The David Pakman Show - 6/16/23: Republicans panic as Biden leads new poll

Episode Date: June 16, 2023

-- On the Show: -- Republicans are increasingly panicking that Donald Trump's multiple arrests may doom them -- Joe Biden leads Donald Trump by 4 in a new national election poll -- Despite saying he would buy everyone food at Miami Cuban restaurant Versailles, Donald Trump did not actually pay for anyone's food -- Caller asks about critical thinking and the right-wing -- Caller wonders why there are Republicans running against Trump -- Caller talks about the possibility of Trump going to prison -- Caller is a libertarian and wants to debate David for $100 -- Caller questions if there's any hope for turning Florida blue -- Caller talks about the federal charges against Trump -- The Friday Feedback segment -- On the Bonus Show: Polling on the Trump indictment, College Board rejects Florida LGBT classes ban, George Santos calls for restoring integrity in the House, and much more... 🖼️ Aura Frames: Code PAKMAN for $30 off + free shipping at https://auraframes.com/pakman 🤢 Reliefband: Use code PAKMAN for 20% OFF + free shipping at https://reliefband.com 👍 Use code PAKMAN for 10% off the Füm Journey Pack at https://tryfum.com/PAKMAN 🧻 Reel Paper: Code PAKMAN for 30% OFF + free shipping at https://reelpaper.com/pakman -- Become a Supporter: http://www.davidpakman.com/membership -- Subscribe on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/thedavidpakmanshow -- Subscribe to Pakman Live: https://www.youtube.com/pakmanlive -- Follow us on Twitter: http://twitter.com/davidpakmanshow -- Like us on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/davidpakmanshow -- Leave us a message at The David Pakman Show Voicemail Line (219)-2DAVIDP

Well, the Republican Party is finally behaving rationally. Republicans are panicking that the now multiple arrests of failed former president, twice impeached, twice indicted Donald Trump may actually boomerang on them and be damaging big picture. There's an interesting article in The Hill by Alexander Bolton called Republicans Fear Trump Legal Woes Will Boomerang on Them. Senate Republicans are worried that Trump's legal troubles will create a major headwind for Republican candidates in 2024. They say the battle between the Justice Department and Trump, who pleaded not guilty Tuesday, just as his unsubstantiated claims that the 2020 election was stolen, became a prominent

point of debate in last year's primaries. They worry Trump's dominance of the media spotlight will turn off swing voters, especially suburban women, and hurt their chances of taking back the Senate or protecting their small House majority. The article goes on to include a number of quotes from different Republicans. This is a logical reaction to what is going on. Now, there is a group of people that is choosing to narrowly focus only on the presidential race. And we will look at the polling in the presidential race a little bit later today. You could convince yourself and maybe others if you look only at the

presidential race, that it is quite binary and it doesn't have any trickle down effect. What is happening with Donald Trump? Let me tell you what I mean by that. You could look at the Trump arrests and look at the Republican primary and say to yourself, listen, if Trump's arrests hurt Trump, someone else will win the primary and then that person will face Joe Biden and they might win or they might lose. And it will have nothing to do with what is going on with Trump. In other words, the context is Trump's legal troubles will only affect who is the Republican nominee. And beyond that, it will not have any broader impact on the Republican Party.

There are two problems with that relatively narrow focus. Problem number one is that indeed, if Trump is leading the Republican primary for several more months, but then he's arrested a third time and potentially arrested a fourth time, and then it becomes clear he can't really campaign because he's just going from courthouse to courthouse and Ron DeSantis or someone else ends up winning the primary. The impact of that last minute collapse by Donald Trump doesn't end with the Republican primary. And there is the belief, and I believe it is a warranted belief, that if such a shakeup were to take place, it would weaken whoever is the eventual Republican nominee against Joe Biden. So that's one way in which thinking of the Trump arrests only as relevant to the Republican primary is wrong. But what Republicans are increasingly

concerned about now is very serious, which is that this entire circus atmosphere and sideshow nature of what is going on, which also, by the way, includes some Republican candidates saying I would pardon Trump and others saying I wouldn't. And this just becoming the circus that it is. It may just be very bad for random Republican senators seeking reelection for random members of the House of Representatives, some who are supporters of Trump and some who are not, that it will create a broader problem for any Republican that is running in November of twenty four, including simply that the Trump fiasco might reduce turnout and make some voters stay home who would otherwise vote to reelect some of these Republicans.

It's too early to know whether that fear is backed by data, but intuitively it makes a ton of sense. We'll leave that question there. And now I want to look a little bit at some new national polling. We do have a new poll in which Joe Biden is leading Donald Trump by four points. This is a hypothetical 2024 general election poll. This is a poll that assumes Trump's the Republican nominee. Biden is the Democratic nominee and the election were held today in this poll. Quinnipiac Biden leads Trump 48 to 44. Trump's support has dropped two points since Trump was since the last time this poll was done in late May. I like to get a more general look at polling.

If we look at the best rated polls, B plus and higher. We have a recent YouGov poll. That poll says Biden and Trump are actually tied among registered voters, with Trump leading by one among all adults. We then have the A minus rated Quinnipiac poll, the one I just described to you. It has Biden ahead of Trump by four. And then we have an A minus Suffolk University poll, which has Biden leading DeSantis by seven and Biden leading Trump by two.

What we can say at this point is that there is a really big red flag and the red flag isn't, oh, Biden's winning or Biden's losing or whatever. The red flag is Biden has done a number of good things as far as presidents are concerned. We have a stable economy at worst, if not a solid economy. Trump has been arrested multiple times, lies constantly, fund raises on grifts, is facing all sorts of different problems after losing for the Republican Party in twenty eighteen, twenty twenty and pushing them to lose or not win by as much as they should have in twenty twenty two. And given all of that, Biden's only winning by one, two, three or four. That's the red flag. This if this country made sense. If voters reacted sensibly and soberly and thoughtfully to the facts of the world, Joe Biden would be leading at minimum by double digits.

And so to anybody who's looking at this current election and saying, oh, this is they're just these Republicans aren't going to win. There's no way Trump can win. There's no way this country would reelect Trump. The polling, even if you believe right, like the best one of these polls, the strongest one of these polls is Biden leading Trump by four. Even if you believe that. It is an absolute and total horror show, and we should all be very much aware that Trump could win and we need to activate any tool we have to prevent that from happening. And of course, by the way,

I mean, any legal tool, including voter turnout, campaigning, debate prep, surrogates, what all of the legal things, all of the legal things, as always, as if I even really have to clarify that scary stuff on tape showing national secrets to guests at his resort. And the best poll we can find has him down for just absolutely horrifying stuff. I'm not going to spend a ton of time on this, but because I told you about it earlier this week, I do want to follow up earlier this week after being arrested for a second time. Donald Trump went to the Cuban restaurant in Miami, Versailles, and at that restaurant, Donald Trump promised food for everyone. OK, remember this bizarre moment?

Are you ready? Are you ready? Food for everyone. OK, my immediate reaction was I'd get a credit card up front before giving anybody food that supposedly Trump is going to pay for. The Miami New Times can now report that Donald Trump did not pay for anybody's food at Versailles. The article confirms Trump opted to decompress with a trip to Versailles in Little Havana. Trump and his entourage arrived there shortly after leaving the courthouse. Trump said food for everyone. So the New Times wondered, did Trump treat his fan club to some food? It turns out no one got anything, not even a cafecito to go. A knowledgeable source assures The New Times that Trump's

stop was 10 minutes long. It didn't leave time for anyone to eat anything, much less place an order. And of course, Donald Trump did not leave any instructions to bill him or charge his credit card or whatever the case may be. This is a very small story in the broader context of everything that happened in the last week, which was an absolutely insane week. It is not the most important story, but it is a reminder that this is a habitually dishonest and despicable guy who cares about his supporters only as far as they are useful to him. And the Versailles incident is the epitome of that. He shows up there cheering. They sing him happy birthday. They're praying over him. The photo op is extraordinarily useful. And so he yells out food for everyone. But then he

leaves because he doesn't actually care about it. He doesn't actually want to give anyone anything. He doesn't actually respect or value these people anywhere beyond the extent to which they are useful to his campaign. We saw it with the fundraising grifts. We saw it around elections. We've seen it so many times. Food for everyone. I would have gotten the credit card up front. He paid for nobody's food. We have a fantastic program for you today. Few programming notes. Number one, we will be off on Monday for Juneteenth. Number two, then I will be here Tuesday, but then away for a wedding, not my wedding. I will be on the West Coast for a wedding. So after the Tuesday show, for which I will be here, then we'll have some great guest hosts. I think you will enjoy it. Make sure that you are

subscribed to the YouTube channel. We made more progress in this last week towards the two million subscriber goal than we have in many, many, many months. Let's close out the week super strong at YouTube dot com slash the David Pakman show. It's free. It costs nothing. And also we are starting to put Republican primary debates on the streaming calendar. I know that it is insane because it is only June. We're getting to the end of June into July of twenty twenty three. But the Republican debates are starting. The first one is scheduled for August twenty three. It will be a Fox News debate. We are figuring out whether we can stream it live without getting absolutely crushed by Fox News,

his copyright enforcement division. I will have news about that soon, but we will do everything we can to bring you as much of campaign 2024 as we can. Let's take a very quick break. We've got a packed program ahead of the three day weekend. Here is the perfect Father's Day gift. Get him a Wi-Fi connected digital picture frame from Aura. Our sponsor, Aura, has been named the number one best digital picture frame by Wirecutter, The Strategist and Wired. This is not one of these early 2000s picture frames. There's no USB or SD cards and you get free unlimited storage and you can instantly frame photos and videos from any device anywhere in the world. I have

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the Trump arrest and all of it. And I just want to encourage you keep signing up at join Pacman dot com. We do an extra show every single day for our members called The Bonus Show, where we make money on the bonus show. As Alex Jones likes to say, you can use the coupon code indicted again, indicted again. That's the code. No space. Lowercase capital doesn't matter as long as it's all one word at join Pacman dot com. Let's now speak to some of those very folks in our audience. We do this on the Friday show. We do it via discord. You can find the discord at David Pakman dot com slash discord. That is the place to do it.

We are going to start today with John from Connecticut. John from Connecticut. Welcome to the program. What's on your mind today? Hey, can you hear me? Yes. Cool. So my question is more along the lines of why does it seem like so many people nowadays, especially on the right, seem to have a problem with any critical thinking? Like, it's so hard for people to understand to, like, you know, look at a situation that they're not used to understanding and they can't like they just immediately jump to conclusions.

Two answers to that. Number one, there are some people who just have not been taught how to think critically and so they don't. Right. And in a sense, you can't blame them to a degree because if you haven't been taught something, how can you be expected to know how to do it? On the other hand, there are those on the right who recognize that when people really apply basic critical thinking and media literacy techniques to right wing ideology, it very quickly falls apart. And this is why those who are wise to this

actually don't want critical thinking taught in schools. They realize if too many people start thinking critically, it's bad for the Republican Party. So it's a combination of ignorance and bad faith actors. And in some cases, maybe a combination of the two. What do you think is more prevalent, bad faith actors or people who are just ignorant? I think among vote, the average voter, I think it's ignorance. And listen, the left is not exempt from this by any means. There's a lack of critical thinking on left and right, and we could slice and dice it. But I think that the vast majority of those who aren't thinking critically aren't thinking

critically because of ignorance, not because they are bad faith actors. They've been sort of indoctrinated as a result of not thinking for themselves in a critical way. And it's really an indictment on the educational system and the media system as well. Right. So last thing then is what do you think would be the best way to talk to the people who are more ignorant that are kind of easier to, you know, maybe give them some evidence to hopefully change their mind on that type of situation? The best path for the folks you're talking about is actually not to give them evidence.

It's to know how to use a gentle, empathetic, Socratic method of questioning to get them to say, hey, maybe I'm not actually that solid in what I believe. So it's where did you learn that? Oh, how do you know that's trustworthy in general? How do you know what things are trustworthy? What's a good way of figuring out what to believe? That approach, rather than beating people over the head with evidence, is probably going

to be more effective. All right. Thank you very much, David. All right. John from Connecticut. Great to hear from you. Why don't we go next to Nicole from Utah? Nicole, welcome to the program.

Thank you so much, David. My question this time is actually going to be related to what Trump has said in relation to the Ukraine war. Do you think he has any chance if he does get elected, which is a long shot anyways, does he have any amount of chance at stopping this war? He claims, listen, he will. He says, let's go through it in parts. Trump says he will end the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 24

hours when he's asked how he says, oh, I'll talk to them. Pretty silly, pretty dumb. The only way that I see that conflict is ending quickly would be if basically Ukraine gives up and Russia just takes over. So even in the best scenario, it's not going to end in 24 hours. Now, does Trump have a chance at actually ending it? I think he does have a chance in the sense that every every president has a chance. The question is the detail of how you would actually do it. But sure. I mean, Trump has a chance. He just doesn't have a great track record that makes me think it's it's highly likely. That's all I have for you today, David. All right. Thank you, Nicole. Nicole from Utah. Great to hear from you once again. Let's go to Roberto from Paris. Roberto from Paris. Welcome to the David

Pakman show. What's on your mind today? Roberto from Paris, please. Roberto, last chance you're on the air. Hello, can you hear me? Speaker 1 Yes, I can. Speaker 5 Oh, perfect. Oh, my gosh, I can't believe I'm on. I actually have a membership even though I live in France and I love it. I love being able to see the show commercial free. Well, thank you so much.

Do you think that all a lot of candidates have joined on the Republican side to split the vote since the primary? I may be wrong, but isn't it not like a winner takes all so that that way Trump can get a plurality in a state but still win the state? Speaker 1 I don't think that that is why Republicans are joining. You know, I actually don't remember whether in the Republican primary it is winner take all or not in every state. I actually I don't remember that. But regardless, I believe the main reason the main two reasons that Republicans are

joining the Republican primary are number one, they want to be there if Trump totally fails because of the indictments and they just need to find someone else. That's number one. They want to be there. And number two, they want to get attention, including potentially being considered to be Donald Trump's own vice president. I believe that that's that's really the point. I don't believe that there have been deals made to join in order to get Trump a plurality or that that sort of thing. I've seen no evidence of that, at least.

Oh, OK. OK, because there were some people over here talking about that and I'm like, I didn't know about it, but people are very petrified of the idea of another Trump. Understandably, understandably. How are things in Paris right now? I'm going to be back there soon, in fact. Things are fine now. Things are perfectly fine. It's actually jam packed with tourists.

Really? So it's jam packed. Like if you go around more math or like the I could triumph. It's absolutely full of tourists. Oh, boy. I'm going to have to avoid those areas, I guess, Roberto. Well, if you're going in the summer, it's the worst time to come in the amount of if you if you don't want to be with tons of tourists.

Right, right, right. Summer is like the worst time. But there's plenty of places that are quiet that don't get that many. Absolutely. So. Oh, well, Roberto, thank you for the call. I appreciate it. Thank you so much.

Have a good day. All right. Roberto from Paris, France. Very strong. Let's go to Ashley from Columbus. Ashley from Columbus. Welcome to the program. What's on your mind today?

Thank you for having me on today, David. Pleasure. I was wondering what you thought of. I had an interesting take about the target boycott from right wingers. Speaker 1 00 00 00 Speaker 1 Okay. Speaker 1 00 00 00 Speaker 1 I first of all, make it clear. Hate what they did and what it goes that the target gave into the right wingers and I got some of that. Speaker 1

00 00 00 Speaker 1 the target gave into the right wingers and I got some of that. LGBT stuff off of their shelves. Yep. Hate that. But I think it actually helps show people on both sides of the aisle that people can still have some power over corporations. Sure. The I think the thing is, we didn't we we did know that. But the only source of that power is trying to impact income and profitability at the end of the day. You know what I mean? It's like it's not I don't believe

any of these things we're seeing McDonald's, not McDonald's, M&M's putting a pause on that new thing they were doing with the androgynous, whatever, all these different things. I think at the end of the day, it's just about the money. Speaker 4 Yeah, but it's it was about that. But I think with the recent news, people, I know myself included, started doubting our power to do this. You saw what the rail worker strikes. The corporations can trust the government to step in and save their profits with this, even if it's to a horrible end. Yeah. Helps bring back that belief that people can actually have power over corporations and

at least gives me some hope that we can have some change for good in the near future. Yeah, I don't totally disagree with you. And what I would like would there to be more ways to have that power over corporations that don't require major government intervention? That would be a good thing. It's just glad to have a little bit of hope for something in our current political climate. Absolutely. Ashley from Columbus, thank you for the call. Thank you for having me our current political climate. Absolutely. Ashley from Columbus,

thank you for the call. Thank you for having me on. All right. There goes Ashley. Why don't we go next to. Oh, I don't know. How about Patrick from North Idaho? Patrick from North Idaho. Welcome to the program. What's on your mind today? Patrick from North Idaho, please accept my invitation to join me. And last chance for Patrick from North Idaho. Well it's too bad it really is. Let's go to Jack from Atlanta. Jack from Atlanta.

Welcome to the program. What can I do for you today? Hey, David, can you hear me? Yeah. Awesome. Well, thank you hear me? Yeah. Speaker 5 Awesome. Well, thank you so much. I have a question. I know you've repeatedly said that you still do not believe that Trump will ever see one day in prison. I'm still wondering, given all the evidence and the severity of this arraignment he had yesterday and the charges being right

against him, why do you still believe that? Speaker 1 So I've actually updated my view on this, Jack, and I'm glad to have the opportunity to do it again. Prior to this week, prior to this recent indictment, I believe that there was no chance Trump would even see a day inside of any kind of cell. I now believe that it is unlikely, but possible. So I have sort of upgraded or downgraded, depending on your perspective, my my view on that on the basis of this latest indictment. Well, one can only hope. And one last quick question, I thought of it after the last speaker gave his question.

Do you find it at all startling that a lot of corporations have actually forgone posting their logo as a rainbow logo for Pride Month? Because it used to be the case where almost everyone would do that. But now I guess maybe they've realized that, hey, now it's not financially viable to do that anymore. Does that at all scare you? You know, I don't know that to be true. And what I mean is I'm not saying you're lying.

I just pay so little attention to what corporations are doing as far as the logos. I know that on the very powerful David Pakman show discord, we did do a modified server logo that includes the rainbow stripe for the month, as we always do. I it's I'm not are you aware like what specific companies used to do it but aren't doing it anymore? Well, I know I've seen like a lot of just random companies like Cisco or Starbucks will post their Twitter profile picture as their logo, but the rainbow-ified version. And I feel like I just have seen very few of those this year. And I mean, given I just saw, this isn't exactly the logo thing, but I saw on the news today that

Starbucks is actually rolling back some of its pride decorations at over half of its stores. So I was just, I don't know, it's just a little bit startling how now a lot of corporations, I mean, yeah, rainbow capitalism is a lot of times empty virtue signaling. But yes, I don't know. It's a little bit worrying that now that's being it's being perceived as, hey, this isn't the right thing to do given the current political climate. Yeah, I mean, because I don't have the actual empirical information in front of me, let me comment in this way.

We all know that the vast majority of these decisions are simply marketing and PR decisions to increase the bottom line. It wouldn't be shocking to me that if it became disadvantageous to do the pride thing that companies would immediately stop doing it. I would find it disappointing and sad because that would be a horrible thing that it's it's no longer that it would be unprofitable in some way to just say, hey, like we're we're on board with with just treating everybody the right way. It wouldn't be a huge shock because these are at the end of the day, they've always been financially oriented

decisions. Speaker 1 Exactly. Well, thanks for taking my call, David. Have a good one. Speaker 1 My pleasure. There goes Jack from Atlanta. Very powerful declarations there. And we are glad to glad to hear them. Why don't we go to Molly from Utah? Molly from Utah. Welcome to the program. What's on your mind today? Hi. So last time I got cut off, I don't know what happened, but their thing I was going to talk about is that the DSA has over 185 seats, both state, local, including national. OK, Molly, just just just with total peace and love. We I if we can get I know that there was a very long lead up going on and DSA is not something

that I'm super engaged with and know very little about it. So so I just if we can get to the question part relatively soon or even first, I can tell you whether I can even weigh in. I don't want to waste your time, you know? Yeah. But it's basically that they've been doing local actions. They've been doing local activities and have been gaining ground. So what do you think about those efforts when it comes down to electoral reform? I know nothing about what the DSA is doing or where they've been gaining ground. And as a non socialist myself, it's not something I'm advocating for.

It's over the entire country. They've been getting out since 2016. And you mean in an elected office? Yeah. Elected offices, both state and local and national. But just like five members of Congress that are DSA members. Listen, what I can tell you is when movements succeed at getting candidates elected, it's good for them.

But beyond that, it's really tough for me to say say too much more. It's not a group I'm a member of or one I'm supporting at this time. Sure. I just I'm supporting at this time. Sure. I just I would recommend looking into them. They seem to be advancing pretty well. That's just like the hopium of like change is possible. They are able to do it. All right. Molly from Utah. Thank you very much for the call. I appreciate that. Let's take a very quick break. We're going to go right back to discord and hear from more people. So don't go anywhere. We're just remove the bad part from your habit? Fume is an innovative, award winning device that does exactly that. Fume is not electronic. There's no vapor or harmful chemicals.

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success story. Head on over to try fume dot com and use the code Pacman to save 10 percent. When you get the journey pack, which comes with the device and three flavors, that's try FUM dot com code Pacman saves you 10 percent on the journey pack. The info is in the podcast notes. Let's go back to the phones. They're not really phones at this point. It's all digital. We take calls via discord. You can find the discord server at David Pacman dot com slash discord. Let's go to Roy from Somalia. Roy from Somalia. Welcome to the program. What is on your mind today? Roy from Somalia, please accept my invitation and then we'll be able to talk.

My bad, sir. I was wondering about the situation in Uganda with the gay rights bill and how terrible it is. And I was wondering your thoughts on that. Speaker 1 Yeah, I have this time around. I mean, this is the same bill that they've been following for a very, very long time, if I recall correctly. I mean, 10 years ago, I interviewed this crazy pastor who was supporting the bill. We're talking about the same bill, right? Yeah, that's right. Yeah. Listen, it's so disgusting and in some sense it's shocking that in 2023, this sort of aggression against people simply for being gay is still going on. I am so far removed from the specific comings and goings of Ugandan politics that it's really hard for me to say, like, what needs to happen or what should happen.

I mean, there are people who follow that specifically much more closely. But it is extremely disheartening that this is even still that there's any effort being wasted on scapegoating people and targeting people for their identity. It's just disheartening and disgusting at the end of the day. Yeah, I agree. And only one member of their legislature actually voted against it. The others from the opposition stayed home. You know, there have been U.S. sanctions and I think those should be ramped up. But it really is just unfortunate. Unfortunate is the understatement of the century, Roy, for sure. Do you live in Somalia?

Oh, no, that was a lie. I'm from South Jersey. Oh, OK. All right. Well, very, very unusual. On that note, we're going to let you go. Try to tell the truth. OK, guys, try to tell the truth. Let's go next to how about Dan from California? Dan from California.

Welcome to the program. What's on your mind today? Hi, David. I do a lot of debates and discussions on my YouTube channel. I've done some with Sam Seder and I was wondering if you would ever be up for a long form debate. I'm a big Iran fan, so that's the perspective I'm coming from. What would the debate be about? It'd be about politics or ethics. I do those topics a lot. Capitalism or egoism. Yeah, I mean, maybe, you know, I'm really limiting my appearances elsewhere just

because I'm so busy. And to be totally honest, you might your channel might have five million followers. I don't know. And this is not how I base my decisions. But very often there's like very little upside and it just it dominates my schedule. You know, I want to have as clear a schedule as possible. So like maybe the way to request that would be to email in. OK, might it make a difference if I offered to pay? No, it really wouldn't. OK, you know, I mean, like how much would it be worth to you? I don't know. Maybe it should. I don't know, like 100 bucks for that. Give me. No, I'm kidding. I'm kidding around. It would not make a difference unless the amount was way higher, Dan, please. OK, no, I'm kidding around. I might do it, but I'm really

I'm really limited in what I'm doing just because I'm so busy. What is what would be your biggest gripe with my perspective, I guess, is my first question. I guess one fundamental issue, which probably underlies political issues is your ethics. So I don't know what your view in ethics is, but do you think people have a moral right to live for their own sake? That would be one key question. Or should they be forced to sacrifice for other people? Yeah.

See, this is this is another reason why I tend not to do these sorts of debates. I exist in a place where I find many of those questions. Do people have a right to live for themselves or should they be forced to sacrifice for others? Well, the first question is, what kinds of societies do we even believe are best or or advisable? And one of the unfortunate, not maybe unfortunate, but like when I hear that question, Dan, and this is why these often end up being philosophical black holes. One of the biggest things when I hear that question is if we start from the point that we have societies of more than one hundred and fifty people, quite frankly, and more than a thousand,

right, the U.S. is three hundred has 330 million people. It almost seems not super relevant whether I think that in some theoretical context, we have a, quote, right to live for ourselves or should be, quote, forced to live for others. If we want to be in this type of society, we are going to centralize some aspects of society and the economy while hopefully finding a balance that still allows people reasonable amounts of self-determination. If that if for me, I start there because this is the society I live in. And if I don't like that, I would then look at, OK, maybe I need to find a different society where the dichotomy you raise is actually feasible, it's less interesting to just abstractly

discuss the dichotomy you bring up. I don't think we get much out of it, if that's fair. I think taxes, you know, that exists in our society, so we all have to deal with that. That's a case where I would say we're forced to sacrifice what we would choose to do with our own money for the sake of other people. So I think it is very relevant to. Are we go? I mean, on taxes, you're not forced to work, right?

Like you could choose not to work. Yeah, but if you do choose to work, you're forced to give away some of your earnings to other people. But you said if you choose to what you did say, if you choose to work right, choose is different than force. You acknowledge that. Yes, OK. And if you don't like the tax structure of the United States, you could look to go to

a different place. I understand it's difficult to stop paying taxes to the United States, but there are different conventions. You could renounce your citizenship, etc. Like you agree that you could also kind of take your take your toys and leave to some degree. Yeah, but I don't think the government has the right to put you in that kind of position. The government's right to tax. I don't think it has the right to tax. It only has rights that are delegated to it by the citizens. But the citizens themselves don't have a right

to coerce others, so they can't delegate the right to coerce others to the government. OK, so basically it's like you're kind of like a standard utopian libertarian, it sounds like. I'm not a utilitarian, I'm an objectivist, utopian, utopian. All right. Well, it's all very interesting. Listen, if people hear this and think it would be interesting for me to do three hours on this, let me know and then I'll do Dan's show. And Dan, you can email in and give me more info, OK? Thanks, David. All right. There goes

Dan and Ayn Rand fan. And listen, we'll look into it. It's just not usually like the best use of anybody's time. That's been that's been my experience, which is why I kind of tend tend not to do it. Let's go to Isaiah from Florida. Isaiah from Florida. Welcome to the program. What's on your mind today? Speaker 4 Oh, David, can you hear me? Yes, I can. Speaker 5 Oh, hello. I just actually had a bunch of topics, but I think I want to stick with Florida. My main question is, how do you think Democrats could potentially like be competitive in the state again, like

like they were under like the Obama coalition? Because after I think losing by 20 points to, you know, with the Santas and Chris, I think that some Democrats fear that or think maybe we should just leave Florida alone. I just don't think that I want to know your thoughts. No, no. Listen, I don't think the situation in Florida is nearly as bad as some people are making it out to be. Florida has tons of Democrats and left leaning independents. The issue in Florida is DeSantis had a very strong bully pulpit, you know, incumbency advantage. And he was lucky in a sense that the twenty twenty two midterms.

Took place right at sort of like the peak of anti woke and since November, like in the last eight months, we've started to see anti woke fade a little bit. We've started to see polling that shows the tide is turning. DeSantis has humiliated himself in a bunch of different ways. I don't know that he has any path to the to the Republican nomination. So I actually think, first of all, on the 19 point victory that DeSantis had, the sanctimonious, I think that it would be it would be far smaller if that election were held today. Number two, part of the issue in Florida, and this is relevant in the whole country, is that voter turnout is so low that if Democrats can just work to increase voter turnout the way

Biden increased voter turnout in 2020 on the basis of like, hey, you realize if you stay home, Trump might get another four years. You can you can win in Florida just by working on voter turnout. And so I think it would be a major mistake, as some are talking about, to like abandon Florida. What I will say, though, Isaiah, is Trump won Florida in 2020 and he still lost the Electoral College by a lot. So it's important for us to know nationally we don't need Florida for Joe Biden to win reelection. But within the state, I would not give up on Florida at all, at all. Yeah, see, my view is I think what they should do is focus more on the local level first and then try to go statewide. And I'm with you because Biden's loss in Florida was not that was not as much as what Chris's was to DeSantis.

Right. And I actually think part of it was because a lot of Democrats here, they just were not thrilled for Charlie Crist. I really think that's what the main issue was. And because, you know, COVID, that issue kind of helped him because of the message he was able to relay on COVID. But yeah, I agree with you on the anti on the anti-walk stuff. Yep. All right. Let's keep fighting in Florida, critically significant state at the state and local level would like to have it nationally, but you don't need it. Yeah, well, that's all I have. Thank you for taking my call and I love supporting your show. All right. There goes Isaiah from Florida with some very, very important things. Just as a reminder to people who are waiting to be on name and location

or location and name should be in your nickname. If it's just like just just a nickname or that sort of thing, you're not going to get called on just so people know. Let's go to Omar from Atlanta. Omar from Atlanta. Welcome to the program. What is on your mind today? Hello, can you hear me? Yes, I can. Yeah. So I think the other Atlanta gentleman had a similar question. It's kind of about the Trump indictment recently on these documents. So my question is, is that especially since the Espionage Act has been used to prosecute people, at least the left would assume to be heroes like Reality Winner and whatnot. First of all, what are your thoughts on the hypocrisy of Reality Winner from the moment of arrest to being released, never saw a foot outside a jail and the hypocrisy there with Trump? And secondly,

on whether or not we should be cheering on the Espionage Act to be used against Trump like this. Speaker 1 I don't have any. Philosophical opposition to it being used, I can. It is not unique that statutes and law. Can be used in we don't agree with. That is that's not that's not a unique thing. And that alone doesn't make me say this is suspect, this is bad or whatever the case may be. We are we just got the indictment. We are eventually going to see what this case is built on. And we're all going to be able to sort of judge for ourselves whether the espionage is correct or incorrect. Now, I think it's important to say Trump is not accused of spying for another country. A lot of people are hearing the word espionage or espionage

act and assuming certain things that are not actually part of the indictment. Let's not allow the word. I mean, the Espionage Act contains a number of different provisions. If the indictment is accurate, Trump did violate the Espionage Act, doesn't mean he spied for Russia. So I think it's way too certainly too early to say it's incorrect to charge him in that way. Right. Yeah. He he's charged with improperly holding documents, not sharing them. Yeah, I guess from my perspective, it's because we have that Georgia case building up right now. I would have much preferred to see that in the limelight than Espionage Act violations,

which just seems at least personally less tenuous from a political perspective. There's also a number of different charges and it's obstruction and it's a whole bunch of different things. And it's also a false notion to say the only thing Trump did wrong was having the documents. It actually goes much further than that. And in fact, this is the point why you have to look at what Hillary was was investigated for to understand. It's not about holding documents and refusing to return them. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, that's fair. All right. Omar from Atlanta, thank you for the call. Thank you. All right. Very, very direct question. I like that. Why don't we go next to

Zach from New York? Zach, welcome to the program. What's on your mind today? Hi, David. Thanks for taking my call. My pleasure. So my question for you is which political figure do you think has the biggest differential between how serious they appear versus how big of a clown they actually are? Let me think about this. The big and it could be it could be that they are more or less serious than their than their public perception. Right. It could be either way. I guess so. But I'm more interested in who appears to be very serious, but is actually a very big clown. You know, Mitch McConnell comes to mind both his seniority and his confidence in answering

even about things he has no clue on make him seem extremely serious to many people. And I think that at the end of the day, he actually is a total clown. So so McConnell comes to mind. I'm trying to think who else. You know, the thing about Trump is he's not serious and he doesn't seem serious. So it's like it's very obviously not Trump. You know. You can spot that clown a mile away. You know, maybe Pence would be in the running because especially next to Trump, Pence seemed

so sober and serious, but his beliefs are just built on crumbling trash, you know, just a dumpster fire. So I would put Pence in the running as well. OK, I like that answer. Thank you. All right. Well, thank you, Zach. I appreciate it.

Zach from New York. That is it is actually a tough question when you don't think about it super, super specifically. All right, everybody, let's take a break. We will take more calls again if I have anything to say about it. Thirty million trees are destroyed every year for toilet paper in the US alone. So toilet paper is a big contributor to deforestation and climate change. Our sponsor, Real Paper, makes toilet paper from bamboo. Bamboo plants keep growing, which means no deforestation. Bamboo also absorbs five times as much carbon

from the atmosphere as pine trees. and bamboo toilet paper is stronger than regular toilet paper and even softer. So bamboo toilet paper is all around a win for you and for the environment. It's time to move on from that toilet paper from trees that you're using at home. When you use real paper, it doesn't feel like you're sacrificing anything. It's soft and fluffy We'll be right back. with one tree planted. So unlike the toilet paper that cuts down trees, real is helping to actively plant them. Go to real paper dot com slash Pacman and use code Pacman for 30 percent off your first order and free shipping. That's our E.L. paper dot com slash Pacman and then use code Pacman. The info is in the podcast notes. All right. Let's get to Friday

feedback Friday. I like to take a look at what folks have been saying. You know, we get five or six thousand different comments a day across email, YouTube, TikTok, et cetera. It's impossible to look at all of them. But I like to take a look at a sampling and see some of the criticisms that people are making, some of the praise and some of the questions that people are making, some of the praise and some of the questions that people are asking. So let's start first and foremost. Let's just get this out of the way. OK, three ninety two choppa on YouTube says who is paying you? This is a question rarely asked in good faith. It usually implies that some nefarious forces are funding this program or that I only am saying the things I'm saying because someone is giving me money or

whatever the case may be. So let me clarify. We fund this program through three general categories. Number one, memberships, people who just sign up on the website. So like three ninety two chopper could just as easily be one of the people paying me as anybody else. That's one of our funding sources. Secondly, the some of the platforms we're on provide ad revenue for the little ads that show up like before a video or in between videos. And that includes YouTube. That includes Facebook. That includes more recently TikTok, not Instagram. OK, so that's another funding source. And then lastly, direct ad sales that we do. So like when you hear me talking about a product or service,

that's who pays me. There's no big millionaire or billionaire donor. There's no DNC money. I'm not even a Democrat. I don't know why the DNC would pay me. I tell you things that I like about Democrats and things I don't not clear what why there would be an incentive there. And that's basically the bottom line. That's it. There's nothing sketchy or secret going on. And one of the great things about that way of being funded is there is no one person that can even attempt to hold money over our heads to get me to say or not say whatever. There's no single advertiser that's so big that they could come and say, hey, we really don't like what you're saying about X or Y or whatever. They would say, listen, we we have many advertisers and we aside from the fact that I would never

do that even financially, like you don't really have me over a barrel. Same thing with our audience members. One person who's a member says, David, I will pull my three dollars a month. If you don't take back that thing you said, there's just no leverage. OK, there's no leverage. So that's who is paying me. And by the way, organizations like the Daily Wire and others actually do have the big donors. Organizations like Turning Point USA have the big donors focus on them. There's no exciting story about who's paying us. Scotty wrote in and Scotty says, I know you won't, but I feel a ton of

us want you to run for president. Well, Scotty, I legally cannot run for president of the United States. I was not born in the United Shaysh. I was born in Argentina. And at least for now, maybe Arnold Schwarzenegger will get the law changed at some point. I was born in Argentina. And at least for now, maybe Arnold Schwarzenegger will get the law changed at some point. I'm not sure. I would not legally be allowed to run for president. So I hate to if if it is true that there are a ton of us that want me to run for president, as Scotty says, I hate to disappoint, but it's just not going to be possible under current law. John Toole says, I wouldn't vote for Chris Christie, but it is nice to hear a Republican sound more like they used to.

Again, it's just nice to see a Republican talking on an adult level again. As of now, Christie really does have the strongest campaign start on the Republican side. Hands down. Agree completely. It's not even close. It's not even close. Vivek Ramaswamy's campaign is just a mess to like a verbal verbal inkblot. Nikki Haley's campaign is a joke. Tim Scott's campaign is laughable.

Mike Pence's couldn't possibly have less energy. OK, you go through all of them. Then you get to Ron DeSantis. He's just a complete and total disaster in terms of his campaign focus on anti woke, his inability to in any remotely charismatic way actually go against the guy who's leading, which is Trump. Then we get Trump. OK, you got Trump. It's Christie. It's and I am not voting for Christie. I'm not a Republican. It's just if I had to vote for a Republican, it's so obviously Chris Christie and John is finding that he's coming away with the same perspective. Bruton Road on Reddit says there's a growing number of people in my community and others believing conservative

propaganda that Democrats are the party of slavery and it's working. Why aren't we trying to stop this? Yes, I know Democrats in the eighteen hundreds did form the Confederacy, but we also know pushing the narrative in twenty twenty three that Democrats are the true racist party without full and proper context is clearly agenda based and not a good faith discussion. My question is, why isn't more being done to combat this? I'm guessing most people are not seeing how big of a problem this is becoming in the black

community. Well, listen, a couple of things. First of all, I don't know that it's becoming a big problem in the black community because if black folks were being tricked into thinking that the modern Democratic Party is the party of slavery, you wouldn't see such high levels of support for Democratic candidates from the black community. Black folks and Jewish folks are the two groups that most vote Democratic in the United States. And my belief is that if either of those groups were falling

for the lie that the Democrats of the Confederacy are the Democrats of 2023, you wouldn't see those levels of support. That being said, yes, I do think it would be better to more strongly disabuse people of the notion that there is a connection between Democrats of the Civil War era and Democrats of 2023. In order to explain this, you do have to go into some history about party realignments and different things. I think that it's worth doing. Part of it would be great to do in school at the educational level and prevent people

from ever falling for this stuff in the first place. But the one part I take issue with this viewer is that I'm not seeing the evidence that it is really convincing too many people. Doesn't mean we don't want to combat it, but it doesn't seem like as big an issue as this person is worried about. Chris Ortiz comments. Why don't what what you don't get, bud, is the reason the economy is so strong is because of what Trump did in his first term. And I guess you forget how high inflation really is. I love guys like you. You point at every bad point of a person but offer no new insight. I bet you call yourself an independent typical, but I may be wrong. Well, listen, I am not a Democrat or a Republican in that sense. I'm independent, but I don't pretend to be a centrist or anything like

that. I'm on the left. But when it comes to economic matters, I try to remove politics as much as possible and just give you the analysis based on the data, the empirical analysis. There is no evidence I can find that the current economic indicators are what they are because of what Donald Trump did in his first term. However, Chris, I also don't go around putting the credit for the economy being what it is squarely on the shoulders of Joe Biden. Presidents in general make tweaks that can affect the general direction of the economy. But much of what is going on is bigger than the United States, and it's certainly bigger than what's in the Oval Office. The point I make about the Biden economy is that there is a group that says Biden doesn't deserve a second

term because the economy is so terrible and there is no empirical data based case that you can make that proves the economy is terrible. That's my point. Vinny wrote in and says, I find it crazy that DeSantis is now running on, quote, destroying the left and the media acts like this is normal politics and not fascism. Imagine if a Democrat ran on getting rid of all conservatism that would be on 24 seven loop on Fox and any other right wing outlet. This guy is full on anti-democracy and nobody seems to care 100 percent. Listen, that applies to so many stories.

Imagine if Barack Obama was indicted on 37 counts and it turned out that he obstructed an attempt to return classified documents to their rightful custodians, that a server room was flooded by draining the pool at his resort, that he had boxes of classified documents stacked up around his toilet. Just imagine how the coverage would be different from the right. And similarly, Ron DeSantis said, if I I will destroy the leftism, if I become president, if Joe Biden said we will destroy conservatism, they would be saying this guy is an authoritarian fascist. He's dangerous. All of the things that we know they try to say at any opportunity. Vinny is completely right. There is a stunning double standard out there about this issue. Dennis says about Ron DeSantis, he is stopping homosexuality in school, not banning educational

books. I don't know if Dennis actually means this, but you realize that if what Ron DeSantis is trying to do is to stop homosexuality in schools. That that's extraordinarily disturbing. What does it mean to stop homosexuality? Because Dennis isn't saying stopping discussion of homosexuality in school. Dennis seems to be saying stopping homosexuality in school. You're going to ban gay people from what? Going to school, teaching. What are you talking about, Dennis? This is someone who's trying to defend DeSantis and actually makes it look even worse. Lastly, on the trans and drag issue, Richard Martin said, if you want to raise your kid to be a freak show

moved to another country, don't put that stuff in the school system and try to screw up other kids heads. If you want your kid to be a freak show that you're a business to take him down to a gay bar, throwing in the door, let them have them and leave a note on his back saying this week, drop off when you're done with them. Have fun. Simple solves the problem. That is one sentence, no punctuation. And it is not even worthy of a response other than to remind you this. And this person also has a Jack Daniels bottle as their profile picture. This is what we are up against. And as I've said before, we're not going to convince Richard Martin that he's wrong in any reasonable amount of time. And so what we

have to do instead is activate people who don't plan to vote. That's the much more direct and efficient path towards trying to win elections. Really sad stuff going on in this country. We have a tremendous bonus show for you today. Just a reminder that we will be off on Monday, the federal holiday, Juneteenth. I hope everybody has a great Monday, whether you're working or not, we will be off and then we'll be back the rest of the week. All right, everybody. Great bonus show today. Sign up at join Pacman dot com. You can use the coupon code indicted again. Indicted again.