The David Pakman Show - 7/12/23: DeSantis failing, Christie punding Trump as inflation declines massively

Episode Date: July 12, 2023

-- On the Show: -- The conclusion to David's interview with Richard Dawkins, renowned evolutionary biologist who has revolutionized our understanding of genes, memes, and the origins of life, and host of the podcast The Poetry of Reality with Richard Dawkins -- Inflation declines again to 3% year over year, the lowest since March of 2021 -- 2024 Republican presidential candidate Chris Christie once against goes after Donald Trump -- A Trump supporter says she never sees homeless Hispanic people, only homeless black and white people -- Ron DeSantis attacks the media when asked by a Fox News host about his massive polling deficit to Donald Trump -- Florida Governor and 2024 Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis has yet another problem, the spread of malaria in Florida -- Donald Trump's lawyers want his criminal trial postponed indefinitely -- A softball Donald Trump interview still manages to go horribly wrong -- Voicemail caller says that the show "blows" and that David must be "paid propaganda" -- On the Bonus Show: DOJ says it no longer deems Trump immune from E. Jean Carroll lawsuit, Bank of America to pay $250 million for illegal fees and fake accounts, abortion protest leaves Marine Corps without permanent leader, much more... 🚲 Lectric eBikes! Shop for your new electric bike at https://lectricebikes.com 😁 Zippix Toothpicks: Code PAKMAN10 saves you 10% at https://zippixtoothpicks.com 🤢 Reliefband: Use code PAKMAN for 20% OFF + free shipping at https://reliefband.com 💰 Public.com: Start getting a 5% yield on your cash at https://public.com/pakman 💻 Get Private Internet Access for 83% OFF + 4 months free at https://www.piavpn.com/David -- 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

My favorite way to enjoy the nice summer weather is on my electric bike from our sponsor, Electric E-Bikes. It's super fun. You can go up to twenty eight miles an hour with tons of torque, fully foldable for easy storage, ships fully assembled and they have affordable financing. Go to L.E.C.T.R.I.C.E. Bikes dot com. The link is in the podcast notes. I have no choice but to admit that we have a remarkable economic situation right now.

The situation is not that we will never again have a recession. In fact, we almost certainly will, unless something changes permanently about the type of economy that we have. At some point, there will be a recession or worse, because that's the way that things have worked for a very long time. But when we look at the latest inflation numbers and we look at all of the other data that we have, it is quite an extraordinary situation. We have new inflation numbers out today. It's July. So the numbers are from June and for the 12 month period ending in June of 2023. And year over year, inflation is down to three percent. Three percent. I have been talking about for over a year now. I've been saying I believe that by August of twenty three, inflation will be down to the low fours or the high threes,

which would be a dramatic improvement from where it was a year and a half ago. I don't know anything. It was just my sense of the direction things were going. And I actually was too conservative in my estimate. Inflation consumer prices in June rose at slowest annual rate since March of twenty twenty one, according to the latest data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Now, these right wingers who just don't like these numbers will say you can't believe these numbers. That's not real. OK, well, when when you like the numbers, you believe the numbers from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. And now they'll go, but eggs are expensive. I saw the other day. We don't judge these numbers by what one person

sees in one grocery store. This is actually a metric that is extraordinarily detailed and nuanced. The consumer price index went up zero point two percent last month and that prior year number. It is now a three percent increase, a three percent increase. As of last month, we had a four percent year over year increase. We are now down to a three percent year over year increase. We are now down to a 3 percent year over year increase. These are really good numbers. And it is not just inflation in a vacuum that looks really good. And I'll come back to what we mean when we say inflation looks good. Wages are rising and are

now higher than they were before the pandemic. Inflation adjusted again. The detractors, the the the MAGA pessimists will say, well, sure, nominally wages are higher, but inflation's been crazy. No, no, no, no, no. Inflation adjusted wages. Real wages are now higher than they were before the pandemic. If you look at the G7 countries, the US has the lowest inflation of all of them. If you look at gas prices, gas prices are now down about a buck fifty a gallon. The unemployment rate is at three point six percent. That is under four percent for the longest stretch in 50 years, 50 years. And of course, they will come back and they will say, oh, but a lot of these are low quality jobs or a lot of people have stopped looking for work. These are always

things that can be said. It's the way these metrics work. You can't only say that when it's to your advantage. These are the real numbers. Now, let's talk about inflation a little bit. I want to remind you that the target for inflation is not zero. The target for inflation is considered to be two percent. We're basically there. We're at three percent. The target is two percent. So we are getting down to an inflation level. That is what you would want for what would be considered by traditional economic measures, a good inflation number. Let me remind you why. And I know that there are people who have heard me say this before, but I do think it's it's such an important basic economic concept to understand that I want to explain it again. If inflation is really high, we know why that's bad. People can't

afford stuff. If inflation is eight percent and wages are only up two percent, things become unaffordable. So people stop buying them, which is bad for businesses. So businesses have to lay people off and then the people they lay off don't have money to buy things. So then more businesses have to lay people off. So very high inflation. It's pretty self-evident why that's bad. Some people might say, well, shouldn't we want zero inflation or even deflation prices coming down? It'd be so great. Everybody can afford what they want. Wrong. If there is a deflationary situation, you would expect things to be cheaper in the future than they are now. And so save for absolute necessities like food, you need food to survive.

If you expect prices to be lower in the future, you would delay economic activity. If I'm looking at a car and I say, well, the car is going to be three percent cheaper in six months, I wouldn't buy it. And it has a similar effect as things being unaffordably expensive, which is you're not buying. And that's bad for businesses. They lay off workers and you have the same thing. The reason that by traditional economic measures, we say two percent inflation roughly is what we want, is that that two percent inflation is what drives economic growth and expansion. Now, of course, when we step out of this traditional economic analysis, we say, well, the planet is of limited size and resources. You can't have indefinite growth. And that is also theoretically true. And in some sense, it's practically true.

Before we get to that point, we may be off to mining asteroids or who knows what. So it starts to get a little theoretical and philosophical. But that's the reason why a little bit of inflation is considered good. I also want to remind you, there are many aspects to inflation that have nothing to do with the president. So I'm not here to tell you we're going to bow and pray at the altar of Joe Biden because of what we're seeing, much the same way that it wasn't exclusively Trump's fault that inflation was high. There are many aspects to inflation that don't relate to the president. This includes changes to the money supply, supply and demand shocks, like, for example, natural disasters, covid, whatever the case may be.

Expectations about inflation become self-fulfilling prophecies. These things are bigger than the president. And remember, inflation is coming down in all G7 countries, but it's coming down more in the United States. What presidents can do is fiscal policy like government spending, taxation, et cetera, and indirectly monetary monetary policy. Remember, the president doesn't control monetary policy directly. The Fed does, but the president does decide who is in charge at the Fed. So no reason to play political games, no reason to sugarcoat or to do sky is falling stuff. These numbers are what they are. They only slightly relate to Joe Biden. But this is a good sign overall. Doesn't mean it's a perfect economy. Doesn't mean there won't be a downturn at some

point in the future. Chris Christie, the former Republican governor of New Jersey, continues to pound Trump again and again and again. And he's saying a lot of things that make sense, but it doesn't seem to be helping his poll numbers, which we are going to look at. I like these Chris Christie interviews because they are just a reminder that even though he's corrupt and even though I don't agree with him on so much when it comes to policy, he's operating in the real world and Republicans can operate in the real world. They often choose not to, but they can. Let's listen to Christie giving his thoughts on what he believes is in Trump's mind about

these criminal cases that he is up against. This was from an MSNBC interview yesterday. Part of what the Department of Justice has always done under all of the attorneys general that I've seen in my lifetime is if we offer you a plea, which I'm certain they will, and you turn it down and you take us to trial and you're convicted, that judge is sending you to jail. And I think that's what he goes to bed every night thinking, every night. And all this bravado and everything else, I've known him for 22 years. And when I was doing these cases in New Jersey, and I would put political figures in jail, he would say to me, I could never do that.

I could never go to jail. And I'm telling you, no matter what he says, no matter how he's bragging and going on and on about him not being afraid, he goes to bed every night thinking about the sound of that jail cell door closing behind him. So the point of all that, Willie, is to say when push comes to shove, I'm not so sure he won't take the plea. All right. And by the way, Trump taking a plea would be just an I'm not even ready to seriously have that conversation yet, even though Trump's already been arrested twice and possibly will

be again in multiple trials and all that. I'm not even ready to have that conversation because it's just it's mind blowing to think about the failed former president taking a plea. But that's Chris Christie's perspective. Chris Christie also weighing in on why he sees Trump as a danger to the country. Of course, it would have been nice for Chris Christie to skip the four years of sucking up to Trump and go directly to this. He didn't do that. For four years, he sucked up and he said positive things. But at least he's saying it now. Do you think he's a danger to the country? Well, I don't want him to be president. So yeah, I mean, you know, the fact is that he's a guy who has shown over the course of

time and even more particularly, I'd say, Mike, in his post presidency, true, that he is detached from reality in this respect. He continues to say and he said this the other day in response to a question, when Brett Baier asked him, you know, how are you going to win back the suburban women voters that you lost in 2020 to Joe Biden? And he said, first off, I didn't lose in 2020. So we don't need a candidate as Republicans who's going to continue to look backwards and try to refight the 2020 election. He's even, even in the race he won in 2016. He's trying to refight the Nevada election. And imagine saying in that interview yesterday in Nevada, he called it a disgraceful state. Well, that's an interesting approach to try to win their electoral votes. By the way,

you people were disgraceful. Vote for me, please. I mean, listen, Chris Christie is right. But sadly, it's not trans. Sadly for him, it's not translating to polling support. If we look at the latest averages of recent polling, Trump's still between 52 and 53. DeSanctimonious is at 21 and Chris Christie is at two point five percent. Two point five percent. Yes. One hundred and fifty percent increase over the one percent where he found himself some time ago.

But it is not going to be enough to get him that nomination. We'll continue following Chris Christie and everybody's campaigns. I'm going to play a clip for you here of a Trump supporter talking about homelessness. Now, homelessness is a very important issue. Homelessness is a moral failing of the United States. There's no reason we have to have homelessness in the United States. There's also no reason we have to have hunger. But we lack a political will and sort of resolution to decide we're not going to do it anymore. But this is interesting.

Here is a Trump supporter complaining about homelessness. She says something very interesting. She says she doesn't see Hispanics out on the street. She sees blacks and whites. What does she doesn't see Hispanics out on the street. She sees blacks and whites. What does she mean by this? What's the truth of it and what the hell is going on here? Let's listen. Speaker 3 It's been some of the negative things since the Biden. You turn your head and you pause for dramatic effect. But me to be honest with you, I mean, we've never seen so many homeless in my life ever, never

in my life have I ever seen so many homeless. And it's like, OK, we're going to take we're going to have open borders. I never see any of the Hispanics on the street. What I see is African-American and Caucasian-American. What is she trying to make in terms of a point here? I don't is the point she's trying to make that Hispanics are hard workers and they don't end up homeless or something like she is this praise of Hispanic Americans, Hispanic immigrants? What point is she trying to make?

Now, the math is sort of interesting. In reality, it's estimated that about 24 percent of those who were homeless in 2022 were Hispanic. And that's that's an overrepresentation relative to the 19 percent of the population that Hispanics are believed to make up. So 19 percent of the population, 24 percent of homeless Hispanics are overrepresented in the homeless population. But I don't know what that proves one way or the other. Just as usual, these folks are wrong on the facts and their analysis and commentary is weird. Now, I do want to mention how do people end up homeless?

Because there is this idea among many on the right that when you're homeless, it's the result of a personal failure. I actually was at a restaurant the other day. There was a guy there with his daughter and also his his girlfriend. It clearly wasn't the daughter's mom. It was it was his girlfriend and with his daughter. And I overheard this guy saying, if you're hungry in this country, it's by choice. And then five minutes later, he yelled at his daughter and then later at his girlfriend very loudly in front of a restaurant full of people. It was super cringy. So that that guy

is the one who was saying, if you're hungry in this country, it's by choice. The truth is that homelessness in the United States is often the result of structural factors, poverty, lack of affordable housing, major issue, not enough housing, unemployment, low wages, discrimination, domestic violence, mental illness, substance abuse, abuse, lack of social support. All of those things can affect anybody, regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, age or background. But it is true that there are historically marginalized communities that are more likely to be affected by some of those issues. One other thing.

There's this myth that homeless people are lazy or dangerous. This is also not true. As far as lazy, the vast majority of the poor and many of the homeless actually do work. That's number one. And then number two, this idea of criminality, homeless criminality, the vast majority of homeless people have never committed any criminal act other than if a city makes it a crime to be homeless, then you are criminalizing their very status. And we've talked about that happening in a number of different cities. So not sure what point this woman was trying to make, but at least it gives us an opportunity to talk about homelessness. Let's take a quick break.

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. . . ..... only people in the running for. But still, they are awards. You can sign up at join Pacman dot com and use the coupon code. Twenty four starts now. You can also get the Children's Critical Thinking book now over 5000 copies sold at David Pakman dot com slash book. Remember to leave a review if you purchase the book over the last week or so. Let's take a look at the continued downfall of Ron DeSantis, the Republican Florida governor who is polling about 20 percent in the Republican primary, more than everybody but Trump,

but with seemingly no path to actually securing the Republican nomination. Ron DeSantis was interviewed by Fox News's Stuart Varney or Fox Business's Stuart Varney. This is a Kafka esque moment. I apologize. I apologize. It is Kafka esque. Stuart Varney mentions to DeSantis, listen, you're down over 30. How are you going to catch up? What's your strategy? And DeSantis just attacks the media. I don't know that this strategy has winner written all over it. You're down over 30 points to Trump. What's your strategy for catching up? Well, first, I think it's pretty clear that the media does not want me to be the candidate.

I think that they've tried to create narratives that somehow the race is over. This is going to be a state by state contest. We've worked really hard to build a type of organization in places like Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina that you need to actually be able to win these early contests. And we're going to continue doing that. We got a lot of work, but we've had very, very favorable response and we're going to keep building off that momentum. At the end of the day, I think the fact that I'm the one that's targeted by the media, by the left, even by the president of Mexico. Listen, if the strategy is I'm

going to pretend to be a victim just like Trump pretends to be a victim, I guess he's doing it. But I don't know that this is going to get him too many votes because people know that I will beat Biden and they know that I will actually deliver on all these issues and beat the Democrats at the border. Be folks, this is really low energy. You're down 30 to Trump. What's your strategy for catching up?

Well, it's mostly the media's fault, but I'm going to beat Biden. Well, you're not even going to face Biden unless you figure out a way to make up a 30 point gap on Donald Trump. If I want to be as charitable as possible to Ron DeSantis, he seems to be saying when he says it's a state by state contest, 30 points nationally don't matter if I can win Iowa and or New Hampshire and justify staying in this race. It's not looking like he can win Iowa or New Hampshire, but let's put that aside. If I want to generously say that's a strategy. OK, I guess that's a strategy, which is forget about the national polling. Just focus on those critical states. During this disastrous interview, Stuart Varney actually asks DeSantis, is there is is there any climate plan that you

have? Listen to what he says. The headlines are just full of stories about wildfires, smoke, extraordinary temperatures in the southwest and the southeast to some degree. Do you have a climate plan? It's going to be to rip up Joe Biden's Green New Deal. I think at the end of the day, we need to embrace American domestic energy. This could be a huge source of national security, economic vitality. It can build our industrial base in Florida. We've actually had a huge reduction in emissions, but it was done through innovation. It was done through

market forces, not command and control. So we'll go about that in a much different direction. Now you might be surprised about hearing that he's going to do away with Joe Biden's Green New Deal. And the reason you might be surprised is there is no Green New Deal. Now if you press them on this and you say the Green New Deal isn't the law, what do they say? They usually say something like, well, Joe Biden has integrated elements of the Green New Deal into the Inflation Reduction Act, as well

as by executive order. But then if you really press them, it's very difficult to actually make that a believable, believable argument. So as I've said before, not ready for prime time, does not have winner written all over him, has absolutely no tangible explanation as to how he's going to make up the 30 point deficit. And he's only running against Joe Biden. And the funny thing is, he's running against Joe Biden and against things Joe Biden hasn't actually done. You've got to figure out a way to win one state here, bro. And it's not clear that he's figured that out. And meanwhile, there are problems in

Florida. Trouble in paradise. Let's talk about that next. There's an additional problem for Ron DeSantis. And the problem is that there is a malaria outbreak in Florida. Now, you might be saying, David, that really has very little to do with Ron DeSantis. And there's also some cases in Texas and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But there is a very specific reason why this is a problem for Ron DeSantis. And we're going to talk about that. Newsweek reports Ron DeSantis under pressure as Florida malaria cases spread. The article reads DeSantis is facing pressure amid a growing number of malaria cases in Florida after reports emerged that two public health roles related to combating the spread of disease have been left vacant for months.

Two more cases of the mosquito borne disease were detected in Sarasota County to the south of Tampa, according to the latest disease monitoring report. This brings the total number of cases contracted inside the US this year to six in Florida. The county, along with Manatee County and Miami-Dade, are now under alert. This is the first time in two decades that the disease caused by a parasite has been locally acquired rather than linked to international travel. The one reason why this is related to Ron DeSantis and bad for Ron DeSantis is because there are two public health roles related specifically

to combating the spread of disease that have been left vacant for months. Now, you can make the argument even with those two roles, you're not going to prevent six cases of malaria. And I'm with you. I don't know that you are going to prevent six cases of malaria because you fill two roles that are empty. But this is another example of the disregard and the indifference to properly staffing these roles related to health. Florida has been having problems with this. They had that wacky Dr. Ladapo anti-vax kooky doctor at the helm during covid firing the woman who was putting together that covid dashboard, all of these different things. So it makes them look terrible. Now, let's talk about malaria a little bit. Malaria is a mosquito borne disease. It doesn't only affect humans. It can

affect other animals. It's caused by a parasite which is transmitted by the bites of infected mosquitoes. When the mosquito becomes infected and then bites an infected person and then goes and bites a non infected person, the mosquito is is spreading the disease. The parasite enters the person's bloodstream, goes to the liver, infects red blood cells. Now, malaria is usually not directly contagious from person to person unless there's contact of infected blood, organ transplant, plant blood transfusion, theoretically, you know, two open wounds touching each other, although it's it's rare. So person to person transmission is not common. It can be transmitted during pregnancy or delivery. And so when you say how contagious is malaria, what's the R number?

It's sort of unclear. The research I did said it could be under one all the way up to 100, depending on the setting. And it's such a small number of cases that we see in the United States in this way that it's actually difficult to put a number on it. Diagnosed by a blood test that can detect the presence of the parasite. Malaria is treated with anti malarial drugs such as chloroquine, meth, lequin and other

drugs depends on the severity, depends on the type. If it is untreated, can cause severe complications and death, including complications can include swelling of the brain, fluid in the lungs, organ failure, anemia, a low blood sugar coma or death. Ugly, ugly stuff. The first approved vaccine for malaria is known by the brand name Moskowitz. And as of a few months ago, it's been given to about a million and a half kids living in parts of the world that have moderate to high malaria transmission.

Are six cases in Florida reason to panic? They are not. Are six cases in Florida when there are two open positions, thanks to Ron DeSantis, a political problem for him? Potentially very much so. All of these stories, we will have follow up discussion and you're able to comment on them on our Instagram, on our YouTube channel and on our tick tock. Make sure you're following us on those platforms.

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company. Plus, there are no minimum hold periods or settlement delays. You can access funds anytime if you keep it invested. Public will automatically roll over your investments at maturity. So you or the Pacman. The link is in the podcast notes. Let's now continue our conversation with renowned biologist Richard Dawkins, a conversation we started yesterday on the program. The full video discussion is available on our YouTube channel at youtube.com slash the David Pakman show. And speaking of which you mentioned moving in the right direction, Steven Pinker and others have been criticized for laying out the perspective that by applying some very objective measures, infant mortality, life expectancy, likelihood

of dying in a war, etc., that it number of people living in abject poverty, that things are better than ever. And one of the big counterpoints to that has been, while that may be true, our standards and expectations for particularly Western democracies and rich nations should have actually been raised so dramatically that it's not necessarily the big win. Someone like Pinker points out to say, OK, there's fewer people living on the equivalent of a dollar a day now that we're actually failing to solve solvable problems. Hunger, for example, or whatever the case may be, is your view more in one direction or the other or more in between a balanced view?

Is the point you're making that it's the danger of becoming complacent because of a book like Pinker's saying things are getting better, therefore we don't need to to work to make them even better still? Is that that? I don't know that that's my argument, but I'm sort of voicing those who say that the measures may not actually be the right measures for how we evaluate how well things are going for Homo sapiens are on planet Earth. Well, I think we obviously need to try to make things better still. But I think Steven Pinker's one of his main points is that we are so pessimistic and the kind of thing that gets reported as news is always bad news. And you never get a news headline that says something positive because it's kind of boring.

It's not not a thing that journalists are interested in. Yeah, I'm on a list of good news stories. And very often you can look at them and say, that's great news. It will never get attention because it's usually something along the lines of breast cancer survivability over the last 15 years has increased, increased 38 percent. That's extremely tangible, meaningful for people who get sick and their families and love it. It's extraordinarily meaningful and it makes a terrible news headline for for profit media.

I mean, one reason for that is that it's not a sudden thing. It's a it's it's a it's a it's a gradual trend. Yes. And I suppose if there were a sudden breakthrough, a sudden discovery that that made breast cancer survival dramatically improve on overnight, then I guess that would count as news. When it comes to a more specifically now in terms of progress versus regression, the threat of Christian nationalism in the United States and around the world and this group that while maybe 30 years ago they felt the same way, they were a little more coy and slick about how they expressed it, We're now we actually have elected officials in

the United States who openly say this should be a Christian nation. Christian nationalism is correct. The Christian doctrine should actually determine civil government and how our society is organized. Has your view of the threat of that movement intensified since you wrote, for example, the God delusion? I am a distant observer of the American scene, and I and I notice that people that the Christian nationalists you're talking about simply lie about the Constitution and about the intentions of the founding fathers. They do absolutely clear that they are telling untruths. It's very different over here, of course, because we genuinely are I mean, in Britain, we are founded in Christianity in the sense that the well, the monarch is the head of the Church of England, for example.

This is a historical accident. It has an oddly paradoxical effect, which is that it kind of makes religion boring. It's not a big problem in the way that it is in America. I think precisely because in America, it's not an established religion. It's it's something that's open to free enterprise to to compete over. Therefore, religion is kind of exciting. You have church, these great big churches with people waving their arms around and dancing and things. We don't have that here. Not much anyway. And I think it's partly because we do have an established church. Yeah. You know, when I speak to my Italian friends, they are always very quick to say, oh, no, no, no. Our elected officials are Catholic. I'm Catholic.

My family's Catholic. And when you probe a little bit about what that means for their beliefs and their everyday life, it means very little in the way of policymaking, the way that it does in the United States. And I believe also if you if you said to them, do you actually believe in the transubstantiation? Do you actually believe that the wine becomes the blood of Christ? They probably don't. They probably don't even realize what it is to be Catholic. They just they're born Catholic.

They're baptized Catholic. They're confirmed Catholic. And so they think they are Catholic, but they don't really believe it. In that sense, as someone who's been a very strong critic of organized religion, do you find that version, for example, of Catholicism that I describe or what you're describing in England? Is it relatively benign or is it only benign in that it's not really the type of religion in that that it sometimes claims to be like you're saying it's not maybe really Catholicism. I think it is relatively benign when I stress the word relatively. I mean, when you think of the competition, when you think of Islam, I'm sometimes inclined

to agree with Ion Herci Ali that in certain parts of the world, at least we need Christianity as a sort of buttress against something worse. Hila Belloc's line, always keep a hold of nurse for fear of finding something worse. I mean, Christianity is bad enough, but it's not the worst religion around. Is that clear in your mind, this sort of ranking of the risk posed by different religions? I think it is pretty clear. I mean, Christianity was so appalling in the Middle Ages and it's kind of had a few centuries to grow up. And so I think that there is a possibility of ranking there. Yes. Do you I mean, what does

that what does that landscape look like to you? Well, I mean, it's one of the doctrines of Islam that the penalty for apostasy is death. Well, that's I think even the most fervent Christian nationalist wouldn't can wouldn't say that somebody who renounces Christianity should be killed. No, I've had Christians on my show who say gays should be killed, which I don't know if it's better or worse. Speaker 1 Well, that's equally bad, but I would say so. But but if that's not that's not a religion anyway. Well, it may be it may be fermented by religion, but it's not actually saying if you give up Christianity, you should be killed. Speaker 2 No, that's certainly true. Do you think that I mean, you know, whenever this conversation is had, someone will invariably say, oh, well, what about Buddhism?

Here's a bunch of very peaceful things about Buddhism. And then someone will come back and say, well, OK, but then here's some other stuff about Buddhism that maybe is actually a little more concerning. Do you do you concern yourself with looking into the details of some of these smaller religions relatively and going down the list further and further? Or is that really a concern? Speaker 1 I haven't really done much of that. No, I don't. I I'm not that keen on giving a kind of rank order. Speaker 1 Fair. No, I think that I think that that's fair. Let's talk about one more general area in the time that that that we

have left. You've said many things over the last two years related to the discussion about gender and transgender and gender identity, et cetera, some of which you've said that I agree with and some of which you've said that that maybe I agree with a little less. One of the most interesting things that I heard over the last few months was Neil deGrasse Tyson in a conversation with a right wing person from the United States say, listen, there are all sorts of of conversations and debates to be had about this issue and the connection to whether it's mental illness or whether it's age appropriateness of certain decisions that are made, et cetera. Can we all agree that gender is expressed on a spectrum? And what I found interesting about Neil deGrasse Tyson saying this is that it's less a conversation about biology

and sex and genitalia, but it is a question about what I think is an undeniable reality about about the world, which is at minimum, the expression of gender is on a spectrum and that maybe that can serve as a starting point for some of these discussions. Would you agree with that? Which seems to me like an uncontroversial statement or is that a problematic statement to you? I'm a biologist and what I really object to is the subversion of language talking about a woman's penis for, for example.

I mean that is just playing around, playing fast and loose with the English language. And I'm, I'm a biologist who needs to talk about sex, and the difference between male and female, which is absolutely clear. It's one of the very few binaries we actually have in biology. Race is not a binary race is a genuine continuum, obviously, because of hybridization and so on. Almost everything else you can think of is a continuum, short versus tall, fat versus thin. All those things are a continuum. Sex is the one thing which actually is a binary. And I think that messing around with the English language and with any language for that matter, to speak English is a subversion, a perversion of clarity of thought, clarity of speech for political ends. Yeah. And I think most of my progressive colleagues would agree that the biological

circumstances undeniably are men, women, some percentage born intersex. And that's tiny, tiny. Yes. No, certainly. No need to exaggerate what the percentage is. Is it also in your mind a problem to separate biological sex and gender expression? Do you have an issue? Language aside, is that a concern to you? I am not particularly bothered if somebody wants to present themselves as the opposite of the sex that they are. I do object if they insist that other people recognize that. And I mean, I support Jordan Peterson in this, if nothing else, that he objects to the Canadian

government making it mandatory that he should call people by a pronoun like they when they are. I mean, he's prepared to do that as a matter of courtesy, but not as a matter of compulsion. And I thoroughly support him on that. You know, I don't have the bill in front of me, but when I looked at it 18 months ago, I struggled to find anywhere where he talks about threat of jail. If you use the wrong pronoun, I did not find that. But since I don't have it in front of me, maybe we'll we'll table those particulars. But that being said, what about, for example,

things like arresting doctors who provide certain gender affirming care, as it's called. Maybe you have an issue with the term or not. But what about the arresting of doctors, for example? Does that not start to bite a little bit? I'm sorry. Which doctors have doctors been arrested for that? No, these are bills that have been proposed in the United States. It has not happened, to my knowledge, fortunately. Children or adults? We've seen both in different states.

Well, I would have I would have strong objection to doctors injecting minors, children or performing surgery on them to change their sex. And as far as adults, you have no issue. Some like Jan Morris, for example, who I read years ago, one of the first of the trans people that I read and greatly respected her struggle that she went through in order to change sex from male to female. She really, really put herself through it and clearly sincere, clearly suffered from gender dysphoria, no doubt about that. And I take my hat off to her and to the doctors who helped her. But I fear that what we're seeing now is a fashion, a craze, a a a me medic epidemic, which is which is which is. Spreading like an epidemic of measles or something like that.

Yeah, I mean, listen, we're obviously we're not going to resolve this today, but I think, you know, I share some of the concerns I've seen you share with regard to children, with regard to questions about some of these treatments, et cetera. And I think that these should all be questions that should be had and asked and answered in good faith with data and empiricism. And I also can't help but see that trans people and also trans kids have become a very ugly scapegoat of a movement that 15 years ago was mostly targeting gay men. And so my desire would be and you tell me if you think it's possible that we can ask all of these questions in good faith while making it clear we're not looking to discriminate against individuals, subject them to whatever it was that other groups were previously subjected to and hopefully get to

a place of understanding. But do you agree that this has become a scapegoated group? I what I see is that there's a in effect a war going on between between gay people and trans people, at least not trans people themselves, but trans activists. So I'm not sure that I follow that. I think that I have great sympathy and great respect for gay people. And I worry about the bullying that goes on, not by trans people themselves necessarily, but by some of the activists. And there was somebody in Britain, I think just a couple of days ago who stood up and made a speech. He was actually

a trans person, a man turned turned woman who said, if you see a turf, punch her in the face. Oh, so in other words, you if I understand correctly, you have some concerns about LGBT and whether or not trans really is part of the LGB movement or something different. Speaker 4 Well, I think there are there's been a recent court case in Britain where an LGB lobby was fighting against a T lobby lobby. Speaker 1 I'm not familiar with that case, but I'm aware of that disagreement, certainly. LGB lobby was fighting against a T lobby. I'm not familiar with that case, but I'm aware of that disagreement, certainly. So that is a concern to you.

Yes. Interesting. All right. Richard Dawkins, there's no appropriate time to cut a conversation, but let's cut it now because we are at the end of our time. We will be linking to your to your podcast. I really appreciate your time and insights. And I know you're very busy. Thank you very much. When you're using websites and apps, your device sends out data about you into the open,

who you are, where you go, things you like. That data then gets sold around for advertising purposes, which is why every time I connect to the Internet, I use a VPN to hide my IP address. And our sponsor, Private Internet Access, is the most trustworthy VPN on the market. It's the only VPN that has proven multiple times in court. They don't log your activity. Private Internet access protects you from the prying eyes of hackers, your Internet service provider, tech companies. Private Internet access is also super fast for streaming and for downloads. You can watch your favorite streaming platforms as if you're in another country like the UK to access cool new content. And with just one account, you can

protect unlimited devices all at the same time. This is really a game changer. Private Internet access is giving my audience 83 percent off. That's two or three a month plus four months free. Go to PIA VPN dot com slash David. The link is in the podcast notes. Donald Trump's lawyers want one of his criminal trials postponed indefinitely. Why not? Right. I mean, shoot your shot. You miss 100 percent of the shots you don't take. Obviously, this is bonkers. And as usual, they are there. They're justifying this request by saying we can't have this interfering with his run for president. It's a form of election interference. It's potentially prejudicial to have this criminal trial related to the documents going

on while Trump is president. What's funny is this is what while Trump is running for president, when Trump was president, they said, no, no, no, no, no. There can't be any investigations. There can't be any charges because Trump is president. Then it was, well, this is a former president. Then we can't do that either because of convention or because of law. Now it's he's a candidate once again. So we also can't do it. And we all know that if by some horrible situation, Trump ends up president again, then they will say, well,

you can't have the sitting president on trial, so we have to postpone it again. The New York Times is a good write up about this. Trump lawyers seek indefinite postponement of documents trial. Imagine if others not in positions of power like Trump could do that. You know, I get it. Charges, due diligence, and you've got the evidence and witnesses, grand jury. Can we just like postpone this thing forever? Maybe until after I'm dead. The article goes on.

The former president's legal team argued in a court filing that no trial date should be set until all substantive motions in the case were resolved, setting up an early key decision by Judge Eileen Cannon. Remember that Judge Eileen Cannon is a Trump appointee and is a subject of controversy in this entire thing. The written filing was submitted 30 minutes before the deadline is an early test for Judge Cannon, the Trump appointed jurist who is overseeing the case. If granted, this is a big key.

If granted, it could have the effect of pushing Trump's trial into the final stages of the presidential campaign in which Trump is now the front runner or even passed the election. Now, of course, then they would just come up with some other reason why it should be postponed again. New York Times writing, while timing is important in any criminal matter, it could be hugely consequential in Trump's case in which he stands accused of illegally holding on to 31 classified documents after leaving the White House and obstructing the government's repeated efforts to reclaim them. There could be complications of a sort never before presented to a court. If Trump is a candidate in the last legs of a presidential campaign and a federal criminal

defendant on trial at the same time. Let me say something about that. Trump and his supporters are saying this is this is crazy. Look at what they are doing to him. They're trying to put him on trial while he's running for president. This is not the justice system's doing. This is Trump's doing. Trump is the one who engaged in the alleged actions for which he's now been charged.

Trump is the one who said, I'm going to run again, despite knowing that this may be coming and the entire cloud above his head. This is all because of Trump, not because of the justice system that has no choice but to react to Trump. But they're always going to paint him as a victim. Another interesting paragraph. Some of the former president's advisers have been blunt in private conversations that he is looking to winning the election as a solution to his legal problems.

And the request for an open ended delay to the trial of Trump and his co-defendant presents a high stakes question for Judge Cannon, who came into the case already under scrutiny for making decisions favorable to the former president in the early phases. Trump's lawyers pitched their request to Cannon as a plea for cautious deliberation and as a means to safeguard democracy. So of course, they want to make the argument that if Trump is forced to go to trial, it really endangers democracy. And as usual, we're talking about projection here because it is Trump's presidency which

endangered democracy. It was Trump's inciting of a riot to try to prevent the guy who won from becoming president that endangered democracy. It was Trump supporters on January 6th, 2021, who endangered democracy. The danger to democracy is not Trump being held accountable, but that's what they want you to believe. Last thing I want to mention about this law and order, right? Due process is what they always argue for. And then they say, postpone my trial indefinitely. There is a real possibility that this wreaks complete and total havoc on Trump's campaign. And as I said before, I don't see a path for Ron DeSantis to winning this nomination unless

something very significant happens to Trump. That significant thing could be getting charged a third or a fourth or a fifth or more recently. Now, we wonder a sixth time. I don't think it will really end up being six, but it certainly could be three, four or even five. That is what DeSantis is waiting around for. The other possibility is the very end of a presidential campaign, either the primary or the general, where Trump can't go to a debate because he has a court date or some similar situation. And it would be unprecedented, but it would not be because Trump is the victim. It would be because Trump is the alleged perpetrator.

And that's important to remember. If you want people to vote for you, you might not want to say that their state is a disgrace. A complete and total softball Trump interview went horribly wrong where Trump called Nevada disgraceful when he was asked about, hey, you lost twice. What's your plan to win in 2024? This is so endlessly fascinating. Trump was interviewed by the this is called the Nevada Globe. OK, the Nevada Globe, the Globe interview of President Donald

Trump. I encourage you to look at all of this. The picture of Trump sitting there on a podcast interview while they were with him is really, really wild stuff. It's a lot. This is a transcript. OK, this is a text interview. There's a fascinating section I want to focus in on. The interviewers say to Trump, so let's talk Nevada. Governor Lombardo lost Clark County by six points. He lost Washoe County by two points. Yet he still won the governorship. Additionally, he's recently signed legislation that awards twenty five million dollars to

the culinary union. The Nevada Republican Party believes that that money is five million dollars to the culinary union. The Nevada Republican Party believes that that money is going to be used for ballot harvesting. Proponents claim it's going to be used for a capital improvement project that hasn't been identified. A Republican presidential candidate hasn't won Nevada since 2004. You lost Nevada twice.

How do you win Nevada? Look at Trump's answer. I think I won the last time. I think I won both times by a lot. This is a state that is disgraceful. Listen, you lost twice here. How are you going to turn it around? How are you going to win? This state is an absolute disgrace. Vote for this man right away. I mean, just not even passing the sniff test for what is going to help him. And Trump goes on to say, you know, we sued on the basis of they robbed the vote at a level. We had a lawsuit that was so good and the judge didn't want to see it.

He didn't even want to see it. We had a lawsuit that was, in my opinion, conclusive. But you know, we have guys like Laxalt. Laxalt was a very weak candidate. He was pathetic. You know, I helped Laxalt do the best he could. I guess his grandfather was strong. His father was good. But I guess the chain got weaker and weaker. Remember, the question was, how are you going to win Nevada after losing it twice? Trump's talking about nonsense. But Adam Laxalt is a stiff and he didn't do the job. He was a lawyer. He was working for a lot of different people on trying to do the vote thing. But he wasn't the right guy.

When you see Trump's words as a transcript, they are 10 times nuttier and more meaningless. Trump going on. We have great people working now. We have great lawyers working. They used covid to cheat the last time they use covid to cheat. But we think we have a great team in place to stop it. We are then asked to wrap the interview. OK.

And then they go on to talk, talk to Trump a little bit more. This it's beyond parody, really. It's be when he's asked about the fact that he lost and how will you win? He insists I actually won. I actually love the transcript of the Trump interview. I think it's a great thing because it really makes it for people who read right, who know how to read. It makes the statements even more meaningless, where he just sort of trails off and skips around from one topic to another. So Trump's strategy to win Nevada is going to be it is calling the state a disgrace, insisting he actually won even though he lost.

And I guess saying that they're going to fix it by something related to ballot harvesting, not a winning strategy in Nevada. My bets on Joe Biden in Nevada, if if I'm totally honest with you, but we hope we will have to wait and see. We have a voicemail number. That number is two one nine two. David P. Often we get political questions or commentary. Sometimes I get praise. We often get criticism for things I didn't actually say. But today's voicemail is particularly weaponized. I would maybe say get the kids out of the room. I don't know. Let's take a listen. You show blows, dude. You show blows, dude. The height of political criticism. You show blows, dude. You show blows, dude. I'm convinced that you are paid propaganda. You're

always just an echo chamber of the main lamestream media paid by by whom exactly? Every time this comes up, I always welcome people who want to tell me exactly who is paying me. I mean, people in the audience are paying all the bonus show where you want to make money. Everybody else that makes money to fund themselves is bad. Sure. People who like this enough to pay for it are paying for it. But who's who's doing the paying actually? And don't bring any new ideas to the table. You talk to your people like they're all stupid children and you're like, well, sadly, some of the people in the comments. Behave like stupid children, and so I do have to explain simple concepts to them.

That's that's an unfortunate reality. It's not the vast majority of the audience, but there are some that do need things explained to them like their kids on them, how they should feel. I think it's funny that that you you think people are that dumb that they can't see right through this. I know that some of the people that comment on my content are that dumb. I've been seeing their thousands of comments a month for years. I mean, some of the people are dumb enough to believe you, but most people see right through your propaganda bulls.

All right. Money is. Yeah, dude, I think that you're a paid propagandist. All right. You mentioned that paid by who? I'd love to debate you someday. Call in any time. As you contradict yourself over and over. When these folks say this, there's this implicit allegation that I'm scared to debate them. Just call in. I mean, it's like I'm not going to

schedule a debate with you when we take live calls on the Friday show. We're not screening for political orientation. I welcome MAGA people, Republicans, conservative libertarians who have a call in your white nationalist. You want to debate me, call in. We're not screening the calls. It's because they don't call in that you're not hearing them on the show, not because we're blocking them or whatever the case may be. So anyway, wacky, wacky stuff. The Department of Justice now says it no longer deems Trump immune from a lawsuit by E. Jean Carroll.

We're going to talk about what that means on today's bonus show. We're also going to talk about Bank of America agreeing to pay to or being ordered to pay two hundred and fifty million dollars for illegal fees and fake accounts. This is part Wells Fargo and part grift. And I actually have a lot of personal stories to tell about bank fees that may be interesting to some of the audience. We are also going to talk about how the Tommy Tuberville situation is leaving the Marine Corps without a permanent leader and how if you believe in supporting the military and you believe in supporting our troops, this is a very unpatriotic

thing to do. All of those stories and more will be on today's bonus show. You can get instant access to the bonus show by simply signing up at join Pacman dot com. Super easy thing to do. In addition to that, you can use the coupon code 24 starts now or indicted again or indicated or sad Trump or any of the coupon codes. You can use any of them to get instant access. I'll see you on the bonus show. Remember, the children's book is available at David Pakman dot com slash book. And we'll be back tomorrow. This isn't the end for the week. We'll be back tomorrow very strongly, very powerfully. If I have anything to say about it.