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Speaker 1: Yeah, oh, I missed it. You know. It's one thing

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I do keep up with closely, Charlie is your Twitter game,

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which is one of the top five percent in the world.

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But I think, ask not what your country can do

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for you, ask what you can do for your country.

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Mister Garbachoff, Tear down this wall. It's the Ricochet Podcast

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with Steve Hayward along with Charles C. W. Cook breaking

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it all down with our special guests Scott Jennings, author

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of a Revolution of common Sense, So Let's have ourselves

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a podcast in which she's quoted as referring to you

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as excuse me and again not my words, sir, but

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a conspiracy theorist of a decade.

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Speaker 2: As like I'll trust I'll trust what you said. I

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haven't looked at the article. I of course have heard

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about it, but conspiracy theorists sometimes I am a conspiracy theorist,

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but I only believe in the conspiracy theories that are true.

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Speaker 1: Welcome everybody to the Ricochet Podcast, number seven hundred and

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sixty nine. I'm Steve Hayward out in California along with

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Charles C. W. Cook in Florida. James is indisposed overseas

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a lot to get to this week as always, but Charles,

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since I have the host parrogative this week, I've been

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curious for a long time, and I'm sure some listeners

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are too. What does c W stand for in the

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middle of your name?

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Speaker 2: It's Christopher William Charles, not real concealed weapon.

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Speaker 1: Oh, I think that's what we're spreading around though. That's

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a good one, right, right, I mean it's I think,

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as you know, it's slightly unusual for Americans to have

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two middle names.

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Speaker 2: Although my way i've been you know why I write

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with it? Maybe I've told you because I had repeated yes,

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because of Charlie Kirk the post. Yeah right, it's getting

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my hate mouth, so I thought it was only fair

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to distinguish myself from the right.

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Speaker 1: And Yeah, although the names are the same, you're pretty

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different people, both in appearance bearing views what you write it.

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But you know you can see how it happens. There

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is actually a Canadian born novelist named Stephen Hayward, exact

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same spelling as mine. I don't think he's very political.

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I haven't read any of his novels, but he happened

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to be down at I think he's still teaching at

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Colorado College in Colorado Springs, and he was there. It

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was that year that I came to the University of

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Colorado at Boulder, and we would get confused once in

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a while, which I thought was the poor man, because

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I was the controversial one and he's just teaching English literature. Yes,

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when I used to write a lot of cover stories

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for the Weekly Standard, I would get fan mail saying,

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what of a great article? And my wife loves you

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because she says you're the cute one on Fox News.

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And then we have gotten each other's email a couple

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of times when people have both of them, and including

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one day my wife missus twenty years ago when our

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kids were small and we were both working in downtown Washington,

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and my wife sends out an email saying, Hey, can

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you pick up the kids from preschool? But she sent

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it to Steve Hayes.

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Speaker 2: Did he do it?

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Speaker 1: No? He wrote back and said, happy to, but you

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want to check with your husband first. So we've had

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fun with that over the years. Yeah, that does happen.

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So all right, gosh, it's on that happy note, which

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I wish we could continue. What a what a horrible week?

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I mean, this shooting in Australia, this Brown University shooting

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which apparently involves also apparently it's now i think confirmed,

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the same person shot the scientist at MIT, making this

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quite different from your normal campus mass shooting event. So

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it was still a lot to learn about that, and

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then the terrible Rob Ryer story. But I think let's

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maybe spend a minute or two on Australia. You know,

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the Muslim angle, of course is well known and well

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talked about. But Charlie, especially with you being the Second

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Amendment advocate, liberals are being notably silent on the fact that,

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as they've been telling us for twenty years, there are

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no guns in Australia. How could this possibly happen?

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Speaker 2: Take it away, Well, there are guns in Australia. There

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are four million or so guns, and there are more

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guns now than there were twenty five years ago when

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the last vestiges of the reforms of nineteen ninety six

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went into force. What Australia did in the nineteen nineties

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after the Port Arthur massacre was past. All of the

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gun control provisions that American gun controllers would like here,

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including confiscation and the melting down of guns and bands

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on most modern weapons, but there are still guns in Australia.

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Speaker 1: Now.

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Speaker 2: I'm of the view that thenineteen ninety six law didn't

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do a great deal. I think it may have very

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slightly reduced the suicide rate. Suicide rates are tricky and

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nevertheless interesting, because you will find nations where there are

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no guns really at all. South Korea and Japan have

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much higher suicide rates than say the United States, because

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we get substitution effects. But I think in Australia it

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may be fair to say that their suicide rate was

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slightly diminished out last thing on that I don't think,

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and this is the American in me. I don't think

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that you should pass gun control laws to protect people

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from themselves. Maybe that makes me a libertarian, but I

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think the case is much stronger, although I'm against it,

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when you're arguing that you should protect people against others. Anyhow,

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Australia did that in nineteen ninety six. I don't think

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it did very much. What did did not do, clearly

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was make it impossible to stage a massacre because you

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can't stop this. You can't stop it with guns, in

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my view, but really you can't stop it at all.

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And if you look around the world, when people who

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wish to harm large numbers of innocent people cannot get

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hold of guns, which they usually can. There are mass

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shootings in Sweden and Germany and France and the Netherlands

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and so forth. But when they can't get hold of firearms,

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they get hold of cars or trucks or knives or bombs.

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And I'm something of a fatalist on this, and so

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I don't turn this answer into a two hour disquisition.

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Let me put it like this. My view, basically, Steve,

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is that it is possible, with good policing and a

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lot of thought and effort and sometimes money, to reduce

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daily crime. I think we've learned this around the country

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over the years. If you know where the crime is committed,

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if you know who's committing it and why, then you

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can reduce it. I don't think it is easy to

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reduce mass killings mass shootings. Once the guns are in

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a country, somebody who wants to do a lot of

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harm at a random point that could never be predicted

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is most likely going to be able to do it.

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And as such, the fact that Australia has responded to

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this by saying, well, now will gun control even harder

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is to me ridiculous and an application of responsibility. And

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if you look at the one big thing that they're

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trying to do, which many gun controllers in America would

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like to do as well, it's reduced the number of

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guns each person or household is allowed to own. But

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what's that going to do? I only have two hands, Yeah,

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I mean, I'm not being facetious. If you are not

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of my view, if you don't have the Second Amendment,

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if you don't have an American conception of individual rights,

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what's that supposed to do. These guys needed one gun each.

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They did have more, but I think they had a couple.

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They wouldn't have cared about that law, and they wanted

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to kill Jewish people on Hanika. That the idea that

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you're going to stop this by slightly tweaking and already

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draconian set of laws is preposterous. So I think this

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is a great example of the limitations of gun control

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and the magical thinking that always goes into the claim

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that if we just tweaked it a little bit more,

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then we could stop this, or that you can't.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, And the fact that normally you would have expected

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this kind of shooting to have been at a mosque

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or some Jewish community center or something. The fact that

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it was done out of Bondi Beach, which I've visited

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many decades ago, is I think, you know, unexpected, you're

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not going to police everywhere. The other thing, just briefly

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about suicide rates. That long story while I'll skip over it,

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but maybe fifteen twenty years ago, I was trying to

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do a deep dive into American suicide rates by method

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and so forth, and what I discovered was, are the

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quality of our suicide statistics are very poor For a

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simple reason. A lot of times suicide invalidates certain life

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insurance contracts, so you want to not have that be

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listed as the cause of death on a death certificate

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or a corner's report. Other times there's families who want

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to not have an acknowledge that somebody has overdosed deliberately.

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And whereas a gun suicide that you can't I mean,

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maybe you could call it accidental, but I think when

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the police and corner investigate, they can't fudge that too far.

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And so our statistics are skewed and incomplete. And but

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in the case of where like Australia. Our gun suicides

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are harder, going to be harder to disguise or classify

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something else than maybe the statistical difference is significant and measurable.

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I don't know the other. Uh. I don't want to

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make a shooting comparison. But Susie Wiles shot herself on

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the foot this week, or so we're told with her

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Vanity Fair interview where she made all these comments about

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Trump has a alcoholic personality. Russ VOIGHTDT is a right

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wing zealot Dvance believe in conspiracy theories and so forth,

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and they're all saying it's taken out of context. I

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have some theories about how this happened. Actually it's not

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a theory. I'm surprised that someone as shrewd and effective

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as Susie Wiles would have thought she would be treated

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fairly by Vanity Fair. And I mean I've been around

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long enough to know and to study this also that

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what I call ventriloquist journalism runs rampant right and it's

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the social skill. I mean, these elite media reporters Eric

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Wemple in this case, But sixty minutes is the best

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example I know. A couple of people have been on

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sixty minutes, and Mike Wallace took him to the cleaners.

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And they say, the way he does it is you

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get relaxed with him. He makes you think he's your

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best buddy, and then you start saying things you shouldn't say.

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And there have been so many examples us over the years,

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going back to in my recollection David Stockman in nineteen

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eighty one to The Atlantic, to a very left wing

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reporter named William Grider, who took things out of context,

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got Stockman to drop his guard and say embarrassing things

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about Reaganomics, and why else appears to have done the

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same thing. And I'm just astounded that an administration who,

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more than any other is self conscious that the major

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media is their enemy, would have fallen under this trap.

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Speaker 2: That's exactly my takeaway. I do think some of the

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things she said are impossible to imagine in context being

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any better than they were out of context. And for example,

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saying that Elon Muskus a ketamine addict, unless she said

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and that's a good thing at the end, then you

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do wonder. But I can see some of it. What

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shocks me, like you, is that she thought that the

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inflammatory parts of what she was saying, We're not going

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to be lifted out and either printed in isolation or

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at least emblazoned on the front cover. And I say

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that because Susie was is actually a fixture of where

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I live, Jacksonville. She moved to Jacksonville in the eighties

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and she's run a bunch of businesses here. Some of

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them were PR firms. One of them she ran with

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Tony Biselli, who was Jacksonville Jaguars Hall of Famer, played

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in the NFL for eight or nine seasons. So I

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am aware how solid her reputation is and how many

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times she's been around the block. She's not twenty five.

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So when I saw this and then the inevitable tweet

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that said, well this is outrageous media bias and I

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was taken out of context, I wanted the same, How

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could this possibly have happened? I will say that I

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think she might get away with it because I think

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Trump will recognize the instinct. The only thing she said

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about Trump was that he has the personality of an alcoholic,

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which is something that Trump has set himself on stage

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over and over again. And he has a very funny

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line about this where he says, can you imagine what

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I'd be like if I drank so because he didn't

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go after him, sorry, because she didn't go after him,

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and because she behaved in the way he does, which

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is just to let it all out. I wonder if

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he will actually recognize the mode and say, all right,

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it's fine.

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Speaker 1: Well I think he did. I mean I caught secondhand

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or a little clip of him saying, oh, yeah, that's

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an accurate description. And then Jade Vance. I thought it

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was also very clever he said, well, I believe conspiracy

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theories that are true. That he rattled off three or

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four and so sort of. And the calmness of the

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White House reaction I think is kind of curious. I'm

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reluctant to go as far as the saying I wonder

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not that this is on purpose, but they knew it

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was coming. He decided reacting calmly was better than going

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off with a tantrum. The other thing I wonder, though,

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is I mean, I don't know how much intrigued there is.

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Unlike Trump one, nobody has been dismissed yet or fired

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or moved around. And I think Trump has screened more

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carefully for loyalty that's a plus the minus, of course.

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On the other hand, I don't know if you caught this.

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Maybe three weeks ago, there was a very our story

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about Cash Patel in the New York Post by Carol Markowitz,

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who's otherwise a very pro Trump columnist and knowing nothing

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and not having any inside information. I did wonder, I

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wonder if that's a planted story. You know, you're hearing

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a lot of stuff, a lot of criticism of Patel

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from other Republicans and people in Washington, and Dan Bongino

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this week announced that he's leaving as the number two

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person at the FBI. I wonder if the Markowitz story

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was planted, and whether some of what Susie Wilds was

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saying to the reporter is also playing the Washington game

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of getting some damaging stories circulating in the press to

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ease some people out. I don't know if that's just

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pure speculation on my part, but that's interesting.

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Speaker 2: I mean, if one assumes that Trump is unhappy with

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Pam Bondy, which probably should be, that was the yeah,

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guess criticism that she could have leveled. She essentially said, look,

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she blew this big task. There's no getting around that. Again,

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that's not taking out of context. That's an attack. So

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perhaps you're right either way. I think there was some

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damage done there. I don't think the whole thing was

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a setup. I don't think this is all seventy two

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d chests. So I'm surprised that it happened.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it seemed surprised me. That's right, because she seems,

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for one thing, she doesn't do interviews, she doesn't go

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onto Sunday talk shows like most chiefs of staff do,

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and seems to run a pretty tight ship there except

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for here's an exit question. We'll get out quickly here.

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But so you know, Trump had that really appalling tweet

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about Rob Reiner. One thing I've noticed about Trump's tweets. Oh,

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by the way, you know, the deal has been as

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we've heard, I'm happy with mean tweets if I get

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three dollars gallon gasoline, okay, But this ABU is the privilege.

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But one thing about his tweets so far in Trump

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two is that there's still very much in character as

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we know in but they seem to be proof read.

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I'll put it that way right now.

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Speaker 3: He dictates is that it okay seeing the video of him,

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I think it was from election night where he sits

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and there's a young lady in this video and he

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dictates it and then he says, read it back to me,

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and then he says.

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Speaker 1: Send, I didn't know that. Actually, Well that explains a lot,

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but they seem a little different than Trump one, where

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you know, we haven't had kofifi yet, which my favorite. Right, Okay,

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well we'll leave that for now, and let's take a

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quick break for some sponsor messages, and then we will

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come back with our special guests. And now we welcome

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to the podcast. Scott Jennings the senior political correspondent for CNN,

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America's favorite pundit, as a lot of people say of him.

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He's been a long time political consultant, a lecture at

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Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, and just announced the week

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the replacement on Salem Radio on weekdays for Charlie Kirk's

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old radio spot. He's also the author and the book

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We Want to Talk About Today, A Revolution of Common Sense,

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How Donald Trump stormed Washington and fought for Western civilization.

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Speaker 4: Scott, welcome. It's a real pleasure to have you join us.

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Thank you, and good to be with you all. Honored

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by the invitation. I'm a regular listener, longtime listener, first

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time caller.

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Speaker 1: As they so, revolution of common sense, and you know,

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I've read enough to know and listened to you enough

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to know that you point out that Trump differs from

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the usual even conservative politician in Washington. He doesn't use

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the normal Beltway vocabulary. He's the major figure at The

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other person who's like this to some extent was Ronald Reagan,

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but Trump even more so. So you know, he won't

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call them undocumented immigrants or undocumented aliens, right, which is

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the politically correct term. They've been forced down on float

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for thirty years, and it's not accurate, right. You know,

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he ridicules paper straws, you know, a man in women's bathrooms,

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a so forth and so. Anyway, So when did you

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first pick up on that? I know that you've confessed

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to being sort of a late convert to Trump, or

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maybe medium convert to Trump, But when did you first

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pick up on the fact that that common sense turned

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out to be Trump's superpower?

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Speaker 4: Well, I was thinking about writing a book after the election.

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Speaker 5: I'd never written one before.

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Speaker 4: But I was sitting on the set at CNN on

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inauguration day and Trump uses this phrase a revolution of

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common sense and his inaugural address, and I turned to

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Van Jones and I said, that'll make a great book title.

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And a couple of weeks went by and I thought about,

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how would I do this, and I went to pitch

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him on it in the Oval office in early February.

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But it really all started with hearing him phrase his

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own political branding that way. Later in the book, I

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go to Michigan with him on his one hundredth day

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in office, and he says to the crowd in Warren, Michigan,

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whether you're right or your left, or whatever the hell

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you are.

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Speaker 5: It's just common sense.

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Speaker 4: And so my interactions with him, my observations with him,

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is that that's how he thinks of himself. I asked

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him once, actually, do you consider yourself more of a

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conservative or more of a common sense person? And he said, well,

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most of the time conservative is common sense. But he

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left himself a little wiggle room, you know, But that's

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how he portrays it. I told him, I thought one

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hundred of the usual suspects would come along and write

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books crapping on him for the first one hundred days.

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What he intended to do, and then somebody who has

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voted for you three times, likes you and wants you

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to succeed, ought to get a crack at it, and

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he eventually agreed.

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Speaker 1: And here's the book. Yeah, so you're from western Kentucky.

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I think that's interesting because while all the political commentators

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have tended to look at how Trump broke the blue

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Wall states in twenty sixteen and again in twenty twenty four,

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you know, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and so forth, but a

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few astute people I know said, you know, the really

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interesting state to look at for Trump is Kentucky. Not

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because it was a state that flipped, but maybe you

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know Elliott County, which I think is out in eastern Kentucky.

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It is so Elliott County is a sign a political scientist,

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so I know these weird things. Elliott County has been

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deep Democrat forever. It did not even vote for Ronald

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Reagan in the nineteen eighty four landslide election. Year it

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went heavily for Barack Obama twice, and then in twenty

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sixteen it went heavily for Donald Trump. That tells you

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something about Trump Democrats. We used to talk about Reagan Democrats,

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but the Trump Democrats story in places like Elliott County, Kentucky,

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and I think elsewhere you mentioned your own father is

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an old Clinton loving Democrat who came around to Trump.

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So I mean, isn't your state your home state, in

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some ways the most emblematic state for what Trump did.

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Speaker 4: Yes, I mean we had been trending somewhat read since

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the Obama years, but Trump put it on blast. In fact,

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Kentucky was the last state that had a Democrat at

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state legislature in the South until twenty sixteen, the night

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Trump was elected, we finally flipped the state House in Kentucky.

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We'd had the Senate for a number of years, and

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so it had been somewhat resistant to the movement towards

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the Republican Party in the way that the rest of

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the South had moved, particularly at the local level. And

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we still have a Democratic governor today, although I think

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that's going to change in twenty twenty seven. But yes,

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there are a lot of people in Kentucky, in east

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and West who had been a career and lifelong Democrats.

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Their parents and grandparents were Democrats who referenced my father,

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Jeff Jennings from Dawson Springs, Kentucky.

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Speaker 5: Where I grew up.

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Speaker 4: I mean, these are the biggest Clinton people I knew

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when I was growing up. They were in unions, they

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loved Bill Clinton. They were Democrats. My grandfather was a

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New Deal Democrat. I was a recial Republican from the

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time I was eighteen. I came of age during the

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gingrich Republican Revolution of the nineties, and so I felt

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kindly towards that and it always appealed to me. But

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you know, I grew up around all these Democrats. But

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my dad was the first guy to tell me Donald

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Trump was going to be the next president. And I,

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of course, as a trained political operative, told him he

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was full of crap. But it was not the first

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time in my life that my father was right and

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I was wrong. It sure it won't be the last,

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but you know, eventually, throughout the course of writing the book,

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the President gave me his hat and signed it for

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my dad, acknowledging that he, in fact, was the first

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Trump supporter in western Kentucky.

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Speaker 1: So I want to ask you one more question before

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I turned you over to Charlie Cook, and it's how

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you do your show prep for CNN. And but the

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reason I ask it that way is every time I

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see you or see the clips that get circulated on

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social media, you're landing a knockout blow. I mean, if

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this surprise fight, you be landing a knockout blow in

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every single round. And so I'm wondering, first two part question,

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what show prep do you do to be so good

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at it? Maybe you're just a natural like Rocky Balboa.

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But also at the same time, how do you keep

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your equanimity? You're bearing, you never lose your temper, you

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never lose your cool. You're always calm, and I think

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that adds forced to when you lay a knockout blow

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on somebody. I mean, do you do breathing exercises? Are

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you taking some kind of experimental zen drugs? Tell me

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how you go about your role on CNN? Sure?

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Speaker 5: Well thanks.

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Speaker 4: First of all, I think the debating show has been

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a great thing for CNN. They used to have debates

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and then they went away from it, and now it's

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like the only show like it on TV. I think

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the country is hungry for debates. I think they want debates.

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Everywhere I go, I hear two things. I love you

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and I love the debates. I don't care for you,

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but I love the debates. The commonality is the debate,

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so it's a good thing. I ingest a huge amount

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of information all day every day. I'm reading virtually every

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mainstream source. I'm reading a lot of conservative sources. I'm

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reading a lot of independent sources. I'm watching things happening

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in real time. I spend a huge amount of time

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on the phone with policymakers. If I don't understand something,

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I'll pick up the phone and call the people involved

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and have them walk me through it. I'm also ingesting

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a lot of things on the left to try to

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predict what vectors they're going to take in the evening.

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Thing I've learned about the left is that they're very

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authoritarian in their communications. Once the argument vectors go out,

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once the debating points go out, they all tend to

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adhere to it. So if I can learn what that

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is during the day, I'm pretty sure I'm going to

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hear it at night. And what you see out there

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is really authentic. I don't have a script. There's nothing

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on the teleprompter for me. I don't know what Abby

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is going to say. I don't know what clips she's

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going to play. So what you're getting is my ingesting

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and analyzing the news all day and an authentic reaction

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to what I'm hearing. You know, sometimes I hear crazy things.

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A lot of nights I hear crazy things. But what

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you're getting my authentic reaction and I and just to

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address the issue of how do you stay calm, Preparation

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breeds confidence, And if I've learned anything from Ronald Reagan,

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it is that we will win more arguments by being

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happy warriors than by being angry. And virtually everyone I'm

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debating against is in a constant state of being in rage,

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which I still don't understand why they're so enraged about

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being America, but they are and I'm not, and I'm

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happy to be here.

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Speaker 2: Hi, Scott Charles Cook care. So the book is about

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Trump fighting for Western civilization as much as common sense.

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What does that mean? And why did it take him?

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What was happening before?

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Speaker 1: Well?

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Speaker 4: I put that in the title because over the course

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of the election and over the course of writing the book,

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it sort of really hit home for me that we're

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not fighting about day to day politics anymore. We're not

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arguing about you know, marginal tax rates and this and that,

476
00:25:34,799 --> 00:25:37,319
and we are, but there's something bigger going on, the

477
00:25:37,799 --> 00:25:41,720
cultural attacks on our Judeo Christian heritage, the mass migration

478
00:25:41,880 --> 00:25:44,759
crisis that's going on that has overrun Europe and threatens

479
00:25:44,799 --> 00:25:46,079
to overrun the United States.

480
00:25:46,880 --> 00:25:49,400
Speaker 5: And so I just I started to see.

481
00:25:49,160 --> 00:25:52,759
Speaker 4: Politics through a much larger lens than just Okay, we'll

482
00:25:52,759 --> 00:25:54,160
be in and then they'll be in, and we'll be

483
00:25:54,200 --> 00:25:54,880
in and they'll be in.

484
00:25:54,920 --> 00:25:56,759
Speaker 5: There's something bigger going on in the world.

485
00:25:56,880 --> 00:25:59,680
Speaker 4: And when I interviewed Elon Musk about this for the book,

486
00:25:59,680 --> 00:26:01,839
he he laid out his views. That's why he got

487
00:26:01,880 --> 00:26:05,119
involved in politics. For Trump, he thought something larger was

488
00:26:05,160 --> 00:26:09,440
at play. He thinks our fiscal situation, the devaluation of

489
00:26:09,480 --> 00:26:13,319
our currency, the mass migration crisis, the low birth rate crisis,

490
00:26:13,359 --> 00:26:16,160
and he thinks all of this is conspiring to threaten

491
00:26:16,240 --> 00:26:19,119
America but threaten the future of the West. And so

492
00:26:19,359 --> 00:26:21,559
for Trump, I don't know whether he knew he was

493
00:26:21,559 --> 00:26:24,079
signing up for it or not, but whether he likes

494
00:26:24,079 --> 00:26:27,640
it or not, he is on the wall of defending

495
00:26:27,680 --> 00:26:31,160
the West against a lot of crazy things, and whether

496
00:26:31,200 --> 00:26:36,400
it's very real things like October the seventh, which I

497
00:26:36,480 --> 00:26:39,160
think has been the Central front, military front and the

498
00:26:39,200 --> 00:26:41,240
fight for the West over the last couple of years,

499
00:26:41,359 --> 00:26:45,079
or cultural things like the transgender ideology or the climate

500
00:26:45,160 --> 00:26:48,200
people or whatever. There's a lot of things out there

501
00:26:48,640 --> 00:26:52,880
converging in a very aggressive way, and he is kind

502
00:26:52,880 --> 00:26:54,880
of standing up to all of them at the same time.

503
00:26:55,359 --> 00:26:57,319
And it's sort of the person who's willing to say

504
00:26:57,839 --> 00:26:59,519
what we're all thinking. But a lot of people have

505
00:26:59,519 --> 00:27:02,440
been afraid say when Democrats are in power, because they'll

506
00:27:02,480 --> 00:27:02,960
come after you.

507
00:27:03,039 --> 00:27:05,720
Speaker 5: And so for a lot of reasons, we had to

508
00:27:05,720 --> 00:27:06,319
have him back.

509
00:27:06,799 --> 00:27:09,519
Speaker 4: If Kamala Harrison won the election, all of these fights

510
00:27:09,519 --> 00:27:11,440
would be lost, all of the wrong.

511
00:27:11,200 --> 00:27:12,359
Speaker 5: People would be encouraged.

512
00:27:12,440 --> 00:27:14,160
Speaker 4: We wouldn't be able to tell the difference between right

513
00:27:14,160 --> 00:27:17,599
and wrong, and civilization and barbarism. And I think Trump

514
00:27:18,359 --> 00:27:21,160
for right now is our best bet in the fight

515
00:27:21,200 --> 00:27:22,960
for the West. We'll have another election in twenty eight

516
00:27:23,000 --> 00:27:25,240
and hopefully the next people that come along and see

517
00:27:25,240 --> 00:27:25,880
it the way he does.

518
00:27:26,039 --> 00:27:27,920
Speaker 2: Yeah, so I want to ask you about that. I

519
00:27:27,960 --> 00:27:31,240
want to ask you what you think happens next. Obviously,

520
00:27:31,440 --> 00:27:34,279
there's been a great deal of debate on the right

521
00:27:34,440 --> 00:27:37,960
in conservatism, in the Republican Party about Trump. I am

522
00:27:38,160 --> 00:27:40,319
critical of him in many ways. There's a lot of

523
00:27:40,400 --> 00:27:43,240
things he does and thinks that I don't like, although

524
00:27:43,799 --> 00:27:45,599
he also does a lot of things that I do like,

525
00:27:46,079 --> 00:27:50,440
and I think much of his legacy will be positive.

526
00:27:51,279 --> 00:27:53,440
When we talk about this at National Reviewer on the

527
00:27:53,519 --> 00:27:59,839
Ricochet podcast, we often bring it into broader ideological fights

528
00:28:00,119 --> 00:28:04,000
have obtained for years. But Trump also is Suey Gennaris.

529
00:28:04,039 --> 00:28:07,640
Trump is a rock star. He has been for years.

530
00:28:07,640 --> 00:28:09,519
It's one of the reasons he won the nomination. He's

531
00:28:09,559 --> 00:28:12,240
extremely charismatic, he's quite funny. He's larger than life. Even

532
00:28:12,279 --> 00:28:15,839
when he's being awful. He's interesting. I wonder how much

533
00:28:15,960 --> 00:28:19,480
of the Trump phenomenon do you think is Trump and

534
00:28:19,559 --> 00:28:22,440
how much is it a reflection of real changes in

535
00:28:22,480 --> 00:28:25,799
the way that Republican voters and Americans generally started to

536
00:28:25,839 --> 00:28:26,960
think ten years ago.

537
00:28:27,640 --> 00:28:30,119
Speaker 4: Great question, and I should have said in my answer

538
00:28:30,200 --> 00:28:33,799
about Shoprev. One of the first things I do every

539
00:28:33,880 --> 00:28:36,960
day is see what Charles is saying about any particular issue,

540
00:28:37,039 --> 00:28:41,039
because you and I don't always track, but like ninety

541
00:28:41,079 --> 00:28:44,240
eight percent of the time I'm tracking, and so your

542
00:28:44,799 --> 00:28:48,400
your takes and your insights on things are actually quite invaluable.

543
00:28:48,400 --> 00:28:50,559
Thank you, although we've never met in person, and I

544
00:28:50,599 --> 00:28:52,799
was wanted to do this because you're You're my hero,

545
00:28:53,400 --> 00:28:58,480
I am, so I asked him about this once. I

546
00:28:58,519 --> 00:29:02,079
asked Trump, who who is best prepared to carry on

547
00:29:02,160 --> 00:29:06,160
your political coalition or your political movement? And he answered

548
00:29:06,160 --> 00:29:08,039
me for about five minutes and didn't name a single

549
00:29:08,119 --> 00:29:11,880
name because I think he knows that he's singular and

550
00:29:12,400 --> 00:29:16,559
his personality, his charisma, the way he does it, his humor,

551
00:29:16,640 --> 00:29:18,359
he's singular. Now, this is true of a lot of

552
00:29:18,400 --> 00:29:22,480
two term presidents, and who replaced Obama? Nobody really who

553
00:29:22,519 --> 00:29:26,640
replaced Bill Clinton? Nobody who replaced Reagan Bush wins the election,

554
00:29:26,720 --> 00:29:29,359
but then as a one term president. So you know,

555
00:29:29,480 --> 00:29:33,200
I don't think anybody can replace him in the way

556
00:29:33,240 --> 00:29:37,079
he does it. So replicating it is impossible. But can

557
00:29:37,119 --> 00:29:40,319
someone hold it together, add to it, build their own coalition,

558
00:29:40,880 --> 00:29:44,119
bring new people in. Absolutely the biggest challenge for that

559
00:29:44,160 --> 00:29:46,440
person is going to be how do you get people

560
00:29:46,480 --> 00:29:49,839
who have only ever voted for Trump to vote for you?

561
00:29:50,440 --> 00:29:52,599
When we haven't really fixed this in the Republican Party.

562
00:29:52,839 --> 00:29:54,960
There's a lot of people who leave the ballot blank.

563
00:29:55,079 --> 00:29:57,119
I mean, we left like four Senate races on the

564
00:29:57,119 --> 00:29:59,079
table last year because they vote Trump and then they

565
00:29:59,160 --> 00:30:01,920
leave the rest of it. That'll be true for any

566
00:30:01,960 --> 00:30:05,160
other Republican that comes next, who I suspect will be jd.

567
00:30:05,279 --> 00:30:05,559
Speaker 1: Vance.

568
00:30:05,640 --> 00:30:07,160
Speaker 4: I don't have any reason to believe he won't be

569
00:30:07,200 --> 00:30:10,640
the nominee, and he has pretty good ratings right now,

570
00:30:10,640 --> 00:30:11,839
and if he and Marco.

571
00:30:11,640 --> 00:30:14,319
Speaker 5: Rubio team up, that would be quite a formidable thing.

572
00:30:14,839 --> 00:30:16,559
But it still doesn't quite.

573
00:30:16,359 --> 00:30:19,599
Speaker 4: Solve the issue of these people who love Trump, who

574
00:30:19,640 --> 00:30:22,440
only participate in politics for Trump. You know where do

575
00:30:22,519 --> 00:30:24,079
they go? Do they come back at all? I mean,

576
00:30:24,119 --> 00:30:26,559
let's be honest. They vote for Trump because they view

577
00:30:26,640 --> 00:30:29,519
him as not a politician. He's an outsider, and they

578
00:30:29,599 --> 00:30:33,039
elected him to smash political institutions and to smash the

579
00:30:33,039 --> 00:30:36,079
politicians that they hate, to smash the media that they hate.

580
00:30:36,559 --> 00:30:38,279
In order to keep them in. You would have to

581
00:30:38,319 --> 00:30:40,960
portray that same kind of attitude. I don't know if

582
00:30:40,960 --> 00:30:43,000
anybody else can do it. Because of the time that

583
00:30:43,039 --> 00:30:46,480
Trump came along, he came along against the Clintons. I mean,

584
00:30:47,000 --> 00:30:49,160
it may be too unique to ever expect anybody to

585
00:30:49,200 --> 00:30:49,640
do it again.

586
00:30:50,240 --> 00:30:52,079
Speaker 1: Can I put in here, Charlie with a sequel to

587
00:30:52,119 --> 00:30:55,680
your last question, and it's I mean, that's always the

588
00:30:55,680 --> 00:30:58,559
succession question is always crucial. You mentioned, you know, I'm

589
00:30:58,599 --> 00:31:00,599
a student Reagan and you know up with him, and

590
00:31:02,119 --> 00:31:06,039
never mind how Bush squandered Reagan's legacy. But one of

591
00:31:06,079 --> 00:31:09,119
the marks of a transformative president is not so much

592
00:31:09,119 --> 00:31:11,000
what they do to their own party and whether they

593
00:31:11,039 --> 00:31:15,000
have a succession, but how they transform the other party.

594
00:31:15,160 --> 00:31:17,759
So even Democrats and took them having to get beaten

595
00:31:17,839 --> 00:31:21,039
by landslides three times to return to the middle. And

596
00:31:21,839 --> 00:31:23,559
you may be familiar with this. There's a whole school

597
00:31:23,640 --> 00:31:26,839
thought among progressives that Bill Clinton sold out to Reaganism.

598
00:31:27,440 --> 00:31:29,519
And there's a certain way in which is that is true.

599
00:31:30,039 --> 00:31:32,359
And so as you're watching Democrats right now, you can

600
00:31:32,440 --> 00:31:35,680
see some smartmans like ruy to Cher who've had on

601
00:31:35,680 --> 00:31:38,599
this podcast and others saying, boy, Democrats got to dump

602
00:31:38,599 --> 00:31:41,880
all this identitarianism stuff. They need to embrace the abundance

603
00:31:41,920 --> 00:31:44,519
agenda and be pro growth like John F. Kennedy. In

604
00:31:44,559 --> 00:31:46,720
other words, Democrats have to get rid of a lot

605
00:31:46,720 --> 00:31:49,440
of what cost him the election. Are you seeing any

606
00:31:49,599 --> 00:31:54,599
signs of that? Instead? It's Trump arrangement syndrome all the

607
00:31:54,599 --> 00:31:58,079
way down. With maybe the possible exception of your home

608
00:31:58,119 --> 00:32:00,599
state's governor. So two part question, tell us if you

609
00:32:00,640 --> 00:32:03,480
want about Kentucky's governor, if you think he is a

610
00:32:03,599 --> 00:32:06,759
plausible threat to a Trump succession. And then more broadly,

611
00:32:07,039 --> 00:32:09,200
do you see any signs or what should we watch

612
00:32:09,240 --> 00:32:11,279
for to see how Trump was going to transform the

613
00:32:11,400 --> 00:32:12,519
other party?

614
00:32:13,119 --> 00:32:16,480
Speaker 4: The shifting coalitions of the two parties under Trump is fascinating.

615
00:32:16,519 --> 00:32:19,119
I mean, all the Clinton Democrats from the nineties are

616
00:32:19,119 --> 00:32:21,640
now Republicans. I mean, like my dad, I mean, and

617
00:32:21,880 --> 00:32:24,480
we've adopted some of the economic theories is I know,

618
00:32:24,559 --> 00:32:26,960
you know, And so they've come into the Republican party,

619
00:32:27,000 --> 00:32:31,079
these working class democrats who liked protectionism, who thought the

620
00:32:31,119 --> 00:32:34,160
state should be doing more. So they come in for

621
00:32:34,359 --> 00:32:37,119
economic reasons and for cultural reason. They're not into the

622
00:32:37,119 --> 00:32:40,680
transgender stuff. You know, they're not into DEI. And so

623
00:32:40,880 --> 00:32:46,559
they just totally rejected the modern cultural and economic liberalism

624
00:32:47,079 --> 00:32:47,960
and the attitude of.

625
00:32:48,319 --> 00:32:50,519
Speaker 5: Liberals today because it's not what they grew up with.

626
00:32:50,599 --> 00:32:51,240
I don't like it.

627
00:32:51,319 --> 00:32:53,880
Speaker 4: And Trump was able to appeal to them and absorb

628
00:32:54,000 --> 00:32:55,319
some of what they wanted to do.

629
00:32:55,920 --> 00:32:57,799
Speaker 5: Will they ever go back? I don't know.

630
00:32:57,839 --> 00:33:00,279
Speaker 4: I don't think they will, because my view is, answer

631
00:33:00,319 --> 00:33:03,440
your question, the Democrats haven't learned anything. I mean, I

632
00:33:03,440 --> 00:33:07,279
think they're doubling down on the lurch to the left,

633
00:33:07,480 --> 00:33:11,039
particularly culturally. That cost them all these people in the

634
00:33:11,079 --> 00:33:13,319
first place. And look where the energy is. Look who

635
00:33:13,359 --> 00:33:16,680
they nominated for this house race in Tennessee the other day.

636
00:33:16,960 --> 00:33:20,119
They found the craziest person they could find videos of

637
00:33:20,160 --> 00:33:22,599
her on the internet, like running into the Texas Tennessee

638
00:33:22,599 --> 00:33:26,480
Governor's office, screaming, being dragged out. This sort of performance,

639
00:33:26,759 --> 00:33:30,359
radical liberalism, that's what they want. They had a guy

640
00:33:30,400 --> 00:33:32,279
in Texas lined up to run for the Senate. Now

641
00:33:32,359 --> 00:33:34,680
Jasmine Crockett's going to run him. I bet she wins.

642
00:33:35,279 --> 00:33:36,839
They have Mondani in New York.

643
00:33:37,200 --> 00:33:38,000
Speaker 5: I mean, it's.

644
00:33:37,839 --> 00:33:41,440
Speaker 4: Pretty apparent that the energy in their party is with

645
00:33:41,599 --> 00:33:45,400
the radicals, with the liberals, with the anti America crowd,

646
00:33:45,440 --> 00:33:48,759
with the people who don't believe in Western civilization, frankly,

647
00:33:48,880 --> 00:33:49,240
and that's.

648
00:33:49,160 --> 00:33:50,519
Speaker 5: Who they're going to continue to nominate.

649
00:33:50,559 --> 00:33:54,200
Speaker 4: It. Maybe what saves the Republicans in the midterms is

650
00:33:54,440 --> 00:33:58,440
Democrats just can't bring themselves to nominate regular, normal, everyday

651
00:33:58,480 --> 00:34:02,000
people like where they're headed. To answer your question about

652
00:34:02,000 --> 00:34:04,319
Andy Basher. I've known him since I was sixteen, were

653
00:34:04,359 --> 00:34:07,400
the exact same age, and I think.

654
00:34:07,240 --> 00:34:09,159
Speaker 5: He's quite liberal.

655
00:34:09,199 --> 00:34:11,480
Speaker 4: He's more liberal, certainly than he has led on to

656
00:34:11,559 --> 00:34:14,280
the people of Kentucky. He has saved from his own

657
00:34:14,599 --> 00:34:17,920
liberalism by the Republican legislature there. We have super majorities

658
00:34:17,920 --> 00:34:20,840
in both chambers. They don't permit him to do anything crazy.

659
00:34:21,360 --> 00:34:23,639
But deep down he's quite liberal. Does he have the

660
00:34:23,679 --> 00:34:25,079
performative piece of it down?

661
00:34:25,760 --> 00:34:25,960
Speaker 1: No?

662
00:34:26,280 --> 00:34:28,719
Speaker 4: And I think that's where he probably will fall short

663
00:34:29,239 --> 00:34:31,800
in this Democratic primary. If the party wants you to

664
00:34:31,840 --> 00:34:36,599
be more performance based, more radically performative, Basher will have

665
00:34:36,599 --> 00:34:37,719
a hard time replicating them.

666
00:34:38,440 --> 00:34:43,199
Speaker 2: So if you advising the Democrats, who would you tell

667
00:34:43,320 --> 00:34:46,480
them to pick and what two things would you tell

668
00:34:46,519 --> 00:34:48,840
them to cut out to have a shot?

669
00:34:50,000 --> 00:34:54,440
Speaker 4: Well, their most popular governor is probably Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania.

670
00:34:54,800 --> 00:34:56,840
I mean, that's what the polling currently says, and he

671
00:34:56,920 --> 00:34:59,960
tends to attract some moderate and even Republican support in Pennsylvan,

672
00:35:00,679 --> 00:35:03,159
a state you have to win with a population that

673
00:35:03,199 --> 00:35:05,639
if you can win over people there, you can see

674
00:35:05,639 --> 00:35:07,719
the appeal of it in other swing states. He'll have

675
00:35:07,840 --> 00:35:10,960
quite a problem because He's Jewish, and the Democratic Party

676
00:35:10,960 --> 00:35:14,039
has decided that they hate Israel, and by and large

677
00:35:14,079 --> 00:35:16,840
they're skeptical of the Jewish population in the United States.

678
00:35:16,920 --> 00:35:19,159
So he's going to have a hard time. But somebody

679
00:35:19,280 --> 00:35:21,280
like that is probably.

680
00:35:20,800 --> 00:35:21,480
Speaker 1: Their best bet.

681
00:35:21,480 --> 00:35:23,239
Speaker 4: The other way to go is do what the Republicans

682
00:35:23,239 --> 00:35:26,119
did and just go totally to the outside. I mean,

683
00:35:26,159 --> 00:35:29,000
after the twenty twelve election, which I worked in, the

684
00:35:29,039 --> 00:35:32,719
party was so depressed and demoralized. It decided that there

685
00:35:32,760 --> 00:35:35,519
isn't a single electric Republican in the country that we trust.

686
00:35:36,000 --> 00:35:37,760
We're going to go find somebody else. And that would

687
00:35:37,800 --> 00:35:39,360
be the other way for the Democrats to do. It

688
00:35:39,400 --> 00:35:43,840
find a charismatic outsider who's a little bit ideologically flexible

689
00:35:44,719 --> 00:35:47,840
and gives them that gives them the flexibility to keep.

690
00:35:47,639 --> 00:35:49,079
Speaker 5: Some things throw things out.

691
00:35:49,440 --> 00:35:51,440
Speaker 4: I'm not a politician, you know, I don't have to

692
00:35:51,440 --> 00:35:56,400
adhere to these ideological guardrails. That might be the other

693
00:35:56,440 --> 00:35:58,199
way to go. And they have plenty of celebrities to

694
00:35:58,280 --> 00:35:59,840
choose from. If any of them are willing to get

695
00:35:59,840 --> 00:36:01,920
in to it. I suspect they might have some room

696
00:36:01,960 --> 00:36:03,760
to run in their primary. What would I get rid

697
00:36:03,840 --> 00:36:06,280
of I would immediately get rid of the wrong side

698
00:36:06,280 --> 00:36:09,719
of all these eighty twenty issues. Jettison the transgender stuff,

699
00:36:10,000 --> 00:36:15,039
jettison the DEI stuff, jettison the condescending attitude towards men.

700
00:36:15,400 --> 00:36:17,719
In the Quinnipiac poll this week, they have a fifteen

701
00:36:17,760 --> 00:36:23,000
percent approval rating among men, fifteen They are down to friends, family,

702
00:36:24,079 --> 00:36:28,800
health insurance executives, illegal aliens, and maybe some transgenders. And

703
00:36:28,840 --> 00:36:32,119
that's what they're down to right now, eighteen percent overall,

704
00:36:32,199 --> 00:36:35,280
fifteen percent among men. You can't win that way, and

705
00:36:35,280 --> 00:36:37,639
I wouldn't advise them to keep going down this path.

706
00:36:37,679 --> 00:36:39,880
Speaker 5: I mean, that's what they're doing now. But it's a

707
00:36:39,920 --> 00:36:40,880
terrible dead end.

708
00:36:41,559 --> 00:36:43,920
Speaker 2: And what about on the right, not who would we choose?

709
00:36:43,920 --> 00:36:48,639
We've covered that, but do Republicans or does Trump himself

710
00:36:48,760 --> 00:36:53,280
do things that you think should be walked back or

711
00:36:53,320 --> 00:36:56,440
cut out completely lest it damage him ahead of the

712
00:36:56,440 --> 00:36:59,159
midterms and the party in twenty twenty eight.

713
00:37:00,119 --> 00:37:07,159
Speaker 4: Well, his communications attitude sometimes interrupts better stories that he'd

714
00:37:07,239 --> 00:37:10,719
rather be telling. I mean, the Reiner comment this week

715
00:37:10,800 --> 00:37:12,320
is a case in point. I don't think he should

716
00:37:12,360 --> 00:37:15,039
have done that, and it took focus off of other

717
00:37:15,079 --> 00:37:17,440
things he wanted to be talking about. For twenty four hours.

718
00:37:17,440 --> 00:37:19,280
This happens over time. You're never going to get him

719
00:37:19,280 --> 00:37:23,000
to stop. And that's who he is. And you know, look,

720
00:37:23,039 --> 00:37:25,079
I voted for him three times. I've learned to accept

721
00:37:25,079 --> 00:37:26,599
it for what it is and for who he is,

722
00:37:26,679 --> 00:37:30,400
and it's part of his ethos. It's unnecessary I think

723
00:37:30,440 --> 00:37:34,840
for winning in the future. From a policy perspective, the

724
00:37:34,920 --> 00:37:37,920
next person, if it's Jade Vance, is going to have

725
00:37:38,000 --> 00:37:40,800
to He'll be in an interesting position because he'll be

726
00:37:40,840 --> 00:37:43,159
defending the Trump legacy and.

727
00:37:43,159 --> 00:37:45,960
Speaker 5: All the good and whatever the voters think is good

728
00:37:46,039 --> 00:37:47,320
or whatever they think is bad.

729
00:37:47,719 --> 00:37:50,559
Speaker 4: But he'll also be trying to portray his own platform,

730
00:37:50,559 --> 00:37:52,639
which I actually think is somewhat different than Trump. I

731
00:37:52,679 --> 00:37:55,199
think he's got different views on foreign policy. I think

732
00:37:55,199 --> 00:37:58,480
he's got different views in some ways on economics. And

733
00:37:59,440 --> 00:38:02,880
so while defending one legacy and promoting your own agenda,

734
00:38:02,960 --> 00:38:07,960
it's a tricky thing. But you know, my general view

735
00:38:08,039 --> 00:38:12,280
is is that the next person should not try to

736
00:38:12,320 --> 00:38:18,079
replicate Trump's attitude that sometimes interrupts, you know, what he

737
00:38:18,159 --> 00:38:21,880
wants to be the message of the day. You shouldn't

738
00:38:21,880 --> 00:38:23,440
think that you have to do that because it won't

739
00:38:23,480 --> 00:38:25,880
be authentic to you and no one will think that

740
00:38:25,920 --> 00:38:26,360
it is.

741
00:38:26,960 --> 00:38:28,400
Speaker 5: And it'll get you off track.

742
00:38:28,480 --> 00:38:30,360
Speaker 4: And so I think it's fine to let Trump do

743
00:38:30,400 --> 00:38:32,559
it because that's who Trump is. But to try to

744
00:38:32,599 --> 00:38:35,199
replicate that, or to think that you have to replicate.

745
00:38:34,800 --> 00:38:36,159
Speaker 1: That in the future, would be a mistake.

746
00:38:37,920 --> 00:38:38,280
Speaker 2: Steve.

747
00:38:39,239 --> 00:38:42,599
Speaker 1: Yeah, So I'm gonna go back to the question that

748
00:38:42,840 --> 00:38:45,760
Charles asked you about, and it's in your title. One

749
00:38:45,760 --> 00:38:48,039
of the things I find so unique about your book

750
00:38:48,239 --> 00:38:50,000
is in contrast to all the other books, let me

751
00:38:50,079 --> 00:38:51,880
put it that way. There's so many books out there,

752
00:38:51,920 --> 00:38:53,679
a lot of them very good about how Trump has

753
00:38:53,719 --> 00:38:58,320
captured the populace turn recognizing things that many Republicans didn't

754
00:38:58,360 --> 00:39:01,480
recognize going on in the country, and lots of good

755
00:39:01,559 --> 00:39:04,559
date about that and all the rest. But you've connected

756
00:39:04,559 --> 00:39:07,239
it to common sense. But then the other side of

757
00:39:07,280 --> 00:39:10,079
it is, I'm really glad you connected the question of

758
00:39:10,119 --> 00:39:13,239
the survival of Western civilization. And here's the part I

759
00:39:13,280 --> 00:39:16,199
still have a hard time trying to understand or convey

760
00:39:16,199 --> 00:39:19,159
to people. I think you're absolutely right about that. I

761
00:39:19,199 --> 00:39:22,000
think he is the champion of Western civilization, and the

762
00:39:22,000 --> 00:39:25,920
fact that he's so popular overseas with other populist parties

763
00:39:25,960 --> 00:39:29,280
other people in Europe. I was in Dublin, Ireland last

764
00:39:29,360 --> 00:39:32,400
June when there was a massive protests from the populace

765
00:39:32,440 --> 00:39:37,920
there against what's the Irish government governing miserably, especially on

766
00:39:37,920 --> 00:39:41,440
the immigration question. And I took lots of pictures of

767
00:39:41,480 --> 00:39:46,159
all people carrying God blessed Donald Trump signs in Dublin, Ireland, right,

768
00:39:46,199 --> 00:39:48,679
And we know that in the continent too. But here's

769
00:39:48,719 --> 00:39:50,280
what sort of odd is when I think of the

770
00:39:50,639 --> 00:39:52,440
and maybe it's because I have a PhD. And that's

771
00:39:52,480 --> 00:39:55,559
my handicap, but I think of the champions of Western

772
00:39:55,599 --> 00:39:58,079
civilization that we love in the modern era. And of course,

773
00:39:58,119 --> 00:40:01,360
you know Churchill comes to mind, Ronald Reagan and John F. Kennedy,

774
00:40:01,760 --> 00:40:04,920
Pat moynihan, for example, and you know they all spoke

775
00:40:04,960 --> 00:40:10,480
in their elegant, highly grounded rhetoric with you know, classical

776
00:40:10,519 --> 00:40:13,639
references and all the rest. And Trump is not like

777
00:40:13,719 --> 00:40:17,360
that rhetorically at all, except once in a while. I know,

778
00:40:17,400 --> 00:40:19,559
as speechwriters are very good either friends of mine, some

779
00:40:19,599 --> 00:40:21,559
of them, and they write very good speeches. And he'll

780
00:40:21,599 --> 00:40:25,360
sometimes will strike those notes in the text. Great, that's wonderful,

781
00:40:25,400 --> 00:40:29,960
but it's not his natural not his natural rhetorical style,

782
00:40:30,079 --> 00:40:34,880
and yet there he is and is that instinct. I

783
00:40:34,880 --> 00:40:36,519
don't know if you talked to him about that in

784
00:40:36,559 --> 00:40:39,840
more detail than just the headline in your book. That's

785
00:40:39,840 --> 00:40:41,840
sort of a rambling question. But this, to me is

786
00:40:41,880 --> 00:40:43,679
the most interesting aspect of Trump.

787
00:40:44,679 --> 00:40:46,400
Speaker 4: Yeah, I don't think he thinks of it the way

788
00:40:46,400 --> 00:40:48,400
that I do, or maybe the way that you all do,

789
00:40:49,400 --> 00:40:50,480
because he's very.

790
00:40:50,320 --> 00:40:50,840
Speaker 1: In the moment.

791
00:40:50,920 --> 00:40:51,920
Speaker 5: He's a counterpuncher.

792
00:40:51,960 --> 00:40:53,039
Speaker 1: He's dealing with as.

793
00:40:52,960 --> 00:40:54,360
Speaker 5: They him in the moment.

794
00:40:54,440 --> 00:40:57,400
Speaker 4: I tend to think of this over time, and if

795
00:40:57,400 --> 00:41:00,199
we make mistakes today, over time, what will those mistakes

796
00:41:00,760 --> 00:41:03,360
due to us? But I tend to find that when

797
00:41:03,360 --> 00:41:05,519
it comes to these issues, he almost always makes the

798
00:41:05,599 --> 00:41:09,159
right decision. Even though he has people in his coalition

799
00:41:09,480 --> 00:41:12,199
or that claim to be in his coalition that have

800
00:41:12,280 --> 00:41:15,239
constantly tried to ascribe positions to him that he does

801
00:41:15,280 --> 00:41:17,679
not have but they want him to have, he tends

802
00:41:17,719 --> 00:41:20,840
to shake it off and resist it, particularly on foreign affairs.

803
00:41:20,880 --> 00:41:22,960
I mean, there's all sorts of isolationists out there that

804
00:41:23,000 --> 00:41:25,639
have forever wanted him to be one of them.

805
00:41:25,960 --> 00:41:26,360
Speaker 5: He's not.

806
00:41:26,760 --> 00:41:29,960
Speaker 4: He's always supported American engagement when it was smart. He's

807
00:41:29,960 --> 00:41:33,360
not an adventurist, but he has not shied away from

808
00:41:33,360 --> 00:41:36,519
an American engagement. And look what's happened. You know, we

809
00:41:36,599 --> 00:41:41,039
took out Solomoni in Iran in his first term. We

810
00:41:41,440 --> 00:41:44,280
fired cruise missiles into Syria. We got the living hostages

811
00:41:44,280 --> 00:41:47,079
home from Gaza. He has solved some of these conflicts

812
00:41:47,079 --> 00:41:51,159
around the world. We've got the Venezuela surrounded by the

813
00:41:51,280 --> 00:41:56,280
US Navy. I mean, he's obviously for American engagement, even

814
00:41:56,280 --> 00:41:58,000
though a lot of people have been hanging on him

815
00:41:58,039 --> 00:42:00,760
to change his views on that or or to fall

816
00:42:00,760 --> 00:42:04,079
in line with their views. I think those things are

817
00:42:04,159 --> 00:42:07,480
ultimately good for protection of the West. It's certainly good

818
00:42:07,480 --> 00:42:09,920
for the protection of the Western hemisphere. But you know,

819
00:42:10,360 --> 00:42:15,320
an engaged America, a strong American president has most of

820
00:42:15,360 --> 00:42:17,480
the time been pretty good for the world. And I

821
00:42:17,480 --> 00:42:20,119
think Trump has shown us that. I do think next

822
00:42:20,119 --> 00:42:22,639
time round there's going to be another attempt by the

823
00:42:22,679 --> 00:42:26,960
isolationists who believe that American engagement in the world is

824
00:42:27,039 --> 00:42:30,760
bad or somehow bad for us as Americans. I think

825
00:42:30,760 --> 00:42:32,480
they're going to push to make that a central part

826
00:42:32,519 --> 00:42:34,360
of the Republican platform, and I think we ought to

827
00:42:34,360 --> 00:42:36,559
reject that. I think we ought to follow Donald Trump's lead.

828
00:42:37,559 --> 00:42:40,079
You don't have to rhetorically be into this all the time,

829
00:42:40,400 --> 00:42:42,039
but as a matter of action, if you make the

830
00:42:42,119 --> 00:42:45,519
right decision about smart American engagement, you can make a

831
00:42:45,599 --> 00:42:48,199
very positive difference. I mean, I think a big debate

832
00:42:48,280 --> 00:42:50,800
in twenty eight is what is the Trump legacy on

833
00:42:50,880 --> 00:42:51,679
foreign affairs.

834
00:42:52,599 --> 00:42:53,960
Speaker 5: It's going to look pretty darn good.

835
00:42:54,159 --> 00:42:56,199
Speaker 4: And I don't really want to have a campaign in

836
00:42:56,239 --> 00:42:58,760
twenty eight where people where both parties are arguing that

837
00:42:59,360 --> 00:43:02,079
somehow Trump way of doing it over two terms was incorrect.

838
00:43:02,079 --> 00:43:05,239
I think it's far superior to what the famously indecisive

839
00:43:05,280 --> 00:43:08,119
and wee Joe Biden was doing, far superior to what

840
00:43:08,159 --> 00:43:10,199
Obama did, And I'd rather do it the Trump way

841
00:43:10,239 --> 00:43:12,719
than the way that they did it. I just I

842
00:43:12,719 --> 00:43:16,440
don't want to see this lurch to the isolationist take

843
00:43:16,440 --> 00:43:17,920
hold of the republic platform.

844
00:43:18,519 --> 00:43:21,360
Speaker 1: So I have one last question for you before we

845
00:43:21,480 --> 00:43:24,480
let you begin your show prep for today. It's a

846
00:43:24,519 --> 00:43:27,320
bit of a delicate one and it concerns your friend

847
00:43:27,400 --> 00:43:30,320
and I think at one time former employer Mitch McConnell

848
00:43:30,760 --> 00:43:33,960
from your home state. And first of all, I am

849
00:43:34,000 --> 00:43:36,199
not one of the naysayers of Mitch McConnell. I think

850
00:43:36,199 --> 00:43:39,000
he's been the greatest Senate majority leader since Lyndon Johnson

851
00:43:39,039 --> 00:43:41,360
in the fifties. So I don't talk smack about him

852
00:43:41,360 --> 00:43:43,480
like a lot of people do. That said, I don't

853
00:43:43,519 --> 00:43:46,079
think it's a secret that he hasn't been on the

854
00:43:46,119 --> 00:43:49,639
best of terms or had the best regard for Trump.

855
00:43:49,760 --> 00:43:52,440
And I don't know if you can. Maybe it's personal,

856
00:43:52,440 --> 00:43:56,199
and I don't want to have you trying disclose confidences,

857
00:43:56,239 --> 00:43:58,800
but I wonder if you might say something about that,

858
00:43:58,880 --> 00:44:01,400
and whether partly it's it's an institutional thing, I mean,

859
00:44:02,159 --> 00:44:05,280
among other of McConnell's virtues as a respector of the

860
00:44:05,320 --> 00:44:08,440
separation of powers and the prerogatives of the Senate, which Trump,

861
00:44:09,440 --> 00:44:12,639
so to say, is not always so a cognizant of right.

862
00:44:12,719 --> 00:44:15,079
So I don't say a little bit about that obviously

863
00:44:15,199 --> 00:44:16,320
difficult relationship.

864
00:44:17,199 --> 00:44:21,000
Speaker 4: Yeah, they're not golfing buddies, that's right, and that's and look,

865
00:44:21,119 --> 00:44:22,960
by the way, that's fine. I don't need all my

866
00:44:23,000 --> 00:44:26,280
Republicans and all my Conservatives to be hanging out every weekend.

867
00:44:26,320 --> 00:44:27,800
What I need them to do is to do things

868
00:44:27,880 --> 00:44:30,800
that we want them to do, like cut my taxes,

869
00:44:30,920 --> 00:44:33,599
which they did, and then they made that permanent. I

870
00:44:34,039 --> 00:44:37,159
need them to make the Supreme Court conservative, which.

871
00:44:36,960 --> 00:44:37,719
Speaker 5: They did together.

872
00:44:37,760 --> 00:44:39,559
Speaker 4: I mean, these two guys, whether they like it or not,

873
00:44:39,599 --> 00:44:41,880
are going to be linked in history by saving the

874
00:44:41,920 --> 00:44:45,760
Supreme Court from the liberals and changing it for a generation.

875
00:44:46,079 --> 00:44:49,679
That's a great thing. They've worked together on other issues.

876
00:44:49,719 --> 00:44:52,119
Sometimes they're at odds with each other. I suspect McConnell

877
00:44:52,159 --> 00:44:53,960
doesn't agree with Trump, for instance.

878
00:44:53,639 --> 00:44:54,760
Speaker 1: About the filibuster.

879
00:44:55,000 --> 00:44:57,639
Speaker 4: In fact, I know he doesn't. But on the big

880
00:44:57,639 --> 00:45:01,119
ticket issues of our day, let our taxes go down?

881
00:45:01,719 --> 00:45:05,079
Did we appoint conservatives to the judiciary? Did we save

882
00:45:05,119 --> 00:45:09,360
the Supreme Court? Absolutely? And so I got Look, I've

883
00:45:09,400 --> 00:45:11,320
happily voted for both of them every.

884
00:45:11,119 --> 00:45:13,760
Speaker 5: Time they've been on the ballot in my adult life, and.

885
00:45:14,159 --> 00:45:17,840
Speaker 4: So have hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of other Kentuckians.

886
00:45:17,840 --> 00:45:21,199
And so you know, I don't need them to be

887
00:45:21,199 --> 00:45:23,119
best friends. They're never going to be best friends.

888
00:45:23,159 --> 00:45:25,639
Speaker 5: And that's okay if you look at Kentucky as a whole.

889
00:45:25,639 --> 00:45:28,679
Speaker 4: Interestingly, a lot of people thought McConnell in the second

890
00:45:28,800 --> 00:45:30,880
term was going to be a thorn and Trump's side.

891
00:45:30,920 --> 00:45:32,960
That has not turned out to be the case at all.

892
00:45:33,000 --> 00:45:37,000
It's been Paul and Massy. Yeah, I've been more vexing

893
00:45:37,079 --> 00:45:40,880
to Trump than Mitch McConnell. So I think history will

894
00:45:40,880 --> 00:45:45,280
probably remember a little bit about their personal differences, somewhat

895
00:45:45,440 --> 00:45:48,400
stemming from January the sixth, But it's at a macro

896
00:45:48,519 --> 00:45:51,320
level going to remember these two guys cut taxes and

897
00:45:51,320 --> 00:45:53,400
save the Supreme Court, and that's a record that any

898
00:45:53,440 --> 00:45:54,800
conservative ought to be proud of.

899
00:45:55,400 --> 00:45:57,199
Speaker 1: I'm going to let your hero Charlie Cook have the

900
00:45:57,239 --> 00:45:58,960
last question comment for you.

901
00:45:59,000 --> 00:46:00,440
Speaker 2: So I have a final question, and I don't know

902
00:46:00,440 --> 00:46:03,159
if you can answer. But you said that people come

903
00:46:03,239 --> 00:46:05,000
up to you and they say that they love the debate.

904
00:46:05,320 --> 00:46:07,239
And then you said you think you're on the only

905
00:46:07,280 --> 00:46:10,519
show where that debate happens. And I think that's probably true.

906
00:46:10,559 --> 00:46:12,639
I would know there's only one of you. They don't

907
00:46:12,679 --> 00:46:14,559
have three or four of you on You're always up

908
00:46:14,559 --> 00:46:18,639
against eight people. But I wonder why you think it

909
00:46:18,840 --> 00:46:23,559
is that we have fewer shows then the public would

910
00:46:23,599 --> 00:46:26,039
obviously want, because I hear this too. I get told this,

911
00:46:26,280 --> 00:46:30,119
whether it's podcasts that I'm on or my own show.

912
00:46:30,199 --> 00:46:32,159
People love the debates. They love it when you have

913
00:46:32,239 --> 00:46:34,320
someone on and you're not rude to each other, but

914
00:46:34,400 --> 00:46:37,320
you argue about politics, and yet it seems to happen

915
00:46:37,400 --> 00:46:38,679
less and less. Why do you think that.

916
00:46:38,840 --> 00:46:42,360
Speaker 4: Is because I think during the Trump years it became

917
00:46:42,440 --> 00:46:46,880
unfashionable in mainstream media to platform any voice from the right,

918
00:46:46,960 --> 00:46:50,159
anybody who was a Republican, anybody who voted for Trump.

919
00:46:50,199 --> 00:46:51,559
So I've been with seeing n for eight and a

920
00:46:51,599 --> 00:46:53,719
half years and no one's ever censored me or told

921
00:46:53,760 --> 00:46:54,480
me what to say.

922
00:46:55,360 --> 00:46:57,400
Speaker 5: But look, in mainstream media as a.

923
00:46:57,360 --> 00:47:00,239
Speaker 4: Whole, it just there was a lot of pressure to

924
00:47:00,360 --> 00:47:04,679
not allow equal footing to the Trump side of the

925
00:47:04,719 --> 00:47:06,880
argument or the Republican side of the argument, which is

926
00:47:06,920 --> 00:47:09,519
a shame because they deserve it. Half the country believes

927
00:47:09,519 --> 00:47:11,559
in Donald Trump and voted for Donald Trump. It's been

928
00:47:11,559 --> 00:47:14,880
true for three straight elections, and so I think it

929
00:47:14,920 --> 00:47:16,800
was a mistake that they made. But I just you know,

930
00:47:16,960 --> 00:47:18,559
one of the number one comments I hear on my

931
00:47:18,599 --> 00:47:22,159
own social media, why does CNN allows Scott Jittings to

932
00:47:22,199 --> 00:47:29,119
talk so illiberalism that has taken hold in quarters of

933
00:47:29,119 --> 00:47:31,760
American politics. I mean, I think it had an impact

934
00:47:31,800 --> 00:47:34,480
on the thinking of people who run our media. I

935
00:47:34,480 --> 00:47:37,480
think CNN was genius in bringing it back. Our CEO

936
00:47:37,599 --> 00:47:41,440
is Mark Thompson, British guy, American citizen like you, but

937
00:47:41,800 --> 00:47:45,119
random BC Rand the New York Times. He believes in debates,

938
00:47:45,360 --> 00:47:48,559
and I'm kind of shocked more people haven't followed his

939
00:47:48,639 --> 00:47:52,519
lead because I think the content is desired, and I

940
00:47:52,559 --> 00:47:54,760
think it's good for half the country to be able

941
00:47:54,800 --> 00:47:56,320
to turn on the TV and say, oh, there's somebody

942
00:47:56,360 --> 00:48:00,199
for me to watch two. But the the debating content,

943
00:48:00,800 --> 00:48:03,800
the way people are consuming it in these little segments online,

944
00:48:04,239 --> 00:48:06,639
I think it's good for our politics, and I wish

945
00:48:06,679 --> 00:48:08,840
more people would produce it. I suspect in the future

946
00:48:09,119 --> 00:48:10,280
you're going to see more of it, even.

947
00:48:10,199 --> 00:48:12,039
Speaker 5: If folks are slow to do it.

948
00:48:12,519 --> 00:48:16,800
Speaker 1: Scott, congratulations on a revolution of common sense, and we

949
00:48:16,840 --> 00:48:18,760
are all thrilled that we'll be able to take you in.

950
00:48:18,760 --> 00:48:20,679
More of you on the radio starting the new year,

951
00:48:20,800 --> 00:48:23,079
and so best of luck to you, Mery Christmas in

952
00:48:23,079 --> 00:48:23,760
a happy new Year.

953
00:48:24,360 --> 00:48:25,360
Speaker 5: Thank you, Steve Charles.

954
00:48:25,400 --> 00:48:28,559
Speaker 4: Good to meet you finally, and I'll keep listening to

955
00:48:28,719 --> 00:48:30,559
really appreciate the time today guys, Thank you all.

956
00:48:33,559 --> 00:48:36,400
Speaker 1: Well. Charlie. I think the other story of the week

957
00:48:36,480 --> 00:48:41,159
that really grabbed me as an old Cold War baby

958
00:48:41,199 --> 00:48:44,920
boomer was the passing of Norman pot Horns, who I

959
00:48:45,000 --> 00:48:48,119
never knew him. I only met him once in person,

960
00:48:48,559 --> 00:48:50,519
you know. I started reading him and commentary in the

961
00:48:50,559 --> 00:48:53,280
late seventies when I was in college. I mean, there's

962
00:48:53,280 --> 00:48:55,559
been lots of encomiums to him the last few days.

963
00:48:55,880 --> 00:48:57,920
I do think there are some essays of his from

964
00:48:58,000 --> 00:49:00,840
the eighties in particular, maybe he was at his peak

965
00:49:00,880 --> 00:49:03,400
of influence that has stood a test of time. I

966
00:49:03,400 --> 00:49:05,199
could talk about those a little bit. Maybe I will

967
00:49:05,199 --> 00:49:06,719
in a moment, But I don't know if you had

968
00:49:06,719 --> 00:49:09,639
a chance to medium or if the sort of commentary

969
00:49:09,760 --> 00:49:12,519
National Review alliance is still as robust as it was

970
00:49:12,559 --> 00:49:14,920
back in the days when Buckley and pot Hearts were

971
00:49:14,960 --> 00:49:18,519
in the chair. But shares your thoughts.

972
00:49:18,360 --> 00:49:20,760
Speaker 2: Well, I never met him. I never met William I. F.

973
00:49:20,760 --> 00:49:23,480
Barkley Junior either, so I didn't meet either side of

974
00:49:23,519 --> 00:49:27,199
the braid. I think was how John Petoritz, his son,

975
00:49:27,280 --> 00:49:31,960
described it in the most recent National Review, the seventeenth

976
00:49:31,960 --> 00:49:40,119
anniversary edition. Here's what I find most compelling about Norman Petorrets.

977
00:49:41,679 --> 00:49:44,880
I was on a podcast earlier this week and we

978
00:49:44,880 --> 00:49:50,199
were talking about Trump's takeover of the party, which I

979
00:49:50,199 --> 00:49:54,960
I'm not thrilled about, as you know, and the failures

980
00:49:54,960 --> 00:49:57,960
of the establishment, which I think are real. And one

981
00:49:58,000 --> 00:50:03,800
of the things that I noted was that we had

982
00:50:03,880 --> 00:50:09,119
a movement reached a point at which a lot of

983
00:50:09,159 --> 00:50:14,559
our leading lights, be they writers or activists or thinkers

984
00:50:14,639 --> 00:50:22,800
or politicians, were just saying words by wrote without much

985
00:50:22,840 --> 00:50:28,320
thought behind them, and that was a problem. We've been

986
00:50:28,400 --> 00:50:30,719
very successful. Reagan had come in, he'd won a lot

987
00:50:30,760 --> 00:50:32,239
of the arguments with the help of a lot of

988
00:50:32,280 --> 00:50:35,400
other people. And then in the nineteen nineties, although Bill

989
00:50:35,440 --> 00:50:38,119
Clinton won twice, the center of gravity was to the right,

990
00:50:38,480 --> 00:50:44,280
and we atrophied, and you met people who would just

991
00:50:44,320 --> 00:50:46,800
stand up and they would say, we must do this,

992
00:50:46,840 --> 00:50:48,280
we mist do that, we miss stand for this, we

993
00:50:48,320 --> 00:50:49,960
miss stand for that. But when you asked them as

994
00:50:49,960 --> 00:50:51,719
a follow up question, they had absolutely no idea what

995
00:50:51,800 --> 00:50:54,920
they were talking about. And what's so interesting and impressive

996
00:50:54,960 --> 00:50:59,679
about Norman Praetoris, in part because he shifted in his politics,

997
00:50:59,679 --> 00:51:02,119
he was bonded to two things and then he created

998
00:51:02,199 --> 00:51:07,800
this new philosophy, was that he always knew exactly what

999
00:51:07,880 --> 00:51:10,719
he thought and why he never wrote a single sentence

1000
00:51:11,119 --> 00:51:14,559
in this entire life that was just going through the motions.

1001
00:51:14,840 --> 00:51:19,400
He didn't inherit any of his views, and so he

1002
00:51:19,519 --> 00:51:25,480
was formidable because he could present them from first principles,

1003
00:51:25,599 --> 00:51:27,840
from the ground up. You could ask him not just

1004
00:51:27,880 --> 00:51:30,199
a follow up question, but eighty follow up questions, and

1005
00:51:30,199 --> 00:51:31,519
he would say, oh, well, of course this is what

1006
00:51:32,199 --> 00:51:35,840
And that is a remarkable thing to offer the world.

1007
00:51:36,760 --> 00:51:41,320
Is a philosophy for which you are not solely but

1008
00:51:41,639 --> 00:51:45,639
maybe primarily responsible, that you thought through and that you

1009
00:51:46,960 --> 00:51:53,440
arrived at through experience and interrogation. And I cannot think

1010
00:51:53,639 --> 00:51:57,360
of a better legacy to have than that.

1011
00:51:58,039 --> 00:52:01,159
Speaker 1: Yeah, so I dust at all have his memoir from

1012
00:52:01,159 --> 00:52:05,280
the late seventies called Breaking Ranks, which detailed his movement

1013
00:52:05,320 --> 00:52:08,239
from the left to the right, which took place mostly

1014
00:52:08,280 --> 00:52:10,599
in the sixties. Certainly it was complete by the time

1015
00:52:10,599 --> 00:52:13,599
a Governor arrived in nineteen seventy two. One of the

1016
00:52:13,679 --> 00:52:15,880
parts of it that fascinated me was how in the

1017
00:52:15,920 --> 00:52:19,320
early sixties, when the student New Left first started forming,

1018
00:52:20,000 --> 00:52:21,719
and he was intrigued by them for a little bit.

1019
00:52:21,760 --> 00:52:26,880
He almost printed an excerpt from the port Heuron statement

1020
00:52:26,920 --> 00:52:29,000
from nineteen sixty two the Tom Hayden Roade, but then

1021
00:52:29,039 --> 00:52:32,000
had second thoughts when he realized, I'm not sure this

1022
00:52:32,079 --> 00:52:35,039
is altogether there. And by the end of the sixties

1023
00:52:35,280 --> 00:52:37,559
one of the things that disgusted him was all the

1024
00:52:37,760 --> 00:52:41,599
prominent liberals he knew friends of his who had completely

1025
00:52:41,679 --> 00:52:46,639
capitulated to the new Left, even though pod Hartz said,

1026
00:52:46,800 --> 00:52:51,599
they all knew that these were ruinous, reckless, ideologically unsound

1027
00:52:51,639 --> 00:52:54,840
people doing great damage to the Democratic Party and the country.

1028
00:52:55,480 --> 00:52:57,920
And now you fast forward to, you know, the era

1029
00:52:58,039 --> 00:53:00,800
of wokeery from say, you know, the election of Obama

1030
00:53:00,920 --> 00:53:04,639
until really the tide hasn't turned until this last election.

1031
00:53:04,760 --> 00:53:07,079
I think that maybe a couple other things you can

1032
00:53:07,119 --> 00:53:10,519
point out, but and so you see again, one of

1033
00:53:10,519 --> 00:53:13,519
things that happens during the you know, the runaway wokery

1034
00:53:13,559 --> 00:53:17,239
in the last decade, was so many people, even some conservatives,

1035
00:53:17,280 --> 00:53:21,679
who but especially people the establishing in universities and corporations,

1036
00:53:21,719 --> 00:53:24,559
who utterly surrendered all the cliches of the left about

1037
00:53:24,559 --> 00:53:29,239
diversity and so forth. You think also of it was

1038
00:53:29,280 --> 00:53:34,239
the late seventies, at the most inopportune time, pot Hartch

1039
00:53:34,239 --> 00:53:37,639
wrote the book called Why We Were in Vietnam, And

1040
00:53:37,679 --> 00:53:40,679
there's almost no defenders left in Vietnam except of course.

1041
00:53:40,679 --> 00:53:43,320
The other one who was was Ronald Reagan, who caught

1042
00:53:43,440 --> 00:53:45,480
hell for saying in nineteen eighty that it was a

1043
00:53:45,519 --> 00:53:46,280
noble cause.

1044
00:53:46,639 --> 00:53:49,719
Speaker 2: Even though Jimmy stewartt I think was the right, yes,

1045
00:53:50,599 --> 00:53:51,760
defender of Vietnam.

1046
00:53:51,960 --> 00:53:55,760
Speaker 1: There you go, and you know, okay, we'll go back

1047
00:53:55,760 --> 00:53:57,760
and revisited that now. But he had the courage to say,

1048
00:53:57,800 --> 00:54:01,239
wait a minute, let's stop all this Vietnam demonization, which

1049
00:54:01,280 --> 00:54:03,400
was the theme of every Hollywood movie in those days,

1050
00:54:03,480 --> 00:54:06,960
right the demonology school, Every book was about, you know,

1051
00:54:07,079 --> 00:54:10,800
Vietnam demonology is I used to put it. There are

1052
00:54:10,800 --> 00:54:13,480
two essays in particular from the mid eighties that I

1053
00:54:13,519 --> 00:54:17,320
think stand the test of time. Now they may both

1054
00:54:17,360 --> 00:54:19,360
sound well. The second one will sound right. The first

1055
00:54:19,400 --> 00:54:24,599
one was one called the Why the God That Failed Failed?

1056
00:54:24,840 --> 00:54:27,800
And this is a little obscure. It's about the once

1057
00:54:27,840 --> 00:54:31,159
famous book from nineteen forty nine called The God That Failed.

1058
00:54:31,199 --> 00:54:34,159
It was six prominent communists and why they broke with communism.

1059
00:54:34,559 --> 00:54:38,159
Arthur Kester was the most famous, but the novelist Ignausio Salone,

1060
00:54:38,239 --> 00:54:42,599
Andre gud and France Richard Wright in America big figures

1061
00:54:42,639 --> 00:54:46,119
then less so now, But what part Haras caught was

1062
00:54:46,519 --> 00:54:49,840
they all said there against the Soviet Union and Marxist communism,

1063
00:54:50,239 --> 00:54:52,320
but they all remained kind of on the left and

1064
00:54:52,400 --> 00:54:55,519
pro socialists, so they really didn't break with what was

1065
00:54:55,679 --> 00:54:59,039
wrong with that sort of spectrum of philosophy. And I

1066
00:54:59,079 --> 00:55:01,400
think that's still true today for people on the left

1067
00:55:01,400 --> 00:55:04,719
are so called progressives, even the ones who say they're

1068
00:55:04,719 --> 00:55:08,280
against wokery and so forth. The second essay, also the

1069
00:55:08,400 --> 00:55:12,400
mid eighties, was if or well, we're alive today? And

1070
00:55:12,440 --> 00:55:15,400
again this will seem like old news for a lot

1071
00:55:15,400 --> 00:55:18,960
of listeners perhaps, but I remember vividly in nineteen eighty four,

1072
00:55:19,679 --> 00:55:22,159
when you know, the year that the book talked about

1073
00:55:22,239 --> 00:55:24,559
arrived and you had all kinds of people on the left,

1074
00:55:24,599 --> 00:55:28,480
like Walter Cronkite distorting the book, saying it's really about

1075
00:55:28,559 --> 00:55:33,239
us and the capitalist West too, And but Harts was saying, no,

1076
00:55:33,280 --> 00:55:35,159
if or we're alive, I know where he'd land to be,

1077
00:55:35,239 --> 00:55:37,800
right next door to me. He put it more elegantly

1078
00:55:37,880 --> 00:55:39,719
than that. Well, lo and behold. I don't know if

1079
00:55:39,719 --> 00:55:43,360
you've heard about this, Charlie, but there's this movie about

1080
00:55:43,360 --> 00:55:46,280
an animated versus an animal house coming out, and all

1081
00:55:46,280 --> 00:55:54,000
the early indications from animal Farm. Sorry, yeah, absolutely. All

1082
00:55:54,000 --> 00:55:57,199
the early indications are they have turned story inside out

1083
00:55:57,239 --> 00:55:59,800
and it's going to be a grotesque perversion. And so

1084
00:56:00,159 --> 00:56:01,960
you know, we need to channel the spirit of Norman

1085
00:56:02,000 --> 00:56:05,360
pot hearts about or Well his application for today in

1086
00:56:05,440 --> 00:56:06,800
this and so many other areas.

1087
00:56:06,960 --> 00:56:09,599
Speaker 2: So that is a hobby horse of mine, Steeve. I've

1088
00:56:09,599 --> 00:56:14,039
written about it over and over. George Orwell was a socialist.

1089
00:56:14,159 --> 00:56:16,679
He was not a conservative. He was a socialist. He

1090
00:56:16,760 --> 00:56:18,519
believed in democratic socialism.

1091
00:56:18,599 --> 00:56:19,039
Speaker 1: I do not.

1092
00:56:20,000 --> 00:56:24,920
Speaker 2: But he was horrified by communism. And this is the

1093
00:56:25,000 --> 00:56:28,599
key point. Not only was he horrified by communism, he

1094
00:56:28,760 --> 00:56:35,480
was deeply worried that even democratic socialism might lead inexorably to totalitarianism.

1095
00:56:35,679 --> 00:56:40,320
That book is not about capitalism. It's about that. It

1096
00:56:40,440 --> 00:56:44,119
is insane to me that they're doing this, and it's

1097
00:56:44,159 --> 00:56:46,800
insane that so many people believe it. So this is

1098
00:56:46,800 --> 00:56:48,679
obviously me going on a long time. I didn't know

1099
00:56:49,079 --> 00:56:52,159
that it happened in nineteen eighty four, hadn't been born yet.

1100
00:56:52,400 --> 00:56:55,920
I did know in twenty twelve, when Barack Obama was

1101
00:56:56,000 --> 00:56:59,760
running against Mitt Romney, that people started saying, oh, this

1102
00:56:59,840 --> 00:57:02,440
is exactly the message of Animal Farm, which is when

1103
00:57:02,440 --> 00:57:05,719
I started writing about it, Mitt Romney apparently, is this

1104
00:57:05,920 --> 00:57:08,440
the topic of Animal Farm? No, he's not.

1105
00:57:09,519 --> 00:57:10,280
Speaker 1: Unbelievable.

1106
00:57:10,599 --> 00:57:13,960
Speaker 2: And in fact, you know that book was not published

1107
00:57:14,079 --> 00:57:17,800
originally for a couple of years because we were allies

1108
00:57:17,840 --> 00:57:20,840
with the Soviets in World War Two and no one

1109
00:57:20,920 --> 00:57:24,320
wanted to publish a book that was such an obvious

1110
00:57:24,320 --> 00:57:26,719
and transparent attack on the Soviet Union.

1111
00:57:27,239 --> 00:57:29,440
Speaker 1: Yeah, a little quick footnote for you, and I can

1112
00:57:29,519 --> 00:57:31,000
make a copy and sent it to you if you like.

1113
00:57:31,079 --> 00:57:33,760
But I came across a review of nineteen eighty four

1114
00:57:34,599 --> 00:57:36,679
by C. S. Lewis, of all not of all people.

1115
00:57:36,719 --> 00:57:38,440
I mean, you can see why he'd be interested in it,

1116
00:57:38,480 --> 00:57:41,079
And what he really said was, I think Animal Farm

1117
00:57:41,159 --> 00:57:44,000
is a much better book than nineteen eighty four, and

1118
00:57:44,119 --> 00:57:46,719
his argument is coaching. But I got to thinking, I

1119
00:57:46,760 --> 00:57:49,599
think Lewis thinks that because Lewis wrote so many books

1120
00:57:49,599 --> 00:57:54,480
that had talking animals. Right, I liked I think you

1121
00:57:54,599 --> 00:57:57,280
liked the vibe of it. Yeah. But anyway, it was

1122
00:57:57,280 --> 00:58:01,639
an odd little discovery. But we have come to the

1123
00:58:01,760 --> 00:58:04,559
end of our hour for this week. This podcast brought

1124
00:58:04,559 --> 00:58:08,519
to you, as always by Ricochet dot Com. Please support

1125
00:58:08,519 --> 00:58:11,400
this show by becoming a member. We'll see you, all

1126
00:58:11,400 --> 00:58:14,039
of you in the comments and until next week. We

1127
00:58:14,119 --> 00:58:16,000
may be off next week for Christmas. I'm not sure,

1128
00:58:16,039 --> 00:58:19,239
but oh I will say this, it is scheduled. I

1129
00:58:19,239 --> 00:58:20,840
think it will happen. I am going to do a

1130
00:58:20,880 --> 00:58:25,119
special episode of Me in Conversation with Rob Long. Who

1131
00:58:25,159 --> 00:58:28,360
better to talk about the Christmas season than Ricochet's own seminary,

1132
00:58:28,400 --> 00:58:31,360
and so look forward to that sometime in the next

1133
00:58:31,400 --> 00:58:33,719
ten days or so. So with that, go to see

1134
00:58:33,760 --> 00:58:36,559
you Charles, We miss you, James, see everybody in the

1135
00:58:36,559 --> 00:58:38,920
comments at Ricochet four point d.

1136
00:58:40,239 --> 00:58:41,840
Speaker 2: Whatever it is perfect