, if you 721 00:59:45.159 --> 00:59:45.840 look over to the New York Times, they're not going to say, by 722 00:59:45.840 --> 00:59:49.360 the way, three my island, nothing happened. I don't know. So 723 00:59:49.800 --> 00:59:52.440 the podcast word he was trusting the science. And now I thought of it. 724 00:59:52.559 --> 00:59:54.280 I just thought of this new one. I need eight episodes or so. 725 00:59:55.239 --> 01:00:01.199 The food Pyramid anyway, rant over, that's all ran. That's absolutely 726 01:00:01.239 --> 01:00:06.840 fascinating. Oh no, no, it's it's believe me. Jane Fonda is 727 01:00:06.880 --> 01:00:09.280 responsible for more of the problems of Western society than anybody else. You know, 728 01:00:09.360 --> 01:00:13.480 But that stupid movie that she made with Michael Douglas as a cameraman saying 729 01:00:13.840 --> 01:00:16.440 yes when I think it was Jack Lemon who said there was a conspiracy, 730 01:00:16.599 --> 01:00:20.239 or maybe it was Wilfred Brimley. I don't know. All I know is 731 01:00:20.400 --> 01:00:24.320 that post Watergate conspiracy. Science, technology, fear. All of those things 732 01:00:24.400 --> 01:00:28.119 combined to make people all shuddery about it. Then, of course you had 733 01:00:28.159 --> 01:00:31.440 the no Nukes concerts of the eighties and the rest of it, because nuclear 734 01:00:31.760 --> 01:00:36.840 warheads and nuclear power somehow were lumped all in the same basket as one of 735 01:00:36.880 --> 01:00:38.800 the things Ronald even wanted to use to destroy the world. The idiocy, 736 01:00:39.239 --> 01:00:43.360 just the monumental idiocy that I've lived through in my life and probably assisted at 737 01:00:43.400 --> 01:00:45.719 some point or the other. But I do know that I'm late, and 738 01:00:45.760 --> 01:00:49.480 we got to go. Gentlemen. It's been fun. We'll see every one 739 01:00:49.519 --> 01:00:52.719 in the comments. Not at Ricochet five point oh. That's coming and it's 740 01:00:52.800 --> 01:00:55.400 going to be great. But we'll see you in the comments at Ricochet four 741 01:00:55.800 --> 01:01:00.400 point oh, gentlemen next week. Next week Tapping New Year Boys, Tappy 742 01:01:00.440 --> 01:01:00.760 New Year.