The Daily Signal - A New Look at Thomas Sowell, 'Great Black Intellectual' Ignored by Left

Episode Date: February 5, 2021

Thomas Sowell is considered by many to be one of the most influential and brilliant minds of the past half-century. He is most famous for his work as an economist, but is also a bestselling author, syndicated columnist, historian, and academic. Yet he hasn't received much recognition. "When people talk about the great black intellectuals today, you hear names like Henry Louis Gates at Harvard or Cornel West ... or today you hear Ta-Nehisi Coates and Ibram X. Kendi," says Jason Riley, a journalist, scholar, and member of The Wall Street Journal's editorial board. "But in my view, Tom has written circles around those guys and is much broader in subjects that he's covered as well as much deeper and his analysis is much more rigorous than those guys'," Riley says. A new documentary, “Thomas Sowell: Common Sense in a Senseless World,” tells the story of Sowell’s life and how his logic and intellect have impacted society.  Riley, who narrates the film, joins the show to discuss the documentary and the personal impact Sowell has had on his own life. You can watch the full-length documentary here or by visiting SowellFilm.com. Plus, John Cooper, associate director of The Heritage Foundation’s Institute Communications and a big football fan, joins us to talk about what we can expect to see during Super Bowl LV this weekend.  We also cover these stories: Democrats urge President Joe Biden to cancel up to $50,000 in debt for student loan borrowers. Biden addresses the National Prayer Breakfast. Former Vice President Mike Pence is joining The Heritage Foundation as a distinguished fellow. Enjoy the show! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the Daily Signal podcast for Friday, February 5th. I'm Kate Trinko. And I'm Virginia Allen. Thomas Sol is considered by many to be one of the most influential and brilliant minds of our day. He is most famous for his work as an economist, but has also made major contributions in a number of other fields. Today, Jason Riley, a journalist, scholar, and a member of the Wall Street Journal editorial board, joins the show to discuss a brand new documentary he narrated on the life and legacy of Thomas Soul. The film is called Thomas Soul Common Sense in a Senseless World. Plus, John Cooper, director of Heritage's Institute Communications and a big NFL fan, joins me to talk about what we can expect to see during Super Bowl 55 this weekend.

And don't forget, if you're enjoying this podcast, please be sure to leave a review or a five-star rating on Apple Podcasts, and please encourage others to subscribe. Now on to our top news. Democrats are urging President Joe Biden to cancel up to $50,000 of debt for student loan borrowers. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York, Senator Elizabeth Warren, Democrat of Massachusetts, and Representative Ianna Presley, Democrat of Massachusetts on Thursday, reintroduced a resolution which would give the Department of, of Education the opportunity to cancel up to $50,000 in federal student debt and calls on the

president to administratively cancel up to $50,000 in federal student loan debt for federal student loan borrowers. Schumer said in a statement that student loan debt is weighing down millions of families in New York and across this country. During a time of historic and overlapping crises which are disproportionately impacting communities of color, we must do everything in our power to deliver real relief to the American people, lift up our struggling economy, and close the racial wealth gap. During a press briefing at the White House Thursday, press secretary Jen Saki, said Biden has and continues to support canceling $10,000 in student loan debt, and added that if Congress drafts such a proposal and passes it, Biden will look forward to signing.

President Biden addressed the national prayer breakfast on Thursday. In his remarks, he touched on climate change, the Capitol Hill riot, and the importance of faith via Politico. You know, I've attended many of these prayer breakfasts over the years with a nation at war and struggle and strife, a nation of peace and in prosperity. A nation, though, always in prayer. But we know this time is different. Over 400,000 of our fellow Americans have lost their lives to a deadly virus. Millions are out of work. We see long lines for food at food banks that stretch from miles. We hear the call for racial justice, some 400 years in the making, and we know the dream, and more importantly, the reality of justice for all cannot be deferred any longer. We see the

existential threat of climate crisis that poses to our planet and everywhere we turn with more severe floods, stronger hurricanes, more intense wildfires. We just have to open our eyes. We've just witnessed images that we've never imagined, images that now will never forget, a violent assault at the U.S. Capitol, an assault on our democracy, on our capital, a violent attack that threatens lives and took lives. We know now we must confront and defeat political extremism, white supremacy, and domestic terrorism. For so many in our nation, this is a dark, dark time. So where do we turn?

Faith. Kirkagard wrote, Faith sees best in the dark. I believe that to be true. For me, in the darkest moments, faith provides hope and solace. Provides clarity and purpose as well. It shows the way forward. Former mayor of New York City, Mike Blue, Bloomberg is urging President Biden to stand up to teachers' unions who have continued to keep public schools closed, even after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, have said it's safe for schools to reopen.

Bloomberg acknowledged the health concerns during an interview with MSNBC on Thursday, but argued that for the sake of the students, teachers must begin in-person learning once again. teachers say, well, I don't want to go back because it's dangerous, said Bloomberg, adding that we have a lot of city and state and federal employees who run risks. That's part of the job. You run risks to help America, to help your state, to help your city, to help your family. And there's just no reason not to have the schools open. Bloomberg made the case that kids from low-income families are being most adversely affected by the lockdowns. They will never recover from this, he said, adding, the virtual classes are a joke. It is worse than a joke. Poor people don't have iPads, they don't have Wi-Fi, and they don't have somebody at home to sit during the day and force the child to pay attention. And without that, the virtual learning just does not exist. Well, we have some exciting news on the home front. Former Vice President Mike Pence is joining the Heritage Foundation as a distinguished fellow. Pence says in a statement, The Heritage Foundation is a flagship of the conservative movement, and I am profoundly honored to join them as a distinguished visiting fellow to advance conservative solutions that will benefit every American.

K.C. James, the president of the Heritage Foundation, says in a statement, over the course of the past four years, our team at Heritage has worked closely with members of the Trump administration on a host of policy accomplishments. That's why I am excited Vice President Mike Pence will join forces with Heritage to ensure we continue to advance conservative principles and policy solutions. As part of his fellowship, Pence will write a monthly column for The Daily Signal, which we're thrilled about. Now stay tuned for my conversation with Jason Riley as we discuss the brand new documentary Thomas Soul, Common Sense in a Senseless World. I'm Zach Smith. And I'm John Carl O'Conaparo. And if you want to understand what's happening at the Supreme Court, be sure to check out SCOTUS 101, a Heritage Foundation podcast. We take a look at the cases, the personalities, and the gossip at the highest court in the land.

Be sure to subscribe on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever else you find your podcasts. It's SCOTUS 101. Many consider Thomas Sol to be one of the greatest minds of our day. Sol is most well known for his groundbreaking. work as an economist, but is also a best-selling author, a photographer, syndicated columnist, historian, and academic. He is a man in pursuit of truth. Free to Choose Media has just produced a one-hour documentary on the life and work of Thomas Soul. The film is called Thomas Soul Common Sense in a Senseless World. Let's take a listen to a portion of the film's trailer.

The main thing that he's done, in my opinion, is to cause people to rethink their assumptions about all sorts of things, not just economics, but about race, about politics, about how we get along. Thomas Sol's essays and weekly columns have appeared in more than 300 newspapers and periodicals, including the New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Forbes and Fortune magazines. Oftentimes they created a backlash. The television and the print media, they've wised up. They're just ignoring what he's... written because there's no way that they can argue with Tom Soul.

Most of the foolish things that are said on these programs were said 20 and 30 and 40 years ago and refuted 20 and 30 and 40 years ago. By you quite often. Anywhere Thomas Soul is, he's the smartest person in the room. Does he care about how he feels about things, how he wants the world to be, or how is the world as it is? You were a Marxist at one time in your life. What was your wake-up to what was wrong with that line of life? thinking of facts. You're about to meet one of the greatest minds of the past half century.

Thomas Soul, one of the greatest minds of the past half century, says Jason Riley, and Mr. Riley, who narrated the film is here with us today to discuss the documentary. Mr. Riley, welcome to the show. Thank you for having me. You narrated this one-hour documentary on Thomas Soul. I watched it last week and was just completely captivated by the film. I've known a little bit about Thomas Soul, but I learned so much watching this documentary. What you've really done here in this film is essentially take viewers through the life of Thomas Soul and really show the impact that he has had on people and across so many areas of our world. So I want to begin by asking you just to share a little bit of your own personal story of how Thomas Sol, his writings, his rhetoric,

his logic, and his honesty has really impacted you personally. Well, I discovered Tom Sol in college in the early 1990s. I was working on the school paper and having a conversation with my fellow students about affirmative action one day. And someone piped in and said, Jason, you sound like Tom Sol. And I said, Tom Who? And the person wrote down the name of a book on a piece of paper. And I went to the school library that evening and checked it out and read it in one sitting that evening and went back to school the next morning and checked out everything

else they had by Tom Sol and was pretty much hooked on him by then. And while I was working at the Wall Street Journal on the editorial board in the the mid-90s is when I first got to meet Tom Sol. He was at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University then, still is. And he would travel through New York on book tours and meet with various editorial boards. So that's when I first got to meet him. And I later went out to Stanford to write a profile of him for the newspaper that would have been in the mid-2000s. And that's when we sort of struck up a friendship that has sort of endured since then. So when you learned, okay, there's this film project, I mean, yourself being a journalist, a scholar, a member of the Wall Street Journal editorial board, what made you say this is a film project that is something that I have to be a part of?

Well, they came to me. The free to choose folks came to me. I had been working on a biography of Seoul that will be out in May. and when they found out that I was working on this biography, they approached me and said, we want to do a film, a documentary about Tom's life. Would you care to narrate it? And I did not hesitate. Share a little bit about your book that's coming out, and what did give you kind of that passion and drive to say, you know what? I appreciate his work so much that I am going to take on this challenge and not only be a part of this film,

but also write this book. Sure. Well, the book is titled Maverick, a biography of Thomas Soul. It's available for pre-order on Amazon now, that it will be out on May 25th. And it is the first ever biography of Tom. He has no other biographer. He's written a memoir himself, and he's written about his personal life in as many columns over the years. but this is the first biography of Tom.

And it's primarily an intellectual biography. I don't focus much on his personal life, although there is a bit of that in there, but I do focus on his ideas, his scholarship, how he's distinguished himself as an intellectual over the past half century and sort of what his legacy will be,

how he'll be remembered. And I was sort of trying to get him to cooperate with the biography. He's a very private person for a while, for more than a decade, actually. I think he's 90 years old now, so maybe I just warmed down. But he did cooperate. He sat for a bunch of long interviews for the book. And I also interviewed a bunch of colleagues of his and acquaintances

and people who were familiar with his work over the years. So it was a lot of fun. It was a lot of fun to write. He's meant a lot to me in terms of my own intellectual development over the decades. And so I wanted to introduce him and his work to a new generation, and I don't think that Tom has gotten the exposure that he sort of deserves. You know, when people talk about the great black intellectuals today, you hear names like Henry Lewis Gates at Harvard or Cornell West and people like that.

Or today you hear Tonehisi Coates and Ibram X. Kendi. But in my view, Tom has written circles around those guys and is, you know, much broader in his, and subjects that he's covered as well as much deeper. And his analysis is much more rigorous than those guys. And I don't think that Tom has sort of gotten the attention and the exposure he deserves. So I'm hoping the film will wet people's appetite and get them to pick up some books by Tom, as well as the biography. I hope does the same thing.

It gets more people interested in Tom and a scholarship. You mentioned Thomas Sol's legacy, and I think that the film does a great job of really explaining what that legacy is. and I'm sure your book does the same. But could you just give us a little bit of a teaser, of in your opinion, what is the legacy that Thomas Soul has already left and will leave? I think in a number of areas he's really made his mark.

Very broadly speaking, though, he's made his mark as a sort of honest intellectual, someone who is much more interested in being right than in being popular. and following the facts where they lead and reporting his findings, even if they happen to be politically incorrect. And he feels that is the real duty of a scholar to follow the facts and not fall for trendy thinking or fashionable thinking or isn't a popularity contest. That's not what true scholarship calls for.

So I think that is one of his legacies. Another is something that I think he modeled himself after Milton Friedman, one of his mentors at the University of Chicago where he earned his Ph.D. in the early 1960s. And Friedman was someone who felt that intellectuals shouldn't spend all their time simply talking to one another, that they should seek a wider audience and speak to non-experts, explain themselves and their work to the general public. And after Friedman left teaching in the 1970s, that's what he did. In fact, one of the things he did was a television program that was produced by the same company that produced this one, the Free to Choose Network. And that was Friedman's way of speaking to the general public

about economics. And so when Sol left teaching in the 1970s, I think he said about a type of public intellectualism that was very similar to Friedman. He wrote his popular column for general interest readers. Most of Tom's books are written for non-academics. And he takes great pride in explaining economics and these ideas to non-experts. He's most known for his writings on race, but his best-selling book is basic economics, which is essentially an economics textbook without any graphs or equations in it. And I think Tom, he sort of left teaching, although he left, you know, the campus teaching, he still sort of continued to teach through these books and columns over the decades. One of the things that I was most fascinated to learn about in the film is that Thomas Sol, he actually used to be a Marxist.

But what really cured him, he says, of that, was working for the government when he realized these Marxist ideas they would never actually work. Could you just share a little bit about Thomas Sol's journey out of Marxism? Because I really find that so fascinating. Yes. Well, you, it's not that uncommon. If you look at a lot of leading conservatives in the 20th century, many of them started on the left. Milton Friedman started on the left. George Stigler started on the left.

Walter Williams, the late Walter Williams, who passed away last year and was a friend of Tom's for more than 50 years, started out on the left. Clarence Thomas started out on the left. So it's not that uncommon. But yes, Tom was a Marxist through his 20s. And then it was working in the government and seeing how some of these ideas he had about how the capital system works, seeing that in practice and seeing the incentives in place and the intentions of some of these policies versus the actual results. That all had an effect on Tom changing, changing his mind about free markets and their power and shaping people's lives for the better. And so that's what it was. It was real-life experience and just less reliance on theories and what's supposed to happen

and paying more attention to what actually comes to pass. You did interview Walter Williams for the documentary, which, as you mentioned, Mr. Williams, did pass away this past December. So it really is a treasure to have these recorded conversations of him sharing about the work of Thomas Soul, his relationship with Thomas Soul. But one of the things that Walter Williams said is that the media really, they stopped covering Thomas Soul a long time ago because they knew that they couldn't debate him. And this is just a sad commentary in my mind on really the state of our media. Why do you think the media has chosen to so often ignore Soul's work?

Well, I think they've taken the side of the black left, broadly speaking, and the black left has ignored Tom for a long time, and the media continues to run to black intellectuals, academics, civil rights organizations, and so forth to speak on behalf of black people. And they tell the media, don't pay attention to Tom, anyone who thinks like that or says those things is a sellout or an Uncle Tom or. or someone who should not be taken seriously. They're simply doing the bidding of white people. So they've responded with these sort of ad hominem attacks on Tom, and the media has largely bought that argument, and the types of people that give out economics awards and those types of things are controlled by the left generally.

And so that has worked against Tom and his exposure over the decades. And one of the things I'm hoping that the book and the film will help correct. Well, and one of the things that I was also really fascinated in the film, was just how far-reaching Thomas Sol's work really is, that despite the media not giving him the attention that he so deserves, he has impacted so many individuals in so many different areas of our world. You all interviewed a rap musician for the film who says that Thomas Soul has inspired many of his lyrics.

What did you learn in those conversations with individuals who have been so impacted by Thomas Soul's work? Well, a lot of them speak about the clarity of his writing. He breaks things down in a way that's very understandable and digestible and witty, and people admire that. Tom, you know, in the early part of his career, did write more academic books that speaking to his peers in the academy, but he could also write for a wider audience.

And editors at newspapers love this because they had this serious, rigorous thinker who could write 800-word pieces on the topics of the day for their general interest readers to understand. So they were getting this depth of knowledge and sort of more easily digestible bites. And they really appreciated that. And fans of soul all seem to come back

to the clarity of his writing and his thinking, how he puts things. He's a wonderful storyteller. And also, he brings, one of the things he's known for us is international perspectives. And so he likes to talk about trends not only within the United States, but in other countries and what's going on over there. And I think there's sometime in America, you have people who live in a bit of a bubble, an American bubble, a U.S. bubble. And Tom says, you know, a lot of these policies that are being pushed here have been tried in other places at other times. And here's what's happened over there. And we should keep that in mind when we think about how those policies might affect life here in this country. So those

international perspectives, which is something he specialized in in many of his books, is something people also appreciate. Making a documentary is no small undertaking. It's a complicated process, a lot of time, a lot of work. What for you was the greatest challenge of, you know, working so closely with the team of individuals who were producing this film? I just wanted to make sure we were doing justice to Seoul. You know, I really see him as this towering intellectual figure. You know, I'm a journalist by training. I'm not an intellectual. I'm not an academic. I spent a life as a print journalist, basically. And I really wanted to make sure, both the book and in the documentary that we were just doing him justice.

You know, I said before that no one else has written a biography of Tom, but I hope someone else does come along. A real scholar comes along, someone who can really grapple with Tom's ideas at his level and lay them out for people. I just, I hope someone comes and does that. I hope my book can be a little placeholder until that comes along and do what I intended it to do, which is, again, let people's appetite about Tom. But that's my biggest concern.

I just want to do him justice because he has, I think he is one of the great social theorists of the 20th century of any color. And his writings on political philosophy, his writings on social theory, his writings on education and law and history and history and culture. They are quite broad. And I think that Thomas someone people will be reading. for generations to come. Well, and I know that you said that Thomas Sol is quite a private man, but you did have the privilege of speaking with him a little bit throughout the course of making the film.

Do you know if he has seen the documentary yet and what his thoughts are on it? I don't know. I haven't had any contact with Tom since it's been out. So I don't know if he's seen it yet. He is at Hoover, the Hoover Institution at Stanford, and I know that Hoover is aware of the film, so perhaps they've reached out to him. But no, I can't say for certain whether he's seen it.

Well, I have no doubt that he'll feel incredibly honored by it. It really is a beautiful documentary and so informative. Would you just tell our listeners both where they can find and watch the documentary and then also, again, share with us when and where your book will be out? Sure. So the documentary information can be found at soulfilm.com. That's S-O-W-E-L-L-Film.com. And it was made for public television, so there you can find where it will appear on your local public television station. In addition to that, it's being streamed on Vimeo and Amazon and YouTube, and you can find links to stream it as well at SolFilM-Film.com. In terms of my book, again, it'll be out in May 25th, to be exact, and it can be preordered on Amazon right now. Great. We will be sure to leave links for both the documentary and to pre-order your book and the show notes today.

Thank you so much for your time. Thank you. Now stay tuned for a special segment discussing what to expect during Super Bowl 55 on Sunday. Americans use firearms to defend themselves between 500,000 and 2 million times every year. But God forbid that my mother has ever faced with a scenario where she has to stop a threat to her life. But if she is, I hope politicians, protected by professional armed security, didn't strip her of the right to use the firearm she can handle most competently. To watch the rest of heritage expert Amy Swear's testimony on assault weapons

before the House Judiciary Committee head to the Heritage Foundation YouTube channel. There you'll find talks, events, and documentaries, backed with the reputation of the nation's most broadly supported Public Policy Research Institute. Start watching now at heritage.org slash YouTube. And don't forget to subscribe and share. So as a big football fan and definitely a big Tom Brady fan, I could not let the opportunity pass by to talk about Super Bowl 55 right here on the podcast and hear with me to give some pre-Burdy fan. game projections is my colleague John Cooper, the associate director for Institute Communications at the Heritage Foundation and a big NFL fan himself. John, welcome. Yeah, thanks for having me. So let's get right to it on Sunday. Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, they're going up against

Patrick Mahomes and the Kansas City Chiefs. What makes this game such an epic matchup? Yeah, it's kind of a question of where do you start? So, you know, one of the neat things about this matchup is there are actually a lot of historic implications to it. And the first one is that this is actually the first Super Bowl, you know, out of all 55, where the previous two winners of the previous two Super Bowls, at starting quarterback at least, are facing off against each other. So, you know, Tom Brady beat the Rams a couple of years ago. And then, of course, Patrick Holmes beat the Niners in that great comeback win last year. So it's the first time in as many years as we've been having Super Bowls that that's actually happened where those two winners are facing each other for, you know,

the third year down the road. The other interesting thing, too, is that if you look at, you know, who's won Super Bowls earlier in their career and been to Super Bowls? There are four quarterbacks in the NFL that have gone to at least two Super Bowls in their first four years in the NFL. Tom Brady is one. Patrick Mahomes is one of the others. And then, interestingly enough, the other two are Kurt Warner, who Tom Brady beat in his first Super Bowl, and then Russell Wilson, who of course Tom Brady, you know, beat a few years ago with the famous Malcolm Butler interception against the Seahawks. So pretty crazy stats that, you know, kind of show how wild it is that we have, you know, the greatest quarterback of all time versus, you know,

maybe the greatest quarterback of his generation that's developing. So a lot of historical implications and I'm sure it's going to be a shootout too, just with how great those guys are. What do you think that we'll see from these two quarterbacks? Because you have, like you said, I mean, these are both kind of legends. Tom Brady has been for a while. If he wins, he'll be earning his seventh Super Bowl ring for Mahomes. If, you know, if his team wins, he'll be earning his second. And so it's this really interesting matchup with kind of the elder Tom Brady,

who's been going out of this for such a long time. and then Mahomes, who's a little bit of the new kid on the block as far as being this all-star quarterback. So what do you think that matchup is going to actually look like? What will we see from these guys? Well, you're going to see Brady be his usual cerebral self. Like he's an incredible player, an incredible passer in the pocket.

And just, you know, he is an incredible player. But as a passer in the pocket, he's someone who can just pick a defense apart, no matter who it is, no matter who you're throwing it. at him. The only thing, the only prayer that the chiefs have of stopping him is if they can get consistent pressure on him and hit him over and over again. That's one of the only ways that you can beat Tom Brady. And that's how he's lost in his previous Super Bowls, especially the ones against the Giants. They just hit him over and over again. And that throws him off. And this year with the weapons that he's had in Tampa Bay, you know, everyone came into the year thinking, oh, you know,

they were saying, you know, sports talk radio all over the place on the ESPN, oh, he's old, he's washed up, he can't throw the ball downfield. He actually threw the ball downfield more often for a better percentage this year than any year in his career because he has great weapons and Mike Evans and Chris Godwin and his tight ends with Gronk and Cameron Brate. So they had a great, a great passing attack that he was able to take advantage of and we just hadn't seen him be able to do that in New England for many years in the recent past. So you know, you're going to see him, I think, continue to try to pick apart that secondary in Kansas City. if they have a weakness, it's more on the back end.

You know, their pass rush is not bad with guys like Chris Jones and Frank Clark. They can get after him. So the Bucks offensive line is going to have a hard time. But if he can get a little bit of time in the pocket and buy some of that time and hit receivers downfield, he's going to have a good game. Mahomes, you know, he had that concussion or neck injury. No one really ever said what it really was in that game against the Browns, but he came back and looked great against the bills.

He still has a bit of an issue with his turf toe. but it looks like he's doing pretty well recovering from that. So, you know, maybe his mobility is a little bit limited, but he's just going to be, he's going to be doing everything that the Chiefs have been doing throughout the playoffs. You know, this Tampa Bay front line, their rush defense is really good, really, really strong, number one in the NFL. But their, you know, their secondary is kind of weak,

and they've had some guys that got injured or were injured coming into the NFC championship game with Green Bay. Hopefully they'll have them all back at full strength. But, you know, if they're down a couple of players in their secondary, it's going to be even easier for Mahomes to use guys like Tyree Kill and Travis Kelsey, who have just been tearing apart defenses throughout the year just to do the same against Tampa Bay. So I think you're going to see this could be a lot like the Eagles Patriot Super Bowl from a few years ago where, you know, just a bazillion points were scored and, you know,

each quarterback threw for 400 plus yards. I know Brady threw for more than 500. So it's going to be a shootout, I think. Are you brave enough to make any predictions on the final score? Sure. Well, you know, I'm not, I'm not brave enough to bet on it. I'll tell you that. But, you know, one interesting thing I saw as an aside is that Andy Reid and Bruce Ariens, who are the coaches, obviously, on both sides, they've only coached two games against each other in their long NFL careers, two games. And they've both won one of those games. Each game that they won was won by three points. The line in this game right now in Vegas is three points. So, you know, it's, you know, it's. It went down initially from three and a half points when the matchup was first set since this game is in Tampa Bay, and some people are buying the home field advantage for Tampa Bay. So fun, fun little anecdote there, but I think you're going to see a close game. I think the Chiefs, you know, they have the ability to score, you know, three touchdowns in five minutes. They can blitz you like that. And, you know, you can be up like the bills were last, you know, two weeks ago and all of a sudden you're down by two touchdowns.

So they have that ability, but I think if anyone has the ability to keep pace with them, It's the Patriots, or excuse me, the buccaneers, not the Patriots. Not so much this year. But, you know, I think ultimately I hate betting against Brady and I would never bet against him, but if you made me pick a team that's going to win this game, I think Andy Reid, you know, coming off, you know, what is essentially a buy, having all this time to prepare, he is historically almost unbeatable when that's been the case. You know, I would say if, you know, if we get a great game and everybody stays healthy,

then I think the Chiefs win this by about three points. Well, I'm going to say that I hope you're wrong on that as a Tom Brady fan, but we'll see. It'll definitely be an exciting game. John, thanks so much for joining us. Yeah, absolutely. And that'll do it for today's episode. Thanks for listening to The Daily Signal podcast.

You can find the Daily Signal podcast on Google Play, Apple Podcast, Spotify, and IHeartRadio. Please be sure to leave us a review and a five-star rating on Apple Podcasts, and as always, please encourage others to subscribe. Thanks again for listening, and we'll be back with you on Monday. The Daily Signal podcast is brought to you by more than half a million members of the Heritage Foundation. It is executive produced by Kate Trinko and Rachel Del Judas, sound design by Lauren Evans, Mark Geinney, and John Pop. For more information, visitdailySignal.com.