WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.120 --> 00:00:03.240 This was a fascinating story, and I didn't get time 2 00:00:03.439 --> 00:00:08.400 to address it last week. But it has to do 3 00:00:08.480 --> 00:00:11.880 with Kamala Harris as the borders are, and I think 4 00:00:11.960 --> 00:00:18.760 that the commentariat around it is kind of getting it wrong, 5 00:00:19.160 --> 00:00:22.920 both on the left and the right. A little bit 6 00:00:22.920 --> 00:00:26.000 on the right is getting it a little bit inaccurate. 7 00:00:27.519 --> 00:00:30.920 The commentariat on the left is to basically try to 8 00:00:31.039 --> 00:00:37.719 disappear the reality of Harris's involvement in the border and 9 00:00:37.799 --> 00:00:41.560 make it appear as if the relative stability at the border, 10 00:00:41.719 --> 00:00:43.600 as compared with the first three and a half years 11 00:00:43.600 --> 00:00:45.359 of the Biden ministry or the first three years of 12 00:00:45.359 --> 00:00:49.880 the Biden administration, all the border's fine. See, Biden got 13 00:00:49.880 --> 00:00:52.399 it all under control after making it out of control 14 00:00:52.439 --> 00:00:55.880 as soon as he came into office. So Harris, no, 15 00:00:55.960 --> 00:00:58.479 Harris was doing fine. She was never the borders are. 16 00:00:58.679 --> 00:01:01.759 And we had this silly fight last week for about 17 00:01:02.240 --> 00:01:09.640 three or four days where everyone was peeing their pants 18 00:01:09.879 --> 00:01:13.239 over the notion of whether or not Kamala Harris was 19 00:01:13.319 --> 00:01:17.599 the borders Zar, which is such as she was never 20 00:01:17.640 --> 00:01:21.719 the borders Zar, and you had these outlets trianngrily insisting 21 00:01:21.719 --> 00:01:23.319 that she was never the borders are in spite of 22 00:01:23.319 --> 00:01:25.640 the fact that they had written articles calling her the 23 00:01:25.680 --> 00:01:29.159 border Zar. And it's such a silly thing to argue 24 00:01:29.159 --> 00:01:33.439 about because clearly President Biden designated that he was going 25 00:01:33.480 --> 00:01:36.079 to put her in charge of a lot of stuff 26 00:01:36.519 --> 00:01:40.000 relating to the immigration problem that was emerging in the 27 00:01:40.000 --> 00:01:45.799 first year of his presidency. And czar is not within 28 00:01:45.879 --> 00:01:54.439 American government some formal title. It is an informal moniker 29 00:01:55.599 --> 00:02:00.280 that the press puts on a person when they've been 30 00:02:00.439 --> 00:02:04.760 designated in some way to be the point person, usually 31 00:02:04.760 --> 00:02:09.400 for a presidential administration to tackle problem X, Y or Z. 32 00:02:12.639 --> 00:02:18.280 So was she formally appointed the czar? No, there's no 33 00:02:18.400 --> 00:02:22.159 formal appointment process for someone to be quote the borders are. 34 00:02:22.599 --> 00:02:25.319 But President Biden designated that he was going to make 35 00:02:25.400 --> 00:02:28.599 Kamala Harris ort of this point person for this and 36 00:02:28.639 --> 00:02:32.759 it's that designation that I want to talk about. I 37 00:02:32.840 --> 00:02:36.919 read this fascinating piece from National Review. You can read 38 00:02:36.919 --> 00:02:38.840 it at my Twitter account Twitter dot com slash Fresno 39 00:02:38.879 --> 00:02:45.000 Johnny at Fresno Johnny. It's written by Noah Rothman. It's 40 00:02:45.240 --> 00:02:51.800 really interesting the ways in which Biden clearly did not 41 00:02:52.159 --> 00:02:57.599 like Harris. And it's been my thesis all along. Biden 42 00:02:57.800 --> 00:03:01.280 never wanted to pick Kamala Harris as his vice president. 43 00:03:01.560 --> 00:03:07.120 He was forced to do so because Democrats felt pressure 44 00:03:07.919 --> 00:03:10.599 to have their ticket include someone who wasn't an old 45 00:03:10.639 --> 00:03:15.840 white guy, and because the donors liked Harris. Harris comes 46 00:03:15.840 --> 00:03:18.680 out of California, she comes out of northern California. She 47 00:03:18.680 --> 00:03:22.439 comes out of the Willie Brown magic circle of donors. 48 00:03:22.960 --> 00:03:26.960 She was connected with Silicon Valley people. Donors loved Kamala Harris, 49 00:03:27.319 --> 00:03:32.039 and they clearly foisted her upon Joe Biden. Biden had 50 00:03:32.080 --> 00:03:35.080 no reason to like Harris. They had never worked together 51 00:03:35.479 --> 00:03:39.120 their time in government, never overlapped. Biden leaves the vice 52 00:03:39.159 --> 00:03:42.800 presidency when she starts in the US Senate, so they 53 00:03:42.800 --> 00:03:46.159 have no history of working together in the Obama administration, 54 00:03:46.680 --> 00:03:52.919 in the Senate, anywhere. And in fact, Harris tried in 55 00:03:52.960 --> 00:03:56.280 a ham fisted way to call Joe Biden a racist 56 00:03:56.360 --> 00:04:01.319 to his face during the debate, which apparently is something 57 00:04:01.360 --> 00:04:04.280 that Jill Biden seems like a woman who holds a grudge, 58 00:04:04.759 --> 00:04:11.960 never forgot, and never liked Harris. So what seems to 59 00:04:12.039 --> 00:04:20.439 have happened is that Biden gets saddled with Harris drags 60 00:04:20.480 --> 00:04:24.879 her across the finish line to win the election, and 61 00:04:24.920 --> 00:04:33.279 then he proceeds to give her sort of ownership and 62 00:04:33.360 --> 00:04:40.680 responsibility for problems he knows are not solvable, including the 63 00:04:40.720 --> 00:04:48.079 border that basically Biden so little regarded her and so 64 00:04:48.319 --> 00:04:55.040 disdained her, so disdained her ability or lack of ability 65 00:04:55.120 --> 00:04:58.000 as a politician and as an executive, that he just 66 00:04:58.040 --> 00:05:03.759 sort of dumped several of his problems into her portfolio 67 00:05:03.879 --> 00:05:08.160 of stuff she worked on, and basically things that he 68 00:05:08.240 --> 00:05:11.279 knew were not really solvable, he would sort of assign 69 00:05:11.360 --> 00:05:14.319 to her so that she would take the blame and 70 00:05:14.360 --> 00:05:21.680 look like an idiot. So here's the piece. Harris's record 71 00:05:21.800 --> 00:05:25.000 is a story both of incompetence and of how little 72 00:05:25.040 --> 00:05:29.000 faith her own allies have in her political acumen and 73 00:05:29.079 --> 00:05:34.879 capabilities as an executive. Since Joe Biden announced his intention 74 00:05:34.959 --> 00:05:36.959 to withdraw from American public life at the end of 75 00:05:36.959 --> 00:05:39.560 his term, the Trump campaign and its Republican allies have 76 00:05:39.600 --> 00:05:43.720 focused on their new opponents subpar performance handling border security. 77 00:05:44.319 --> 00:05:47.040 The GOP strategy makes sense for all the media's efforts 78 00:05:47.079 --> 00:05:50.879 to revise or even erase history. Harris was in function, 79 00:05:51.040 --> 00:05:56.639 if not title, although even that, like title, no one 80 00:05:56.639 --> 00:06:01.759 gets formally designated with this title in function, if not title, 81 00:06:02.600 --> 00:06:06.839 was the Biden administration's Borders Zar. And yet the Republican 82 00:06:06.879 --> 00:06:09.879 Party's approach to this messaging campaign has so far been 83 00:06:09.920 --> 00:06:14.240 to frame Harris as a fully empowered functionary who nevertheless 84 00:06:14.279 --> 00:06:19.000 bungled her charge. In reality, the Biden administration set Harris 85 00:06:19.079 --> 00:06:21.879 up to fail as a way of providing the president 86 00:06:21.959 --> 00:06:26.120 cover for his own dismal mishandling of the border. It 87 00:06:26.199 --> 00:06:29.800 was only two months after Biden's inauguration, with all Trump's 88 00:06:29.800 --> 00:06:33.839 COVID era restrictions still in place, that encounters between migrants 89 00:06:33.839 --> 00:06:38.879 and patrol agents exploded at the US Mexico border, soon 90 00:06:38.920 --> 00:06:42.680 to eclipse even pre pandemic highs. That same month, the 91 00:06:42.680 --> 00:06:46.120 President tapped his vice president not to bring the crisis 92 00:06:46.240 --> 00:06:52.959 under control, but to take the blame for it. So 93 00:06:53.160 --> 00:06:56.360 here's the critical part. Harris was not empowered to oversee 94 00:06:56.360 --> 00:07:01.680 the administration's policing efforts on the border. So these are 95 00:07:01.720 --> 00:07:04.800 all the things that Biden didn't actually task Harris with. 96 00:07:06.199 --> 00:07:10.839 She wasn't allowed to oversee policing efforts. She wasn't allowed 97 00:07:10.879 --> 00:07:17.519 to spearhead negotiations on Capitol Hill for Congress to pass 98 00:07:17.800 --> 00:07:23.800 new laws regulating asylum. She wasn't allowed to negotiate deportation 99 00:07:25.800 --> 00:07:28.959 with countries beyond Mexico's borders from which most of the 100 00:07:29.000 --> 00:07:32.800 migrants were coming. So again a lot of this at 101 00:07:32.839 --> 00:07:35.839 that time, it was not Mexican migration. It was coming 102 00:07:35.879 --> 00:07:42.639 from Central American countries south of Mexico. She was charged. 103 00:07:42.920 --> 00:07:47.360 Here's the actual tasks she was given. She was charged with, quote, 104 00:07:47.399 --> 00:07:51.399 talking to the leaders of Mexico and the nations that 105 00:07:51.439 --> 00:07:55.680 make up Central America's northern triangle to address quote the 106 00:07:55.759 --> 00:08:01.639 root causes of migration, gang violence, and trafficking and cartels, 107 00:08:01.759 --> 00:08:04.800 as the president said at the time, but also natural 108 00:08:04.839 --> 00:08:10.920 disasters hurricanes, floods, and earthquakes. Rothman, in his piece writes, 109 00:08:11.000 --> 00:08:13.839 if the vice president had the power to mitigate phenomena 110 00:08:13.959 --> 00:08:17.319 like that, she'd be overqualified to merely preside over the Senate. 111 00:08:19.160 --> 00:08:25.160 In fact, as he writes, Harris wasn't granted any power 112 00:08:25.199 --> 00:08:28.920 at all, and she treated the role with which she'd 113 00:08:28.920 --> 00:08:34.240 been saddled like the burden that it was. Within weeks, 114 00:08:34.679 --> 00:08:38.240 her conspicuous failure to even visit the border she'd been 115 00:08:38.279 --> 00:08:42.360 tasked overseas became a political liability, won her lack of 116 00:08:42.440 --> 00:08:45.519 political talent only made worse. But within a few months 117 00:08:45.519 --> 00:08:48.279 of her accession to the role, Harris started producing the 118 00:08:48.279 --> 00:08:52.240 only results she could. She got a commitment from twelve 119 00:08:52.279 --> 00:08:58.720 private companies to quote invest in Central America. She was 120 00:08:58.759 --> 00:09:02.919 able to deploy us A USA disaster team to provide 121 00:09:02.919 --> 00:09:06.879 food assistance and poverty reduction, and she got three hundred 122 00:09:06.879 --> 00:09:14.200 million dollars in humanitarian assistance. All this supposedly to mitigate 123 00:09:14.360 --> 00:09:20.879 the push factors driving migrants north. Its effects were obviously negligible. 124 00:09:22.480 --> 00:09:25.320 The initiative's failure came at no surprise to Kamala Harris 125 00:09:25.399 --> 00:09:29.679 or her staff, so by twenty twenty one, Harris herself 126 00:09:29.879 --> 00:09:34.320 was leaking to reporters about what a BS situation she 127 00:09:34.360 --> 00:09:38.679 had been set up for. Harris's aids is Rothman writing here, 128 00:09:38.720 --> 00:09:41.759 Harris's aids were telling reporters that they had begun to 129 00:09:41.919 --> 00:09:45.559 panic over the torment to which Biden had consigned them. 130 00:09:45.840 --> 00:09:48.799 As CNN reported at the time, her assignment was being 131 00:09:48.840 --> 00:09:52.399 mischaracterized and could be politically damaging if she were linked 132 00:09:52.440 --> 00:09:57.399 to the border, as indeed is happening right now, indeed 133 00:09:57.759 --> 00:10:01.519 potential potentially opening her up to criticism for the handling 134 00:10:01.519 --> 00:10:06.200 of the seemingly intractable problem was why Harris was tapped 135 00:10:06.200 --> 00:10:08.360 to be the face of the administration's failures on the 136 00:10:08.360 --> 00:10:16.159 border in the first place. So Biden was deliberately just 137 00:10:16.360 --> 00:10:20.919 dumping his problems into Harris's lap so that she could 138 00:10:20.960 --> 00:10:23.399 be the fall gal, not the fall guy. The fall 139 00:10:23.440 --> 00:10:30.840 gal the President's staff, Rothman continues, never missed an opportunity 140 00:10:31.200 --> 00:10:35.159 to undermine Harris's conduct in her new role, promulgating the 141 00:10:35.159 --> 00:10:38.159 subtle implication that the horrors at the border were an 142 00:10:38.159 --> 00:10:43.360 outgrowth outgrowth of her mismanagement of the crisis. The exercise 143 00:10:43.399 --> 00:10:46.679 in misdirection was so effective for the Biden administration that 144 00:10:46.759 --> 00:10:50.799 it went back to the same well on several subsequent occasions. 145 00:10:50.960 --> 00:10:53.679 Harris was soon given the task of combating state level 146 00:10:53.720 --> 00:10:58.159 Republican efforts to reform voting systems, over which she had 147 00:10:58.279 --> 00:11:02.759 zero authority. The White House dispatched her to Europe to 148 00:11:02.799 --> 00:11:06.360 stop Russia from invading Ukraine, three days before Russian forces 149 00:11:06.480 --> 00:11:12.039 cascaded over the Ukrainian border, all the while White House 150 00:11:12.080 --> 00:11:15.679 staff scoffed at her failures in on background conversations with 151 00:11:15.759 --> 00:11:22.440 the press. Her portfolio is trash. Harris ally Bakari sellers 152 00:11:22.440 --> 00:11:25.799 complain in October of twenty twenty one, those sentiments were 153 00:11:25.879 --> 00:11:30.399 likely reflective of Harris's own consternation. Maybe I don't say 154 00:11:30.440 --> 00:11:32.840 no enough, she half joked in an interview with b 155 00:11:32.919 --> 00:11:36.200 Et that year. But the reported tensions between Harris's office 156 00:11:36.200 --> 00:11:41.360 in Biden's staff, and the lingering hostility toward Harris nursed 157 00:11:41.399 --> 00:11:45.720 by Jill Biden, who was said to have not forgiven 158 00:11:45.799 --> 00:11:49.320 the Vice president for sandbagging her husband in the Democratic 159 00:11:49.360 --> 00:11:53.519 Party's twenty nineteen primary debates, are indicative of why she 160 00:11:53.639 --> 00:11:57.039 was treated like a receptacle into which the most thankless 161 00:11:57.200 --> 00:12:04.600 and insurmountable tasks were dumped. And beyond that, there was 162 00:12:04.639 --> 00:12:08.320 also constant leaking from the Biden camp that Harris was unelectable. 163 00:12:08.559 --> 00:12:11.960 The president's staffers routinely retailed the notion that Harris was 164 00:12:12.039 --> 00:12:15.200 unelectable to the presidency, in part because of how poorly 165 00:12:15.279 --> 00:12:18.039 she managed the roles with which they had burdened her. 166 00:12:19.960 --> 00:12:25.639 Engineering This self fulfilling prophecy served President Biden's purpose at 167 00:12:25.679 --> 00:12:29.919 the time, which was to neutralize his most viable Democratic rival. 168 00:12:32.200 --> 00:12:35.360 Isn't that amazing that Biden just viewed Harris as his 169 00:12:35.519 --> 00:12:38.120 chief rival the chief person he had to be afraid 170 00:12:38.120 --> 00:12:42.720 of unseating him for twenty twenty four, and so he 171 00:12:42.840 --> 00:12:46.679 was actively undermining her the whole time politically, and his 172 00:12:46.759 --> 00:12:49.840 staff was actively undermining her the whole time politically and 173 00:12:49.960 --> 00:12:54.879 dumping all of his problem, all of his failures, just 174 00:12:54.919 --> 00:12:59.879 getting dumped into her lap. So it is a thing 175 00:13:00.039 --> 00:13:08.720 of like I think in general, Harris Harris has to 176 00:13:08.759 --> 00:13:11.759 take responsibility for the failures of the Biden administration. If 177 00:13:11.799 --> 00:13:14.200 she thought the Biden administration were such a sinking ship, 178 00:13:16.159 --> 00:13:18.879 then she either needed to make her objection to things 179 00:13:18.919 --> 00:13:22.919 known or resign so by which she never did. So 180 00:13:23.080 --> 00:13:27.000 I think any vice president has to take some of 181 00:13:27.039 --> 00:13:32.799 the crap for the failures of the administration she serves it. 182 00:13:35.320 --> 00:13:40.960 But I do think it's really interesting how, in fact, 183 00:13:42.159 --> 00:13:46.320 she wasn't really very empowered when it came to the border, 184 00:13:46.320 --> 00:13:50.440 and that was by design. It was Biden deliberately trying 185 00:13:50.519 --> 00:13:55.919 to set her up to look terrible, to take the 186 00:13:55.960 --> 00:14:00.360 fall for him, and to damage her politically, because Biden 187 00:14:00.440 --> 00:14:03.440 knew that once twenty twenty four came around and he 188 00:14:03.480 --> 00:14:06.399 was eighty one years old, people would be people would 189 00:14:06.399 --> 00:14:11.720 have the knives out for him. So obviously his effort 190 00:14:11.759 --> 00:14:17.000 to do that it didn't quite work. When we return 191 00:14:17.360 --> 00:14:23.759 the silliness in some ways of blaming Harris for Biden's problems, 192 00:14:23.799 --> 00:14:26.240 at least from a governmental perspective. That's next on the 193 00:14:26.279 --> 00:14:31.159 John Girardi Show. I thought this at the time when 194 00:14:31.279 --> 00:14:36.399 Republicans were pushing for the impeachment of Alexandro Majorcis, and 195 00:14:36.559 --> 00:14:40.919 I think this has to relate to Harris's failures at 196 00:14:40.919 --> 00:14:43.360 the border. And we're talking about this really interesting piece 197 00:14:43.399 --> 00:14:49.120 from National Review by Noah Rothman where he's detailing how, yeah, 198 00:14:49.360 --> 00:14:52.639 it's not like Harris covered herself in glory with the border, 199 00:14:52.679 --> 00:14:55.360 but it's actually kind of a more rather than just 200 00:14:55.440 --> 00:14:59.320 a story of Harris being incompetent, it's really actually this 201 00:14:59.440 --> 00:15:06.840 story of Biden deliberately dumping all of his problems, his 202 00:15:06.879 --> 00:15:13.519 administration's most intractable failures, dumping them into Harris's lap, like 203 00:15:13.600 --> 00:15:15.720 sort of publicly saying that she's going to be the 204 00:15:15.759 --> 00:15:19.600 point person for X, Y or Z, but not actually 205 00:15:19.720 --> 00:15:24.840 giving her the authority to do anything about it and so, 206 00:15:25.039 --> 00:15:29.559 and thus putting these unsolvable problems into her purviews so 207 00:15:29.639 --> 00:15:32.639 that she takes the fall for it, and she looks bad. 208 00:15:33.000 --> 00:15:35.879 Why Because Biden hated Harris's guts and he saw her 209 00:15:35.879 --> 00:15:38.120 as a threat to himself politically, which it turned out 210 00:15:38.159 --> 00:15:42.879 she was, and so he would dump all of his 211 00:15:43.000 --> 00:15:46.399 problems on her, including the border. And I sort of 212 00:15:46.399 --> 00:15:49.240 thought this at the time with my orkus, like why 213 00:15:49.240 --> 00:15:55.799 are the Republicans bothering and peaching Mayorcis? Is only one 214 00:15:56.000 --> 00:16:05.039 person in the executive branch has ultimately executive authority, the President. 215 00:16:05.840 --> 00:16:09.559 The executive power of the United States law enforcement power 216 00:16:10.080 --> 00:16:13.519 in the United States government is vested in Article two 217 00:16:13.559 --> 00:16:20.840 of the Constitution in one person, the President. All of 218 00:16:20.879 --> 00:16:26.000 the inferior officers of the United States, all the inferior 219 00:16:27.000 --> 00:16:30.919 officials who exercise some level of executive power, they are 220 00:16:31.000 --> 00:16:36.399 exercising the President's delegated power, and thus they have to 221 00:16:36.399 --> 00:16:40.919 do what they do in accordance with how the President 222 00:16:40.960 --> 00:16:44.639 wants it done. And that's why I always thought impeaching 223 00:16:44.679 --> 00:16:51.480 Maorcus was silly, Like Majorcus wasn't doing anything. The Republicans 224 00:16:51.519 --> 00:16:54.600 wanted to impeach ma Orcis for the policies Maorcus was 225 00:16:54.639 --> 00:16:59.279 adopting for how to regulate immigration, for how to regulate 226 00:16:59.320 --> 00:17:05.519 the border. It wasn't for something like my orcus was 227 00:17:05.559 --> 00:17:09.640 accepting bribes. It was stuff where my orcus was obviously 228 00:17:09.799 --> 00:17:17.400 clearly carrying out the president's wishes. So if all my 229 00:17:17.559 --> 00:17:21.640 orcus is doing is carrying out the president's wishes, Okay, 230 00:17:21.720 --> 00:17:24.519 I get being upset with my Orcus. I get maybe 231 00:17:24.559 --> 00:17:26.720 the argument that my orcus is doing things that are 232 00:17:26.720 --> 00:17:30.160 contrary to law, or that they are lawless, or that 233 00:17:30.200 --> 00:17:34.279 he's violating his oath of office. But ultimately the bigger 234 00:17:34.359 --> 00:17:38.559 fish here is Biden. Why not impeach Biden over it? 235 00:17:38.599 --> 00:17:40.960 If you're gonna impeach anybody at all, which maybe is 236 00:17:41.400 --> 00:17:45.160 just a fool's Errand in general, impeach Biden, not my Orcus, 237 00:17:45.920 --> 00:17:50.680 or my Orcus is just doing his job. He's just 238 00:17:50.720 --> 00:17:54.599 doing what he's told. He is carrying out the executive 239 00:17:55.519 --> 00:17:59.440 authority of the United States' wishes. And that executive authority 240 00:17:59.480 --> 00:18:04.000 was Joe Biden. So it is a thing of like, yeah, 241 00:18:04.400 --> 00:18:06.759 Harris is a failure in this regard, in that regard, 242 00:18:06.759 --> 00:18:11.200 in this regard, in that regard, but all the authority 243 00:18:11.279 --> 00:18:21.200 that Harris had was delegated. She would have no authority 244 00:18:22.480 --> 00:18:25.759 unless it came to her from above to if I 245 00:18:25.839 --> 00:18:29.279 may rip off the words of Christ to paunch the pilot. 246 00:18:32.039 --> 00:18:35.440 All of the vice president's authority other than breaking ties 247 00:18:35.480 --> 00:18:39.880 in the Senate, comes to her from the president, like 248 00:18:40.039 --> 00:18:44.759 she only has jobs within the executive branch insofar as 249 00:18:44.799 --> 00:18:49.839 the president wants to give her a job. And that's 250 00:18:49.920 --> 00:18:53.319 kind of the interesting slash weird thing about the vice 251 00:18:53.359 --> 00:18:57.039 presidency is that, frankly, it's kind of useless for governance. 252 00:18:58.279 --> 00:19:01.440 I mean, you can get a vice president who is 253 00:19:01.680 --> 00:19:04.839 super competent and you want to have help you with 254 00:19:04.880 --> 00:19:08.640 all kinds of things and manage all kinds of stuff. 255 00:19:08.720 --> 00:19:14.079 Or you can pick, you know, a total lummocks or 256 00:19:14.279 --> 00:19:18.400 I don't know, you can pick a total doorknob who 257 00:19:18.559 --> 00:19:21.279 just sits around and does nothing and helps you win 258 00:19:21.319 --> 00:19:25.200 a swing state. And honestly, I think getting a dufist 259 00:19:25.200 --> 00:19:26.640 who just helps you win a swing state at the 260 00:19:26.680 --> 00:19:29.519 end of the day might be more useful because you 261 00:19:29.519 --> 00:19:31.880 can just have other advisors advise you. You can have other 262 00:19:32.160 --> 00:19:34.839 delegated people do the kinds of delegated things you would 263 00:19:34.839 --> 00:19:37.160 have the vice president do. The vice president has no 264 00:19:37.240 --> 00:19:40.599 authority on his or her own. And I think that's 265 00:19:40.599 --> 00:19:45.400 the fascinating thing about Harris is that most of the 266 00:19:45.440 --> 00:19:48.480 things that I mean, Look, you're the vice president. You 267 00:19:48.559 --> 00:19:51.839 deserve to take crap for the failures of the administration 268 00:19:51.880 --> 00:19:57.359 you serve under. And Harris should take some blame for 269 00:19:58.039 --> 00:19:59.680 the crisis at the border, for this, for that the 270 00:19:59.680 --> 00:20:04.720 other thing. If Harris was truly thought that the Biden 271 00:20:04.720 --> 00:20:08.480 administration was doing stuff wrong and was not empowering her appropriately, 272 00:20:08.519 --> 00:20:13.039 then she should have piped up about it. But she 273 00:20:13.119 --> 00:20:15.400 never did so. I think she hasked to take the 274 00:20:15.400 --> 00:20:17.880 crap for the failures of the Biden administration. But it 275 00:20:18.000 --> 00:20:21.960 is interesting how Biden was really deliberately setting her up 276 00:20:21.960 --> 00:20:26.519 to fail because of how much he seemingly loathed and 277 00:20:26.559 --> 00:20:32.400 disdained her. When we return the bogus Supreme Court quote 278 00:20:32.480 --> 00:20:37.319 reform rules that Biden is pushing now and Harris is 279 00:20:37.359 --> 00:20:39.920 also embracing now. That is next on the John Girardi Show. 280 00:20:42.000 --> 00:20:45.200 I've been talking the last several years about the ridiculous 281 00:20:45.200 --> 00:20:51.839 and I'm hardly some uniquely insightful commentator or observer of 282 00:20:51.880 --> 00:20:53.640 these things. By the way, a lot of smart lawyer 283 00:20:54.240 --> 00:20:57.640 commentators have been seeing this same thing happening and predicting 284 00:20:57.640 --> 00:21:04.559 what's coming down the pike. The constant barrage to create 285 00:21:04.599 --> 00:21:08.160 a sort of fog of news, the constant barrage of 286 00:21:08.240 --> 00:21:14.400 stories around individual members of the Supreme Court, and all 287 00:21:14.480 --> 00:21:16.920 concerned all the conservatives, none of the liberals have ever 288 00:21:16.960 --> 00:21:22.240 done anything that scans in spite of let's bring up 289 00:21:22.279 --> 00:21:25.400 lots of examples of liberal justices doing all these same things. 290 00:21:26.799 --> 00:21:29.359 Story after story after story after story over the last 291 00:21:29.400 --> 00:21:35.759 three years have detailed ways allegedly in which conservative justices 292 00:21:35.799 --> 00:21:44.400 on the Supreme Court engaged in alleged ethical improprieties. Clarence 293 00:21:44.440 --> 00:21:47.039 Thomas was friends with this billionaire and took a bunch 294 00:21:47.079 --> 00:21:54.640 of flights on his private jet. Chief Justice Roberts's wife 295 00:21:55.079 --> 00:21:58.160 is a high powered attorney. She's kind of like an 296 00:21:58.160 --> 00:22:03.640 attorney headhunter who helps big time law firms recruit kind 297 00:22:03.680 --> 00:22:11.359 of partner level attorneys to move laterally to to new firms, 298 00:22:12.160 --> 00:22:16.960 and she gets compensated very handsomely for that. Not exactly 299 00:22:17.000 --> 00:22:20.920 a surprising thing that a Supreme Court justice is married 300 00:22:20.920 --> 00:22:23.839 to a lawyer. That's happened many times before. Ruth Bader 301 00:22:23.880 --> 00:22:27.279 Ginsberg's husband was a very high powered tax attorney in DC. 302 00:22:28.599 --> 00:22:33.039 Amy Cony Barrett's husband was I think a former federal prosecutor, 303 00:22:33.119 --> 00:22:36.200 and I think now he's got a practice in d C. 304 00:22:38.440 --> 00:22:41.160 So John Roberts's wife is a very successful attorney as well, 305 00:22:42.440 --> 00:22:46.319 but both this raises questions about propriet she trading in 306 00:22:46.359 --> 00:22:51.559 on her husband's name inappropriately. Forever all the BS stories 307 00:22:51.599 --> 00:22:55.519 about sam Alito, which, by the way, like the story 308 00:22:55.640 --> 00:22:59.200 all we've discussed sam Alito's wife was flying an upside 309 00:22:59.200 --> 00:23:02.480 down American. We know all about all the different flags 310 00:23:02.519 --> 00:23:04.960 that the Alito family has flown outside their home, but 311 00:23:05.079 --> 00:23:07.599 we only just learned a week or two ago that 312 00:23:08.119 --> 00:23:11.680 the Biden administration hasn't had a cabinet meeting since before 313 00:23:11.720 --> 00:23:15.960 the Israel war started in October of last year. By 314 00:23:16.000 --> 00:23:19.200 the way, have you noticed no stories anymore, no leaks, 315 00:23:19.240 --> 00:23:22.480 no stories anything about Biden being seen Isle anymore. After 316 00:23:22.799 --> 00:23:26.519 two solid weeks of the press dumping all their notebooks out, 317 00:23:26.880 --> 00:23:29.400 every story they had collected over the last three years 318 00:23:29.599 --> 00:23:33.920 about how obviously senile Biden was book the vault, now 319 00:23:33.920 --> 00:23:41.519 all of a sudden, we're silent. Anyway, So their story 320 00:23:41.559 --> 00:23:45.920 after story after story about the Supreme Court justice, and 321 00:23:45.920 --> 00:23:51.960 it's always the conservative justices being in some way corrupt, 322 00:23:52.440 --> 00:23:56.640 violating ethics rules, not reporting gifts they received and everything 323 00:23:56.680 --> 00:23:59.839 the Court was doing was in accordance with sort of 324 00:23:59.839 --> 00:24:02.920 the ethical standards that the Court sort of sets for themselves. 325 00:24:03.720 --> 00:24:09.240 And why does the Court set ethical standards for itself. Well, 326 00:24:10.279 --> 00:24:15.720 lower courts abide by different kinds of ethics rules set 327 00:24:15.920 --> 00:24:19.920 for them, but the Supreme Court is a kind of 328 00:24:20.000 --> 00:24:24.240 coequal branch of government to the executive branch and the 329 00:24:24.279 --> 00:24:28.559 legislative branch. And basically, excuse me, Basically, the Supreme Court 330 00:24:28.599 --> 00:24:32.240 has sort of taken the posture of no, we can't 331 00:24:32.279 --> 00:24:36.720 have the legislative branch mandating our terms of conduct for 332 00:24:36.920 --> 00:24:39.920 us anymore so than we should be able to mandate 333 00:24:40.359 --> 00:24:44.359 the terms of conduct for the executive branch or for 334 00:24:44.480 --> 00:24:46.920 the legislative branch for how they do their jobs. We're 335 00:24:46.920 --> 00:24:50.440 a co equal branch of government, so we'll have a 336 00:24:50.440 --> 00:24:56.920 body of ethics rules, but it's our own body of 337 00:24:57.000 --> 00:25:00.000 rules that we set for ourselves as a co equals 338 00:25:00.160 --> 00:25:02.680 branch of government. And that's just the way it'll be, 339 00:25:03.359 --> 00:25:07.480 much like Congress sets up Congress has rules and procedures 340 00:25:07.519 --> 00:25:13.119 for kicking someone out of Congress for misconduct. That's how 341 00:25:13.119 --> 00:25:16.000 we're going to run this. That Congress doesn't tell us 342 00:25:16.039 --> 00:25:23.559 what to do. So now beyond that, beyond this ethics 343 00:25:23.599 --> 00:25:26.400 thing where basically they've taken a bunch of non stories 344 00:25:26.440 --> 00:25:29.279 and they've been able to gin up enough non stories 345 00:25:29.279 --> 00:25:30.960 over the course of the last year that it creates 346 00:25:30.960 --> 00:25:35.039 what I call the fog of news, where it doesn't 347 00:25:35.039 --> 00:25:38.160 matter that the twenty stories or whatever it is, that 348 00:25:38.279 --> 00:25:44.359 all twenty of them have been ludicrously you know, ludicrous 349 00:25:44.359 --> 00:25:48.480 reaches to try to somehow say that conservative justices are 350 00:25:48.480 --> 00:25:56.279 corrupt when really they aren't. There's nothing there. It doesn't 351 00:25:56.279 --> 00:25:58.519 matter that none of the twenty stories work, the fact 352 00:25:58.519 --> 00:26:02.200 that there have been so many story stories of alleged 353 00:26:02.359 --> 00:26:05.599 corruption by conservative justices on the court and noticed that oh, 354 00:26:05.720 --> 00:26:08.119 no liberal justice has ever done this, and a lot 355 00:26:08.160 --> 00:26:10.279 of a lot of the stuff they're criticizing people for 356 00:26:10.960 --> 00:26:15.400 it's stuff that the liberal justices did too. Oh, Clarence 357 00:26:15.440 --> 00:26:18.599 Thomas accepted free flights when he was asked to go 358 00:26:18.680 --> 00:26:21.079 speak at you know, such and such. Yeah, Ruth Bader 359 00:26:21.119 --> 00:26:25.079 Ginsberg received free flights when she went and spoke over here. 360 00:26:25.119 --> 00:26:27.720 Sonya sodomy Are received free this when she went to 361 00:26:27.759 --> 00:26:30.680 speak over there. Elena Kagan, like, it's a lot of 362 00:26:30.680 --> 00:26:33.079 it is stuff that the liberal justices have also done, 363 00:26:33.079 --> 00:26:36.680 but it's not an ethical issue when Justice Bryer did it, 364 00:26:36.799 --> 00:26:40.799 or when Justice Ginsburg did it, or when Justice sodomy 365 00:26:40.920 --> 00:26:47.079 or does it. They even tried to make a story 366 00:26:47.160 --> 00:26:50.480 out of Neil Gorsich, like he had a home in 367 00:26:50.559 --> 00:26:54.880 Colorado and he was selling it and somehow this was 368 00:26:54.920 --> 00:26:58.359 an ethics file. Almos another lawyer in Colorado, but some 369 00:26:58.440 --> 00:27:04.000 Democrat lawyer in Colorado and courses was like, yeah, I 370 00:27:04.039 --> 00:27:05.880 sold my house. I don't know how that can be 371 00:27:05.880 --> 00:27:08.279 an I made money off the sale of my house. Okay, 372 00:27:08.319 --> 00:27:11.839 that's not an ethics violation to sell your house. Now, 373 00:27:14.440 --> 00:27:17.680 because they have this fog of news, as we call it, 374 00:27:20.000 --> 00:27:24.960 they deliberately build up these phony, baloney stories in order 375 00:27:25.039 --> 00:27:32.799 to justify proposals to in some way alter the makeup 376 00:27:32.839 --> 00:27:39.359 of the Supreme Court and thereby get more liberal results, 377 00:27:39.680 --> 00:27:43.480 because that's what they want. You have to understand how 378 00:27:43.599 --> 00:27:48.440 fundamentally liberals think that the universe is not right, that 379 00:27:48.519 --> 00:27:52.680 the universe is in fundamental disorder because the Supreme Court 380 00:27:52.720 --> 00:27:56.200 is not controlled by liberals. They have controlled the Supreme 381 00:27:56.240 --> 00:28:00.640 Court fundamentally. They have controlled the Supreme Court since nineteen 382 00:28:01.160 --> 00:28:08.440 thirty seven. It's been their court, and any political issue 383 00:28:08.480 --> 00:28:13.359 that they really cared about they could always count on 384 00:28:13.400 --> 00:28:17.359 the Court to bail them out. I mean, they managed 385 00:28:17.400 --> 00:28:21.039 to make abortion legal nationwide without us, without like a 386 00:28:21.079 --> 00:28:25.559 single Democratic vote on the subject, just a snap of 387 00:28:25.559 --> 00:28:28.000 our fingers. In nineteen seventy three, we went from a 388 00:28:28.039 --> 00:28:30.839 country where most of the country outlawed abortion to every 389 00:28:30.839 --> 00:28:32.799 single state in the Union had legal abortion for all 390 00:28:32.799 --> 00:28:35.240 forty weeks of pregnancy for any reason. Snap of the fingers. 391 00:28:35.440 --> 00:28:37.279 Gay marriage becomes the law of the land. With a 392 00:28:37.319 --> 00:28:41.920 snap of the fingers. This that the other liberals have 393 00:28:42.160 --> 00:28:48.799 fundamentally controlled the Supreme Court for all They fundamentally controlled 394 00:28:48.839 --> 00:28:54.480 it for almost ninety years, for over eighty years, and 395 00:28:54.759 --> 00:28:59.799 Ginsburg dying in September of twenty twenty and being replaced 396 00:29:00.920 --> 00:29:04.559 by Amy Cony Barrett, they think is the greatest disaster, 397 00:29:06.039 --> 00:29:13.039 the greater disaster than the Titanic, thinking it fundamentally puts 398 00:29:13.200 --> 00:29:19.319 the universe in disarray, and particularly rov Wade being overturned, 399 00:29:19.519 --> 00:29:24.640 that they cannot tolerate it. So conservatives who tolerated this 400 00:29:24.759 --> 00:29:28.359 for almost ninety years and say, well, I guess we 401 00:29:28.440 --> 00:29:31.119