The David Pakman Show - 12/25/23: Nikki Haley surges, Wolf Blitzer stunned by IDF admission (CLASSIC EPISODE FROM 11/1/23)

Episode Date: December 25, 2023

CHRISTMAS DAY / CLASSIC EPISODE FROM NOVEMBER 1, 2023 -- On the Show: -- JL Collins, known as The Godfather of Financial Independence and author of three books including The Simple Path to Wealth, joins David to discuss personal finance, and much more. Get his book: https://amzn.to/476pKRu -- CNN's Wolf Blitzer is visibly shocked that an IDF spokesperson admits that Israel bombed a Palestinian refugee camp in order to potentially kill one Hamas commander -- Antisemitism explodes, but many on the left aren't interested in hearing about it -- Ty Cobb, Donald Trump's former lawyer, predicts that Donald Trump will soon be jailed for violating one of the multiple gag orders placed on him -- A terrified failed former President Donald Trump says that is it now Republicans who will steal the Iowa caucuses from him in the 2024 Republican primary election -- 2024 Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley surges to 22% in her home state of South Carolina, still with less than half of the support that Donald Trump has -- Donald Trump absolutely explodes in the middle of the night on Truth Social, unleashing endless unhinged insanity -- The Eggman leaves a voicemail saying he is depressed by the news and requesting ten minutes of time be wasted talking about Daylight Saving Time in order to cheer him up -- On the Bonus Show: Hawley wants to reverse Citizens United, Kansas blocks 24-hour waiting period for women seeking abortions, Biden targetting more junk fees, and much more... 🔊 Babbel: Get 55% off your subscription at https://babbel.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 -- 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

Hey, this is David Pakman inviting you to enjoy a classic episode of The David Pakman Show today. We will return with new shows before you know it. We start today with a story from Israel and Gaza. We will then talk about anti-Semitism in the United States. I know that there are many in my audience who believe that I am not emotional enough. I'm not getting agitated enough when I talk about these stories. If that's what you want, you're not going to be happy with these stories either. I know that there

are other shows where you can find emotional attacks or defenses or condemnations or outbursts and screaming and this sort of thing. That's just not what we're doing here. I'm going to try to present to you the stories of what is going on and what what is the legality and what are the implications of what has taken place? And that is that's the way I do it. So I'm going to play a video clip for you in a moment of CNN's Wolf Blitzer, shocked, visibly shocked that Israel is admitting that it bombed a refugee camp, all with the goal of killing a Hamas commander, which I guess they killed, although it's not even totally clear from looking at the video. There is a question as to what the death toll is as a result of this bombing. I believe right now there have been a number of

initial estimates. The most recent and most seemingly accurate ones seem to be centering around low hundreds, a hundred, something like that in order to maybe kill this Hamas commander. There is so much to say about this. There is outrage of all kinds. And let's first listen to the conversation that Wolf Blitzer had with the IDF spokesperson. I want to ask you first about this massive blast that we all just saw. We saw the video at the Jabalia refugee camp in Gaza. Is there anything more you can first of all tell us about how this explosion happened? I will. Thanks for having me.

So we'll be coming out in the next, hopefully, hour with more data, but I can update you now that there was a very senior Hamas commander in that area. Sadly, he was hiding, again, as they do, within civilians, and that's all I can say at this point. We're looking into it, and we'll be coming out with more data as we learn what happened there. So can you confirm it was an Israeli attack

that destroyed a big chunk of that Jabalia refugee camp? Yes, I can. We were focused, again, on our target, a senior commander wolf, and we'll be updating you with more data as the hour moves ahead. But even if that Hamas commander was there amidst all those Palestinian refugees who were in that Jabalia refugee camp, Israel still went ahead and dropped a bomb there, attempting to kill this Hamas commander,

knowing that a lot of innocent civilians, men, women, and children, presumably would be killed. Is that what I'm hearing? That's not what you're hearing, Wolf. We, again, we're focused on this commander again, who you'll get more data who this man was killed many, many Israelis. We're doing everything we can. These are it's a very complicated battle space. There could be infrastructure there. There could be tunnels there. Notice that there's a lot of goods here. And we're still looking into and we'll give you more data as the hour moves ahead but you know that there are a lot of refugees a lot of innocent civilians

men women and children in that refugee camp as well right this is the tragedy of war wolf i mean we as you know we've been saying for days move south the villains are not involved with kamas please move south just trying to get a little bit more information you knew there were civilians there you knew Move south. Civilians are not involved with Hamas. Please move south. I'm just trying to get a little bit more information. You knew there were civilians there. You knew there were refugees, all sorts of refugees. But you decided to still drop a bomb on that refugee camp attempting to kill the Hamas commander.

By the way, was he killed? I can't confirm yet. There will be more updated. Yes, we know that he was killed. I can't confirm yet. There'll be more updated. Yes, we know that he was killed. Speaker 1 I can't confirm that that will be updated. Yes, we know that he was killed. So and to correct what I said earlier, low hundreds in terms of injuries and 50 Palestinians believed dead, maybe to kill this Hamas commander.

Now here's my view on this. Even if it is true that they got a Hamas commander, even if it is true that these are the tragedies of war, this seems like a very counterproductive military decision. And we'll get to the legality of it in a moment. Now, we actually do have specific parameters about what is or is not allowed, and we don't have to speculate. Now, I support Israel taking out Hamas. I don't think any other country would just say, let's do nothing about Hamas. But doing it this way seems counter to both ethical and political responsibilities.

And I'll tell you what I mean by that. When we evaluate the legality of let's assume that they're telling the truth, right? There was a Hamas commander. And let's even assume that they got him, which the guy says we don't yet know. But yes, we got him. And they killed 50 people and injured another 150 in so doing it. One of the first principles under international law of warfare. And I know that we can all look at this and say, David, international law of warfare. Give me a break. What? There are rules to what there are. I mean, it's a crazy situation we have, right? Homo sapiens on planet Earth. We have rules of what you're allowed to do when it

comes to war. Only if you care about the rules. Is this even a conversation worth having? And we'll get to that as it applies to Hamas. First principle is there must be distinction when strikes are carried out. Parties to a conflict must distinguish between combatants and civilians, between a military objective and a civilian object. And attacks have to be directed against combatants and military objectives. OK, but David, the combatants are allegedly hiding at a camp exactly for this reason, in order to attempt to dissuade such a bombing. OK, then we get to the international law principle of proportionality. Even if a military objective

is identified among civilian objects and spaces, you were not allowed to make an attack if it is expected to cause incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians, damage to civilian objects or a combination of those things. And in that case, in that case, it would not be allowed. Certainly in this case, you would expect that. And indeed, the ratio at best is 50 to one in terms of deaths and 150 to one in terms of injuries to the one death you're actually trying to cause.

And then the third principle in figuring out would something like this even be legal under an international law is necessity. Military actions must be intended to achieve a legitimate military purpose and to secure a definite military advantage. We must ask the question, does killing 50 civilians and injuring 150 in order to achieve the death of one Hamas commander, does that meet the necessity test? What would really in the grand scheme of things, can we argue that it was necessary to get this one commander to secure an advantage such that 50 civilian deaths and 150 civilian injuries are warranted? It's really hard to make

that case. Now, what could change that? Well, if there were a bunch of terrorists at a camp and you knew they were about to launch some kind of missile attack from that camp, posing an imminent threat to a thousand people in a nearby populated area in Israel. Maybe you could make the case under international law that there are legal grounds for such an operation. It would still have to be more precise than this was. So it seems to me that this probably violates international law. Now, I'm ready to get the feedback that Hamas

doesn't care about international law. So why should Israel? That's a legitimate question, right? Hamas isn't accountable in any way. Everything Hamas did on October 7th violates international law, right? Violating the tunnels by the tunnels are illegal by international law. Violating the sovereignty of the border, as they did on October 7th, is illegal by international law. Deliberately targeting civilians, women, children, babies. It's all illegal by international law. And the reality is Hamas doesn't care about international law. Nobody is holding Hamas accountable based on international law. And it's not even a conversation. International law is not a deterrent deterrent or even a factor.

If you go to Hamas and say, hey, here's five things you did. They violate international law. They go, hey, we're resisting. We're resisting the Zionists. And our charter says kill the Jews. So we can understand that there is a double standard there while also saying, hey, if you evaluate such a strike, it's very difficult to make the argument that it was legal based on what we know.

Now, even if you believe that this strike was legal by international law and you somehow believe that it was a good tactical decision, it's still a terrible decision by PR standards, because as we saw in the immediate aftermath of October 7, sympathy for the need for Israel to defend itself against terrorist attacks from Hamas was as high as it had been in a very, very, very long time. And even if you can make the justification for such a strike on some kind of technical grounds, which I don't believe that you can make based on what I've seen, I still don't see how this helps have anyone on the side of what Israel is trying to do.

So that's where I am on this. I'm not screaming at you about it. I'm not. I know that I'm talking about this in a very precise way. And that's my deliberate effort. And I'm open to feedback on what we saw if it's tailored to the facts rather than to emotion. And by the way, if there is even any idea of attacking me for being Jewish as a reason to ignore everything I say, then this set next segment is probably something that you should listen to. All right, listen, I am going to talk now

potentially against my better judgment about the record explosion of anti-Semitism in the U.S. and around the world. And I'm going to admit something to you. I've been delaying doing this segment because I'm sort of scared to do this segment. And here's what I mean about that. This is not a segment about Israel. This is a segment about anti-Semitism rising globally where Jews are actually being targeted. This is a segment that has nothing to do with the justification or lack thereof for any kind of strike by the Israeli government. This has nothing to do with that. And in fact, the actions of the Israeli government, a government that many people, Jews, Jews and non-Jews disagree with, is not a valid reason for anti-Semitism around the world

any more than it would be legitimate to target random Muslims in Michigan because of Hamas's action. Both are wrong. OK, I would normally talk in a bunch of detail about Joe Biden's new plan to combat anti-Semitism, what we're seeing on campuses, Jewish leaders in the United States being genuinely freaked out. My Jewish friends coming to me, not quite with tears in their eyes, but close to say I am genuinely scared about the rise of anti-Semitism that we are seeing. But I know that unfortunately, many on the right and some on the left will react by saying the anti-Semitism is valid. The anti-Semitism is logical because of what Jews are doing in Gaza or whatever the case may be. And that is an insane conflation and an extraordinarily dangerous bit of rhetoric.

But let me tell you some of what's been going on. Anti-Semitic threats at Cornell University. A student there, Patrick Dye, has been arrested for making threats to specific Jewish students on campus. Posters of Jews who are being held hostage by Hamas are getting ripped down in New York City and elsewhere, leading to groups of people defending the posters and scuffles and fights are breaking out. A mob in the Russian Republic of Dagestan stormed runways at an airport, bloodthirstly seeking out Jewish passengers. If you can imagine that colleges have been bracing for anti-Semitism and violence. And it is happening. We have reports that open hatred of Jews is surging globally. Anti-Semitic graffiti in Germany,

in Paris, Jewish homes marked with stars of David, Jewish students at Columbia University, terrified, demanding action about rising anti-Semitism targeted specifically at them. The FBI says that anti-Semitism is at historic levels. The scariest part of all of this is that some Jews are being told you're just wrong about what counts as anti-Semitism. And that's a really scary part of this. Contrast this. You know, we are rightly told when black folks tell us what's racist, we should listen to them because they're telling this to us based on their experience.

When LGBT folks tell us what is homophobic or transphobic or whatever the case may be, we say, hey, we should listen to them because they're the ones experiencing it. And shockingly often when Jewish folks say, hey, this this is anti-Semitic, we have non-Jews who say, you don't know what anti-Semitic is. Let me tell you what anti-Semitic is. And you're wrong. This isn't anti-Semitic. That's not anti-Semitic. A horrifying double standard being applied in terms of who is allowed to tell us who is allowed to tell us whether they are being targeted by anti-Semitism or racism or homophobia. So listen, I'm not going to spend a bunch more time on this because quite frankly, I know that this this story will not be interesting

to a lot of my audience and it will trigger a lot of people into just writing me absolutely horrible things. So this is happening. Anti-Semitism at record levels. It is not legitimate to target random Jews at Columbia University because you don't like what the Likud party in Israel is doing in Gaza. It's just not legitimate. And maybe we'll leave it there. And it's horrifying and it's scary. And we'll take a break and come back and talk about some other things. Don't forget to subscribe to the show. says Trump is likely to spend a weekend or an evening in jail soon for violating gag orders. This is now getting very serious and it is not only Trump's former lawyer who is saying this. Let's take a look at this. As you know, Donald Trump continues to attack judges, prosecutors,

witnesses, all sorts of different people involved directly and indirectly with his various criminal and civil trials. Here is Ty Cobb speaking last night to Aaron Burnett, and he says that he believes Trump is going to be sent to jail at some point for these violations. Take a listen to this. Well, the New York judge fined him ten thousand dollars. That's in a civil case. You know, that's not as consequential as Judge Chutkan's case. I think Judge Chutkan, you know, prudently allowed Trump

to try to persuade her to extend the gag order she concluded, you know, on the basis of his conduct this week not to do so. And I think she'll come in with a much heavier penalty. And ultimately, I think he'll, you know, spend a night or a weekend in jail. Wow. I think it's going to take that. I think it will take that to, you know, to stop him. Wow. That'll be an incredible thing to actually see happen. But you think that's where it goes?

I do now, whether Ty Cobb is or isn't correct, what is abundantly clear is that if Trump ends up spending a night or a weekend in jail, I actually think it helps him with his supporters. It will be a relatively minor thing in a sense, although I don't know that Trump is really the type of guy equipped to do this. But I'm guessing his accommodations will be far more cushy than for the average inmate. Or I don't know. I don't know that you're called an inmate if you're just in jail. But regardless,

I do think it actually will help Trump with his most ardent supporters who will believe that he is being targeted, that it's all unfair, that because of his speech, they are going after him. Now, it is not only Ty Cobb who believes that this is a possibility. Andrew Weissman, another attorney, said any normal person would be trying to make sure that they wouldn't in any way be responsible for harming another person. And this is quite the contrary. When you have the government correctly saying these words, he knows darn well are going to lead to these consequences, making the argument that Trump knows that the things he is saying potentially are going to harm

other people. Now, where am I on this now? I'm still sort of in the I believe I'll believe it when I'll see it perspective. He should be in jail now. And if we want to ask the question, once Trump does something worthy of being jailed, will anyone have the audacity to jail him? We really can't say yes, because Trump has already done that. Any criminal defendant who is not, quite frankly, a former

president or certainly a rich elite who did the things Trump has done would be in jail right now for the regular and continued barrage of attacks against the courts, court personnel, prosecutors, witnesses and others. So we already know Trump's getting special treatment. There is a two tier justice system. I won't do my whole rant about that. But the two tier justice system is not Democrats and Republicans. It's everybody else. And then rich, wealthy elites like Trump, other defendants probably would have had their passports seized and likely would have been at least at this point have spent a night in jail for violating these gag orders and continuing to attack in people involved with the cases. So it remains

to be seen. I am not yet ready to say that it is likely that Trump is going to be jailed. He should be. That would be the right thing per the law. But I am not convinced that it's going to happen. I do want to look at a couple of other videos put out by a visibly terrified Donald Trump, who is now saying, forget about Democrats stealing the election from him. It is Republicans in Iowa who plan to steal the caucuses from him. This is now I mean, listen. It was bad enough that Trump supporters fell for the Democrats are going to steal it from me and that Trump has kept that lie going for years.

That's bad enough. But doesn't it actually become less believable when then it's, oh, even though Democrats are the ones that supposedly commit the voter fraud, it is also now non Trump Republicans who are going to be stealing elections from Donald Trump. It's all getting very difficult to believe as if it wasn't already. And here is Trump saying that the other Republicans, the Republicans running against him in the primary, have a plan to steal the Iowa caucuses from Trump. How you do that, I don't know.

But the principle is, unless Trump wins, it's rigged. Our wonderful Trump caucus captains, thank you for all that you're doing. We really appreciate it. The most important thing you can do for our campaign is to lock in your 10 for Trump and turn them out for caucuses, teach them how to caucus, take them in your car on caucus night. If you have to do whatever is necessary, we got to get them in. We got to make America great again. So do whatever it takes. If you do, we will win and win big. And that's what you have to do. You know, the other side does cheat and we're not going to let that happen. We cannot let that happen. But that's what

we need from you. Get in your car, get a lot of people and get down caucus. Now the other side in the Iowa caucuses is all Republicans, including Republicans who at different points endorsed or supported Donald Trump. Those are the people that Trump now wants you to believe are planning to steal the Iowa caucuses from him. If he didn't win, then it was rigged. That is the story. That is the principle. That is the value that is at play here. Now, Donald Trump, as you know, has started doing these vlogs of sorts where he screams at the camera, accountable GOP and a number of

other accounts track these very closely. And I'm going to play a couple of others for you because they're quite stunning. Donald Trump is also claiming that he is finally going to make the evidence, I guess, of the election having been stolen. He's going to make the evidence available during his criminal trials. He's had years to do it. Courts have looked at the so-called evidence, have found it without merit. But finally, now that Trump has been criminally charged in the trials, he's going to present the evidence. The rigging dogs, they are rigging dogs, the horrible cheaters and liars. Massive information and 100 percent evidence will be made available during the corrupt trials started by our political opponent. Think of it. I got indicted by my political opponent. My political opponent indicted me because I challenged the election.

Right. Which is, of course, not what happened. I did everything right and they indicted me. Yeah. Trump is allowed to say whatever he wants about the election. That's not what he's been charged with. Do you think that the Trump supporters really believe at this stage of the game? Are they so gullible? Maybe the answer is yes. Are they so gullible that they believe that once Trump's criminal trials finally get going in 2024, nearly four years after his election loss, he's finally going to be, excuse me, presenting the evidence. Do Trump supporters really believe that? If you do, please call into my show when we take calls on the Friday show. I really want to talk to you. Trump also complaining that his court cases this we knew this would happen. Trump saying his trials shouldn't be allowed to start

until after the election. I'll say more about this in a moment. These highly political Biden lawsuits and indictments shouldn't be allowed to start until after the election is over. Who would ever think a thing like this would be allowed to start? We actually have one judge that wants the lawsuit to start the day before Super Tuesday. These are corrupt people. Our founding fathers are looking down at Biden with scorn right now. They're looking down on Biden and this administration with disbelief. Remember, there's still no evidence Biden has

anything to do with this. We're going to make America great again. We're going to put America first. We're going to have a great country. It's going to be called the United States of America. Thank you very much. God bless the United Chase. Listen, it's always like this whole thing of I'm now running. So the trials can't start. If Trump successfully delayed the trials until he was no longer a candidate, imagine that he won. Then he would say, well, now the trials have to be delayed because I'm president elect. And then the trials have to be delayed because I'm president, especially with an election every two years of some kind, you're always either running in elected office or preparing to run for something if you're involved in American politics.

So this is an argument that is falling very, very flat. And then lastly, Trump also continuing attacks on media. Even the Rupert Murdoch News Corp owned New York Post is now bad, according to Trump, because they are they are now not unflinchingly loyal to him, I guess. Since the New York Post went bad on Trump and they had their numbers have fallen tremendously. Right. People aren't buying it. They don't want to read that.

The New York Post has treated me great for almost a lifetime. And now, for whatever reason, and I guess it's radical left or the rhino stuff, they have gone really bad. And it's ridiculous. But the numbers are down. Their numbers of readers and everything else has gone down tremendously. Right. People are tired of hearing fake news. The New York Post used to be so good, but not anymore. We have to get it back before it's too late, because frankly, if they don't change, there will be no more New York Post. And that would be sad. There you go. Now, I know it's never clear whether Trump says there would be no more New York Post because it will just naturally go out of business or there will be no more New York Post because Trump is going to do something to end the New York Post. But we know Trump is hostile to any media that is not unflinchingly loyal to him. So a number of unhinged vlogs for from Trump, but a little bit of a preview of some of the arguments that he is soon to be making.

He will try to get trials delayed on the basis that he is an active political candidate, that it will interfere with his candidacy. He is preparing to say that if any primary or caucus doesn't go well, it is now not Democrats, but Republicans rhinos that stole it from him. He's telling us what he's going to do. We should listen to him. I don't know if Republicans are prepared for it. If you value what we do at The David Pakman Show, remember to support us on Patreon. prepared for it. Check it out at Patreon dot com slash David Pakman show. Today, we're going to be speaking with J.L. Collins, who's been called by some the godfather

of financial independence. He's the author of three books, including The Simple Path to Wealth, which is on my list of personal finance recommendations, by the way, which you can find at David Pakman dot com slash finance. J.L., it's really great to have you on. I appreciate it. David, it's an great to have you on. I appreciate it. David, it's an honor to be here. Thanks so much for the invitation.

So listen, one of the things I've talked to my audience about is I believe one of the greatest tricks that has been perpetrated by the entire financial services industry is making people think that this is a far more complicated topic than it actually is so that they go and maybe pay too much for a financial advisor. Now, that's oversimplified. There's all sorts of different advisors and advice, different situations. Without question, there's a lot more detail to it. But is it generally the case that much of what is sold to people is sold with the understanding that a lot of this stuff is just too difficult for you to handle on your own? Absolutely. I think you're spot on. In fact, the reason that

this stuff is made so complicated is precisely to drive people into the arms of those who are selling it, because that's where the real money in the financial industry is made, is through commissions and high fees going on. I liken it to imagine if you had a banquet table filled with every kind of exotic delicacy you could imagine, some of them extraordinarily complex to make, right? You could put your arm on that table and sweep all of that except a tiny corner onto the floor. And that tiny corner would represent the simple foods that are actually healthy and good for you.

In the financial world, that's low-cost, broad-based index funds, which is what I talk about. Everything else, nobody really needs. It benefits mostly the people who sell it. What about those who say, listen, we've all heard about, you know, invest in index funds and chill and all of these other things. But that doesn't account for growing unrealized gains, which will have a taxable implication at the time that you start needing that money or, you know, you'll always get the ifs, ands

and buts where people say, yeah, sure, OK, what JL says and what some others say is fine, but it doesn't account for this particular tax consideration or inflation or what. What do you say to those counter arguments to the extent that they are counter arguments? So, first of all, you're kind of talking about two different subjects then. Right. And the inflation thing you mentioned at the end, I throw into investing and that's well covered in with your broad based low cost index funds. But yes, the government has made investing enormously complex under the guise of helping us. And I suppose to a certain extent it does. But with IRAs and 401ks and these kinds of tax advantaged programs that are out there, which people should take advantage of. But that does

make the decision making more complex. The investments you put in those plans, again, should be broad-based, low-cost index funds. But how you execute those plans, when it's best to withdraw from them, those kinds of strategies, strategies around dealing with capital gains, for instance, in your taxable account, or capital gains distributions and dividends and those the taxable implications of those. Yeah, those are all tax related kinds of issues. And for those things, a tax adviser is probably a very useful person to have on your team. What do you think is the area when it comes to personal finance that's most impactful to the bottom line of one's personal financial situation,

but most frequently overlooked. And it can really be anything. Certainly the fees one is paying for the instruments they're using could be a possibility. The impact of interest payments on debt that people maybe are not conceptualizing correctly or asset allocation that hasn't been appropriately thought through monthly budget. I mean, really, of all the different things that one can consider, what do you believe is impactful and does not get the attention it probably deserves? So all the things you mentioned are important and impactful. But the single biggest one I would

point out is people need to stop tinkering with their investments. One of the beauties of the simple path to wealth that I lay out is you don't need to understand finance in any great depth. There are a few key things you need to understand. You need to understand where to invest, which we've already talked about it. Then you set that up on autopilot. So you're investing automatically. You don't have

to think about it and you leave it alone. You know, I got a comment recently from a reader who was saying, oh, the simple path to wealth was written in 2016. Is it still valid? Does it still work? Simple path to wealth is a plan that spans decades. When I invest in VTSAX, which is Vanguard's total stock market index fund, great example of the kind of fund I'm talking about, my holding period is forever. Literally, the only time I'm ever going to sell it is to withdraw a little bit of money to live on when the time comes to live on the portfolio. There are folks. Oh, sorry. Oh, yeah. Go ahead.

No, I was just going to say, so the single biggest thing is don't tinker. And this has to do, certainly, it sounds like with asset allocation, which every time there is a big market downturn, for example, people often start to wonder, is this actually the right asset allocation for me? I mean, one great example was in March at the start of covid, where it was unclear whether that precipitous decline was going to persist for a long time. It turns out it didn't. But nobody knew that at the time. A lot of people started writing to me saying, yeah, OK, fine, David, just keep buying and holding. But what now? What now? And my view is if you aren't able to handle

the downturn, maybe you were overexposed to the stock market to begin with, and it wasn't the appropriate asset allocation from the get go. Maybe you should have had more money in bonds or cash to begin with rather than reacting to market events. Is that a concern that people's asset allocation applies only when things are steady? But then all of a sudden, when there is some kind of calamity, you say maybe this wasn't the right allocation for me all along. Yeah, I absolutely agree with you. And I say to people, if you are going to panic and sell when the market drops, you don't want to follow my advice. My advice will leave you bleeding at the side of the road. It is essential that you stay the course if you're going to walk the simple path to wealth.

Because what people need to understand is that market corrections, bear markets, even market crashes are all normal. They're a natural part of the process. Dangerous, scary, but they never last forever. They always pass. And if you panic and run out in them, that's when you're going to get in trouble. So, absolutely, the time to decide whether you are comfortable with your asset allocation is times like now when things are good. And then think through how will you feel about this if you wake up tomorrow and the market's down 20% or 30 or 40%. And you need to think that through

before it happens, because when it happens, the rest of the world is going to be in a panic mode. Everybody's going to be screaming, sell, sell, sell. It's the worst thing you can do. So resolve in your mind how you're going to handle it. And if you're following my path, the resolution you're going to make is you are going to do nothing. As Jack Bogle once famously said in a market crash, don't just do something. Stand there. What about when it comes to alternative assets that might include, you know, 15 years ago, it was all about precious metals and so many

companies selling gold online, gold and silver in the last five years. It's been Bitcoin or other sorts of cryptocurrencies. People who say, well, maybe actual direct real estate investments or maybe more indirectly through a real estate investment trust, et cetera. What what role should those asset types have in a simple approach, the likes of which you write about? So you kind of put your finger on it in the sense when you first started and you said 15 years ago and the implication of a comment like that is these things tend to be fads right you don't hear about gold and silver so much anymore who knows in 10 15 years if we'll be hearing about bitcoin or not i am not a fan in my world those things are speculations when you buy gold or silver or you

buy bitcoin for that matter, you are hoping that at some point in the future, someone will pay more for it than you did. Now, you might be right, in which case you'll make money, but that's the very definition of speculating. I'm not a speculator. I'm an investor. And the reason that I like stocks and I like to hold them in index funds is when I hold VTSAX, I own a piece of every publicly traded company in the United States of America. And every one of those companies is working hard to make me richer. That's the kind of economic activity I want behind my investments. I'm not a speculator. And I know couldn't one argue to play devil's advocate that you're speculating,

but you're just speculating more broadly on the entire economy of the United States or or even of the world if they are American companies that do business globally? Isn't it a spec? It's a it's a maybe a less risky speculation. Well, you're right. I mean, that's exactly the way to look at it. It is a speculation first on the United States because that's a U.S.-based fund, but by extension, the world, because as you mentioned, the biggest holdings in that fund are international companies. But that is a much broader speculation than a specific asset class like Bitcoin or gold, silver. If my speculation doesn't work out, if the United States swirls down the sewer,

or the world in general does, well, then yes, my speculation is not going to pay off. But we will have so much bigger problems at that point. Whereas if my speculation and some other focused asset class doesn't work out, then that's an immediate financial consideration and problem in an overall good environment. So, yeah, if you are someone who believes that Armageddon is coming, you also don't want to follow my simple path. You probably want to be stocking up on guns and ammo. Let's talk a little bit about people who maybe it's not that they don't want to follow your your simple approach, but feel as though they can't. And what I mean by that is there is a sort of counter movement to the financial independence movement that you and others write about, which is this is all great if you have a certain type of job and a certain level

of income. But for a country where 40 percent of Americans can't even afford an unexpected four hundred dollar expense without having to charge it or borrow from somebody they know and all of the other things we could talk about, stagnant wages and all of these different things, even getting started in this approach seems completely inconceivable. All right. Index funds. I'm in ten thousand dollars worth of credit card debt and I'm struggling to afford food, for example. What about that broader systemic critique of your approach? What a perfect question for today, because yesterday my new book Pathfinders launched and Pathfinders is a follow-up to the

Simple Path to Wealth and in it is a collection of a hundred stories from people all over the world starting from all kinds of different economic situations who are following the Simple Path to Wealth successfully and one of the things that I've said is I've read these stories because that pushback that you described is one of my pet peeves is that you cannot read the pathfinders and then say in all honesty that this can't be done regardless of where you're starting from. I guarantee that virtually everybody listening to us, if they pick up Pathfinders, they're going to read stories about people who have started from a more challenging position than they're currently facing. So you may read it and say, you know what, I don't want to follow that path. But you'll never credibly be able to look in the mirror and say, I can't do it.

Because you'll be reading about people who do, who have done it and are doing it and probably starting from tougher situations than you. Now, what is step one in those situations, I guess, is the question many in the audience might be asking. Well, step one, if if if you are carrying debt, you know, you you cannot become wealthy. You cannot become wealthy. You cannot become financially independent carrying debt. And it's stunning to me how in our culture, the idea that we carry debt, that we buy things on credit and pay it off on time is considered normal. To me, it's like being covered with blood-sucking leeches. I mean, obviously, that's going to drain your life energy. So the first thing you need to do is pull out your sharpest knife and start scraping the little bloodsuckers off. And of course you do that

by somehow arranging your life, and this is not easy, but other people with more challenging circumstances have done it, so that you free up money to begin paying down that debt. And I say start with the highest interest rate debt, pay that down because that's the most powerful economic thing you can do. Now, here's the silver lining, because David, once you pay that debt down, you've developed a wonderful habit. You've developed the habit of not spending every dime that comes your way. And now you have all that money that was going into debt repayment that you can now channel into your investments and begin building your wealth. So if you're starting from a position of being in debt, it simply means that you have a little longer race to run than somebody starting at ground zero.

Or for that matter, a lot of people listening probably already have some investments and are further along that path. So everybody starts at a slightly different starting point. The last thing I'll say about this is that, yes, it can seem a long way from wherever you are to being fully financially independent, but that's kind of like going to the gym for the first time, right? You're not going to be bench pressing 300 pounds on the first day, but the first day you go to the gym, you walk away a little bit stronger. And it's the same thing once you start paying down your debt and or investing. The moment you start, you're a little bit stronger than you were the day before. And that builds.

So it's not an on off switch. It's a process. It's a journey. It's a path. We've been speaking with JL Collins. The new book is Pathfinders. One of his previous books, The Simple Path to Wealth, is on our list of personal finance recommendations at David Pakman dot com slash finance.

JL, really appreciate your time and insights today. Hey, David, I appreciate being on the show and wonderful questions. Thank you. Follow us on social media. Interact with the David Pakman Show community. See exclusive content. See when we're taking calls live and stay up to date on other big show announcements. We post daily.

Find us on Reddit, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Discord and Tick tock. Well, I have good news and I have bad news for twenty twenty four Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley, and they're both the same, which is that she's polling 22 percent in South Carolina. Why is it good news and why is it bad news? Well, I'll explain in a moment. CNN reports Trump dominates South Carolina Republican primary with Nikki Haley, a clear but distant second Nikki Haley, not in third or fourth place in South Carolina, primary with Nikki Haley, a clear but distant second Nikki Haley, not in third or fourth place in South Carolina, as she is in many states, but rather in second place. The numbers here, 53 percent of likely Republican primary voters in South Carolina are behind

Trump and 22 percent are behind Nikki Haley, with 11 percent supporting Governor Ron DeSantis. Everybody else is far lower. When you look at this SRS CNN poll, you do see that there are a bunch of people polling literally zero Trump, 53 Haley, 22 DeSantis, 11 Scott, six. He's also from South Carolina. Chris Christie to Pence has already ended his campaign and Vivek Ramaswamy surging, supposedly polling only one percent. So what's the good news and the bad news of this? Well, the good news for Nick, for Nikki Haley of polling 22 percent in South Carolina is that this is way better than she's doing anywhere else. And it's a sign that maybe she can argue for staying in this thing a little bit longer on the basis that her campaign isn't totally dead in every

state. That's the good news for Nikki Haley. The bad news for Nikki Haley is that this is her home state where she was the governor for a while, and she still has less than half of the support that Donald Trump has. South Carolina Republicans are so unmoved and unswayed by their own former governor running for the Republican primary nomination for president in their own state that they have more than twice the number of people supporting Trump than the number supporting Nikki Haley. Now, obviously, the trend line here is different than what we see nationally, as you probably are familiar with by now. Trump is dominating with 59 percent of all the vote. All of the other candidates are splitting up the remaining 41 percent. DeSantis at 12, Nikki Haley at eight, Vivek Ramaswamy at four. Everybody else is below that. So when we zoom out, this seems to be the best anybody can hope to do

in your own home state. You might you might be able to get 20 or so percent. Now, I am curious if we look at the Florida numbers, Florida Republican. Let's see how DeSantis is doing there. I actually was hoping to have these and I forgot to pull it up. Florida Republican primary. As of right now. OK, so listen, we actually don't have any numbers newer than July. But back in July, Trump was only leading DeSantis by 10 in Florida, which is the Sanchez's home state. My bet would be that if we had newer polling from Florida than what we appear to have, Trump has extended his lead as DeSantis has really, really failed.

So there still seems to be no path whatsoever for anybody other than Trump to secure this nomination. Trump is under multiple criminal indictments, doesn't seem to affect him. Trump is skipping the debates, doesn't seem to accept him. Donald Trump to affect him. Donald Trump is attacking witnesses and getting gag orders placed on him. If anything, it all seems to be helping Trump short of his death. It's very difficult to think of what might dethrone Trump from this commanding lead. That all being said. He is massively triggered 24 hours a day. I want to briefly talk about that next. Donald Trump exploded at 4 a.m., 4 a.m. He's up all night posting to Truth Social in these all caps rants, attacking and continuing to violate the gag orders that have been placed on him.

We won't spend a ton of time on this, but I do want to show you this. Donald Trump post. This is a middle of the night outburst. It's like it's just coming out of him. The posts are I'm talking about Trump posting, quote, radical left judge taking away my right to free speech in order to help crooked Joe Biden and his third world election interference scam. As good as this sounds, it won't work. That is Trump arguing that Joe Biden is involved in the criminal trials against Trump. There's no evidence of that. This is Donald Trump arguing that the criminal trials are designed and timed, maybe most

importantly, to hurt Donald Trump's chances of becoming president. So far, they seem to have helped him secure more support among Republican voters. So that doesn't seem to be true either. Trump continuing. Remember, crooked Joe Biden and his radical left thugs waited three years to bring these indictments and lawsuits against me right in the middle of my campaign. As we've talked about before, the indictments came out over a period of months. These investigations take a while. Some of the things Trump has been charged for happened more recently than three years ago. So I don't know how you charge someone three years ago when the alleged crimes took place

more recently than three years ago. And then at 424 in the morning, this is 424 a.m., my friends, Trump posting in all caps election interference. Imagine sitting on your phone at four in the morning as a former president, maybe surrounded by the boxes of documents around his toilet. I don't know where he was at this moment posting election interference. It is truly screaming into the void. And there's always an election every two years. Everything is almost always in the middle of some election or somebody's campaign. It's really just not an argument. And it's certainly

not proof that Joe Biden has anything to do, anything at all to do with these indictments. Trump is at risk of going to jail, according to his own former lawyer, Ty Cobb. Will it happen? I don't know. Maybe nobody's up at 4 a.m. to pay attention to what Trump is saying. You tell me. We have a voicemail number. That number is two one nine two. David P. Here is a call from the Eggman.

The Eggman is depressed because of all the horrible news lately. And he has a special request for me. OK, let's listen and see if I can indulge it. Hey, Dave, with the domestic shootings and the war overseas, I'm just a little bit depressed. Well, a little more than normal. But can you please lighten to a little bit lighter story of daylight saving time again? Because isn't it that time of year that you do a story about daylight saving time, explaining it to us and what we want and, you know, just to waste 10 minutes. So I forget about all this awful stuff. Shallow, brother. Yeah, let's do it. And the Eggman is right. Usually around this time of year, we do a story about daylight saving time. So let me tell

you the things that every year we end up having to explain to people, first and foremost, it is daylight saving time, not daylight savings time. A lot of confusion about it, but it is daylight saving time. Now, what we are about to do is we are about to make it so that the sun sets an hour earlier relative to our clocks. Many people don't like that. We set the clock an hour ahead during the warmer part of the year. So we get even more daylight, et cetera. And then the clocks are then fall. They fall back. We spring ahead and then they fall back. And the general idea here is you get better use of daylight hours. However, however, this is extraordinarily controversial. Many regions have opted out of this time change completely.

Now, the other thing I think is important to mention is daylight saving ends in November. It ends in November. It ends in November. So a lot of people say that they want to end daylight saving time permanently. But what it sounds like they really want to do is they want permanent daylight saving time. So that's another confusion that often takes place. And what I want to remind everybody of, and there are a lot of people who agree with me, but some people who disagree with me, I want to be on the normal summer schedule year round. I want it to be light out an hour later when when the sun sets before five o'clock in December. It's extraordinarily depressing. So, number one, you get more daylight in the evening.

This is not just good because we might like it. It reduces energy consumption because there's more people up at that time than very early in the morning. And so losing the hour of daylight in the morning, getting it at night, it reduces energy consumption. It's good for the environment. It's good for the economy because people are more likely to go shopping and do other activities when they have an extra hour of daylight.

People are also more likely to do outdoor exercise. So for health reasons, we should also be staying on the summer schedule. Mental health reasons. A lot of people suffer from sad seasonal affective disorder. More daylight hours when people are more likely to be awake is better for mitigating seasonal affective disorder. It can improve mood. It can improve productivity. There is a traffic accident argument to be made. More people tend to be driving at 5 p.m. than at 6 a.m. in some total. And so what that means is when there are more people on the road, there will be more light. And this tends to reduce traffic accidents. You can also make the argument that staying on the summer schedule will reduce crime in general. Better lighting in the evening

deters criminal activity. Many crimes occur under the cover of darkness. More people are awake at five and six p.m. than at five and six a.m. So it stands to reason that you would also reduce crime by making this change. And it's also just simpler. It's simpler. You don't have to change the clock. So I'm a big advocate of this. I want the extra hour. I think it's better economically. I think it's better financially. I think it's better from a mood and mental health perspective. Traffic accidents. It's just better. If you disagree with me, let me know. I know I always hear things about it being dark when people are getting their kids out to the bus. And so they like the winter schedule for that reason. Everybody's entitled to a perspective. So so they like the winter schedule for that reason.

Everybody's entitled to a perspective. So, Eggman, I hope that that's good for you. We can now skip the daylight saving segment from the bonus show, although we'll probably still talk about it on Monday. I don't know. But we did it. And I'm glad that the Eggman reminded me of it. All right. On the bonus show today, not daylight saving time because I just did it. Senator Josh Hawley, a Republican, has introduced a bill to reverse Citizens United. Why? What are his motivations? We'll discuss it. A Kansas judge has blocked the 24 hour waiting period for women who are seeking abortions. What are the implications? Why is this important? And thirdly, there is another target of Joe Biden's crackdown on junk fees, and it is those

retirement advertisers. Which ones am I talking about? I'm sure you've seen or heard these commercials. We will discuss all of those stories and more when producer Pat joins me on the bonus show, the bonus show where you want to make money. Everybody else that makes money to fund themselves is bad. Sign up at join Pacman dot com. It'll be quick. It'll be easy. And the new website is getting oh so close to launching. When the new website launches, the new membership price will go up. Existing members always keep their membership price locked in forever for as long as they

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