The Dan Bongino Show - Ep. 608 Why is this National Crisis Being Ignored by the Swamp?

Episode Date: December 8, 2017

Is this Democrat Senator really resigning or is this another cynical Democrat scheme? https://www.conservativereview.com/articles/levin-heres-the-democrats-sickening-cynical-franken-scheme   Why is this growing national crisis being ignored by the DC swamp? http://reason.com/blog/2017/12/07/whos-ready-for-some-trillion-dollar-repu   Of course the 5 wealthiest counties in the US are located around the swamp. https://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/terence-p-jeffrey/census-bureau-5-richest-counties-are-dc-suburbs   Read this report and see the outrageous things the federal government spends money on. https://www.cato.org/blog/federal-fumbles-failures?utm_source=Cato+Institute+Emails&utm_campaign=1f2c28b678-Cato_at_Liberty_RSS&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_395878584c-1f2c28b678-143016961&goal=0_395878584c-1f2c28b678-143016961&mc_cid=1f2c28b678&mc_eid=3fd7404a34   CNN finally admits the truth about Trump. http://ijr.com/the-declaration/2017/12/1030901-cnn-makes-big-admission-donald-trump-keeper-promises/?utm_campaign=Conservative%20Daily&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=59206578&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-9LdKQwYKlWw0X2zjFq9r-1CIo0Y13TmtgPfXO-NL1KFucc3EXHe2AgQZe0T1sO-yGbg1MZhp5BQ4zsSkvL0yleRSzfNA&_hsmi=59206578 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Growth is essential for every entrepreneur. At BDC, we get that. And the businesses we support grow at double the average rate, accelerating the pace. We're on it. BDC. Financing. Advising. Know-how. Get ready to hear the truth about America on a show that's not immune to the facts with your host, Dan Bongino. Welcome to the Dan Bongino Show. Producer Joe, how are you today? Dan, I'm always glad to be here with you, baby. He's glad to be here with you, baby. It's Friday. Yeah, we love Friday. I don't get weekends off, you know. I know.

No, I'm not. Listen, I'm not looking for anybody's sympathy. My life is wonderful. God has blessed me with a multitude of blessings. I know. No, I'm not. Listen, I'm not looking for anybody's sympathy. My life is wonderful. God has blessed me with a multitude of blessings. I thank him for every opportunity every night. But it is busy. As a matter of fact, I'm taking my kids to Disney tomorrow. And I'm still doing a Fox News hit in the morning before I leave. Yeah, I was supposed to do Judge Jeanine, too. But I can't get back in time.

So I couldn't. Hey, quick update, because I'm getting a ton of emails on the stem cell thing I had done. You know, I have really bad arthritis and I had my stem cells taken out of my back. They take it out of the fat in your back and everybody has it, even if you're super lean. And I did it. The regular listeners know about it. I've done it before. It worked like a charm. So quick update. One, let me tell you something that's driving me absolutely mad. I can't go to the gym for six weeks. So I'm two weeks in. I am shrinking. I'm shrinking. It's driving. I have, listen, my audience, I love you all. And I feel the need to share the intricacies of my personal life.

However, TMI it is, right? Too much information, too bad. I'm shrinking dramatically, and I have a condition called bigorexia. Have you heard of bigorexia? I'm telling you, it's legit. It is the opposite of anorexia, which is a very serious condition. I'm not messing around, but I do.

I have a bit of bigorexia. Like, I never think in the gym I'm big enough, and I'm always, I'm dead serious, folks. This gets in my head and I was up to 225 pounds. You know, I can't do a post any of these shirtless pics. You'd look ridiculous, but I was getting pretty big. And now that I can't work out, I'm losing weight dramatically because I'm letting my body heal from the stem cell procedure. But, and it's driving me nuts.

I'm down to like two, one. Look at me on TV. If you see me on Fox, look at my neck. My shirt collars don't even fit. I'm like a pencil neck. Now it's making me nuts. I'm down to like 200. Look at me on TV if you see me on Fox. Look at my neck. My shirt collars don't even fit. I'm like a pencil neck now. It's making me nuts. Honey, I shrunk the Dan. Honey, I shrunk the Dan.

Like the Rick Moranis movie. It's driving me crazy. So thanks for the email yesterday from the guy who said, corrected me on Gaslight. That is not a Hitchcock movie. So thank you. I appreciate it. I always got to correct that stuff.

But I'm shrinking. But the procedure for those who have arthritis or serious joint conditions is again been working like magic my left elbow which was incredibly damaged is like brand new not an ounce of pain i'm not kidding as dr berman in beverly hills b-e-r-m-a-n who did the procedure he doesn't pay me to say this or anything. The guy's amazing. I can't, if you have arthritis and you've been told you need a joint replacement, I'm not your doctor or anything. Just check this guy out beforehand before you go remove one of your joints, because I'm telling you my left elbow's like new. So there's a quick update. Sorry to knock off a couple minutes of your time, but I get a ton of emails on it. So it's Dr. Berman

in Beverly Hills at the Stem Cell Network. Google him. You will not be disappointed. It has been just magical. But I am the incredibly shrinking human being. All right. Listen, the Franken story, just quickly. So Al Franken yesterday gave a speech on the Senate floor about resigning, but didn't resign. Folks, there's some interesting theories about what's going on right now, and I'm talking slowly to try to methodically put this together to not confuse you. So, just quick background. Al Franken

was caught in that, you know, disgusting picture trying to manhandle the personal parts of Leanne Tweeden while she was sleeping. Many of you have seen he's a Democratic senator from Minnesota. It's a pretty disgusting picture. I think he thought it was funny based on the fact that he's smiling in the picture.

He literally has his hands hovering over her breasts. It's gross. It's not funny. I mean, if that was your daughter or your wife, you'd beat the snot out of the guy, right? So other accusers came forward, and I do believe in due process i al frank at all i disagree with him politically i believe he is entitled to due process the picture is pretty

obvious that was pretty gross uh but yesterday he gets up on the senate floor gives an 11 minute speech and says i'm resigning from the senate but not right now. Okay. So Mark Levin, who is always... Levin's a brilliant... I don't just say that because I work with him. I get it. A lot of you would say that. Like, oh, you work with him. Of course you use it.

No, Mark is really always... I'm telling you. He is always two steps ahead of this stuff. He has an interesting theory with that, which I 100% agree with. Here's the theory he put out there yesterday, and I'll put the article up at my show notes at Bongino.com. If you subscribe to my email list, I'll send it to you. It's the theory he put out there yesterday, and I'll put the article up at my show notes at Bongino.com.

If you subscribe to my email list, I'll send it to you. It's available at Conservative Review, written by Chris Pandolfo. But he's covering Levin's comments. He says, here's what's really going on. One, Joe, if you were to tell me, right, Dan, can't deal with you anymore, buddy, I'm resigning, you'd typically just leave, right? Or you'd give like two weeks notice, right?

You're gone in two weeks, right? I'd be gone, yeah. Right, you don't say, Dan, I'm resigning. You typically just leave, right? Or you give like two weeks notice, right? You're gone in two weeks, right? I'd be gone. Yeah. Right. You don't say, Dan, I'm resigning, but I'll be leaving at a date soon to be determined in the future. Why would someone do something like that? Well, an interesting theory is there is an election coming up December 12th. You may have heard about that December 12th election is the Alabama Senate election, United States Senate, the Roy Moore-Doug Jones race. Roy Moore has been accused of sexual improprieties as well. The theory out there is that they're waiting to see what happens in the Moore race on December 12th. And if Moore, in fact, wins under the same cloud of impropriety and suspicion that Franken is, that Democrats may turn around and flip the script and say,

well, we did the right thing and we were going to resign. But now that Republicans have elected Roy Moore, you know, let's just let this play out in an ethics investigation for Moore and Franken at the same time. You see where I'm going with this, Joe? Yeah, I see where you're going. Now, I think Levine is correct that that's what's going to happen. I also think there's an alternate theory here. The alternate theory here is that, so that's theory number one,

that he's not in fact really resigning. He's just saying it to take the quote unquote high road. But what's really going to happen is they're going to wait to see what happens with Moore. And then if Moore doesn't in fact resign or isn't kicked out after he's elected, they're going to keep Franken too and say, well, what's good for the goose is good for the gander. I think that may be the theory. There's an alternate theory. I buy into I'm like 60 percent on that one, 40 percent on this one. Here's the other one. The other theory is, no, they really do want Franken out. He's just not resigning right now because there's some votes coming up that they may need him on. But he is going to resign, regardless of what happens with Moore.

And the Democrats, given that Minnesota is a relatively safe seat, it's a swingy kind of state. It's definitely blue, but it's possible, of course, for a Republican to win a Senate seat. Norm Coleman was a Republican who Al Franken beat and barely beat. He only won by 300 votes in a state race. That's incredible. Think about that. And there were significant allegations of fraud on the Franken side as well. Not that he did it personally, but voter fraud got him in. One of the other theories is the midterms are coming up and they want to use the election of Roy Moore outside of the Franken anchor. In other words, he'd be gone.

So you can't hold Franken against him. Right, Joe? Right. They want to use that Roy Moore election. Like, look, you Republicans are sexual harassers. And they're going to beat every Republican running in the midterms over the head with it. How would they do that, Joe? Joe Armacost was running for Congress in Maryland. He said, Joe, where are you on Roy Moore right now? Where are you? And if you

don't say the right thing, Joe, of course, it's going to be he is he's an enabler of sexual harassers. You get what I'm saying? Yeah. So those are the two running theories. I lay a little more weight to the Levin theory that he may, in fact, not resign because of the Moore election. But number two has some credibility, too, that he's going to be used to beat Democrats, excuse me, to beat Republicans over the head with him in the in the midterms. So interesting. I'll put a couple of stories on that up at the show notes that I find interesting. And I can send them out to your email if you wish. All right. Story number two. This one is on a very serious note. This one's kind of troubling. It's bothering me a lot because the lack of seriousness applied to this topic. I think a lot of America, you know what, I'm going to take a little vitamin B12.

Excuse me. I take the spray stuff, it's pretty good. That was ridiculous. I am like the most ADHD guy in human history. But very seriously, people are losing their interest in this topic. And I can't for the life of me understand why, because I believe it's the greatest economic threat to America right now. And I am not alone by any stretch. The debt. Joe, where is the conversation about the national debt anymore? Have you noticed it's been sidelined? I guarantee you, if you ask

Americans their top 10 issues they're concerned about, the debt, which should be, in my humble opinion, number one, is probably four, five, maybe 10. You don't hear any serious conversations about this anymore. Now, I have some theories as to why that is. I think one of them is there have been no, at this point at least, no real world ramifications for it. And I'll get to that in a second. And I think when people don't feel consequences for actions, they keep doing them. I mean, if you keep going into a candy store every day and not paying for the bubble gum, why would you pay? And the owner doesn't say anything. After a while, Joe, it's natural, correct, for you to assume it's free. Yeah. You're like,

I just keep walking in. He never says anything. So people don't experience consequences when you don't experience consequences. You know, whether it's Pavlovian or operant conditioning, you start to think that the behavior is fine or it's without without consequence. Nobody's talking about the debt. The reason I bring this up is because short term spending bills are being passed right now under our noses in Congress, which are bankrupting the United States in live time, folks. A couple of things here. Regarding the real-world ramifications, if this were a private business, the United States government, a free market business, right, that had taken on the debt load, the debt load we have now is closing in on 100 percent of the entire productive value of the united states our gdp we're moving towards 20 trillion dollars

in debt which is the value of every single thing the country produces if this were ford motor company and ford motor company as a as a company was worth whatever 20 billion dollars who knows i'm pulling these numbers out of my head here it It's worth $20 billion. And Ford Motor Company had $20 billion in debt. The interest rate on a Ford Motor Company bond and loan would be through the roof. Why? Because no one's going to lend this motor company, and they don't have that. Ford's doing pretty okay. I just bought their stock. They're doing all right. But nobody's going to lend them money at a low interest rate, Joe, because the risk of not getting paid back is high. Yeah.

Pretty simple stuff. Why is that not happening in the United States right now? Well, it's not happening in the United States right now because the world economy is generally just sputtering along. But, but, but, but, but, but, but, it's not motoring along. It's sputtering along. So people are still investing in the United States at rather low interest rates and giving the United States the equivalent of the federal government Ford Motor Company right now, right? If that were the case.

Are still giving us money because there's nowhere else to put it. Now, I use the car company because during the Great Recession, Ford, I love Ford, by the way, my Raptor is awesome. For those who've asked me about how it's going, the Raptor is the greatest car I've ever had, truck, I love it. But during the Great Recession, where other car companies took bailouts, Ford didn't. And I think Ford came out of it quite well. They've had some minor setbacks here and there, but I think Ford's going to do very well over time. But there's no question after the recession, Joe, all the car companies were struggling. A lot of people, though, bought Ford stock because they figured, all right, even though Ford's not doing great, it's certainly not doing as bad as GM and these other companies that took some government bailout

money. You get what I'm saying? So it wasn't that they were motoring along, pun intended, for it. It was that they weren't failing as bad as the other ones back then and came out of it pretty good. And I think their cars are terrific. They don't pay me to say it. They're not even a sponsor. You see the point I'm making about the government? Eventually, folks, there are going to be other countries around the world that get their

act together. We're seeing it in Ireland. We're seeing it in some of the bells, the Baltic countries, Estonia, Latvia. We're seeing it around the world. And as other investment opportunities come up, people are going to invest in other governments as well. They're not going to be nearly as large of an economy as the United States with the world's largest economy. But these interest rates do not have to stay low forever. I'll wrap it up by saying this. Sooner or later, there are going to be real world ramifications for this debt. I don't know what that number is. I can only tell you what the economic research is.

The economic research, which has been pretty consistent, has stated that once you hit about 90% of your GDP in debt load, you start to suffer interest rates, slow economic growth, and those types of things. Folks, we're there right now. This is a really pressing issue. And what's really irking me is we're passing these short-term spending bills, we're passing these mammoth spending bills, and there's seemingly no conversation whatsoever outside of the Freedom Caucus in the House of Representatives about actually cutting government spending. Folks, there's a great piece by Reason.com, which I

will put again in the show notes, about the debt. It's short. It's probably no more than 600 words, maybe less. And it talks about this Committee for Responsible Federal Budget Report. And it's interesting. They quote some lines from the report there that joe we're headed for annual deficits annual meaning yearly remember our entire economy joe is only worth 20 trillion right we are headed by 2019 right around the corner by 2019 for annual deficits of 1.05 trillion the whole economy's only worth 20 trillion. The government only, only, it's a joke. I mean, talk about a slip.

The government now spends 4 trillion. We're looking at deficits every year of 1 trillion in a $4 trillion budget. A quarter of what we spend, this is incredible folks by 2020 they're predicting 1.1 trillion where is the conversation about the tidal wave of debt coming ashore here's the real world

ramification for this as i said before and opened up with sooner or later people are going to wise up and say, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Does the government even have the capability to pay this back? Folks, here's the problem too. When it happens, it happens like that. Argentina used to be what the third wealthiest country in the world till they had a debt collapse just like we're looking at right now. And then what happens? When people stop lending us money anymore, Joe, we have to offer them exorbitantly high interest rates to get them to lend us money to compensate them for the risk that they're never going to be paid back. Common sense, right? When that happens and

interest rates go up, folks, do you want to go back to paying 12 and 15% interest rates on your mortgage? Oh, come on, Dan, that's never going to happen. Oh, no, no, it did. Matter of fact, it happened in my lifetime. I was born in 1974. You remember the 1980s show mortgage rates, 9, 10, 11%? This really happened, folks. I mean, I get it that a lot of us younger folks, you know, in our 40s and younger, and I consider myself relatively young still, we've never known really a time in our adult lives of super high interest rates. This is going to happen. This means real money for you. You know, when you go into a car dealer, you negotiate.

Most people do, and it's a terrible way to negotiate, by the way, but this is the way it happens. Joe, you know this. What do they do? They negotiate on the monthly payment when you buy a car, right? What can you afford every month? Yeah. What can you afford? And car dealers love that, by the way, because then you ignore what? You ignore the actual price of the car. I'm not telling you it's not the right way to do it. The way to negotiate is on the price of the darn car. But a lot of people don't do that. They don't do it when they buy a house either.

They're like, well, what's our mortgage payment going to be and can we afford it? Folks, when interest rates start creeping up to 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, do you see how this works against you? All of a sudden, the price of the car doesn't even matter. The mortgage doesn't even matter because most of what you're paying, Joe, is interest in the first few years. You're going to be like, wait, the monthly payment on a $6,000 car is $72,000 a month. Obviously, I'm exaggerating.

But you get the point. You're going to buy a $20,000 car and the monthly payment is going to be absurd. Because it's going to be all interest for like three years. Folks, this is going to happen. The real world ramifications of this are going to happen. The action item I'm asking you is when you vote and when you talk to your legislators, this matters. They do pay attention and you email their offices and you call their offices, ask them what they're doing to cut the government budget. And I'm a little bit excited, not a lot because I know how DC works,

but a little bit excited that I heard Paul Ryan say, listen, we've got to look at entitlement reform. All right. Yes. And everybody loves to knock Paul Ryan. I get it. I understand why people get upset sometimes, but that's a pretty darn bold thing to say. We're going to go broke folks. It's only a matter of time. It is a mathematical certainty. This is not a joke. Now, there's an interesting report, too, by Cato, which will be in the show notes. Strongly encourage you to read this one about Jim Lankford, a senator from Oklahoma, who puts out a report called Federal Fumbles. Joe, listen to some of the things with the government spending money on.

Now, granted, entitlements are an enormous chunk of our national debt and deficit problem. I get that. But that's not an excuse to flush money down the toilet bowl elsewhere either. Here are some of the fumbles from this Cato coverage of the report by Lankford.

The government spent, this is crazy, $745 million on an Air Force control center that was scrapped. $745 million. What the hell was in that thing? That was, it was scrapped. Joe, $745, my house, I bought for, I don't know, you probably look on Zillow.

I think it was like 520 or something we bought our house for, right? $745 million that's 1400 of my houses I there's not even 1400 houses in Palm City where I live I don't think what you could have bought all of Palm City for 700 745 million you Joe I'm not kidding you probably could have bought my entire neighborhood, the adjoining neighborhood, and this section of I-95 that runs next to us for 745 million. What the heck is in that?

What did you build this thing out of? Gold and silver? Were the faucets and toilet bowls made of platinum? My gosh. Was there a Rolls Royce parked in every single parking spot of this Air Force Control Center? Oh, $745 million. Do you understand how many Social Security beneficiaries

could have been paid with $745 million? Folks, that's just the opening line here's a couple other ringers we paid 85 000 for a music conductor's birthday party what the heck where where was this birthday party the the russian tea room are you serious? 85,000. I had my daughter's birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese for like 200 bucks. Are you serious? It's Chuck E. Jesus, actually. I always say Chuck E. Cheese. Go to Chuck E.'s. Go meet the guy, Chuck E. You know, he comes out in a suit. Kids, hang it on. With the big dopey ears. Hey, Chuck E., can we get a picture? $85,000. What were you serving?

Beluga caviar and Kobe beef? Here's another one. $148,950 for Alabama's birthday party. I didn't miss a word there. Not Alabama Senator's birthday party. Not Alabama Governor's birthday party. I didn't miss a word there. Not Alabama Senator's birthday party. Not Alabama Governor's birthday party. For Alabama's birthday party. Alabama's not a person. He doesn't care.

It's a state. There's no Mr. Alabama. He's not like, hey, thanks. This is great. Look at that cake. It's even in the shape of Alabama. This is great. There at that cake. It's even in the shape of Alabama. This is great. There's no Mr. Alabama.

What the heck are you spending $148,000 on? What are you cutting like a dollar check to everyone in Birmingham to celebrate? This is ridiculous. For Alabama's birthday. Here we go. $150,382 to document the domaqi language in pakistan why we don't even mandate people speak english anymore in the united states and we're documenting the domaqi language in pakistan what what what is this like remember that that movie with denzel

washington was the book of eli where he's documenting like the last bible left on earth i mean seriously 150k go get rosetta stone for like 20 bucks you know those language still great by the way i used one for spanish go buy it for damaki or i don't even know if i'm saying it right forgive me i'm not trying to be like culturally insensitive i mean it I just I don't know anything about this language. Go get Rosetta Stone. They'll do it for you for 20 bucks. One billion for a low value trolley in San Diego, 17 billion on earned income tax credit subsidies, and $1 billion on federal agency advertising.

Because yes, federal agencies need advertising to tell people they're there. Because nobody knows as a federal government, despite the fact that we spent $4 trillion. Now, one more point. Folks, I'm really being deadly sincere with you. I only intended on spending five minutes on this, but it's comically sad that we're going bankrupt and we're celebrating Alabama's birthday as if Mr. Alabama is going to care and blow out a candle. This is outrageously stupid. One more report I'll have in the show notes today from CNS News is Terrence Jeffrey,

who's amazing. He's always this drudge, by the way. He does really great stuff on government spending. Joe, pop quiz for you. You ready? Yeah. These are not trick questions. Now, this may be a tough one.

So for the audience, give Joe a little bit of a pass if he doesn't get this exactly right, okay? All right. Joe, the five wealthiest counties in the united states in the cns news piece yes i'm going to give you a hint where they're located now we've done a similar test before but don't let that skew your thinking joe these are not trick questions the five wealthiest counties in the united states joe Where do you think they're located in the suburbs of?

Now, I will give you a hint. A lot of government spending happens in this city. It's the American capital. I know this is tough. I know you're having a tough time. Let me give you a couple more. You live very close to there. I know where you live. I know you're having a tough time. So let me give you a couple more. You live very close to there. I know where you live.

Go down Ritchie Highway, pop onto 50, and you'll get there. One more. A lot of lobbyists that lobby the big government for this largesse of taxpayer dollars live in the suburbs of this American city. Joe, what does it go? Well, I know you're trying to trick me, but I'm going to say Washington, D.C. Oh! Oh!

Dude! I'm telling you. I'm like crying right now because you are, of all the executive producers, of all the major conservative podcasts out there, you are clearly, I mean the IQ leader amongst that population of EPs. I mean

buck 20 or more on IQ, easy. You're a genius. Who else would figure that out? The five wealthiest counties in America. You got Loudon, you got Howard and Maryland, you got a bunch of others in Virginia that populate the top 22 but the five wealthiest in the entire country, in the entire country are located right around Washington, D.C.

What a shocker. Now, think about this. This is what's incredible. For all of my beefs with New York, I'm a native New Yorker, and I love the people, but for all of my beefs with New York politics I'm a native New Yorker and I love the people, but for all of my beefs with New York politics and the liberals that have run that great state into the ground, New York, Joe, and the city of

New York, the five boroughs, is still a hotbed of entrepreneurial activity. It is, even despite the Democrats' best efforts to ruin it, right? It's a wonderful town, yeah. It's a wonderful town. It's just full of bad politicians. California too. You know I visit California a lot. Joe knows.

The audience knows. I love California. I hate its politics. I hate the fact that the good people of California are being terrorized by liberal politicians. I really do. They're destroying the state. But I'm telling you, California is awesome. I love it.

We go out there sometimes. I kid you not. We fly out there just to eat in a restaurant because it's so awesome. California love it. We go out there sometimes. I kid you not. We fly out there just to eat in restaurants because it's so awesome. California and New York, hotbeds despite bad politics of entrepreneurial, super creative thinkers, Silicon Valley, the financial district in New York, are still nowhere near the top five wealthiest counties in America, which all are surrounding Washington, D.C., the hotbed of government spending. Don't you find that mildly suspicious? You still think we don't have a government spending problem? Oh, man, folks, when are we going to wake up?

This is serious stuff. I know we're laughing about it, but I have to or I'll go crazy because I wake up every day and I think about this. It drives me nuts. Seriously, it's driving me mad. Okay. Today's show brought to you by our buddies at Filter Buy. I really like this company. I have a serious problem with allergies. You know I share everything on this show, but you're probably all like, I know, too much. But hey, you're my audience. I feel like you're entitled to know who the host is, right? I have really terrible allergies. But I noticed over the last couple of years, my allergies sometimes get better, sometimes

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Here's a great story I saw in the Wall Street Journal today. You know I like these little behind-the-scenes stories about like the Why Matters show, right? And I saw this one, I thought this would be really cool to cover on the show, and it's quick. But there's a real battle going on about, I'm calling

them the salt wars. It has nothing to do with the sodium chloride. Salt, there's state and local taxes. But the salt wars are going on right now with regard to the tax bill. It obviously hasn't passed yet. It passed the House, and in a different version, passed the Senate. So a lot of people after it passed the Senate thought it passed. No, no, no. They have to reconcile the differences between those bills first to get something to the president. So the salt wars have heated up. The salt wars are based on the state and local tax deduction. If you live in a high tax state like Ormecos does in Maryland,

I don't in Florida, Joe gets a deduction for the state income taxes he pays, the property taxes he pays to state and local entities in Maryland. Copy, pretty simple stuff. Now, that's a pretty heavy tax deduction. There are people who make $200,000, $300,000 a year who are paying exorbitant state income taxes who can get $50,000, $60,000 deductions. That's a big deduction, Joe. That's worth a lot of money. Now, depending on which tax bill passes,

that's largely going to go away for people who live in largely blue states that charge their residents high taxes. I don't have that problem here in Florida. We have no state income tax. We love Florida. Florida's great, but it's heaven on earth. Move down. We'd love to see you. Just please vote Republican.

Keep the state red. We need it. So here's the real story about what's going on with the Salt Wars, and the Journal covers this extensively today. The Democrats are freaking out. And even Jerry Brown, the governor of the great state of California, the liberal Democratic governor of California, is starting to freak out. Because why? Apparently, he barged into some pension negotiation meeting the other day and actually made the Republican cause, the conservative cause for spending control on government pensions. Now, let me be clear on this, and I'm not trying to play both sides or swage anybody.

I'm just going to give you the truth. I was a state and federal employee. I am not in any way disparaging people who get up every day and work hard for the government. There's nothing wrong with that. I'm nothing. Really. It's not your fault that you got a job and it was with the government. That's an honorable thing to do. work every day you work hard i mean you could probably get a job in the private sector but you chose a job in the government there's nothing wrong with that

people who work for a living are not the problem and we should i'm i really believe we should never attack government employees we should i i worked for them they're all they're honorable people having said that and i mean it i people. Having said that, and I mean it, I sincerely do. Having said that, though, the government screwed you over, and ignoring the economic reality of state, the state pension crisis is not going to do anything to make it go away. It reminds me, you know the thing we do

with the Rob Schneider thing with dude, dude, dude, dude. You know, he has the one, the 65 different ways to say dude or whatever one of them is like you think he was a serial killer around the corner in your apartment it's late at night you're like dude and you just want to make sure he's there that's the pension crisis it's sitting there around the corner and you saying dude it's not gonna make it go away i have a cop friend of mine this this guy, Brian, who I, he's been a friend of mine forever. We went to the police Academy together and he, he, he loves, he likes the show

and he loves economics. And he's calls me a lot about this pension crisis. Cause he's a New York city cop ready to retire. Cause you think the money's going to be there. I go, no, it's not going to be there. I don't know any easy way to tell you this, but the answer is no. Um, the money's not going to be there because the money's not there now. Well, how are people getting paid pensions? Well, they're borrowing it. The government's borrowing money from taxpayers now to pay pension. There's no pension fund. They're all broke. Well, most of them, some of them are doing okay. Florida's actually doing all right. The point I'm trying to make here is why is Jerry Brown now making the conservative argument that we need to do something about the California state pension system, which is in an absolute crisis. There's no

money. They're broke. Because the elimination of SALT, follow me here for a second, Joe. Let's walk through this. The Dems, the Democrats got into bed with public sector unions a long time ago, and they made them pension promises, Joe, in turn for donations and continued political power. They made them pension promises. There was no mathematical, financial, or economic way they could keep. All right? You tracking? Mm-hmm.

Number two, instead of those public sector unions starting to acknowledge that the money wasn't going to be there and early on working on a fix for the future instead of defined benefit, defined contribution, basically instead of pensions, 401k type plans. They took it to court

and in court they argued that these contracts are inviolable, Joe. You can't break them. You see what I'm saying, Joe? In other words, Democrats, you needed our votes. We gave you our votes. You promised us all this money and pensions, and now the contracts are unbreakable.

The courts have been wishy-washy on this, but have largely said that that's not true. I mean, Joe, even laws are changeable, right? I mean, it's nonsense to say contracts are inviolable in the public sector. Contracts are broken all the time. I'm not saying it's a good thing. I'm just telling you this is a fact. Companies go into bankruptcy all the time and people don't get paid. Gosh, Joe and I haven't got paid for stuff we've done,

right? I'm serious. So I got an outstanding balance now for someone I got to get back to who hasn't paid me forever, which is fine. I don't even care. Seriously, I don't even worry. It's not even worth the trouble. So Dems get into bed with them, make them promises, promises there's no money for. The pension, the unions argue, well, listen, those contracts aren't breakable. OK, what happens next? Word starts creeping out that, well, this salt deduction may go away, meaning. The people in our state are now going to pay the full load of the tax bill. You tracking, Joe?

Oh, yeah. Because now if they don't get a deduction for the massive tax bill California is sending them, they're going to pay the whole bill. In other words, if you paid $50,000 in taxes to the state of California but got back from the government $20,000, Joe, you only paid $30,000. Simple math. $50,000 minus the $20,000 you got back, you only paid $30,000. Simple math, $50,000 minus the $20,000 you got back, you only paid $30,000. If that goes away and you have to pay the entire $50,000, that's going to hurt.

Yeah. What does this have to do with pensions? Jerry Brown sees the writing on the wall right now, liberal governor of California. He barged into this meeting and apparently was making this case according to some speculation by the journal which i agree because he's saying listen if these pension contracts are inviolable and we can't break them and we have to pay this money in the future that means even the absurd ridiculous tax load we're asking our California folks to pay now is going to go up in the future, piled on top of Joe, a de facto increase because they're not going to be able

to deduct it anymore. In other words, you paid 30 last year, 50 minus 20. You lose the 20 deduction next year. Next year, you're paying 50 and we're going to have to raise their taxes again to pay the pension bills we promised these people to get reelected. The Democrats are in a full blown panic. So the essence of the journal piece is like, hey, this thing is paying dividends already. The salt that hasn't even passed. Why? You may say, well, that's not fair, Dan.

I always get an email from a nice lady in New Jersey, but she took a shot at me. She's like, wow, I'm not wishing ill on you in New Jersey, New York, and California at all. I lived in New York. I know a lot of you can't move. I'm simply saying to you that the dividends are paying off because even liberal Jerry Brown, Joe, is saying this can't continue forever, folks. We can't keep taxing the snot out of our citizens there's going to be nothing left that's the point i'm trying to make that the deduction the salt deduction was was allowing politicians of a liberal stripe to insulate themselves from the pain of

their own policies you see where i'm going with this joe yeah sure now that the politicians the libs are like wow gosh now our citizens are really going to get an actual tax bill they're like oh man this is this isn't good this is really bad i told you this would happen there's positive ramifications to this you may actually overall in california the state level wind up getting a tax cut and pension reform out of this in the future. It's a good thing. Trust me on this one. Please, I wouldn't steer you wrong. I'm not saying anything because I live in Florida. You know, look at me. I'm all right. You know, as they say in the military, you know, FIGMO, you know what it means. I'll leave the initial part out, but I got my orders. It's the last part. So that's not what I'm doing here. I'm just telling you, I think this is going to be a good thing in the long run. All right. Today's show also

brought to you by our buddies at Brickhouse, getting a number of really positive stellar reviews on their newest product, Field of Greens. I love this. I don't dictate to Miles, the owner of the company, what he does. He's a smart guy. He does his own thing. But I said to him a while ago, so I'm going to take a little credit here. I said, Miles, you know what you need? I said, I'm a super healthy eater. I have an incredibly good appetite. I eat a lot of food, but I am absolutely convinced that food is the pharmaceutical of the next generation. I am. I mean, Joe, remember the generation we grew up in where people had donuts and a stogie for breakfast?

Yeah. Nobody thought anything of it, right? It was like fuel. They're like, oh yeah, donuts. It's like, you know, it's gas in the tank. What's the difference? Well, obviously nutrition science has gone through the roof and people have figured out

that a donut and a stogie for breakfast is probably going to kill you by the age of 22. I am a firm, solid believer in the power of fruits and vegetables to just overall increase the quality and the betterment and just that your quality of life goes through the roof. I mean, look at the evidence you have out there, these people who do the juicing, and they go on, they live these unbelievably healthy lives. I mean, the power of food. So I said to Miles, you have to go, and you have to find the most powerful, potent fruits

and vegetables you can, grind them up, and put them in just a powder so people don't have to eat 72 asparagus sticks, 22 bananas, oranges, and broccoli every day. I do it anyway because I think it's great, but a lot of people don't have the time. So he created an incredible product called Field of Greens, which I am sincerely proud to be on board with these guys. Go give it a shot along with Dawn to Dust, their energy product and foundation, which you'll look amazing after seven days of this stuff. But these guys are putting out top tier, tier one nutrition products, second to none. Their quality control is amazing. Go to BrickHouseNutrition.com slash Dan. That's BrickHouseNutrition.com slash Dan. Or if you're on my email list, there's a click through right at the top.

And pick up Field of Greens today. This stuff is incredible. Folks, the power of good food is immeasurable over time in your life. Commit to it. Commit to it early. Commit to it often. It's never too late. If you've been a burger eater your whole life, nothing wrong with a burger once in a while,

time to take a turn for the better. Go give Field of Greens a shot. BrickHouseNutrition.com slash Dan. All right. Oh, oh, oh. Oh, yes. Independent Journal Review, IJR, has a great piece out today.

Now, can I, I know people hate this, but can I pat myself on the back a little bit here? Just a tad, just once. Forgive me, folks. I know self-praise things. My aunt used to tell me that. God rest her soul. But yesterday on the show,

I had this theory about why liberals are increasingly losing their minds over trump just when you think they've reached the stupid ceiling they blow right through it onto the next floor and i said during yesterday's show and i encourage you if you missed it to go back and listen to the segment because i think i really enjoyed it that they're they're losing their minds because they thought Trump was going to be a joke. They did. I mean, they knew he was, quote, dangerous to their liberal ideology. But I think, Joe, they largely thought he'd be a joke. He's going to be powerless.

Oh, don't worry. We'll impeach him. We'll do this Russia thing. We'll insult him the whole time. We'll make fun of him on Saturday Night Live. It'll all go away. Get what I'm saying? Yeah.

So the point I made during yesterday's show is liberals are becoming increasingly unhinged because what Trump said he was going to do he's doing he's doing whether it's and again i don't agree with everything but i think there's no question that the guy is uh keeping his promises nafta regulations taxes and i said the flashpoint i think was the move of the embassy or the announced uh announced U.S. sanctioning of the of the cap, which it's the capital. The Jerusalem's the capital of Jerusalem is the capital and a planned move in the future from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. And the reason I bring that up and I maybe I didn't say this yesterday is because presidents have talked about this forever. Republican and Democrat actually moving the embassy and officially sanctioning Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, Joe, and none of them have done it. So the Democrats, now that Trump has done something,

which was Joe previously totally off limits to a president of either party, that he's done something he promised that nobody thought would happen. The Democrats are increasingly saying, holy crap, what's next? This guy's not kidding. Right, Joe? So not to repeat yesterday's show, but I needed that set up because this morning IJR has a peace out. Let me read this directly. CNN admits Trump is, quote, a keeper of promises. And this is another quote from CNN. Even those two promises are talking about even those that horrify the political

and foreign policy establishment. I told you, I told you. CNN is now losing its mind because they're starting to really worry right now that Trump's for real. That this guy is the first politician to run for presidency in eons who actually is doing and checking off a list of promises

what he said he was going to do. And they are very sincerely concerned about what's next. So again, mild pat on the back. I know self-praise things, forgive me, but I don't make this stuff up. I didn't hear that from anyone. I'm not trying to take credit for anyone else's ideas, but I saw that this morning and I'm like, you see, other people are catching, too, even the libs. This is why they're freaking out, folks. All right. One last story.

The economic numbers came out today, and they are spectacular. 228,000 new jobs in November. The projection, folks, was 200,000. Let me tell you right now, 228,000 jobs in November is a huge number, an enormous number. But I'm not trying to be Debbie Downer. I just want everyone to be cautious because we're still in the midst of a slight Obama hangover. Obama grew dependency through federal disability rolls, food stamp recipients. He grew federal dependency. No question. It's just the numbers. It's not an insult. It's just the numbers. Those numbers,

people on food stamps, people on federal disability payments grew. That's just a fact. It's not an inarguable fact. There's an interesting piece in the journal today that makes a point, though, and a point I had debunked a while ago. It's interesting that when the Obama, now I'm going to tell you the truth, the Obama people didn't. Remember Joe, you may remember, you may not. We did a show a long time ago where the Democrats talking point about the low labor force participation rate.

In other words, the fact that unemployment was going down, but it was going down because more people weren't looking for jobs. The labor, the unemployment rate wasn't going down because more people were finding jobs. It was just because more people were leaving the workforce and it skewed the numbers. And the Democrats' talking point, which is they will always, always lie to you. Every time.

Well, that's why tune into this show. I debunk the nonsense. I said to you, that's crap. Their talking point was this. Their talking point was, oh, it's just the labor force participation rate. In other words, people working is going down, which is bad. You want more people working because Joe, a lot of older people are leaving the workforce. And I said to you, the numbers don't back that up at all because the number of younger, able-bodied work people not working is going up. So that's not possible that

it's all attributable to older people not working because younger people aren't working either. So I bring that up to be fair. I think it's think this is not due to Trump. I think this is still the Obama hangover, Joe. You stick people on food stamps and on disability. And I mean, some of them need it, but some don't. And they get used to not working. And even though Trump economy is motoring along, they're still not working. And I just want you to be a little cautious about the numbers. They're good because that labor force participation rate, although it's going up, which is good, it's still stubborn. And there's still about 2 million people missing from the workforce. Quick quote from the journal piece. We'll wrap it up here. He says in the journal piece,

this is from Ed Lazier, but one statistics makes clear that the missing jobs are not solely a reflection of demographics. In other words, that old people are leaving the workforce. that the missing jobs are not solely a reflection of demographics. In other words, that old people are leaving the workforce. The employment rate of people aged 25 to 54 is lower than at the pre-recession peak by 1.3 percentage points. Even adjusting for demographics, Joe, the overall employment rate is still about 0.8 percentage points shy of where it would have been in prior peaks.

In short, there are about 256 million Americans who are 16 and older. So that job deficit works out to about 2 million people. So bottom line, Trump economy is doing great. He's making all the right moves right now. But to be fair and not parrot stupid Democrat talking points they tried on us. The labor force petition patient rate is still lower than where it should be and it is not all older people. There are still younger people not working. So don't, you know, just so we have a fair perspective of what's going on.

It's the only right way to operate. Don't let silly liberal talking points, you know, get in the way of a sound analysis. Alright folks, thanks again for tuning in. Please go to Bongino.com subscribe to my email list and I will see you all on Monday. You just heard the Dan Bongino Show. Get more of Dan online anytime at conservativereview.com.

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