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Speaker 1: It's being converted on the fly, So every moment that

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it's in use, it's being converted. It's like nineteen eighty four.

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It's a relentless totalitarian conversion that never stops. You want

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to imagine the future, Imagine a USB two cable into

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a USB three cable, stamping on a human face forever.

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Speaker 2: Ask not what your country can do for you, Ask

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what you can do for your country.

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Speaker 3: Mister gorbucha, Tear down this wall.

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Speaker 4: It's the Ricochet Podcast with Steven Hayward and Charles C. W.

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Cook James Lillax. Today we talked to Jerry Baker, editor

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at large of the Wall Street Journal. So let's podcast.

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Speaker 5: Mister Greed, take your seat. Take your seat, sir, take

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your seat. Finding that members continue to engage in wilful

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and concert a disruption or proper decorum, the chair now

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directs is startant at arms to restore order. We'll move

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this gentleman from the table.

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Speaker 4: Well become everybody. This is the Rickchhepe Podcast, number seven

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hundred and thirty one in James lilloxs in Minneapolis. Beautiful

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crisp day. We got about ten inches of snow. Yeah,

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we can take it. It's March. I'm joined by Stephen

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Hayward and Charles C. W. Cook. Who are I believe

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in respective poles of the country, Florida and California. And

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where to start with this week? Every day it seems

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to be something, and then we forget that we did.

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We annext Greenland last week? I don't know what a

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swirling constellation of stars around your head like somebody in

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a cartoon who's been whacked on the nug and with

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a frying pan. So what to begin? What do you, guys,

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what stands out at the end of this contentious week

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as the most important issue to you or the one

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perhaps that flew under the radar, That will that will

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be something we're talking about in a little bit now.

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Could it be the Supreme Court decision that appeared to

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slam the knuckles of Doge Stephen Charlie.

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Speaker 2: Well, I'm not quite sure it did that. It's a

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little bit it's a little bit obscure and maybe technical

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and narrow. I think actually the biggest story of the

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week is still unfolding today Friday, as we're talking. First

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two days ago we had the news that Gavin Newsom

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is now a podcaster by the way. I predict he's

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going to do as well at podcasting as Mario Cuomo

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did a talk radio thirty years ago, and I thought

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he'd be the ride, he'd be the rival for Rush,

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and he was just boring as good beat. But what

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the news was that a newsom suddenly sounded like a

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Republican's interest. I'm against boys and women's sports, I don't

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want to use l tinks, and defunding the police was idiotic.

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So this is clearly someone gearing up to run for president.

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But then it's followed up by the news that after

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Senate Democrats voted unanimously to block the Republican bill to

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ban trans women from women's sports, suddenly they're changing your tune.

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And now they're out with a new proposal. Well, let's

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let the states decide, you know, sort of the their

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equivalent of the Dobbs decision on abortion, I suppose you

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might say, and I think you're seeing the weakening here

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on some of these cultural issues on the left because

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it realizes they're getting killed on this and so anyway,

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I think that's the sleeper story that's going to grow,

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and it's going to cause great divisions inside a democratic

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coalition interesting.

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Speaker 4: Well, yes, watching new some molt and shed his skin

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is interesting. But then there are some people who say, well,

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I'm looking at this bill here they're talking about boys

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and women's sports. I don't like it. But on the

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other hand, I looked at my IRA the other day too,

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and I really don't like that. Ah.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and it seems to be getting worse. If you

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look at the stock market right now, it's worse than

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it was this morning, and that in turn is worse

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than it was yesterday. It was okay twelve days ago.

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It seems to me, James, and I don't know if

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you think this is maybe a conspiracy theory or me

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putting pieces together that doesn't belong. But do you think

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this might have to do with the tariffs? I think

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it might, yeah.

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Speaker 4: And you know, as somebody who is on the cusp

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of retirement, and you know, I generally don't check those things.

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They go up, they go down, you know whatever. We

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you know, I don't like it, and I especially don't

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like it because it seems to be what we call

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an unforced error own goal. I was not in the mood,

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particularly for a trade war with Canada. And while Canada

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may indeed have an onerous terrace on American milk. It's

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just it's not it's not really up there. Now. I

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understand the long term reasoning is to do this to

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bring back, you know, manufacturing in the country, and we

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have to go through short term pain and then in

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five years it'll all be better because we'll have more

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industries than businesses. Here. One of the major car companies

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announced that they're going to start building some stuff in America. Again,

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I get that, I get that, But I hate tariffs.

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I just do. I just I just do. And maybe

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it's because I associate them, you know, with a smooth

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end or holly and think that didn't work, and maybe

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this doesn't work now. So yeah, the Mexican tariffs have

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been abated for a month, though, have they not they

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not decide to step away from those for a while.

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Speaker 1: Well, they're showing as tariffs you see, they're introduced well

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because they both exist and don't exist, and they're both

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good and bad because when they're introduced, there's all these

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reasons that we need them. We need to be more

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like America in the eighteen nineties when we were apparently rich.

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We need to be like William McKinley. We need to

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protect industry and create jobs and potentially even get rid

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of the income tax.

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Speaker 4: And that's just terrific.

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Speaker 1: And that's why tariffs are so good and the most

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beautiful word in the English language.

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Speaker 4: And we all love them.

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Speaker 1: Also, they're so horrible that if you threaten people with them,

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then you get things that you want. So we don't

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really want tariffs. What we want is to threaten tarifs

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and then not do them, because obviously we wouldn't do tariffs.

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Trump actually did this yesterday, James. He actually said yesterday

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when he was announcing that he might give some tariff

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relief that he was going to rescind some of the

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tariffs to protect American industries from them. But you put

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them on, so he's both the provider and the taker.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I think the embarrassing irony hearers that

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if you go back to twenty sixteen, Trump was most

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prominently talking about tariffs to save American auto industry jobs

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and save auto factories in America, and those are the

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first tariffs are that sector that he relaxed within hours

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of imposing them because I think someone pointed out to

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him that the supply chain for automobile manufacturing in parts

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is more complicated, and it's not so simple. I still

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wonder if, well, an old word comes back to me, James.

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You'll remember from the seventies we were going to fight

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inflation by jaw boning, remember jaw boning, and that meant

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we'll talk about it a lot. And what shame people

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in the lowering the price of eggs? I don't know,

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but I do wonder sometimes, and Charlie put his finger

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on it right here, just now, how much Trump really

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believes in tariffs and how much this is Trump's typical supercharged,

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exaggerated rhetoric in service of trying to be jaw boning

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on steroids. And you know, look all presidents of going back.

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You know, Reagan put up with some tariffs under politically

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circumstances that were difficult.

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Speaker 4: He kind of had to.

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Speaker 2: But you know, a Bush put on tariffs to protect steel,

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so did Biden. Well, there are aluminum tariffs. We've had

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tariffs on Canadian softwood lumber on and off over the years.

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I don't keep up with it, but so I don't know.

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I'd like to think that, in my optimistic moments, that

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Trump has got a serious game here, and he's playing

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it the way he does everything else, and maybe it

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will get some results. But at some point paper are

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going to figure this out, as we have suggested before.

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Speaker 4: Well, those were individual tariffs. I mean, there are targeted,

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specific cares. We've been doing that stuff, this sort of

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broad brush stuff. If it was just talk, there'd be

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one thing. But he did them, so that's another. And

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if he backs off from this, because I'm wondering what

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would make him back off of it, if anything, because

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everything the wins that you've had, all of the rhetorical, philosophical,

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symbolic wins that Doze has been racking up by saying, look, America,

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you there, you guy, you who paid five thousand dollars

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in taxes last year. Actually what we did is that

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your entire tax payment for the last twenty years has

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been going to one L pack of farmer in Peru.

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I mean, and again, we no longer need to make

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up absurd examples of spending like this, because that's where

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it was. I think it was ninety thousand dollars for

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an L pack of farming in Peru. So somebody looks

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at that and says, well, exactly, how is that supposed

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to work for me. Then I am driving around on

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roads that are pothold, there's miscreants and lolling about in

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my park that isn't clear, et cetera. I mean, we

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know these are all complex state, local issues, but people

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just basically get the idea, I'm paying a lot of

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money for taxes, and if we lived in an absolute, utopian,

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clean paradise like Tomorrowland in the movie, yeah, throw a

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couple of nickels at the guy in Peru. But we don't.

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And why so that's a win because I think that

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then as nonpartisan, I think people actually the middle get that.

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But when all of a sudden you have shuddering economic

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contraction because of something that was put on that nobody

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really really really was voting for. I wonder at what

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point Trump looks at this and says, I'm going to

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cut bait and cut my losses and back off of this.

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I don't know if he has it in him or

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if he's just gonna be bullheaded about it and keep

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going forward.

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Speaker 1: Charles, I think he definitely has it in him, because

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he keeps rescinding them when the stock market goes down. Look,

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this is a real risk. So let's look at this

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both from the perspective of somebody who might hate Trump

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and from the perspective of somebody who really likes Trump.

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I think the argument against this course of action is

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applicable from both sides. If you hate Trump, you look

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at this and you say, well, he's doing tariffs. Theyre stupid.

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He's a stupid person and he's being stupid, and.

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Speaker 4: I hate him.

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Speaker 1: Okay, fine, If you like him, you don't want this problem,

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and it's become a problem to overshadow all of the

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other things that you want him to do, because the

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maxim that it's the economy stupid is still true. It's

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the primary reason that he won the election. He won

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the election because Joe Biden and his party made inflation

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a great deal worse in twenty twenty one by pumping

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a whole bunch of money into the economy that the

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economy did not need and creating the worst inflationary environment

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in forty years, and then saying it's not happening, and

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then saying it's transitory, and then saying, well, maybe it

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is happening, but it's not too bad, and then this

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is the worst part of all, passing a bill called

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the Inflation Reduction Act that had literally nothing to do

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with inflation. Well, look at Trump's policies right now, many

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of which I like. But look at what he wants

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to do in the next six months. He wants to

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expand the tax cuts from twenty seventeen, including no tips

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on taxes on tips, no taxes on overtime, no taxes

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on social security benefits. Best sent. The Treasury Secretary said

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two days ago that their aim is to bring interest

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rates down, and he's imposed tariffs supposedly twenty five percent

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on everything from Canada and Mexico. At least that's the aim.

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All of those things are inflationary, and inflation hasn't gone.

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People won't put up with it. Most people aren't ideological

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like we are. Most people don't follow politics like we do.

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They're gonna say, ah, wait, everything's expensive. I don't want

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things to be expensive. And when that happens, you don't

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get to do all of the rest of the stuff

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that I like, all the reform of the executive branch

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and the destruction of DEI and some of the foreign policy,

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not all of it. But I think this is a

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real risk for him that he is taking and not

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just again from the perspective of people who don't like him,

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who are going to say that anyway, but for the

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people who do like him.

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Speaker 4: Agreed. Although we can have this argument about taxing social

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security another day perhaps, but I agree with you. And

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if inflation doesn't go down, then people are going to

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scratch their heads and wonder why. Now, you know, inflation

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is one of those things where you know it's hard

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to find a sweet spot for it. But your metabolism

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is different. Your metabolism. If your metabolism is working properly,

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this thing. And thank you Luhmann for sponsoring this the

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Ricochet podcast. And now we welcome to the podcast. Gerard

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Baker the editor at large at the Wall Street Journal,

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and you'll also find his weekly Free Expressions column every Tuesday. There.

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He hosts podcasts but the same name, along with the

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interview series w SJ at Large with Jerry Baker on

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Fox Business.

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Speaker 6: Welcome, Thank you very much indeed for having me. It

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might be my first time. What's my first time for

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a while anyway, I think I think we've done this before,

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but back in the back in the ancient days of

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the Puts, the Biden administration.

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Speaker 4: That would be a long time. You know, we've been

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doing this forever. This is podcast number seven thousand, seven

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and forty two, so you know, we may have had

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you back in the two thousands or something like that.

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So here we are. You know, we're halfway through the

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hundred days and you get a little tired of the

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one hundred days thing. But it's hard to shake. I

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guess it's inevitable. Trump has packed more into the first

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half of the hundred days, I think than I can

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imagine a lot. And it's this baffling welter. It's like

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standing in for behind a jet engine into which somebody

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has fed feathers and tacks and it's just it's really, so,

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what's your impression so far?

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Speaker 6: Yeah, it's the uh, the everything everywhere, all at once

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to approach to governing. And by the way, there's obviously

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there's there's method in that, right, there's I mean that

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that that's done very deliberately. I remember reading an interview

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with Steve Bannon years go, I think in the early

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days the first Trump administration, where he said, you know,

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part of part of the purpose of this is a

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obviously to give a to project an image of activity

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and momentum and all of that, but also frankly, just

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to sort of overwhelm the media and political opponents. I mean,

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you know, you you at one minute, you're talking about

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Matt Gates being nominated for something, and everybody's, oh, throwing

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their arms up about that and so and then the

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next thing, we're talking about Telsea Gabbitt, and so we've

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forgotten about maca you know. So you know, there's no

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question it's a you know, and again everything from executive

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orders on everything from you know, immigration to you know,

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the administrative state to tariffs, and goodness knows what else.

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Speaker 4: I mean.

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Speaker 6: So you don't have time, the media don't have time

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to digest and interpret and critique and all of those

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things that you would normally do. So so part of

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it is so and that's you know, you can't you

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can only stand back and look at that and say, wow,

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that's kind of impressive management as well as impressive sort

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of energy. Look, I think I do think maybe this

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was the week in which, you know, maybe maybe maybe

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the we saw some of the kind of downsides of

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the frenetic pace the I mean, first of all, the tariffs, right,

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I mean, are just a disaster. Let's be completely honest

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about it. They're not only a disaster in themselves intrinsically,

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I'm a believer tariffs generally do nothing but harm. But

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but but the the back and forth, and you know,

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the desultry way in which Trump is you know, yes,

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they're on one day, they're not the next, and you

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can see the reaction of the financial markets. Nobody likes

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that and and so that's you know that that that's uh,

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maybe a sign of the you know, this this extraordinary,

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this this train hitting the buffers. You've had the you know,

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I think more worrying signs about the economy with jobs

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numbers weren't too bad today, but I think that's also

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going to kind of punch some holes in this, uh,

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in this performance. And and of course, you know, losing

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the case at the Supreme Court, or at least sort

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of temporarily as I understand it, losing the case of

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the Supreme Court on the on again in another administrative

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state case. So it feels a little bit as though.

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And then and then, by the way, you know, the

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European what this I mean Europe at the moment, in

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this extraordinary revolutionary kind of temper that there is in us,

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you know, European relations, I think that is also perhaps

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a sign that things are not going quite quite as

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smoothly as planned. So look, I think there's you know,

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it's it's been a it's been a highly productive, incredibly

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productive start from the executive side. We've got to see

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obviously where any of the legislative process goes. That that's

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you know, there's especially the big the big beautiful bill

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and other stuff. But I just think we're starting to

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see for the first time this week. I wouldn't say

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go as far as to say the wheels coming off,

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but the you know this, when you do, when you

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start out with this kind of blizzard, then stuff is

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going to start to stuff is going to start to,

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you know, to fall fall by the wayside. And I

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think we're starting to see that.

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Speaker 2: Jerry, it's Steve Hayward out in California. And so, by

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the way, you know, my Tuesday morning starts reading your

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column in the Journal. Actually, my mornings start with reading

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all the daily columnists. And I wish you could get

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Dan Henninger to unretire and come back on Thursdays. But anyway, look,

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ask you about the European scene. Since you're over there.

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I've been planning out the theme lately with people that

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just as Trump is attempting to overthrow the Wilsonian legacy

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Woodrow Wilson's legacy of the administrative state at home, he

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is also trying to undo the Wilsonian legacy in foreign policy.

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In other words, the Wilsonian internationalism that has been the

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consensus of you with both parties at least since the

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end of World War two, if out in certain ways

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before all that, And I think I'm sympathetic to that

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project in some ways. That would take a long time

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to go through, But I don't think there's any way

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that that could be accomplished without some kind of big bang,

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without something that would be wrenching. I mean, I thought

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I was writing actually when Obama was president, that he

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had the opportunity if he wanted to reset sort of

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American European relations and the NATO strategy and so forth,

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but he really had no interest in that. And so

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of course Trump's going to be bumbling, But I think

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there is potentially an upside here. Am I too optimistic?

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What am I missing? Are Europeans so thoroughly alarmed and

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panicky that this was an ill advised idea?

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Speaker 6: Yeah, So I'm here in Europe wading through the waiting,

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through the through the broken eggs of the of the

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the president Trump is in the process of making. I

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don't disagree with you that, Jim, I think. I mean,

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I think I think, you know, fundamentally, one of the

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things that I found really interesting this week, and it

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got a lot of attention to got a lot of

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negative attention when Trump gave I think he was in

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the Oval Office and he was talking, you know, in

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doing that strange thing that he does where he kind

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of holds a kind of a rolling in comptue press

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conference while he's signing those executive orders. He was talking

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and a topic he got onto the subject of Japan

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and the Japan Security Pact that the US has with Japan,

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and he said, you know, it's kind of ridiculous. We

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have a pact with Japan whereby we promised to protect

403
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them if they get if they get attacked, But what

404
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do they do for us? Absolutely nothing, then anything for us.

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Who who the hell came up with that idea? The

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answer is Douglas MacArthur. And it was an essential part

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of the of the of the post war settlement that

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actually the pacification of Japan was considered back then to

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be a rather important national security priority for the United States.

410
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But it did strike me then just and this is

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your point, but you know, back to your point about

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Europe and the Wilsonian framework. It's from me then that

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you know, he of course he has a point. I mean, yeah,

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because exact because the answer, as I just said to

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who came up with that crazy idea was you know,

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Douglas MacArthur and then Truman and then ultimately eyes now

417
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and they and it was a good idea at the time, right,

418
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but that was that time was seventy plus years ago.

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Speaker 3: It probably doesn't make anything.

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Speaker 6: We don't we don't view Germany and Japan today in

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the way that we did in you know, nineteen forty

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five and ninety forty six. So of course we need

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a new a new order. And I think more broadly, yeah,

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the kind of you know views that we've call it Wilsonian,

425
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but the sort of you know that the post Cold

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War liberal order that was you know, very much the

427
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thing for a long time. I also agree with that that,

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you know, the US has different strategic interests, the world

429
00:21:29,240 --> 00:21:32,920
poses a different set of challenges, and I think there's

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absolutely things a lot to be said that. The only

431
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thing I'll say though, is, I mean, I think Trump

432
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has incredibly good instincts, and sometimes his instincts put him,

433
00:21:40,920 --> 00:21:44,200
you know, a really really good political and even geopolitical instincts,

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and they put him in a place where, you know,

435
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perhaps almost inadvertently, he discovers this is exactly the right

436
00:21:50,640 --> 00:21:54,079
strategic approach should we should be taking. But then he

437
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does also all frankly, and you know, this is also

438
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the question at the back of everybody's mind. Is he

439
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really kind of unconsciously undoing the Wilsonian order and consciously

440
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undoing the global liberal order or does he just have

441
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a bit of a.

442
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Speaker 3: Thing for Vladimir Putin?

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Speaker 2: You know?

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Speaker 6: And I you know, and I'm sorry, I can't I'm

445
00:22:11,240 --> 00:22:13,160
not being too flippant about that, and I certainly don't

446
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buy the you know, Putin's got something on him, compromat

447
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kind of thing. But it just does seem in his

448
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case he just really has a thing for the man

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and never says a bad word about of mind conscious

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that he you know, just actually has called the post

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sanctions something. So so you know what, that's all I'm saying,

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is we do all we do this with Trump all

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the time, like he's this incredible. Charles wrote a terrific

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piece recently about the you know, I'm picking the absurd

455
00:22:37,119 --> 00:22:39,480
observation claim that Trump plays four D chess. You know,

456
00:22:39,480 --> 00:22:41,799
everything he does is like, oh, you know, I think

457
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I can't remember it was a tallyron set of metinic

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or the other way around when they died.

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Speaker 3: You know, I wonder what he meant by that, and

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that's what we said to do that with Trump.

461
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Speaker 6: We do that with Trump, right, and it's like, you know,

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he just he just you know, he just you know,

463
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sent out a text tweet saying, Kaffifi that's regulably a

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sophisticated observation on the state of the world. No, I

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just that's the problem with him. I mean, you know,

466
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you know, his instincts are good. Often sometimes it's not.

467
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They're terrible. But is it instinct or is it you know,

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grand strategy.

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Speaker 2: Well, yeah, right, I mean that's a good question. There

470
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is a headline, a news headline in your paper today.

471
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I haven't read a story, but the headline goes something

472
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like Germany considers acquiring nuclear weapons and I wonder, is

473
00:23:28,599 --> 00:23:30,640
this for real or is this the Germans learning how

474
00:23:30,640 --> 00:23:31,599
to play Trump's game.

475
00:23:32,799 --> 00:23:36,720
Speaker 6: I have a very dear, very dear friend, a Jewish

476
00:23:36,799 --> 00:23:39,519
journalist friend and colleague who you know, when we were

477
00:23:39,519 --> 00:23:42,119
having these arguments years back about burden sharing and whether

478
00:23:42,119 --> 00:23:43,960
the Germans should be doing more on that, the Germans

479
00:23:44,000 --> 00:23:47,119
were you know, useless militarily, and he would say, and

480
00:23:47,160 --> 00:23:48,680
we'd have this argument, he'd say to me j S.

481
00:23:48,839 --> 00:23:51,440
Speaker 3: Jerry said, we are having an.

482
00:23:51,440 --> 00:23:55,960
Speaker 6: Argument about how bad it is about whether or not

483
00:23:56,440 --> 00:23:59,720
about the fact that the Germans aren't we know, militaristic

484
00:23:59,799 --> 00:24:02,799
in it. That is a good thing, you know, That

485
00:24:02,920 --> 00:24:05,000
is that you know that, that is that that that

486
00:24:05,240 --> 00:24:08,079
is something anybody in the last two hundred years would

487
00:24:08,079 --> 00:24:10,599
be celebrating. Why on earth are we kind of you know,

488
00:24:10,880 --> 00:24:12,880
worrying about it. So when you see a headline saying

489
00:24:12,880 --> 00:24:15,400
the Germans want to get nuclear weapons, you know, on

490
00:24:15,400 --> 00:24:17,599
one level you might think, uh oh. But one of

491
00:24:17,599 --> 00:24:19,440
the things I wrote quite recently, I read a column

492
00:24:19,519 --> 00:24:21,240
sort of just looking at kind of the implications of

493
00:24:21,240 --> 00:24:24,240
this new world order, and nuclipliferation is absolutely one of them.

494
00:24:24,279 --> 00:24:27,119
I mean, that's you know, if I am Germany for

495
00:24:27,160 --> 00:24:29,880
that matter, and you know, Freedom Nurse that soon to

496
00:24:29,920 --> 00:24:32,839
be chancellors said this. But if I'm poland, if I'm

497
00:24:32,839 --> 00:24:35,200
the Baltics, and if I don't think that, if I

498
00:24:35,240 --> 00:24:37,200
don't think if I think NATO is in effect a

499
00:24:37,240 --> 00:24:39,799
dead letter, which I think, frankly it almost. If it

500
00:24:39,839 --> 00:24:42,119
isn't now, it will be soon. The first thing I

501
00:24:42,160 --> 00:24:43,640
want is to get my hands on a nuclear weapon.

502
00:24:43,640 --> 00:24:45,519
Because I want to be able to say to Vladimir

503
00:24:45,559 --> 00:24:48,640
Putin or whoever his successes are, you know, you you know,

504
00:24:48,720 --> 00:24:50,640
you come and come after our cities. We're going to

505
00:24:50,759 --> 00:24:53,640
you know, we're going to We're going to annihilate Moscow.

506
00:24:53,720 --> 00:24:56,279
So I I you know, so yeah, this is the reality.

507
00:24:56,279 --> 00:24:58,039
But I think I do think the larger point here

508
00:24:58,079 --> 00:25:00,599
is that I do think NATO, even if it's not

509
00:25:00,720 --> 00:25:03,480
formally dead, and you know, I think Trump will probably

510
00:25:03,480 --> 00:25:05,400
come back and say some nice things about it, would

511
00:25:05,400 --> 00:25:07,160
be persuaded to say some nice things. I saw Pete

512
00:25:07,200 --> 00:25:09,440
Haig Sith yesterday say some very nice things to the

513
00:25:09,480 --> 00:25:12,240
British Defense Minister. But I think in practical to him,

514
00:25:12,319 --> 00:25:15,000
does any I mean, do you think, for example, that

515
00:25:15,079 --> 00:25:19,400
Donald Trump would take America to war to defend Estonia

516
00:25:19,519 --> 00:25:21,440
if Vladimir Putin invades tomorrow?

517
00:25:21,680 --> 00:25:22,119
Speaker 4: I don't.

518
00:25:22,279 --> 00:25:25,160
Speaker 6: I mean, maybe I'm I just don't.

519
00:25:26,759 --> 00:25:26,880
Speaker 4: Hi.

520
00:25:27,039 --> 00:25:31,440
Speaker 1: Jared's Charles Cook here on the question of four, five,

521
00:25:31,599 --> 00:25:33,400
six or maybe seventy chess.

522
00:25:33,640 --> 00:25:34,759
Speaker 4: What is your take.

523
00:25:34,680 --> 00:25:42,839
Speaker 1: On Trump's attitude towards Tariff's because it's certainly been a

524
00:25:43,000 --> 00:25:48,720
feature of his rhetoric for years since the eighties, but

525
00:25:48,839 --> 00:25:51,920
it is totally incoherent, and he does seem to impose

526
00:25:51,960 --> 00:25:55,000
them and then back off. You can't reconcile the way

527
00:25:55,039 --> 00:25:56,880
he talks about tariffs. It's been the greatest thing that

528
00:25:57,039 --> 00:26:02,319
ever existed with his condoc and his incorporation of them

529
00:26:02,319 --> 00:26:05,400
into this art of the deal myth. So what do

530
00:26:05,440 --> 00:26:09,240
you think he's doing because it is inscrutable to me.

531
00:26:09,200 --> 00:26:10,000
Speaker 3: It looks chaotic.

532
00:26:11,319 --> 00:26:15,039
Speaker 6: It does look chaoto, and I agree I think he so.

533
00:26:15,160 --> 00:26:17,960
I first of all, I think he has a very

534
00:26:19,400 --> 00:26:23,039
dare I say, simplistic, but sort of simple view of

535
00:26:23,160 --> 00:26:26,480
international economic relations. Not even mechantalyst, it's a it's just

536
00:26:26,519 --> 00:26:30,319
a very simplistic, arithmetical view, which is that if one

537
00:26:30,359 --> 00:26:33,240
country has a trade surplus or current account surplus with

538
00:26:33,319 --> 00:26:35,799
the United States, then it's cheating. You know, it's just

539
00:26:35,839 --> 00:26:38,359
it's it's it's just cheating. We're being ripped off. I mean,

540
00:26:38,440 --> 00:26:41,279
he keeps using phrases like subsidized. He said, you know,

541
00:26:41,319 --> 00:26:43,599
when when he talks about the US having a trade

542
00:26:43,640 --> 00:26:46,880
deficit with Canada, he says Americans are subsidizing Canada, which

543
00:26:46,880 --> 00:26:50,640
it is economically nonsense. It's not a subsidy, it's an

544
00:26:50,680 --> 00:26:54,039
economic transaction. But you know, we get that. You know,

545
00:26:54,240 --> 00:26:57,960
we we get oil and the Canadians get us, and

546
00:26:58,000 --> 00:27:00,000
they're very happy on both sides. Used to be very

547
00:27:00,039 --> 00:27:02,000
happy with that arrangement. So but I think he genuine

548
00:27:02,000 --> 00:27:04,559
I think he thinks that's how he thinks of the

549
00:27:04,559 --> 00:27:08,440
international economic system, that it is a kind of zero

550
00:27:08,480 --> 00:27:11,400
sum game, and you know, just probably get it just

551
00:27:11,440 --> 00:27:12,839
as he you know, when this is when he was

552
00:27:12,880 --> 00:27:15,559
a real estate guy. If if he was winning, if

553
00:27:15,559 --> 00:27:17,039
he if he got it, if he got to if

554
00:27:17,039 --> 00:27:19,240
he beat somebody to a deal, that was that meant

555
00:27:19,240 --> 00:27:21,359
he was winning and the other guy was was losing.

556
00:27:21,359 --> 00:27:22,680
And so I think so, I think so, I think

557
00:27:22,680 --> 00:27:24,960
it stems from that, that that basic view that the

558
00:27:24,960 --> 00:27:26,720
world is unfair, and that that what you need to

559
00:27:26,759 --> 00:27:32,559
do then to redress that unfairness, to to to redress

560
00:27:32,599 --> 00:27:36,519
that injustice is tariff's tariffs are you know, are obviously

561
00:27:36,519 --> 00:27:38,119
an obvious way to do it. They you know, they

562
00:27:38,200 --> 00:27:41,440
hurt us, but they hurt the other side more because

563
00:27:41,440 --> 00:27:43,640
they will have the effects other things being equal, of

564
00:27:44,720 --> 00:27:48,119
of of reducing their the other side exports. So I really,

565
00:27:48,200 --> 00:27:50,480
I think it really, I think it's that simple. And

566
00:27:50,480 --> 00:27:52,079
then I think he's built on top of that this

567
00:27:52,200 --> 00:27:54,599
idea that tariffs will generate huge amounts of revenue. He

568
00:27:54,640 --> 00:27:57,920
keeps talking about, you know, William McKinley, and how you

569
00:27:57,960 --> 00:28:01,319
know tariff's generated the asked bulk of federal income back

570
00:28:01,319 --> 00:28:03,279
then and asked that that's when the that's when the

571
00:28:03,319 --> 00:28:06,400
federal federal government represented about two percent of GDP.

572
00:28:06,559 --> 00:28:08,000
Speaker 3: But but you know, so I think he's so.

573
00:28:08,039 --> 00:28:13,200
Speaker 6: I think from that basic sort of economic equation, kind

574
00:28:13,200 --> 00:28:15,680
of kind of false economic if you like economic equation,

575
00:28:15,880 --> 00:28:19,480
that that trade that if that if you're trading, if

576
00:28:19,519 --> 00:28:23,000
your trading partner has a surplus, then they're cheating and

577
00:28:23,039 --> 00:28:25,839
they need to be and they need to be hauled in.

578
00:28:26,359 --> 00:28:28,680
He then builds on these other ideas like taris will

579
00:28:28,680 --> 00:28:31,599
produce great revenue and all. But he's not wrong about

580
00:28:31,599 --> 00:28:34,559
the you know that tariffs ultimately will produce will induce

581
00:28:34,720 --> 00:28:38,400
and incentivize American or need any company to come and

582
00:28:38,440 --> 00:28:40,640
you know, build in the United States. So but I

583
00:28:40,640 --> 00:28:42,880
do think it I think it really stems from that.

584
00:28:42,960 --> 00:28:45,799
He looked, and I think Charles and I remember, you know,

585
00:28:45,960 --> 00:28:48,359
looking where. I remember I lived in New York in

586
00:28:48,400 --> 00:28:51,279
the nineteen eighty late eighties, and I remember him taking

587
00:28:51,279 --> 00:28:52,880
out those ads in the New York Times when he

588
00:28:52,880 --> 00:28:55,200
would say, you know, when the trade deficit with with

589
00:28:55,319 --> 00:28:58,400
Japan and they would have an enormous trade definite, he say, look,

590
00:28:58,519 --> 00:29:00,480
this is wrong. They're cheating. This is absolutely and I think,

591
00:29:00,680 --> 00:29:02,240
I really do think it comes from them.

592
00:29:02,559 --> 00:29:04,759
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's rhetoric. It's the same used to say politicians

593
00:29:04,759 --> 00:29:07,920
in America effectless and they're allowing Japan to cheat. It's

594
00:29:07,960 --> 00:29:10,839
pretty much a through line from there. My second question

595
00:29:10,920 --> 00:29:14,720
is about the budget. Republicans historically have talked about the

596
00:29:14,720 --> 00:29:17,240
deficits we run every year. They've talked about the debt

597
00:29:17,400 --> 00:29:22,559
that those deficits create. They've talked about the issues that

598
00:29:22,599 --> 00:29:26,000
we have with entitlements, and Trump doesn't. Now you can

599
00:29:26,279 --> 00:29:29,039
make the argument that this is politically smart, because it is.

600
00:29:29,279 --> 00:29:31,079
People don't want to hear it. The public is not

601
00:29:31,319 --> 00:29:35,279
their Republicans who talk in that way lose. But the

602
00:29:35,359 --> 00:29:38,880
math remains the same. Do you expect Congress to just

603
00:29:38,960 --> 00:29:43,480
blow open the deficit this summer when they pass their

604
00:29:43,519 --> 00:29:46,160
spending and tax bills or do you think any saner

605
00:29:46,240 --> 00:29:47,160
voices will prevail.

606
00:29:48,200 --> 00:29:49,839
Speaker 6: No, I think they'll I think they'll go for broke,

607
00:29:50,039 --> 00:29:53,240
and I think with one caveat which one comes to look.

608
00:29:53,279 --> 00:29:56,119
I think the I think, if the economy is slowing,

609
00:29:56,119 --> 00:29:58,400
as it really does seem to be doing, I think,

610
00:29:58,440 --> 00:30:02,200
you know, we're getting these sort of the usual kind

611
00:30:02,240 --> 00:30:05,319
of hail of not necessarily consistent data, but but but

612
00:30:05,400 --> 00:30:08,839
it usually points broadly in one direction. Even today's jobs

613
00:30:08,920 --> 00:30:11,240
numbers were you know, on the softer side, and we've

614
00:30:11,240 --> 00:30:15,839
seen two months of relatively soft employment growth. The the

615
00:30:15,920 --> 00:30:18,680
you know, the there's certainly the markets think the economy

616
00:30:18,680 --> 00:30:20,920
is slowing very sharply. That's why, you know, market interest,

617
00:30:21,759 --> 00:30:24,599
treasury yields have fallen. And I think there's a pretty

618
00:30:24,640 --> 00:30:26,359
good chance that we get to the middle of the

619
00:30:26,440 --> 00:30:29,039
year or as this as this legislate, as this as

620
00:30:29,079 --> 00:30:33,240
a as as this budget and tax cut goes through Congress,

621
00:30:33,279 --> 00:30:36,319
I think I think the nervousness about the economy will grow,

622
00:30:37,599 --> 00:30:41,279
and I suspect that will you know, that will be

623
00:30:41,440 --> 00:30:45,559
enough to silence the what whatever remaining deficit hawks there

624
00:30:45,640 --> 00:30:47,759
may be, because the argument is going to be we

625
00:30:47,799 --> 00:30:49,960
really need a stimulus, of course, but the caveat I

626
00:30:49,960 --> 00:30:52,119
was going to say is, at the same time, inflation

627
00:30:52,279 --> 00:30:54,599
is not is certainly not going away.

628
00:30:54,640 --> 00:30:55,440
Speaker 3: It's getting worse.

629
00:30:55,599 --> 00:30:57,880
Speaker 6: I don't think as it happens for you know, reasons

630
00:30:57,920 --> 00:30:59,200
we don't need to go into I don't think tariffs

631
00:30:59,200 --> 00:31:01,200
are inherently inflationary. I think they lead to a one

632
00:31:01,200 --> 00:31:05,240
time increase in the price level, and they're not necessarily recurring,

633
00:31:05,279 --> 00:31:07,839
which would only be inflationary. But they will raise if

634
00:31:07,880 --> 00:31:11,039
they ever get into if we ever actually impose these tariffs.

635
00:31:11,160 --> 00:31:13,599
We keep going through this sort of you know, hide

636
00:31:13,640 --> 00:31:15,279
and seek with tariffs that we've been doing for the

637
00:31:15,319 --> 00:31:16,960
last couple of months. But if we ever get the tariff,

638
00:31:16,960 --> 00:31:19,839
then they will push up prices, and you know, by

639
00:31:19,839 --> 00:31:22,319
the way, and then and a big fiscal blowout, even

640
00:31:22,400 --> 00:31:25,759
though it might be advantageous for demand in the economy

641
00:31:25,759 --> 00:31:28,599
of demand is really weakening. Could also you know, will

642
00:31:28,680 --> 00:31:32,119
will will certainly make the inflation picture worse too, so

643
00:31:32,200 --> 00:31:34,599
you could you know, this is this is the stagflation scenario.

644
00:31:34,680 --> 00:31:35,119
Speaker 3: Obviously.

645
00:31:35,440 --> 00:31:39,720
Speaker 6: The other caveat or conditional is if we you know,

646
00:31:39,799 --> 00:31:42,440
if the market really we if we have a market

647
00:31:42,440 --> 00:31:45,720
event where it looks like the market suddenly takes fright,

648
00:31:46,000 --> 00:31:49,359
bond yield spike, you know, and people think this is

649
00:31:49,400 --> 00:31:52,160
not sustainable. At one hundred and twenty five percent of

650
00:31:52,359 --> 00:31:58,079
GDP debt level, and that causes, you know, a real rethink.

651
00:31:58,119 --> 00:32:01,759
But I think that's low probability outcome. I would say,

652
00:32:01,839 --> 00:32:04,000
you know, I'd say they push it through.

653
00:32:06,519 --> 00:32:09,079
Speaker 2: Jerry. It's Steve Hayward again. I want to ask you

654
00:32:09,119 --> 00:32:13,400
a question about your column this week about the consequences

655
00:32:13,400 --> 00:32:16,079
of collapsing public trust in the media. And what I

656
00:32:16,119 --> 00:32:18,759
want to do for listeners is just quote two sentences

657
00:32:18,759 --> 00:32:20,319
from it to get the flavor of it, and then

658
00:32:20,319 --> 00:32:23,119
I'll give you my question about it. Here's what you write.

659
00:32:23,519 --> 00:32:27,400
What happened is that news organizations were transformed in character

660
00:32:27,519 --> 00:32:31,359
and purpose. They went from being quasi legal institutions to

661
00:32:31,640 --> 00:32:35,440
quasi religious ones. They are more like prayer books for

662
00:32:35,480 --> 00:32:39,519
a believing congregation. Their purpose is to strengthen believer's faith

663
00:32:39,839 --> 00:32:43,119
by offering reassurance and imparting moral guidance. And you have

664
00:32:43,160 --> 00:32:44,880
men more harsh things to say after that.

665
00:32:45,519 --> 00:32:46,480
Speaker 4: I agree with all that.

666
00:32:46,920 --> 00:32:50,599
Speaker 2: I do wonder if the problem of the collapsing public

667
00:32:50,599 --> 00:32:52,880
trust in the media goes deeper and shares something in

668
00:32:52,920 --> 00:32:56,599
common with a parallel collapse in public trust with the

669
00:32:56,680 --> 00:33:00,400
universities and education. And I'll put this proposition to you

670
00:33:00,559 --> 00:33:03,920
I think it was a great turning point or mistake

671
00:33:04,559 --> 00:33:07,559
that decades ago journalism went from being a working class

672
00:33:07,599 --> 00:33:11,480
profession like being a policeman or something like that, to

673
00:33:12,640 --> 00:33:16,240
a skilled profession with people getting journalism degrees from Columbia

674
00:33:16,240 --> 00:33:17,440
and so forth, and.

675
00:33:17,440 --> 00:33:18,119
Speaker 4: So beyond the.

676
00:33:19,680 --> 00:33:22,640
Speaker 2: Beyond the problem of having people who are very progressive

677
00:33:22,640 --> 00:33:24,599
of going to newsrooms, and you point out out in

678
00:33:24,640 --> 00:33:28,079
a sequl paragraph people I think who are actually not

679
00:33:28,119 --> 00:33:31,200
that well educated. And here's my bold proposition. I think

680
00:33:31,240 --> 00:33:33,559
you go back seven or eighty years ago to a

681
00:33:33,839 --> 00:33:36,759
daily newspaper reporter who had only a high school education

682
00:33:37,359 --> 00:33:40,240
probably had a better grasp of history, history and American

683
00:33:40,279 --> 00:33:43,759
civics than a lot of our professionally trained journalists do today.

684
00:33:43,880 --> 00:33:45,880
And I think that's as much a part of the

685
00:33:45,920 --> 00:33:48,079
problem as ideology is.

686
00:33:48,079 --> 00:33:49,880
Speaker 4: Is that completely outrageous to say.

687
00:33:50,119 --> 00:33:53,039
Speaker 6: No, it's one hundred percent correct. And in fact, there's

688
00:33:53,039 --> 00:33:56,039
a chapter in my book, Steve, which I will encourage

689
00:33:56,079 --> 00:33:59,319
your listeners to the American breakdown We Trust's Lives the

690
00:33:59,319 --> 00:34:01,160
whole chefro in my book, which I absolutely go through

691
00:34:01,160 --> 00:34:05,039
the kind of demography of the news business. You're absolutely right. Now,

692
00:34:05,079 --> 00:34:06,640
let me tell you just one one fun story which

693
00:34:06,640 --> 00:34:08,000
I think I refer to in the book. Actually, but

694
00:34:09,239 --> 00:34:13,559
when I was editor of the journal, a a friend

695
00:34:13,679 --> 00:34:16,079
at a at another at a magazine, actually a news magazine,

696
00:34:16,079 --> 00:34:21,280
a conservative leaning magazine, recommended a bright, young reporter to me,

697
00:34:21,440 --> 00:34:23,960
and he said, you'll love him. You said, he's looking

698
00:34:23,960 --> 00:34:25,400
for a job and he wants to work for you'd

699
00:34:25,400 --> 00:34:27,039
love to work for the journal. And you know, he

700
00:34:27,159 --> 00:34:28,639
talked to me and he said, I'll give you this.

701
00:34:28,639 --> 00:34:30,519
This is an example of why you'll like him. He said,

702
00:34:32,119 --> 00:34:35,159
he's only three or four years out of some ivy

703
00:34:35,199 --> 00:34:38,639
league college, very bright, but a very good reporter, very

704
00:34:38,840 --> 00:34:44,119
very thoughtful, very fair, very analytical and scrupulous. But they

705
00:34:44,159 --> 00:34:46,079
sat him down and when he said he wanted to

706
00:34:46,159 --> 00:34:48,000
be a reporter at the Wall Street Journal somewhere else,

707
00:34:48,320 --> 00:34:52,079
they said, well, you know what, you know, why why

708
00:34:52,159 --> 00:34:54,039
do you know you're you know, you're bright, you're smart,

709
00:34:54,039 --> 00:34:55,159
You've got great prospects.

710
00:34:55,199 --> 00:34:56,119
Speaker 3: You're working for a magazine.

711
00:34:56,119 --> 00:34:57,199
Speaker 6: You could be a you know, you could be a

712
00:34:57,280 --> 00:34:59,840
you could be a commentator, a columnist, you know, you know,

713
00:35:00,039 --> 00:35:03,920
opinion writer. And this kit, this young man apparently said,

714
00:35:04,719 --> 00:35:06,000
I'm twenty six years old.

715
00:35:06,239 --> 00:35:08,840
Speaker 3: I've been out of college for four years, who gives

716
00:35:08,840 --> 00:35:10,079
a shit what I think about?

717
00:35:12,719 --> 00:35:16,440
Speaker 6: And it's just not as absolutely, absolutely absolutely the kind

718
00:35:16,440 --> 00:35:19,079
of reporters we need. And that is exactly it. I mean,

719
00:35:19,079 --> 00:35:21,679
there's you know, they you're absolutely right, Steve. You know,

720
00:35:22,079 --> 00:35:25,440
they come out of university and they've been you know,

721
00:35:26,079 --> 00:35:31,199
expensively educated, and they have imbibed all that you know,

722
00:35:31,639 --> 00:35:34,760
nonsense unfortunately that's taught at most of these universities, and

723
00:35:34,800 --> 00:35:37,800
they come out with a you know what was where

724
00:35:37,800 --> 00:35:39,639
they come up with that sort of Marxian apro What

725
00:35:39,679 --> 00:35:42,840
did Carl Marx say that philosophers sought to interpret the

726
00:35:42,840 --> 00:35:44,960
world the point is to change it, and that sort

727
00:35:45,000 --> 00:35:46,679
of I think that's you know, that's that's that's how

728
00:35:46,719 --> 00:35:48,760
I view journalists. You know, journalists used to just go

729
00:35:48,800 --> 00:35:51,039
out and report the world exactly as you stay say,

730
00:35:51,119 --> 00:35:54,039
because they didn't have sort of high falutin ideas about,

731
00:35:55,079 --> 00:35:56,599
you know, the way the world should run. They just

732
00:35:56,599 --> 00:35:58,480
wanted to go out and find out what was going on.

733
00:35:58,519 --> 00:36:02,679
And instead they've been replaced by this cost you know

734
00:36:02,760 --> 00:36:08,559
of of sort of self revering intellectuals who want to

735
00:36:08,599 --> 00:36:10,880
tell people how to think. And I couldn't agree more.

736
00:36:11,239 --> 00:36:13,760
Speaker 4: The average newspaper of say the nineteen forties, nineteen fifties

737
00:36:13,840 --> 00:36:17,679
or so, would have probably twenty thirty stories on a page.

738
00:36:17,880 --> 00:36:19,719
Now it might be car accidents or the fact that

739
00:36:19,719 --> 00:36:21,920
a toddler had slipped on a roller skate in his head,

740
00:36:22,159 --> 00:36:26,000
but you got this great, big panoply of life in

741
00:36:26,039 --> 00:36:28,519
these papers. And now, of course you'll find maybe one

742
00:36:28,599 --> 00:36:30,400
or two stories on the paper, if the paper even

743
00:36:30,440 --> 00:36:32,920
exists anymore, and it will be something of a deep

744
00:36:32,920 --> 00:36:36,000
social importance, or something that is happening around town that

745
00:36:36,159 --> 00:36:39,679
is seen through a particular prism that oftentimes is just

746
00:36:39,760 --> 00:36:42,719
not available. The people who are holding that prism in

747
00:36:42,760 --> 00:36:45,000
their heads don't know that they have that prison. They

748
00:36:45,039 --> 00:36:46,679
still think they're being objected. But I want to ask

749
00:36:46,719 --> 00:36:47,320
you this, but.

750
00:36:48,039 --> 00:36:51,079
Speaker 6: Sorry, Josh me interrupted quickly. It would be toddlers slips

751
00:36:51,079 --> 00:36:56,599
on ice, white supremacy, to blame right right, colonialism, to

752
00:36:56,639 --> 00:36:58,239
blaye right right.

753
00:36:59,000 --> 00:37:02,119
Speaker 4: Because one of the things that has been I mean,

754
00:37:02,280 --> 00:37:04,440
I'm sitting in a newspaper office right now. I've been

755
00:37:04,480 --> 00:37:08,880
a newspaper since nineteen seventy eight, and as an opinion writer,

756
00:37:08,960 --> 00:37:11,719
because what the hell do I know? And one of

757
00:37:11,760 --> 00:37:13,440
the things that's bothered me the most of the last

758
00:37:13,480 --> 00:37:17,119
few years is this shift away from even paying obecient

759
00:37:17,199 --> 00:37:22,079
lip service to objectivity, because objectivity means giving credence to evil.

760
00:37:22,360 --> 00:37:24,519
Is what a new generation of journalists say when you

761
00:37:24,559 --> 00:37:26,480
when you pull them in, these jay skulls, which ought

762
00:37:26,559 --> 00:37:28,880
not to exist in the first place, I tell you, well,

763
00:37:28,920 --> 00:37:31,280
you know, there's no other hand when it comes to Hitler,

764
00:37:31,320 --> 00:37:33,800
there's no other hand when it comes to climate change.

765
00:37:33,920 --> 00:37:35,679
So let's go to the Washington Post and look at

766
00:37:35,679 --> 00:37:38,519
that paper in the competition Bezos is trying to do

767
00:37:39,039 --> 00:37:43,039
apparently he lockstep with gearing and garables and the rest

768
00:37:43,039 --> 00:37:47,199
of it. He's demanding, perhaps requesting that the editorial page

769
00:37:47,880 --> 00:37:53,519
come out for free, you know, free economy and personal liberty,

770
00:37:54,039 --> 00:37:58,880
who which again fascist of fashion adjacent issues right there,

771
00:38:00,199 --> 00:38:01,840
And the reaction of the staff seems to tell me

772
00:38:01,880 --> 00:38:04,800
that that probably is indicative of their own blinders and

773
00:38:04,840 --> 00:38:07,079
their own ideology, which will continue to do in the

774
00:38:07,079 --> 00:38:08,800
news industry as we know it today.

775
00:38:08,639 --> 00:38:14,960
Speaker 6: Right exactly, I mean, I mean the idea that again

776
00:38:15,639 --> 00:38:19,719
you absolutely you know, identify the ideological issue, but just

777
00:38:20,039 --> 00:38:23,159
the kind of larger to me, and this is such

778
00:38:23,239 --> 00:38:26,480
an so typical of sort of entitled view that we

779
00:38:26,559 --> 00:38:28,079
have to deal with with so many you know, the

780
00:38:28,119 --> 00:38:32,280
idea that someone pays, you know, essentially pays someone's salary

781
00:38:32,280 --> 00:38:36,280
and loses hundreds of millions of dollars over a fifteen

782
00:38:36,320 --> 00:38:39,960
year period to keep this thing afloat and keep these

783
00:38:40,000 --> 00:38:43,559
people employed. The idea how that it's absolutely outrageous to

784
00:38:43,639 --> 00:38:46,159
that that that person, that owner should then actually decide

785
00:38:46,159 --> 00:38:49,719
he you know, he thinks he would like the paper's

786
00:38:49,760 --> 00:38:53,159
opinions to broadly align with his own. No, it's you know,

787
00:38:53,280 --> 00:38:58,320
it's it is that is that this is the problem

788
00:38:58,320 --> 00:38:59,960
we have that Abo bunts one of the reasons again

789
00:39:00,079 --> 00:39:02,079
I said, sorry to revert to my own column, but

790
00:39:02,400 --> 00:39:05,239
you know why people don't trust why people don't trust

791
00:39:05,239 --> 00:39:10,159
them anymore, it's they've they've lost all credibility and not

792
00:39:10,199 --> 00:39:12,440
any credibility, but also they've lost any kind of the

793
00:39:12,599 --> 00:39:14,559
lost any sensibility too, you know what I mean. I think,

794
00:39:14,559 --> 00:39:17,719
I think they move in such rarefied circles. They all

795
00:39:17,760 --> 00:39:20,800
believe that, you know, Donald Trump is the second coming

796
00:39:20,840 --> 00:39:24,239
of Hitler, and you know, again all that stuff that

797
00:39:24,280 --> 00:39:26,840
they've been taught about about colonialism and all that kind

798
00:39:26,880 --> 00:39:29,079
of thing. I don't meet anybody who who even disagrees

799
00:39:29,079 --> 00:39:31,119
with that. I mean, I always remember the story of

800
00:39:31,119 --> 00:39:33,000
someone telling me, you know, some time ago, they're out

801
00:39:33,039 --> 00:39:35,480
for you know, dinner with a bunch of journalists back

802
00:39:35,480 --> 00:39:38,039
in the twenty sixteen campaign, and you know, somebody said, well,

803
00:39:38,039 --> 00:39:40,119
how many people around the table voted for Trump? Or

804
00:39:40,280 --> 00:39:42,000
just after the campaign was in? And not a single

805
00:39:42,000 --> 00:39:43,480
hand went up? And then the more interesting question was,

806
00:39:43,519 --> 00:39:45,760
how many of you know anyone who voted for Trump?

807
00:39:46,199 --> 00:39:48,360
And still not a single hand went up? And that's

808
00:39:48,559 --> 00:39:50,119
you know, I look, I don't want to be too harsh.

809
00:39:50,639 --> 00:39:53,159
There there's a lot of still terrific journalists out there

810
00:39:53,159 --> 00:39:56,800
doing honest work, good work. But it has you know,

811
00:39:57,280 --> 00:40:01,639
it's as a as a hesitated with profession because I

812
00:40:02,079 --> 00:40:05,039
don't think it is a profession, but as a as

813
00:40:05,199 --> 00:40:09,400
an occupation, and as a as a useful function for

814
00:40:09,480 --> 00:40:13,440
a you know, for for for society, it's it has

815
00:40:13,519 --> 00:40:16,079
just it's lost its way incredibly badly. And I you know,

816
00:40:16,280 --> 00:40:18,079
I don't think it's over. I think there are ways

817
00:40:18,079 --> 00:40:20,360
in which it can be recovered, but it's in a

818
00:40:20,480 --> 00:40:22,079
very very very bad place.

819
00:40:22,159 --> 00:40:23,719
Speaker 4: I regret it too. I love it because I love

820
00:40:23,760 --> 00:40:26,159
this industry. When I go to England, I stay with

821
00:40:26,360 --> 00:40:28,880
a telegraphic family, and there's just something about opening up

822
00:40:28,920 --> 00:40:32,559
that big paper. So I love the telegraph. That reminds

823
00:40:32,599 --> 00:40:35,360
me of what the medium can be. But when Stephen

824
00:40:35,400 --> 00:40:37,519
was talking before about the lack of faith in journalism

825
00:40:37,519 --> 00:40:40,320
and the lack of faith in the institutions of education,

826
00:40:40,679 --> 00:40:44,320
doesn't it It's it's part and parcel of a broad

827
00:40:44,719 --> 00:40:47,199
spectrum lack of faith in the institution. There's been a

828
00:40:47,239 --> 00:40:53,000
there's been a suicide of institutions institutional credibility in the

829
00:40:53,039 --> 00:40:56,559
last four or five years. That seems to be nearly

830
00:40:56,599 --> 00:40:57,840
every single one of them that you can think of,

831
00:40:57,920 --> 00:41:00,840
possibly with the exception of the American military, which again,

832
00:41:01,079 --> 00:41:02,719
you know, always doing things like well we got to

833
00:41:02,760 --> 00:41:04,559
do you know, we have we have to pay for

834
00:41:04,559 --> 00:41:07,320
the surgeries of transgender soldiers, or we simply won't be

835
00:41:07,400 --> 00:41:11,760
the effective fighting for us we want to be. Which

836
00:41:11,800 --> 00:41:15,920
institutions have survived the last five years or so and

837
00:41:16,039 --> 00:41:19,599
actually gained credibility with the people or is it just

838
00:41:19,679 --> 00:41:21,840
pretty much everything that we look at seems to have

839
00:41:21,920 --> 00:41:25,159
revealed itself is made of fallible human clay, and and

840
00:41:25,360 --> 00:41:28,079
and you know, bent Timber.

841
00:41:29,039 --> 00:41:32,320
Speaker 6: I mean I apologize profusely because I did not come

842
00:41:32,360 --> 00:41:34,159
on this show, which I love this show, I think,

843
00:41:34,360 --> 00:41:36,559
I think it's terrific and I love I'm honored to

844
00:41:36,559 --> 00:41:37,480
do it. But I did not come on the show

845
00:41:37,519 --> 00:41:39,719
to promote my book. But this again is which I

846
00:41:40,159 --> 00:41:41,960
actually go through this in the book. And actually, if

847
00:41:41,960 --> 00:41:44,960
you look at the data the institutions that there are

848
00:41:45,000 --> 00:41:49,840
a few institutions that have in in whom trust in

849
00:41:49,880 --> 00:41:52,320
which trust can can you know, continue to be relatively high.

850
00:41:52,559 --> 00:41:54,400
The military you mentioned, although as you say, there's been

851
00:41:54,400 --> 00:41:56,159
some damage to that over the last few years. But

852
00:41:56,199 --> 00:41:59,719
the really interesting ones are small businesses. Actually, people still

853
00:42:00,280 --> 00:42:02,480
really have a very very high level of trust in

854
00:42:02,559 --> 00:42:05,280
small business. Oddly enough, they also have a high level

855
00:42:05,320 --> 00:42:08,960
mustionis ealdly enough, that's unfair, but certainly counter to the

856
00:42:09,039 --> 00:42:11,639
kind of broader trends. They have got a high level

857
00:42:11,679 --> 00:42:14,199
of trust in local government too. They you know, again,

858
00:42:14,239 --> 00:42:16,679
when local government works for them. I mean, you know,

859
00:42:16,679 --> 00:42:20,239
if the DMV is efficient, you know which in many

860
00:42:20,239 --> 00:42:23,039
places it is actually signed in New York City and

861
00:42:23,079 --> 00:42:26,000
to my intense surprise, New York City government is a

862
00:42:26,039 --> 00:42:28,480
disaster on every front. The only two things the New

863
00:42:28,519 --> 00:42:31,719
York City government does remotely efficiently is the DMV for

864
00:42:31,719 --> 00:42:35,280
some reason, and of course tax collection, it's brilliant, it's

865
00:42:35,320 --> 00:42:37,159
incredibly efficient to both of those. But but you know,

866
00:42:37,320 --> 00:42:39,639
so people do so if you know, if the if

867
00:42:39,639 --> 00:42:42,239
their streets are cleaned and there they can get their

868
00:42:42,320 --> 00:42:45,559
driver's license, and they can you know, and they the

869
00:42:45,599 --> 00:42:48,639
police are pretty good, and the fire the you know,

870
00:42:48,679 --> 00:42:50,679
the people that they like the fire house. So people

871
00:42:50,719 --> 00:42:52,840
have high levels of trust. And I think the larger

872
00:42:52,880 --> 00:42:54,760
point here, and I did draw this conclusion in the book,

873
00:42:54,800 --> 00:42:57,320
is that the closer people are part of the problem.

874
00:42:57,320 --> 00:42:59,719
I think it's only a part of it. I wouldn't

875
00:43:00,079 --> 00:43:02,840
way claim that it's hugely important, but I think part

876
00:43:02,840 --> 00:43:05,760
of the problem has been that institutions have become larger

877
00:43:05,800 --> 00:43:09,719
and more remote, and we become more remote. And this

878
00:43:09,800 --> 00:43:12,679
is a function again inevitably of the digital age that

879
00:43:12,760 --> 00:43:15,480
you know, we just do spend so much, you know,

880
00:43:15,519 --> 00:43:18,559
we can do so much, you know, without stepping outside

881
00:43:18,599 --> 00:43:23,039
of our front door. That I think that that has

882
00:43:23,119 --> 00:43:25,480
created a kind of you know, forgive me for using

883
00:43:25,920 --> 00:43:28,960
sort of an alienation and a kind of isolation which

884
00:43:29,079 --> 00:43:33,920
breeds mistrust. But so when people actually encounter and have

885
00:43:34,039 --> 00:43:39,320
interactions with institutions, direct institutions, small businesses where they go

886
00:43:39,360 --> 00:43:41,440
into the mum and pop store, or they go into

887
00:43:41,440 --> 00:43:44,079
the you know, into the local restaurant, whatever, they get

888
00:43:44,079 --> 00:43:45,760
a good meal, they like them, they have and again

889
00:43:45,800 --> 00:43:46,760
this is reflected in data.

890
00:43:46,760 --> 00:43:47,679
Speaker 4: You can look it up.

891
00:43:47,719 --> 00:43:50,119
Speaker 6: They have a high level of trust in small business.

892
00:43:50,159 --> 00:43:52,280
They have quite a high level of trust in you know,

893
00:43:52,599 --> 00:43:54,599
very very local government. They even have quite a high

894
00:43:54,639 --> 00:43:56,920
level of trust in local newspapers, which tells you something.

895
00:43:56,920 --> 00:43:59,119
So so I think there's something there about the kind

896
00:43:59,159 --> 00:44:04,000
of bigness. That bigness and remoteness has bred mistrust as

897
00:44:04,039 --> 00:44:05,719
well as all these other things that we've talked about.

898
00:44:07,119 --> 00:44:08,719
Speaker 4: So we don't want to be big lely. I get it,

899
00:44:08,760 --> 00:44:12,519
And you're right, local is better. Let's just record scratch

900
00:44:12,679 --> 00:44:15,199
up in the sketch, and I want to get back

901
00:44:15,199 --> 00:44:17,239
to England. One of the things that people who are

902
00:44:17,519 --> 00:44:19,840
very online here in America are aware of is that

903
00:44:19,880 --> 00:44:22,840
there seems to be two things going wrong with England.

904
00:44:22,920 --> 00:44:27,480
One of them is immigration, which is reshaping the nation

905
00:44:27,559 --> 00:44:29,400
in ways that people perhaps don't like, and the other

906
00:44:29,519 --> 00:44:32,239
is a crackdown on free speech in which it seems

907
00:44:32,239 --> 00:44:36,840
as if you can stab somebody for setting a krona fire,

908
00:44:36,880 --> 00:44:41,159
but if you have a thought in your head outside

909
00:44:41,199 --> 00:44:43,719
of an abortion clinic, or if you post something critical

910
00:44:43,719 --> 00:44:46,360
of a local councilman on your Facebook page, then the

911
00:44:47,320 --> 00:44:49,119
police will come round in place. You want to caution

912
00:44:49,239 --> 00:44:52,840
and talk and wave badge that you are we exaggerating

913
00:44:53,559 --> 00:44:56,159
what's going on? There? Are there? Let's just do the

914
00:44:56,199 --> 00:44:59,639
free speech thing. Is there a worrisome trend or an

915
00:44:59,639 --> 00:45:02,840
old friend worrisomely exacerbated in England when it comes to

916
00:45:02,880 --> 00:45:05,079
the free expression of ideas in England of our places?

917
00:45:05,159 --> 00:45:06,440
Speaker 6: The answer is yes, and yes, I mean there is

918
00:45:06,480 --> 00:45:08,559
some exaggeration. I mean you, you know, to read some people

919
00:45:08,639 --> 00:45:11,440
over here, and indeed to listen to JD Vance when

920
00:45:11,440 --> 00:45:13,400
he went to Munich and talked about this a few

921
00:45:13,400 --> 00:45:16,440
weeks ago, you'd think that Britain was essentially East Germany

922
00:45:16,440 --> 00:45:19,159
in you know, circa nineteen sixty seven or something. And

923
00:45:19,239 --> 00:45:21,360
you know that people are being arrested all the time

924
00:45:21,400 --> 00:45:25,719
for saying, you know, politically unacceptable things. It's not It's

925
00:45:25,719 --> 00:45:27,599
obviously not true. You can you can still, you can

926
00:45:27,639 --> 00:45:31,599
still go and go online and anybody who anybody spends

927
00:45:31,599 --> 00:45:33,519
any time online and England knows that there is a

928
00:45:33,719 --> 00:45:37,559
you know, just a deluge of free speech. There are

929
00:45:37,599 --> 00:45:40,880
still you know, newspapers and television and in fact, there

930
00:45:40,880 --> 00:45:42,920
are more television channels than there ever will. But when

931
00:45:43,199 --> 00:45:46,480
Charles and I, you know, grew up there so it's

932
00:45:46,679 --> 00:45:50,119
of course it's exaggerated. But but I won't I won't

933
00:45:50,119 --> 00:45:53,159
diminish it that that there is the absence of a

934
00:45:53,199 --> 00:46:02,679
First Amendment protection, the the the dominant the domination of

935
00:46:02,719 --> 00:46:09,079
the major institutions of government, law enforcement, and by a

936
00:46:09,119 --> 00:46:11,119
government I mean sort of the permanent governor alone now

937
00:46:11,119 --> 00:46:13,039
and you can add to that the elected government, but

938
00:46:13,039 --> 00:46:15,039
this was going on when the Conservatives were in power too.

939
00:46:16,440 --> 00:46:18,880
And the dominance of the cultural institutions like universities and

940
00:46:18,920 --> 00:46:22,760
the media does mean that that a you know.

941
00:46:23,519 --> 00:46:26,960
Speaker 3: That there there there have been a there's.

942
00:46:26,760 --> 00:46:30,559
Speaker 6: Been a high level of there's there's been a there's

943
00:46:30,559 --> 00:46:33,440
been a there's been a considerable amount of an attempt

944
00:46:33,840 --> 00:46:38,280
to police speech and and and and I think this

945
00:46:38,360 --> 00:46:40,280
fits in with another which I find which is I

946
00:46:40,280 --> 00:46:43,079
think is even more sinister, but it's it's related in

947
00:46:43,119 --> 00:46:48,000
the UK, which is a there's there is there's been

948
00:46:48,159 --> 00:46:50,320
for and by the way. Kirstama, the Prime Minister, is

949
00:46:50,320 --> 00:46:54,760
an absolutely kind of first rate exponent of this. There's

950
00:46:54,760 --> 00:46:57,039
been this attempt which we've had a little bit of

951
00:46:57,079 --> 00:46:58,639
in the United States, a lot of in the United States.

952
00:46:58,800 --> 00:47:00,559
I think it's going going first there in the UK

953
00:47:01,159 --> 00:47:08,599
to essentially transfer out of democratic political decision making very

954
00:47:08,639 --> 00:47:13,519
important issues of social and cultural matters and the political

955
00:47:13,519 --> 00:47:16,039
matters and and and have them reside in the legal

956
00:47:16,239 --> 00:47:20,760
in the courts, so essentially to establish rights in the

957
00:47:20,800 --> 00:47:25,639
courts which are then invulnerable to any sort of political

958
00:47:26,760 --> 00:47:29,400
you know, to any to any any to any attempt

959
00:47:29,400 --> 00:47:34,039
by politicians democratic electing politicians to overturn them. That is something,

960
00:47:34,519 --> 00:47:36,800
you know, So that's why you get some of these

961
00:47:36,840 --> 00:47:39,719
cases because there are you know, it has been enshrined

962
00:47:39,760 --> 00:47:42,480
in law, the hate speech things like hate speech of

963
00:47:42,519 --> 00:47:45,000
interest around in law or you know, there's a big

964
00:47:45,039 --> 00:47:47,280
debate going on in Britain about whether or not ultimately

965
00:47:47,320 --> 00:47:49,639
it should have it won't under the Labor government, but

966
00:47:49,840 --> 00:47:53,079
under the Conservative whether Britain should essentially derogate from the

967
00:47:53,119 --> 00:47:55,679
European Court of Human Rights where all of these rights

968
00:47:55,679 --> 00:48:00,239
have been been you know, again on issues like you know,

969
00:48:00,440 --> 00:48:05,360
on on religious expression or on abortion or many many

970
00:48:05,400 --> 00:48:09,039
of these big hot button social issues, as obviously happened

971
00:48:09,079 --> 00:48:10,679
here by the way, of course with Roe v. Wade,

972
00:48:12,000 --> 00:48:15,159
to to to make them, to make them essentially invulnerable

973
00:48:15,239 --> 00:48:18,199
or sort of immune to political the political process, and

974
00:48:18,239 --> 00:48:21,440
to and to and to have the courts be the

975
00:48:21,440 --> 00:48:24,159
deciding authority. That is a very worrying thing. And it's

976
00:48:24,159 --> 00:48:26,960
and it's and it's allied to this, you know this

977
00:48:28,320 --> 00:48:32,719
not not you know, not insignificant attempts to suppress, to

978
00:48:33,000 --> 00:48:34,320
suppress certain types of speech.

979
00:48:35,519 --> 00:48:37,719
Speaker 4: Well, as a former BBC producer yourself, I'm sure you

980
00:48:37,760 --> 00:48:41,519
know that the the deep, the deep well spring of

981
00:48:41,880 --> 00:48:44,519
right wing thought at the BBC will eventually come out.

982
00:48:44,559 --> 00:48:49,880
And as he's uh, he's sitting in a in an

983
00:48:49,960 --> 00:48:53,280
isolated chamber somewhere in broadcasting house and they don't they

984
00:48:53,280 --> 00:48:56,920
don't let him out. But yes, did you know Paul

985
00:48:56,960 --> 00:48:57,800
Heiney when you were there?

986
00:48:58,440 --> 00:48:58,880
Speaker 3: I did?

987
00:48:58,920 --> 00:49:02,800
Speaker 4: Actually, yes, yeah, I know I know paulin Libby, Yes

988
00:49:02,840 --> 00:49:04,719
I do. They live in They live in the town

989
00:49:04,840 --> 00:49:07,840
in Suffolk where I go a couple of times a year,

990
00:49:07,920 --> 00:49:08,760
a place called.

991
00:49:09,679 --> 00:49:12,000
Speaker 6: There were a few kind of you know, dissenters from

992
00:49:12,039 --> 00:49:15,480
the BBC Progressive orthodoxy. But I'm not joking yet. I

993
00:49:15,480 --> 00:49:17,679
think they all left. I mean I think every single

994
00:49:17,719 --> 00:49:20,360
one I knew who was, you know, vaguely kind of

995
00:49:20,400 --> 00:49:26,519
who differed from the the sort of the progressive nostrums. Literally,

996
00:49:26,679 --> 00:49:28,079
you know, just couldn't stand it and left.

997
00:49:28,199 --> 00:49:30,719
Speaker 4: Their bones were ground for cafeteria gruel. I'm sure of that.

998
00:49:31,840 --> 00:49:32,039
Speaker 2: Jerry.

999
00:49:32,039 --> 00:49:34,199
Speaker 4: It's been a great pleasure as ever, and we hope

1000
00:49:34,199 --> 00:49:36,199
to have you back as soon as possible and talk

1001
00:49:36,239 --> 00:49:37,960
about all the great things that are happening at the

1002
00:49:37,960 --> 00:49:41,159
fantastic renaissance of America, etcetera, etcetera. But in the meantime,

1003
00:49:41,400 --> 00:49:43,679
advise everybody to read his books and read him in

1004
00:49:43,719 --> 00:49:45,920
the Wall Street Journal. And thank you very much for

1005
00:49:45,960 --> 00:49:46,960
being on the show today.

1006
00:49:47,159 --> 00:49:48,719
Speaker 6: It was really my pleasure. Thank you so much for

1007
00:49:48,719 --> 00:49:49,039
having me.

1008
00:49:49,119 --> 00:49:51,760
Speaker 3: Yeah, thanks Jerry, Thank you Cheria.

1009
00:49:52,320 --> 00:49:55,440
Speaker 4: You know there is are you get this sort of

1010
00:49:55,480 --> 00:49:57,440
warm feeling when your guest talks about how much they

1011
00:49:57,519 --> 00:50:00,480
enjoy the show. And it was interesting because I was

1012
00:50:00,519 --> 00:50:04,519
checking his checking his biography on a Wikipedia just to

1013
00:50:04,800 --> 00:50:07,280
catch up on a few details, and the inset picture

1014
00:50:07,280 --> 00:50:10,719
of him, his picture on the Wikipedia page is identical

1015
00:50:10,760 --> 00:50:12,440
to the picture that we're looking at in our video

1016
00:50:12,480 --> 00:50:17,559
feed was it was a bit unnerving as a matter

1017
00:50:17,599 --> 00:50:19,280
of fact, as though, oh, that's right, I do live

1018
00:50:19,320 --> 00:50:21,400
in a simulation of Matrix and it's just been updated

1019
00:50:21,400 --> 00:50:23,559
for my own satisfaction and convenience. Here, I get it,

1020
00:50:23,599 --> 00:50:25,119
I get it, I get it. But he looked well

1021
00:50:25,159 --> 00:50:27,920
rested in both, didn't he Absolutely? So, No, we don't

1022
00:50:27,960 --> 00:50:30,480
live in the matrix. We are not you know, hairless

1023
00:50:30,480 --> 00:50:33,840
people shivering in a capsule of blue goo and having

1024
00:50:33,840 --> 00:50:37,320
our electricity rain, which didn't make any sense technically, but sometimes,

1025
00:50:37,320 --> 00:50:40,920
you know, you want to wrap yourself in something that's warm,

1026
00:50:41,239 --> 00:50:44,320
and I imagine that, you know, if you popped out

1027
00:50:44,360 --> 00:50:47,039
of the Matrix cube and we're sort of all wet

1028
00:50:47,039 --> 00:50:50,239
and confused, and you'd want you'd want somebody to drape

1029
00:50:50,280 --> 00:50:52,840
a nice blank or towel around you, wouldn't you. Now,

1030
00:50:52,960 --> 00:50:54,719
we're not living the matrix. We're not all a bunch

1031
00:50:54,719 --> 00:50:57,800
of people in little pods there, you know, living in liquid. No,

1032
00:50:58,000 --> 00:50:59,960
we're not. We are in the real world.

1033
00:51:00,199 --> 00:51:02,440
Speaker 3: But the real world can get cold, and the real world.

1034
00:51:02,239 --> 00:51:03,800
Speaker 4: Sometimes can get harsh, and that's why you need a

1035
00:51:03,840 --> 00:51:06,639
little bit of luxury in your life. Luxury It starts

1036
00:51:06,760 --> 00:51:09,719
where you rest your bedroom. It should be more than

1037
00:51:09,760 --> 00:51:11,679
just a place of sleep, it should be a retreat.

1038
00:51:11,840 --> 00:51:16,519
Right Cozy Earth, Cozy Earth's best selling bamboo sheets are

1039
00:51:16,639 --> 00:51:20,239
buttery soft, temperature regulating and crafted for five star comfort

1040
00:51:20,280 --> 00:51:22,920
every night. Cozy Earth's goal is to help you turn

1041
00:51:22,960 --> 00:51:25,119
your home into a sanctuary, a place where you can

1042
00:51:25,239 --> 00:51:28,760
escape the outside world's demands and truly unwind life, get

1043
00:51:28,800 --> 00:51:32,000
tactic right and finding comfort and calm. It's essential your

1044
00:51:32,039 --> 00:51:34,639
time outside that five to nine should be all about

1045
00:51:34,679 --> 00:51:38,400
relaxation and recharging. There's a maintrix again, and soaking in

1046
00:51:38,480 --> 00:51:40,960
the sense of peace. With Cozy Earth, you can create

1047
00:51:40,960 --> 00:51:43,320
a space that feels like a personal retreat where comfort

1048
00:51:43,440 --> 00:51:46,719
serenity come together naturally. I don't have my comfort fee

1049
00:51:47,079 --> 00:51:50,039
my Cozy Earth sheets yet I'm looking forward to them.

1050
00:51:50,320 --> 00:51:52,000
But we are in the presence of a man who,

1051
00:51:52,320 --> 00:51:56,480
shall we say, acquiesced to his spouse's wisdom on the matter?

1052
00:51:56,559 --> 00:51:57,159
Is that right, Joe?

1053
00:51:57,239 --> 00:51:59,840
Speaker 1: You remember the word that I used? I'm honored?

1054
00:52:00,280 --> 00:52:02,000
Speaker 4: Oh did I did did you ex acquiesce?

1055
00:52:02,239 --> 00:52:03,119
Speaker 1: I did?

1056
00:52:03,719 --> 00:52:06,239
Speaker 4: We ascribe a multi syllabic word to our to our

1057
00:52:07,719 --> 00:52:10,280
great breeding and education? So do go on?

1058
00:52:10,639 --> 00:52:14,519
Speaker 1: I did I acquiesced. I concurred, I submitted even I'm

1059
00:52:14,519 --> 00:52:15,960
glad that I did. It's not go that far.

1060
00:52:15,960 --> 00:52:16,920
Speaker 4: We don't want to put that metal.

1061
00:52:17,480 --> 00:52:19,920
Speaker 1: I'm glad that I did, especially when we're talking about sheets.

1062
00:52:20,280 --> 00:52:23,559
I like them a great deal. My wife made a

1063
00:52:23,559 --> 00:52:26,480
good choice, because yeah, she's a fantastic It's very important.

1064
00:52:26,519 --> 00:52:28,159
I know I always say this, but it's very important

1065
00:52:28,199 --> 00:52:31,719
to get sheets right in Florida because it's not just hot,

1066
00:52:32,079 --> 00:52:36,159
but unlike in California, it's humid, and so you just

1067
00:52:36,239 --> 00:52:37,719
have to get the right sheets. And these are the

1068
00:52:37,800 --> 00:52:39,400
right sheets. And if they were the right sheets, then

1069
00:52:39,440 --> 00:52:41,000
I wouldn't sleep in them, but they are, and I do.

1070
00:52:41,480 --> 00:52:44,519
Speaker 4: There you go. You too can transform your space risk

1071
00:52:44,559 --> 00:52:47,119
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1072
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1073
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Cozy Earth bettings and bath products. Love them or turn

1074
00:52:52,559 --> 00:52:55,880
them back, but trust us, you won't want to. Luxury

1075
00:52:55,920 --> 00:52:59,440
shouldn't be out of reach. Sanctuary awaits that Cozy Earth's

1076
00:52:59,440 --> 00:53:01,800
that cozier you do. Com slash Ricochet and use our

1077
00:53:01,880 --> 00:53:05,039
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1078
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1079
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dot com slash Ricochet, and if you happen to get

1080
00:53:12,440 --> 00:53:14,559
a post purchase survey, would you mind telling him that

1081
00:53:14,559 --> 00:53:17,400
you heard about Cozy Earth right here? Thanks, and we

1082
00:53:17,400 --> 00:53:21,559
think Cozy Earth responsoring this the Ricochet podcast, Well, gentlemen,

1083
00:53:21,599 --> 00:53:23,239
before we go on, I think we should all just

1084
00:53:23,559 --> 00:53:26,000
for a moment, you know, have some fellow feeling and

1085
00:53:26,039 --> 00:53:28,000
some empathy for those who are on the ruppers, and

1086
00:53:28,000 --> 00:53:32,920
that would be Hunter Biden apparently is broke. From what

1087
00:53:32,960 --> 00:53:35,519
I read, I think he spent some He sold like

1088
00:53:35,599 --> 00:53:39,760
twenty four paintings in a year for fifty thousand a throw,

1089
00:53:40,039 --> 00:53:44,239
and now miraculously, since the beginning of this year, he

1090
00:53:44,280 --> 00:53:47,079
doesn't the demand for his work doesn't seem to be

1091
00:53:47,400 --> 00:53:52,280
as robust, and his book has only sold eleven copies

1092
00:53:52,280 --> 00:53:54,199
in the last six months or so. So he's broke.

1093
00:53:55,519 --> 00:53:56,119
Speaker 3: Why is that?

1094
00:53:56,239 --> 00:54:00,719
Speaker 4: Why? I trying to figure out, Because the iding quality

1095
00:54:00,760 --> 00:54:02,880
of art should be such that Stab should be just

1096
00:54:02,920 --> 00:54:04,559
jacking up the price again and again and again and

1097
00:54:04,559 --> 00:54:07,280
again because we haven't seen the style and a talent

1098
00:54:07,440 --> 00:54:10,000
like his, And what what is going on in this

1099
00:54:10,039 --> 00:54:12,119
world when nobody's buying Hunter Biden's book. That's what I'm

1100
00:54:12,119 --> 00:54:12,519
asking you.

1101
00:54:13,239 --> 00:54:16,719
Speaker 1: Well, it just goes to show the cruelty of the

1102
00:54:16,840 --> 00:54:18,360
artistic gods, doesn't it.

1103
00:54:18,239 --> 00:54:20,159
Speaker 4: That you appreciate the grief.

1104
00:54:21,320 --> 00:54:25,000
Speaker 1: Yeah, For a brief period, Hunter was touched by greatness,

1105
00:54:25,039 --> 00:54:27,800
and he produced twenty seven works of art, all of

1106
00:54:27,880 --> 00:54:30,039
which sold in a two or three year period that,

1107
00:54:30,559 --> 00:54:33,679
in an amazing coincidence, overlapped with his father's tenure in

1108
00:54:33,719 --> 00:54:39,360
the White House, and people thought, they are the lynch

1109
00:54:39,480 --> 00:54:43,360
pin of my collection. And in the last one year

1110
00:54:43,440 --> 00:54:46,760
I hear he sold just one. And I just think

1111
00:54:46,800 --> 00:54:49,639
that is what happens to every great artist after a while.

1112
00:54:51,960 --> 00:54:54,280
After a while, they just sit there with the blank

1113
00:54:54,320 --> 00:54:56,800
canvas and the brush stripping paint in their hand, and

1114
00:54:56,840 --> 00:55:00,800
they think, why has my inspiration gone? This what happened

1115
00:55:01,920 --> 00:55:03,599
to the beach boys.

1116
00:55:04,880 --> 00:55:07,840
Speaker 4: Of very droll Charles.

1117
00:55:08,039 --> 00:55:10,159
Speaker 1: He would sit, He would sit for hours with his

1118
00:55:10,159 --> 00:55:13,599
feet and sand next to the piano, and he couldn't

1119
00:55:13,639 --> 00:55:16,840
come up with another. God only knows, And that seems

1120
00:55:16,880 --> 00:55:20,079
to be Hunt's lot, so we should.

1121
00:55:20,840 --> 00:55:23,039
Speaker 2: This was the most predictable news story of the year.

1122
00:55:23,679 --> 00:55:25,280
You can see this coming, well, you can see this

1123
00:55:25,320 --> 00:55:27,960
coming years ago. I think the next shoe to drop

1124
00:55:28,000 --> 00:55:31,039
on the story will will be my suspicion from the beginning,

1125
00:55:31,039 --> 00:55:33,039
and said Hunter didn't do any of those paintings. He

1126
00:55:33,039 --> 00:55:35,400
had someone do them for him, just as his book

1127
00:55:35,440 --> 00:55:38,599
would have been ghost written too. Maybe someday at enterprising

1128
00:55:38,679 --> 00:55:41,239
journalist will get onto that, But that'll be the fine

1129
00:55:41,239 --> 00:55:44,400
little cherry on top of this embarrassing melting ice cream

1130
00:55:44,440 --> 00:55:46,199
of a crazy family.

1131
00:55:46,599 --> 00:55:49,199
Speaker 4: What I wish he'd done is actually go full Warhol

1132
00:55:49,519 --> 00:55:54,360
and paint representational art, so you'd have Brilla, you'd have

1133
00:55:54,559 --> 00:56:00,000
doz biz Tide draft name every one of his canvases,

1134
00:56:00,199 --> 00:56:04,039
asked after a laundry detergent, just just to make it

1135
00:56:04,159 --> 00:56:06,639
all the more blatant, exactly what is going on here

1136
00:56:06,639 --> 00:56:09,239
in the purchase of these things? And still nobody would

1137
00:56:09,440 --> 00:56:11,599
nobody in the media really would have cocked an eyebrow

1138
00:56:11,679 --> 00:56:13,800
with the fact that people were paying ridiculous amounts of

1139
00:56:13,800 --> 00:56:16,639
money for this ridiculous amount of art. Well, that'll do.

1140
00:56:16,840 --> 00:56:19,840
We've had a substantial and dense piece of work here,

1141
00:56:19,920 --> 00:56:23,480
a noble you know, two English accents in one podcast

1142
00:56:23,760 --> 00:56:27,119
really does bring the general intellectual tenor up I think

1143
00:56:27,199 --> 00:56:29,920
by at least thirty forty degrees or points or whatever.

1144
00:56:29,920 --> 00:56:31,960
The Dow is down six five hundred. I don't know.

1145
00:56:32,760 --> 00:56:35,679
You know, I've lived through a few corrections in my time,

1146
00:56:35,760 --> 00:56:37,400
So you buckle up, you buy in the dips, and

1147
00:56:37,440 --> 00:56:41,239
then you keep going on it. One last thing I

1148
00:56:41,239 --> 00:56:44,199
forgot to mention. Have you guys been hearing a lot

1149
00:56:44,199 --> 00:56:46,599
from the left about how Donald Trump is coming after

1150
00:56:46,639 --> 00:56:50,280
Social Security? I'm hearing this a lot. I mean, having

1151
00:56:50,480 --> 00:56:53,480
my friends on the left who are warning me that

1152
00:56:54,000 --> 00:56:56,960
I better print out PDFs of what I'm owed because

1153
00:56:56,960 --> 00:56:59,960
they're coming after it. I'm not exactly sure those pda

1154
00:57:00,280 --> 00:57:03,239
all up in court, but I researched this this morning

1155
00:57:03,320 --> 00:57:06,880
as far as I could tell. Since he Donald Trump

1156
00:57:06,880 --> 00:57:09,679
has steadfastly said that he will not cut Social Security,

1157
00:57:10,119 --> 00:57:13,079
but he has talked about reducing the workforce by ten percent,

1158
00:57:13,199 --> 00:57:16,199
which would mean then that social Security would be less

1159
00:57:16,280 --> 00:57:18,639
responsive and you might have trouble getting your checks. Is

1160
00:57:18,639 --> 00:57:20,840
that basically the bith of the gist?

1161
00:57:21,320 --> 00:57:24,679
Speaker 1: Yes, So two things have happened here. One is that

1162
00:57:24,679 --> 00:57:29,639
Democrats just cannot stop but say the Republicans are going

1163
00:57:29,679 --> 00:57:31,880
after social Security. They wake up in the morning and

1164
00:57:31,920 --> 00:57:34,480
they say this. It's a form of political turets. Even

1165
00:57:34,559 --> 00:57:38,159
if Donald Trump literally says I will never touch social Security.

1166
00:57:38,199 --> 00:57:38,679
Speaker 4: I love it.

1167
00:57:38,719 --> 00:57:40,920
Speaker 1: I hug it at night on my Cozy Earth sheets.

1168
00:57:40,960 --> 00:57:43,280
They say, oh, my goodness, did you hear what he said?

1169
00:57:43,559 --> 00:57:45,599
That he's going to cut social Security. That's the first thing.

1170
00:57:45,800 --> 00:57:47,719
But the second thing is that a lot of news

1171
00:57:47,800 --> 00:57:51,719
outlets I have noticed have, either deliberately or because they're lazy,

1172
00:57:52,400 --> 00:57:58,039
run headlines and lead paragraphs that conflate social Security with

1173
00:57:58,320 --> 00:58:01,559
the Social Security Administration. Because I was a bit confused

1174
00:58:01,559 --> 00:58:05,840
by this too, it said Donald Trump plans big cuts

1175
00:58:05,880 --> 00:58:08,840
to Social Security, and then you click through and in

1176
00:58:08,880 --> 00:58:11,400
paragraph eight it says administration.

1177
00:58:11,840 --> 00:58:12,079
Speaker 4: Stop.

1178
00:58:12,559 --> 00:58:14,920
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's just not the same thing at all.

1179
00:58:15,599 --> 00:58:19,119
Speaker 4: No, no, it's not. No, it's not so good. Well

1180
00:58:19,119 --> 00:58:21,840
that's a relief. Then, so I can retire on my pittance,

1181
00:58:21,880 --> 00:58:24,239
and maybe my pittance won't be taxed by the institute,

1182
00:58:24,239 --> 00:58:26,079
by the very government that held a gun to my

1183
00:58:26,119 --> 00:58:30,039
head and demanded that I contribute to it. London Liberty. Anyway,

1184
00:58:30,119 --> 00:58:32,880
we thank you for listening. We thank Luman and Cozy

1185
00:58:32,880 --> 00:58:34,920
Earth responsoring. Your life will be better if you avail

1186
00:58:34,960 --> 00:58:37,320
yourself of the virtues of their products, and we encourage

1187
00:58:37,360 --> 00:58:39,440
you to do so. We encourage you to give five

1188
00:58:39,480 --> 00:58:41,760
stars to us wherever you possibly can in your podcast

1189
00:58:41,760 --> 00:58:44,639
review system. And we encourage, we intreat, we beg No,

1190
00:58:44,880 --> 00:58:49,679
we offer the open arms of embracing welcome for you

1191
00:58:49,719 --> 00:58:52,039
to come to the Ricochet and join. And you say,

1192
00:58:52,199 --> 00:58:55,320
why would I do that? I can read it, I

1193
00:58:55,360 --> 00:58:58,159
can listen to it. No, the member side. The member

1194
00:58:58,239 --> 00:59:01,079
side is with the friendships grow or the topics range

1195
00:59:01,079 --> 00:59:03,199
all over the place, and we're posts that eventually you

1196
00:59:03,239 --> 00:59:06,320
see in the main page surface are are initially planted,

1197
00:59:06,360 --> 00:59:09,400
and it's just it's the same place you've been looking

1198
00:59:09,440 --> 00:59:11,320
for in the Internet ever since they plugged this thing in.

1199
00:59:11,800 --> 00:59:15,039
I'm James Lelax. It's been great. Stephen Hayward, Charles. We'll

1200
00:59:15,400 --> 00:59:17,400
see you guys next week and we'll see everybody in

1201
00:59:17,440 --> 00:59:20,079
the comments at Ricochet four point zero by.

1202
00:59:22,000 --> 00:59:26,239
Speaker 3: Ricochet. Yeah, join the conversation.