The Dan Bongino Show - Ep. 574 Is Our Government for Sale?

Episode Date: October 23, 2017

In this episode -   Incredibly ironic that the “Trump-Russia” investigation is evolving into a “Democrats-Russia” investigation. http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/byron-york-is-tone-of-trump-russia-probe-changing/article/2638309   Big government healthcare is collapsing in Massachusetts but the Left still thinks it’s a model of success. http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/massachusetts-shows-rationing-is-inevitable-when-government-is-in-charge-of-healthcare/article/2638176   Why are Americans dying sooner? https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-10-23/americans-are-retiring-later-dying-sooner-and-sicker-in-between   Scientists discover a chemical in blood that drives predators mad. https://www.yahoo.com/news/scientists-blood-molecule-attracts-wolves-repels-humans-115020698.html   Democrats are fighting this tax cut for small businesses because they think your money is theirs. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-10-23/this-big-tax-cut-for-high-fliers-shows-why-an-overhaul-is-hard       Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Dan Bongino. They've been tweeting to me, Bongino's a nut, Bongino's a blanker, blanker. The Dan Bongino Show. Everywhere big government gets bigger, corruption grows bigger, and these liberals just keep going on and on and on about how great big government is, and they can't prove to you any examples of how wonderful big government is almost anywhere. Get ready to hear the truth about America. Young kids, you are too stupid to figure out your health insurance needs, so we're going

to hammer your cabooses to death until you figure out that the government knows what's best and you're an idiot. 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? Happy Monday, everybody. Yeah, man. Dude, I am itching to get backegade Republican with Dan Bongino. Producer Joe, how are you today? Happy Monday, everybody. Yeah, man. Dude, I am itching to get back on the mats with the grappling.

I'm dying here, folks. I'm dying here. I mean, obviously not actually. Well, we're all actually dying at some point. But, you know, I hurt my shoulder and it's not bad, nothing dramatic. But I've had to stay off the mats for a little while. And I love this grappling. And the thing about grappling and ground fighting

and Brazilian jiu-jitsu and like ultimate fighting type stuff is you got to get, you have to grapple. You have to actually like grapple, spar, like roll around, throw each other around and do stuff. And that's my thing. I don't, you know, I haven't told my jiu-jitsu instructor guy this year,

but I hate drilling stuff. I hate it. I just like to spar. That's it. All the, because you figure it out. When you got some big dude on top of you guy this year but i i hate drilling stuff i hate it i just like the spar that's it all the because you figure it out when you got some big dude on top of you is like 300 pounds or 200 pounds and super strong and he's you're in like a half guard on the bottom and he's smashing you and you're and your head is sideways you can't breathe because this g top is you're sucking it into

your mouth every time because it's falling over your face. And you're like, you know what happens? You learn super quick how to get the hell out of that because it sucks. And I just love it so much. I've been telling this doctor I've been seeing how much I love it. He's going now, too. I mean, it's just a passion. That's right. It is killing me.

Killing me. Eating me alive inside not being on the mats because i was just starting to get really good like i know self-praise things but now i see things i never saw before oh it's eating me up all right a lot to talk about enough about me let's get to the show here um you know what this muller investigation is just uh exploding the special investigation that was allegedly started for russian collusion i'd argue that's been focused more on trump but interesting development over the weekend uh folks this thing is starting to take a really nasty turn for the democrats uh the what we would refer to as the trump russia investigation even though there

is no trump russia collusion scandal. Now it's been leaked that the Mueller investigation, the special counsel, is looking into the activities of the Podesta group, which was run by John Podesta's brother. For those of you who forgot who Podesta was, he was Hillary Clinton's consigliere, big time campaign consultant. He was the chief of staff at the White House. This is a guy who's been around Democrat politics forever. His brother has been intimately involved with lobbying on behalf of foreign governments. And now it looks like the special counsel is going to be looking into Podesta as well. Folks, it doesn't make me a fan of the special counsel investigation. I'm not going to be a hypocrite.

Oh, Joe, now that you're looking at Democrats, this this is just a great idea i think special counsels are universally a bad idea we already have a department of justice that was in no way prohibited from looking into russian collusion whether with democrats or anybody else a special counsel is nothing other than give it a title special there's nothing new about it okay so it was i think it's a waste of time but i bring this up not i don't want to get into that you know it's this is an old story already but folks our government is for sale um and this has really bothered me and i have a couple of stories i'm going to tie into a larger narrative here and i'm going to give you a solution at the end to not leave you all hanging but the the pedestal story and and and to be fair

an angle they're taking on manafort as well paul manafort who was trump's campaign manager for a little while who was fired by the way and i'm believe me i i fully understand the trump russia collusion narrative is garbage it's nonsense i we get that. So please don't email me and say, what are you saying? The Trump-Russia thing's garbage. It's completely fabricated. But Manafort did do some lobbying on behalf of Ukraine as well, a foreign government. The Podesta thing is equally, though, frightening. And when you see what happened with the Uranium One deal and the scandal that's been breaking over the weeks. And I know, I know Peter Schweitzer wrote about this in this book, about the sale of uranium assets to the Russians while the Obama administration

was in office and while Hillary Clinton and the Clinton, well, and the Clinton Foundation was taking millions of dollars in speaker fees from a company intimately involved in the purchasing of nuclear fuel assets from the United States by the Russians. Folks, the government is for sale. The government has been for sale for a long time.

Now, I read that story and I was in the gym this morning working out and I'm like, well, I don't really want to cover the Trump-Russia story again, but I do want to cover what the problems are that we're having right now with the unnecessarily influence of government against allied against the taxpayers. We saw it with Uranium One. We saw it with some Russian interference trying to get involved in our election, which nobody disputes. I'm only telling you that it had nothing to do with benefiting the Trump campaign, at least with Trump's knowledge. That's nonsense. So I saw a few stories. Here's the first one. That's nonsense.

So I saw a few stories. Here's the first one. You know, I've been talking about this, this, the tax code and the Trump tax plan, the Trump tax cuts, tax rate cuts. And one of the things that's bothering me is the interest groups now coming out against it. And again, these are interest groups that lobby. They lobby the government in no differently than John Podesta did or Manafort did or anyone else who's taking money from an

entity to advance that entity's cause. Now, I'm not suggesting we should stop free speech. I'm just telling you that there are ways to stop this unnecessary influence in the government that doesn't infringe on free speech. I'll get to that at the end, but here's another example of this. This is driving me nuts. I read a letter from the National Association of Realtors this morning. It's in the Wall Street Journal, Joe, about this mortgage interest deduction they're trying to hold on to. This has become a big deal on the tax rates cuts. Now, folks, yes, this is going to impact many of you. What is the mortgage interest rate deduction?

I've described it before. You get to deduct from your income the interest you pay on your mortgage. Not necessarily the principal, but the interest. Obviously, the principal's involved because your mortgage. Not necessarily the principal, but the interest. Obviously, the principal's involved because you're paying interest on the principal. But if you pay a $3,000 a month mortgage, granted, that's a lot of money, but it's a pretty big mortgage, and $2,000 of that is interest, you get to deduct a solid portion of that interest from your income, therefore not paying taxes on a portion of your mortgage. income, therefore not paying taxes on a portion of your mortgage. The mortgage interest lobby wants to preserve that, and they are passionately fighting to hold on to this thing. And they wrote

a letter in the Wall Street Journal this morning, it appeared in today's Wall Street Journal, responding to calls by many Republicans and some Democrats as well to get rid of this mortgage interest deduction and to just have a flatter, fairer tax code. And they say two things, Joe. They say, well, you know, potentially home values will go down because it's going to cost more then for people to own homes for the obvious reason, Joe, if you were getting a tax deduction for the interest portion of your mortgage you're paying and you don't get that anymore, then that's more money at the end of the year you're going to have to pay towards housing because you're not getting any of it quote back from the government because you're not getting the

deduction make sense so they're saying well home values would go down because right now that would be that that deductions factored into the price which depresses the cost a little bit and makes it more affordable folks that is total complete junk okay i get it that in one or two or three years maybe afterwards while the market readjusts there may be some correction in the pricing towards the actual market price but over time this is far better for the economy now they make another point in there that social safety nets in other countries because i had said last week during the show and which is accurate by the way that other countries don't allow this and have higher rates of home ownership. So saying that, oh, we should allow people to deduct the interest on the mortgage, Joe,

will lead to higher rates of home ownership doesn't comport with what's happening in foreign countries. That's not accurate. They say, well, other countries have different social safety nets. Yeah, the countries we're talking about have bigger social safety nets, have bigger government spending loads. I don't see how that's an example of a positive thing we're supposed to emulate or not emulate. They're different scenarios. They're not related to each other at all other than the tax rates that are paid to finance them. So they're losing their minds, the real estate lobby, because they don't want to lose this benefit. Secondly, another story, how the government's being bought off. Now, why do I

say that? Because the real estate lobby is not a knock on real estate agents. I'm just saying that instead of fighting for a fairer, flatter tax code, which I'll get to in a second, they're fighting for their carve out too. Just like Podesta was fighting for a carve out for the people he was lobbying for. And Manafort was fighting for a carve out for the people they were lobbying for. The EPA this week, another one, caved on this biofuels quota what was the biofuels quota folks we have to blend a certain amount of ethanol into gasoline this is this decision is i i get it i totally get it that people who are farmers who produce the agricultural products

that go into ethanol that this benefits them just like i get it the mortgage interest deduction may temporarily benefit people in the real estate in the real estate industry excuse me through higher home prices and greater commissions but just like this distorted tax code in the real estate industry i don't think benefits society at large because it leads to higher home prices which sucks more money out of the economy. The same thing's going on with this ethanol. The EPA caved on this, which is stunning to me. They allowed this to continue, this biofuels quota, forcing more ethanol into our gasoline, despite very little evidence over the long term that this is going to benefit us. It benefits ethanol. I get it. I understand that there are farmers that profit from that. I'm not knocking

you for making a living. I'm just saying that this is another example of how all of us are going to have to get big and give up something. So we're not willing to give up the mortgage interest deduction, but which benefits me. I'm not, don't email me and be like, oh yeah, real brave. It doesn't hurt you. you no it hurts me directly i will potentially lose money on that but i know it's better and i'll get to the solution in a minute if we do x which i'll talk about in a minute just like i know it's better in the long run to find the highest and best use for our corn supply other than sticking it in the gas tank of a car that doesn't need it. Right. Third article, Joe, right out of your, I'm on a couple email lists still from Maryland when I was running for office up there.

I saw an article this morning. Again, I'm having a hard time believing this, that this is the kind of stuff that Americans aren't starting to see through right now as we're all going collectively broke. There's a governor's race in Maryland, re-election race race there's a republican governor by the name of larry hogan up there uh he's got a lot of democrats eye in his seat he won in an upset um i think he's gonna have a really tough time getting re-elected you know i hope he does he's you know he's generally uh he's generally okay on some issues he's been a bit of a disappointment on others but yeah i hope he gets re-elected for the purposes of redistricting. Joe knows and has met him. I know him pretty well as well.

And there was a conference out in, I think it was in Ocean City with the Maryland Teachers Union. So they had, of course, all the Democrat candidates running out there to lobby for their endorsement. Here's a quote from the Baltimore Sun folks. Again, how your government is entirely for sale. It says, one by one over the course of two days, the eight Democrats running for governor climbed the convention center stage here, courting one of the most coveted endorsements in Maryland. The support of the sprawling and powerful teachers union. Listen to this, Joe. This is a kicker.

The candidates offered big promises to increase funding for public schools, sometimes by more than $2 billion a year. This is incredible. This is amazing. Now, it goes on to say later in the piece that the benefits of these Democrat candidates for governor offering the teachers union all this free stuff that you're paying for, by the way, $2 billion a year. $2 billion a year, by the way. The benefits of all this is the teachers union gives out roughly $2 million in donations a year and provides 2,000 volunteers. How is your government not for sale? Hey, how is that not like

legalized bribery? We are the teachers union. We get paid by the taxpayers. The taxpayers will then elect a governor. The governor will then take more of the taxpayer money to give to a teachers union that will in turn give money and volunteers to have said governor elected or reelected. Folks, your government is for sale.

Now, not to beat this topic up, I spent 12 minutes on it, but these were frustrating stories. I read them and I'm like, when are we, I keep talking about getting big. Folks, I get emails all the time from people whenever I discuss anything that someone's going to take it on the chin. But do you understand that we are all going to sink together if something doesn't change soon? There is no possible way to continue on as a society with $20 trillion in debt to suck money out of the free market economy into the annals of government to dish out to ethanol, to dish out in real estate deductions, to dish out in expanded benefits for teachers unions.

Folks, we don't have the money. We don't have the, there's no money. I mean, the show about social security, people want, I got 20, 30 people want Looney Tunes on me. And keep in mind,

I wasn't even suggesting people now, despite I know I'll get emails, it doesn't matter what I say, people still hear what they want to hear. I wasn't suggesting people even on Social Security now lose their benefits. But people 55 and younger, there's no money. There is just no money.

I don't know why. What makes you think there's money? Oh, it's in a lockbox. Yeah, where's the lockbox? I don't know. Someone told me that once. There's no money. I don't know where, why, what makes you think there's money? Oh, it's in a lockbox. Yeah. Where's the lockbox? I don't know. Someone told me that once there's no money. They spent,

it's not our fault. The government spent it. It's the government did it. Bureaucrats did it, but elected politicians did it, but that doesn't absolve us of the reality that there's simply no money. Again, I don't know.

I get that the real estate lobby wants to keep that for higher home prices. I get that the ethanol lobby wants to keep it for people who produce farm products that lead to ethanol. I get that the teachers union wants more money. But when are we all going to say collectively that it's time for something a little more reasonable? Oh, this is another quote, by the way, from that piece about the teachers union. This is a kicker, Joe. This is from the teachers union representative at the meeting we're ready to be all in and to be the biggest player on the progressive side of the maryland of maryland politics progressive not the taxpayer side right joe there's nothing in there about the taxpayer financing this large s

nothing they're interested in being a big player on the progressive side of politics. They're lobbying against you. They're lobbying against you. It's your money. Folks, we are all going to have to give something up. Now, here's the solution. Folks, we need a flat tax.

And we should have no more public unions. I'm sorry. I was an employee i know i've been there i was a public employee in the police department in new york city i was a public employee with the secret service we had no union with the secret service we got paid just fine you know why the secret service had to attract people with the skills necessary to accomplish the job and the only people with those skills demanded a certain amount of money to get hired. The Secret Service is a very complicated position. You needed a four-year degree. Practically speaking, you needed a graduate degree. I mean, on paper, you need a four-year degree, but I don't remember that many people getting hired

without a four-year degree and some significant work experience afterwards. People with those kinds of skills are not going to accept less than a certain amount of money. A public union to do what? To lobby against the public? This is taxpayer money. Get rid of public unions. That's it. Full stop. Now, secondly, we need a flat tax because these distortions in the tax code. Now, I do understand the real estate lobby and their argument here. And remember, I lose money on this. Yeah. I understand their point, Joe.

Their point is like, well, why should we give it up, our deduction and nobody else? I totally get it. And that is an absolutely 100% reasonable response. You shouldn't. If the tax code is going to be a bunch of crap crony handouts and we're not going to wipe it clean at the same time, Joe, and just do a flat tax.

And when I say a flat tax, I mean 15%, 20% tax rate across the board. Everybody pays the same amount. Nobody gets a crony deduction. That's it. That's the only way to do it. But nobody has the guts to say that. Why? Because just going back to my initial point I opened up with,

our government's for sale. These are the same lobbyists who go up to Capitol Hill. They make $2,600, $5,200 donations to reelection campaigns for members of Congress, to local, state, federal officials, to United States senators everywhere. And they buy off our government and our government is for sale to every, basically to the highest bidder. Oh, the real estate lobby, we can't upset them. The teacher's lobby, we the highest bidder oh the real estate lobby we can't upset them the teachers lobby we can't upset them the ethanol lobby we can't upset them what about the american taxpayer lobby do we get a say in this folks i am not benefiting from i'm losing on this and i'm telling you the best thing for the united states economy is to stop the distortions through the tax code and the misallocations of potentially trillions of

dollars in assets over decades towards crony businesses that where prices are not reflecting reality and let's start doing a flat tax where people have to actually compete on value it's frustrating man i'm reading these stories this morning in a gym maryland teachers epa um you know john pedest is under. Now the mortgage interest deduction. And I'm like, gosh, when do we get a say in this? Holy Moses. Seriously, when do we get to sit down and be

like, hey, do we have a seat at the table or are we just the ones constantly getting screwed? It's frustrating. All right. Hey, I'm really stoked here. We have a new sponsor on board. Now, now folks for all of you people out there all of you listeners who are even remotely interested in self-protection the second amendment you know you got to train with your firearm right now it's expensive we all know

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especially for such an important skill. Alright. More breaking news over the weekend. There is... I got a couple of emails from people about the deduction for your 401k contributions potentially going down to 2400 joe people were pissed i mean like emails like what the hell i mean caps exclamation points uh asterisks you know covering up for the curses in there. I mean, I had stuff that was sent to spam because people put everything in caps. They were fired up. Here, let me just sum this

up for you in a nutshell. It won't, it's not going to happen. So for those of you who heard that the Trump tax plan is going to eliminate the deduction we have now for 401k. Not eliminate it. Reduce it significantly to up to $2,400 a year. Trump put out a tweet this morning. He said, not going to happen. Forget it. Okay? So forget it. I think it's a horrible idea.

If it ever comes up again, call your legislators immediately. Folks, the issue I have with this, in addition to the other solution I just put out about a flat tax and the elimination of public unions, another one is I would like to see a almost quadrupling of the deductibility of 401k. I mean, I'd like to see up to $50,000 a year. Why would I say that? Folks, the economics of this are very simple.

The capital stock matters. Not to use wonky economic terms, I don't want to buoy you to death, but the capital stock matters. The capital stock is. Not to use wonky economic terms. I want to buoy you to death. But the capital stock matters. The capital stock is our productive capacity. Our capital, our ability, our land, our machinery, Joe. The things that enable us to produce T-shirts, computers, iPhones, everything. Trees.

I mean, we have a tree farm, Becker Tree Farm down the road on 95. I'm always impressed with the amount of capital. They have a ton of land to produce a tree farm. All of this stuff was created and the capital stock was created through savings, through American and international savings. People save up, they buy the land, they buy the equipment to produce t-shirts, they buy the equipment to produce iPhones, they buy the equipment to produce computers. This is all accumulated through savings, whether ours or others. Remember, you can say, well, I took a loan. I didn't save it. No, no. Someone else saved and gave you the loan. To build the capital stock

and to build more stuff cheaply, which is what matters, productivity matters, to build stuff cheaply, we need to build the capital stock and we need savings. 401ks are a significant source of that. Cutting that, and again, it's not going to happen, but I got a lot of emails, so I want to be sure I address it. Cutting that or the ability for you to deduct only $2,400 rather than, what is it, like $15,000 now? It would be, I mean, seriously, folks, one of the dumbest ideas I've ever heard in American history. I'm not kidding. So people ask me my opinion. That's my opinion. One, it's economically incredibly stupid. You would destroy the capital stock of the United States and destroy our capacity to produce stuff in the future. And secondly, you would up your tax bill significantly because now you'd be paying taxes on 10 to $12,000 in income. You weren't paying taxes on

in the past, which could mean three, $4,000 in tax bills, depending on what your tax rate is, Joe. Horrible idea. But Trump tweeted out this morning, which I deeply appreciate, it's not going to happen. So don't worry about it. Got a lot of emails on it.

Wanted to cover it, but don't worry about it. All right. A couple other stories I saw this morning, which I found interesting. Here's one kind of unrelated. I probably should cover this on Rough Cuts, but we'll do another one of those too, by the way. People have asked me.

I just haven't decided. All right. Scientists. This was on Drudge this morning, and I think I saw it on Zero Hedge too. Scientists. This is kind of creepy, Joe. They discovered this chemical in blood called E2D, right?

E2D. E2D, like R2D2E2D2, right? E2D. E2D, like R2D2 E2D2, right? E2D. And it's a chemical in blood that gives it a metallic type smell and apparently, even in minute quantities, it drives predators crazy, like they start salivating

and the wolves start going nuts. If you're a predator, like a wolf, that even the smallest scent of this chemical will make you go nuts in blood well that part makes sense right i mean if you're a predator like a wolf and you you know you sense a wounded animal bleeding the wolf wants to go and wants lunch so he's gonna go eat the damn animal so i don't think that's surprising but what was surprising about the story what i found interesting was this e2d in even minute quantities up to it says in the article one part per trillion which is very

unusual for human beings we're not necessarily olfactory creatures like other animals that human beings human beings are human beings are repelled by the smell. That they did this study where they put it in front of your sniffer and people back away. And you've got to read the piece in Bloomberg. I'll put it in the show notes at Bongino.com. Of course, if you subscribe to my email list, I'll email you the stories every day. But it's a really cool story. And you may say, well, why is that? And the answer, as I read on, I was a little surprised because I thought we were predators, right?

Like we were the ones hunting the woolly mammoth and, you know, we were the ones hunting for our meat. And they said, no, not really. Like we were really insect eaters and gatherers. You know, the hunting of the woolly mammoth or whatever is only a recent phenomenon in a revolutionary history. And the truth is we're the prey most of the time. time so human beings have evolved to smell this chemical this e2d and get the hell away from there because it usually means there's some blood feast going on somewhere with wolves and you better get out of there before you're you know you're the you're the dessert to this uh seven course wolf feast coming up the wolves look at it like eat today yeah yeah eat today yeah yeah yeah eat we

should put that one on a mug too, right? Yeah, no, it was pretty good. I read that story and I was like, gosh, man. One part per trillion in human beings will get away with it. The anti-pheromone. Yeah. Anti-pheromone. Yeah, exactly.

Okay, a couple other things I saw this weekend. This Frederica Wilson lady is losing her mind. She's the Republican congresswoman. Yeah, she accused the chief of staff of being a racist. This is one of mind. She's the Republican congresswoman. Yeah, she accused the chief of staff of being a racist. This is one of those, dude. You know, we talked about the 52,000 ways to say dude.

When you're scared, dude. When you're excited, dude. When you see Frederica Wilson's name come up on Twitter, you're like, dude. You're just like, you can't take it. So she tweeted out something I found interesting this weekend because it goes to show you how powerful far-left narratives are, folks, how they pervade the society and they're accepted as the moderate default position.

Think about the NFL. The NFL played again this weekend to multiple stadiums with thousands upon thousands of empty seats. This is not open for dispute. What I'm telling you is not hyperbolic. It is not factually incorrect. Go look at the photos. If you take any of this, if you're saying, ah, that's not true, he's just making that up.

Go look at IJR, IJ Review. They have these pictures up, Breitbart pictures up of empty NFL stadiums. The NFL is playing to empty stadiums because they accepted as the default position, the narrative that the left is the dominant political force in the country. The far left, anti-American left, we hate America, the national anthem sucks, Americans, an imperialist empire. The NFL decided to accept that and to allow that thinking they were going to appeal to a massive number of people and what happened they got screwed big time because that is a that is a fringe whack-a-doodle position now that's because of the power of the media academia um and hollywood

out there now you see it again with this with this with a tweet i saw from frederica wilson this weekend she tweeted out she said oh, this thing that happened in Niger with the four heroes, these four US servicemen who were killed in a counter-terror operation in Niger, they said that, Frederica Wilson tweeted out, oh, but this is going to be Trump's Benghazi.

And I thought, wait, wait, hold on, time out. I thought the entire narrative of the media and the left, because they're the same thing the entire time, was that Benghazi was nothing. There was nothing to see there. Joe, wasn't that the narrative? There's nothing to see here, folks. We did everything we could do.

Nothing controversial. Everybody move on. Right. That was the far left narrative the whole time. Now, this is hysterical. This goes to show you how sick these people are. This Frederica Wilson a loony tune wacko on the left who has got to gone to war with the White House over a condolence call

made to a a widow where she was in the car and and it was put on speaker she who attacks the president over a condolence call you have to be a sicko but this wacky Wilson out there now tweets that oh this is going to be Trump's Benghazi. Meaning what? There's nothing to see here? Do you understand how you can't have it both ways? You can't say on one end that Benghazi was a loss, but there was nothing untoward about it, and then tweet out this is going to be Trump's Benghazi as you try to insinuate that something untoward happened in Niger.

It says to you folks that these people are liars that this Frederica Wilson and all these other leftist hacks including their media buddies they understood Joe the entire time that Benghazi was a disaster that it wasn't this they know that and it's just interesting how they slip at the worst possible moments and nobody picks up on it. Now, just to be clear on this, by the way, comparing what happened in Niger, which was a military operation

in an African country where they're battling, it was a counter-terror operation, to a diplomatic mission and the loss of an ambassador in Benghazi is really the height of stupidity. But that's what the left does. So keep that in mind, folks.

The next time your leftist friends tell you, oh, Benghazi, you guys are all conspiracy theorists, your immediate response should be, is Frederica Wilson too? No, no. She's a Democrat, by the way. No, no, she's not a conspiracy theorist.

What do you mean? She's the one insinuating that there was something wrong in Benghazi. She's doing Democrat, by the way. No, no, she's not a conspiracy theorist. What do you mean? She's the one insinuating that there was something wrong in Benghazi. She's doing it now. It just upsets me because the default position, the left always, always seems to win the cultural narrative here. And it's up to us to constantly put it out there to fight back, folks. It's really frustrating.

Hey, a couple of notes. I'll be outnumbered this week, by the way, on Thursday, flying up to New York. So make sure you tune in for that. That'll be fun. I'll be the hashtag one lucky guy. So check that out. I'll be on Fox and Friends that morning, too. Today's show brought to you by our buddies at BrickHouse Nutrition.

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love this stuff. Daniel at bongino.com. All right. A couple of other things i saw today you know um one of the arguments that's constantly resurfacing in the seemingly ever-present battle with the left over single payer and government-run health care um because they're not always the same thing i mean single payer means the government runs it completely government run means the majority of the time government has some involvement in the health care and distorts prices. I would suggest in the country we're already involved right now with government run healthcare because the United States government, actually if you factor in state, federal, local, the governments pay about 40 to 50% of healthcare as is right now. So we're already involved in some form of a government run healthcare system.

But one of the arguments I'll hear our leftist friends and I use that term loosely make all the time is they'll say, well, look at what happened in Massachusetts. They had a single payer type health care system in Massachusetts. And look what happened there. It was so great. I mean, that was a Republican idea. Mitt Romney signed the bill and the Heritage Foundation was involved in it. Folks, don't care. I don't know why I should care that a guy who put a Republican label in front of his name signed the bill that was bad.

Oh, don't worry, Joe. Mitt Romney signed it. Therefore, it requires no additional critical analysis at all. I'm here to talk about ideas. You want to talk about party labels and your obsession with the D versus the R? Knock yourself out. I don't do that on this show. That's why the show is called The Renegade Republican, okay? It was a bad idea. I don't care if Mitt Romney signed it or hit Tomny. It doesn't matter to me. I don't care who signed it. It was a bad idea. Now, I'm bringing

this up because there's a great article in the Washington Examiner. Please read it. Hadley Heath Manning wrote it. It'll be in the show notes today. It's a spectacular article about what's happening right now in Massachusetts. Folks, there's a collapse going on right now in Massachusetts, which MassHealth, which is their Medicaid program. By the way, Joe, keep in mind, this is an example by the left of their success program.

Okay? So MassHealth, which is their Medicaid-type program in Massachusetts, Joe, added 400,000 more people to their roles since 2014. 400,000. Now, one in four people in the state of Massachusetts are covered, and it's sucking up by this program. Forty cents of every tax dollar spent. So what's happening? There's no money.

Just like with the real estate people in the beginning. There's no more money for this. Just like with the ethanol folks. There's no more money for this. Just like with the teachers union. There's no more money for this. We're all going to have to wake up to these realities and lift and shift. We're all going to have to do that. Now with mass health, what's happening? Folks, if you're a liberal

and you're listening and you're not interested in the facts, tune out. I don't care. This is for really, I'm serious. This is for intelligent folks who want to evaluate pros. We want to we want to evaluate pros we want to analyze cons and we want to say in the best uh in the what's the best in the end are the pros bigger than the cons of the cons bigger than the pros what's going to benefit us

all now joe there's rationing going on in massachusetts surprising absolutely no one because they're running out of other people's money as Margaret Thatcher said so many times with the problem with socialism. So what are they doing now, Joe? They're going to closed formulary systems. Long and short of it is

it's a way to shut down choice in prescription drugs for people on this Medicaid program in Massachusetts because the money's drying up. So they're going to offer people basically one option. So you have disease X, you're going to take drug Y.

Well, I don't want to take drug Y. I want to take drug Z. Well, you can't take drug Z. You're going to take drug Y. Well, why? Because we said so, because we're out of money. Folks, this is what I've been warning you about the entire time. There are only two ways to effectively allocate resources in society.

Medicine, drugs, a doctor's time. You can price it, which will encourage more providers to get in the market as the price goes up, or you can ration it. That's what's happening now. They're rationing it because the price signal is so screwed up because the government's paying, therefore disconnecting you and the doctor. Nobody has any idea what the prices are. You pay your tax money.

Some government bureaucrat pays for you have no idea so this closed formulary system is another form of rationing by telling you what you can and can't have well i mean i know they'll ignore this joe i know it doesn't matter um and that's the frustrating part about this whole thing arguing with liberals but folks they use this as an example of a success story that's the most disturbing part of this entire thing they don't even think anything of it that this thing the rationing's occurring remember obama when he said that line they were asking about obamacare and they were talking about the grandmother with the the hip problem and he's like whoa if you're 90 years old and your grandma with the hip problem maybe you just need to take that pain pill. This is how the left thinks. Yeah.

I mean, next thing you know, they'll be prescribing cyanide pills. Again, it just irks me, folks. Now, also, another thing they argued about Obamacare was this was going to improve the status of the American healthcare system. Another piece out today, and it was either

Reuters or Bloomberg. Either way, I'll put it in the show notes. system another piece out today and uh it's either reuters or bloomberg either way and i'll put it in the show notes another good piece out joe u.s age adjusted the mortality rate rose 1.2 percent from 2014 to 2015 the first rise since 2005 meaning more people are dying we're not healthier now there are a number of reasons for this i would argue obamacare is probably one of them because of the and and i'll make it let me just make a quick case for this so just to be clear this article and i think i'm pretty sure it's bloomberg gonna be in the show notes i read this this ties into the massachusetts piece massachusetts oh look at the exact massachusetts took over the healthcare system. Look how great it's been.

They're rationing. It's not working. Secondly, the second argument for Obamacare. Oh, look, Americans are going to be so much healthier. They're all going to have access to healthcare. It's not happening, folks. More people are dying. Now, there are a number of reasons for that.

I don't want to create a direct A to B causal inference here, okay? But there are reasons that are related to Obamacare, I'm absolutely convinced. Deductibles have skyrocketed and gone through the roof along with premiums, forcing people who don't have liquid cash assets to go to the doctor to avoid going to the doctor when they're sick, which is not a healthy activity to engage in. If you have emphysema, if you have HIV, if you have cancer and you have to delay treatments because you can't afford your deductibles, you are probably going to die sooner. Now, the article conveniently leaves that part out, Joe, because God forbid, you know, what is it,

Bloomberg or Reuters, either one of them, you know, God forbid they actually tell the truth about far left policies. But one of the reasons at the end that they cite in the piece is they cite, you know, the rising drug use in America, alcohol use and obesity. And I think they're right about the drug use and obesity. I think alcohol use, especially amongst teens, has kind of gone down a little bit. But I think obesity obviously has been a big epidemic in the country for a long time. We are the richest country on earth. And with that comes a supply of food, obviously large enough that we can eat when we want. And some eat literally when they want, then eat all the time and it doesn't work out if you don't work out. So I think that does have a

lot to do with it. But ignoring the fact that Obamacare has actually, I think, decreased access to people when it comes to trips to the doctor because they don't have the liquid assets, the cash to actually go and see the doctor and pay the bills. I think that has to have something to do with it. So that refutes another silly argument that the left's been making from the beginning about how great Obamacare is, including the dopey Massachusetts example. Oh, you support rationing? I don't support rationing. Well, that's whating? I don't support rationing. Well, that's what's happening in Massachusetts. Closed formula.

All right, one more quick thing. There's a lot of posturing going on right now with the tax bill. Now, I know I said in the beginning, and I opened up the show, kind of tie it back together, about how I support the flat tax and no public unions. That's where I stand.

Flat tax, I actually support a fair tax, but I think, sadly, right now, there's very few ways to get there. But a flat tax, I public unions. That's where I stand. Flat tax, I actually support a fair tax, but I think sadly right now there's very few ways to get there. But a flat tax I will take. It's worked in a lot of the bells, the Baltic states, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, it's done very well in some of those states. There's a lot of posturing going on right now over the pass-through rate, Joe. The pass-through rate is if you own a small business and you're not incorporated, so whatever, you're Joe Armacost and you get paid by, well, you do. Joe does own a small pass-through.

You get paid by Conservative Review, right? Yeah. Joe's an employee. He's somewhere else, but he gets paid pass-through. So Joe has to pay the tax rate for that

on his income. He doesn't pay the corporate rate. So there's talk with Trump of cutting the corporate rate to 20%. That's what he wants in a tax plan.

But they also want to cut the pass-through rate, which is, again, it would be people who just declare payments to themselves as personal income. They don't incorporate. They're not paying the corporate rate. There's talk of cutting the pass-through rate to 25%, which would be, for some, a pretty big tax cut because the top marginal rate, income tax rate now, remember, you're paying it as income if it's a pass-through. You're not in corporate. You're just paying it as Joe Armacost under your Social Security number. The top rate now is 39.6.

So there's a big fear on the left about, oh my gosh, these rich people that own small businesses, they'll pay less taxes. What the hell are we arguing with these people for? And the Republicans are like, the Republicans are taking up the, by the way, as I said before, the default leftist narrative that the rich pay less taxes. What the hell are we arguing with these people for? And the Republicans are like, the Republicans are taking up, by the way, as I said before, the default leftist narrative that the rich should pay taxes, extra taxes,

no good economic reason at all, Joe, just because they hate rich people. Why are we even arguing this? My suggestion to any Republican listening is you turn around and go, listen, when you can make a case to me that successful wealthy Americans

who own small businesses, their money would be better spent by government bureaucrats. I'll listen to you. Till then, shut up. It's their money. They earned it. They're paying a good amount of money. You're talking about paying a quarter of their money.

Stop telling me that you're entitled to their money. It's their money. They know what to do with it. You don't. That's why you're in government and they're in business. Thank you. Have a nice day. All right, folks. I appreciate you tuning in.

Thanks for all the reviews on iTunes for the podcast. And please go to Bongino.com and subscribe to the email list. We'll send you these stories in your email box every day. Thanks a lot. If you just heard the Dan Bongino show, get more of Dan online anytime at conservativereview.com. Dan online anytime at conservativereview.com. You can also get Dan's podcasts on iTunes or SoundCloud and follow Dan on

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