The David Pakman Show - 12/10/24: They're going for vaccine autism, Trump's list of people to imprison

Episode Date: December 10, 2024

-- On the Show: -- Millions of Americans are about to feel the pain of Donald Trump's victory -- Multi-billionaire Elon Musk met with millionaire US Senators to talk about reducing Social Security and Medicare benefits which average $1700 per month -- Donald Trump's first list of people he wants imprisoned is told to NBC News interviewer Kristen Welker -- Donald Trump says that RFK Jr will be investigating the link between vaccines and autism, which has been debunked for decades -- Donald Trump admits that it's possible consumer prices will go up as a result of his planned tariffs -- The allies of MAGA are preparing for a total takeover of Donald Trump's lame duck presidency -- Alina Habba, the failed former lawyer of Donald Trump, is being hired as counsel to the President -- A deep dive into the continued right wing lie that red states are better off -- they're not -- Fox News gives Donald Trump a sycophantic, fake award, "Honorary Patriot of the Year," and it's humiliatingly pathetic -- On the Bonus Show: Daniel Penny found not guilty, public broadcasting under attack, Americans stockpiling goods ahead of Trump tariffs, and much more... 👩‍🎓 The 431 Exchange: Help us reach our goal by donating at https://431exchange.org/pakman 🛡️ Incogni lets you control your personal data! Get 60% off their annual plan: http://incogni.com/pakman 🛌 Helix Sleep: Get 25% OFF and 2 free pillows at https://helixsleep.com/pakman 🖼️ Aura Frames: Use code PAKMAN for $35 OFF & free shipping at https://auraframes.com/pakman 🩳 SHEATH Underwear: Code PAKMAN for 20% OFF at https://sheathunderwear.com/pakman  🛏️ Eight Sleep: Get $600 OFF the Pod 4 Ultra until Dec 14 at https://eightsleep.com/pakman -- Become a Member: https://davidpakman.com/membership -- Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/davidpakmanshow -- TDPS Subreddit: http://www.reddit.com/r/thedavidpakmanshow -- Pakman Discord: https://davidpakman.com/discord -- David on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/davidpakmanshow -- Leave a Voicemail: (219)-2DAVIDP

. Welcome to the show, everybody. We are now starting to settle into what the next four years might look like legislatively and from a policy perspective. And one of the things that we're quickly learning is that if you thought the last Republican win came at a cost, the consequences of this one, Trump winning the presidency, Republicans winning in the Senate, Republicans winning in the house, albeit by the tiniest of margins, the consequences of this one are going to hit

harder and faster and with no apology or hesitation whatsoever. Let me tell you what's on my mind as far as this goes. Millions of Americans who voted for this outcome are about to feel the sting of what they just endorsed. And I'm going to break this down for you in four or five primary areas. Health care number one, Republicans have made it clear over the last few days, they are sharpening their knives for Medicaid, Medicare, any program that doesn't directly funnel cash to their donors.

And Trump has now said in that recent interview, we looked at that he would love to get rid of Obamacare as well well since it is red States that disproportionately don't have their own healthcare exchanges. Unlike States like California, New York and Massachusetts. If Trump gets his way, it'll be disproportionately Republicans in red States who suffer the consequences. Forget about the campaign promises of protecting benefits. That was bait. They're already eyeing cuts, which will leave millions scrambling to pay medical bills or

potentially going without care altogether. And of course that includes rural voters who leaned right into this red thinking that, uh, their Medicare is going to be untouchable. It's not untouchable. And we even now have reporting that Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, a couple of unelected bureaucrats are looking at cutting not only Medicare, but also social security. Although we'll talk about that in a little bit, we go from healthcare to the economy. Remember how Trump's tax cuts gave corporations these huge windfalls and workers got breadcrumbs. If anything at all, this new Republican majority has the sequel in mind, which is more tax cuts for the ultra wealthy, more loopholes for the big guys and a

ballooning deficit, just like we saw during Donald Trump's first term, which they always conveniently forget about until it's time to cut social programs. Watch how they'll frame this as making tough choices for the betterment of the economy. Well, the betterment of the economy, not so much the benefit of giga millionaires and billionaires while regular people get screwed, including the people who voted for it. Yes. Trump's cluelessness is going to hurt his own voters the most because the blue state voters on average have more protections thanks to blue state social programs. The manufacturing towns in the red States, people hoping for jobs, not going

to happen. The farmers who trusted Trump's trade policies, not going to help them wait until, wait, wait till the devastating retaliatory tariffs start to hit. So the Maga diehards who thought he was going to come to their rescue and now they're going to sit by and watch as potentially Medicare cuts are on the table. Trump's not draining the swamp. He's flooding it with incompetence and grift on social issues. Forget about progress. Republicans are going to double down on the banning of books, policing classrooms, stripping away basic rights, all under the guise of giving parents choice and freedom and all of

this nonsense. And the Supreme court has already figured out that they're going to help. So brace yourself for more of this culture war nonsense. It divides communities. It distracts from the economic pain that they are also causing abortion trans issues. We've seen the country move left and left and left on these issues, but Trump's continuing to go at it. He has the help of the red state governors. He has the help of the Supreme court. Now Trump's confusion or his complete and total lack of understanding about how anything works is a major contributing factor here.

If it's tariffs or if it's foreign policy or it's inflation, he has no idea what's going on. He's playing. It's like playing with matches in a room full of gas cans and just saying, I don't know, why can't I just drop the matches? Well, there's a reason why the guy thinks that tariffs are a tax that other countries pay when it's actually a tax paid here in the United States. And meanwhile, it's American consumers and businesses that foot the bill. Trump's concern is whether he looks good. If it hurts you, if it hurts his voters, collateral damage in what is ultimately a PR game. It's important to remember that this did not have to happen. Millions of Americans who stayed home or believe the Republican party's lies about Democrats

being too extreme handed them the victory. The same voters will wake up in a year or two wondering why their paychecks don't stretch far enough. Trump was going to bring egg prices back down to a dollar and gas was going to be a dollar. They'll wake up and be wondering why are our schools not even able to afford pencils? Well, part of it is the wrestling lady running DOE. Why are their health care costs through the roof? Because Trump never really had a plan that was two weeks away. So what do we do? And we're going to lay this out in pieces later on in the show. We don't shut up. We don't go away. We don't let their non-existent mandate that they believe they have go unchecked. If Republicans believe they've won a blank check to gut the country,

they're in for a rude awakening. Now they may succeed in a bunch of the red States, but we're going to try to fight. It's a very slim house majority, maybe just a single seat. They can be stopped cold with one or two dissenters. We are talking obstruction at every turn, no matter how Republicans spin their win. Most voters voted for someone other than Trump. There's no landslide slide and there's no mandate. They got a tiny edge. The pendulum swings back and forth. We can't let them use it to dismantle the progress that has been made. The house is where budgets start and that's why it's so critical. It's where oversight either happens or doesn't happen. So if the Republican party wants to play politics with people's lives,

the goal has to be to make sure that they get nothing done. And you might be saying, Oh, but David, isn't that the worst of obstructionist politics when they are trying to do things that will damage the country and hurt people, even if they are Trump voters, I would still rather stop it. I don't want people to be hurt. Gridlock is better than them achieving terrible things. So the goal is not just survival. It's laying the groundwork to flip this

mess in two years. I hope that Democrats don't let up for a second. It seems that there are people ready for a fight. You know, I used to be critical of Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. I would say that I didn't think that her political instincts were yet well developed, that she was naive in some ways. I think she's fixed a lot of that stuff and she seems ready for the fight. Now, unfortunately, some of the self-described progressive left says AOC has sold out and left everybody behind. I think AOC has become far more tactical and shrewd, and that's exactly what you need when fighting these people. Now, if you want to go to a specific example of what they have up their sleeves, this one is vomitous. I'm warning you. Let's talk about it. A billionaire and a bunch of millionaires met last week to talk about whether the average

social security benefit of $1,700 a month should be cut. Let that sink in. Elon Musk, giga turbo billionaire, hundreds of billions has been deputized in an unelected role to start cutting. And he met with senators who have average net worths in the millions. So a giga billionaire and millionaires got together and they said, what about cutting social security to people getting 1700 bucks a month, which they are entitled to since they worked for a living? Let's look at cutting their benefits. Let's look at cutting Medicare. We've got a bunch of reports on this. Uh, CNBC reports, Doge's Musk and Rama, Swami want Congress to pass huge spending cuts. That's a tough sell. And it points out that mathematically you can't do anything meaningful

unless you look at social security, Medicare and Medicaid. I will tell you why this is the case mathematically in a moment. The article points out the duo had a day of meetings on Capitol Hill with hundreds of Republican lawmakers. Nothing is sacrosanct was the reaction from the senators who met with Musk and Rama. Nothing is sacrosanct, meaning it's not off the table that we would look at social security. It's not off the table that we would look at Medicare. It's not off the table that we would look at Medicaid.

And in fact, we did have this disturbing video Fox business reporting after this meeting that indeed, yes, social security, Medicare and Medicaid are very much on the table. Nothing is psychosomatic, nothing. They're gonna put much on the table. Nothing is psychosomatic. Nothing. They're going to put everything on the table. That's what they told lawmakers. Everything is on the table. And that includes Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

Let me tell you why this is mathematically a reality. If you're surprised by this, if you are a factory worker in Iowa who gleefully voted for Donald Trump for strength and for the economy and for alpha and for testicular fortitude and because Trump pretends to be six, three and right. Whatever reason you had for voting for Trump, we now have a problem. And the problem is that they are talking about cutting $2.5 trillion from the budget. The problem with that is the entirety of discretionary spending is $2.5 trillion. You can, if you don't touch mandatory spending, social security, Medicare, Medicaid, if you don't touch that, you have to somehow take 2.5 trillion out of 2.5 trillion. That means discretionary spending goes to zero. So either they're not going to cut anywhere

close to what they told us they're going to cut, which we knew, or they're going to have to cut social security, Medicare, Medicaid, or they'll have to cut not as much and take a little from social security, Medicaid, Medicare. That's the math of it. And for all of the bluster, you can show up at a rally, sweaty and orange three hours late and tell people how Kamala is a communist. Right. You, you can show up at a rally, sweaty and orange three hours late and tell people how Kamala is a communist, right? You, you can do that a million times and you can promise cuts and Elon or Leon, as he called him once. Do I have that on my soundboard? I don't think I do. Um, you, you, you can say it as many times as you want that Elon's going to cut and Vivek is going

to cut and we're going to cut our way to prosperity. But at a certain point, the math is the math. You're obviously not going to cut this fresh discretionary spending to zero. So if you want to get anywhere close to your promise, 2.5 trillion, it's going to have to come out of social security. The disgusting nature of a guy with hundreds of billions of dollars meeting with senators who make 180 a year and are mostly millionaires to say, how are we going to do this thing? Well, maybe the people getting 1700 bucks a month from Medicare, from social security, we'll bring them down to 1500. There's an idea. Well, well, what, but Elon's got 200 billion. What is we need to save by

cutting pennies on the dollar from people who worked for a living and are entitled to that money. So this is an oligarchy and or a kleptocracy. Let me remind you about those terms. Oligarchy is a system of government where a small group of people, they're usually wealthy. They're usually inflation influential. They control usually wealthy. They're usually inflation influential. They control the country. And when you say, Hey, the vague with a couple hundred billion, I'm sorry, the vague with a

few hundred million and Elon with a couple hundred billion and millionaire senators, that's who will decide on social security benefits. That's an oligarchy. It's also kind of a kleptocracy. A kleptocracy is a corrupt form of government where leaders exploit their power to steal wealth and resources for personal gain. In some mathematical sense, that's what this is. It's about Elon's not going to pay more. The vague's not going to pay more. The senators aren't going to pay more. We'll cut the benefits of people who made $42,000 for their careers and are now retired. Is it an oligarchical kleptocracy or is it a kleptocratic oligarchy? I don't know. It's probably both. Um, but this is where we are right now. And so in particular,

building on the, some of these people are about to get a rude awakening. This is the direction things are going. And I am not an accelerationist. I want to remind you that in fact, I have an entire chapter in my book about why I believe accelerationism is wrong. It doesn't work. History tells us that you don't improve things by burning it to the ground and rebuilding it. In fact, when you do that, things often get worse for a lot of people. The people doing the rebuilding are sometimes even worse than the people who were in power previously. So I'm an incrementalist, but despite my views, it's looking more and more like we are going to see an acceleration of the destruction that these people have planned for their own

betterment. Their pockets are going to do great. I heard Trump's going to let me keep my special tax cut called Q bid, the qualified business income deduction. Cool. Okay. But what about the people getting 1750 in social security? We're going to cut you to 1600 that you can't afford a medication. Oh, well, that's going to be a problem for you. That's where things are going. After the break, we have the first list of people Trump wants to imprison. Yeah. They said it was hyperbole.

They said it was an exaggeration, but we have the list and we'll go over it with you this holiday season. Let's remember how powerful it is to have someone in your corner. Have you ever taken a big step as an adult going back to school, changing careers? Think back to who encouraged you along the way. That's what the 431 exchange is for, for so many adult learners. Our sponsor, the 431 exchange is a nonprofit that provides scholarships to adults 18 to 75 who were working to transform their lives and support families. The 431 exchange fills a vital need in Louisiana, which ranks 40th in K through 12 education.

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This service can also reduce the number of spam calls and emails you get since many solicitors and scammers get your information from these very same sources. Go to Incogni dot com slash Pacman and use the code Pacman for 60 percent off. That's I N C O G N I dot com slash Pacman for a huge 60 percent discount. The link is in the podcast notes. I had a chat over the weekend with some of my progressive independent media buddies and people are worried. People are genuinely worried about what's coming with this forthcoming administration. We're going to talk about the first imprisonment list that Donald Trump has acknowledged. But if we are going to continue, uh, providing an alternative to the unhinged propaganda

of this Maga Republican party, uh, we're going to need strong, progressive, independent media. Now, as I always say, it doesn't have to be this show. I know I'm not everybody's cup of tea. Some people don't like my sweater. Some people say my eyes are not the right proportion on my head. Some people just don't like my voice, whatever it is, that's fine. But it is important to support whatever independent media you believe has a vision that makes sense for this country. If you do think I'm at least one of those people, consider getting a membership at join pacman.com. You can also support the show by pre-ordering my forthcoming book, The Echo Machine. Now beyond 4,300 pre-orders pushing for 5,000, you can get the book at davidpachman.com slash book or anywhere that books, eBooks or audio books are sold. And that includes calling your local bookstore. They can get it for you. Tell them you'd like

beacon presses, the echo machine by David Pakman. All right. Uh, this is not a rehearsal. It is not Trump just talking or running his mouth to rile up his base. Donald Trump is overtly laying out plans for the most authoritarian presidency in American history. It's not an exaggeration. Now we are not saying he's Hitler, Mussolini or Kim Jong Un. We're comparing him to other presidents and what Trump has already said he wants would make him the most authoritarian American president by far.

I'll remind you that on meet the Press over the weekend, we spoke about this yesterday. Donald Trump said that the members of the January 6th committee should go to jail for daring to investigate him. This is what Trump said to Kristen Welker during this gong show interview on Sunday. And Cheney was behind it. And so was Benny Thompson and everybody on that committee. We're going to for what they did. Yeah. Honestly, they should go to jail. So you think Liz Cheney should go to jail? For what?

Everyone on the committee. I think everybody, anybody that voted in favor. Are you going to direct your FBI director and your attorney general to send them to jail? Not at all. I think that they'll have to look at that. But I'm not going to I'm going to focus on drill baby drill. So here's where the usual MAGA defense kicks in. Trump says lots of things he doesn't mean, or there's no real way for him to imprison this, these people. And that's where they are very wrong. Sure. Trump likes to talk big. It's true. There's no legal mechanism for Trump

to snap his fingers and throw Liz Cheney into prison, but let's not pretend that he won't weaponize every single level of power to get as close as possible to doing it. What can Trump actually do? Well, he's already doing some of it. He's already signaling how he would make it happen. When Trump appoints a loyalist like Pam Bondi as attorney general, he is ensuring that the Department of Justice is not about enforcing the law. It's about enforcing Trump's will and Trump's will is revenge. He doesn't have to go and say, arrest Liz Cheney. He creates the conditions. He hires the right people and he lets them figure out how to twist the law into a weapon of political revenge. When he nominates Kashap Patel to be the FBI director, Patel's shown, he said he's not just willing, he's eager to go out there

and be Trump's personal fixer. He was trying to discredit the Russia investigation, his involvement in the classified documents case, pushing election fraud from 2020. You don't need to go and say, do this. If you make Patel the director of the FBI, he can launch endless investigations, subpoenas, legal harassment against Trump's enemies. Doesn't matter if the charges don't stick. Doesn't matter if she's never even charged. The process itself becomes the punishment and it gets very expensive when you're forced

to hire lawyers to defend you. That's how Trump operates. It's not blatant orders. It's you put loyalists in key positions to kind of bend the system until it breaks. It's very Putin like in that way. And you really only need to look at Trump's first term. He leaned on DOJ officials to declare the 2020 election fraudulent. He fired FBI director James Comey when the Russia investigation was getting too close. He pardoned loyalists who committed federal crimes, rewarding their criminality and the fact that they didn't, uh, become, uh, they didn't spill the beans on Trump.

So imagine the first term, but on steroids with an unrestrained Trump who doesn't have another election to run. Let's also not overlook Trump's audience. Trump's words about imprisoning committee members are not just hollow threats. They are marching orders for the most diehard followers. The January 6th insurrection did not happen in a vacuum. It was the culmination of years of Trump's rhetoric, taking root with people ready to act on his words. And when he gave the word, they did it. So even if Trump doesn't directly say to cash at Patel, the FBI must go after Liz Cheney.

He's setting the tone that's going to make it happen. And he's setting a tone that makes it dangerous to oppose him. Now this isn't about whether you like Liz Cheney. I mostly disagree with her politically. This isn't about whether you like Benny Johnson, Benny Thompson. This is about what happens when the presidency becomes a tool to silence your political opponents. Hard to think of something more anti-American than that. And Trump is laying the groundwork for something we have never seen in the United States. Timothy Snyder talked to us about it when I interviewed him several weeks back.

This is going to be a government run by fear and loyalty tests and vengeance and Trump's making it clear. So let's stop the pretending that, oh, you know, Trump is excuse me. Trump is Trump. Trump is telling us exactly what he plans to do. And he doesn't need a real mechanism to imprison Liz Cheney to make life a living hell for his political enemies. He has the power of the presidency. He's shown us time after time, he will abuse it. So the real question is, will we stop him before it's too late? As I laid out yesterday, this is going to require a blue state governors and others who care about law and order to actually, uh, get on the ball. We'll be even more specific about that in a, in a forthcoming show. Uh, but we can't let him show up with his list of enemies in hand

with Kashat Patel and Pam Bondi ready to do the whole thing. This is really scary stuff. Full blown conspiracy theorists are about to be in charge of major levers of government. And Donald Trump is now admitting that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is indeed going to go into the vaccine autism conspiracy theory that has been debunked for decades. It's been debunked for decades and they're going back to it. Listen to this exchange between Kristen Welker and Donald Trump about this issue. Let me ask you about RFK Jr. He has obviously talked about his skepticism of vaccines. He's expressed opposition to childhood vaccines. Do you want to see childhood vaccines eliminated? If they're dangerous for the children? Look, so possibly

when you look at some of the problems, when you look at what's going on with disease and sickness in our country, something's wrong. Are you talking about autism? Well, if you take a look at autism, you go back 25 years, autism was almost non-existent. It was, you know, one out of 100,000. And now it's close to one out of 100. Well, I mean, what what's happening if they can find it? Now, I did something the other night that was a little unusual at Mar-a-Lago. I called the drug companies, the top drug companies, and I called RFK Jr. and Dr. Oz and some of his people,

and I said, let's all get together and let's figure out where we're going, because we're going to do a lot of things. Number one, we're going to reduce prices, because the middleman makes more money than the drug companies, in all fairness to the drug companies. There's a middleman that nobody even knows who they are. And you look at our drug prices, they're much higher than the prices for

the same medicine, for the same stuff. So we met and we were met for a long time and we talked about pricing and we talked about vaccines, you know, in terms of the meeting was so long that making America health again, Trump had four diet Cokes and six Big Macs during the meeting. That's how long it was when he was focused on making everybody healthy. What happens, we talked about pesticides, we talked about everything. And I think a lot of good things are gonna come from him.

And he's not gonna upset any system. He's not gonna upset the system. He's not looking to reinvent the wheel totally. But when you look at the numbers, we really don't have a very healthy country. Sir, going back 25 years, studies show that there is no link between vaccines and autism. And yet it sounds like you are open to the possibility of him looking. I'm open to getting rid of them. I think somebody has to find out. if you go back 25 years ago, you had very little autism. Now you have it. I mean, well, they say because they're better at identifying it. One in 100,000 and now it's one in 100. That's, that's a pretty bad number.

So, you know, the thing about merely being open to looking at vaccines and autism is that it's been looked into endlessly. They love to act like nobody can investigate that, but it's been investigated for decades. So let's kind of go through it. This all started in 1998 when this doctor named Andrew Wakefield published a study which claimed that the MMR vaccine, measles, mumps, rubella caused autism. The problem with the study was that it was based on only 12 kids who had been hand selected and brought to Wakefield, too small a number to prove anything. And the entire thing was flawed. It turned out Wakefield was being paid by lawyers suing vaccine companies. He had a financial motive to make vaccines look bad. And when other scientists

investigated this, they tried to replicate the findings and they couldn't. A bunch of larger studies were done. No link between vaccines and autism. And before publishing the study, Wakefield filed a patent for a measles only vaccine. Think of that. He stood to profit if people stopped using the MMR vaccine and switch to a measles only vaccine, which, wow, he happens to have a patent for. And if parents turned away from the MMR vaccine, it would benefit him directly. That study on which all of this is based has been retracted in 2010. The journal that published it retracted it saying it's bogus. Wakefield lost his medical license for what he did. And what we now know is that decades of research involving millions of kids shows

no connection between vaccines and autism. Um, it's kind of hard to find something that's been studied more and they love to frame it as you guys don't want open inquiry. You don't want free speech. We've had it for decades and the only thing we get out of bringing it up again is people saying, oh, damn, maybe there is something to that. I won't get my kids vaccinated. And next thing you know, we have another measles outbreak. Now, with the question of why rates are rising, Trump goes, it used to be one out of 100,000. Now it's one out of 100. We have a pretty good grasp of this. To some degree, the rate of autism may be going up, but you first have to understand

we have much better awareness and diagnosis. There are 10 or 12 kids I grew up with. In retrospect, they were obviously autistic. They were never identified as such. You know, when I was in elementary school in 1993, with the benefit of hindsight as adults, they've now been diagnosed appropriately, but there just wasn't the, you know, reminds me of the rain man scene where Tom Cruise brings Dustin Hoffman and says he's autistic. And the doctor goes, Oh, he's artistic. What's wrong with

that? It's sort of a joke, but that's a huge part of it. The diagnostic criteria has expanded to include people on different parts of the autism spectrum that weren't previously included. There are better services, which earlier put kids in front of individuals knowledgeable to say, this is someone that actually may have autism and yes, environmental factors, parents on average being older, we're trying to understand if that increases the risk of autism survival of very premature babies that in the past would not have made it. Now they make it. Is that making it so that we are having a higher rate of autism in children who survive?

We're exploring all of those things. There's no doubt. And people want to say, well, what about plastics? What about this? Explore all of those things. There's no doubt. And people want to say, well, what about plastics? What about this? Explore all of it. But the MMR vaccine link to autism has been thoroughly debunked. And it's another one of these dangerous just asking questions, just asking questions. All right.

One more aspect that I want to drill down on from Donald Trump's disastrous interview with Kristen Welker on MSNBC on NBC news rather is that Trump does acknowledge despite all of his confidence in his tariff, excuse me, tariff scheme, he cannot say for certain that his tariffs aren't going to increase prices. Of course we know they are here is Trump sort of, uh, uh, carefully saying, I can't guarantee prices won't go up under my plan. One of your signature promises on the campaign trail, which was to end inflation, to lower prices.

You are now proposing tariffs against the United States. Three biggest trading partners, economists of all stripes, say that ultimately consumers pay the price of tariffs. I don't believe you guarantee American families won't pay more. I can't guarantee anything. I can't guarantee tomorrow. Of course, if he was certain that the the tariffs specifically won't raise prices for

Americans, he would say it. Trump hyperbolically promises things all the time, but he knows he can't promise this. And you know, the truth is they all know it. Remember, Elon Musk was caught on audio acknowledging that the agenda being put forth by Trump is going to cause unnecessary hardship for the middle class. They know what's coming after you spending to live within our means. And yeah, that that necessarily involves some some temporary hardship, but it will ensure long term prosperity, temporary hardship. The reason they won't say prices won't go up is because basic economics tells us that they will.

Tariffs are basically taxes on imported goods. If a company in the U.S. buys something from abroad, they pay for the product and then they pay something extra to the American government because of the tariff. It sounds like it's the other country getting taxed, but that's not true. The American business doing the import pays the tariff and then they pass that cost on to consumers, us by raising prices. What Republicans love to say is, oh, if you put a 10 percent tariff on China, China lowers its prices 10 percent so that when the Americans buy the thing, the total price is the same. Or if they keep the price the same, they're going to be able to sell less of the stuff. The problem is that this relates to substitute goods, supply chains, and it affects different

industries differently. This is why a blanket tariff on a country makes no sense. It might encourage domestic production over the longterm. If it gets more expensive to get something from China over the long term, you might start manufacturing it in the U S but in the short term, you're not able to do that because it takes a while to bring those supply chains home in the short term. It's just going to mean you get it from somebody else at the next lowest or next highest cost as it actually ends up being. Tariffs are sold as a patriotic big boy to punish other countries. But the people that get punished are the Americans buying this stuff. And you know what?

Who can better afford to pay 10 percent more for their phone, the rich or the middle class, the rich? And that's why the tariffs disproportionately hurt the middle class. It's basic economics deep down in that brain of big, a brain of his. Trump knows it. Elon Musk certainly knows it. And unfortunately, hundreds of millions of Americans are going to know it soon. If you're shopping for a new mattress, I can tell you from experience that Helix sleep

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Donald Trump will soon be back in the white house for a second term, but this incoming administration is really shaping up to be less about Trump and more about the people running the show behind the scenes. This is not a deep state conspiracy theory with vague actors. Remember when I had Vivek Ramaswamy on the show, he started talking about deep state this and deep state that. And I said, Vick, tell me who are the people? Give me, give me the names of the people. And twice he refused to name anybody. And eventually he said, you know, people like Susan Rice. This is not a deep state conspiracy.

This is about the specific people involved with Trump and who Trump is appointing and nominating right now. Trump is essentially a mascot for the far right. And the question is what will emerge from the last vestiges of Trump's political career, which is the next four years, what will emerge to succeed it. Trump's older than ever as are all as, as are we all, uh, and more out of touch than ever.

And he's clueless about a lot of the mechanisms that are at play, but that doesn't really matter because there's a machinery around Trump ready to take over. Here's the game plan and it's already in motion. First there's a machinery around Trump ready to take over. Here's the game plan and it's already in motion. First there's project 2025. This is the heritage foundations blueprint to remake the federal government. And despite Trump saying many times, I don't know anything about it. I don't have anything to do with it. The number of project 2025 adjacent people who are getting positions of power in Trump's administration is stunning. And their goal we know about because they put it in writing. The goal is

fire tens of thousands of career civil servants, people whose job it is just to keep government running and stable, no matter who is in power, be it Democrats or Republicans, take those career civil servants, fire them, replace them with hardcore loyalists. Forget about experience. Forget about competence. The only qualification is Trump's undying allegiance to the agenda. That's what matters. And it's really the agenda of the people pulling the strings.

Trump's allies are already moving on this. They're stacking key roles with loyalists like cash at Patel, who's going to lead the FBI. Billy long. That's an accountant. No, no, no, no, no. An auctioneer, an auctioneer is going to be the new head of the IRS. It's not just amateur hour.

It's a calculated strategy. These are selections meant to dismantle the independence of these federal agencies and just turn them into a tool that Trump can use. So that's project 2025 and the plan on, on civil servants. Trump's agenda 47 is the shiny object that they're dangling to distract Trump's base. It's the freedom cities, death penalty for drug dealers, the militarized deportations. It's that stuff. The real story is the authoritarian infrastructure that they're building behind the scenes. This administration is about creating a government that you can't challenge in any meaningful way. Trump will be the figurehead. The loyalists will be running the show. And here is the kicker. Donald Trump is not

even the longterm plan. What I mean by that is Trump's got his four years, but what's next? Who's going to run? I recently spoke to someone in a position to know who told me that privately the plan is to pave the way for JD Vance to be the Republican candidate in 2028 with Donald Trump jr. As his running mate, think about how terrifying that is. Now, of course, one of their principles is that they're against political dynasties. They're against the Clintons. Bill Clinton was president. Why do we need Hillary?

They, uh, you know, he talks badly about George W. Bush as he never should have been president. They already had a Bush. They're against political dynasties except when it's them. That's what this is all actually about. It's about securing generational power for a hard right movement. Part of the reason it seems that Donald Trump Jr was so adamant that Trump's VP be JD Vance rather than Doug Burgum is that Vance is the guy who would have Don Jr as his running mate. Trump right now is serving the sort of role of the lame duck figurehead who's going to

be a gateway to get them there. They know this is the end of Trump's political career, both because of his age and because it's his second term. And what we're looking at is not governance. It's a takeover. The people around Trump are setting up a government that's going to outlast him. It's going to consolidate power in ways that could fundamentally reshape the country. And it is already happening and it's happening with a lot of doofus as I might mention, one

of them is Alina Haba. So um, Donald Trump is announcing that his failed former lawyer Alina H, is going to be White House counsel, his personal lawyer. This is wild. Trump posting to Troth Central, quote, I am pleased to announce that Alina Haba will join my White House team as counselor to the president. Alina has been a tireless advocate for justice, a fierce defender of the rule of law, and an invaluable advisor to my campaign and transition team. She has been unwavering in her loyalty and unmatched in her resolve, standing with me through numerous trials, battles, and countless days in court. Few understand the weaponization of the injustice system better

than Alina, who has fought relentlessly against the full force of lawfare with courage and an unshakable commitment to justice. As a first generation American of Middle Eastern heritage, she has become a role model for women in law and politics, most recently being named Chaldean Woman of the Year. Congratulations to Alina, her husband, Greg, and her three beautiful children, Chloe, Luke, and Parker getting so, okay. Um, we suspected Alina Haba was going to have some kind of role. Now, months ago, Alina Haba's name was being floated as possibly the attorney general. Of course that would be laughably humiliating, but is Pam Bondi as attorney general that much better?

I don't know. But Trump ended up steering away from Alina Habba. Agie then Alina Habba was considered to be press secretary for Donald Trump and ultimately she did not get that role either. That one going to Caroline Leavitt, who I believe is going to be the youngest press secretary ever. So Alina Haba ends up as counsel to the president. If you want to look at this in a positive light, you could argue she would do less damage

in that role. I don't know that that's really accurate. I think as counsel to the president, you can give the president what he may believe is good legal advice to go ahead and do absolutely horrible things. Whereas as press secretary, yes, you were a cog in the propaganda wheel, but you arguably could do less damage as press secretary than as lawyer for the president. So this is a very concerning nomination. Now get it or selection getting less attention. But also interesting is that Michael Anton has been nominated by Trump to be director

of policy planning at the state department. This is another project 2025 guy. This is yet another link to project 2025. Donald Trump announcing this by saying, quote, Michael Anton will become director of policy planning at the state department. Michael served me loyally. That's what matters loyally and effectively at the national security council. In my first term, he has an extensive background in government, the private sector and academia.

I thought academia sucked and it wasn't a credential anymore. He spent the last eight years explaining what an America first foreign policy truly means. Of course, Trump continuing to insist he has nothing to do with project 2025, but the now, now the number of project 2025 connected people that Donald Trump has nominated, selected or hired is, uh, over a dozen at last count. So project 2025 is going to play a major role in this administration. Clueless people that Trump hired either because he likes the way they look or they are Brown nosing loyalists like Alina Haba. They will play a major role in this

administration. What we're lacking is genuinely competent people who can bring expertize forward to maybe achieve something that will actually benefit the bulk of the American people. It would be nice to have that. So far, we don't. Not all men's underwear is the same with traditional underwear. The sticking and the rubbing are something many of us know all too well. But our sponsor, Sheath Underwear, puts it to an end once and for all. Sheath Underwear is ultra light and breathable. You can barely tell it's there. But importantly, sheath is uniquely designed with two pouches in the front that separate everything out, giving you an extra confidence boost throughout the day. Air can flow in between keeping things dry and comfortable all day. No more sweating and sticking. Sheath underwear is the type of

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out of the wallets of the people working and living and paying taxes in the blue states. Now, I've talked to you before when these Republicans come up with these secessionist ideas, I've explained to you many times, if you took the red states and they became their own country in this sort of like secession, wet dream that Republicans have, they would be an economic train wreck. They are propped up entirely by federal subsidies and the productivity of the progressive blue states. MAGA ideology loves to claim that they are about self-sufficiency, but the numbers paint a picture of dependency that would make Ayn Rand weep, even though she was a big, strong woman. Red States routinely reject federal

government programs like the Obamacare Medicaid expansion that I mentioned earlier. They leave millions uninsured while claiming that they're fighting against big government. And meanwhile, these very same States are the largest takers of federal dollars using blue state tax revenue to fund their roads and their schools and their public services. The MAGA Republicans love to scream freeloaders at us in the blue states, but they are the free loading states instead of taxing the wealthy or taxing corporations, red States lean very heavily on sales taxes, which disproportionately affect low income residents. And it's this regressive system that stifles economic mobility and makes inequality even worse. You've got the anti-union laws, especially right to work policies.

It keeps wages low. It keeps workers powerless. And this will drive many of the skilled workers to blue states where unions can still negotiate fair pay for them. It's really not a coincidence that the state's most hostile to unions, most hostile to organized labor are the states that have the highest rates of poverty. So you've got these red States pouring energy into banning books and targeting trans kids and restricting access to, uh, reproductive health services. And instead

they don't address housing shortages. They don't address poverty. They don't address access to health care. They don't address the fact that were it not for the blue states, they couldn't even survive. When your biggest legislative priority is making sure that 13 year olds don't get to read Handmaid's Tale in school. It's not exactly a surprise that your economy is tanking and data shows that people are leaving red states for blue ones in certain high skilled areas and professions. Now, I know that the red staters love to say it's an exodus from California. It's an exodus from New York.

People are leaving blue States. It is true that some of the highest population blue States have seen very small numbers of outflows over the last five years. That's true. Part of it was COVID, a lot of different explanations. The data shows that educated professionals, innovators, entrepreneurs, younger people, they are fleeing the restrictive policies of red States, leaving the red States with an overall older workforce, which requires more financial subsidy as they retire and

fewer taxpayers. That is a real problem. Uh, a Washington post analysis showed that States banning abortion are seeing declines in college educated professionals from moving in. And meanwhile, we've told the story of the OBGYNs moving out of Texas, moving out of Florida, moving out of Mississippi, partially because they don't want to get arrested for providing medical treatment to patients.

The best and the brightest aren't sticking around to see what happens when you ban AP African-American studies. They're just getting the hell out. Now, this is very much reflected in the statistics that I know that you can you can sort of try to use rhetoric about Marxists and nanny states. But when you look at the data, red states consistently rank worst in health care outcomes. They have higher rates of maternal mortality, higher rates of preventable disease, opioid deaths. Part of it is their refusal to do the Medicaid expansion that makes the crisis worse.

And it turns out that their bizarre version of freedom doesn't cure diabetes. It doesn't stop an opioid overdose. It doesn't help pay for any of the things that people need. And then you add on to this deregulation, neglecting their infrastructure. You end up with things like the Texas power grid collapse we saw in 2021. So the red state focus on short term profits instead of long term resilience is not doing them well. So then we get to the numbers. It's really hard to hide the reality of this red state disaster.

On average, blue states have higher GDP per capita, better health care outcomes, higher educational attainment and lower rates of poverty. On the other hand, on average, the red states have more poverty, lower wages, worse health care, and a less educated population. Now it is true. A lot of that does make some of the blue states more expensive to live in. And that's because of something mostly called supply and demand. The more people want to move to California, especially San Francisco, San Diego, Los Angeles, that's that demand is going to make it more expensive. And that's a reality that they never want to acknowledge.

You know, California is often derided by the right. The GDP of California is bigger than that of most countries. And meanwhile, you have states like Mississippi or Alabama who were it not for the taxes collected in blue states wouldn't even be able to fund the meager infrastructure and services that they offer. Red states are building their economies on borrowed time and they're building their economy on blue state generosity while they blame the blue states and attack the federal government claiming they don't need either. The reality is they very badly need both and they're setting themselves up for failure

financially and socially and politically. So the initial takeaway is that house of cards is going to continue to collapse. They will keep blaming immigrants and liberals and drag Queens. And you know, uh, a Margaret Atwood book that somehow got into a seventh grade classroom. The problems start in their states, not in Massachusetts or in Washington, DC. Now there's one other aspect to this that I do think is important to mention. We've been talking about Trump's incoming borders are Tom Homan's plan to deploy red state national guards into the blue states to do the mass deportation and round people up and all of this stuff. And we've said the blue states better be damn well ready. Many governors have said we're not going to participate. Many mayors have said we're not going to participate. Great. It also should be considered and a lot of this is done

at the federal level, so states can't really do it. But if that is what the red states are going to do, what about cutting off some of the blue state gravy train? That is what's keeping these red states up and running. I don't know how it would be done. It's something that should be considered a confused Donald Trump receiving another fake award from Fox news, which is very much not fair and balanced. Fox news made up an award for their orange King giving Trump the honorary Patriot of the Year Award. Trump spoke after being named honorary Patriot of the Year by Fox. You will see here that I believe this is Sandra something. This is a supposed hard news anchor in the crowd applauding Trump as usual, confused

about what he's even being given an award for, uh, really undercuts the idea of Fox news as a serious news station. Check this out. They tried and then they just dropped their placards and went home. They said, this is a slaughter. And, uh, but we're gonna, we're gonna do things that have been really needed for a long time. And we are going to look at elections. We want to have paper ballots, one day voting, voter ID and proof of citizenship. A little thing, a little thing like proofs. And we have a super fair and balanced, isn't it? A Fox news to do this. This, this really puts those North Korean news anchors to shame. And as part of his, I guess, acceptance speech of a completely contrived award, Trump

talks about speaking with Canadian prime minister, Justin Trudeau, Canada, and Justin came flying right in because we talked about 25% tariffs. That's just the beginning. He's a hell of a nice crowd. I like this crowd. We're going to lose all of our allies, aren't we? This is a nice crowd. A lot of people thought we're going to drill, baby, drill. We're going to get your prices down. And we're bringing the cost down.

You know, when we were campaigning, a lot of people thought the biggest thing was the economy. And it is it probably pulled the best. But I never believed it was as important as immigration and the border and stopping our country from being invaded because this was a massive invasion of our country. Four years of this crap we are about to suffer through. I'm doing my best to outline the strategies that I think will be best for surviving these four years. Psychologically, I'm talking about mostly, but also economically and in other ways, this guy's going to just destroy all of our alliances and it's sad thing to watch. It's a slow motion disaster that just will not stop, but he seems committed to it and he's put a complete and total band of sycophants around him without praising Trump's first

cabinet to a degree. Rex Tillerson was not nuts in the way that the people he's putting in are nuts. Trump selecting Christopher Ray to FBI director is not insane in the way that putting cash app Patel in there is completely and totally nuts. So we're really in for it here. I appreciate having you all here and the community we've built so we can survive this thing hopefully together. Uh, we've got a great bonus show for you today. Make sure you're signed up at join pacman.com.

The bonus shows just one of the many member benefits that we provide to those who say, hey, you know what? I want to vote with my dollar and participate in something that hopefully can solve some of the problems we're dealing with rather than create new ones. I also want to say a huge thank you. We are now well beyond four thousand preorders for my forthcoming book. Let's push for five thousand preorders. My publisher, they came to me with tears in their eyes. They said, David, how are you? What people are loving the book. Please consider pre-ordering, pre-ordering this book. The book really explains how things got as bad as they did. What could be done to fix it and countries where they've done it proof. And we look all over the world. It's not just, oh, Sweden. Anybody can talk about Sweden, but we go elsewhere.

We go to India. We go to South America. Anyway, I'm really proud of the book. Over 4000 preorders. I would love for you to make it one more. And after getting the book anywhere, Amazon, Barnes and Noble, wherever it's called the echo machine, submit your receipt at David Pakman.com slash free book stuff to get a free signed book plate and many other goodies. I'll see you on the bonus show

and I'll be right back here tomorrow.