Speaker 1: I just I hate them so much, and I really
Speaker 1: think they deserve it. And it's not just that they
Speaker 1: lie about everything. It's like they lie about everything, and
Speaker 1: then they have the nerve to morally judge us. Like
Speaker 1: if you just watch even just the last few weeks
Speaker 1: of the Trump election, they're not in the business of
Speaker 1: reporting the news. They're totally just in the business of
Speaker 1: making you feel like you're a bad person if you
Speaker 1: don't fall in line with the regime. America has this
Speaker 1: giant war machine right, Like, we're just always at war.
Speaker 1: We're the most war hungry country in the world. Even
Speaker 1: if we're taking a little bit of a break from
Speaker 1: a war, we'll fight two more proxy wars while we
Speaker 1: do that. America looks back at the nineties. Bill Clinton
Speaker 1: has the time of peace and prosperity. We call it
Speaker 1: peace because we only fought a war in like Serbia
Speaker 1: and had a blockade around Iraq, and we're like bombing
Speaker 1: the crap out of Iraq with a few other military
Speaker 1: interventions in there too. You know, the un estimated that
Speaker 1: Bill Clinton's sanction and bombing regime of Iraq. Okay, everyone
Speaker 1: just thinks of George H. W. Bush's war and w's war.
Speaker 1: But Bill Clinton was bombing Iraq his whole and you
Speaker 1: had a full blockade around the country. The un estimated
Speaker 1: that five hundred thousand children died of starvation or malnutrition
Speaker 1: due to the blockade. Now I've heard people argue, by
Speaker 1: the way, that number is exaggerated. Maybe it wasn't five
Speaker 1: hundred thad maybe it was only one hundred thousand. So
Speaker 1: that's the time that we consider peace when we were
Speaker 1: just starving one hundred thousand children to death in Iraq.
Speaker 1: And you, everybody in the corporate media are in the
Speaker 1: business every single one of those wars. You've sold them.
Speaker 1: Everyone my entire life, the media has sold those wars.
Speaker 1: And you're gonna morally look down on me. You're gonna
Speaker 1: judge me, motherfucker. You're in the business of baby murder.
Speaker 1: Get the fuck out of here. You're looking down judging
Speaker 1: an American because I maybe I'm going to vote for
Speaker 1: Donald Trump, or maybe I dare to question the results
Speaker 1: of the last election.
Speaker 2: Fuck you, dude, probably the most consequential election of our lifetime,
Speaker 2: and within twenty four hours of that, the largest podcaster
Speaker 2: on Earth, really the largest platform on Earth, the Joe
Speaker 2: Rogan experience Joe Rogan. Who does he call? Does he call?
Speaker 2: I don't know, jd Vance or Trump to come in
Speaker 2: and talk about it. Now. He calls Dave fucking Smith,
Speaker 2: a stand up comedian and libertarian podcast. That's who he
Speaker 2: calls to come in and give the true American breakdown
Speaker 2: as to what we just witness, what we just experienced.
Speaker 2: I don't think people understand how big what Dave is
Speaker 2: doing is. I'm going to get into it a little
Speaker 2: bit because I've got Tom Woods on in the second
Speaker 2: half of this episode, and he and I talk about
Speaker 2: this towards the tail end of our conversation. But I
Speaker 2: just want to really emphasize how special what Dave is
Speaker 2: doing is right now. And yes, he's my friend, and
Speaker 2: yes I owe him a lot for all the help
Speaker 2: he's provided me. That's not why I'm saying this. I
Speaker 2: promise you that I mean this from the bottom of
Speaker 2: my heart. I genuinely think that what Dave is accomplishing,
Speaker 2: what he has accomplished since he decided not to run
Speaker 2: for the presidency under the Libertarian Party, has far out
Speaker 2: outpaced what he could have likely achieved had he ran.
Speaker 2: That's a pretty bold statement. And I think it's like
Speaker 2: empirically true. I can't say it's sympirically true because I
Speaker 2: can't prove what he would have done had he ran
Speaker 2: for president, and I think he probably would have made
Speaker 2: major waves had he done that. But without doing that,
Speaker 2: I feel as if he is accomplishing arguably more than
Speaker 2: he could have had he been running. He was on
Speaker 2: with Patrick Bett David doing the live stream coverage of
Speaker 2: the election. He then catches a red eye. I assume
Speaker 2: maybe he flew in the first thing in the morning,
Speaker 2: lands in Austin, hops into Alex Jones studio, does an
Speaker 2: hour or whatever it was over there, and then immediately
Speaker 2: kicks it over to the Joe Rogan experience. I mean,
Speaker 2: he talked to twenty million people in a matter of
Speaker 2: forty eight hours, and what is the message that he
Speaker 2: wants to convey there? War is bad? If you think
Speaker 2: that's not a big deal, I don't think you're paying attention.
Speaker 2: And may this argument to Tom in the interview that
Speaker 2: I did with him, But I genuinely think that Dave
Speaker 2: is on the cusp of surpassing Ron Paul in terms
Speaker 2: of what he was able to accomplish. And again, this
Speaker 2: is a bold claim. So let me explain why I
Speaker 2: think that's possible. There was a major push from myself
Speaker 2: and Dave and everybody else that's in our world, clamoring, screaming,
Speaker 2: you cannot have a nicky Haley, Mike Pompeo, led State Department, CIA,
Speaker 2: whatever Trump was thinking about doing with these people, And
Speaker 2: because of our pressure, in my opinion, not not necessarily ours,
Speaker 2: but like the collective MAGA world pressure against those candidates,
Speaker 2: Trump won a different direction, he says. He sends out
Speaker 2: a true social post and he says, look, I'm not
Speaker 2: going with Haleyer Pompeo. I appreciate them. Well, we gotta
Speaker 2: go a different direction. While that is being announced, Dave
Speaker 2: tweets out, it's not enough to just throw a wall
Speaker 2: up to Haley and the Pompeos of the world. We
Speaker 2: actually have to have no neo cons in the cabinet. None,
Speaker 2: and who of all people quote tweets that Donald Trump Junior,
Speaker 2: the son of the President elect, and he says, I'm
Speaker 2: on it one hundred percent. Now, there has been news
Speaker 2: over the past twenty four hours that leads me to
Speaker 2: believe Donald Trump Junior is losing that fight right now.
Speaker 2: In my opinion, it's our job to lend him credibility,
Speaker 2: to lend him support in his claim to his father
Speaker 2: that hey, this is not popular at all amongst your base.
Speaker 2: You don't have to go this path, and maybe he
Speaker 2: will have enough leverage to keep some of these more
Speaker 2: atrocious candidates out. The latest being reports from the I
Speaker 2: think it was the New York Post put out that
Speaker 2: they have people that are around the campaign are saying
Speaker 2: that Marco Rubio has been selected for Secretary of State. Now,
Speaker 2: I don't think I need to convince you guys that
Speaker 2: Marco Rubio is not an America First guy. Okay. He
Speaker 2: has also been very very critical of Donald Trump, calling
Speaker 2: him a con man over and over again.
Speaker 3: The stakes are giving control of the Party of Lincoln
Speaker 3: and Reagan, of the conservative movement, and ultimately of the
Speaker 3: United States over to a con artist. That will not happen.
Speaker 3: I make this promise to you today. I will do
Speaker 3: whatever it takes. I will campaign as long as it takes.
Speaker 3: I will stay in this race as long as it takes.
Speaker 2: I don't know why Donald Trump would do that in
Speaker 2: terms of like, do you want loyalty, Well, he's not
Speaker 2: very loyal. Do you want someone who will actually try
Speaker 2: and get us out of wars. Marco Rubio has rarely
Speaker 2: seen a war. He isn't all in for. He's extraordinarily
Speaker 2: hawkish when it comes to China and Iran in particular.
Speaker 2: It doesn't seem as if it jives with his campaign promises. However,
Speaker 2: the fact that we always have to keep in the
Speaker 2: back of our heads is Mariam Maidelson, whose number one
Speaker 2: goal is the defense of Israel. She shipped one hundred
Speaker 2: million dollars to Donald Trump to get him elected. So
Speaker 2: there's no doubt Donald Trump is going to do things
Speaker 2: and appoint people that are in alignment with her worldview
Speaker 2: and her preferences. That is an inevitability. The puritanical libertarians
Speaker 2: out there that have already been chastising me, Oh okay,
Speaker 2: who he look what he's doing. Ah, you fool. Look,
Speaker 2: I'm not naive. I know exactly what we're up against,
Speaker 2: and I know that that Trump is going to make
Speaker 2: good on some of those promises to the AEOSNS. That's
Speaker 2: a fact. Do you think it would have been much
Speaker 2: different or maybe not even maybe even worse if Kamala
Speaker 2: Harris was the president, Like, do you think that she
Speaker 2: would have been like, ah, Israel, your on your own. No,
Speaker 2: that's that wasn't gonna happen either, So we have to
Speaker 2: like we are working in the land of the imperfect. Okay,
Speaker 2: that's what politics are. So if you want to take
Speaker 2: your little victory lap and say, oh, I'm so pure
Speaker 2: and I didn't vote for uh Donald Trump, and therefore
Speaker 2: this is all on you, okay, fine, put the blame
Speaker 2: on me. I don't really give a shit. That's not
Speaker 2: what I'm in the game of. I'm in the game
Speaker 2: of can we influenced them to be better than the alternative?
Speaker 2: And I think the answer to that is yes, I
Speaker 2: think we can. And there has been the latest reports,
Speaker 2: and Apoulina Luna says, my understanding is that there has
Speaker 2: been no pick made for Secretary of State. So what
Speaker 2: I think is happening is I think that Donald Trump
Speaker 2: is floating out names. He is not himself confirming these names.
Speaker 2: It's just being reported on. And then magaworld erupts and
Speaker 2: they say, what the fuck is this? This is not
Speaker 2: what we signed up for. And then he he gives
Speaker 2: you a twenty percent better option. This is a perfect
Speaker 2: example was with the the leadership of the Senate race
Speaker 2: that's happening this week, in fact, tomorrow or Wednesday. I think, yeah,
Speaker 2: so tomorrow they are trying to do a vote in secret.
Speaker 2: And apparently Trump and Tucker Carlston the vague the senators
Speaker 2: I do like, and Micha Lee and Rand Paul, they're
Speaker 2: saying that Scott out of Florida, he's the guy. We
Speaker 2: got to get him in there as the leader of
Speaker 2: the Senate. Okay, I don't know. I don't love the guy.
Speaker 2: He's pushed red flag laws. I'm not super fond of
Speaker 2: him by any stretch of the imagination. But on the
Speaker 2: alternative is Thune and Cornyn, who are just straight up
Speaker 2: swap monsters, really nothing beneficial to add. They are just
Speaker 2: a the heir apparents to Mitch McConnell's of the world.
Speaker 2: You don't want that, So, like, if you're going to
Speaker 2: be a puritanical libertarian on these issues, well then Scott
Speaker 2: sucks too, right, But obviously the preferred option of the
Speaker 2: three on offer, like I would rather it be Mike
Speaker 2: Lee or Ran Paul, obviously, But I could shout those
Speaker 2: names into the wind and get nothing, or I can
Speaker 2: add my name to the growing chorus of people saying
Speaker 2: Scott's the guy, and maybe that's enough to shift the votes.
Speaker 2: Because as of the first announcement of this secret vote,
Speaker 2: Thune was the favorite. Now the betting markets have Scott
Speaker 2: as the favorite. So this is the game that we're
Speaker 2: actually in. If you want to play it, this is
Speaker 2: how you play it if you're If you just want
Speaker 2: to say, my hands are clean, I didn't vote you know,
Speaker 2: I well it ought to be Rand Paul and just
Speaker 2: say that and then have it not happen. You can
Speaker 2: do that. That's it's your prerogative. But I'm actually in
Speaker 2: the game of like, can we marginally improve Trump's cabinet
Speaker 2: and Trump's second presidency presidential term over the first. I
Speaker 2: think the answer is yes, we can, but we have
Speaker 2: to be willing to deal in the imperfect. Marco Rubio
Speaker 2: as Secretary of State would be a disaster. Is Anthony
Speaker 2: Blincoln good? No, I'd say he's at least as much
Speaker 2: of a warmonger as Marcro Rubio, as evidence by all
Speaker 2: of the wars that are happening right now. So like,
Speaker 2: this is actually what we're dealing with is not perfect.
Speaker 2: We're not dealing with our ideal. We are dealing with
Speaker 2: what is the alternative? I could have voted for the
Speaker 2: libertarian case it, okay, and then Trump would still be
Speaker 2: the president anyways. Okay, So like now we have a
Speaker 2: significant influence. We have Donald Trump Junior in our orbit,
Speaker 2: we have a vake in our orbit, we have RFK
Speaker 2: junior in our orbit. They're all in Donald Trump Senior's orbit.
Speaker 2: Should we be using our leverage, our influence, our audiences
Speaker 2: to try and scream the Senators into voting for Scott
Speaker 2: or should we just say none of these three guys
Speaker 2: are perfect, therefore we're not gonna say anything about it.
Speaker 2: We're gonna just say, oh, we hate all these guys.
Speaker 2: My answer is I'm going to try and get the
Speaker 2: best of the options on offer. A lot of you
Speaker 2: are gonna hate me for it. A lot of people
Speaker 2: are gonna be like, that's that's not that's not libertarian. Okay,
Speaker 2: Like I've accepted my fate. I am in this to
Speaker 2: actually improve things on the margins. That is not getting
Speaker 2: me to anarcho Kappistan. It's like, it's not happening. But
Speaker 2: it might avoid World War three, it might it might
Speaker 2: get justice for some of the people responsible for the
Speaker 2: twenty twenty era. It might. It might. It might get
Speaker 2: some of the DEI ESG stuff out of academia, out
Speaker 2: of corporate America. It might. In fact, I think it will.
Speaker 2: So that's that's really what I'm striving towards. And if
Speaker 2: you're interested in that, if you're interested in seeing genuine
Speaker 2: change on the margins, I think we have an actual
Speaker 2: opportunity to do that. So now let me get back
Speaker 2: to Dave. In a matter of forty eight hours, Dave
Speaker 2: is doing all this, and he has Donald Trump Junior
Speaker 2: that is quote tweeting him saying he's on it and
Speaker 2: that he's gonna keep all the neocons out. Probably gonna fail.
Speaker 2: Let's just be honest, like, probably gonna fail. He's gonna
Speaker 2: there's gonna be some neocons in there, there's no doubt
Speaker 2: about that. And let's be honest. There's also some tactical
Speaker 2: reasons that you might want to do that, like if
Speaker 2: you're if you're negotiating, and if you're interested in peace,
Speaker 2: you may want some lunatics a llah John Bolton around
Speaker 2: just so you could say I'm better than this guy.
Speaker 2: You want to deal with this guy, you can deal
Speaker 2: with me this is what Trump said was the silver
Speaker 2: lining of having John Bolton around. You know, more puritanical
Speaker 2: libertarians go, that's bullshit. Screw John Bolton. I don't want
Speaker 2: him anywhere. I don't want him anywhere around them either.
Speaker 2: But I do understand from a businessman negotiating standpoint like that,
Speaker 2: there is a rationale there that does make sense. Do
Speaker 2: you want to negotiate peace with me? Because I got
Speaker 2: John Bolton on the other line and we can go
Speaker 2: We can go the hard way if you like. Like
Speaker 2: in geopolitics, there is there is some some value to that.
Speaker 2: But obviously my preference would be Colonel Douglas McGregor, like,
Speaker 2: that's who I actually want as Secretary of Defense, or
Speaker 2: some position high up that could actually avoid some of
Speaker 2: these wars that actually understands them intimately, Like that would
Speaker 2: be my preference. If that option isn't on offer, I'm
Speaker 2: going to have to deal in the imperfect. I'm going
Speaker 2: to have to deal with option A out of a
Speaker 2: list of BCD being apocalyptic. Sorry, like, someone's got to
Speaker 2: tell you the truth. That's what politics is in this
Speaker 2: current iteration. We are trying to move them five ten percent,
Speaker 2: fifteen percent closer to us, and therefore move there electorate
Speaker 2: the mag of faithful ten to fifteen percent closer to
Speaker 2: us too, which I think has already happened to a
Speaker 2: loge extent. And then you move it again another ten
Speaker 2: to fifteen percent two years from now, and another ten
Speaker 2: fifteen percent two years from now, like you have to
Speaker 2: have a little bit of a long time horizon on
Speaker 2: this little you know, delayed gratification, low time preference, if
Speaker 2: you will, to put in Austria in terms like this
Speaker 2: is this is actually how you how you make progress.
Speaker 2: And to get back to my very bold claim that
Speaker 2: I think that Dave Smith is on the cusp of
Speaker 2: surpassing Ron Paul in terms of accomplishments. Doctor Paul made
Speaker 2: his name by being doctor No. He voted no against everything,
Speaker 2: and he passed very little. And I appreciate him for it,
Speaker 2: and he's a legend for it, Like that's the truth
Speaker 2: he is. He's an absolute fucking legend for it, and
Speaker 2: he's a saint. But in terms of like passing legislation,
Speaker 2: he didn't pass much. Most of the stuff he authored
Speaker 2: never got passed. And the Fed, you know, audit to
Speaker 2: fed like it didn't happen. Okay, we have an opportunity,
Speaker 2: through Dave and our little orbit of influencers whatever I'm
Speaker 2: part of here, to genuinely influence policy on a federal
Speaker 2: level that gets implemented, not just ideas, not just words,
Speaker 2: not just hearts and minds, but actually changing policy at
Speaker 2: the federal level, doing it with a microphone and nothing else.
Speaker 2: Not a singular no vote in Congress, as Ron Paul did,
Speaker 2: and God bless him for it, but just talking and
Speaker 2: convincing enough millions of people over a forty eight hour
Speaker 2: period and then getting the son's president to quote treat
Speaker 2: you saying I'm on it, no neo cons That is
Speaker 2: enough to actually change some of the cabinet appointments that
Speaker 2: will be in positions of extreme importance in Donald Trump's
Speaker 2: cabinet in his orbit. Like that is huge, huge progress
Speaker 2: for us, and I think people are sleeping on it.
Speaker 2: I do, Like, does it mean that we will accomplish it?
Speaker 3: No?
Speaker 2: Does it mean that we will accomplish all of it? Definitely?
Speaker 2: Not Like we're definitely not going to get everything we want,
Speaker 2: that's a fact. But we have a chance to get
Speaker 2: some things that we want when we've gotten nothing. Ever. Ever,
Speaker 2: you see why that's an improvement. I hope this logic
Speaker 2: checks out for you guys, because I think I'm right.
Speaker 2: We've never gotten shit ever. They've never even thought to
Speaker 2: try and pander to us because we were so fucking unimportant.
Speaker 2: They never gave us anything. They never gave us, they
Speaker 2: never lied to us. Even they were just like, you
Speaker 2: don't matter. We matter now. They came to our convention,
Speaker 2: but veg Grandma saw me, who's running for president, debated me.
Speaker 2: For God's sakes, we definitely matter. RFK Junior was there,
Speaker 2: Donald Trump was there. They want us to vote for them,
Speaker 2: They want our support. That means that our voices matter now.
Speaker 2: Our voices matter when it comes to his approval ratings,
Speaker 2: when it comes to how the whole MAGA world and
Speaker 2: community response. And it's not just us, it's not just
Speaker 2: the Libertarians. There are genuine Trump supporters that are fucking
Speaker 2: furious about Marco Rubio secretary of State, or as John
Speaker 2: Thune as the head of the Senate. Like they are
Speaker 2: not that different from us. They don't want enlist wars,
Speaker 2: they want the government to be cut back. They want
Speaker 2: prosecutions and genuine investigations into the lockdown era. They do
Speaker 2: so we can work with them as imperfect as they
Speaker 2: are and we are, I might add. Or we can
Speaker 2: just say we're better than you, we're more pure, and
Speaker 2: we can get fucking nothing done. Ever you choose, you
Speaker 2: get to be more pure than me. Congrats, I offer
Speaker 2: you that. I offer you a more pure voting record
Speaker 2: than I have now I have now voted for a
Speaker 2: winning president. It feels strange. I'll be the first to
Speaker 2: admit it, and it's going to be not even close
Speaker 2: to my ideals, but I am not giving up. This
Speaker 2: is very early days, and yes, his cabinet matters tremendously,
Speaker 2: but he also was the least militaristic president in my lifetime,
Speaker 2: and he did that with John Psycho, bloodsoaked monster Bolton
Speaker 2: in his cabinet. So just because he's appointing Mark or
Speaker 2: Rubio does not mean reportedly it looks like that may
Speaker 2: be false, as I said earlier, But just because he's
Speaker 2: appointing Mark Rubio to Secretary of State, or if he does,
Speaker 2: that does not necessarily mean that he will not deliver
Speaker 2: on his promises. Now, if he fails, if he actually
Speaker 2: starts a war, well, yeah, obviously this has all been
Speaker 2: a ruse and they have used us, they've used me.
Speaker 2: If you're one of the pure ones that didn't vote
Speaker 2: for him, okay, I'll admit that, Like I'm totally fine
Speaker 2: with that. But until that happens, I'm going to continue
Speaker 2: to use my influence to try and sway him and
Speaker 2: them and his orbit as much and as hard as
Speaker 2: I possibly can, because that's that's what matters right now.
Speaker 2: It's not about oh, I'm better than you. I didn't
Speaker 2: do this. That's not what it's about. It's about can
Speaker 2: we get them ten, fifteen to twenty percent better? I
Speaker 2: think we can. Don't stop, make your voices heard. Don't
Speaker 2: just be blackpilled and give up and odds just the
Speaker 2: duopoly and they okay, yeah, look, maybe you'll end up
Speaker 2: being right, But until you are for sure, it's still
Speaker 2: worth voicing your preferences, your concerns, what you want to see.
Speaker 2: I promise you these people are paying attention, serious attention
Speaker 2: to what we want. It was going to be Mike
Speaker 2: Pompeo and Nikki Haley. It is not the because of us,
Speaker 2: not me, all of us. If we continue to lend
Speaker 2: our voices in unison to demand improvements in his cabinet
Speaker 2: we will get improvements. It will not be perfect, but
Speaker 2: it will be better. And if that's something that you
Speaker 2: would like to strive towards, I welcome you, and I
Speaker 2: hope that you will lend your voice in support of
Speaker 2: mine and we can actually get after it because we
Speaker 2: ain't got much time left. We are on the cusp
Speaker 2: of fifty trillion in national debt. It is a stone's throwaway,
Speaker 2: very very close. We happen to also be in multiple
Speaker 2: proxy wars and one with the largest nuclear power on Earth.
Speaker 2: We don't have fucking time to waste. We don't have
Speaker 2: time to do this purity spiral bullshit. We have to
Speaker 2: actually stop World War III. Do I have to explain
Speaker 2: how important that is? I shouldn't. I shouldn't have to.
Speaker 2: That's my mind frame, that's my outlook. I just wanted
Speaker 2: to express it as direct to you as I possibly
Speaker 2: could so that I could stop with the look. It's
Speaker 2: gotta be Rubio, Look, how fucking stupid you. I like
Speaker 2: these these tweets that I'm getting from people. It's like, God, really,
Speaker 2: is that what matters to you? Like? Are you are
Speaker 2: you more happy that I was wrong then you are
Speaker 2: upset that Marco Rubio might be the Secretary of State,
Speaker 2: like what are your priorities? Like? I think that's that's
Speaker 2: really what people ought to be asking themselves, Like what
Speaker 2: are you prioritize? Do you want to be right and pure?
Speaker 2: Or do you want to stop World War three? Do
Speaker 2: you want to stop the national debt implosion that's imminent
Speaker 2: and the confettiing of our dollar? What do you what's
Speaker 2: your actual end goal here? That's what everybody ought to
Speaker 2: be asking themselves. Are you in this to actually improve
Speaker 2: the world? Yeah, I am. I know. I'm just one
Speaker 2: dude speaking into a microphone. It seems fucking far fetched.
Speaker 2: Dave Smith is just one dude speaking into a microphone,
Speaker 2: and he is changing the fucking world. And he cannot
Speaker 2: be alone in that fight. And I will not let
Speaker 2: him be alone in that fight. And you shouldn't either.
Speaker 2: We should all be fucking circling the wagons. Get after it.
Speaker 2: We have an opportunity here. Don't let it fucking slip
Speaker 2: through your fingers with some puritanical, nonsensical spiraling. It's fucking stupid,
Speaker 2: it's a waste your time. I promise you. I did
Speaker 2: it for a long time. I did it for most
Speaker 2: of my life. We have an opportunity here. It's the
Speaker 2: best opportunity we've ever had. Let's see what we can
Speaker 2: make of it. That's all I'm asking. All Right, let's
Speaker 2: get in my interview with the great Tom Woods. He
Speaker 2: has the Tom Woods Show. He's written a dozen books
Speaker 2: or something crazy amount. I've read three of them. He's
Speaker 2: a great guy, absolute wealth of knowledge. If you don't
Speaker 2: know the Tom Woods Show, you ought to be subscribed
Speaker 2: to it. If you don't know Tom Woods, well you're
Speaker 2: about to find out, guys. Brilliant. We get into the
Speaker 2: tariff's argument because I wanted to basically use him as
Speaker 2: a sounding board or a soundboard to bounce my ideas
Speaker 2: off of him as to like, is this feasible? Could
Speaker 2: we actually reply the income tax with tariffs? I'll save
Speaker 2: you the answer, I'll let him give it to you,
Speaker 2: and I think you'll enjoy this conversation. It was very
Speaker 2: informative and appreciate you. Guys. If you're sick of the
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Speaker 4: In fact, we should probably make a video you me
Speaker 4: and Dave Vig.
Speaker 2: We love you. Don't make us change, don't don't break
Speaker 2: my heart for it. I can't handle it.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I know, I know we could.
Speaker 4: We could sing yeah to the tune of Don't Go
Speaker 4: Break in My Heart by Elton John and Kid.
Speaker 2: All right, well, let's see, all libertarians oppose taxation. Tariffs
Speaker 2: are a tax, and therefore libertarians oppose tariffs. I have
Speaker 2: I have never really given serious thought to tariffs because
Speaker 2: they are taxes, and I'm just like, well, I don't
Speaker 2: like taxes, and I haven't dug much deeper than that. Sure,
Speaker 2: I've I've read some of our greats in this this arena,
Speaker 2: but that's kind of the depth of my knowledge. I'm
Speaker 2: much more in the Fed policy, interest rate policy lane
Speaker 2: And obviously Donald Trump made major news by talking about
Speaker 2: perhaps which is unlikely to happen, but perhaps getting rid
Speaker 2: of the income tax and moving to a tariff based
Speaker 2: tax a lah the late eighteen hundreds. He said this
Speaker 2: on the Joe Rogan Experience. So today I have on
Speaker 2: the great Tom Woods to tell me why tariffs in
Speaker 2: any form are bad, or perhaps if this is a
Speaker 2: workable plan. So what do you what do you think?
Speaker 2: In Tom?
Speaker 4: Well, Okay, first of all, if I really felt like
Speaker 4: I was being presented with a plan whereby we would
Speaker 4: ditch income taxation, and replace it with tariffs.
Speaker 5: And I knew for a fact that that was what
Speaker 5: was going to happen.
Speaker 4: I could, I would probably be on board for that.
Speaker 4: I would consider that a marginal improvement, you know. And
Speaker 4: you may think that my reasons are self interested or unconvincing,
Speaker 4: but for one thing, I feel like I, as an individual,
Speaker 4: I would have much much less imposition on my time
Speaker 4: and labor in preparing taxes, and I would have far
Speaker 4: less rusion into the my you know, into my privacy
Speaker 4: and private life and where I'm earning my income and
Speaker 4: all the different sources and having to track every last thing.
Speaker 5: And I would rather avoid that if I could.
Speaker 4: Also, there are limits to how high tariffs can go,
Speaker 4: because eventually they get so high that they become protective tariffs. Now,
Speaker 4: for for some Trumpers, that's a that's a feature, not
Speaker 4: a bug, that's the goal. There are a lot of
Speaker 4: products people do want to buy, and if you try
Speaker 4: to levy one hundred percent tariff on them, yeah, they'll
Speaker 4: very reluctantly buy the domestic version. But that's not a
Speaker 4: long term strategy. I mean, you're not going to become
Speaker 4: competitive on the world stage by doing that. You're you're
Speaker 4: going to encourage your domestic industry to be inefficient and lousy.
Speaker 4: But anyway, So, but the whole point of this thing is,
Speaker 4: first of all, I don't believe that's what would happen.
Speaker 4: I think what would happen is we would still have
Speaker 4: income taxation, and then we would also have a bunch
Speaker 4: of tariffs on top of that, which I think is
Speaker 4: practically speaking, what's more likely to happen, which is why
Speaker 4: I would be concerned about it. Now I come to you, Clint,
Speaker 4: not as somebody somebody who has TDS. You know that
Speaker 4: I'm not somebody who automatically rejects something just because Trump
Speaker 4: recommends it.
Speaker 5: I'm not one of those people.
Speaker 2: But I.
Speaker 4: Don't like the tariff stuff, even though I will say
Speaker 4: that the main reason I've argued against I argue against
Speaker 4: tariffs is really the main libertarian reason, which is that
Speaker 4: it's a destructive thing to do to the economy.
Speaker 5: We'll get to that in a minute.
Speaker 4: But there are other arguments that I don't address directly.
Speaker 4: I mean, I suppose I could, and I have addressed
Speaker 4: on the Tom Wood Show, like it's better for us
Speaker 4: not to be dependent on potentially hostile forces, for necessities
Speaker 4: in case of a war, and so it's good for
Speaker 4: us to be self sufficient. Or another argument is we
Speaker 4: can use the threat of in effect closing American markets
Speaker 4: to force recalcitrant trade partners to liberalize their policies so
Speaker 4: as to allow Americans to sell more to them. And now,
Speaker 4: now that's a different argument from we're going to use
Speaker 4: tariffs to save American manufacturing. That was really the main
Speaker 4: thing we were told was the virtue of these things
Speaker 4: that will save American manufacturing with them. Now it's interesting
Speaker 4: our friend Gene Epstein, who is the who runs the
Speaker 4: SOHO Forum in New York and he moderates debates. He
Speaker 4: participated in a debate at the SOHO Forum with economist
Speaker 4: Stephen Moore. And Steve Moore worked with Trump for a
Speaker 4: little while in the White House, and Moore is a
Speaker 4: free trader, no doubt about it. But he was arguing
Speaker 4: in that debate that actually Trump could very well wind
Speaker 4: up doing more good than harm with his particular with tariffs,
Speaker 4: because he was using them, he said, as leverage to
Speaker 4: get other countries to open up to American exports. And
Speaker 4: he said, now, initially I went in there as a
Speaker 4: free trade purist, and I said, you're full of it
Speaker 4: and this is all wrong. But then I observed with
Speaker 4: my own eyes that it was a useful negotiating tool.
Speaker 4: So again, so that is that's a strategic question we
Speaker 4: can argue with back and forth. But it's worth noting
Speaker 4: that when Jane tried arguing against that, he actually lost
Speaker 4: the debate. I don't know if Jane's going to listen
Speaker 4: to this episode, Clint, but he lost that debate. Steve
Speaker 4: Moore won that debate in front of basically an audience
Speaker 4: of libertarians. But my main concern is I think it's
Speaker 4: a false promise. I don't think you're going to save
Speaker 4: American manufacturing this way. But secondly, I think I understand
Speaker 4: why people have a kind of a nostalgic attachment to
Speaker 4: manufacturing because they think, well, that means we're making things,
Speaker 4: and I know that make things is better than not
Speaker 4: making things. But at this point, manufacturing amounts to seven
Speaker 4: percent of all jobs in the US. Now, I mean
Speaker 4: that's a small number. It used to be thirty seven.
Speaker 4: So I would just start with, we have to explain
Speaker 4: why this fetish for just this seven percent of the
Speaker 4: economy that we would want to rearrange everything in order
Speaker 4: to accommodate simply that.
Speaker 5: Well, and then I'll give you one. I'll let you
Speaker 5: jump in a second. I know it's your own.
Speaker 2: Show, but no, please.
Speaker 4: If I don't finish this point, I'm gonna forget it,
Speaker 4: which is that there's other manufacturing though that would be
Speaker 4: hurt by tariffs that are supposed to protect manufacturing. So,
Speaker 4: for example, I gave the example in a recent post
Speaker 4: on x in which I said, it's true that you
Speaker 4: could perhaps save some jobs in the steel industry by
Speaker 4: putting a high tariff on imported steel. There are one
Speaker 4: hundred and forty thousand jobs in the steel industry, and
Speaker 4: you could very well say, see, look those jobs are
Speaker 4: still there, and why because of this terrif I implemented.
Speaker 4: The problem with that is apart from the fact that
Speaker 4: it's not making American steel competitive to give it this
Speaker 4: kind of special advantage. But the real issue is there
Speaker 4: are two million American jobs that involve manufacturing that requires
Speaker 4: steel as one of its inputs, and now suddenly all
Speaker 4: these firms have to deal with a sudden artificial rise
Speaker 4: in the price of steel, and this will harm the
Speaker 4: marginal producers and the employees of these marginal firms will
Speaker 4: lose their jobs, but nobody will know that that's why
Speaker 4: they lost their jobs.
Speaker 5: I'm looking on the name of statistics.
Speaker 2: I'm blinking on the end of the economists. I'm sure
Speaker 2: you'll remember the scene versus the unseen with Frederick Bastiat Basia.
Speaker 2: So this is the unseen example. Yeah, the unseen are
Speaker 2: the jobs that you lose on the inside on the
Speaker 2: inverse of this.
Speaker 4: Exactly, exactly, because what's seen is, of course, we can
Speaker 4: see with our physical eyes the jobs that are quote
Speaker 4: unquote protected by these tariffs. But what we we have
Speaker 4: to see with our mind's eye because our physical eyes
Speaker 4: fail us. Here are the other jobs that would be lost,
Speaker 4: but that won't be ear marked in the same way.
Speaker 4: You know, these steel jobs were earmarked by the tariff,
Speaker 4: and we know that they're going to get special protection,
Speaker 4: But who knows about all these other jobs that are
Speaker 4: just spread out throughout the economy. That'll just be some
Speaker 4: inexplicable rise in unemployment that nobody can account for.
Speaker 5: So that's a problem.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean the way the the BLS does employment
Speaker 2: statistics these days, all of the jobs are unseen because
Speaker 2: they I mean they just continue to manipulate the figures
Speaker 2: to confuse everything. But all right, so I'm gonna I'm
Speaker 2: gonna steal man some oppositional points because I have actually
Speaker 2: made this argument on my show, not knowing about gene
Speaker 2: Epstein's experience debating this topic, that I do think that
Speaker 2: if we're going to advocate on behalf of a free market, well,
Speaker 2: doesn't it make sense to use whatever leverage we have
Speaker 2: to try and beat down oppositional tariffs, tariffs that are
Speaker 2: on our goods that we're exporting to people. I mean,
Speaker 2: if you look at Europe, if you look at much
Speaker 2: of the world, you have extraordinary tariffs that are levied
Speaker 2: against American products which make it completely uncompetitive for us
Speaker 2: to export our goods. There. On the flip of that,
Speaker 2: we import a ton of their goods, so they want
Speaker 2: to sell into our market. It seems very likely that
Speaker 2: they would relent and they would drop their tariffs in
Speaker 2: order for us to be able to export some of
Speaker 2: our goods and to compete a little bit more readily.
Speaker 2: Is that not advocating, Yes, it's using state power. But
Speaker 2: is it because we're already dealing with state intervention in
Speaker 2: the tariffs that exist from our oppositional side. Is that
Speaker 2: not kind of getting us into a better place to
Speaker 2: have a nego shating a chip that the President can
Speaker 2: go sit down with Emmanuel McCrone and say, hey, I
Speaker 2: don't want to do this, but Champagne is now tariffed
Speaker 2: unless you you drop the tariffs on American auto automobiles
Speaker 2: for instance.
Speaker 5: Yeah, now, I don't.
Speaker 4: I don't dispute that. It's it's conceivable that that could
Speaker 4: work out. But it's also conceivable that a trade war
Speaker 4: can go on for an extended period of time, that
Speaker 4: it can actually go on for years, and in the
Speaker 4: past sometimes has gone on for years, and then then
Speaker 4: we have a problem. And I should also note this
Speaker 4: is especially acute at a time when consumer prices are rising.
Speaker 4: Now you may say that the rate at which they
Speaker 4: are rising is lower than it was a year and
Speaker 4: a half ago or something, but they're still rising faster
Speaker 4: than we'd like, and people are complaining about this.
Speaker 5: Well, you're not.
Speaker 4: There's no way you're going to reverse that by imposing
Speaker 4: a tariff on the inputs that everybody needs to use
Speaker 4: to produce their goods. That's that's not going to We
Speaker 4: want to get the most inexpensive inputs we can. So
Speaker 4: even if there's a country that is being stupidly belligerent
Speaker 4: in their trade policy, if the result of it is
Speaker 4: we get inexpensive inputs for our manufacturing here.
Speaker 5: Why don't we just take them?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 4: I mean that there's a pretty good argument for that.
Speaker 4: Why don't we just take those inexpensive inputs rather than say, well,
Speaker 4: maybe two years from now, I'll force them to back down.
Speaker 4: It's another two years of people having to deal with
Speaker 4: rising prices. I'd rather get low cost inputs now sure,
Speaker 4: rather than gamble on well, how good of a negotiating
Speaker 4: stance will our trade negotiators have?
Speaker 5: I you know, I don't. I don't know.
Speaker 2: Well, I think I think that the the My concern
Speaker 2: is that, you know, the statistics that you brought up earlier,
Speaker 2: that it used to be thirty something thirty seven percent
Speaker 2: or whatever it was that was manufacturing jobs, and now
Speaker 2: it's down to single digits. It's like, well, that is
Speaker 2: the argument for tariffs. I mean, that's that's what Trump
Speaker 2: is going to argue, is that, hey, the reason that
Speaker 2: that we're getting our lunch eaten is because they are
Speaker 2: protecting their industries and we're not protecting ours. I mean,
Speaker 2: that's what they're going to say to you. So what
Speaker 2: would you respond to, Yeah.
Speaker 4: Well, manufacturing is also falling in China, it falls everywhere
Speaker 4: because of productivity improvements. So we don't need as many
Speaker 4: physical people doing it. So it's the same process that
Speaker 4: occurred in agriculture. We don't need ninety eight percent of
Speaker 4: the public to be engaged in agriculture, and so we
Speaker 4: have For example, I understand that we think of manufacturing
Speaker 4: as being the backbone of the middle class that you
Speaker 4: get you can have a good middle class income in manufacturing.
Speaker 4: But the thing is, there are huge swaths of the
Speaker 4: American economy where you can earn as much or more
Speaker 4: in construction. We have something like seven million construction jobs,
Speaker 4: and they generally pay better than in manufacturing. But for
Speaker 4: some reason, there's we don't have this weird attachment to
Speaker 4: those jobs even though they're buying large better jobs. Or
Speaker 4: the household sector has at least six million in jobs
Speaker 4: that pay better. We have a million jobs in oil
Speaker 4: and gas extraction, same thing. And we have probably fifty
Speaker 4: plus million people who are in management positions or professional
Speaker 4: occupations that are in the non manufacturing part of the
Speaker 4: private sector. They're all earning at least middle class income.
Speaker 4: So for seventy five years, the share of the US
Speaker 4: economy devoted to manufacturing has been declining, regardless of what
Speaker 4: the trade policy has been, regardless of what domestic policy,
Speaker 4: we've had, none of it. It's like trying to stop
Speaker 4: COVID with a mask. It's going to just do its
Speaker 4: thing regardless of what you do, because it's just natural,
Speaker 4: just the way the way life works. So are we
Speaker 4: going to impose what I think harms us? It certainly
Speaker 4: harms consumers, and it harms a whole lot of unnamed
Speaker 4: people in employment. For you know, on behalf of a
Speaker 4: seven percent that has been declining through benign forces for
Speaker 4: three quarters of a century.
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Speaker 2: really compelling argument. Let me give you one more oppositional
Speaker 2: argument and see what you think about it, because this
Speaker 2: is one that I've thought about myself, that that yes,
Speaker 2: I agree with you that as you go through the
Speaker 2: industrialization process, eventually you move into more of a service
Speaker 2: based economy or creation economy as opposed to just you know,
Speaker 2: nuts and bolts type of stuff. And but because the
Speaker 2: US dollar has the reserve currency the status reserve currency
Speaker 2: status via the cantal On effect, essentially like you're always
Speaker 2: going to have if you are the reserve currency country,
Speaker 2: you're going to have maximal purchasing power from the US
Speaker 2: dollar domestically. Let me pause there and just ask you
Speaker 2: do you think that's accurate? First off, that because we
Speaker 2: have the printing price and we have access to the
Speaker 2: dollars first and at the lowest interest rates. Mostly you
Speaker 2: would assume that that, in fact, inflationary pressures are felt
Speaker 2: globally worse than they are felt domestically or.
Speaker 4: No, I think they're lower domestically than they would be
Speaker 4: otherwise we'll say that.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So the reason I bring that up is that if
Speaker 2: you want to maintain the reserve currency status, it seems
Speaker 2: to me that you are basically expediting the hollowing out
Speaker 2: of the kind of middle class America. And I know
Speaker 2: middle class has been synonymous with industry. It doesn't have
Speaker 2: to be. It probably shouldn't at this point, but that's
Speaker 2: how a lot of people view it. And I'm just
Speaker 2: concerned that, Like I think the libertarian answer here is, well,
Speaker 2: we shouldn't be the reserve currency. Any of the deleitarious
Speaker 2: consequences that come from that, you know, beneficial position, or
Speaker 2: just the price you pay to be that that you're
Speaker 2: able to now borrow and spend more than any other
Speaker 2: country on earth. Deal with the consequences of that. But
Speaker 2: for the middle class in this country, they're looking at it,
Speaker 2: they don't think in these this.
Speaker 5: Realm at all.
Speaker 2: I mean, if we're being honest, like they're not going
Speaker 2: to think about any of this higher level stuff. But
Speaker 2: do you think that it's kind of inevitable that if
Speaker 2: you are the US, like if you are the global
Speaker 2: reserve currency, that you are essentially going to be in
Speaker 2: this position where almost everything gets produced outside of your
Speaker 2: land mass. I know that was a very complicated question,
Speaker 2: but I hope it makes sense.
Speaker 4: I'm not sure that that has to follow, but I
Speaker 4: would have to. I would have to sit down and
Speaker 4: plot that one out. I'm not sure it has to
Speaker 4: follow that that in the in an arrangement where you
Speaker 4: have a fiat currency that operates as a reserve currency,
Speaker 4: and it just means that it's a in practical terms,
Speaker 4: it means that it's widely used or it's used in
Speaker 4: a bunch of places, and it is it's it's it's
Speaker 4: accepted and used in a lot of international transactions because
Speaker 4: it is noted for its stability compared to others.
Speaker 2: But seventy percent of global trade is US dollars from
Speaker 2: what I've read, right, So it's a lot.
Speaker 4: But I it could just be my inability to comprehend
Speaker 4: all this, But I don't think that necessarily even if
Speaker 4: it did lead to that outcome, then I still feel
Speaker 4: like I feel like once you understand how a market
Speaker 4: economy works, you realize that every time there's an attempt
Speaker 4: to manipulate it, to shift it around, to try to
Speaker 4: stop this what is perceived to be an undesirable phenomenon
Speaker 4: from occurring, that you're basically playing whack a mole because
Speaker 4: every one of these things that you hit winds up
Speaker 4: creating another problem that wasn't there before. And then you
Speaker 4: hit that problem, and then there's another problem. So that's
Speaker 4: what I'm talking about with regard to the use of tariffs. Yeah,
Speaker 4: I understand, for example, that there's already intervention in the
Speaker 4: global economy and that there are other countries that have
Speaker 4: tariffs that are interrupting the free flow of international trade,
Speaker 4: and so we want to whack that mole. But the
Speaker 4: problem is then we wind it turns out that we're
Speaker 4: actually harming ourselves, and not just because of likely trade retaliation, which,
Speaker 4: by the way, in I know it's fashionable these days
Speaker 4: to say the smooth Hawley tariff work. The trade retaliation
Speaker 4: against that was widespread and in a huge number of
Speaker 4: industries it was. It was not a minor thing. But
Speaker 4: even if we didn't get any of that, somehow we
Speaker 4: miraculously avoid that, we still have the problem of we're
Speaker 4: crippling ourselves by artificially propping up certain prices in the
Speaker 4: US economy of things we need to produce the consumer
Speaker 4: goods whose high prices we are all complaining about. So
Speaker 4: it's like, no matter what we do, every mole we
Speaker 4: hit pops up another.
Speaker 2: One another way.
Speaker 4: So I feel like even if we try to, you know,
Speaker 4: even if, as you're suggesting, you could come up with
Speaker 4: a scenario that well, because of the United States unique position,
Speaker 4: it needs to impose this policy. The policy, it seems
Speaker 4: to me, seems self defeating, and so that for every
Speaker 4: problem it seems like it solves, it's creating three problems.
Speaker 2: Yeah. No, I understand that logic. That does make a
Speaker 2: lot of sense to me. It's just I'm I guess
Speaker 2: I really want to get rid of the income text,
Speaker 2: and I'm I'm trying to figure out a way that
Speaker 2: this makes more sense. And you know, I do think
Speaker 2: that it probably would be preferable just for privacy purposes,
Speaker 2: as you said earlier, Yeah, I would rather have it. Yeah,
Speaker 2: And I think I mean from my understanding, our GDP,
Speaker 2: or like, our total consumption is somewhere around thirty trillion
Speaker 2: in America and only ten percent of that is actually imported. Good.
Speaker 2: So if you could truly get rid of the income
Speaker 2: tax and replace it just with tariffs on that that
Speaker 2: ten percent of total consumption in America, well that seems
Speaker 2: like a trade off worth making. But I don't think
Speaker 2: you could actually do that because you need to bring
Speaker 2: in I mean, the way they're spending right now, you
Speaker 2: need to bring in three four, five six trillion dollars
Speaker 2: worth of taxes through tariffs.
Speaker 5: Good luck issue like.
Speaker 2: Ain't happening, brothers. So you got to cut the government.
Speaker 2: Then you could actually get back to a tariff's based,
Speaker 2: you know, funding model. But we're nowhere near what size
Speaker 2: of government we were in the late eighteen hundreds.
Speaker 5: So and that's what the problem is.
Speaker 4: That that's why we can't unfortunately we can't immediately do this,
Speaker 4: is that we're going to try to do it while
Speaker 4: still wanting to maintain the spending level that we have now.
Speaker 4: They were able to do it in the eighteen hundreds because,
Speaker 4: as Ron Paul would say, they had a different philosophy
Speaker 4: of government back.
Speaker 5: Then exactly, and yeah, they would not be.
Speaker 4: And the way tariffs work is that if you think,
Speaker 4: well we're not generating enough revenue, we'll just raise them.
Speaker 5: The more you raise them.
Speaker 4: The less people, you know, the less likely people are
Speaker 4: to pay them, because they will look for alternatives to
Speaker 4: the taxed goods.
Speaker 5: And so if you you.
Speaker 2: Know, whereas it's a Laffer curve of tariffs.
Speaker 5: It is a Laffer curve of tariffs with income text.
Speaker 4: I think you can go higher and hire and hire,
Speaker 4: and people do still they keep working because they want
Speaker 4: money in general, but I don't need that particular kind
Speaker 4: of car. So I could just absolutely cut that out entirely,
Speaker 4: and then where are they They can't make, you know,
Speaker 4: so maybe they could put a ten percent tariff for
Speaker 4: a twenty or thirty, but once they get to forty
Speaker 4: fifty sixty, thinking they're going to get more money, they're not.
Speaker 4: And I think the Laffer curve, as we're calling it
Speaker 4: for international trade would say that probably appears much faster
Speaker 4: than it does with the income tax.
Speaker 2: Makes sense to me. All right, do you have a
Speaker 2: few more minutes? I got to ask you one more thing. Yeah,
Speaker 2: that's anything you want, all right, so I'm sure you
Speaker 2: saw the the quote tweet from the President Alex's son
Speaker 2: of our good friend, mister Davey Smith, that happened yesterday,
Speaker 2: and I wanted to flow a concept past you and
Speaker 2: I I just knowing you as well as I do
Speaker 2: at this point, I have a feeling you've been thinking
Speaker 2: the same thing. First Off, it's unrecking, believably cool that
Speaker 2: this is happening. It's so it's so novel to just
Speaker 2: see like a guy I know really well. I got
Speaker 2: to talk to Don Junior for an hour out in
Speaker 2: Iowa before I ROL started Josie and I did. I
Speaker 2: got to talk to the guy. I talked to him
Speaker 2: about a bunch of stuff that it was off the record,
Speaker 2: so I won't give details. But he's not too far
Speaker 2: away from us. I know people won't believe me. They'll
Speaker 2: think I've sold out or whatever. Like, No, this dude
Speaker 2: is pretty red pilled.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I'm pretty I've been reasonably impressed with him, from
Speaker 4: which I've been able to glean.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, and I'm telling you off off the record,
Speaker 2: off the mic, he is even more one of us,
Speaker 2: Like I really like him a lot. So anyway, setting
Speaker 2: that aside, what I was thinking to myself is like
Speaker 2: doctor Ron Paul, the Great Ron Paul, the legend himself.
Speaker 2: He is, he made his name by being doctor No,
Speaker 2: by basically not getting much past but just saying no
Speaker 2: to everything and holding the line, so to speak. But
Speaker 2: almost the government, you know, grew tremendously during his tenure.
Speaker 2: I feel as if we are seeing a new iteration
Speaker 2: of Ron Paul in Dave Smith through a microphone, not
Speaker 2: through wielding hard power of a vote in Congress, but
Speaker 2: rather through soft power of just being influential. And I'm
Speaker 2: not sure that Dave won't actually be able to get
Speaker 2: more done than Ron Paul did in Congress for decades.
Speaker 2: And I'm just thinking, what are your thoughts on that?
Speaker 2: Am I am? I totally swinging out of my shoes
Speaker 2: ears that does that seem like a possible at this point?
Speaker 5: Well, I'll say this.
Speaker 4: He is on every large program. I mean, he's just
Speaker 4: been on everything. He's been on everything you'd want to
Speaker 4: be on. He's been on, and everybody likes him. I
Speaker 4: mean everybody, every host of these shows loves having Dave
Speaker 4: Smith on because they know it'll be entertaining and interesting
Speaker 4: and that yeah, he'll sound kind of like some of
Speaker 4: the Trump people they have on, but not entirely, and
Speaker 4: he'll be way different on in areas where the hosts
Speaker 4: themselves feel like Dave's probably the one who's right here
Speaker 4: and to watch him. He's he's good at it. He's
Speaker 4: good at it too. I mean I think that's you know,
Speaker 4: we can't discount that. It's not happen never dance. Yeah,
Speaker 4: I mean, it's not happenstance that this has happened. I
Speaker 4: mean he's really good and also he's funny and engaging,
Speaker 4: and he knows the details too, Like he really spends
Speaker 4: time learning the material. So if he's going to do
Speaker 4: a debate, you know the other side, I better be
Speaker 4: ready because Dave is.
Speaker 2: Ready, As is always the case. Liberty Lockdown is brought
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Speaker 2: Phoenix Mo. That's f E nix A m m O.
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Speaker 2: is Phoenix ammo dot com. You don't need a promo
Speaker 2: code because they're just savages and they sponsor me because
Speaker 2: they love me and I love them, and it's just mutual,
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Speaker 2: get all your Ammo there, because then you'll love yourself
Speaker 2: a little bit more. So. You don't need a promo
Speaker 2: code because they already give you a discount when you
Speaker 2: buy in bulk, and if you're a libertarian, you're already
Speaker 2: buying in bulk. Hate to break it to you, Finix,
Speaker 2: that's Phoenix Ammo dot com. Get you some. He was
Speaker 2: on the arguably maybe not the largest, but one of
Speaker 2: the largest live streams during the presidential election. He then
Speaker 2: catches a red eye, gets on Info Wars with Alex
Speaker 2: Jones the next day, and then that night is on
Speaker 2: with Joe Rogan, the largest show in the world, I mean,
Speaker 2: in a in a forty eight hour period, he reaches
Speaker 2: I don't know, twenty something million people, and then he's
Speaker 2: getting quote tweeted by the son of the President of the
Speaker 2: United States the next day, and then he's basically galvanizing
Speaker 2: is what you would think would not be our movement,
Speaker 2: but kind of is. At this point where he's saying, hey,
Speaker 2: it's fantastic that Haley and POMPEII are kept out. That's
Speaker 2: not enough. And then Don Junior is just like, I
Speaker 2: got you, brother, We're we're going way harder than this.
Speaker 2: And I'm like, this is a fucking legendary run. Excuse
Speaker 2: my language, but this is a seventy two hour stretch
Speaker 2: that pales in comparison anything I've ever seen. And I'm
Speaker 2: just sitting here like this is miraculous. I mean, Dave
Speaker 2: had the opportunity to easily get the nomination and run
Speaker 2: for president, but it's so crystal clear that this was
Speaker 2: the better route to go that his influence has grown
Speaker 2: far more, in my opinion, than had he run for
Speaker 2: the presidency. And I might add, had he ran, there's
Speaker 2: a decent chance that Kamala Harris is the president of
Speaker 2: the United States right now. So how do you like
Speaker 2: all that?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I agree with every single thing you said. That
Speaker 4: A lot of us were disappointed when he didn't run,
Speaker 4: but it turned out to be the best decision he
Speaker 4: could have made. And not to mention, uh, he has
Speaker 4: a lot of things to say that that people on
Speaker 4: the right need to hear. Now, everybody needs to hear.
Speaker 4: People on the right need to be corrected on some
Speaker 4: of their you know, some of their problematic I hate
Speaker 4: using the word problem ditch that word on some of
Speaker 4: their incorrect views. And he is a really good guy
Speaker 4: to correct them because he's not lecturing them, he's not
Speaker 4: calling them names like they'll listen to a guy like
Speaker 4: Dave Smith, and that's really important.
Speaker 5: And he wouldn't have been able to do that.
Speaker 4: If he had run, let's say he'd run on the
Speaker 4: Libertarian Party ticket. He would have got enough attention that
Speaker 4: Trump would have given him a name, you know, one
Speaker 4: of those nicknames like Lil Marco or whatever, and that
Speaker 4: would have stuck with him for uh, Dave right, And
Speaker 4: then that would have stuck with him. It would have
Speaker 4: been impossible from that moment on for him ever to
Speaker 4: crack into a world that needs to hear what he.
Speaker 5: Has to say.
Speaker 4: And you may have noticed that, Bill Kristal, you remember
Speaker 4: the guy. I now think of Bill Crystal, not as
Speaker 4: the publisher of the old Weekly Standard or the frequent
Speaker 4: cable TV news commentator, but as the guy who lost
Speaker 4: a debate to Scott Wharton.
Speaker 5: I think of him that way too.
Speaker 4: Bill Crystal pounced when Donald Trump Junior quote tweeted Dave
Speaker 4: and pointed out.
Speaker 5: Oh, well, look at Dave three months ago he was
Speaker 5: anti Israel or some stupid thing like that.
Speaker 4: And the response to that was overwhelming, Like, Bill, your
Speaker 4: day is over.
Speaker 5: Bill, it's over.
Speaker 4: Like no one cares about what You don't even get
Speaker 4: invited on MSNBC anymore, Like no one even cares about
Speaker 4: your neo con views. So Bill's post criticizing Dave got
Speaker 4: something like two hundred and fifty likes. Dave responded and
Speaker 4: get thirty eight thousands, like Bill, it's over.
Speaker 5: Okay, you're the crank.
Speaker 2: Now, it's a new era.
Speaker 4: I mean, it's right, we're dictating the agenda now, not you, Bill,
Speaker 4: We're cleaning up the mess you made.
Speaker 2: It's it's truly, it's truly amazing. I think for the
Speaker 2: younger libertarians out there that feel like this is normal,
Speaker 2: this is not normal. We are kicking the shit out
Speaker 2: of neo cons in public in their territory. Not only that,
Speaker 2: but all of the conservative thought leaders, like the real
Speaker 2: conservative thought leaders, the Tucker Carl Since the Candice Owns. Oh,
Speaker 2: they're all personal friends with Dave Smith at this point,
Speaker 2: and they all sound almost exactly like him when it
Speaker 2: comes to foreign policy, Like really really close. So I just,
Speaker 2: I just I think I've I've struggled to deal with
Speaker 2: the amount of optimism that I've had over the past week.
Speaker 2: I have never in my life been so hopeful and
Speaker 2: optimistic about politics in my lifetime, and it's like it
Speaker 2: I'm so accustomed to being pessimistic that I feel like
Speaker 2: there's like there's I'm waiting for the other shoot to drop.
Speaker 2: Have you dealt with that at all?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean that's why I'm I'm actually lowering my
Speaker 4: expectations because I don't want to be disappointed. I don't
Speaker 4: really think, for example, like I'm not actually optimistic that
Speaker 4: they're really gonna cut spending. I don't think anybody cares
Speaker 4: about spending. I mean, yeah, I know Elon Musk might
Speaker 4: cut some government employees or something. I really am skeptical
Speaker 4: about that, but I've decided that nobody cares about that,
Speaker 4: So that's just not happening.
Speaker 5: So now I'll move on to the next thing that
Speaker 5: I care about.
Speaker 4: But I do want to say one more thing about
Speaker 4: Dave if I may, which is how gracious he is
Speaker 4: in this situation. You know, I know somebody'll maybe I'll
Speaker 4: tell you his name off the air.
Speaker 5: You probably know him.
Speaker 4: Who very very quickly skyrocketed to the top in terms
Speaker 4: of media attention and popularity and then had a dramatic fall.
Speaker 4: And I'm not talking about Milo somebody else. And once
Speaker 4: he made that, once he broke through and became a
Speaker 4: bit of a phenomenon, he forgot all about his friends.
Speaker 4: It really, like was the old story. He forgot all
Speaker 4: about his friends because he's a fancy, gut person now
Speaker 4: and he moves in all these fans circles. He doesn't
Speaker 4: need them anymore. And not only is Dave not that way.
Speaker 4: You know, he still texts, you know, a low life
Speaker 4: like me.
Speaker 5: You know, I still talk to him.
Speaker 4: But beyond that, he gets on these shows and he
Speaker 4: builds up his friends right till say. You know, Scott
Speaker 4: Horton has the classic book on this. It's already a classic,
Speaker 4: hasn't even come out yet, And you really should talk
Speaker 4: to him like Dave will do. You know, he's debating
Speaker 4: Chris Cuomo. He brings my book and puts it on
Speaker 4: the table and says, you should read this.
Speaker 2: I was there for that, by the way, Oh were
Speaker 2: you okay?
Speaker 5: I saw I was.
Speaker 4: I think I was at a concert or something I
Speaker 4: was seeing. I think I was seeing an earth Wind
Speaker 4: and Fire and Lionel Richie that night.
Speaker 2: I was sitting back back row in the in the
Speaker 2: right but I remember seeing your book and I was like,
Speaker 2: this is so awesome. By the way, I just got
Speaker 2: to point out that is a knock on effect. I
Speaker 2: think Dave probably is this type of person anyways, but
Speaker 2: that is a major knock on effect of his relationship
Speaker 2: to Joe Rogan, because what has Joe Rogan done. He
Speaker 2: has brought all of his friends up with him. He
Speaker 2: has turned all of them into superstars. That's exactly what
Speaker 2: Dave's trying to do because he feels that same sort
Speaker 2: of gratitude towards Rogan, and he's trying to be the
Speaker 2: same guy, in my opinion, and I think it's and
Speaker 2: also I just think he's a good person and he
Speaker 2: wants to help where he can, and he realizes, like, yeah,
Speaker 2: a lot of these ideas I got from these guys,
Speaker 2: I'm gonna leave them behind, like of course.
Speaker 4: Not, yeah, yeah, yeah, So I feel like it couldn't
Speaker 4: happen to a more deserving guy. And it happened in
Speaker 4: part because he seized every opportunity that came his way.
Speaker 4: And by that, I mean he had opportunities to debate
Speaker 4: people that he seized upon and took them and did it.
Speaker 4: And those debates, either the debates themselves went viral or
Speaker 4: clips of the debates went viral. So then people started
Speaker 4: seeing him. He'd been on Rogan all this time, so
Speaker 4: that doesn't hurt. And so but all of a sudden,
Speaker 4: you know, in your feed, whatever platform you're on, but
Speaker 4: these days it's X I suppose is what where all
Speaker 4: the normal people are? You keep seeing the same guy
Speaker 4: over and over and you think, well, why am I
Speaker 4: not talking to him?
Speaker 2: Yep, No, And just to prove your point that he
Speaker 2: hasn't left any of us behind, I texted the guy
Speaker 2: while he was on the PbD live stream during the
Speaker 2: election night, and I told him I think it's over.
Speaker 2: I think Trump's got this. And he responds right away,
Speaker 2: and you know, I won't say the details of what
Speaker 2: we talked about, but yeah, he's just he's a real
Speaker 2: one man, and he and he's a true believer, and
Speaker 2: he's got incredible capacity to argue our points in a
Speaker 2: compelling fashion that can absolutely flatten our opposition but also
Speaker 2: embrace people that are not us, and most libertarians can't
Speaker 2: do that. So all of the haters, all of the
Speaker 2: people in the Libertarian party that are like, ah, fuck
Speaker 2: Dave Smith, You're an idiot. Okay, oh you are awesome.
Speaker 4: You will never have one millionth even a millionth of
Speaker 4: Dave's influence. And as I say, it's happening to him.
Speaker 5: Because he put in the time, he put in the work.
Speaker 4: I mean, he's told me when I've interviewed him about
Speaker 4: his early days that he went like two years on
Speaker 4: part of the problem with basically no traction at all, none,
Speaker 4: and he just kept at it and kept at it
Speaker 4: and kept at it. So you know, it's it's an
Speaker 4: overnight success that took years, which is true of most
Speaker 4: overnight successes.
Speaker 2: By the way, that's right, Yep, he's been doing it
Speaker 2: for fifteen years. And people will say where'd this guy
Speaker 2: come from. It's like, well, he put in the time,
Speaker 2: and he's.
Speaker 4: Like, by the way, now I get to brag to
Speaker 4: people because Dave was a groomsman at my wedding. Oh no,
Speaker 4: when I introduced when I was with Canvas Owens, I
Speaker 4: told her that as a way of kind of explaining, Look,
Speaker 4: you know, I'm a good guy.
Speaker 5: Here's how I prove it.
Speaker 4: But then I tell them, Then I tell them that
Speaker 4: Michael Malice was my best man, and they just stop,
Speaker 4: like with a cold white expression, like a ghost, like,
Speaker 4: oh my gosh, what what kind of a best man
Speaker 4: speech did that guy give?
Speaker 5: And all I can say is you wish you could
Speaker 5: have been there?
Speaker 2: Oh I bet, I bet it's It's legendary, no doubt. Anyways,
Speaker 2: the great Tom Woods tell people where they can follow.
Speaker 4: You, Tom tom Woods dot com. And at the very
Speaker 4: top of tom woods dot com you can even do
Speaker 4: what every instinct in your body is telling you not
Speaker 4: to do, which is sign up for my email list.
Speaker 4: You think I don't want to get any emails. I
Speaker 4: know you don't, but you do want to get mine
Speaker 4: unless you have brain damage.
Speaker 5: So Tom wars dot com.
Speaker 2: Tom woos dot com. Uh, listening to the Tom Wood Show.
Speaker 2: He's great. You'll learn a lot if you haven't already
Speaker 2: been deep down this rabbit hole. And even if you have,
Speaker 2: he'll teach you more as I brought him on today
Speaker 2: to you know, steal man and uh and devour any
Speaker 2: arguments in favor of tariffs. So I appreciate your time Tom,
Speaker 2: and thank you guys so much for tuning in. Hit
Speaker 2: the like button, subscribe, shared around, and leave a comment
Speaker 2: down below If I got anything wrong, which I'm sure
Speaker 2: I did, Appreciate it. Appreciate you guys. See you so peace.
Speaker 3: Welcome to Liberty Lockdown, Plea's got your walk home to
Speaker 3: Liberty ain't come, but yeah it's on home.
Speaker 2: Where did it come from? And where did he go