The Dan Bongino Show - Ep. 497 The Liberal Media Can't Get Out of Its Own Way

Episode Date: July 6, 2017

In this episode I address the continued fake news crisis at CNN and their alleged blackmail of a GIF producer.  http://thefederalist.com/2017/07/05/cnn-just-published-a-fake-quote-from-abraham-lincoln/   http://www.dailywire.com/news/18286/breaking-cnn-may-have-targeted-wrong-reddit-meme-ben-shapiro   I also discuss the liberal policy meltdown in blue states using tax revenue data to show the futility of liberal economic ideology.  https://www.wsj.com/articles/get-able-bodied-americans-off-the-couch-1499188689   https://www.wsj.com/articles/blue-state-budget-breakdowns-1499198223   Finally, I address the economics of green energy and the North Korean crisis.  https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2017-06-20/texas-is-too-windy-and-sunny-for-old-energy-companies-to-make-money     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Dan Bongino. I have an obligation to come on the air with data and material and research. I can't just say trade stinks. Thanks for tuning in. The Dan Bongino Show. Let's jump right in because we have no time for nonsense. Get ready to hear the truth about America. When I was a young man, I don't remember it being sexy to want to allow a nanny state to

control my life. On a show that's not immune to the facts with your host, Dan Bongino. All right, welcome to the Renegade Republican with Dan Bongino. Producer Joe, how are you today? I'm doing very well, Dan. Thank you very much. You want to give a quick shout out to Jay, right? Yeah, man. Jay Davins, the guy that sent me that abacus he's in pennsylvania and uh i didn't remember his name yesterday yesterday when you asked and i do today jay david thank you so much yeah jay you're the man we appreciate that yeah by the way also one quick other shout out folks if you'll allow me i got a uh a gi from a guy to growl and do a little brazilian jiu-jitsu grappling it's a century gi and. And thank you. It was very nice of you.

And I told him I'd give him a review, but I'll give you a little shout-out on the show, too. It's a pretty good Gi, man. I'll tell you, better than the one I have now. So thanks for doing that. I'll give you a full write-up. But a Century Ambassador Gi. So really nice.

You know, when you're rolling around a lot, you don't want these really super thick Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Gis because your fingers get caught in there, and they get all dinged up. Gosh, they look like sausage fingers. I have now, man. All right. As always, overloaded with news today. So let's jump right in. Yesterday, I covered the blue state madness going on. And yesterday's show did phenomenal numbers. Thank you. I don't know if that was everybody catching up from the 4th of July holiday, but we went bonkers yesterday. But I wanted to cover this a little more today, too, and then go into a couple of other stories as well, because there

is a lot of breaking news going on. But before I get to that, CNN, it's I don't even know what to say, folks. It's a total meltdown over at CNN. I tweeted out a story yesterday at The Federalist by Molly Hemingway, who I really like a lot. Apparently, CNN tweeted out a fake Lincoln quote on the 4th of July, which, all right. You know, I know it happens, I guess, like people get burned all the time. I'm sure I've probably tweeted out Thomas Sowell quotes that maybe Thomas Sowell didn't say. But gosh, this is a news organization that can't seem to get their their act together. And yesterday I was I did a little Fox hit on this. The story, which together. And yesterday, I did a little Fox hit on this. The story, which you probably heard about, I addressed a little bit of it yesterday,

is CNN basically outed a Reddit user. And now we're finding out it may not be a Reddit user. It may be someone else who published the WWF gif of Trump that Trump used in the tweet. Folks, this is a complicated story. If you haven't seen it, forgive me for not explaining this well, but Trump tweeted out, what is it, Sunday or Saturday, a gif, a moving picture of himself in the WWF when he hit Vince McMahon and someone superimposed the CNN logo on Vince McMahon. Trump took that and tweeted it out.

CNN engaged in this full blown investigation to find this kid, which I said yesterday is amazing because they found this kid on Reddit supposedly. Now they're saying he's not a kid. It's a middle aged man. And now I got another tweet from a guy who says not only is it not a middle aged guy, it's not any of those people because it's a different gift. This is a crazy story. Here's all you need to know about it this goes to show you the priorities of cnn right now

they have what they have been pitching to us joe literally for months to be the biggest espionage story in human history that the russians colluded with the sitting president of the United States at the time a candidate to throw a presidential election in the said candidate Donald Trump's favor. This is the story, Joe, is it not? Yes. This is the story they have been pitching to us for months. It is the biggest espionage story potentially in human history.

story potentially in human history. They have not developed one credible named source or one scintilla of evidence to back this story up to the point now where it's even Democrats are starting to realize, as we've noted a long time ago, that the story's made up. It's a fantasy. There's nothing to it is literally made up. There's no there, there, there at all. All of these resources, none of them can find a name source on this huge story they've been promoting for months, yet the minute something makes CNN look bad, this giphy Trump put out with him hitting Vince McMahon

with CNN on his face or whatever it may be, CNN takes it personal. All of a sudden, Joe, the resources avail themselves to go track down what was originally reported to be a 15-year-old kid, which I had said on the air because that's how it was reported to me. But now they're saying it's not a 15-year-old kid. They found this kid almost overnight.

Again, it just speaks to the priorities of these people. They don't care. They don't care about anything but making Trump look stupid, Joe. Is that not obvious at this point? Pretty damn obvious, Dan. They don't, right? They don't seem to care. It's amazing.

This Trump Russia story, they can't find anything. They won't dedicate any resources to putting anybody on the record because they know they have a fake news story. And yet the minute a gif comes out, which makes them look stupid, they track down some kid or some adult, whatever they're reporting now. And just so you know, folks, there's a question of journalistic ethics here because CNN, I'm going to read you from a CNN piece. I'm going to read you something they put out there.

Now, tell me this doesn't sound sinister, folks. I'm not making this up, by the way. This is from a CNN piece. I'm obviously not making it. I'm reporting on my show. CNN is not publishing this guy's name. Supposedly the guy who created the giphy with CNN that made them look bad because he is a private citizen who has issued an extensive statement of apology, showed his remorse by saying he has taken down all of his offending posts, and because he has

said he is not going to repeat this ugly behavior on social media again. In addition, he said his statement could serve as an example to others not to do the same. Here's the money line, Joe. CNN reserves the right to publish his identity should any of that change. What? So let me get this straight. We're blackmailing people now as journalists as long as they apologize for producing giffies we don't like? Folks, listen, Joe, I've been the subject of some pretty funny giffies over the years.

I'm pretty sure I've never made the effort to track anybody down and basically blackmail and harass them into not publishing another negative Dan Bongino gif again. What a load of crap. Really, right? I'm going to move on after this, but I had a funny one after I lost that election in Florida.

I announced publicly, and I'll announce again today and repeatedly to whoever asked, I'm not running for office again today and repeatedly to whoever asked. I'm not running for office again. I just, you know, I gave it a shot. I hate perennial candidates. I didn't win. It's time to move on.

Maybe God has a different path for me. There's nothing wrong with that. Gave it a college try, right? And some guy tweeted back to me because he doesn't like me at all. He tweeted back to me, Dan Bargeto isn't running for office again. And he had a giphy in there of this guy in a bear suit break dancing. And I got to tell you, you know, at first I was offended. And the more I, it's the funniest thing ever. If you get the chance to, I wish I had saved it. It's really funny. Like I never had the desire to track the guy down by his Twitter handle, whatever it was

at liberal, liberal toolbox. I know that wasn't his thing but that wasn't his handle but you get the point like i never had desire to go track the guy down and bribe him like i'm going to expose you and i'm going to give people your name and unless you apologize for this abhorrent behavior i mean this is folks this is just stupid time right now toolbox nice yeah it's just ridiculous all right moving on before i get to hey, folks, have you picked up a bottle of Brickhouse yet? I got another great email yesterday about Dawn to Dusk from another regular emailer to my Daniel Appongino account, which I always appreciate. I read your emails. Thanks for sending them.

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Go give it a shot. BrickHouseNutrition.com slash Dan. Okay. So yesterday's story, we were talking about Illinois and the Blue State meltdown going on right now. And I got an email from one guy who was basically terrified. What was his name? Hold on.

Let me just find this guy quick because it was a cool email. Well, Bobby. Bobby S, we'll call him. Bobby's like, brother, I didn't know it was that bad in Illinois. And he's like, is this true? I'm like, Bobby, I didn't know it was that bad in Illinois and he's like is this true I'm like Bobby I didn't email him back but I'll tell you on the air Bobby yes it's true Illinois you're really screwed listen to yesterday's show if you want to see how bad the budget situation in Illinois is but folks it doesn't end there because and the problem I'm having with this and the reason I keep talking about these blue state meltdowns is because the same exact policies happening in

these blue states are the policies Democrats nationally are advocating for for the entire nation. And I want to go back and readdress the topic I've addressed in episodes. I was big on this last summer. I used to talk about it all the time. Remember subsidiarity, Joe? I used to talk about it all the time. Last summer, I was all over this. And it deserves a re-mention here. Last summer, I was all over this, and it deserves a re-mention here. Folks, subsidiarity was basically a Catholic church principle, but it applies to politics, too. It's the idea that management and decision-making should be pushed down to the lowest level possible of organization. So we as conservatives generally support subsidiarity.

It's a really fancy way of saying local control. The reason we support local control is because your vote matters more in local elections where you can influence policy. If I'm voting for where I live, the Palm City, a commissioner in Palm City or a councilman, whatever it may be, right? If I'm voting for those people, Joe, and only 5, 5000 people show up, my vote really matters. I'm one of 5000. But in a national election, I'm one of, you know, what, 100 million people who could vote. My vote doesn't matter as much. It's a matter of simple math, folks. It's not a matter of opinion. You have more ability to sway policy at a local level. Secondly, when policies are pushed down and legislation is pushed down to the local level

rather than the national level, and I'll get to this as it relates to the states and national policy in a second, but when it's pushed down to the local level, it inconveniences the least amount of people possible who don't agree with that policy. There is no policy. Believe me, if you had a policy

that we're going to give out free candy to kids, there would always be a kid in the class who's going to vote against it. There's there's no policy. It's going to get 100 percent support ever. So the idea of living in a constitutional republic like we live in a not a direct democracy, but a constitutional republic, a representative democracies, we're going to elect people going to make decisions that are going to be unpopular with a lot of people, no matter what, Joe. decisions that are going to be unpopular with a lot of people, no matter what, Joe, no matter what. Now, when you have decision-making at the local level rather than at the national level, you are inconveniencing the least amount of people possible. Use the example of Obamacare. Take the exact same policy, the community rating, the guaranteed issue, the mandated benefits,

the individual mandate, the employee mandate, take all that stuff, Joe, transplant it from a national policy to Palm City, Florida. Think of the advantages there. You're like, your advantages to Obamacare? Yeah. You know what the advantage would have been? It would have sucked in Palm City so bad that 330 million Americans wouldn't have been subjected to it. So in Palm City, where it's about 65%, I'd say Republican, the rest Democrat or liberal,

right? You would have subjected, say 65 out of 100 people to this bad policy. And if you take a random group of 100 people, they would have been able to tell their neighbors how crappy it was. And it probably wouldn't have impacted the entire nation that's why conservatives love local control because your vote matters more and policies can either that are bad that are like test tube chamber policies like obamacare you don't have to impact the entire nation you can impact the local area first who can warn the rest of the nation how bad these things are democrats hate it they are anti-subsidiarity. They absolutely hate it. This is why Democrats and liberals, well, I should say liberals, not all Democrats, but liberals are globalists, Joe.

Globalism is the opposite of subsidiarity. It's the idea that control should be pushed out to not the smallest amount of people possible, but the largest amount of people possible, meaning global elites. That's why they love international organizations. They love the UN. They love international cooperation, not because they want to sit around a campfire and sing

Kumbaya, but because, Joe, this is critical. And you'll remember this from last summer. They don't want you to be able to escape. Right. So if you are a Palm City resident, Obamacare passes here. And again, it's about 65% Republican down here. You can move. You can say, you know what?

The health insurance plan, Palm City care that resembles Obamacare stinks so bad. I'm moving to Stewart or I'm moving to Hope Sound or Jupiter. Those are all surrounding areas. I'm getting out of Palm City because I want to deal with it. Fine. Go ahead. People can do that. That's a great part about living in a free country.

The reason liberals hate subsidiarity is precisely because of that, because you can escape. Liberals don't want you to escape because when given the option to escape, Joe, people do. People leave. They don't want you to leave because as I said in yesterday's show, liberals crave control and power. They economic, they, but they worship the power of the state. The state and power are the same thing to them. They need power. They don't care about policy. They care about power. They will stand for anything if it gives them power. As I said in yesterday's show, again, a tax hike, a tax cut, school choice,

they don't care. They will flip on a dime if they think it will empower them more. Now, conveniently, giving parents choice and giving people their money back typically disempowers the state. They're not completely unrelated, so they will usually rarely support them. But if they can support a tax cut and it gives them power to do something later on that implements state control, they'll do that too. They don't have any principles. Just listen to yesterday's show if you think I'm making this up, okay? Now, I wanted to bring this up because while we're on the topic of blue state madness in light of what's happening in Illinois, in light of what's happening in Connecticut, in light of what's happening in New Jersey right now, I wanted to give you an example from Maryland and why subsidiarity matters.

Given the opportunity to escape, people will. Now, Joe, you remember the millionaire's tax in Maryland? Yeah. Remember the huge controversy that was? We had a Democratic governor, super majorities in the House, super majorities in the Senate when I was in Maryland. And Governor Martin O'Malley, again, was a Democrat, pushed through this brilliant, and believe me, I'm using the term brilliant in the most negative way possible.

He had this brilliant idea for a millionaire's tax. The tax was projected to rake in $106 million. Here's what the tax was, to give you specific numbers. It was a hike in the tax of people who had roughly a million dollars in income or above from 4.75% to 6.25%. So it was a pretty substantial tax hike. And again, the projections were that it was going to raise $106 million. What do you think it did?

See ya! It lost $257 million. You got that abacus out there, our friend Jay? Is it Jay Davis? Jay, get the Jay Davis abacus out here. You got it? Yeah, yeah, yep. All right, you're going to have to move some beads around here.

So a gain projection of $106 million. So let's see, did it meet that? What's bigger than, is $107 million bigger than $106? It is, right? By $1 million? Yes. Yes, okay. Let's see. Did it meet that? 106. What's bigger than... Is 107 million bigger than 106? It is, right? By 1 million? Yes. Yes, okay. So if you lose, meaning put a negative in front of this.

If you don't gain 100, move the abacus, get their abacus ready. If you don't get 106 million and it's a negative, you lose $257 million from the same class of taxpayers. Is that... $257 million, Joe, clearly is less than 106 do the things is that right yeah so negative 257 million is less than 106 million yeah okay there you go jay comes through again with the abacus right here it's sad that jay had to help us out with this to walk liberals through this kind of stuff.

But I get it. We're being sarcastic. Joe and I like being silly, but how silly are we being? This is abacus math. I mean, this is simple. Liberals do not get it.

They still defended this tax cut. Remember Joe, all this, all the nonsense they had, they had a thousand different reasons. This thing didn't work. Oh, well, people don't only leave because of taxes. And here's the point, subsidiarity, by the way, which I just kind of teased a bit.

I might have stole my own thunder. What happened is millionaires fled the state because they didn't want to pay more money. They just fled. They had second houses in Maryland, and they were like, all right, we're just not going to declare residency in Maryland anymore. A lot of them moved to Florida.

One of them was a friend of mine who I'm not going to name, but he was a relatively wealthy guy. He had two homes, one in Maryland in Talbot County and one in Florida. And he just said, you know what? I'm just going to go declare my residency in Florida and stay down there. Folks, simple as that. It was a paperwork change. He didn't sell his house in Maryland. He just stayed there less often.

And you know what, Joe, here's the thing. You know what they collected from him, and he's probably worth easily over a million dollars in income a year. You know what they collected from him? Zero! Because he declared his residency in Florida. This is why liberals are globalists. The why matters.

You know, it doesn't do you any good. Oh, you know, globalism. Okay, why? Why are we afraid of globalism? No, we as conservatives, and I know many of you know this. I'm not trying to insult your intelligence. But we as conservatives have to make really good, powerful, salient, strong arguments as to why we believe in what we believe in because liberals own the media. So when we have facts, we have to get them out there on social media to fight the liberal

propaganda they have out there on the media. The reason globalism is a bad thing is because you cannot escape you can't escape it if that millionaire's tax was national i got news for you whatever state you live in you would have been subjected to it folks it's a scam you're being screwed globalism is a liberal thing and it has nothing to do, and this is why I object to it so strongly, it has nothing to do at all with shared international values and all this flowery crap BS they put out there. It has nothing to do with it. It has everything to do with the fact that they don't want you to escape ever.

They want all of their policies to affect everyone all the time. It's no more complicated than that. Oh, man, that Maryland millionaire's tax. It infuriates me. It really does. Now, in a little more current events, in relationship to yesterday's piece, which is in the show notes, and I'll put it in today's again, about Illinois and what's going on in Connecticut as well. Connecticut, Joe, raised their top tax rate to 6.99%, which is three-quarters of a point higher than the Maryland millionaire's tax. Connecticut thought this was a great idea, too. What happened there?

Again, liberals, this is the facts portion of the show. I know this is tough for you. Take a volume or something to calm down if this bothers you, but these are just the facts. What you do with them is completely up to you. So Connecticut raises its top tax rate again, 6.99%, nearly 7%. Income tax revenues, Joe, I had to underline this to make sure I emphasized it, were downgraded by $1.1 billion. Okay, raised income tax, 6.99%.

Income tax revenues downgraded by 1.1 billion. Libs, again, don't let facts get in the way here. Just keep fighting for higher taxes, even though you get nothing out of it at the state level. Sales and corporate taxes plummeted by $450 million after a hike in the corporate tax as well. I don't... Where do we go with this?

Now, Daniel Malloy, who is the governor of connecticut now to be fair those tax hikes happen happened with a democrat uh overwhelming democrat majority in their house and their senate but there was a i think jody rel was a republican governor when these taxes right but again it was the idea joe that oh this is a sensible republican hiking taxes you're not getting tax money out of it. People are leaving. What's your solution? Keep them there at the barrel of a gun? Have stationed state troopers at the border?

Don't give many ideas. You know what? That's a good point. That's funny. You're absolutely right. Don't give many ideas is right. That could be another T-shirt. Democrats, don't give them any ideas.

I like that. But Dan O'Maloy, Joe,, is now they're in a severe budget crisis in Connecticut. Right. So the governor there wants to shift pension because they can't pay public pensions anymore. They just don't have the money, just like Illinois, which has one hundred thirty billion in liabilities, pension liabilities. They don't have the money. There's no money. Listen, folks, there's just no money. So Malloy wants to shift the pension uh payments the future pension payments to cities now the cities in connecticut a lot of the cities are run by democrats and the democrats in the cities are like wait wait wait we're not going to pay for this these are state pensions you guys are going to pay for it so now there's this again what i told you yesterday that i'm not trying to repeat yesterday's show i'm just trying to tell you how profound the negative psychology amongst the left is that they don't see the implosion of their own movement even coming here

they're starting to fight now amongst themselves the democrats this is all good news for us by the way but they're actually fighting amongst themselves because now the cities are saying, no, we're not paying those pensions. So now Daniel Malloy is responding by saying, okay, maybe we'll do this. Maybe we'll just bump up the state sales tax. Not just the governor, but a lot of Democrats want to bump up the state sales tax, which by the way, is a regressive tax, meaning it affects the poor. It's not a progressive tax. It's a regressive tax. It affects the poor. Now, why is that? Because a greater quantity, a greater percentage of the income of middle class and poor folks is spent on consumption type behaviors, food, gasoline, Joe, things like that. Entertainment. If you're spending $15 on a movie, you go to one of those fancy places like I go in Jupiter, which I really like. I probably shouldn't say that. I sound like a liberal, limousine liberal, but it's a cool movie theater.

If you're spending $15 on a movie, $100 in the supermarket, and $80 a week on gas, and you make $40,000 a year, that's a big chunk of your income, folks. And if the sales tax goes up on those items, that's a big chunk of your income, folks. And if the sales tax goes up on those items, that's a big chunk of your gross income. But, and here's the but, if you're making $2 million a year and you're spending the same thing, $80 in gas, $200 on gross fees, and you go to see a few movies, that's not a big chunk of your income. That sales tax, folks, is nearly insignificant. It is a regressive tax, the sales tax. It hurts the poor poor so here's my

point to sum this up i made the argument yesterday about factions how they start the liberal factions are starting to fight each other now the cities which are run by democrats don't want to pay the pensions so they're they're saying no no i'd prefer a sales tax a statewide sales tax hike which by the way is going to affect all of the poor and middle-income people throughout the state to a greater extent than it'll affect the rich. But we tried to milk the rich, and the rich already left Connecticut. Folks, it's like a joke, and nothing will change these people's minds.

They are obsessed with class warfare and income inequality, and nothing will stop the buffoonery. Nothing. I'm just giving you the numbers. We don't mess around on the show. We don't jerk you around. I'm just giving you the numbers. What you do with them is entirely up to you.

All right, I got a couple other stories I want to get to. But hey, also, today's show brought to you by buddies at My Patriot Supply. Big fan of these guys. You know, you have to have a supply of emergency food. But everything going on with North Korea and their obsession with an electromagnetic pulse, atmospheric nuclear detonation. I'm not making this up. This is something they've threatened repeatedly. Thank God the chances of that are very low.

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and I hate when I do this and I don't bring it up. So I'll just quickly hit on it. Remember the story about the Texas wind farms? And I kept saying, and I just got lost. There was so much going on last week. There was just an interesting story. And I saw, I think it was in Bloomberg about these wind farms in Texas. I'll look it up. I'll get it in the show notes today for you. You can check it out, but I just wanted to bring it up. I found the story interesting because, you know, the Greenies obsession with solar and renewables and wind energy, it's ironic that there is a market for this, Joe. And listen, I'm a capitalist. If wind energy turns out to be cost effective and a great

way to produce energy, I'm all for it. The problem I have is when we talk about things like public investments in renewable energy, what Democrats are really saying is taking taxpayer money and giving it to companies that couldn't attract taxpayer money if they had to do it without the cudgel of government. You know what I'm saying, Joe? I sure do. I mean, when you talk about taxation and you refer to it as public investments, what you're really saying is investments people weren't willing to make with their own money

because then you wouldn't need public money, right? The problem I have with the wind industry is there are areas of the country where wind is super effective. And the Gulf Coastline in Texas, there's a great story I'd read about how wind is so plentiful over there during the day. The problem they have with wind, ordinarily, folks, is it doesn't blow as heavily during the day when people need it. So they haven't found an effective way to store all the energy that builds up at night when the wind is a little bit more intense. You get what I'm saying? They don't have batteries basically big enough to store all that. That's not a problem in the Texas Gulf where the wind blows 24 hours a day. There's a whole bunch of reasons why, meteorological reasons I don't care

to explain, but all you have to know is it can work in certain areas. And that's a great part about capitalism. Matter of fact, it works so well, it's putting natural gas in that area nearly out of business. So I just wanted to bring it up to show you that when liberals attack you and say, oh, you know, you guys are all for coal and whatever dirty energy,

all these stupid talking points they develop in clueless focus groups of limousine liberals from Manhattan and, you know, the village and places where we could never live because we couldn't afford it. When they do that with these focus groups, folks, they're not telling you the truth. We're all for wind and solar. What we're for, though, is wind and solar that's cost competitive so that it doesn't bankrupt people in the process of trying to subsidize it with taxpayer money that you'd never get your

mitts on if you didn't use the force of government to get it that's just a better way to say it so i i forgive me last week for not bringing that story up but i i noticed i get a lot of emails from binge listeners and i wonder sometimes like when i when i bring up a story right and i say that and i never get to it i wonder if they're in their garages or something listening and around like your second or third hour of the show and they're like is this dude ever going to talk about this? Or are you what? So there you go. Finally got that out of the way.

Two more quick. I got to knock out for you. The North Korea thing, I just want to cover quickly. All right. We're in a little bit of trouble with North Korea. I'm not suggesting we should engage in a World War III right now with the North Koreans,

the Chinese and the Russians. Please, I am a conservatarian. I know people have a problem with that label, but I have some very proud libertarian streaks in me that I'm not going to run away from. And one of them is I think we have to be very careful about where we send our troops. And I think libertarians are very cautious of that. I have a lot of respect for them for that. The know, the Fox-Connor rules of war. You know, never go to war alone, never go for long, and never go to war unless you absolutely have to. I've never forgotten that. Check those out.

Fox-Connor's rules of war. Eisenhower was a big fan of his. I never forgot those three rules. They're simple, but they should be true. And, you know, when you lost a family member like I have in combat, I never met him. I want to be clear. He was my uncle and my mother's older brother. But it was so impactful on my life because my family was pre and post Greg. I mean, nothing was the same. Greg Ambrose was his name. I have his Vietnam memorial,

you know, where you put the chalk on the wall right in front of me here. I never met him, but it impacted my mother, my aunts, and my grandmother so deeply. My grandmother was never the same. She lost her, you know, teenage son, basically, in Vietnam, shot in the back rather heroically. I've told this story on the show before. But he's a hero of mine. He really is. His story's amazing, what he did.

You know, in a firefight in a firefight through Duck, Vietnam, where he was killed. And my family was never the same, ever, ever. I mean, my grandmother, when she died, still Greg was on her mind all the time. And I just remember the story. We owned a bar in New York and they thought he was coming home and two army uh two two men from the army showed up and instead of Greg you know when they showed up my grandfather at the time yelled at them and told him to go away because he knew what happened and my grandmother was just they had to put her in a hospital she was they had a sedator I mean mean, she was devastated. I didn't intend to get off on that. I mean, it's not a tangent to me, but you listen to my show, and I just want you to

understand why I consider myself a conservatarian and not a strict conservative on some national security issues. Because I feel like when we're going to put other people's kids into combat, it damn well better be a very serious, credible, existential threat to us. I don't think we should be casually dedicating our armed forces overseas to the safety and security of other countries not willing to send their own kids into combat themselves. The problem I have right now with North Korea, and the reason I think we may have to, we may, there's no reason right now to jump into this tomorrow.

But we, and I know people are battle planning. I don't mean to sound cavalier about it. But these are not rational actors, the North Koreans. Joe, what would we do if you and I woke up one morning on the podcast and we were reporting on a nuclear detonation in Alaska. I mean, how do you even discuss that on the show? Now, folks, I get it. I know this sounds insane and crazy, but it sounds insane because a lot of people in the national security establishment, I'm on a lot of listservs, email groups, with very credible people with very, really unbelievable resumes. I don't want to say who.

I don't want to say anymore. But these aren't just bit players. A lot of people out there are downplaying this North Korean threat under the assumption that there are people in the North Korean regime that are rational maximizers in economic terms. In other words, reasonable people that understand the minute the North Koreans launched, North Korea is wiped off the map. Folks, I'm not sure that that's the case. The Otto Warmbier thing really changed things for me.

If you're looking to engage in credible international negotiations, like you're saying the North Koreans are, how do you basically choke a kid out, torture him to death, and send him home in a coma? That's not rational, folks. That's not reasonable. The North Koreans, if they were reasonable, must have known that was going to really damage their international reputation. The point is they didn't care.

Now, there's a big difference between launching a nuke and torturing a person. They're both depraved, don't get me wrong, but one is a, you're talking about a geometric expansion of the use of force from one person to millions, Joe. You know, a nuke versus the torturing of a person. They both take a moral vacuum. But we're talking about consequences that are

geometrically greater. But ladies and gentlemen, I'm just going to leave you with this. I'm not so sure these people are as reasonable as some people in the national security establishment think they are. And if we now know that they at least are capable of launching a missile towards Guam, where we have an enormous number of US assets, and potentially towards Alaska. Now, we don't know yet that they have the technology to arm that missile with a nuclear device because you have to leave the atmosphere and re-enter, and the re-entry causes vibration and heat. So they're not sure yet that they, and I'm not sure they're there either. But the point is, do we want to wake up one morning and figure out, oh, they're there

and how do we know? Because there was a mushroom cloud over Alaska. Folks, we're in a little bit of trouble with them. And here's my, not solution, but the idea that me and thousands of other people, it's certainly not an original idea. Regime change, we have to do it. I mean, it hasn't worked for us in the Middle East, but in other areas of the world, you know, it has where you have a population, I think, eager to get back to civilization. And I think in this case, the North Koreans are, they have a South Korean neighbor. It's worked for us in, you know, with the unification of

Germany. It worked for us in Japan, you had the legacy of imperial rule. I think it could work with the North Koreans. And how that regime change happens, there are obviously legal barriers to that with assassination and things like that. But I mean, Joe, what are we going to do? Are we going to let this guy hold the entire world at the end of a barrel of a gun forever? the entire world at the end of a barrel of a gun forever? I mean, we obviously can't engage in a preemptive nuclear strike. That's insane. I mean, what are you going to do? We wipe out North Korea? I mean, the fallout would fall over South Korea. Remember, the North Koreans have, you know,

hundreds of metric tons of artillery aimed at South Korea. The minute you drop them, they're going to launch artillery into the, you know, 35 miles south into South Korea, destroy the whole city. Right. You know, it's a serious problem, but something's got to be done about the North Korean leader. Our buddy Kim's got to go. He has to go. They have to do something. He's not our buddy.

He's a fool, but you get the point. Little fat guy. Can we call him little fat guy? Yeah, Kim done soon. Dude, that's funny. Paula thinks you're hysterical. And she throws compliments around like freaking manhole covers.

Yeah, she does. She doesn't. You know, Paula, she's like, I don't have an agent folks. So,

you know, one, because I'm not a pretentious jerk, but I mean, I don't, I may one day for, for different business reasons. Some people just like to have an agent to say they have an agent.

But no knock on agents, by the way. You do a good job. I really had a lawyer once. But I say that because Paula, a lot of times, just is my intermediary. And she's like AB, man. All business, all day. She doesn't think anything. She thinks Joe's hysterical.

She thinks your lines are class Kim Dunn Seward. Dude, that's classic. I may have to like hashtag that all right you got me like crying a little bit here one last thing i wanted to hit because i teased it yesterday uh put this piece in the show notes a really good piece in the wall street journal folks we're not out of the water yet in the economy and it would be really unfair for me to report to you that, oh, because Trump got elected, the economy's turned around, everything's magic. Listen, he's doing a lot of great things. I'm not diminishing the Trump presidency at all. There's been a ton of regulatory reform. Even the talk of tax reform has helped.

We're still looking at hopefully some healthcare reforms, right? So things are good. Don't take this the wrong way. Things are good on the policy front. Things are not necessarily great in the economy yet. And there was a number in here I want you to remember. It's from this Wall Street Journalist piece. They quote this guy, Nicholas Everstadt. The labor force participation rate, in other words, the amount of people actually working,

for men, 25 to 54, prime working age men, the people who can produce the most, who are the most productive uh men there's women obviously productive too but we're just talking about men in this case 25 to 54 the labor force partition participation rate for that group joe is lower now than it was at the end of the great depression folks remember what i've told you about productivity there's only a couple ways to increase the amount of things we produce which is our wealth our wealth is measured by productivity what we produce medicine food that's how you feel wealthy. No one feels wealthy

if they don't have anything, okay? We can only do that by increasing the amount of output, things we produce with the same amount of inputs, or by decreasing the amount of inputs and producing the same amount of output. Because by decreasing the amount of inputs, you have labor available for other things, which will eventually lead to greater output later on. You get what I'm saying? Yeah. You don't have as many workers. You have other workers available to do other things.

Folks, if we don't have people working and we have a labor force participation rate for men 25 to 54, lower than it was at the end of the Great Depression, I would be very skeptical about where we are at the economy. And it's just another reason to push Republican lawmakers to get your hands out of whatever the hell they're doing. Stop sitting on them and whatever else you're doing with them and start getting busy on tax reform. One more statistic from this piece, which, again, I was like, gosh, I knew it was bad, but I couldn't believe it was this bad. 41% of non-disabled adults on Medicaid don't have jobs. Whoa. 41% of non, we're not talking about disabled adults on Medicaid, people who can't work. We're talking about functional people who have full function of their, we're not talking about people who have some kind of physical disability that impedes them from actually working. We're talking about

people who are totally able to work. They have no disability at all. 41% of non-disabled adults on Medicaid don't have any jobs at all. What are you doing? No, I'm serious. Like Joe and I are not, we're not the smartest guys in the room. We're not the best looking. But you know, Joe and I work hard. We put together a good show. It takes a long time to put together.

I'm just curious and I'm dead serious. I don't mean this as a moral or ethical insult. I'm asking you a serious question. What the hell are you doing all day? Are you seriously telling me you can't find a job? I mean, there's got to be something. Restaurants, fast food. There's got to be something.

What are you doing all day? I mean, I got guys coming in and out of my house all the time where these guys bust their butts it's florida it's 100 degrees down here during the day i got guys actually landscapers busting their butts all day what are you doing all day i just don't get it that statistic really irked me so all right i'm just gonna take that down a road that i don't want to go because i don't want to alienate people otherwise all right i'm just gonna take that down a road that i don't want to go because i don't want to alienate people otherwise all right folks i appreciate it thank you again for for listening in it's been a long day had a busy night last night so uh you know i'm it's been just a crazy

week but i had another exciting show for you on friday don't miss it see you all soon thanks for you just heard the dan bongino show get more of Dan online anytime at conservativereview.com. You can also get Dan's podcasts on iTunes or SoundCloud. And follow Dan on Twitter 24-7 at DBongino.