The David Pakman Show - 12/4/24: Hegseth nomination on life support as Tucker returns to Russia

Episode Date: December 4, 2024

-- On the Show: -- Tucker Carlson returns to Moscow to produce more pro-Putin propaganda -- Joe Rogan explains that he got involved in the 2024 election, endorsing Donald Trump, because Tim Walz's lies bothered him -- Video of Pete Hegseth, Donald Trump's nominee for Secretary of Defense, trashing Donald Trump, resurfaces -- It appears that six Republican Senators are not inclined to vote to confirm Pete Hegseth to Secretary of Defense, which would effectively end his nomination -- In a panic, Pete Hegseth sends his mom onto Fox News to beg Donald Trump to stick by her son for Secretary of Defense -- A desperate Pete Hegseth will be doing a friendly Fox News interview in an attempt to save his nomination to Secretary of Defense -- Kari Lake once again blames everybody but herself for her two election losses -- In a delusional moment, Karoline Leavitt, Donald Trump's incoming Press Secretary, claims that what Trump has above other candidates is that he tells the truth -- On the Bonus Show: Trump's pick for DEA withdraws, court rules Idaho can partially enforce "abortion trafficking" law, first Democrat joins DOGE caucus, much more... 🪒 Henson Shaving: Use code DAVIDP for free shave cream at https://hensonshaving.com/davidp 🥦 Lumen lets you master your metabolism. GET 15% OFF at https://lumen.me/pakman 💪 AG1 is offering you a FREE $76 GIFT when you sign up at https://athleticgreens.com/pakman  🖼️ Aura Frames: Use code PAKMAN for $35 OFF & free shipping at https://auraframes.com/pakman 🩳 SHEATH Underwear: Code PAKMAN for 20% OFF at https://sheathunderwear.com/pakman 👍 Buy the FÜM Journey Pack and use code PAKMAN for a FREE GIFT at https://tryfum.com/pakman -- Become a Member: https://davidpakman.com/membership -- Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/davidpakmanshow -- TDPS Subreddit: http://www.reddit.com/r/thedavidpakmanshow -- Pakman Discord: https://davidpakman.com/discord -- David on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/davidpakmanshow -- Leave a Voicemail: (219)-2DAVIDP

Welcome to the show. Tucker Carlson, the former Fox News propagandist, has bravely and courageously returned to Russia to produce more pro-Putin propaganda and question American democracy as he loves to do. This is Tucker Carlson's unique brand of it's not journalism, but it's what Putin might call beautiful journalism deserving of a standing ovation. So here is Tucker looking extremely sunburned, explaining why he's back in Russia, what has happened since his last propaganda trip to Russia. And this is very, uh, uh, it's inextricably wrapped up in Trumpian foreign policy, MAGA's view of our traditional Western liberal allies versus authoritarian strongmen.

So there's a lot of meat on this bone for us to talk about. Let's first, let's listen to Tucker's brave declaration about being back in Russia. Since we left Russia, Moscow, where we are now in February after interviewing Vladimir Putin, we've watched from the United States as the Biden administration has driven the US ever closer to a nuclear conflict with Russia, the country that possesses the world's largest nuclear arsenal. Now, of course, that already I mean, that one sentence is wait a second. So Russia invades Ukraine alludes to the possibility maybe of having to use nukes. The United States and our allies say, hey, Ukraine needs to needs help defending itself. Let's help them do that. It's the U.S.'s fault that Russia

might become even more aggressive when Russia is the invading force. That's already a completely backwards way to even sort of draw the parameters of this conflict. But let's continue. It has accelerated ever since, and it's reached its apogee so far in the weeks after Trump's election. He's now the president elect in that time. Just a few weeks ago, the Biden administration, American military personnel launched missiles into mainland Russia and killed at least a dozen Russian soldiers. So we are now. Now, I mean, even that soldiers were killed during a war that Russia started. I'm not for killing. I'm not for violence.

I'm not a fan of rockets and guns and bombs and grenades, but Russia started a war and some of their soldiers died. And Tucker goes, look at the crazy stuff Biden's do. Russia started a war and some of its soldiers died. If, is there any scenario where we can say that's war that would more closely and more accurately represent that than this. No, but that it's Biden's fault. Most Americans in a hot war with Russia, an undeclared war where you did not vote for and that most Americans don't want, but it is ongoing. And because of that war, because of the fact that the U.S. military is killing Russians in Russia right now, we are closer to nuclear war than at any time in history.

Far closer than we were during the Cuban Missile Crisis. That would mean the elimination of Russia, the United States, and most of the rest of the world. We felt there must be someone behind the scenes in Washington working to make sure that this conflict doesn't become a nuclear holocaust. But we found out that no, in fact, there is nobody. Tony Blinken, the current Secretary of State, cut off all contact between the U.S. and Russian governments. There is no back channel. There is no conversation.

There hasn't been for more than two years. That's shocking. Meanwhile, most Americans have no access to any perspective other than that granted to them by NBC News and The New York Times. They don't know how close we are. They don't know the Russian perspective. We've been trying for over a year to get that perspective out to American news consumers. We've also tried for over a year to get an interview with Zelensky, the president of Ukraine. We've attacked that from a bunch of different angles. He's spoken to a lot of different people around him, had dinner with them. We've been

in talks continuously, and those efforts have been thwarted by the U.S. government. The American embassy in Kiev, which our tax dollars pay for, told this Lenski government, no, you may not do the interview. You can talk to CNN. You can't talk to us. So we've been unable to speak to him. So we came back to Moscow yesterday to interview the foreign minister of Russia, Sergei Lavrov, one of the biggest propagandists that is it. If you think about who are the biggest Russian propagandists where every word has to be verified, if he, if, if Sergei Lavrov tells you, uh, even, even the most minor uncontroversial things, you would still want to verify it. That's how

dishonest that guy is. Longest serving foreign minister in the world. He's been a part of this government for 25 years. He's been in the diplomatic corps for over 40. And ask him, where exactly are we? Are we headed toward an unprecedented conflict between Russia and the United States? Is there any way to peel Russia back from the east, from the sphere of China back in to the west? Is that alliance permanent? And does the election of Donald Trump mean an end to this war, which is reshaping the world, the U.S. economy, the global economy, and risking the life of every person on this planet? Is that possible? Yeah. We just walked out of that interview. It's absolutely fascinating.

It's absolutely fascinating. It's coming very soon. We hope you'll watch very soon. So as usual, Tucker Carlson spreading the typical pro Kremlin propaganda, uh, with all sorts of accusations against the United States saying it's the U S who killed Russian soldiers saying we're closer to nuclear war than at any time in history, which I don't know to be true. I mean, there is no doubt that Putin in his belligerence earlier in this war against Ukraine

did allude to bigger, more powerful weapons. He certainly did that. I don't know if we're really closer to nuclear war than at any time in history, but we have to zoom out and consider that this is the type of rhetoric that not only downplays Russia's role in its own brutal invasion of Ukraine, that really is the catalyst. They Tucker will never tell you that. Um, but it's also that the real villains, not only are they not Putin who started the war, the real villains are the United States

and other democratic countries that democratically select their leaders. And Tucker's comments don't exist in a vacuum. And that's why this is so critical. The broader trend we've seen under Trump ism is they lionize the authoritarian strong men. MAGA, uh, much prefers to be cozy with the authoritarian strong men and instead are skeptical of our Western democratic allies. And so when we see Tucker Carlson getting cozy with the Kremlin and its narratives. It's not that different than when Trump said, Oh, Putin savvy. And I believe him. I mean, he said they didn't hack.

I believe the guy, he very strongly denied it. Or when he falls for Kim Jong Un's love letters or when he says Victor or bond and she are such strong, powerful leaders. And so the, the theme here is Trump and MAGA favor autocrats over Democrats. They alienate longstanding partners, NATO, and they cozy up to regimes that stifle dissent, crush freedoms and don't have a free press. And so this mindset, which says democratic alliances, those aren't so good. Authoritarianism, that's cool. That's a real threat to how the U S positions itself in the world. They elevate leaders that prioritize power

and authoritarianism and autocracy, and it weakens a global fight for democracy. I prefer democracy, right? It's, it's, uh, uh, uh, a terrible system, but better than all of the other ones. Uh, something like that. I want to remind you that this pro Kremlin propaganda from Tucker is not new. Here's Tucker at a Moscow grocery store, uh, some months ago. And this is a classic. The, they say everything's bad, but look at this beautiful grocery store. This is a classic out of the authoritarian propaganda playbook.

We've seen this in North Korea. We've seen it in Venezuela. We've seen it in Cuba. Here it is in Russia. This was Tucker. So a longstanding feature, maybe the longest standing feature of Cold War propaganda in the West was the Soviet grocery store. No products, no choices, shoddily made things. And it wasn't actually propaganda. It

was real. And you can look up the pictures on the Internet if you want. So we thought it'd be interesting to take a look at a contemporary modern day 2024 Russian grocery store two years into sanctions. Here we go. All right. Here we go. So I guess you put in 10 rubles here and you get it back when you put the cart back. So it's free, but there's an incentive to return it and not just bring it to your homeless encampment. Cool. OK, this is the by the way, you know, I some of you know, I've been to Aruba a few times. It's the same thing there. This is the, by the way, they, you know, I, some of, you know, I've, I've been to Aruba a few times. It's the same thing there.

It's the whole, like you put a coin in and then you get the coin back and that it's, it's proper incentives and they're, uh, it's not unique to Russia. Okay. Democratic places also have the same cart scheme. Yeah. Grocery cart escalator. This is designed. I'm figuring this out now where the wheels don't move.

They lock on the grocery cart escalator. Look, Ma, no hands. Anyway, so Tucker does the thing where he walks through and it's filled with products. This is a classic. OK, you can go and see videos of supporters of the Maduro Chavez regimes in Venezuela going to grocery stores. It's the same thing. They go, look, they tell us that everything's bad. And despite all these sanctions, look at this beautiful olive oil that's here. Of course, when you look more deeply, the olive oil costs what the average person in

the country makes in a month. So, yes, a lot of these places have grocery stores for the elites and for rich people and for foreigners. You can see it in Cuba. You can see it in North Korea. But using this as a way to talk about how great an authoritarian country is, is, is pretty, it's an old strategy, but I'm guessing that some of the magas are still falling for it.

So let's zoom out here. What we have is continued, continued weaponization from people like Tucker and the MAGA people and others about the idea of global alliances. NATO is obsolete and this is unfair and they're not paying their fair share. And actually everything's really great in Russia and kind of interesting. This is what we are to expect for the next four years. It's what they did last time. It's what they're going to do again. Joe Rogan recently explained why he got involved in the 2024 election after previously saying

he wanted nothing to do with it and specifically why he endorsed Donald Trump and Joe Rogan's reasoning is baffling to say the least. In a recently published episode, Joe Rogan says his decision to get involved and endorse Trump ultimately was driven because of lies. Now you might say, Oh, that makes sense. Trump lies all the time. Rogan. No, no, no, no, no, no. Tim walls is lies are the reason that Rogan decided to endorse Donald Trump, which is weird because Donald Trump is a compulsive liar and Rogan rattles off a variety of different things that Tim walls has said. And they have to do with credentials. They have to do with military. They have to do with all these different things.

So here is Joe Rogan explaining it to us. And this, this is truly baffling. I wanted to stay out of the presidential election. Yeah. Because I feel like I had to, I felt like this is so nuts. This is so not when that Tim walls guy,

that guy's it's so nuts. That guy was going to be the vice president. You're telling me, you're telling me this whole thing's fake. You're telling me you don't care if someone's a liar. You don't care if they lied about their military rank, where they served. You don't care if they lie about being an assistant. You don't care if they lie about Tiananmen Square. There's too many things. This is so crazy. You would get fired if you were an assistant manager at a fucking oil changing company. OK, so, you know, first of all, you can break down each of these claims that Rogan makes

individually. The alleged lie that walls told about his military rank, I believe was a confusion as to what is the highest rank he reached versus at what rank did he retire? Is that, is that a lie? Is it anywhere close to Trump's 30,000 lies? You can be the judge, but my, is that a lie? Is it anywhere close to Trump's 30,000 lies? You can be the judge, but my understanding is that walls did accurately represent the highest rank he reached, but that's not the rank at which he retired. Okay. As far as serving, my understanding is that walls did not claim to have served in combat. That's my understanding.

As far as the dates of Tiananmen Square, he did get that wrong and he acknowledged that he got those dates wrong. He was there within months, but it wasn't, there was not overlap. Okay. But then you have to zoom out and you have to say, okay, if you're upset about those three things with Tim walls, how do you then go and endorse Trump if what you care about is the truth? Because Trump told over 30,000 documented lies during his presidency.

This is the Trump who said Mexico will pay for a wall. COVID will magically disappear by Easter of 2020 that he won an election that he actually lost by millions of votes. Trump's lies aren't just frequent the scale of them and you know, w w w walls is rank at retirement versus peak rank versus Trump saying, I actually won this election and should have gotten to be the president. Trump still lies about the election results of 2016. Trump still doesn't want to acknowledge that he straight up lost the election results of 2016. Trump still doesn't want to

acknowledge that he straight up lost the popular vote in 2016. That was eight years ago. And Rogan endorses Trump because it's walls who's dishonest. Now, I think it's fair to ask, does Rogan genuinely think Trump is more honest than Tim walls or is it about picking the lies that you're willing to tolerate? Because if lies were the deal breaker, Trump would be the first candidate. You would say, I've got to rule them out because they tell too many lies. Instead, Rogan doubles down on the guy who's made lying a cornerstone. You know, we talk about is Trump for or against legal abortion?

Is Trump for or against gay marriage? Is Trump for or against tariffs? We don't know cause he's taken every position. The one thing Trump is fine with is lying and dishonesty. That's the one thing he's fine with. And it's not just hypocrisy. This is part of a bigger pattern where the MAGA crowd pretends to care about a principle. In this case, the principle is honesty, but then when it's inconvenient, they ignore it.

Did Kamala Harris really work at McDonald's? Was Tim walls really drawing up the plays or did someone else coach the offensive line? Trump tells 30,000 lies and they go, I'm voting for Trump because I care about honesty and, and the truth and forthrightness. If Rogan wants to call out walls, fine, but you've got to say, and because of that, I also can't endorse Donald Trump, but instead he did endorse Donald Trump. So it's just a reminder for a lot of people. Politics is not about principles. I have an entire chapter in my forthcoming book about this.

They want to make the conversation only about principles and then they abandon all of their principles. It's about facts be damned. I'll do whatever is convenient for the person I've already decided that I'm supporting. That's where we are. It is wild, wacky stuff, but I don't think there's going to be any reversal over the next couple of years. That's for sure. There are two big problems with the cheap plastic disposable razors. Two thirds of people have skin irritation and then over two billion plastic razors enter our landfills in the United States alone. Now, our sponsor, Henson Shaving, solves both problems with the plastic disposable razors.

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the coupon code black Friday 24. All right. We are going to dive deep today into the nomination of Pete Hegseth as Donald Trump's secretary of defense. It turns out that this is not only a bad nomination. It turns out that not only is this nomination borderline dead and we will get to that. It turns out that this nomination is actually emblematic of a lot of what we've talked about with regard to Maga, which is that politics makes strange bedfellows or kind of in Trump Ian speak. All that really matters is loyalty and the particular type of hardcore brown nosing loyalty to Donald Trump.

Video of Pete Hegseth trashing Donald Trump has resurfaced. Now I'm going to tell you upfront because we're going to be looking at a lot of different aspects of this, including that they pulled out Pete Hegseth's mommy to beg Donald Trump, please hire my son. Pete Hegseth's nomination by Trump to be a secretary of defense is on its last leg. By the time today's show is out, he may have withdrawn. We will get to that. We're already seeing names floated as replacements. Fox news is Pete Hegseth is now sort of in hot water after an old video of him going right after Donald Trump. And I have to say with pretty

accurate criticisms has resurfaced. And in this clip, Pete Hegseth calls Trump, uh, all bluster true, low substance. That's true. An armchair tough guy. That's true. And even goes after, uh, Trump's infamous attacks on John McCain. So take a listen to this. It's typical Trump, all bluster, very little substance. He talks a tough game, but then when pressed on it, he's an armchair tough guy. I hate to say it, but this is a guy who said who said that John McCain is not a war hero, yet he sought his own five military deferments.

That's right. All accurate, salient criticisms of Donald Trump. Why would Pete Hegseth want to be the secretary of defense, the second in command of the military behind the commander in chief of someone that he believes has been so disrespectful to veterans and to the military. As Pete Hegseth previously accurately pointed out. Now, this is not just a PR nightmare for Pete Hegseth. This is yet another reminder that it's all completely transactional for MAGA. Pete Hegseth with a long track record of views about foreign policy, completely antithetical to Trump's latest stated views, a view of Donald Trump from Pete Hegseth that is completely

opposite to this guy's a patriot that I would want to work for. And it's all brown nosing, sycophancy and transactional nature of MAGA politics. Loyalty to Trump is not about ideology. It's not about principles of foreign policy or respect or whatever. It is unflinching loyalty to the orange man himself. And when you start to see the cracks appear the way we're seeing it right now, the fallout is typically swift and unforgiving. Now, as of right now, Trump is standing behind Hegseth to the extent that he stands behind anybody.

Hegseth is still in the process of this nomination, but we are starting to hear rumors of possible replacements. Ron DeSanctimonious is one person who is now being considered for secretary of defense. Joni Ernst, the Republican senator from Iowa, is reportedly being considered as a replacement. So we are probably going to find out in the next 12 to 24 hours. You may already know by the time you listen to today's show, what is the future of the Hegseth nomination? But imagine that the guy Hegseth has spent years defending after he used to criticize him is reportedly already shopping around for a shinier, more loyal sycophant. But it doesn't just end here in terms

of the humiliation for Hegseth. There's more. We are now learning that Donald Trump's pick for defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, is learning a difficult political lesson. Just because you do a 180 and pledge complete and total unflinching loyalty to Donald Trump, that still doesn't guarantee that you are going to smoothly sail into the position you've been nominated for. We now have the allegations of drinking, mistreatment of women chanting. What was it? Kill all Muslims at a bar, financial mismanagement of the organizations he was involved with. It has left the Hegseth nomination hanging by a thread. And we now are getting into the math of it because at the end of the day, he needs votes to get confirmed. It's not

up to Trump. It's up to the Senate. And really it's up to Republicans in the Senate. We are now learning that as many as six Republican senators are having doubts about Pete Hegseth and without those six, this nomination is dead in the water. This is part of why Donald Trump is reportedly shopping around for different nominees and we are now learning that Joni Ernst, the Republican Senator and others are saying, I'm not so sure about this Hegseth nomination. NBC news reports as many as six Senate Republicans, perhaps more are currently not comfortable supporting Hegseth bid to lead the Pentagon as new revelations about his past continue to be made public.

Three Republican sources with direct knowledge have said, given Republican slim Senate majority in the next Congress, Hegseth can afford to lose only three GOP votes, assuming all Democrats vote against him. Senator Joni Ernst on the armed services committee would not commit to supporting him. Um, and there are a number of other names here, Republicans who are saying, I'm not so sure about this. So the math is very simple. If true that six Republicans are not on the Hegseth train, it's over for them. They're just not going to have the numbers. Uh, what we are quickly learning, we saw this with the Gates nomination. We may see it with the cash app Patel nomination. We seem to be seeing it with Hegseth. Trump's cabinet picks reflect very different values than what you or I might sort of consider if we were making selections. It's

not about qualifications. It's not about a positive vision for America and how you would use your appointment, uh, nomination to carry that out. It's about loyalty as defined by Trump. It's about the willing to web willingness to weaponize whatever department or, or entity you will be in charge of. And it is about doing Trump's bidding, whether or not it is on this side of the law or that side of the law. And for Pete Hegseth, it's coming back to haunt him. His, uh, uh, Fox news stint was part of how he got on Trump's radar. His recent pro Maga rhetoric is part of what endeared him to Donald Trump. Even though years ago he said very negative things about Donald Trump. But when it comes to those who matter, in other words, the Republican senators, it does not seem to erase the very real questions about Hegseth's ability to lead the Pentagon.

And of course, if you zoom out, it's laughable. Pete Hegseth leading the Pentagon second in command of the U S military behind the commander in chief himself. None of us would ever even fall for the mere possibility that that could make sense. But we are now starting to see the repercussions, which are that potentially six or even more Republican senators are saying, this is not going to be for me. If that's the case, he's not even going to get to a vote. He's not even going to get to confirmation hearings. This is the kind of nomination that sends the opposite message of what we really need about accountability and competence when we have sort of diminished confidence in the

military in many ways. So will Pete Hegseth's nomination survive the week? I don't know. Will Kashyap Patel's nomination survive the week? I don't know. What's your opinion? Will Pete fall? Will cash fall both or neither? Those are sort of the, the, the options. Let me know info at David Pakman.com. If I were a betting man and you all know that I'm not, but if I were a betting man, my bet is at least one of these two nominations, Pete and cash, at least one fails to actually get to a confirmation vote. So let's take a very quick break. Make sure you're subscribed to the YouTube channel. Make sure you've pre-ordered my forthcoming book, the echo machine at davidpacman.com slash echo. I finished up recording the audio book last night. It's going to be very, very good.

We'll take a break and then we will talk about Pete Hegseth's mommy begging Donald Trump, please give my son the job, please. Staying motivated and eating healthy during the holidays can be a challenge. That's why I love our sponsor, AG1. I don't always carefully plan every single meal, so I know I'm getting the exact right amount of every vitamin and nutrient every day. That's why I start the morning with a scoop of AG one before my cappuccino. I mix AG one into a glass of cold water. That's it. Tastes good. One scoop. I get an entire day's worth of 75 high quality vitamins and minerals and probiotics

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by using the promo code Pacman at checkout. That's a you are a frames dot com and use code Pacman for thirty five dollars off. The link is in the podcast notes. All right. You know, you're in trouble when you bring out mommy to go on Fox News and beg President Trump, please hire my son, please. And that is exactly what is happening with Pete Hegseth's nomination to be Donald Trump's secretary of defense. Pete Hegseth's mom, Penelope, or we might know her just as Penny, went on Fox and Friends this morning and makes a direct appeal to Donald Trump. Stick by my boy.

Now, I don't know how those who want us to believe that they are the ultimate alphas who take personal responsibility for their actions and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah are well served or that that's compatible with when your nomination is hanging by a thread, having your mom go out and defend you. I think it's great that Pete's mom, I guess, likes him, even though she wrote those emails saying he's an abuser and a horrible person. I guess it's good. Most of the time you would expect that mommy would say, my son's a very good boy and you should hire him. But actually putting her out there to make the case that your nomination that's going south very quickly shouldn't is a little weird. It's a little weird. But here is Penny making the case to Trump. But we are broken by your behavior and your lack of character.

When you wrote that, what's the back story? What was going on that made you so angry you want to write that? Well, I will tell that story in a moment, but let me make two statements first. And one is to President Trump. And by the way, for people who made for who if if it matters to you, Penny has a very large cross necklace displayed. So she is a Christian. And that that may be a factor here in terms of evaluating stuff about her or her son. Or I don't know, I guess maybe some people would care about that, she thinks, by proudly displaying it. And I want to say thank you for your belief in my son.

We all believe in him. We really believe that he is not that man. He was seven years ago. I'm not seven mother and I hope people will heal it. Hear that story today. Can you imagine the guy that my son was at 37 bears no resemblance to the guy he is at 44. Everything I excoriated him for at 37 is null and void. And now he should be in charge of the Pentagon.

And the truth of that story. So the other thing I want to say is I am here to tell the truth, right? To tell the truth to the American people and tell the truth to the senators on the Hill, especially our female senators. I really hope that you will not listen to the media and that you will listen to Pete. There you go. This is sort of like the thing Trump does about how his kids are good kids when they're in legal trouble. It's like they're 45 years old. Wait, wait, they're, they're good kids. Don't just leave them alone.

So this move just reeks of panic, reeks of panic. As I told you earlier, multiple Republican senators openly questioning, is this a guy we're really going to support? Trump's favorite Fox news warrior is in trouble. And it's touching that Penny believes in her son's redemptive arc. But this is not a Hallmark movie. This is should we put a guy in charge of the Pentagon and the Defense Department and the military? And should we have to listen to mommy to figure out whether he's the right guy? Here is Penny going full MAGA attacking the media. Of course, it was it was a difficult time.

I want to say something about the media. And part of today is to discredit the media and how they operate when they contact you. I let a few phone calls go, but then they call you and say they threaten you. That's the first thing they do. They say, unless you make a statement. So she's claiming she's been threatened by the media. We will publish it as is. And I think that's a despicable way to. By the way, this is also called being given the opportunity to comment. Now you may, you may not like it or you may like it, but the idea that she was threatened,

what it sounds like she's saying is media outlets reached out and said, we have this letter. If we don't get a comment, we will just publish the letter. Or you can also provide a comment. She calls that a threat. Anyone threats are dangerous and they're hard on families. So to recap, you were angry about what was going on, his behavior during the divorce. And so you wrote that email and then a you know, a couple hours later you apologize and you guys talk and you worked it out.

Yes. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Uh, Pete and I are very close today. In fact, I like how she looks right into the camera. So this isn't just about Pete Hegseth or Penny. This is emblematic of the Maga playbook. Loyalty and spin are what matter. Accountability doesn't matter.

The Hegseths aren't refuting the allegations. They're reframing them. They're saying, I wrote something. I was mad. We figured it out. He was 37. Now he's 44. And they're kind of counting on Trump's tendency to reward loyalty over character, even though now there's resurfaced videos of Pete Hegseth criticizing Donald Trump. Uh, so here is the final clip. And again, Penny is telling us seven years ago, Pete was a totally different guy. And I think the senators need to listen. Um, do you, do you worry Penny though, that, you know, Donald Trump's trying to hit the ground running. Of course. You know, in less than 50 days. And this, the Pete Hegsett stuff has become a distraction.

To a degree, but I think it can be overcome. I think people need to. That's why I'm here, Steve. Listen to him, get to know him, not the Pete from seven years ago, but the Pete of today. One of the funniest things about all of this is the idea of these complete and total turnarounds. You know, we, we've, it's everywhere with Maga 68 years, Trump was pro choice. And then months before becoming a candidate for the Republican nomination, he became pro life and we're supposed to believe that.

Uh, you know, we've talked about Dave Rubin 40 years on the American political left and then all of a sudden he's on the right and it just happens to coincide with buckets of money that are coming in. Um, there's endless examples. And it just happens to coincide with buckets of money that are coming in. There's endless examples. And now with Pete Hegseth, we're supposed to believe the abuser, the horrible person, the despicable mistreater of women for 37 years. Not that he was a mistreater of women for 37 years, but well into his adult life.

Irrecognizable guy from 44 year old Pete Hegseth, just completely different people. Now, will this resonate with Trump? I don't know. I, I, I have no idea. Maybe mommy's appeal will resonate with Trump because he does value family loyalty or the appearance of it. Um, but is it going to be enough to sway the skeptical six Republican senators who can single handedly torpedo this nomination? That's not super clear.

If the best defense for Pete is his mom saying he's no longer at 44, the guy he was at 37, that raises a lot of questions about whether this is the person who should have one of the most critical jobs in the country. All right. Final Pete Hegseth note for today. His nomination may be dead by the time today's podcast comes out, but there is another sign of desperation in a very rare step for Trump's cabinet nominees. Pete Hegseth is going to be interviewed on Fox News, his former employer. This is completely born out of desperation, the friendliest turf that he could

find. And according to reports, Trump's transition team doesn't want their nominees doing interviews. Caitlin Collins from CNN reported on Twitter quote in a sign of how seriously the Trump transition team is viewing Republican senators concerns about Pete Hegseth. He is expected to sit for an interview with Fox news tomorrow, meaning today I'm told by multiple people that's notable given most, if not all of Trump's cabinet picks have been told not to do media until after they are confirmed. And again, remember, this is his own former employer, Fox news. This is not about answering tough questions to show how qualified he is.

This is about damage control using a network that already shares his talking points and will help him spin the narrative, help him spin the narrative in his favor. This move also really is a reminder of just how shaky the Trump transition team must feel about Hegseth's chances because they are clearly hoping we're going to try the public charm offensive. We're going to soften what's happening in terms of the negative outlook about him. But there is a potential to completely backfire. I struggle to believe for all the criticisms of Republican senators. I don't know that Republican senators are going to be swayed by a friendly interview from Fox News,

especially when the allegations about Hegseth's past, including sexual misconduct, drinking on the job, chanting, kill all Muslims, all of it every single day it is piling up. So if he wants to convince the senators, maybe going and sitting with the senators who will decide the fate of his nomination would be the right way to do it. He did meet with some of the senators who will decide the fate of his nomination would be the right way to do it. He did meet with some of the senators. But it's not clear that a friendly interview with Fox News where he has worked for years is going to be the way to really charm people.

So that's as far as we're going with Pete Hegseth. My hope is that tomorrow I can tell you he's withdrawn from consideration and Trump's going with someone else, probably dissent this. It seems like that's the direction Trump is going. I hope that tomorrow I can tell you that and we can never speak of Pete Hegseth again. Counterpoint to that, assuming Hegseth sticks in and that it seems as though Republican senators will confirm him. We don't know that yet, but if that's the way it goes, my prediction is that we're going to be talking about Pete Hegseth's harebrained decisions about the Defense Department and the Pentagon for four years or as long as he lasts before Trump fires him.

It's going to be one of the two. Let's hope he's gone by tomorrow. We'll take a very quick break. I want to touch base about Carrie Lake and a few other things after this short break. Not all men's underwear is the same with traditional underwear. The sticking and the rubbing are something many of us know all too well. But our sponsor, Sheath Underwear, puts it to an end once and for all. Sheath Underwear is ultra light and breathable.

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an election the right way. If you look yesterday at my breakdown of this interview on Pod Save America with three of the campaign people from kamala harris's team i'm trying to just say we lost let's learn rather than saying this person rigged it and that person sabotage me in so we're gonna try to do it a little bit differently let's start with kerry lake talking to steve bannon and blaming everybody other than herself image mcconnell didn't want to go steven law and Stephen Law and Mitch McConnell, here's how much money they gave you, ma'am. Zero. Against $80 million coming from the Democrats, you didn't get a penny. That is a seat we could have won.

And they would rather have 53 seats and no Kerry Lake than having 54 with Kerry Lake, ma'am. Yeah, I mean, it's unfortunate. And we worked hard to try to make up some of that. We could have used the help we could have used. I think they have a war chest of I've heard 400 million to help get the Senate majority. And I think I was hoping that we would eventually get some of that money. I know they were spending it in places like Maryland, where it was a blowout defeat of the Republican running Larry Hogan. And unfortunately, we didn't get any money. They didn't give Blake Masters any money in the last go around as well. And so, I mean, it is what it is and we can't go back in time. It's very

unfortunate. Yeah. So she has now lost the Arizona gubernatorial race last cycle. She's now lost her U S Senate race as well, both in Arizona. And she has blamed election fraud. She has blamed cured or uncured ballots. She's blamed deep fried ballots, sauteed ballots. Yeah, it's just, it's every McConnell. And then this Republican fund didn't give me money. And what happened in November is really simple. About close to 200,000 Republican Trump voters who went out to vote for Trump looked at their ballots and said yes to Trump. No to Carrie Lake. That's it.

That's the explanation for why Carrie Lake lost. There were voters in Arizona who voted for Trump and made it crystal clear while we are on board for Trump over Harris, we are not on board with Carrie Lake. It's just it's a bridge too far. We're not going to do it. And that's why she lost. You don't get to. Well, you can. But it's not logical to say that here is the list of 10 reasons I lost and none of them apply to Donald Trump, who was a fellow Republican

on the exact same ticket. There were hundreds of thousands of Arizona Trump voters who went out of their way not to vote for Carrie Lake despite filling out their ballot. Carrie Lake's entire campaign was built on grievance politics, conspiracy theories, loyalty tests of course. But there is a limit to how much chaos even Trump supporters are willing to stomach. And to some degree, even though Trump's a loser from 2020 and they still voted for him. More recently, Carrie Lake just lost in Arizona, still hasn't just straight up said, I was

defeated. It's well, we didn't get the votes because of this judge and that rigging and these. But but very recently, two years prior, she lost and still hasn't just acknowledged I lost. And a bunch of the Trump voters weren't willing to stomach it. They didn't need Mitch McConnell to convince them. They didn't need Republican Senate campaign money. Carrie Lake alienated the voters all by herself. And instead of learning from her loss, she's doubling down. It's the GOP establishment. It's the media. It's the vote counters. It's the vote printers. The one person she won't blame is herself. You know what? It wasn't a turnout issue.

Enough Republicans came out that I could have won. How do I know that? Because they voted for Trump. They didn't vote for me. I need to look at myself. Laughable. They never admit fault. It's always about who else can I blame fraud or Mitch McConnell's fault or whatever.

Her problem is not Mitch McConnell or the media or any of it. It's Carrie Lake. Here is where I want the left to go at this in a different manner. And this is why yesterday we took more than 15 minutes to just really think through some of the different explanations as to why Kamala Harris lost. And of course, Democrats also losing in the Senate, Democrats losing in the House. You can't possibly I say often you can't fix the problem unless you diagnose it. Carrie Lake didn't diagnose it in 2022 or she misdiagnosed it as fraud and other things. And so what happened? She lost again.

Now, that doesn't always happen, right? I mean, Trump misdiagnosed it in 2020, saying he really won. He didn't. 2024, he genuinely did win. But it's not always going to work for you. And so what we need to just think about is if your reflex is now to go to Kamala lost because of fraud or this other obscure thing having to do with how ballots are counted or processed in Pennsylvania. Or let's just remember, you can't fix the problem. You usually can't fix the problem unless it's by some random chance if you misdiagnose it. And as we start to think about 2026 and 2028 and what needs to happen in

terms of the people that are on the ticket and the people that are behind the scenes and the approach and the message and the policy, there's not one simple answer in a country of 340 million people where the election has so many voters, but such a small margin. And so our first instinct should be take a lesson from Carrie Lake in 2022. It was fraud in 2024. It was Mitch McConnell. Rarely is there one reason or one explanation. You think back to 2016, there were some who said Hillary lost because she didn't visit the critical battleground states in those last 10 to 14 days. Could that have been a factor?

Yes. Is that the reason why Hillary Clinton lost? No. Others said the reason Hillary Clinton lost is James Comey out of the blue, did a second press conference to talk about how there would not be charges against Hillary, but how there is an investigation, et cetera, that hurt her. It probably did hurt her. But is that the reason Hillary Clinton lost in 2016? I don't think so. The point is anybody giving you one explanation you should be skeptical of. Secondly, if there is going to be a different result in 2026 and in 2028 than there was

in 2024, something has to change unless you are counting only on your opponent failing. Now this is interesting to think about because Trump's 2024 campaign was essentially the same campaign as 2020. It was the same threats about a depression, a stock market crash, all this stuff. It was bogus in 2020 bogus in 2024. It was the same half-baked economic promises based on a very limited understanding of how anything works. It didn't work in 2020. It worked in 2024. You can't assume that doing the same thing is going to work because it often doesn't

for Trump. It did for reasons that are very specific. Despite pretty good economic numbers, enough voters just didn't see it that way. Well, that's what matters. It matters how voters see it. Harris seen as an extension of the Biden presidency didn't help. So many errors were made by the Democratic Party that for Trump, it worked out that doing the same thing he did in 2020 got him elected, doing the same thing he did in 2020 as he

did in 2016 didn't win. So the takeaway should be you probably want to take the reins of this thing and not just plan to repeat the exact same playbook. Does that mean a different candidate in 2028? Absolutely. I see people talking about Kamala Harris. I think it's mostly a name recognition thing right now. I don't think Kamala Harris should be the nominee in 2028 is a different campaign approach necessary. A thousand percent. It wasn't not doing the Rogan interview that hurt the campaign irreparably, but it was the totality of the media strategy,

the lack of a left wing independent media ecosystem, the way the right has, it's a whole bunch of different things. What about policy? Harris ran to Biden's right. That doesn't seem to have been a particularly effective approach. So a lot of things need to change, but let's not be like Carrie Lake. Let's not be like these people. Donald Trump's incoming press secretary, Caroline Leavitt, says that the thing that makes Trump different than everybody else is authenticity and that he tells the truth. I know at the top of the show, at the beginning of the show, we talked about how Joe Rogan bafflingly said because he cares about truth and lies, he endorsed Trump. It's so crazy.

What? Okay. Caroline Leavitt, who is going to be Donald Trump's press secretary, unless she has a problem getting confirmed, but I don't anticipate that. She says Trump's truth telling is what really distinguishes him. You have to wonder, did she get hit on the head? Is she okay? Because this statement defies logic, evidence and basic common sense.

What president Trump has that no other candidate who has ever run for office in modern history has is authenticity and he tells the truth and you might not like the truth all the time, but he tells it. And when he says he's going to do something, he delivers on that promise. We're already. Trump delivered on almost no promises during his first term and did a whole bunch of stuff he never said he was going to do. Solve the Israeli Palestinian conflict in one term. Didn't do it. Build a wall with Mexico that Mexico would pay for. Didn't do it. Solve trade by tariffing China. He did some tariffs. It certainly didn't solve trade. I could I could go on, replace Obamacare with something big and beautiful. That will be good for anybody. The magical thinking that we see from these people

is truly the purest form of it. This is the same phenomenon we see time and again in Donald Trump's orbit. People say these provably untrue, fabricated, unhinged things. We don't know if they believe them or because it's the price of admission. We've talked about this before when a bunch of Trump supporters, 57% of Republicans after the 2020 election were saying, I do believe Trump really won and that it was stolen. And we wondered, do they really believe that or do they see that as the price of admission? Something you just have to say to show, to signal I'm part of your group, include me

as part of your group. I don't know. But what we've learned is that if enough people repeat the mantra or the slogan enough and everybody bows to the lies and and then you get to stay in the club, it sort of becomes irrelevant whether they really believe it. As we've said before, I don't think Trump is particularly anti-gay personally, but it doesn't really matter. The question is, how will he govern? I still don't believe that Donald Trump is personally against abortion, as he claimed to be once he became a 68 year old man. He said, actually, I'm against it.

It doesn't matter, though. Even if he's pro-choice, he appointed three Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe v. Wade. And so then we get to this whole thing about Trump and authenticity and truth and lying. Donald Trump has been fact checked as lying over 30,000 times just during his presidency, whether it's the Mexico wall claim, insisting he won multiple elections that he lost. He says he won the popular vote in 2016. He didn't. He says he won the election overall in 2020. He didn't.

The idea of calling Trump authentic or a truth teller, it's beyond laughable. It's now a question of what is happening to the brains of these people. And that's kind of the deeper problem. When Trump's inner circle starts to parrot the talking points, it's not really about convincing us. Right. starts to parrot the talking points. It's not really about convincing us, right? I don't think any of you hear and see Caroline Levitt say Trump's got truth and authenticity as his incredible characteristics. You're not going to be convinced.

I'm not going to be convinced, right? People in reality won't be convinced. It's actually about creating a parallel reality. And this is a critical feature to understand. Facts are negotiable. Loyalty means repeating the lie louder than the next person. It's a performance. It's a loyalty test.

And it's really a disturbing insight into how propaganda works in the Trump era. They're not going to convince us, but they need to build people. But they need to build a coalition of people who are just as convinced about a lie as we are about the facts. If Trump's press secretary truly believed that Trump is a beacon of authenticity and truth, you would expect her to provide some examples of the authenticity and of the truth telling, but they don't because they can't because there are none. And instead they rely on these vague platitudes. They expect the audience to fill in the blanks with their fantasies. And where that breaks down is when Luke Beasley goes to the Trump rally and they go, Trump

tells the truth all the time. And Luke says, oh, okay, tell me about a policy he promised that he did. And then they go, oh, I dunno. This interview is over. You put, you're part of the liberal media. It's cultish behavior and it's not just about Caroline Leavitt's statement. It's about really being prepared for the broader erosion of truth in our politics. That's going to continue. And when you have a press secretary so blatantly willing to continue constructing the parallel narrative, it just chips away at the understanding of reality of so many people. And that's the point. When people don't know what's true anymore or they're willing to repeat something they suspect is a lie endlessly, they are easier to manipulate because once they're in,

once they're pot committed to use a poker term, it's hard for them to get out. That's what I expect to see. Uh, we are seeing more trouble in the forthcoming Trump cabinet. A Trump's pick for DEA administrator has withdrawn from consideration. A court has ruled that Idaho can partially enforce its abortion trafficking law. Horrible. Exactly what we feared. And finally, a Democrat has joined the Elon and Vivek Doge caucus. We will talk about all of those stories and more on the bonus show. We are at three thousand eight hundred and seven preorders for my book, The Echo Machine. Free stuff is available, available when you preorder. So preorder the book anywhere. You can even call local bookstores. They'll order it

for you. Submit your receipt at David Pakman dot com slash free book stuff. I'm going to say it one more once more. OK, people who are saying the website's not working, you're typing in the wrong address. It's David Pakman dot com slash free book stuff. Submit your receipt. You'll get the free stuff. I will see you on the bonus show.