The David Pakman Show - 12/14/22: Putin Nukes Are Back, DeSantis Goes Antivax

Episode Date: December 14, 2022

-- On the Show: -- A closer look at the possibility of Russian President Vladimir Putin launching nuclear weapons -- Democratic Oregon Governor Kate Brown commutes all sentences of people on death row -- Looking at the most pressing, and less pressing, climate change risks over the next ten years -- How Fox News propagandist takes a real story and turns it into a conspiracy theory -- Fox News host Stuart Varney tells Elaine Chao that everyone at Fox was "appalled" when Trump made fun of her Asian ethnicity -- Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis announces an investigation into COVID vaccines -- Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis continues his antivaccine tirade on Fox News -- Why Donald Trump's 2024 run could end in total disaster -- A shocking new poll shows Ron DeSantis leading Donald Trump 56-33 in the 2024 Republican primary, even though DeSantis hasn't even announced his candidacy -- Voicemail caller delivers 19 seconds of right wing MAGA conspiracy red meat -- On the Bonus Show: US lawmakers unveil bipartisan bid to ban TikTok, SCOTUS Justice Brett Kavanaugh apparently hangs out with radical Republican Congressman Matt Gaetz, explaining the US pandemic border entry limits on migrants, much more... 🧻 Reel Paper: Use code PAKMAN for 30% OFF + free shipping at https://reelpaper.com/lemur 👍 Get 20% off an Allform sofa or armchair at https://allform.com/pakman 💪 Athletic Greens is offering FREE year-supply of Vitamin D at https://athleticgreens.com/pakman 🪒 Henson Shaving: Use code Pakman for FREE blades at https://hensonshaving.com/pakman -- Become a Supporter: http://www.davidpakman.com/membership -- Subscribe on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/thedavidpakmanshow -- Subscribe to Pakman Live: https://www.youtube.com/pakmanlive -- Subscribe to Pakman Finance: https://www.youtube.com/pakmanfinance -- Follow us on Twitter: http://twitter.com/davidpakmanshow -- Like us on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/davidpakmanshow -- Leave us a message at The David Pakman Show Voicemail Line (219)-2DAVIDP

Speaker 1 It is being reported that Russian President Vladimir Putin is readying nuclear weapons. What does this mean? Can we trust it? But maybe most importantly, what is it actually like to theorize about what would happen if such weapons were to be unleashed? So let's start with the beginning. A number of not very good sources and then some OK sources are reporting things like what Newsweek is reporting. Russia primes nuclear bomb 12 times more powerful than that dropped on Hiroshima. Now let's break down the headline more powerful than that dropped on Hiroshima. This is a very common 21st century headline. The it's very common that now the nukes that countries have access to are more powerful than the one that was dropped on Hiroshima. So that doesn't tell us too, too much. But let's look into the details. Video of an intercontinental

ballistic missile on a silo launcher has been released by Russia's defense ministry and widely reported by the country's media in an apparent warning to the West. A Russian tabloid newspaper reported that the Yars missile complex, which was loaded in the Kaluga region, had a capacity 12 times greater than the American bomb that destroyed Hiroshima in 1945. The mass circulation papers report outlined some of the missile specifications, including a launch weight of 46,000 tons, which some are disputing as plausible as implausible, an operational range of up to 12,000 kilometers that can strike the U.S. or anywhere in Europe and a payload of up to 500 kilotons. Now, is Putin doing this and what might cause him to do something like this?

We can't say with complete and total certainty. So I think it's maybe more interesting and more relevant to talk generally about what this would be like. What would it look like geopolitically and in terms of the science of it? If Russia launched a nuke of roughly this size against the West, often we just say, well, it would be a general nuclear winter, nuclear holocaust. But I find that it's better to be a little more specific. The exact outcomes of what would happen if Russia were to launch one of these nukes, let's let's put it at one for the time being as more likely that it would be one rather than a bunch just for the sake of discussion. The consequences would really depend on the specific target and the number of weapons used. But the potential consequences

would likely include the destruction of whatever city is hit and the infrastructure of that city. So you're talking buildings, you're talking roads, bridges and power grids already catastrophic. But those are the primary impacts. Then we have to talk about the sort of like follow on effects. You then would have contamination of large areas with radiation that has significant consequences in terms of long term health effects for the survivors, potentially making the areas uninhabitable. And of course, the impact that that would have on the ability to grow food. Remember, the bridges are destroyed, the roads are destroyed. So if you can't grow food, where do you bring food from if the bridges and the roads are also destroyed. So you can see how these are

compounding effects. Economic disruption on a global scale, trade and financial markets would likely be devastated. A significant geopolitical escalation would likely happen. It's sort of an understatement. I think the question is, to what extent and how quickly does the West respond in kind? Does this lead to a full scale war involving nuclear weapons, which these are these are just such dystopian scenarios that it can be hard to think about them sort of in practical terms. And then, of course, the general increase in likelihood that other countries would use their own nuclear weapons and end up a global nuclear conflict that could develop. Really important to understand the catastrophic nature here. I mean, think about just one item like to go back to food supply. Nuclear bombing would have a catastrophic effect on the food supply in the affected areas. The explosion itself would destroy farmland, crops, livestock, food stores that exist.

So you immediately have food shortages. The contamination of the environment with radiation could make it difficult or even impossible to grow crops, to raise animals in those affected areas, furthering the food shortages into long term. Then you've got to bring food in from somewhere else. But the infrastructure was destroyed, as I mentioned, the roads, the bridges, the ports. So transporting food in becomes difficult, exacerbating those very shortages. And so just to take one area, food, the use of a nuke could devastate the food supply and lead to widespread starvation. So that's just food that we're talking about.

How long would areas be affected by a nuke? The effects of radiation on the environment can last for years, And it can take a significant amount of time before it would be safe to live in an affected area, to grow food in an affected area, to raise animals. It can take a very long time. And in some cases, effects can be what for the human lifespan we would call permanent or semi-permanent. So we don't know what's going on with Putin right now. Health questions, questions about his mental state, questions about what is the game plan here with what's going on in Ukraine. And we have increasing but isolated and not exquisitely well sourced reports that nukes are being readied. We have to hope, of course, it doesn't go in that direction.

And to the extent that diplomacy can be used to prevent that, we should welcome it. The governor of Oregon has commuted all death sentences for the 17 individuals on death row in Oregon. The governor is against the death penalty. And I think that this is an absolutely fantastic decision. CNN reports. Oregon governor calls death penalty immoral. Commute sentences for all 17 inmates on death on death row. Outgoing Oregon Governor Kate Brown is commuting the sentences of all 17 people on death row to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole, according to a news release yesterday. She said, since taking office in 2015, I have continued Oregon's moratorium on executions because the death penalty is both dysfunctional and immoral. Today, I am commuting Oregon's death row so that we will no longer have anyone serving a sentence

of death and facing execution in this state. She used executive clemency powers to commute the sentences. It is set to take effect today. Now, important to understand about the death penalty in Oregon generally, as the article says, Oregon has executed two people since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976. And since Oregon reinstated the death penalty in 1984, the most recent was in 1997. I think that this is a fantastic decision. I'm against the death penalty. I believe we should all be against the death penalty. And there are so many reasons, some of which I will tell you right now. Now, I want to say up front, sometimes there are people who are against the death penalty for three of the reasons I'm going to mention. And they will say,

David, that fourth reason isn't very good. It's sort of fallacious, actually. Let's take them one at a time. And I know specifically what people are talking about, but let's take them one at a time. First of all, if we believe that human lives have inherent value, which is often part of the justification for the death penalty, meaning it goes something like human life has inherent value. And so when you take a life, you are giving up your right to live. And therefore, the state can or should take your life intentionally. If we are against the intentional taking of lives which have inherent value, then we can't say except when the person has done A, B or C, at which point the state should get involved

in the business of taking life. Nope. Doesn't make sense. The state should not get involved in the business of taking life. Nope. Doesn't make sense. The state should not be involved in that. And I am against it. Secondly, there are wrongful convictions all the time in our justice system. And in addition to there being innocent people on death row, there are also many cognitively limited people on death row.

And so because we can't possibly get it right, we can't accept as a society the possibility of putting to death someone who may be innocent. Now, you could say, but David, what if the system were perfect and there were no one innocent? I would still be against it for the other reasons that I'm mentioning. So don't just because one reason alone isn't bulletproof. Don't say it's not a reason. The state shouldn't be taking lives. And there are innocent people on death row.

And there are cognitively limited people on death row. Solving just one of those things doesn't actually change anything. You can't undo taking a life. Whereas if you imprison someone and they're innocent, there's at least the chance of fixing it and compensating them in the future. Third, it does not appear as though the death penalty is an effective deterrent to crime and that it is not actually making society safer. It's it's beyond the scope of this segment to look at that, but it's been widely studied.

And so if it's not a deterrent, then why are we putting the state in the position of obtaining the chemicals that we use, which sometimes work and sometimes take hours? It doesn't make any sense. I also don't think that the death penalty is the harshest sentence for the offender. And what I mean by that is, based on my beliefs, you put someone to death and the lights go out and they're suffering or living with the consequences of their actions ends. If you put someone in prison without the possibility of parole, they're going to sit there for however long they live, living with the reality of what they did and that they now live in a box forever. Now, I am not one to say that there should be extra

punishments like, for example, prison rape. I'm against that. Those are indications that our prison system is unable to keep inmates safe. But I do believe that turning the lights off, for lack of a better term, is a less harsh punishment than making someone sit in prison for the rest of their life. So if your desire is the worst possible punishment and experience for the offender, it's life in prison without parole. And then if your concerns are financial, if you care about money, it's cheaper to do prison without the possibility of parole

because in our system, individuals on death row have significant access to appeals. Now, some people will say, get rid of the appeals. No, no, no. We need those appeals because there are so many innocent people on death row. So there is no reason to be for the death penalty. And I think what Kate Brown is doing is absolutely fantastic. And I'm glad to see that she did it. The real climate change risks over the next 10 years. Who's telling you the truth about them? There is so much discussion about we've got eight, 10 or 12 years left before total climate disaster. There is no greater believer than me in the climate science belief. I accept the climate science. To say I believe in it is not even the right term because the climate science is what it is regardless of belief. I accept climate science. I believe we

have to act and I believe we have to act now. I also think it's important to be accurate and sober rather than hyperbolic about the real risks over the next 10 years. So let's talk about what those are. There are some risks that are overblown, at least when thinking about the next decade. One of the most important risks of climate change over the next 10 years is the potential for more extreme weather events. And we have been seeing some of them, heat waves, which are deadly droughts, which can affect food production floods, which can create and spread disease and cause all sorts of other problems. The negative impacts of the extreme weather events as a result of climate change are very real. They can damage infrastructure. They can destroy crops. They can lead to death and affect human health directly.

That's a real risk. And it is now and it is a real risk over the next decade. Another significant risk from climate change is the potential for sea level rise. That's a real risk that could have significant impacts on coastal communities already. And over the next 10 years, sea level goes up. It can displace people. It can cause damage to buildings and infrastructure. There are economic consequences as well as social consequences and the unrest that would happen if large populations have to start moving because where they live is underwater. That's a real risk now and over the next 10 years. On the other hand, let me give you some examples of less important risks, particularly over the

next 10 years. Food production is one. Often our food production will be destroyed by climate change and soon is thrown out there. The best science we have right now does not actually point that way. Slight global warming could actually be beneficial for agriculture. Doesn't mean we want it, but it just it is what it is. It could be beneficial. Slightly higher temperatures and slightly higher carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere could actually improve crop growth. And there are studies that have shown that under certain conditions, when you have a little bit higher temperature, a little more CO2, you can even increase crop yields like for corn and wheat, but also you can increase the

land area on earth where food can be produced on average. So right now, you know, in the future, you could have a feedback loop that maybe would would point to it being bad for food production. But that's not actually one that is of concern right now. And that's the best science that we have. Another example would be the potential for slight changes in global temperature. Now, it's really important to understand what I'm saying and what I'm not saying here. A rise in global temperature can have negative impacts. But over the next 10 years, the changes from average global temperature are likely to be extraordinarily small or non-existent. Now, distinguish.

Temperatures being slightly higher on average is different than acute weather events, including heat waves, which absolutely can be deadly. But just it being a little bit warmer on average is not actually the disaster over the next 10 years that some believe that it will be. Some folks are also concerned about the potential for climate change to cause widespread loss of biodiversity and accelerate the extinction of certain species. It is absolutely true that in a feedback loop, climate change can have negative impacts on biodiversity. The overall risks are considered very low right now compared to other human activities, like the fact that we're destroying habitats by clearing entire forests, as one example, and polluting the air. Okay, so the climate change component effect on biodiversity over the next 10 years, much smaller than a lot

of these other things that we are doing. So what's the takeaway here? The takeaway is it would be best to have two things happen. Number one, we talk about the risks in the realist scientific terms. And if we have a list of 10 possible disasters, but four of them really aren't acute concerns right now, let's focus on the six that are. And number two, let's actually act on the ones that are the biggest risks, because that's going to have it's sort of like the lowest hanging fruit in the impact that we have. If you're interested in this discussion, the book Precipice by Toby Ord discusses a lot of what I'm talking about in pretty significant detail. Make sure that you are subscribed on the YouTube channel. Help us get to two million YouTube subscribers. It could happen sooner than later with your help.

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24 starts now to get yourself a discount. I am going to show you right now. Why later? Let's do it now. How Tucker Carlson turns reality into conspiracy theory. And this is a really great example. You know, I've told you before, very often right wing talking points and or conspiracy theories start with a kernel of truth. There's a kernel of truth somewhere, even if it's sometimes sort of hard to find. And it is fundamental if you want to be an informed consumer of political and news media, think for yourself, be able to figure things out for yourself to understand the mechanism that I'm going to show you here. In this clip, Tucker Carlson talks about the signing ceremony that took place yesterday at the White House for the bill that codifies gay marriage into law, even though it doesn't really.

All it says is states have to recognize gay marriages, but doesn't actually say states have to grant marriage licenses to gay or lesbian couples. We talked about the bill earlier in the week. I was invited to go to the White House for this event just too short. They literally invited me the day before. I just couldn't make it on that short notice because I had to be here with all of you doing a show. Who do they think I am? But in any case, they had this event and Tucker Carlson starts talking about the event. But look at how quickly he takes the kernel of truth and expands it into an absurd conspiracy theory.

It's pretty interesting when you think about it. So this is a bill signing affirming the legality legalizing once again gay marriage, which most people support in this country. Should people to get married if they love each other? Yeah, they should. That's fine. OK, so that is true. It was an event to sign that bill. The bill is about affirming gay marriages, even though it doesn't guarantee them.

But like the event happened, that's what the bill is for. So far, it's OK. Let's continue. Not that controversial a point at this stage. But here's Joe Biden using that opportunity to promote gender affirming care for kids. And of course, that means the sexual mutilation of children, cutting the breasts off 15 year olds, sterilizing them for life with chemicals. Now, remember, we looked at the numbers cutting off the breasts of 15 year olds.

Understand they've already had to modify their talking point on this. First, they were talking about cutting the breasts off of prepubescent girls. Prepubescent girls don't really have breasts to cut off. So then they started going into, well, these are minors. Are they 18 or 17 and a half or 50? So they're just modifying the exact figures to try to make it plausible. But this really isn't happening. And there are, of course, in a country of 331 million people, you can fight examples of everything and often for good reasons and different reasons that we may not even know because of medical privacy in particular cases. But he's expanding this into,

oh, well, this is celebrating the event, which was about affirming gay marriage, is about celebrating double mastectomies for gender affirming reasons on 15 year old girls, which basically doesn't happen. That's what Boston Children's Hospital and many other hospitals have been doing. Puberty blockers have fun with osteoporosis when you're 30. OK, now that I don't know about. I don't know about any potential link between puberty blockers and osteoporosis. Not really the crux of this discussion, though. So why would Joe Biden be promoting that apart from the fact certain special interest groups want him to? OK, so there's another idea, which is part of the reason Biden is promoting this stuff, which he isn't and which barely ever happens, is that it's the money. There are moneyed interests

that want the so-called mutilation of children. We're off the deep end now into conspiracy world. Again, this was supposed to be about gay marriage and it was. But here you have Joe Biden, president of the United States, purportedly pushing child sexual mutilation. Now, we are very off the deep end from where we started here, and it's important to understand how these things happen outside of the media, right? Not Tucker, because this is a for profit show, but outside of the media, just among the population. Sometimes reality gets turned into a conspiracy theory sort of accidentally. It can happen when people are trying to make sense of something that's complicated or there are unfamiliar events.

People don't have all the information and they start filling in gaps and they add interpretations or they add assumptions or they assume the worst and put that in there. And that can really distort your picture of what happens. Sandy Hook is a great example of that. You can often also get into conspiracy ville when people are looking to explain events that are difficult to understand or that go against their beliefs or that point to a much more dangerous and unpredictable world than people would like to believe we have. randomness. It wasn't random. It was planned. That's not what Tucker is doing. Tucker is doing a show where he is deliberately taking something completely benign and uncontroversial, an event signing this affirmation of gay marriage bill and turning it into a conspiracy theory, which is the type of thing his audience is already expecting to hear. Biden affirming gay marriage. There's

got to be more to that. There must be evil lurking somewhere. And when you hear something like this, there are really simple steps you can take to evaluate it. And this may be our next white paper, quite frankly, examine the evidence, look at the evidence that exists and consider is this evidence credible and reliable? Is it based in fact? Is it speculation? Is it hearsay? Start there. Are there alternative explanations that are not nefarious based on the credible evidence that we have? Look at the sources. Who's presenting the conspiracy theory? Do they have a motive to present a conspiracy theory rather than what is suggested by the facts that we actually know for sure. Check for confirmation bias. Is the person giving you the theory or are you looking for evidence that supports a certain

conclusion already and ignoring evidence that contradicts it? Confirmation bias. We've talked about that. Look for independent verification. Check to see has the conspiracy theory been independently verified by others? Have other people or organizations looked at the evidence and come to the same conclusions? Or are there other conclusions that folks have come to? And lastly, always think critically. Does it pass the sniff test? Does it make any sense? Is it logical and consistent with other things that I know about the world aside from being supported by the evidence? That's the framework. And it might make for a great white paper. And by the way, more than 3000 people have now downloaded the free

guide to having political arguments with people. David Pakman dot com slash guide. It's genuinely free. It's a free guide. It's available. Download it at David Pakman dot com slash guide. We're continuing our look at whether or not Fox News is abandoning Donald Trump in 2024. The answer seems to continue to be they're not abandoning him yet, but they've got an ejection, an ejection seat, and they could pull the lever at any time if it looks like things are going to go the direction of Ron DeSantis. Here's yet another example. Stuart Varney interviewed Mitch McConnell's wife, Elaine Chao. Elaine Chao was attacked by Donald Trump for her ethnicity. Now, multiple times he's referred to her as Coco Chao. And what is interesting about this interview is that Stuart

Varney says, I mean, months too late, but Stuart Varney says we were all appalled here at Fox News when Trump spoke about you that way. Not sounding very Fox News like let's take a listen. I want to talk about inflation in a moment, but first, former President Trump attacked you on the grounds of your ethnicity. I wonder if you'd like to take this moment to respond. Well, the president says many things. I don't make a point of responding to his comments. OK, I'll leave it right there. We were all appalled at what he said.

And it's up to you what you say in response. Thank you very much. We were all appalled by what he said. So this is kind of interesting. There are people making too much of this. You know, the first thing is, if everyone at Fox News was appalled when Trump said this about Elaine Chao in what was the exact date, the very beginning of October, it's almost the end of December now.

So they hid, they kept to themselves how appalled they were about what Trump said until mid-December. So if they were indeed appalled, they were not super eager to make it known. But this is yet another one of those. You don't really have to read further into it than at face value, which is Fox News is maintaining a certain distance from Trump under notice that even since announcing that he was running in 2024, I don't believe Trump had like a serious interview on Fox News. I don't even know if he's appeared at all. Fox News is keeping a respectful distance to Trump while continuing to have pro Trump and anti Trump voices from the right on the channel. Fox News doesn't know the direction it's going to go. We know that the Murdoch's would prefer someone other than Trump and anti-Trump voices from the right on the channel. Fox News doesn't know the direction

it's going to go. We know that the Murdochs would prefer someone other than Trump be the Republican nominee and ultimately president. And they're just leaving themselves that possibility open. It's not the biggest deal, but they just want to be prepared with an escape hatch. If indeed the tide truly turns against Trump, that's what's going on here. Let's not make more of it than it is, but it is something that that's the way Fox News is approaching the twenty twenty four primary so far. We'll have all of these clips that I played on our Instagram, which you can find by searching Instagram for David Pakman show. Good habits have to be sustainable in order to become habits. It has to be something you'll actually do. And when it comes to nutrition, some people have hours to plan out every meal,

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and vitamins you likely want. Vitamin A, C, E, magnesium, zinc, potassium in one simple scoop. You keep your body nourished. You'll also get a free year supply of vitamin D, Well, Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis, fresh off of his big win to reelection in the 2022 midterms, has announced an investigation into. COVID vaccines. I know. I know. Ron DeSantis seems to be going fully anti-vax. We're going to talk about why he also went on Fox News to attack covid vaccines. But first and foremost, holding a press event yesterday wherein he announced in conjunction

with the Supreme Court of Florida, they will impanel a grand jury. Sounds pretty serious, huh? To investigate vaccine wrongdoing in Florida. I know, guys, I know. It's bonkers what's going on. Let's take a listen to what DeSantis had to say. Because in Florida, you know, it is against the law to mislead and to misrepresent, particularly when you're talking about the efficacy of a drug. We see just the other, just recently, Florida got $3. two billion through legal action against those responsible for the opioid crisis. And so it's not like this is something that's unprecedented.

So today I'm announcing a petition with the Supreme Court of Florida to impanel a statewide grand jury to investigate any and all wrongdoing in Florida with respect to COVID-19 vaccines. And we how powerful, how principled. Anticipate that we will get the approval for that. That will be something that will be impaneled, most likely in the Tampa Bay area. And that will come with legal processes that will be able to get more information and to bring legal accountability for those who committed misconduct. Yeah. Now, listen, there's two sides to this. One side is it seems as though Florida may have committed the misconduct in their opposition and attempt to tear down the vaccines, which I will get to in a moment. But the investigation really should be of those people. Now, you might remember Florida involved in all sorts of hijinks with the vaccine. There was the

woman who was putting together that panel to provide COVID information about hospitalizations, deaths, et cetera. She was fired. That was an insane incident, which should be investigated. They have this state surgeon general or head of Department of Public Health, Dr. Ladapo or Ladapo, who regularly puts out COVID and covid vaccine disinformation as a mouthpiece for the state that should be investigated. But that's not what they want to investigate.

This is a point in the pandemic. Where cases are again going up, the hospitalizations are disproportionately the elderly. The deaths are disproportionately the elderly. We are in flu season. The numbers are not good for a group that is overrepresented in Florida, Florida, on average, having a significantly older population than many other states. DeSantis should be saying, hey, get your bivalent boosters because we need the protection right now. But instead, he announces an investigation into vaccine wrongdoing. The wrongdoing is the anti-vax people, the pharmacists who deliberately spoiled vaccines and the the pharmacists who didn't really vaccinate people

pretended to but didn't actually vaccinate people. The chiropractor who offered bogus medical exemptions to be unvaccinated, to remain unvaccinated fraudulently and just to anybody who wanted such an exemption, the people who spread the disinformation online, some of whom work for the state of Florida. That's the wrongdoing we all know exist. But that's not what Ron DeSantis wants to investigate. He after this event went on Fox News. And that's a whole other aspect to this, which I want to talk about. And then we will sort of speculate on why now and why this. And we'll get to that in a moment. After proudly announcing that the state of Florida would investigate covid vaccine wrongdoing, recently reelected Republican Governor Ron DeSantis went, of course, to Fox News on Fox News. He was interviewed by Laura Ingraham, and he is now going full anti-vax.

I believe this has to do with a potential Republican presidential primary run against Donald Trump. I will explain that to you in a moment. But here is Ron DeSantis going full anti-vax with Laura Ingraham last night. Learn today and hearing again these voices, many of them suppressed or people ostracized over the last few years. Well, Laura, like anything, I mean, you take an MNRA shot and the weight of view. MNRA, MNRA. That doesn't sound quite right.

It is OK. What are the benefits and what are the drawbacks? Yes. It seems like our medical establishment never wanted to be honest with people about the potential drawbacks. And so you showed a clip from Dr. Latipo down here in Florida and the analysis that he's done with people, particularly young men who've taken the M RNA shots. We of course had remember that that analysis was not on actual Florida department of health letterhead. It was completely unsigned. Latipo published it and it was based on cherry picked out of context, inaccurate information. I can't read debunk that quote. It's not even a study. It's a paper. I don't even know what to call it. That opinion piece. I can't redo all of that right now, but we have a dedicated segment about that. It was not it was

bogus. Witnesses talk about their experience and how are we in a situation? Yes, Florida, we banned vaccine passports almost two years ago. We banned the shot mandates for jobs and saved a lot of people's jobs. Nevertheless, throughout our country, you still have hundreds of universities in other states that are still mandating these boosters on these college kids. When any type of cost benefit analysis would say the benefit for them taking the shot, as you as you alluded to, it doesn't prevent them from getting infected or spreading it anyways. The benefit is minuscule. But as Joe Latipo and other studies have shown, you know, there is a risk for doing it. So why can't our medical establishment acknowledge that?

Why the deception? Why have they continued to do this for two years? I have to tell you, I don't know what he's talking about in the sense that it seems widely known. Is anyone covering up that these new vaccines don't prevent the spread and they don't appear to prevent infection, but the idea is to protect you from a really serious case. I would love it. Remember, I had COVID last week. I would love it if the vaccine did protect me completely. It didn't, but I felt really sick for 28 hours. It seems plausible and backed by the science that I had 28 hours of feeling really sick rather than three days, five days, whatever the case may be. On average, remember, with one person, you can never say because you either are vaccinated when

you get COVID or you don't. That it was shortened dramatically and it did not get more serious because of the vaccine. I mean, it seems to me everybody's been upfront about that since the vaccines with the new variants stopped preventing infection. It would be great for it to be better. But the idea that there's huge wrongdoing here does not seem based on the facts. Now, why is DeSantis doing this? DeSantis believes this is an issue he can use to beat Trump. The MAGA base is anti-vax, but Trump says, I did a great thing by getting these vaccines, but it's up to you whether you get it, but you should, but you shouldn't have to. And the MAGA base disagrees

with Trump. They often will boo Trump when he talks about the vaccines. DeSantis correctly perceives this is a wedge that could be put between Trump and his base to DeSantis's benefit if DeSantis chooses to run. The problem is that the calculation might work in the primary and not work in the general. And what I mean by that is the vast majority of the public supports vaccines and taking an anti-vaccine position in the primary that you then can't run away from in the general. Because at the end of the day, if DeSantis runs and he goes anti-vaccine in the primary, he'll just stop doing that when it gets to the general and pretend it never happened. But it may be difficult to run away from that position in the general, and that could actually

damage Ron DeSantis. This is all speculative since DeSantis hasn't actually announced that he's running for anything yet, although every sign seems to be pointing in that direction. After the break, we will talk about a new poll as well as why 24 could end up being a disaster for Trump. If DeSantis does choose to run, that'll be after the break. But in the immediate DeSantis going anti-vax, it's a calculated move. I don't personally believe DeSantis believes any of the stuff he's saying. I just don't knowing as much as I know about DeSantis, but he's trying to use it to set up this wedge to try to drive MAGA voters away from Trump and potentially towards him if he decides to run for president.

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throw his hat into the ring to try to be the Republican presidential nominee, I want to go through the most likely reasons why Donald Trump's 2024 run could be a complete and total disaster. Now, before we jump into the reasons, remember that since his announcement, which was really low energy, people trying to walk out of the ballroom at Mar-a-Lago as the announcement was still going on, one of the lowest energy presidential announcements I've ever seen. Trump has barely left his house for the month since the announcement. Everything that's going on is strange. New polling is very bad for Trump. And we'll talk about that in a moment. So that's sort of like the preface. But I also want to add to the preface, no matter what I say here, we're not counting Trump out. He shouldn't be counted out. This

was a mistake that was made in 2016. We still don't know what's going to happen. As Joe Walsh told us yesterday, for now, Trump is still at the top of the party. However, there are things that are different this time around. We have a former president who lost and is now running again after not being president for four years. Those are not common circumstances. In addition, that former president who's running again is losing in early polling to a guy who hasn't even announced that he's running for anything, Ron DeSantis. So this is really an unprecedented situation. Now, I get emails from people saying, David, I generally am hearing, oh, this could be bad for Trump. This could go bad. What are the most present,

I guess I would say, risks of how this could go poorly? Okay, let's go through them in no particular order. Number one, Trump might, and it appears that he will, face significant opposition from within the Republican Party. Some Republicans see Trump's candidacy as we like the policy. I know that's hilarious. It's like what policy? We like the policy, but Trump is divisive. Trump is damaging to the Republican Party's chances of winning. We don't think he can win. And this is part of what former Republican Congressman Joe Walsh told us yesterday. They like Trumpism, but they just don't know that Trump could win. They're just not sure about it. So that's number one. And the early signs from the polling, wherein Ron DeSantis is already beating Trump in many

polls, even though he hasn't announced, is a sign that indeed there may be significant dissent from within the Republican Party. Number two, I know that we always say this and it never happens. Trump does anything he wants and then still becomes president, whatever. Trump's past conduct, including the sort of culmination of multiple impeachments, inciting the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, et cetera, may acutely weaken him and make him vulnerable to attacks from others from within and outside of his party in a way that was not the case during prior elections, because in 2016 was before the insurrection and 2020 was before the insurrection. We don't know to what degree that is going to impact the campaign and how it will affect

Donald Trump. Three, Trump's statements and policies and inflammatory rhetoric, immigration, Mexicans, the anti-Semitic stuff. Now, it's conceivable that it will alienate not the MAGA base, but the types of folks that are more in the middle, the independents, the I'm a Republican, but I don't love Trump, but I'd probably vote for him, except maybe now it's just gotten beyond the pale. We know that there's anti-Semitism and xenophobia and racism in the Republican Party, but it's not complete and total. And that may impact Trump if Trump decides to go fully steam, full steam ahead on that in his 2024 run. And he seems like maybe

he is the rhetoric that he has been focusing on at rallies when he was still having them was anti-trans, anti-immigrant, ridiculing people from all sorts of different walks of life. So that is something that could have an impact. Legal challenges. This is another layer to this. Trump may well get indicted. There are ongoing investigations into financial dealings. There's the possibility of criminal charges. There are civil suits. All of this stuff could, number one, be a distraction from the campaign. But maybe more importantly, it really could undermine his credibility as a candidate. How is a Republican electorate that already seems to have

cooled on Trump going to react if the guy is under indictment and being prosecuted? Are they're going to say, well, we should go to somebody less controversial with fewer encumbrances, or is it going to activate them and get them to say they're going to indict my president? I'll show them by supporting Trump. It's unpredictable. It's an open question. I don't think we'll know if and until it happens. And then there's the financial aspect to this. Trump has grifted donors for a very long time, but he may struggle to fundraise. He may have real problems fundraising from certain donors, particularly donors who would be hesitant to contribute to Trump because of the potential legal problems. People unwilling to contribute to Trump because they'd prefer someone else like a

DeSantis and just want to wait to see does does DeSantis say he's going to run? And that could weaken Trump early. So it is very difficult to predict what will happen. It's also all starting so early, potentially even ill-advised that it's starting so early in the sense that, you know, Trump seemed to think it was better for him legally to announce early, even though Merrick Garland of others have said said it's really not going to make a difference. We're going to do what we have to do. But these are the potential reasons that Trump may struggle, the obstacles he may face. And a lot of it is going to come down to does Ron DeSantis actually run for this thing? The latest polling is unbelievable for Ron DeSantis.

Shocking new 24 Republican primary poll shows Trump imploding DeSantis at 56, Trump at 33. This is stunning stuff. BBC article Trump's conservative base deserting him for DeSantis. Most Republican leaning voters would prefer Florida's governor over Donald Trump as their 2024 presidential nominee, according to a survey by a 56 to 33 margin. Ron DeSantis over Trump. The Suffolk University USA Today poll also found Joe Biden has a higher approval than Donald Trump. It follows mixed results, I'll say, for Trump back candidates in midterm elections. DeSantis outpolls Trump not only among the general electorate, but also among these Republican leaning voters who have been the former president's base.

Republicans and conservative independents increasingly want Trumpism without Trump. Also interesting, the poll released Tuesday recorded only a 30 percent approval for Trump compared with 46 for Biden. The survey also found over 60 percent of voters would prefer neither Trump nor Biden stand in the 2024 race. So let's talk through a few aspects of this. First question, which we should all be asking, how valuable is a presidential primary poll roughly 18 or 19 months before the bulk of that primary? We're 23 months from the 2024 election, but these are primary polls. So we're dealing with something that will take place over that summer. So it's more like 19 months away. How valuable is it? A poll today? It's limited. It's quite limited. The general answer is 19 months out.

Can't predict how the political landscape will change between now and then. Things can happen external to the candidates that shift support one way or the other. The economy may change. We don't yet officially know that Joe Biden is even running. DeSantis hasn't actually said he's running. We don't know legally what is coming for Donald Trump. International events, shifts in public opinion, scandals. We just don't know. There's all of these things that make this polling extraordinarily premature. That being said, the most important takeaway here is zoom out. Trump has been the president and is the de facto leader of the Republican Party. Ron DeSantis isn't even running. And here is a good poll, a good pollster

that says DeSantis is up more than 20 points over Trump among the primary electorate. That's not the type of thing you can easily dismiss, at least as far as pointing to the picture today. Now, what about Trump? What is he doing or saying about this? Trump posted an alternative poll to Troth Central, interactive polls, IA polls 2022, Politico morning consult, which has Trump winning by 18. So there are definitely other polls out there that are not bad for Donald Trump. At what point does a presidential primary poll accurately reflect who's likely to be the eventual winner in the months leading up to the primary? You know, the polling can fluctuate, particularly in a very contested primary with many candidates. The polling can

fluctuate April, May, and then typically June, July of the election year. I'm not even talking about 23. I'm talking about 24. June, July is when it really starts to become definitive. And so these are very important early signals, what they really mean about what will take place in a year and a half. We really don't know. But if you're Trump, you'd rather be winning as the former president than losing to a guy who hasn't even said that he's running. We have a voicemail number. That number is two one nine two. David P. Take a listen to this voicemail from a guy who's just throwing out all the right wing MAGA red meat. Listen to this. And you're going to say David Packboy is a beta, beta male.

What he's saying is David Packboy is a beta male. Thank you. And Trump 2024. OK, well, vote for the guy. Go ahead. Jesse Lee Peterson's an alpha male and he's innocent. You know, Jesse Lee Peterson hasn't to say Jesse Peterson is innocent. People have come out and said Jesse Lee Peterson's gay. I don't know that innocent is necessarily the right term. Yes, he's accused of making advances. But the term innocent is a weird term to use. And Joe Biden, Hunter Biden, prison 2023. That's a bet I would be willing to take.

I am not a betting man. But if someone wants to bet even odds, do Hunter or Joe Biden end up in prison in 2023? I will take the no on whatever stakes you've got. Later. Yeah, later. This is pretty significant brain rot. But unfortunately, at least some of these people vote. It's important we all be registered and we all participate. I have something super exciting to announce to you next Friday, December 23rd. We have never done something like this before. We're going to be doing

our end of the year membership drive. Oh, David, but you've done that before. Oh, the bonus show where you want to make money. Yeah. Everybody else that makes money to fund themselves is bad. No, no, no, no, no. This is different. Okay. Our end of the year membership drive. It'll be a one day event, Friday, December 23. It'll be beautifully timed right before Christmas and during Hanukkah. It's going to be fantastic. Okay. It's going to be really, really good. Open to everybody, whatever you celebrate or don't celebrate.

One day membership drive. The first month's payment for people who sign up on that day using the special coupon code is going to be donated and then matched and doubled. And we are going to be doing this through give directly, which actually gives cash to people in extreme poverty, widely known now the best way to really build industry and community and allow people to determine for themselves how best to improve their lives. You don't send shoes. You give cash. Okay. So this is super, super exciting. Friday, December 23, it's going to be a membership drive with a great discount code. So you can get a membership, but then that first payment, if you pay monthly, it'll be your first payment. If you pay yearly, we'll take a 12th of it. Your first month's membership payment, we're not keeping.

We will donate and then double it, okay? I have no idea whether this will do well or whether it won't. We've never done anything like it before. But I would love for you to participate. It's really easy. Get on my mailing list at davidpakman.com. Just get on the mailing list. Friday, December 23rd, you'll get an email telling you, here's the coupon code.

You sign up. You get the membership. We donate that first payment and double it. Donate and double. Double. Unbelievable stuff. Excited to do it. Last thing.

We've got a great bonus show for you today. We're going to talk about the new plan to ban TikTok. The plan, we've got a great bonus show for you today. We're going to talk about the new plan to ban TikTok, the plan to ban TikTok in the US. Secondly, we've learned that Brett Kavanaugh hangs out with Matt Gaetz. Why? What are they doing? Is it appropriate? It's not. And we will talk about the pandemic border entry limits on migrants being set to end next week. What are the implications? What are the speculations? All of that and more on today's bonus show. Sign up at joinpacman.com and get instant access.