The David Pakman Show - 2/17/23: Tough talk on train derailment, Nikki continues to struggle

Episode Date: February 17, 2023

-- On the Show: -- Fox & Friends hosts admit that regulations regarding train safety were cut during the Trump administration -- Fox & Friends interviews Nikki Haley and she refuses to directly criticize Donald Trump -- Caller asks how the Republican civil war will end -- Caller asks about whether Florida banning books is a free speech issue -- Caller asks what it means for Democrats to start playing offense -- Caller goes off the rails in a historic swear-infested call -- Caller asks whether Democrats are too obsessed with poll numbers -- Caller talks about apolitical people who think they are being virtuous -- Caller talks about how bad lying in politics has gotten -- David responds to viewer emails and social media messages -- On the Bonus Show: John Fetterman seeks treatment for depression, Tucker Carlson makes dumb point about 2020 election, bill banning trans people in military introduced, and much more... 🧻 Reel Paper: Code PAKMAN for 30% OFF + free shipping at https://reelpaper.com/pakman 💪 MOSH protein bars: Code PAKMAN for 20% off + free shipping at https://moshlife.com/pakman 🌳 Use code PAKMAN for 20% off HoldOn plant-based bags at https://holdonbags.com 🪒 Henson Shaving: Use code Pakman for FREE blades at https://hensonshaving.com/pakman 💻 Stay protected! Try Aura FREE for 2 weeks: https://aura.com/pakman -- Become a Supporter: http://www.davidpakman.com/membership -- Subscribe on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/thedavidpakmanshow -- Subscribe to Pakman Live: https://www.youtube.com/pakmanlive -- Subscribe to Pakman Finance: https://www.youtube.com/pakmanfinance -- Follow us on Twitter: http://twitter.com/davidpakmanshow -- Like us on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/davidpakmanshow -- Leave us a message at The David Pakman Show Voicemail Line (219)-2DAVIDP

As we continue to learn more about the train derailment that took place in Ohio and we continue to cover it. It's harder and harder to avoid this sub story that's come up about some breaking related regulations that were put in place by the Obama administration that the Trump administration rolled back. Now, the reason I haven't spoken about that yet is it's genuinely unclear to me and apparently to others as well, whether those regulations are actually related to what took place in this particular train derailment. I have a friend who's a train engineer and he looked at it very strongly and he said, yes, that happened. But it's not clear yet,

at least that that's related to this train derailment. But putting that aside for a moment, that topic has now even made it to Fox and Friends, even Fox and Friends, who, you know, the interesting thing about this story is that it has gone somewhat bipartisan because, I mean, it's kind of crazy, but from some of the right, they're interested in the train derailment, not because they care about trains or they care about regulation, but because they believe the media doesn't care about the train derailment because a lot of the victims in Ohio are white. I know it's crazy. And we already talked about that on The Wednesday Show. But regardless, it's leading to right wing media caring about the

train derailment. They also see it as an opportunity to criticize Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and Democratic President Joe Biden. So needless to say, I have to tell you, I was surprised even Fox and Friends is Brian Kilmeade yesterday morning mentioned this issue of those regulatory changes. Speaker 2 speaking to the White House, apparently regulations regarding train safety. Well, this is Steve, Steve Doocy, not Kilmeade. Changed during the Trump administration. This particular railroad and others lobbied President Trump to dismantle an Obama era rule that would have required railroads to update their braking systems. And apparently the Obama administration

had pushed for it to govern transportation of hazardous materials after about half a million barrels of crude were dumped. But ultimately, the Trump administration undid that and said the cost exceeded the benefits. Nobody understands. And, you know, when they talk about whether or not it's safe to drink the water. OK, so then they get off of that aspect. That is absolutely and completely true. If you Google this, you'll find it widely documented. Here's one article Trump rolls. This is from 2018.

Trump rolls back train breaking rule meant to keep oil tankers from exploding near communities. And the article reads trains that carry oil and other flammable material won't have to install, won't have to install electronically controlled brakes that reduce the risk of train derailment and explosions after the reversal by Trump officials of an Obama era safety rule. The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration posted the rule change on its website. And again, they say today this was from September of 2018, arguing the cost of installing these more sophisticated brakes outweighs the benefit. This was first proposed in December 2017, around the time of a deadly Amtrak derailment and finalized today, the improved brakes had had a

2021 deadline for installation. So it is 100 percent true that this was something that was started during the Obama administration. A deadline was placed on it under Trump. That was canceled. I would want to be really sure that it's actually related to this train derailment before we ascribe this train derailment blame under that umbrella. But it still goes without saying that we are not overregulated when it comes to trains by any means. And in fact, it's probably the opposite. But ultimately, we will have a more

specific answer here. And I mean, listen, good for Fox News for bringing it up. They get they mention it as an aside and they get off of it very quickly. But they did bring it up to their credit. There is something going on with this 2024 presidential primary that should interest political scientists, psychologists, sociologists. It it's unbelievable the dynamic that has developed between Nikki Haley, who announced her candidacy on Tuesday against Donald Trump and Trump himself, Trump very quickly jumping out and attacking Nikki Haley as terrible at her job. Nikki Haley not attacking Trump, in fact, not even drawing any distinctions.

And yesterday morning she appeared on Fox and Friends. She's been going around saying we need a cognitive test for politicians over age 75. Now, she mostly means it because of Biden. But she's argued the real advantage to her over Trump is she's from a new generation, which means she's younger. So in some sense, Trump being 76 and Nikki saying, if you're 75 or older, you should take a cognitive test. It also applies to Trump. So the Fox and Friends crew asks Nikki Haley about it and says, well, how would Trump do on that test? Because he's also of that age.

Nikki doesn't take the bait, refusing to criticize Donald Trump. How would Donald Trump do on the competency test if at 76 years old? You know, I think he did great the last time he did it. I have no reason to think he wouldn't do well this time. He identified the tiger. It was great. But I do think we need it. And it's across the board. I don't think it's for president. I think you look at Congress. Look at all the members of Congress. You have to start doing this for elected officials. When people send someone to Washington, they need to know they're at the top of their game. That's why I think those competency tests are important. We can't have someone like Joe Biden who's asleep at the wheel and have China sitting

there threatening us and us wondering if he actually knows what's going on. China is good for America to do competency tests. This isn't about one person. Yeah. So refusing to criticize Donald Trump. This is the funniest sort of dance that's taking place here. Do I criticize Trump? Don't I? Well, I am running against him, but I also don't want to go against him too hard. And maybe she's actually running to be Trump's VP. That's another

thing that occurred to me. This is really a campaign so that she runs a campaign, doesn't insult Trump. And then if she does well enough, maybe Trump invites her to be his running mate. I don't know. This campaign is palpably palpable. You could just feel it. It's thick. It's going nowhere. In another moment during the same interview, she said Donald Trump is my friend.

Yeah, I mean, it's not in exactly that way. Take a listen to this. When you flip around to other channels or even, you know, when we interview Democrats on this channel, they say you flip flop one minute, you're friends with Donald Trump. The next minute you're not. How do you answer that? Yeah. Well, first of all, President Trump is my friend. I was honored to work with him in the administration. I thought he was the right president at the right time. And that remains to be the truth. We had a great conversation.

I told him that I was doing this because I thought it was time for a new generation. I thought we needed to leave this. I told him you're too old. And we needed to move forward. So I just don't even know where to start. First of all, is it possible that Trump actually does want Nikki Haley to run? It is possible. And I keep going back to the same reason why when you look at twenty twenty four Republican primary polling, when it's Trump versus the Santas head to head, the Santas does way better and sometimes is actually winning.

When you have a poll that it's do you want Trump or DeSantis or Pence or Don Jr. or Mike Pompeo or Nikki Haley or Roger Stone or Alex Jones, who have the more people you stuff into the poll, the better Trump does, because a lot of those other choices take away more from DeSantis than they do from Trump right now. So one could make the argument Trump wants as many people as possible to run because it hurts DeSantis and it helps him. That's a possibility. Secondly, is there any shot that Nikki Haley wins this nomination if she refuses to go head on and criticize Trump and by criticize, I don't even mean insult. I just mean draw some policy distinctions. Right. Do something to show other than just being young

and a minority and a woman, which is the identity politics that Nikki played at her first rally, which we covered yesterday, which took place Wednesday. You have no chance. And the same applies to Ron DeSantis, but differently with Ron DeSantis. I think DeSantis, if he does run for the nomination, has to abandon taking the high road because it's just not what Republican voters seem to want. But with Nikki Haley's campaign, if all you're going to say is Trump is my friend and you're not going to criticize him in terms of policy. You're not going to suggest, yeah, the cognitive test is for Trump, too, because he might be loose. You're going absolutely nowhere. There's just no way. And if her intention is really just to be the

VP rather than be the nominee, then maybe this is the right approach. It's just not clear what she's thinking. We should figure out, is she coming up with these ideas or are these the ideas of her advisers? Is she waiting to transition in the here's what what is different about me? I don't know the answer, but this is already a completely insane primary. We will have the clips I played for you here on our YouTube channel, YouTube dot com slash here. Did you know that every year 30 million trees are cut down to meet the demand of toilet paper in the United States alone? Here's something really simple you can do to fight climate change

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for 20 percent off and free shipping. The link is in the podcast notes. The David Pakman show, of course, is a community supported program. You can support the work that we do at join Pakman dot com. And it is a lot of work. It really is. You know, people think, oh, David, you just sit around playing on your computer. Well, yes, but there's more to it than that as well. I could tell you someday you can sign up at join Pacman dot com. You'll get instant access to the bonus show and to all of the other great, great things. And of course, while I believe our normal membership rates are eminently reasonably priced, you can take a discount, a non means tested discount available to everybody by using the coupon code 24 starts now. And it really has Nikki Haley, Donald Trump and all of the different things.

Let's hear from some people in the audience. We love to hear from the audience, ideally through respectful communication, mutually acceptable communication. Why don't we start today via the discord at David Pakman dot com slash discord with Harry from Columbus, Ohio. Harry, welcome to the program. Let's start with hopefully no technical issues and a beautiful beginning to today's live calls. Harry, go. Oh, boy. Not an auspicious start. Harry muted and just horrifying things happening.

Harry, you want to give it one more shot, buddy? Yeah, well, Harry's having a tech disaster. That's too bad. You got to select the right audio device for it to work. Let's try Ricky from Charlotte and see if Ricky from Charlotte can help us recover. Ricky, welcome to the program. What's on your mind today? Hey, David, can you hear me? I can hear you beautifully. OK, cool. Yeah. So I wanted to ask you about this right-wing civil war that we see starting to unfold. Yeah. And I'm just curious. I'm not exactly sure, like, what the dividing lines around this will be.

I mean, I guess we could say, like, in the context of going into the 2024 primary, it could be the Trump versus DeSantis line. But I'm really curious about like what the fracture will make, you know, like what the Civil War will make them look like fractured after like this whole thing is done and whether there could be like any sort of permanent split that could benefit the left. You know what I'm asking? A hundred percent. And it's a really hard thing to predict, but it's a really astute thing to be wondering about because up until weeks ago, really, the dividing line has been you've got your pro Trump and your anti Trump Republicans. Fine.

When the speaker vote came that ultimately led to Kevin McCarthy becoming speaker of the House, you had a further subdivision of that where you had anti Trump. But then you had pro Trump that likes McCarthy and pro Trump that says we need an alternative. So it was like Marjorie Taylor Greene versus Lauren Boebert. The 24 election is going to be its own thing, because, for example, you're completely right. You've got the DeSantis and Trump part of it. But now you also have, for example, Nikki Haley. Nikki Haley worked in the Trump administration.

She was Trump's ambassador to the U.N., but now she's running against Trump. But the other wrinkle to it is Trump actually needs as many people as possible to jump into the primary. Because if you look at head on one on one polls between Trump and DeSantis, it's very good for DeSantis. When you include more people in the polls, it's better for Trump because they take away support from DeSantis. So it's weird because Nikki Haley is a former Trump staffer who's running against Trump. But Trump actually benefits from the field being more divided. So you're asking a really great question, which is after it all shakes out, then what

is the party look like? And it depends whether Trump wins or doesn't win. If Trump loses the primary, whatever the split is between now and July of twenty twenty four, if Trump loses the primary, all bets are off in the sense that there will be a realignment of the Republican Party altogether. And they might even say, hey, you know, we also don't want the Marjorie Taylor Greene's get them all the hell out of here. If Trump does win the primary, then there will be a question of whether the anti-Trump Republicans have had enough and they want to really try to do something invoking force majeure or something along those lines. It's so hypothetical, Ricky, that I don't know. But it's a fascinating question.

Yeah, no, I'm I'm really curious to see where it goes. But like my general thing is, I just hope that it causes like permanent, lasting damage. You know, I believe like what Chomsky said, that Republican Party is the most dangerous organization in human history and like so I just root for their downfall and it's been really interesting to see how um some of the infighting that we've seen you know over the last few years sort of on the left at least like in the independent media space yeah seems to be really consuming the right because the right you know the Republican Party and the right seems to be like more you know closely united with their whole like internet culture and independent media culture. So I don't know if you've seen some of these characters like a Laura Loomer. She's this really crazy far right. Like, yeah, Nick Fuentes adjacent. I'm familiar. Yeah. And she's like going hard. She's like essentially leading like a Trump robust movement for 2024. And they're calling DeSantis essentially calling his sense like

a lefty and all this stuff. And the interesting thing about that, Ricky, if I may, is some of that infighting that took place on the left. It's with people that we now all know aren't really on the left. Like it's so it's so funny to give a couple examples. Jimmy Dore and Glenn Greenwald. I don't know if you're familiar with them. It's funny because at one point it was sort of well accepted that they're part of, quote, the left. But then as the infighting began, it kind of became clear that they're kind of reactionary libertarian populists, really. And that is not exactly on the left. And now, you know, Jimmy Dore is doing his own thing and Glenn Greenwald, I think, is on like Rumble or something like that. I don't hear anyone on the left still

considering them part of the left anymore. And it's sort of like become very clear that a lot of these people really weren't on the left, if that makes sense. Yeah, I think. Well, yeah, I know that like Jimmy and there are some others, I don't know, like Michael Tracy or some of these other people, especially like around issues like the Ukraine war claimed to be like the true left is still. And I just think that the interesting thing with that is this can be my conspiracy theory. were being played by like some sort of Peter Thiel deal, you know, in order for them to get rich. And they never really believed in interesting doing the shift that they believed in. But I just hope that like I would love to see a similar thing like that actually happen to the right, because I feel like it could be more damaging because that's more tied to their like mainstream culture than, you know, the left and the bend. I mean, 100 percent, 100, because these characters on the right that are involved in these tips, they really are on the right. Like when when

the Jimmy Dore thing happened, it was like, oh, this guy's not on the left, but these right wingers really are on the right there. It's not like, oh, you know, it turns out Laurel Loomer is actually a leftist. Like, obviously, that's exactly so it has the potential to be much more damaging. Yeah. OK, well, let's hope it works. Let's hope. All right, my friend. Thank you very much. There's Ricky from Charlotte.

Great to hear from him. Let's go next to Johnny from Toronto. We will go to our friendly neighbors to the north. Johnny from Toronto. I am inviting you to speak once you accept and properly configure your audio device. Hopefully you and I will be able to have dialogue. Hey, David, can you hear me? I can hear you fine. All right, David, sir. It's so great to be here. I kind of have tears in my eyes. I hope my audio is not too bad, but I just had a quick question

in relation to your workout program. Okay. I remember a few, a few months back, you mentioned that you weren't quite comfortable going back to the gym. I'm back at the gym. Yes. I was just kind of interested and curious if you had a workout program and what that looked like. And because I had a follow up question as well. Speaker 1 Yeah.

I mean, so so just to make sure I didn't step on you, I am back at the gym at this time, not literally now. Right now I'm in my studio, but I mean, I'm going to the gym. I basically alternate forms of cardio between running elliptical and rowing machine and then rotate through different weightlifting elements targeted at different parts of the body. I hit the body with weight. data or something like that. And I was wondering, do you think it's kind of a bit of a humorous question? Do you think people on the right might take you slightly more seriously if you decided to, like, bulk up and gain 20 pounds of muscle or something like that? You know, I'm not sure. Number one, because it's not really that obvious when looking at screens, I don't think. And as a counter example, I got word through our team that Ben Shapiro has been lifting weights and

apparently has put on some some, you know, modest amount of muscle. And I don't see anyone taking him any more seriously. OK, I understood. Got it. Well, thank you for the opportunity to talk, man. I appreciate it. All right. Johnny from Toronto. Thank you very much. Important questions for sure that I can't can't ignore those types of questions because they are critical to the culture war, I would say. Let's go to Smitty from Los Angeles. Smitty from Los Angeles, California. Welcome to the program. Welcome back, I think. Right. You've been on. I have. I have. Good morning, David. How are you? I'm doing well. Great. So, Ben Shapiro has kind of been stealing some of the language that you use.

He started using it on his show. Really? I listen to other people. So, I listen and kind of hear what he's saying, which a lot of times is just crap. What language of mine has he stolen? He started using the phrase you use where if all you have is a hammer, then everyone looks like a nail. Well, I didn't invent that, to be clear. No, but I haven't heard anybody else in podcasts doing fair that fair language. He's certain I've been listening to him for a while

because I do like to get the other perspective and just hear what things are trying to get away with saying. So I just thought that was where I thought I would report that to you. Interesting. Anyway, I guess my question is today

with the book banning of Florida and that sort of thing, isn't that something that teachers could actually sue, sue DeSantis over? Speaker 1 00 on first on First Amendment grounds? Speaker 4 00 00 00 00 Speaker 1 00 00 00 Speaker 1 00 00 00 Speaker 1 00 00 00 Speaker 1

00 00 00 Speaker 1 00 00 00 Speaker 1 00 00 00 Speaker 1 00 00 00 Speaker 1 00 00 00 Speaker 1 00 00 00 Speaker 1 00 00 00 00 Speaker 1 00 00 00 00 Speaker 1

00 00 00 00 Speaker 1 00 00 00 00 00 00 Speaker 1 00 I obviously I'm not a legal expert. My formal training is in dentistry, so I'm a little bit out of my comfort zone here. But from what I have read. It is arguable it doesn't mean you would win, but it could be argued that if a state government says you can't use these books or whatever the case may be, that you would have some kind of a free speech case. But, you know, these things often come down to I don't want to call them technicalities, but they come down to very narrow aspects of the law and definitions that exceed, you know, my ability. And it sounds like yours as well, since you're asking about it to determine that

as a layperson, it sure sounds like there could well, since you're asking about it to determine that as a layperson, it sure sounds like there could be a First Amendment argument there. I mean, that's what I thought. I just haven't heard anybody. I would assume that somebody would already be taking him to court over that or something or certain aspects of it. But I haven't heard that yet. So I mean, listen, what I would be more concerned with, in a sense, although obviously if there's legal remedies that they should be pursued,

is that, as I said earlier this week, the book banning and idea banning stuff is a prominent characteristic of fascism. And that should very, very much scare us. Exactly. Yeah, exactly. That's what I'm very worried about. I'm just continuing to see a lot of signs that are not very good. I think we're in for a long fight and we all need to be diligent and doing everything we can to contribute in ways we can to prevent this from getting any deeper. I mean, I would I was hoping that the party would experience a Republican Party, would experience some kind of spiritual awakening. But I see that happen with them. Speaker 1 Yeah. The only spiritual awakening they seem to be having is that they they now are very much in favor of Christian nationalism. I saw a new poll about that, but that's a depressing topic for a different day, Smitty. Yeah. So I have one thing I wanted to see if I could just read to you real quick or something I can tell you about. So I had chat GPT write a

song about you. You want to hear the first verse? OK, yeah, sure. He's a man with a mission, speaking the truth with precision from politics to pop culture. It shows a decision. He's the one and only David Pakman's his name. And when he speaks, we all listen. And the truth is his game. I like it. First one. I like it very much.

I would consider it a success. All right. Well, thank you very much, sir. All right, Smitty, sir. Thank you. With tears in my eyes, we say goodbye for today, but not forever. Not forever. Let's go next to Aubrey from Wisconsin. Aubrey, welcome back to the program. If you're able to get your equipment functioning properly. Aubrey, we are connected, but I believe you have the wrong audio device selected. And Aubrey, last chance to get that equipment working. Well, it's too bad. There goes Aubrey. Let's go instead to Keaton from San Jose. Keaton,

welcome to the program. What's on your mind today? And you do have to unmute yourself, Keaton. Hey, David, can you hear me? Yes, I can. Great. Yeah. So you had talked about this during the the midterms and 2020. And I'm curious as to what you mean when you say Democrats need to be on the offense. Yeah. You're just curious what I mean by that. Speaker 1 Yeah, I guess strategically communicatively what that looks like. Speaker 1 Yeah. So being on defense would be Republican. Being on defense is the status quo. Basically, it's Republicans make some claim. These people on the left want to

make our country socialist or they want to ruin this or they want to indoctrinate your kids or whatever. And then Democrats come out and like they get organized very slowly on their talking points. And then they come up with something, but it's just a defense. And then you sound defensive and Republicans have already gotten out ahead on the issue. So you're kind of just playing reactive politics. The truth is Democrats, given the disaster and joke that is the Republican Party, where they don't even pretend to be about policy anymore, the Democrats could put together a much more proactive strategy to create and take control of the news cycle, pointing out all the ways in which Republicans, if they got their way, would actively worsen the

country for large swaths of people. So there's no it's not a there's no hidden message. It's just Democrats need to be more proactive rather than reactive. I see. And one last question. Sure. I'm wondering if you and the mods or whoever it is, are planning on having another chess tournament, because I actually found you through chess dot coms, hog champions, I think. Pog champs. Yes.

Well, that was a tournament that I organized. I'm open to doing another chess tournament. We're just so busy and we have so many different things, including the children's book coming out soon and others. I would gladly do another chess tournament, but it's on a list of many things that we would like to do, if that's fair. Of course. All right.

Well, thanks a lot, David. All right. Keaton from San Jose. Great to hear from you. I'm told that Aubrey from Wisconsin's microphone is fixed. Let's see if that is true. Aubrey from Wisconsin. Welcome to the program. Let's see if we can make it happen this time. Speaker 3 Can you hear me this time? Speaker 1 Yes, I can. Aubrey, welcome back. Speaker 2 Okay. Hi, David. Thank you. I'm so sorry. My phone's like a schizo. OK, please don't swear, because as I've told you during all of your previous phone calls, we have to bleep when you swear for our radio affiliates. Thank you.

I apologize. I apologize. Yeah, my phone is schizophrenic. I really apologize. OK, no, I'm sorry. Don't be mad. I can hear it. You're like mad at me right now. Speaker 1 No, I'm curious what you're bringing to me today because you do you do broach interesting topics. Speaker 2 Yeah, yeah, yeah. OK, I was going to mention to you about like filters and stuff, but I don't want to talk about the type I want to talk about. I want to have. Sorry. What is your take on America and Israel, right? Because like right now- America and what? Ethereal?

Israel. Israel. Israel, the country of Israel. Hello? Yeah, because this happened like a week ago. I wanted to ask you this. Yeah, can you hear me? Yes, I can.

Okay, cool, cool, cool. Okay, yeah. Because this happened like a week ago and I was like muted on your server, actually, because me and a certain someone got in an argument. I'm not going to get into it. She was very rude to me. Anyways, so this like happened a week ago.

They like bombed a military weapons, whatever, in Iran. And like if this was like any other country, this would have started World War III. But, you know, because it's sweet baby Israel, America didn't care because, you know, we pump them up with money. And I'm a proud Palestinian Lebanese woman. As you can see, like, you know, in my PFP, I'm like, you know, an Arab girl. So that like, you know, I just like want to see your take. Like, do you think that like America will ever stop pumping Israel with money? Or do you think that like, you know, they're just going to take over the entirety of Palestine and, you know, do whatever the fuck they want

or whatever the heck they want? That's what I said. I said, hi, I didn't say anything. Aubrey, you know, you've broached such a massive issue, which is the Israeli Palestinian conflict. I could see no man. So I have the right to say it. Speaker 2 Oh, I didn't. I'm not questioning. You're right. I'm just saying I couldn't possibly thoroughly respond to what you're saying in this format. But what I do want to tell you is that I have dozens of videos with what I believe is the only real credible path to peace in the Middle East on my YouTube channel, and I outline it in detail, including what I believe the borders would be, what I believe leadership

on both sides would have to look like, et cetera. And so I would recommend checking out some of some of those segments, I think. But do you think it's crazy that they're able to just like, oh, my gosh, I believe Aubrey, Aubrey, Aubrey, you're swearing completely uncontrollably. OK, let's see if we can simmer the situation a little bit. I believe that a two state solution is the only likely path to peace. I don't know that I believe current leadership on either side is credibly going to get us there. And I encourage you to check out my material on the YouTube channel about it. Speaker 1

OK, thank you. Speaker 1 All right. Thank you. And Aubrey, remind us you're not from Long Island, right? Speaker 1 No, I'm from Wisconsin. Speaker 1 Wisconsin. OK, very good. All right, Aubrey. Great to hear from you. I appreciate it. Thank you. Have a great day. You too. There goes Aubrey from Wisconsin. Let's take just a very quick break to recover from that. And once we've reconstituted our energy, we're going to come right back and take more calls. So if you are waiting on the discord, please don't hang up. We'll be right back to it. and help the planet a little bit. Our sponsor, Hold On Bags, is the company making plastic-free trash bags and zip seal kitchen bags. They're just as strong and high quality as the plastic

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Let's hear from some more people via discord at David Pacman dot com slash discord. Let's go to Kansas where Casey from Kansas, Casey, because you're in Kansas, obviously you're really happy that the Kansas City, Kansas chief won the Super Bowl, right? I don't watch any sports ball. OK, it was a joke because Trump once seemed to think that the Kansas City chiefs were from Kansas rather than Missouri. But it went over like a lead balloon, my friend. I'm sorry. I'm just as ignorant as him on that. Fair. But no, but hold on.

You know that Kansas City, Missouri is in a different state. Yeah, you do. OK, good. All right. OK, but I just had a question because somebody was talking. You were talking about like the how defensive and slow the Democrats are sometimes. Yes, sir. Do you think that the Democrats should just like stop focus testing and fixating on polls entirely? Like, I don't know that Democrats are. What do you

in what evidence do you have that Democrats are focusing on polls? Like in the first six months of Biden's presidency, he was not really doing much. OK. And then, well, he did the COVID stimulus, right? Focus. Vaccine rollout. They came up with the phrase mega, mega. Mega, mega.

Yeah, that didn't accomplish anything like he came out and he said, oh, these are like mega, mega Republicans. It turned out that that was from Democratic advisers doing like focus testing with a bunch of, you know, groups being like, OK, yeah, this sounds the worst mega, mega or something. You know, what's crazy is this is the first I've ever heard that term. Speaker 4 I think it was mega, mega, but it might have been something. What's crazy is this is the first I've ever heard that term. I think it was mega mega, but it might have been something. No, you're right. I just Googled it.

It's absolutely true that that was a thing. But you mentioning it is the first I've ever heard of it. But, yeah, back when this was happening, I was just like it felt like the Democrats weren't really like doing like an aggressive strategy for a while. And the first thing that Biden comes up with is mega maga after sitting on a focus group for six months. Do you think that sort of stuff is a problem at all? Yeah, I mean, I think it's I think it's just kind of a waste, you know. And here's the thing. It's not wrong to think that the right nicknames for things can be effective because let's be honest, Trump got the term crooked Hillary to stick to Hillary Clinton. Trump got Sleepy Joe Biden to stick to Joe Biden among certain.

So he didn't take six months to come up with that. Well, we don't know. We I guess I'm not sure how long it took him, but he came up with it is the point. So I think it's right to think that messaging and nicknames and those types of things can can be important. I just don't necessarily know that focus group testing them is the right way to go. Speaker 1 OK, yeah. Do you do you think that they should get new strategy advisers like entirely? Speaker 2 Well, I don't know. I mean, maybe. Yeah,

it's very easy for me to say that. I think the approach needs to change. It's possible that the current advisors and strategists would be fine if they could agree on what is the different approach going to be. I don't know. They want to do that, though. Yeah, I guess. No. But yeah, that's all I had. All right. Well, Casey, thank you for the call. I appreciate it. OK, thank you. There is Casey from Kansas, not Missouri, from Kansas. Let's go next to Joe from New Hampshire.

Joe from New Hampshire. Welcome to the program. Hey, can you. Yes, I can. Awesome. I have kind of a two parter for you. Sure. You know, I'm living on a college campus right now, and I would say it goes without saying that most people around here are more political than the average population.

Sure. But even then, I meet probably the majority of people I meet would consider themselves apolitical. They don't like to touch politics. Interesting. And I'm noticing a lot of people I meet just in general seem to think that like being apolitical is some kind of virtue. Yeah, it's similar to enlightened centrism. There are people who believe that because they're in the middle and they're like, well, listen, you know, one side wants to kill trans people and the other wants them to be

able to use whatever bathroom they want. I'm in the middle. It's like you're in the middle of one position that's crazy, dude. So I think the enlightened centrism is similar in a way. But also, I don't want to. Now, let me say one thing here, Joe, before you move on. I don't think that political apathy is a good thing because political apathy carried to its full conclusion allows small groups of extremists to basically decide how our entire political system works. So I think knowing what's going on and voting very, very important at the risk of turning people off from my own program. I do think there are some people who are too sucked in to political issues and events and news that will never affect them and that they will never affect. And there are people who have written

about this. It's not nihilism, but it's sort of understanding, you know, OK, what am I going to do about what's going on in Ukraine or the South China Sea or blah, blah, blah, blah. And I've seen for some people it becomes unhealthy where they're so sucked into news and politics. They're just upset. They're not doing. And on a lot of things, they can't do anything about it other than I might occasionally donate to a cause or vote or whatever the case may be. And so I do think it's important.

And I do this myself. I think shows like mine, if you imagine like a pyramid instead of a food pyramid, it's like a information pyramid. I should be at the top of the pyramid, sort of like the junk food. You're using this to fill in your understanding of news and events built on an understanding of history and other areas built on a foundation of critical thinking and epistemology. And there are some people who are just constantly consuming opinion. And I don't think that that's a good thing to do. Yeah, absolutely. I definitely agree. I think my main concern is that there's a lot of people who, for instance, in my state, New Hampshire, we elected two Democratic senators, but we reelected the the anti-abortion Republican governor. Yes. And I

was talking with some people after after I personally voted and they were talking about who they voted for. And they're like, yeah, you know, I'm not too political. So but, you know, I still like abortion. So I voted for the two Democratic senators and the and Chris Sununu because they thought Chris Sununu was pro-abortion. Right. And they just like were not critical of who they were voting for. Yes. No, that's a real problem. And I also know people who are like, yeah, I'm not really political, but I just I'm kind of more of a Republican. So I don't get very involved or pay attention, but I just vote for Republicans. But I'm not really very political. And then I talk to the person and all of their views actually really align more with the Democratic Party.

So sometimes that apathy is actually more destructive than people who are involved. Yeah, that's that's kind of what I was thinking, too. Yeah. Well, Joe, I appreciate you breaking bringing up the issue. It's an important one. Yeah. Thanks for taking my call. All right.

There's Joe from New Hampshire. Great to hear from. Why don't we try? Oh, I don't know. Maybe Emily from Colorado. Emily from Colorado. Welcome to the program. Emily from Colorado, I've invited you in. Hello, David, can you hear me? I can hear you fine, Emily. Thank you. Great. I hope your day is going well. It's going well. Thanks.

So lying. Let's talk about lying. Sure. Politicians have always done this forever. But with Trump, it became this sort of comical like spectator sport. Right. And he was some kind of robot who can't be destroyed and only gains power through lies. He was president. But now we have Congressman George Santos, boxing world champion and tallest man alive, among other accolades. And he's lying a lot and really badly, right? And it's about his credentials and his identity. And it's getting a lot of attention and people are calling for his resignation, but no one's making him resign. And so my question is like, how is there no one's making him resign. No. And so my question is like, how is there no way to make him resign? I know a law that says if you lie to the American people that you're fired. Well, that would be a very hard that that law that would be a very hard

law not only to pass, but also to enforce. But you're pointing out something interesting, which is politicians have lied for a long time, but there was a different type of lie that was normalized by Trump. And so before Trump, politicians would lie. But most of the lies were things like, you know, I lowered the deficit. No, you raise the deficit. It's like, well, it either went down or it went up, but you could sort of massage data and figure out some narrow definition to make what you're saying marginally plausible, where it's not an out and out lie. That type of line, you're saying there was more nuance, there was more nuance to the lies and they were a different type. It wasn't like,

oh, I have a different name and I had jobs. I didn't. Trump normalized a different type of lie and the types of lies that George Anthony DeVolder Santos has been telling are the types of lies that were normalized by Trumpism. As far as the resignation part, I mean, listen, Republicans don't seem to want to force a vote on his resignation and they have the majority. So it's a very tough situation. Right. I feel like I don't know how we protect democracy from corruption with this two party system. Right. And, you know, it's a small margin in the House. And to some degree, Republicans might be thinking, well, if we force DeVolder out or George or

Anthony, whatever you want to call them, all of them, if we force them out and then we lose one of the small margin that we have and then maybe someone dies or resigns or whatever, and then all of a sudden we may end up losing control altogether. And I think that that's their primary motivation. Speaker 5 Yeah, yeah, it's depressing. It's a huge problem. I don't know and I don't know how we're going to dismantle the two party system in America anytime soon. Well, you've got to do campaign finance reform. You have to change how our elections are.

There's so many things that have to be done. Proportional representation would be a good step forward. None none of which are happening in the next year and a half. I can tell you that, Emily. Well, well, yeah, it's frustrating and I'm glad you're frustrated with me. I'm with you. I'm with you. I'm with you. Thank you, Emily. Appreciate the call. See you later. All right. There is Emily from Colorado capping off. I would call it an eight out of 10 today as far as calls are concerned. Only three bleeps needed and only two dropped

calls, which is really not bad. Really not bad. All right. We'll take a quick break. We'll see everybody very soon and much more coming up on the Friday show right after this. of activity from your bank and then your credit cards. That is what identity theft is like. And it's a horrible feeling. And we dealt with it at the show not that long ago. But now I have an app called Aura, which gives me much more peace of mind. Our sponsor, Aura, is the all in one solution for keeping your online account safe because Aura will scan the dark web for your personal info, password, social security number, and you get fast alerts when they find something. You also get fast alerts about credit inquiries. Aura protects all of your devices from malware. Aura even requests the removal of your

info from data broker sites. And Aura helps you manage what your kids can do on their devices. You can restrict certain apps, set screen time limits, set focus times when you need them off of devices. Go to Aura dot com slash Pacman to try it free for seven days. Your login credentials might already be floating around out there and Aura will tell you instantly for free. That's a u r a dot com slash pacman to try aura for free. The link is in the podcast notes. Let's get into this week's mailbag email info at David Pakman dot com. If you have a question, comment, criticism, suggestion, whatever. You also may be featured if you leave a YouTube comment or if you send us a message on Twitter or Facebook or whatever the case may be.

Let's get right into it, because there are so many interesting messages. I want to start with a negative message. Yes, sometimes we start with something negative and then we move on to positive things. Clay wrote in with a very aggressive message. Clay said Gutfeld kicks every late night fascist ass maggots ass. That's why you whine about him. I can't remember the last time I mentioned Greg Gutfeld. You whine about vaccines because your dumb asses ran to pump the clot shot you. Now you clowns see that it's killing people and always the perpetual victim. It's not funny. But at the same time, you're all such narcissistic, lobotomized morons. You won't admit your party leaders after you because liberals are idiots. Now run off and

wait for the impending abortion. Hmm. I guess I do support self-aborting liberals. This is a sick person. I feel so bad for people like this because their lives must just be terrible that they talk like this, that they're willing to even send messages to people like this one was by Facebook. You know, it's like this. We can see this guy's full name and where he works. And I would even if I thought stuff like this, which I don't. I would be. Embarrassed into a hole in the ground if I ever sent someone a message like this, and so I feel bad for these people. I really do. It's more of a sad thing that they are willing to send messages like this than anything else. But they exist. And there are many, many, many of them. One more criticism. This one came via email from Wayne.

Wayne said, are you getting your content from MSNBC, CNN? You're an idiot. Why? Oh, you are. It's almost a requirement, folks. If you send hate mail, you have to have the wrong. You're you're an idiot. My an idiot.

You're an idiot. If you believe any of this, just wait for the speech tonight. Not this was about the State of the Union. Not one word will be the truth as the Biden crime family continues to lie about everything. Gullible, low IQ people like you is the reason they're slowly wrong there. And then it should be our instead of is slowly letting socialism take over our country. Wake up, idiots. You know, it's this is this isn't about being a grammar Nazi. It's if you're accusing me and my audience of being low IQ and stupid and all these things, you've got half a

dozen grammar errors in a four line email and you want to call me low IQ. Come on, guys. And again, it's more of a tragedy. It's an educational tragedy. But understand something is correlating here. As I've said before, if people learn media literacy and critical thinking early. It's like a vaccine against disinformation. And it's not a shock that some of the people who have six errors in a four line email also believe things that aren't true about everything from vaccines to socialism to whatever the case may be. It is it is not a surprise. It's not being a grammar Nazi. It's noticing there are trends here. All right. Bjorn wrote in about Sarah Huckabee Sanders response to the State of the Union

says, hey, David, thanks for the show. I listened to your show February 8th, saying that Sarah Huckabee Sanders response was maybe the most vile State of the Union response you heard. To me, it wasn't even a response to the State of the Union as it didn't really address anything in the State of the Union. It felt like a prerecorded Biden is woke and bad and the left is horrible statement. Vile. Yes. A response. I don't know. What do you think? You know, one of the things that Bjorn is right about and I realized after the fact, I don't I'd have to listen to it again. I don't know that Sarah Huckabee Sanders needed to wait until after the speech to give that speech.

What I mean is she could have recorded the speech before Biden's State of the Union address and it would have been just as relevant, irrelevant in reality, because I think Bjorn is right. I don't know that anything Biden actually said was addressed. Yes, socialism and woke and all these different things. But I don't think that the actual subject matter of Biden's speech was addressed by Sarah Huckabee Sanders. I think Bjorn is absolutely onto something. It really wasn't an actual response. Matt wrote in and said, David, sir, I love the new backdrop on the set. You're the best, Matt. You know, I have to tell you. On this program, any time we've changed anything.

If we're lucky, half the audience is positive about it. When we change music, we get so many criticisms. When we've changed set elements, we get criticisms. When I went to, oh, you know, now I do wear a tie on the show. Now I'm no longer wearing a tie. Now I'm not even wearing the blazer. I'm back. It's always negative. Our guest hosts negative, which we'll get to, by the way, this change to the backdrop, which I believe is a beautiful change, has been received more positively than anything we have ever changed on the show, which is great. Makes me happy. You love to see it. And we've got a couple other small changes up our sleeve, which will be coming soon. Mikkel wrote to me and said, David, there's something that bugs me when you cover George Santos in your show.

You keep referring to him as George Anthony Devolder, Katara Santos. I think you should not include Katara at this point. What he did in his past as a drag, I think he I think Mikkel means as a drag queen was not a lie. And he doesn't owe any explanation about it to anybody. I know you're not asking for that. But when you keep including that part when covering his continuous lies, you make it look like that's a lie, too. It wouldn't be a big deal unless homophobes, transphobes and drag phobes could use that against him, which I'm afraid can happen. That's why I think you should limit his name to George Anthony DeVolder Santos already long enough without Katara. So I have two thoughts

about this. Number one, Katara is related to a lie because he said it wasn't him initially when the photos came out of Santos and drag, which is politically relevant because Republicans have been on a crusade against drag queens and drag shows and drag time reading hour, whatever. He lied and said that wasn't me and then later said, actually, it was me. So it is part of the lie. That being said, I've received emails on both sides of this. I received a few emails like what Mikkel says, which is it could be sort of seen as like mildly homophobic or drag phobic or whatever to include Katara in the name because that was his drag name and others who wrote to me, including people from the LGBT community who said, David, he lied about the drag stuff. It's completely fair to include Katara when you say George Anthony Katara, DeVolder Santos, sort of like Stephen Kenneth

Destiny Bunnell, the second. I have stopped using Katara over the last week. I don't have a strong feeling one way or the other, but certainly nothing homophobic is meant by it. John wrote in and said, if Trump is still president, why does it matter that the election was stolen? Seems like it wouldn't matter, right? Great job, David and Luke. Keep it up. That's from John, who also goes by Mongoose. Yeah, this is one of those, you know. The January 6th riots were actually totally peaceful and the rioters were Antifa. And it's like, wait, but so were they peaceful or were they Antifa? It is true. It is true that for the people who say the election was stolen and also I believe Trump is still the president.

If Trump is still the president, it wasn't really stolen, was it? If you believe Trump won. Good luck speaking to these people. I mean, it's like you're trying to apply logic to claims that are completely illogical. So while you're completely correct, I believe it would be a waste of time to try to confront these folks with that, but probably entertaining on some level. Daniel wrote in about my replacements, my guest hosts, and said, David, none of these people comes even close to you. I cannot watch the show if you're not there. Please don't go away again, says Daniel. Well, Daniel, I'm sorry to tell you, I'm going to continue going away. Breaks are important. Vacations are important. Now, we've gone over this issue with the guest hosts many times with you in the audience. There was a time when when I was off, there was no show,

just there were no shows. And a lot of people didn't like that. There's a David. You should have someone fill in for you. We started having people fill in, which, by the way, is a lot more work for us. And no matter who fills in, I get a ton of emails saying I didn't like that person. People write in. They say, I don't like when Luke Beasley fills in. I prefer Farron. We have Farron people write in. Farron's terrible. You should have, you know, Jesse Dolem or someone else. Jesse Dolem or fills in for me. Jesse's terrible. He yells too much. Someone said you should have Luke do it. There is not going to be a perfect fit, but I think there's a couple of takeaways from this. Number one, it is flattering that me being gone is upsetting to people in the sense that

there are people that are sort of counting on the show and like the show enough that when I'm not here, it's upsetting to them. I find that beautiful. I think that that's a testament to the community that we've built here. And it's a really great thing. Now, where it gets ugly is the people who threaten to cancel their memberships if I have replacement hosts or go on vacation. You know, if you're telling me you value the show so much that you want me to be here more and you're willing to pay for a membership, it seems a little strange that you would say I'm going to stop watching and cancel my subscription if you take any vacations. It seems not only insensitive to

the reality that like, hey, I need breaks, too. But if you love the show so much that you're furious when I'm gone, why would you swear it off and start supporting the show? That's a little bit of a bummer. But here's the bottom line. Nobody likes not everybody likes any of the hosts that we have. OK. And after all, it is the David Pakman show. So it sort of makes sense that at least in general, you're tuning in to see me. So I'm very sensitive to that. We are going to continue a rotating cast of guest hosts. That way there will be hopefully someone everybody likes. And if you only want to see me, then just don't watch or listen on the days that I'm gone. I think

that's the best solution for everybody. And most importantly, I really appreciate everybody who does have a paid subscription. And when we're off, writes in and says, hey, David, just wanted to let you know I'm a paid supporter. You being gone reminded me how much I like the show and count on it. Enjoy the time away. Can't wait to see you when you're back. Those are really beautiful messages. I get like three whenever I'm away.

OK, we have a great bonus show for you today. Sign up at joinpacman.com. We'll see you then.