The David Pakman Show - 9/13/23: McCarthy launches Biden impeachment inquiry, Hannity begs RFK to run 3rd party

Episode Date: September 13, 2023

-- On the Show: -- Clancy Martin, writer and philosophy professor, joins David to discuss his book "How Not to Kill Yourself: A Portrait of the Suicidal Mind," a book about his multiple suicide attempts. Get the book: https://amzn.to/3LiRXfa -- Republican Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy announces an impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden, despite still having no evidence against him -- Yet another Republican, this time Ken Buck, says he has still not seen any evidence indicating President Joe Biden should be impeached -- It is revealed that failed former President Donald Trump met with Republicans about impeaching Joe Biden -- OBGYN's are fleeing red states over the outrageous abortion laws that have been enacted -- Repugnant Republican Congresswoman Lauren Boebert gets thrown out of a theater performance for vaping and generally causing a disturbance -- Fox News propagandist Sean Hannity begs Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to run for President as a third-party candidate, which would likely help Donald Trump -- Facing life in prison, Donald Trump breaks down on Truth Social in the middle of the night -- 77-year-old great-grandmother calls in, and she loves the show -- On the Bonus Show: Elon Musk's refusal to have Starlink support Ukraine attack raises questions, bipartisan push to ban deceptive AI-generated ads, over 75% of voters want maximum age for elected officials, much more... 🔊 Babbel: Get 55% off your subscription at https://babbel.com/pakman 👕 Laundry Sauce: Get 15% off with code PAKMAN at https://laundrysauce.com/pakman 🌱 Unsolicited Plant Talks: Save 15% with code PAKMAN at https://unsolicitedplanttalks.com/pakman 🥄 Use code PAKMAN for $5 off Magic Spoon at https://magicspoon.com/pakman ✉️ StartMail: Get 50% OFF a year subscription at https://startmail.com/pakman 🌎 Bank with Atmos to fight climate change! Open an account at https://joinatmos.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

. Republicans are doing the very thing they accused Joe Biden of doing and that they accused Democrats of doing. They are opening an impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden for political reasons, for the purposes of trying to interfere with the reelection of Joe Biden, absent any evidence or at least absent any evidence that they have presented. I told you yesterday, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy is planning to endorse an impeachment inquiry of Joe Biden. Well, he went further later in the day actually saying, I am directing us to start an impeachment inquiry of Joe Biden.

We're not going to put it to a vote. There's a question as to whether they would even have the votes. We'll get to that a little bit later. But most importantly, they have no evidence of wrongdoing by Joe Biden that would reach anything even remotely close to the level where this action would be justified. That which they say the left has been doing, they are doing themselves. Here is Kevin McCarthy making this announcement yesterday. There are questions as to whether his heart is even really in it and discussions of whether

this could be political suicide for the future of Kevin McCarthy's career. You read into this. You tell me whether it seems like his heart really is in this. There's a bit of a perfunctory sort of nature to this announcement. Take a look. Despite these serious allegations, it appears that the president's family has been offered special treatment by Biden's own administration. Treatment that not otherwise would have received if they were not related to the president. These are allegations of abuse of power, obstruction, and corruption.

And they warrant further investigation by the House of Representatives. That's why today I am directing our House committee to open a formal impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden. Wow. This logical next step will give our committees the full power to gather all the facts and answers for the American public. That's exactly what we want to know. The answers. I believe the president would want to answer these questions and allegations as well.

This effort will be led by Chairman James Comer at the Committee on Oversight in coordination with Chairman Jim Jordan for Judiciary Committee and Chairman Jason Smith. All right. We quite frankly, we don't really care who's going to be running this charade. The important things that we care about are, number one, there's this completely circular nature to why they are even saying they're going to be doing this. They argue, well, even if we don't have evidence, the evidence may be covered up. So we need the ability to subpoena Joe Biden's bank records, as we heard Nancy Mace say to Caitlin Collins on CNN on yesterday's program. The counterpoint being, well, do you

even have probable cause of any kind? Do you have any evidence? Well, we have allegations. Yes, but these are allegations that are being made for political reasons absent any evidence. Well, we have allegations. Yes, but these are allegations that are being made for political reasons absent any evidence. Well, but they're allegations we need to look into. And the only way to look into them would be by starting an impeachment inquiry. The most important takeaway as of today and again, if this changes, I will be the first to tell you. But as of September 13th, 2023, there's the allegation that Joe Biden's son, Hunter Biden, profited in business dealings by arranging access to then Vice President Biden.

There is no evidence of that. It's based on an unverified tip to the FBI saying there is a bribery scheme involving Biden and Ukraine. They've not found any evidence to support that at this time. The next allegation that they've made is Biden himself profited. It wasn't just Hunter Biden. It was Biden himself who profited from Hunter Biden's business affairs. That is based on speculation and innuendo. There is no concrete evidence. Republicans have not provided proof when they've referred to proof that they have.

It then falls apart very quickly. Well, we have a tape. Actually, we don't have a tape. We have a witness. Actually, no one's spoken to the witness for three years. We have another witness. Oh, we checked with that witness. They say they've never actually spoken to anybody involved. They don't have a clue what's going on.

And then thirdly, actually, there's there's third and fourth. Thirdly is the allegation that the Justice Department interfered with investigations into Hunter Biden's taxes at the direction of Joe Biden. No evidence of that whatsoever either. And then lastly, it's the generic Biden bribery. It sort of is related to item number one, but it also could be broader than that. And it's it's not just that Biden was involved with Hunter's business dealings, but Joe Biden

accepted bribes from foreign governments in exchange for favorable policy. There is no evidence to support that allegation either. I believe that this will end up being a huge political mistake for Kevin McCarthy's political future, for his future political aspirations. That's just a prediction. Before we even get to that, we have to see whether the inquiry turns up any evidence. There are even Republicans who are skeptical of that. Let's talk about that next.

Does any Republican. Have the. I don't know what you want to call it, it's not really audacity. Is it the honesty to just say, hey, we don't have any evidence against Joe Biden? I don't know why we're opening up an impeachment inquiry. Well, there's at least one Republican Ken Buck. He's been saying this for a while. He appeared last night with CNN's Anderson Cooper, and he says, I still have seen no evidence linking Joe Biden, certainly not to Hunter Biden's business activities. Two days ago, you said that the

time for impeachment is when there's evidence linking President Biden to a high crime or misdemeanor. Right. You said, quote, that doesn't exist right now. Do you still feel that way tonight? I have not seen any evidence that links President Biden to Hunter Biden's activities at this point. I will be getting a briefing later in the week. I'm looking forward to understanding more of what the Oversight Committee has uncovered. But at this point, I have I have not seen that evidence. Now, Ken Buck is rare in that he's willing to just say I've seen no evidence. There are other Republicans who become irate, furious when they are asked about this. Matt Gaetz, I'm not even going to play the Matt Gaetz clips. He gave a gong show interview. I believe it was the CNN yesterday. He has no evidence is the

long and short of it. Here is video of Republican Congressman Scott Perry again, just being very respectfully pressed by a reporter about is there any evidence to support this? He didn't like being questioned. Yes, ma'am. What actual evidence do you have as opposed to allegations to show to the American public that would merit an actual impeachment inquiry of Joe Biden and prove that today isn't just about some of you? Oh, I don't know. McCarthy for the sake of enacting political revenge. This isn't about political revenge.

We have the bank accounts. We can see, ma'am, you can see that the homes that the Bidens own can't be afforded on a congressional or Senate salary. You also understand that it's not normal for family members to receive millions of dollars from overseas interests. Those things aren't normal. That's not normal to have 20 cell shell country companies. These things are not normal. And it alludes to not only just widespread corruption, but money laundering, if not influence peddling itself. And we also have the president or the vice president at the time on record saying that the prosecutor was fired. Well, son of a bitch, the prosecutor was fired, right? Because the prosecutor was going after the company that his son was working on. That's what we have. If you can't see that, if you are if you are that blunt, look, I'll turn it over to the attorneys. So listen, there's a whole bunch of stuff here. But what's

clear is Republicans don't want to be questioned. These are the same folks who are very quick to say allegations aren't evidence. And yet all they have here are allegations and circumstantial nonsense. Now, it is true that Joe and Jill Biden had incomes that went up significantly in 2017, 2018 and 2019. This has been widely documented. Joe Biden, unlike Donald Trump, has actually released his financial records. I don't have them in front of me, but it includes Social Security benefits. They started receiving rent on rental properties. It includes starting to collect money from pensions and annuities. There was a book deal or two in there for which Joe Biden was was compensated. It's we have the information.

And what they don't want to accept is that this is a fishing expedition. Now, the real I don't know that I want to say the crux of this, but the really important context is there. There is one particular individual who has been meeting with Republicans about impeaching Biden and who really wants Biden impeached solely for his political benefit. And that man's name is John Old. Oh, I'm sorry. No, Donald J. Trump. Let's talk about that next. Politico has reported that Donald Trump has been meeting privately with Republicans and pushing them to impeach President Joe Biden. Trump, who has argued that the impeachments against him were merely Democrats playing politics to hurt him politically. Trump, who has argued that the indictments against him

were directed by Biden in order to hurt him politically. I did everything right and they indicted me. Right. It turns out that Trump has been meeting with Republicans behind closed doors and saying, please impeach him for me. Please do it. Politico reporting Trump privately discussed Biden impeachment with House Republicans. The former president talked with House Republican conference chair Elise Stefanik on Tuesday. Trump has been speaking to many Republicans about this. Two sources spoke Tuesday after House Speaker Kevin McCarthy.

I'm sorry. Trump and Stefanik spoke Tuesday after McCarthy announced that they were going to pursue this inquiry. Trump on Sunday had dinner with Marjorie Taylor Greene. The topic of impeachment came up. A Trump spokesperson didn't comment. The former president has not been shy about his belief that Biden should be impeached. Last month, he wrote on Truth Social, either impeach the bum

or fade into oblivion. They did it to us. Trump is asking for the impeachment of his political opponent. This is exactly how could he he would never do the thing he criticized Biden of doing, would he? Oh, right. That's how they operate. It is projection, projection, projection. We know that Trump is actually confessing when he makes these unhinged allegations against others.

When someone tells you what they will do, you should listen to them. I'm impeached. So you need to impeach him for what? I don't care. Find something corruption or getting me impeached or getting me indicted. But, sir, we don't have any evidence of that. I don't care. Now, I am not alleging, nor do I believe that Trump encouraging Republicans to impeach Biden is criminal. I just have seen no legal opinion that that's the case. But it is just a reminder that when they start loudly screaming, hey, Democrats are doing this thing, we should really consider

whether it is Republicans and Trump specifically that are doing the thing now in some theoretical sense, I'm willing to keep an open mind if they do an impeachment inquiry and they actually find the evidence against Joe Biden. Will it have been a fishing expedition? Yes. I guess you could say the ends justify the means if they find such evidence, although I would be shocked if that were to happen. But it is so brazen and so obvious and so clear to anyone who's paying attention that now we are seeing a politically motivated impeachment inquiry. The impeachments against Trump, number one and two, were based in fact, fact that was

plain as day before they started the process. They didn't start the process to find the evidence. They had the evidence. So they started the process. It's the exact same thing with the investigations that have now led to four criminal charges, as well as the fraud lawsuit against Trump's business in New York. But they operate differently. They are doing that which they claim Democrats are doing.

Are we shocked that Trump is involved? Of course not. Do I think at the end of the day it will make a difference and that it will help them find the evidence they so desperately want? No. Will they actually come forward and say, hey, you know what? We looked into it. There's nothing there.

Of course not. If they find no evidence, their conclusion will be they've done a really good job of hiding the evidence. The lack of evidence is part of the cover up, which is a classic conspiracy theorist line. That's my prediction. Let me know what you think. Speaker 1 clothes really look brand new. I love laundry sauce because they smell so much better than the stuff you get from the grocery store. You know, the usual suspects you get at the store. There's a weird, cheap, chemically type of smell. All of the different scents from laundry sauce have a luxurious, smooth, natural scent, not too strong. You can especially tell when your clothes are coming right out of the dryer.

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notes. OBGYNs are predictably fleeing red states over the insane oppressive abortion laws that have been passed. This was completely predictable when Roe v. Wade was overturned. And as we see the continuing effort from the religious right, the MAGA right, the extreme right to ban and even in some cases criminalize elements or all of abortion. The New York Times is a very good piece about this. It's called as abortion laws drive obstetricians from red states. Maternity care suffers. Some doctors who handle high risk pregnancies are fleeing restrictive abortion laws.

Idaho has been particularly hard hit. This shouldn't surprise any of us. This is the predictable outcome, which is that health care will become even worse in these red states as they make abortions increasingly difficult to obtain. One by one, the article reads doctors who handle high risk pregnancies are disappearing from Idaho, part of a wave of obstetricians fleeing restrictive abortion laws in a hostile state legislature. Dr. Caitlin Gustafson, a family doctor who also delivers babies in the tiny mountain town of McCall, is among those left

behind facing a lonely and uncertain future. And you can read through the article and see examples of everything. You can see examples of E.R. doctors who are worried. If I have a pregnant woman come in for a different issue, I now need to be careful. This is now not specific to Ohio, but more generally, I need to be careful about the emergency treatment I provide, because if it were to induce a miscarriage, there could be legal consequences for me as a doctor. Obviously, this goes beyond this specifically into abortion services.

What you have is a situation where Republicans, they're not saying this, but they are acting in a way which suggests they are trying to figure out how do we make constituents health care worse and how do we drive up infant mortality and maternal mortality? This is the path. Had they gotten together five years ago and said, what could we do to raise infant mortality and to make health care less accessible? Well, let's overturn Roe v.

Wade. Let's then pass outrageous, insane abortion restrictions. And then let's even look at criminalizing aspects of medical care provided by doctors, OBGYNs, ER doctors, et cetera. This actually goes well beyond abortion rights now. That's that's the reality. This is about comprehensive maternal health states pushing these aggressive restrictions where prenatal care is affected, childbirth, postnatal care. All of it suffers. And the result is going to be pregnancy is riskier for the mothers. Pregnancy is riskier for the babies, particularly during high risk pregnancies. And what is also I mean, listen, I know Republicans don't care about this.

I'm mentioning it to you because I imagine you will care. Republicans don't care. All of these restrictions will disproportionately affect. Do I even have to complete the sentence? We all know these restrictions will disproportionately affect marginalized communities that already struggle getting access to health care, leaving them with even fewer resources. Wealthier people can travel to other states for some of these services, assuming there are states nearby that will provide them and provide them in a safe way.

Wealthier people can. I mean, listen, you know, look at Argentina, my birth country. Abortion was illegal for so long. Anyone with any means was able to get what they needed from private clinics. It's the same story, right? We know who is disproportionately affected by this. And this is why it's so dangerous to politicize women's health beyond the abortion debate. We really need to be guaranteeing quality maternal care to all and quality care of all kinds to everybody. It really should be seen as a fundamental right. We're not even ready to have that conversation because we're several layers short because we have this disastrous situation with

OBGYNs just fleeing. We will, of course, continue following it. I am not optimistic that it's going to get better anytime soon, short of codifying some aspects of this at the federal level, which does not seem likely to pass with a Republican House of Representatives. Maybe that will change in November of 2024. And certainly as we see right wing governors and right wing legislatures at the state level, they made it a state issue the way they wanted. What's happening at the state level is a disgusting disaster. So I'm not optimistic on this one, but I will keep you apprised of what happens. Humiliatingly, Lauren Boebert was kicked out of a theater for vaping and screaming and causing a disturbance. We've said before about the Trump family.

Money really doesn't buy class. And if you look at the gold plated everything in Trump's apartments, you realize that if you look at Trump's bathroom stacked to the ceiling with boxes of duck, You all know it. OK, I don't know that Lauren Boebert is particularly wealthy, but I think the point here would be even being elected as one of 435 members of Congress and getting a seat in one of the most sort of privileged legislative bodies of the United States. It also doesn't get you class. And her behavior is just so vile and disgusting.

A video shows Lauren Boebert storming out of a theater after Beetlejuice ejection. The controversial congresswoman was accused of vaping, recording and audibly singing along during the show. We have video of this. This is the crazy thing. She's initially asked to leave. I'm going to show you a few different moments from this video and I'll describe it for people that are watching. The video was obtained by nine news. At this point, you see an usher speaking to Lauren Boebert. Here she is standing up. She's second in from the aisle. She and the guy she's with, I guess, ultimately get up. Here is Lauren Boebert asked to leave its night vision because presumably it's relatively

dark in the theater. The show was going on and she starts to walk away. You then see from another camera that she comes out. This is now fully lit video from 9 News in the city of Denver. Denver outcomes, Lauren Boebert speculation that she was inebriated. I certainly can't make that call from watching this video and the way that she's walking. I just don't know. She walks out and leaves the immediate room. Later on in the video, you actually see her arguing with people as she walks by further

making her way. How humiliating is this? Nearly 40 year old congresswoman getting kicked out for vaping and screaming and acting like a moron. She's furious and she's walking out. You then see a little bit later as she it's just amazing cameras outside of the venue show her making a walk of shame of sorts as the theater is still going on, conversing with this guy. These truly are children. These truly are children. So listen, this is not merely a make fun of Lauren Boebert clip.

There's two points here. Number one, this is a reminder. The people that Republicans are willing to elect to public office have no business being there. We sort of figured this out when they selected Trump as their nominee and then made him president in 2016. We sort of figured this out when they elected Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert. But this is just a reminder. These folks really have no business in public office. Their behavior in general is just humiliating and

embarrassing. But I also want to remind you that Lauren Boebert has an opponent and Adam Frisch almost defeated Lauren Boebert in twenty twenty two. And he's running again. And if you vote in this district, make sure that this is an election you participate in. You can go to Adam for Colorado dot com to learn more about Adam Frisch. There is another option here, and I hope that voters in Colorado will avail themselves of it. Embarrassing, humiliating, pathetic. This is where the MAGA Republican Party is today. One of our sponsors today is Magic Spoon, the breakfast cereal with the crunchy, sweet goodness you love,

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pixels and emails, which companies and hackers can use to track you. You can create unlimited email aliases to protect your identity and cut down on spam. You can encrypt every email you The David Pakman Show David Pakman dot com. slash Pacman to get 50 percent off your first year. That's only about two bucks a month. That's S.T.A.R.T. mail dot com slash Pacman for 50 percent off. The link is in the podcast notes. Today, we're going to be speaking with Clancy Martin, who's a writer and philosophy professor whose latest book is a memoir about his multiple suicide attempts. How not to kill yourself, a portrait of the suicidal mind. Clancy, it's it's so great to have you on. And I mean, you know, this book, it's such a well, you tell me it seems like such a personal and sensitive experience. What was the thought process behind deciding to write about this?

How it happened was some years ago, a magazine had contacted me and they wanted a long form memoir and I wasn't sure what to write about. And I so I said, how about a kind of contemporary one flew over the cuckoo's nest? And as I was writing it, working with that editor, someone dear to him attempted suicide. And he said to me, you know, I notice every time you've been in the psychiatric hospital, it's because you've tried to kill it, take your own life. And I said, yeah, that's true. And he said, so I wonder if you could focus on that. So I wrote that piece and it went up on Huffington Post and it kind of went viral and then I had people emailing me from all over the world saying I was googling how to kill myself and I read your piece and I changed my mind and then I was like okay that was just that

piece is just a little snapshot of my actual experience with suicide. So I thought I had this opportunity and also honestly kind of this obligation to tell the whole story. You talk in the book about how suicide attempts are often the sort of culmination of longstanding issues or a sort of building life circumstance of sorts. Can can you talk about that a little bit? Yeah, I mean. I think that one of the myths of suicide is that a suicide is like a very impulsive thing. And then, you know, someone maybe makes an attempt, hopefully survives, and then, you know, goes on with their life. And that's really not the way it works.

Most people who make suicide attempts are suffering from chronic suicidal ideation. They're thinking about suicide a lot. The World Health Organization estimates that 10% of the world population suffers from some form of chronic suicidal ideation. So we're talking about, you know, somewhere around 700 million people around the world. And then what happens is, you know, someone's thinking about suicide a lot. They have this habit of thinking about suicide it's part of their structure of their belief and then events start building up and you start and your your vision of your options gets narrower and narrower and narrower and then you think this is the only decision that you can make and um so in my own life for example when I was in the luxury jewelry business for a long time it's just like every day being in business was unhappier than the day before.

And I got to this point where, you know, every morning, part of my morning ritual was going into the bathroom and taking the gun that I had at that time and putting it in my mouth every morning after morning. And this happens kind of thing is happening with all kinds of people from every walk of life. And so we need to well, we need to be having conversations like this so that people who are struggling with this kind of ideation realize they're not alone. That alone is a huge step forward. There's sometimes in media reports

after the suicide of a known or well-known person or even not sometimes just even when it's not a well-known person. There's these stories that come forward like you never would have guessed. I had no idea this came out of nowhere. If we put aside for a second what you're saying about frequently the thought goes on for a long time, focusing in on the idea of concealing the ideation or even as you've talked about the attempts from people in your life. Talk about that a little bit. Yeah. You know, all of us, of course, have all these masks that we wear. You have your mask as a parent, your mask is a friend, your mask. And and you try to you're trying to integrate these things to be the sort of maximally authentic you but that's just the nature of human society

that we have all these different roles and one of the roles that a lot of people particularly and I think in here in America we feel the need to play is kind of the role of the happy successful person who's managing dealing with life and everything and one of the role of the happy, successful person who's managing, dealing with life and everything. And one of the problems with that, particularly if you're struggling with depression and anxiety, is it makes it very difficult for you to be honest with other people about how you're feeling. And the one thing that we know that is a guaranteed medicine for thinking about suicide and for avoiding a suicide attempt

is talking to another human being about it and so um we have to if we're worried about someone we have to remember you know just always reach out always say hey you know what's going on with you you know let's like just talk as normal people. You seem like you're, you seem really stressed out or whatever it happens to be. And if you're struggling yourself, I beg of you, try to reach out to someone. I know there one time, not so long ago, I was going through a really rough period and I felt like I couldn't talk to anyone around me. And I texted my roofer guy who was working on my roof just because he seemed like a good guy and said, man, I'm having a really lousy day. How's your day going? And this guy, without knowing what he was doing, he talked to me off the ledge.

Literally. Wow. You know, there I I've spoken to many people and I've had thoughts myself that relate more to the fragility of life than to suicidal ideation. I'll give you some examples. So you're driving on a non divided highway, right, where there's oncoming traffic in the next lane over and you have a realization that I could just turn the wheel. It's such a small it's an inch of hand motion and could end up losing my life or taking someone's life that's driving in the opposite direction or waiting in the New York City subway and realizing I could just step in front of this train right now. And I think that there are many in the mental health field who say these are intrusive thoughts. They don't necessarily relate to actual suicidal ideation, but it's good to recognize And I think that there are many in the mental health field who say these are intrusive thoughts.

They don't necessarily relate to actual suicidal ideation, but it's good to recognize when these are going on. Can you talk about is there a clear dividing line between those types of thoughts and whatever we might think of as this next level of ideation that you experienced? I think there are I think it's really important to recognize what you've pointed out that these thoughts that we think of as intrusive thoughts occur on a spectrum. So the spectrum starts with something like intrusive thoughts, and then those thoughts might be get more and more intrusive, might seem more and more appealing. And then the stage we get most worried about is when people start actually planning um based on those thoughts and it's it is indeed a spectrum and but the the reason what

you said is so wise and why it's such an excellent question is that for people who are wrestling with this they should know that everybody as you say has these kinds of thoughts pop into their head. Or there are very few people who don't. I have spoken to people who say they've never even had that kind of thought pop into their head, but I think they're few and far between. And the key to this, once you recognize that those thoughts are just thoughts is being able rather than um rebelling against those thoughts or fearing those thoughts or letting those thoughts control you just being able to recognize that they're thoughts like any other thought you know and you have all these crazy thoughts as a human being that you don't act on and you don't have to act on this one either and if you can

even if you have chronic suicidal ideation and you think about it all the time, you can start to change your relationship with that thinking by rather than trying to push the thought away or by moving in the direction of the thought, just recognizing it as a thought, maybe even embracing it and caring for it as a thought saying, yeah, I'm going to I'm going to take care of this little scary thought and then letting it go. That's that's that's very interesting. So in the same way, I don't know if you're saying this, but in the same way that someone who lives in the US might say, you know, I could go to the Philippines and just like start over. I could just abandon everything I know and just like move to the Philippines. OK, now I'm going to go on with my day and I'm going to go pick up my kid and get groceries and you don't act on it in the same way the I could very easily just step in front of the subway. It doesn't have

to necessarily be considered a special category of thought. Exactly right. Yeah. One hundred percent exactly right. Philosophy has many different things to say about suicide. And depending on, you know, what you read and from what era, from what source, et cetera, you can find a lot of different opinions or philosophizing about that idea. In preparing for this interview, I came across some pieces that maybe suggest or believe that a philosopher might in some way be, I don't know if better insulated from from more serious suicidal ideation, but that philosophy in some way might have a protective element to it. Can you weigh in on that at all?

I think it's true. You know, I wondered about that before I was writing this book. And then I spent, you know, a couple of years, just literally a couple of years reading everything that every philosopher in the Western and Eastern traditions has ever had to say about suicide. And slowly but surely, my own attitudes towards my own suicidal ideation, I could feel them shifting. And the reason they were shifting, I think, is that these arguments, like, for example, the argument that your life is not entirely your own, but belongs to a lot of other people around you. You know, in the book, I say taking your own life is sort of like burning down your house without recognizing that there are a whole bunch of other people living in the house with you. And this is a classic argument from the philosophers or Seneca's classic argument that comes.

He's a Stoic and comes from the Stoics that the door is always open. You're always free to do this. So you don't have to do it today. You can just wait a day. You do it tomorrow. And I always use this argument when people come to me in crisis every time. Just wait a day. The door is always open. They actually really do work. It's a little surprising to me because as professional philosophers, you know, this is my business. We often start to kind of worry. Does philosophy bake any bread? Does it actually do anything

in the world? But you know what it does? It can save lives. When you talked about the incorrect notion of the impulsivity of the attempt, that often it's the end result of a cumulative whatever, many different things that go on. There are stories of someone who pulls a trigger or jumps or whatever, where instantly they know they regret it. Talk a little bit about that contrast between the long cumulative lead up and the instant regret. Yeah, I think that one of the interesting things, you know, there's this famous story about this guy who jumped off the Golden Gate Bridge.

And as soon as he jumped, he thought to himself, I realized in that moment that everything in my life was totally fixable, except for the fact of my having jumped off this bridge, you know, and happily he survived and went on to talk about it. And there are lots of these stories. And I have experienced that myself. I think it's also important to remember that a person who's made an attempt is not necessarily going to feel that way, especially right after, let's say, she wakes up in the hospital from her attempt. So another friend of mine, famous scholar of ancient languages, you know, when he made his attempt, he woke up in the hospital and he was absolute, as he put it,

absolutely gutted. He was just miserable that he had had survived and I've had that experience as well I think that we when you're making when you're thinking about making an attempt you're very often thinking that like okay there's this only you're you're thinking is that the blinders have become so narrow and the weight and the pain have become so oppressive that you start to think there's only one way out the only way out is to take my own life and then when you make the attempt suddenly something in your mind hopefully if you if you're lucky, you realize, wait, no, that just wasn't true. You know, that thinking was confused. And hopefully, again, if you survive the attempt, you will come around to seeing, as many people do, do that no that was a confused way of thinking that was just brought on by severe pain and um

a kind of a kind of paradoxical thinking that the fact that you're willing to kill yourself is proof that you actually ought to be you you actually ought to do it because because you're such a bad person who would conceive of this in the first place you feel that way and that's totally confused um so there are a few things that people are feeling this way need to try to remember that like just do anything to lighten the pressure a little bit do anything to open the blinders a little bit do anything to ease the pain a little bit and that these can be very simple things taking a walk almost always will help talking to a friend almost always will help. Talking to a friend almost always will help. If, you know, a friend of mine who's had multiple attempts, who's a wonderful on with helping

survivors, Desiree Lestage, her thing was she'd go get a Frappuccino and she could tell she was getting close to the edge. She'd go get herself a Frappuccino. And that's what helped her. For me, at a certain stage of my life going to get a nice a 99 cent ice cream cone from mcdonald's could could literally save my life so people should uh people who are at risk in particular should recognize those things also very crucially and quickly they should not have a gun in the house or if they do keep a gun in the house and they're committed to it when they can see they're getting into a troubled headspace, they should give the gun to a friend or, you know, somehow or other, get that gun away from themselves.

That was actually the next thing I plan to ask about, which is there are different it's it's weird to call it a success rate, but there are different success rates for suicide attempts based on what tools or methods one attempts to employ. And very high at the top of the list is, of course, guns. Can you talk a little bit? I mean, you've already said if you have a gun or have access to one, you should recognize when you're at a certain place and remove access to yourself from that firearm may be're at a certain place and remove access to yourself from that firearm may be difficult for some people to do. Can you talk a little bit about the role of firearms here? Speaker 3

Yeah. I mean, there is a direct correlation between people's access to firearms and death by suicide. And particularly in those states with high rates of gun ownership, consistently, we have higher rates of death by suicide. It's just one of the very clear statistics on suicide. So what we know is, and they've been they've been you know this is people are working on this what we know is it will help even a little bit if you have a gun safe in the house just that much making it a little bit harder to get to your gun is better now i tell everyone that the many many people who come to me to talk about when they're on the brink of making an attempt, I tell them, you know, you really need to just do me a favor

and go give that gun to a friend for a little while, it doesn't matter who it is, and actually physically get it out of the house. But as you say, for some people, depending upon their profession, that may be impossible. or it may also be that their beliefs about gun ownership are just so strong that they really are not willing to do that yeah so so then at a minimum get a gun safe lock that sucker up and you could also you know you since you can recognize that people depend on you and love you and you can feel like okay i'm getting into this risky situation you could um ask someone to change the combination on the gun safe for you for a while right they're trying this out in states right now and it's working it's it's lowering

the rates of of death by um gun in those states we what a lot of people don't realize is the vast majority of death by gun in this country is not someone killing someone else. It's someone killing themselves. Excellent, excellent advice and practical and easy, easy to apply. The book is How Not to Kill Yourself, a portrait of the suicidal mind. And we've been speaking with the book's author, Clancy Martin, who's a writer and philosophy professor. Really appreciate your time, your insights and sharing your story. David, I can't thank you enough for your show and for addressing this topic, which the one thing we know for certain is that when people address this topic in the media in an informed, thoughtful way like this, suicide rates go down.

So you're actually saving lives just by doing this show. Fox News host Sean Hannity is begging Robert F. Kennedy Jr. What about running as a third party, which Sean Hannity cynically knows is likely to help Donald Trump get elected? Although Bobby Kennedy Jr. has plenty of MAGA people that like him. So we'll talk about what that would look like. But let's take a look at this. As many of you know, if you've been watching this week, the strong challenge to Joe Biden

presented by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has basically evaporated by 40 percent. At one point, Bobby Kennedy Jr. polling about 20 percent in the Democratic primary, now down to 12 or even 11 and change. So the campaign's not going particularly well. Bobby Kennedy Jr. appeared last night with Sean Hannity and Hannity insists multiple times. What about maybe running third party? You know, the Democratic Party's being very unfair to you. What about running third party? Take a listen. Your campaign manager, Dennis Kucinich actually said the following in a letter to the DNC that they created a class, unfortunately a pledge delegates called party leaders, elected

officials, essentially the same as super delegates due to the amount of control the party XS exercises over elected officials. Um, basically saying you can't get a fair shake, that the deck is stacked against you. Joe Biden already pulled out of Iowa, pulled out of New Hampshire because he thinks he'd do better starting in South Carolina. You know, if you're not going to get a fair shot with the Democratic Party and you're not getting even a fair shot in the mainstream media, you are very complimentary of Fox. We appreciate it, and you're not getting even a fair shot in the mainstream media. You were very complimentary of Fox. We appreciate it, that we're being fair

and we give you a voice. My question to you is, why stay with the Democratic Party? Would you consider third party? Would you consider the no-labels party? Or any party? Well, right now, I'm still, we're still, we're still arguing with the DNC and trying to get them to hold actually a fair election.

As you pointed out, they have disenfranchised now all of the voters, essentially, in Iowa and New Hampshire, the states in which President Biden ran forth the last time around. So they're punishing the states that did not vote for President Biden the last time by basically disenfranchising the voters, making it so that if you live in New Hampshire, you cannot vote for anybody but President Biden this time around. They're trying to do something else,

which I think is much more alarming, which is they're trying to pass a rule. They're debating right now to pass a rule, and it's're trying to pass a rule. They're debating right now to pass a rule, and it's almost certain to pass. That voters in Georgia will be disenfranchised. The music. If they vote for any of the, if they vote for me or for Marianne Williamson.

Well, let me ask you that. Would you consider another, will you consider running on another party ticket? Well, you know, right now I'm focused on trying to run as a Democrat. This is my home. This is the place I grew up. They don't seem very friendly to you. I'm hoping to make the Democratic Party work.

When Sean Hannity's nicer to you than they are, you got a problem. You would agree with that? I did not treat you fairly. Why stay with them? If they, I did not treat you fairly. Why? Why? Why stay with them? If they're not going to treat you fairly, why? Well, I'm hoping that they will.

I'm hoping that they will at least allow a fair vote in the states outside of New Hampshire and Iowa. All right. So listen, the Hannity is a Hannity is cynically assuming that if Bobby Kennedy Jr. runs third party, he pulls more votes from Biden than from Trump and therefore helps Donald Trump win. It's the reverse scenario of the Trump third party scenario. I've explained before the math is relatively straightforward with Trump. If DeSantis were somehow to win this nomination, seems unlikely at this point, but imagine that it were to happen if DeSantis somehow wins the nomination

and Trump says, I'm furious, I'm going to run third party, you know, sore loser laws aside, whatever. Imagine Trump gets on the ballot in enough states. If only a fraction of the typical Republican voter says, hey, you know what, instead of DeSantis, who's the actual nominee, I'm going to go with Trump. If only a fraction of them do that, it could throw so many states that would otherwise be close to Joe Biden. Now Hannity's assumption here is that the same would happen in reverse if Bobby Kennedy Jr. were to run third party.

Oh, Trump versus Biden going to be very close in a lot of states. Imagine that in Florida or maybe a better example would be like Arizona, Arizona. Biden might win by three, except if Bobby Kennedy Jr. runs and the people who support him are mostly Democrats say, hey, five percent of us are going to go from Biden to Bobby Kennedy. It pulls just enough support for Trump to win. It is possibly true that that would happen. The one counterpoint to this is that even though Bobby Kennedy Jr. is nominally running as a Democrat and it's true that he comes from a historically Democratic family and

all of it, that is all absolutely true. Bobby Kennedy Jr. is interesting to a relatively high number of MAGA people who love the anti-vax, but don't necessarily love Trump's bluster. And so I think it's probably still the case that Bobby Kennedy third party helps Trump slightly more than it would help Biden. But we shouldn't understate the number of Maga people who actually like Bobby Kennedy. And as we know, he's being supported by some major Republican donors. And even though he is nominally a Democrat, there is a significant amount of Maga and

Republican support that makes up his contention constituents. So we know why Hannity is doing it. He's cynically encouraging third party because he thinks it helps Trump. That may indeed be the case, but it may be by a closer margin than we thought. The failed former president exploded in the middle of the night on Truth Social once again. Central the weight of facing life in prison from a variety of charges in four different criminal indictments is really getting to him. And I think it's important as we get closer to the end of the show here, we've talked about the

impeachment of Joe Biden. We've talked about the absurdity of many of the Republicans who have no evidence justifying that we've gone through all of the last 24 hours. The last element, the final element to the last 24 hours is that Donald Trump continues to exist in a world where he is a legend, a legend in his own mind, and is just unable to handle what is going on in the real world, including the fact that Joe Biden is actually being president and is getting some things done, including this Iran negotiated agreement we talked about yesterday and that Trump truly is facing life in prison. Trump posting in the middle of the night, quote, DeSanctimonious poll numbers are crashing. Is it that he is a not very skilled politician or perhaps is not so long ago fight against farmer Social Security and

Medicare? Or maybe it's the lack of loyalty to the man who took the DeSanctis failing campaign. Perhaps is not so long ago fight against farmer Social Security and Medicare. Or maybe it's the lack of loyalty to the man who took the dissent dis failing campaign and through a strong endorsement got him elected. Whatever it is, few have ever witnessed a drop so fast and so severe. It's a beautiful thing, isn't it? Now, this is sort of weird because there's really nothing going on with the Santas's polls over the last month. DeSantis did lose about half of his support. DeSantis was at nearly thirty one in January.

He's now at 14. He's lost more than half of his support, but it's basically been unchanged for the last month. There's no new data, reliable data that would tell us why all of a sudden Trump's talking about DeSantis polling in the middle of the night on September 13th. I just don't know. Trump continuing, quote, It's all happening even worse than anyone projected. President Vladimir Putin of Russia is using crooked Joe Biden's illegal banana republic style treatment of his political opponent, who is beating him badly in the polls to condemn America and all of the good things that one stood for. By the way, if you struggle to follow the subjects and objects of Trump's sentences,

you're not alone. Grammatically, this is just a mess. Trump continuing the whole world is watching as the USA is being torn apart by dreams of election interference. None of that makes sense. But Trump continuing the post 9 11 freak out on Joe Biden, Trump engaging caps lock and posting, quote, a big lie. Crooked Joe just said he was in New York City on September 12. One day after the fall of the World Trade Center, this was immediately proven to be

not so a total lie. Like everything else, he says he even went into a big deal about the horrors he saw while there, how tragic a sight it was. Remember, he wasn't there. Trump clearly not well at all. And then on the new Iran negotiations, which we discussed yesterday, Trump just furious, saying, quote, So let's get this straight. We did a hostage trade with Iran. We gave them five very tough, smart people that they desperately wanted. We likewise

got back five people, but we also gave them six billion dollars. How much of a kickback does crooked Joe Biden get? Does anyone realize how much money six billion dollars is? When I was president, I got back 58 hostages for zero money. Remember Pastor Brunson? It sets a terrible precedent. Republicans call out the 25th Amendment. Now Biden is incompetent. Now I will be the

first to tell you and to admit that there is much to discuss about the deal that Joe Biden was able to put together to get these five detained citizens back. I didn't hide from you that there is a perspective that should be listened to, which says if Iran learns we'll get rewarded if we have these detainees and then negotiate for them for their release. Why wouldn't they do it again? I mean, this is not unique. It's not unique to Iran.

It's not unique to Joe Biden. It's not a unique situation on humanitarian grounds. The deal seems to make a lot of sense. But the idea that Trump is just furious that Biden is doing anything, getting anything done. And of course, by the way, Trump demanding the 25th Amendment be used to strip Biden of his powers is really rich, given the extensive concerns during Trump's entire presidency, including in particular surrounding the time that Trump took his so-called cognitive test where he had to draw a tiger and recognize what time it was on an analog clock. It's particularly rich that Trump is bringing up the 25th Amendment when it really makes

extraordinarily little sense. This guy is on the edge. And my concern is, listen, whatever happens to Trump is going to happen to Trump. He's got four criminal trials. We don't know. He may end up in prison. He may not. It's very much unclear.

The concern now is how do we pull the cultists out of the cult? Because what we don't want is Trump getting indicted or Trump losing the general election or even losing the primary, as unlikely as that seems. We don't want that happening. And then the magas go crazy and become violent in the streets. Again, we need some nonviolent, non traumatic way of deprogramming these people. The best sort of hypothesis that we've gotten about how that might happen is that Trump is supplanted with someone else that the cultists can transition their support to.

The only problem or potentially scary thing about that, of course, is that it might be an even more extreme and dangerous person. When cult leaders are replaced. It's often by an even crazier person. And that should, quite frankly, scare every single one of us. Let me know what you expect to happen. Make sure you're subscribed on YouTube. We will be here through and beyond the 2024 election covering every aspect of this, as well as global reaction to what is happening in the United States. And for those of you who have been following that, it is not pretty. It is not pretty. We have a voicemail number. That number is two one nine two. David P. I submit to you a new caller to the show.

A great grandmother. I believe this may instantly be one of the best callers we have. Listen to this delightful phone call. David Pakman, you are awesome. I am a 77 year old great grandmother and I do not miss your show under any circumstances. Thank you. Keep up the good work. You're very informative. You're very balanced and fair.

And I love your show. And my name is Linda. And I live in Oregon. Thank you very much. Linda from Oregon. Thank you for the call. I absolutely love that. There are actually quite a few great grandparents in the audience. I hear from them more grandparents than great grandparents, admittedly. But we have no shortage of great grandparents in the audience. All are welcome. That's for sure. We have such a great bonus show for you today. The Elon Musk refusal to have Starlink support a Ukrainian attack in Crimea is raising questions for the Pentagon. We're going to discuss this in detail on the bonus show. Secondly, there is now a bipartisan push to ban deceptive AI generated ads in American

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according to new polling. This is relevant in the context of Joe Biden, Donald Trump. What's going on with Mitch McConnell, Dianne Feinstein and many others? We will discuss the concept of an age limit. Would you need a constitutional amendment to do it? Because it is not currently a requirement. There's a minimum age outlined for president. There is no maximum age. So how do you even do it legally? And would it be the right thing to do? All of those stories. When producer Pat joins me on today's bonus show, the bonus show where you want to make money, everybody else that makes money to fund themselves is bad. Well, we make

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