The David Pakman Show - 9/8/23: Bret Weinstein goes full conspiracy, Trump launches insane attack

Episode Date: September 8, 2023

-- On the Show: -- Bret and Heather Weinstein of the Dark Horse Podcast go full conspiracy mode about COVID tests and "secret" vaccines for Joe and Jill Biden -- Failed former President Donald Trump launches an outrageous attack on Special Prosecutor Jack Smith after Smith raises concerns of jury tampering -- Caller asks why right-wingers care so much about birth rates -- Caller talks about the "Think Like a Detective" book sales -- Caller discusses Vivek Ramaswamy's campaign and the availability of botox -- Caller asks how to deprogram people from right-wing propaganda -- Caller talks about getting money out of politics -- Caller asks why right-wingers care so much about Hunter Biden but not about the Trump family -- The Friday Feedback segment -- On the Bonus Show: Trump illegally selling mugshot, Vivek Ramaswamy collapses on Mehdi Hasan's show, and much more... 🔊 Babbel: Get 55% off your subscription at https://babbel.com/pakman 💻 Psono: Get the world’s best password manager fo businesses at https://psono.com 😁 Zippix Toothpicks: Code PAKMAN10 saves you 10% at https://zippixtoothpicks.com 🌎 Bank with Atmos to fight climate change! Open an account at https://joinatmos.com/pakman 🪒 Henson Shaving: Use code PAKMAN for FREE blades at https://hensonshaving.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

I've received a few emails over the last couple of days, especially this morning and last night, about a new clip from Brett and Heather Weinstein, or I guess it's Brett Weinstein and Heather Haying. I think they have different last names. They're Dark Horse podcast and folks asking me to weigh in about this and a little bit more generally about Brett. Listen, historically, I've liked Brett Weinstein and thought he had a lot of interesting things to say and actually asked interesting questions, not bad faith questions. You know how sometimes where it's like, uh, this man says he had sex with Obama, but CNN won't cover it.

Why not? Asks Tucker Carlson. And it's like a completely bad faith question about a debunked, uh, convicted con man. Okay. We dealt with that earlier this week. Sometimes people ask questions in bad faith. Some years ago, I thought that Brett Weinstein was actually asking some really interesting questions about different things, even if I didn't agree with the direction that that things were going as he explored the answers to those questions. Some of the recent stuff is a combination of everybody is against me, like Twitter and YouTube and all the mysterious

things are happening. Searches I didn't do are popping up on my laptop like just really paranoid stuff. And listen, just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't after you, but just really out there stuff. And then now coming up with some covid vaccine and test claims for which there's just no evidence. And again, I don't have a problem with asking questions. But at a certain point, when we have zero evidence to just say, well, I'm just asking questions and the fact that we don't have answers is part of the conspiracy is problematic. What am I talking about? Here's the first clip. Brett and Heather are

talking about covid tests. And Brett raises the idea that the tests are deliberately unreliable so that if you want to say there's tons of cases for political gain, you can. And if you want to say there's very few cases for political gain, you can. I believe that that's the point he's making. I'm going to play it for you now. Is it possible that really noisy COVID tests are a feature and not a bug because it allows you to claim anything at any moment. Right. And is that, you know, I, I do think I have a sense of foreboding around the upcoming 14 months that the U S presidential election is, uh, going to create a, um,

a fertile landscape for psychological operations of many kinds. We're going to have many claims of misdice and malinformation over presumably true things will be dismissed, false things will be portrayed, all of the usual stuff. And the ability to have a viral boogeyman that you can call forth at any moment by declaring that some set of illness is this thing may be the reason that the tests aren't any good. Because if you could just simply go to CVS and buy a test that was reliable enough that it really gave you a confidence that you either did or didn't have the thing, then we'd be in a very different place because we would actually be able to generate information about what is or isn't circulating.

So listen, Brett's not wrong that the tests have been all over the place. I've told stories. I mean, just look at my stories alone. When I went to Spain in 2021, when you needed a negative test to come back. We got these tests, my girlfriend and I, where you do a video conference and they watch you test yourself. And then with that, you get a certificate saying you're good to come back. And my girlfriend got two consecutive positive tests. And we said, this is crazy. We eventually scrambled on a Monday Catholic holiday in Spain to get a PCR test at an ER. It was negative.

Months later, we found out those tests we had were defective. There was a huge number of that particular test. It was the Illume, I believe. They were just straight up defective. They would say positive when you weren't. It almost prevented us from coming back to the United States. Other situations. My sister and stepmom both got COVID same day at the same thing, same symptoms, same trajectory. One of them never tested positive.

They obviously had the same thing. Why was that? I don't know. But so I'm with Brett that these tests aren't perfect. There's really weird things. As the variants change. Their effectiveness seems to change as well. But these are wild claims with no evidence of some kind of apparently Democratic Party

conspiracy to use deliberately unreliable tests that they, I guess, had some role in putting out there in order to control or impact who wins the 2024 election. There's just no evidence of that. Present evidence and I will consider the claims. But at a certain point, we have to demand evidence. And the answer can't simply be part of the conspiracy is covering up the evidence. We're not going to get anywhere with that.

Here's another doozy from Brett and Heather, which is that I guess he's saying Jill and Joe Biden got a different vaccine than we got or no vaccine at all. I don't really know. Take a look. I do not trust that Jill Biden or Joe Biden got the same vaccinations as citizens. Right. So. So again, what did Jill Biden and Joe Biden get? Did they not really get a vaccine? Is that the conspiracy that the vaccine is too dangerous for people like them to get it? So the dangerous vaccine is for us, but not for them. Or did they get a different, better vaccine that's like more effective in some way or safer as far as and why? Who made it and why would they get that? And why wouldn't everybody get it? Is it too expensive for the vaccine? That's good or that you have to at some point present some evidence. And that's the problem I'm having with the degree to which Brett is,

quote, just asking questions. Questions are fine. but at a certain point you can't lack any answer forever because they are covering it up or don't want you to know. We need to have some factual basis to make these claims. I'm not seeing it. And I know it. I know that talking about Brett Weinstein is like when you talk about Jordan Peterson. Oh, David, you're you're deliberately missing. You're either deliberately misinterpreting what he said in order to attack it or you're

not smart enough to understand what he said. OK, if anybody can answer some of these questions as to is there any evidence, send it to me and then I will do a follow up. Donald Trump has launched an insane, unhinged attack on the very prosecutor that is worried that Trump is starting to preemptively tamper with juries by virtue of what he is saying on the internet. This is an extraordinary situation. Special prosecutor Jack Smith put together a court filing and the point of the court

filing was to notify the court that Donald Trump is getting a little bit too loose with some of the things that he's saying and And at a certain point, he may be trying to prejudice the entire jury pool. This is a motion that was given to the court under seal. And Jack Smith wrote, Trump is personally engaging in making, quote, daily extrajudicial statements that threaten to prejudice the jury pool in this case. It's obvious that Trump is doing that. There is no question Trump is trying to tamper with witnesses and he's trying to prejudice the jury pool. Fine. When special prosecutor Jack Smith put out that statement, obviously this is a warning to Trump. If you cross the line into actionable efforts to taint the trial, we are going to try to

have you sanctioned and what the sanctions would be, whether they are financial or pretrial jailing or what. It's not completely clear at this time. How does Trump react? He takes to truth central, sorry, truth social, and he attacks Jack Smith, uh, saying quote is deranged Jack Smith, the prosecutor who is continuously overturned due to his unchecked and insane aggression, investigating the political hacks and thugs of the highly partisan January 6th unselect committee for tampering with deleting

and destroying highly confidential and classified documents, pictures, tapes, evidence, and all forms of other important information. I know it reads like a run on sentence, but I think technically it's not. If not, why? I fully believe it is because the evidence in question destroys his fake election interfering case. Dismiss suit. We couldn't have more dramatically different realities. And one of them is the real world and the other is Trump's Trump's mind in which he is a legend. On the one hand, we have four criminal trials. A fraud lawsuit from Letitia James, the E.

Jean Carroll case in which which Trump was found to be a civilly liable rapist. And I could go back even further. The reality is we have all of this consistent, predictable activity by Donald Trump, much of which he may now be held accountable for. They found enough evidence to charge him. He's been indicted. He will at least in theory face consequences. And every single prosecutor has acted out of an abundance of caution, taken longer than

maybe otherwise would have because they want to dot all their T's and cross their eyes. As Sean Hannity once said, weird when you cross your eyes, but some people do it. They just look when you're famous, they just let you do it. That's the one side, which these are very serious charges, very serious cases, very solid, as many have admitted. On the other hand, you have Trump's world. And Trump's world is, this is all fake. They keep finding things to go after me for merely for political reasons. Even though, yes, OK, I had

this fraud lawsuit and that one and this one. And then I also had to shut down my charity because I was using the money as a personal slush fund and on and on and on. And it's been a completely consistent multi-decade period of Trump doing exactly the same stuff, which rose to criminality once he became president of the United States and then stopped being president of the United States and engaged in allegedly criminal behavior. Those are two very different scenarios. The belief among Trump insiders is that now that at least one of his trial extensions was denied, he wanted to push it to 2026. Judge said, we're going to trial in March of 2023, 2024. The belief among some Trump insiders is he realizes this is getting very serious and

he is now just fully panicking. He will attack anyone. He will abandon anyone. He will cozy up to anyone. Whatever he thinks will be best for him at that time. The next two years, no matter what happens in November of 2024, are truly going to be unprecedented and unique times in American history. Depending on what happens in November of 2024, you could have a situation where you have a

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The primary way that we do what we do and fund our program and pay salaries and health care and all the things workers deserve is through the membership program. So I encourage you to sign up at join Pakman dot com. You can use the coupon code four years for indictments to get yourself a discount. Let's go to the phones at the discord of the David Pakman show, which you can find at David Pakman dot com slash discord. It is free, completely free. And we are going to start today with Ben from San Diego with Ben from San Diego. Ben from San Diego.

Welcome to the David Pakman show. What's on your mind today? What can I do for you? Ben you've got to accept my invitation in order for me to be able to hear you. Please don't start us off on such a sour note. It would be so sad. Hi David, this is Ben. Can you hear me? I can hear you loud and clear, sir. Thank you. I wanted to get your thoughts

on an idea I had, which was related to the Supreme Court. Okay. And my thought is that the sort of the donor class of the conservative right in the U.S. are alarmed by changing demographics. And in addition to fewer people, you know, voting along conservative lines, they may also be concerned about seeing Gen Z and millennials prudently having fewer children. Why would that be a concern to them? Well, I'm thinking that they're concerned about not having a sufficient reserve army of labor for the future. And that that might be a motivation. Ben?

Tony Barrett onto the Supreme Court. Yeah, you sort of blanked out there. It might be a motivation for what? Might be a motivation for the overturning of Roe, among other things. Oh, in other words, overturn Roe, fewer people have abortions, more kids are born. You build more of a labor supply. Yes. Yeah.

I mean, listen, when you talk to some of these right wingers about Social Security, one of the things that they will say is they will just kind of recognize the demographic reality that due to baby boomer retirements and expected continued retirements, there are fewer people working to build the social security trust fund and more and more people receiving benefits. But usually they say that because they want to kill social security. And so the plan that you are talking or privatize it, the, the idea you're talking about would be we want to save Social Security and fix it. Therefore, we want more people born so that they can work. It just runs a little bit counter to what they've said they actually want to see happen with Social Security.

Nevertheless, it is true that the right recognizes that there is a demographic problem for them, but the demographic problem they seem to realize exists is younger and younger voters are less and less likely to vote for Republicans. But what it's led them to do is to try to figure out ways to just steal elections. I think what you're looking at, you're thinking about this very thoughtfully, but I think that they've already figured out their approach, which is make it really difficult to vote in Democratic areas, try to take elections that we actually lost anyway. That seems to be their approach right now. Not, you know, birth a whole bunch of people that then can work and we can convince to vote for us. I just see no evidence that that's what they're doing. I see.

OK, thank you. My pleasure. Great to hear from you. There is Ben. Let's go next to Chloe from Southern California. Chloe, welcome to the David Pakman show. What's on your mind today, Chloe? Chloe, please accept our invitation so that we can hear you. Oh boy. And Chloe, last chance here to appear on the David Pakman show. All right. No Chloe, let's go to rusty in Arizona. Rusty in Arizona.

Welcome to the David Pakman show. Thank you, by the way, Rusty, for being a website member as well. I appreciate that. You, sir, are very welcome. Hey, man, David Pakman. How the heck are you? How's the baby doing? Everybody's good. Thank you.

That's fantastic. So I have a question about your writing career, actually. Please. Now, I've actually was taught to critically think in seventh grade, so I think the book may be wasted on me, but I can't wait for the whole book so I can buy several copies

and leave them in Republican mailboxes. Love it. Love it. But as a member of your Discord, there is something that's come up that may be another avenue for you to publish another book. Have you ever thought about of your discord there is something that's come up that may be another avenue for you to uh publish another book have you ever thought about penning something related to for lack of a better way to

say it personal finance for idiots maybe aimed at the i don't know the upperclassmen in high school because the average person is getting out of high school not knowing anything about how money works. Yeah. And that's how they can kind of get – I see it as a part of how they get preyed on with high-interest student credit cards. You are absolutely correct. You have no idea how they're actually going to pay back. Yeah. So not to mention, probably be a good market for you to get your name – you get another book out there, but it could possibly also do a lot of good as well. Here's the thing that I wanted to throw

out there for you. So here's the deal, Rusty. You're absolutely correct. People are graduating high school with no basic personal finance knowledge. Uh, creating some sort of book, targeting that is a great idea, et cetera, et cetera. Here's the thing. One of the things I've learned is when I spread myself too thin, everybody loses. And so right now we had this first children's book. We, by the way, we got beyond 11,780 copies. That's the number of votes Trump wanted in Georgia. We have now more than he needed to win Georgia. It's incredible. It's one more. Yeah, it's unbelievable. So we have the second children's book that's going to be coming out in the next couple of months. And then I am starting to work on like an adult political book. I would love to write a personal finance book, but to be totally honest, I think I would be

spreading myself too thin. The marketing of that versus the marketing of the books I'm writing would be very different. It's just, I can, I can't do everything. You know, I have to, in, in my youth, I thought maybe I can do everything. I can't do everything. And so I have to narrow the focus a little bit, but someone should write that book. And here's the thing. There are dozens of books that would be good on that topic. Yeah, but I like you fair. I appreciate that rusty, but let me do this in time for the holidays.

I will have a second kids book out that you can gift to Republicans. Is that fair? Excellent. All right. I, I will buy it in mass and I wish I could buy a copy autographed by you, sir. We haven't figured out how to make that happen. Yeah. We haven't figured out the right way to make that happen, but we'll, we'll see if we can

do it somehow. Sounds like a plan, David. Appreciate your time. Keep up the good fight and have a wonderful day. All right. There goes rusty in Arizona. Let's go to Tiffany from orange County, Tiffany from orange County. Welcome to the David Pakman show. Hello. You're on the air. Yes. Hi, how are you? I'm doing well, thank you. Nice to meet you. Okay, just one second.

Let me just sort this out. Everything okay there, Tiffany? Yes. So I wanted to know a bit more about your political opinions on the vague. Yeah. Yeah. I just wanted to know, like, what do you think of him? Like, so did you did you know I interviewed him? Sorry. Did you see my interview with Vivek Ramaswamy? Yeah, you did. OK, so my general view of Vivek Ramaswamy is that he is the next iteration of the super slick extremist who simply lies to the faces of journalists. He will say a and then in the next interview, he'll say I never said a, I meant B and then he'll

say, no, no, no. C is actually what, what the, what I really meant. He is both extreme in his ideas and also extraordinarily dishonest, but he's super articulate and super slick. And I'm as curious as anybody else to see how well he ends up doing in the Republican primary. But I don't think he's going to do that well. And just one more thing. Do you think he'd make like Botox widely available? Because I think that, you know, it's kind of important. And I think if he did, I think that would be a good thing because people should be able to have Botox and feel good about themselves if they're insecure.

Well, listen, Tiffany, when you say make it available, it seems to me Botox is widely available. Do you mean will he force insurance companies to cover it? Yeah. I can't imagine that Vivek Ramaswamy is going to force health insurance companies to pay for Botox. No, I don't think that that's high on his list. Okay. Well, thank you so much for your time. I'm so glad to come up here and I hope you have a great rest of your day and good luck to the rest of the people. Thank you very much. All right.

Tiffany from Orange County with a question on Bot people. Thank you very much. All right. Tiffany from Orange County with a question on Botox. Very interesting. I have to say, let's go next to Everett from, I guess it's, is it Franklin County Everett from Franklin County or Franklin Franklin Everett? You're on the air. Franklin. Okay. Hello, David. You got me? We got you. Okay. I would like to ask a question about, you know, because I've been interested in a recent development in Detroit, Michigan, about a land value tax that is going to be on the ballot up there in February 2024. Okay. What do you think about that? If you know

enough about it to have an opinion? I, so I don't know specifically what's been proposed there, but by a land value tax, this would be a separate tax from a real estate tax. Tell me how they're conceiving of it. So they're conceiving of it as like, um, a sort of replacement for a property tax. Like Mayor Duggan said that Detroit's current tax structure punishes development. So he wants to change the tax structure in order to encourage development, especially vacant lots. I got it. I just was able to find it. So it seems the idea is as follows.

Normal real estate taxes are based on the value of land plus buildings. So obviously, if you keep a lot vacant, the value is low. You pay very little tax on it, but it doesn't exactly encourage development because as soon as you put a building on there, it gets reassessed and you owe more taxes. So it seems the idea here is change the way that this is structured. If speculators own a bunch of plots of land and they're not getting going on developing them, you're going to tax that more maybe by it's not totally cleared, but it might be by taxing the potential value of what would be there if you built something. And the idea would be it would encourage developers not to hold empty land and to build something

so that then they can monetize it, sell it or rent out. It's an interesting idea. This is the first I'm hearing that that this is what Detroit is looking to do. I think Detroit needs to do something. I don't know. I'd need to learn more about this before I could really weigh in substantively. But it's certainly interesting. Yeah, like, you know, and I guess my interest is coming in to their land value tax because I come from a metropolitan area that has a lot of blight yeah just blight every blight everywhere you look in a lot of places in the metro area particularly in the northern parts of st louis so that's something that I'm really concerned about for the city of St. Louis, because

the Missouri legislature may be about to strike down the earnings tax that St. Louis and Kansas City have. So that'll be a big problem for their budgets. Well, let me look into that further, but certainly an interesting idea for sure. Thanks for letting me know about it. All right. Thank you. All right. Everett from Franklin County. Why don't we go next to Vincent from Montreal? Vincent, welcome. Thank you, David. And Vincent, we've got you cranked up all the way and I can barely hear you. So definitely try to speak up. Is that better? That's marginally better. Okay. So recently I had an experience at work concerning the war in Ukraine. And I had a coworker that kind of falls for, I would say, like right-wing narratives, I guess you would say. Sure. question is is how how would you deal with someone who's kind of fallen for right-wing kind of news

that just believes everything other people say and i think with someone like that you have to start just by getting them to maybe question their beliefs and where they're getting their information so like for give me an example of what he comes and says to you like what's a belief he said i mean he was saying like complete bunker stuff about how like you know like the bio labs in ukraine and and stuff i've never heard before like how zelensky was somehow installed by putin and really bunker stuff yeah i mean i think if i if someone came to me with that and you know sam harris has talked about the fact that Really bunker stuff. rebut them and it can, it can sort of become a problem as Sam Harris describes it. It's, you can easily set a bunch of small fires and it can be difficult to put all of them out. But what I would say is something along the lines of, Oh, uh, Putin handpicked Zelensky. Got it.

Where did you, where did you hear that? How did, where did you learn that? And presumably they would say, Oh, I saw it on X or Y or something along those lines. And then you could say, Oh, is that a trustworthy news source? And then they might say, yeah, I think it is. And you say, well, why do you think it's trustworthy? How do you know if a news source is trustworthy? And I would just it's a very long process of incident, but I would open it with something like that. Yeah, especially, you know, when I try to confront them about not where they get the news source and how it sounds a little questionable. Yeah, I'm just I'm like, so like with these people in particular, I'm just shrugged up as like, oh, well, you don't know anything. So it's kind of hard to have a good faith conversation. It is hard. It is hard. And if that's the case, I would back up even further and I would go, OK, so it doesn't sound like you're ready to talk about whether a

news source is trustworthy yet. Let's back up a little bit. How do you think that people who disagree about something can have a good conversation and get them to like back up to that if you have to and get them to say, well, I think we should avoid personal attacks, not interrupt each other. You know, maybe you get them to establish something like that, but I'm not going to pretend this is easy. Vincent, this is really tough with some of these people. They've been so propagandized that it is really difficult. Okay, well, that answers my question perfectly.

All right. Vincent from Montreal, thank you so much for the call. We're going to take a very quick break, but I'm going right back to discord after the break. So if you still want to talk to me and why would you know if you still want to talk to me, just hang on discord and we'll get right to you. All right, let's hear from some more people from the audience through the David Pakman show discord and see what is on the minds of the people. Let's go to read from Rhode Island,

read from Rhode Island. Welcome to the show. What's on your mind today? Hi, David. How's it going? Going well. So I'm calling from Providence, Rhode Island. I've lived here for a couple of years now, originally from Massachusetts. Great. And I wanted to ask you kind of a question about your thoughts on campaign finance. So we just had a election for the first congressional district here in Rhode Island. Yes. And the result just came in. So Gabe Amo or Amo, I'm not sure how you pronounce it, but he won and he kind of came out of nowhere. He was kind of flying under the radar. Former White House staff who was running the front runner was Aaron Regenberg. And he kind of came out of nowhere. He was kind of flying under the radar. Former White House staff who was running the front runner was Aaron Regenberg. And he actually just had a rally with Bernie Sanders a couple of weeks ago here in Providence.

And he was a grassroots kind of campaign, very progressive. The kind of issues we want to see going forward. But he ended up losing out. And one of his biggest criticisms from his opponents were his finances. He did take $125,000 from his father-in-law, which obviously not great if you're running on a grassroots platform. That being said, all of his competitors, they were super PAC funded, and they've taken hundreds of thousands in donations

themselves. So my question for you is, what are your thoughts on strategy around finance? Obviously, you need to raise money to win elections, but ideally it's completely grassroots and kind of where's that gray area? Yeah. I mean, listen, obviously it's like it's great when candidates say I won't accept any super PAC money. OK. I mean, listen, obviously it's like it's great when candidates say I won't accept any super PAC money. OK, I mean, the truth is super PACs can just support whoever they want anyway. So it's not always the most incredible, groundbreaking promise. I mean, I think that there is really no fixing this other than fixing it by the law. And so we can talk about public financing of elections in conjunction with reducing the duration

where you can't just start campaigning earlier and earlier and earlier. Obviously, you can campaign quietly, but if there's no money to raise, then you might not be incentivized to do it. This is a huge complex area, but my view is we need to go to public financing of elections. We shouldn't have super PACs.

We should have a limited duration campaign. The ways in which campaigns communicate with voters should be, I don't want to say restricted, but certainly regulated a little more heavily. And I've said more about this and maybe I'll do a segment about it, but we need a total rethink on this and there needs to be some way to limit the disproportionate power of the rich and corporations. You know, it's so easy to say, David, listen, you can donate up to 2,700 per, I don't remember how much it is now. Maybe it's gone up a little bit, 3,000 or 2,700. And that's it. Everybody's restricted in that way. Sure. But if you've got a million bucks to throw at a super PAC, you can still do it.

And so we need a total rethink. And the problem is way bigger than many people even give it credit for. Yeah, I totally agree with you on that front. I've definitely thought we need a systemic change in the way we fund elections. I guess one more follow-up question would be for trying to win more progressive victories, especially at the more local levels or in Congress. In the short term, we obviously have to play with the system that we have. So what do you think is the best strategy for fundraising? Do you think it's best to just go the Bernie Sanders route and say twenty seven dollar donations and really make that your campaign pitch?

Or do you think it's better to kind of play the system and go after those bigger wallets and those bigger super PAC kind of interests in the in the quest of actually getting elected? Yeah, this is an ongoing, you know, I've 12 years ago at progressive political conferences, there would be panels debating this and one side would say we need to lead the right way. And if we are against the super PACs and the fundraising and whatever, we should just not even accept donations over 50 bucks and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then people come in from the other side and not, not Republicans, but I mean the other side of the left and go, why would we unilaterally disarm?

Everyone else is going to raise as much money as they can from whoever they're going to raise it. All that will happen is we lose and then we don't end up in a position of power where we can actually make the change we want to make. I tend to lean on that second thing, which is we need to do whatever we can under the current system to get elected. But we need to be electing people who are really up front and saying, I'm going to do what I need to do now to get elected, but I'm going to change the system once I am in power, whether we believe they will do it, whether they actually are able to.

You know, these are obviously other questions, but the unilateral disarming is just going to lead to us losing, which doesn't seem like the way to go. I completely agree. Well, thank you very much for taking my question, David. My pleasure. So great to hear from you. Always great to hear from our friends in Rhode Island. Let's see here.

Why don't we go next there? You know, there are so many people waiting here. How about let's try Sean from Israel. Am I pronouncing that correctly? Yes, we talk well back. Well welcome back. Hey, no, I just want to say if you recall, I was. Do you remember if we talk about one time with the idea of the kibbutz, right?

Yes. Well, I remember a caller from Israel and talking about the kibbutz. Absolutely. I didn't remember it was you exactly. Yeah, yeah. No, that was me. No, because you said like the kibbutz is a great idea, et cetera. And you said like that it's only like for like a small scale and and do some

thinking more about it and i kind of want to take it back i don't think we need the kibbutz no because like it i don't know explain it because like you said because the kibbutz doesn't hold up on its own at all like like explained before and and the way like because first of all yeah because first of all the system itself in the u.s that's all like there's no point to start like another you know program for other like community etc so here's the thing here's the thing about the kib thing about the kibbutz. The kibbutz is sort of limited by what, what's called the Dunbar number or the sort of like general sociology, psychology dynamics of, uh, groups where once a group gets much bigger than one 50, you really have to start delegating more and more tasks. It starts to need some kind of more

central governance. It's some of the elements of the kibbutz at scale simply wouldn't work. That being said, the kibbutz within a broader economic context where there is a, there is still a state and whatever. I think it's an amazing thing. And I know people who have raised kids in a kibbutz or have been and whatever. I think it's an amazing thing. And I know people who have raised kids in a kibbutz or have been raised themselves. I think it's great. I was raised in a kibbutz myself. Yeah. It's a secular, not religious, but, um, but yeah, but like you said, it's usually it's more like, you know,

about 500 people or like other than that, like it's small scale. It's, that's where it starts to get really challenging. Yeah. And even at 500 people, there typically still is specialization, some centralization of decision making, et cetera. Yeah. No. All right, Sean. Well, glad that you clarified.

I appreciate it. Thank you. All right. There it goes. All right. Thank you very much. Well, it's not night here yet, but I do appreciate the call and have a good evening. Why don't we go next to Genio from Chester Springs? Genio from Chester Springs. Welcome to the program. What's on your mind today? Hi, David.

Hi. How's it going? Going well. awesome um so my question well first i had a comment i bought your book for my two kids uh my daughter turned eight today my eight-year-old and my five-year-old and my mom who is a four-year-old preschool teacher she read it with them and she said it was absolutely wonderful. And she's going to buy it for her school. And I love that. Enjoying it. That is amazing. And the sequel, which is so think like a detective is the book you're talking about.

Critical thinking book for kids. Think like a scientist is moving along very quickly. And I think it'll be out within a couple of months. Awesome. Nice. We can't wait for it. Appreciate it. My mom just really loved how like it created conversation with her and the kids.

And it wasn't just like reading it to them. There was just a lot of discussion beyond the book. Yeah. And you know that I'm so I hear that from a bunch of parents that like I showed this to my kids. I read it to them. It just generated so much discussion. That was amazing. I honestly, I didn't even really expect that or do that on

purpose, but I'm thrilled. We're right around 12,000 copies sold and it's just, it's unbelievable. Awesome. Well, thank you for writing it. We're really enjoying it. Thank you. Um, one question, where have you been getting your new where do you get all of your news from? So tough to answer that question. When you say my news, do you mean what are my sources for the factual claims? In other words, really, we're talking about like reporting, not opinion. Yes, because you always you usually say, like, you should, you know, primary sources.

Yes. Primary sources. Yes. Primary sources. Exactly. It's a long list, but everything from, you know, Reuters and associated press, New York times, Washington post and PR has good original reporting. I'll go to local stations for local stories. If something happens in Florida, I might go to the local Florida affiliate or paper. A lot of the Texas stuff lately.

I go to the Texas newspapers that are the original sources. Basically, I want to avoid these blog style news rewriting websites that just take someone else's reporting and rewrite it and add a video and call it a day. Yeah, no, that's good. Thank you so much. Um, I have one other question. So now the Republicans don't have a problem with the Trump kids and spouses working in government and especially in the White House. But then they have such, you know, they're so bothered by, you know, by Hunter Biden and he wasn't even working in the government. So how does that equate?

They're hypocrites. I mean, you know, I could come up with a way to talk for five minutes about it and give you a more detailed answer. They're hypocrites and it's all projection. Their stated values mean nothing once they are inconvenient for them. They are simply hypocrites. That's it. OK.

And importantly, let me say one other thing, Jenny. Republican voters do not punish hypocrisy anymore. So there's very little risk to them to being hypocrites. Oh, God. Yeah, that's true. I liked your interview with that. Uh, the conservative, I don't know if it was an author or Dennis Prager, the radio host. Yeah. Yeah, it was an interesting. And, um, I like,

I didn't like it, but I thought it was interesting how he like kind of came down on you about not being married, but having a child. You know, the funny thing is I didn't go to this because it seemed he was getting personal. So I should have also, but he's been married three times. And so it's sort of like, is that, is that biblically aligned as well? Uh, you know, when he said he would come to my wedding, I should have been like, well, I'd go to your fourth one if you have one too, but I, it just didn't seem right to go personal, even though he was going personal. Yeah, no, that would have been good. Well, thanks so much. Have a great day. All right. Jenny O from Chester Springs. Always

great to hear from you. Always great to hear from you. Always great to hear from everybody in the audience. We will go to a break. I will take calls again if I have anything to say about it. After this short break, the Friday show will continue if I have anything to say about it. I've had such trouble finding a great razor where I am not cutting myself or getting those nicks on my skin, which are so common with the cheap, disposable razors. You have to meet our sponsor, Henson Shaving. Henson actually manufactures parts for the International Space Station and the Mars rover, and they are bringing that exact same precision engineering

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pack of blades to your cart. Then enter the code Pacman to get the hundred blades for free. That is a three year supply. That's H-E-N-S-O-N shaving dot com slash Pacman. Use code Pacman. The link is in the podcast notes. All right, let's get to your feedback. Fridays, we look at emails, YouTube comments, Facebook comments, all sorts of different things to just get a little bit of a sampling of where the audience is on what we've discussed for the previous week. I want to start today with a comment from Rebecca Freeland, who said, commentator, not even the dignity to address me by name commentator. Try doing a little research before you make a bigger fool

of yourself. I like the defamation suit on Ray Epps because we will find out who Epps really is. So it is absolutely true that because Ray Epps, the guy who supposedly was an FBI agent instigator of the January 6th riots. Ray Epps has sued Fox News for defamation. And what happens in that scenario is that Fox News will indeed get to depose and carry out discovery on Ray Epps, because, of course, a defense to defamation is that the things that were said were true. And what was said about Ray Epps includes that he was some kind of inside man, FBI agent, whatever the case may be. There is no evidence of that.

I talked before earlier this week, in fact, about the situation where I was sent a threat of defamation suit from someone who I talked about on the show. And lawyers advised me, you know, they probably won't actually sue you because then you'd get to depose them. And I have a feeling that what you said is true and they're not going to want that out in the public eye. But, you know, you have to be risk averse and you could rack up quite a legal bill in fighting this. So keep that in mind. It is true. They Fox News could go and depose Ray Epps and figure out, is he really an FBI agent? I would be willing to bet just about anything. And I am not a betting man that if you depose Ray Epps and you investigate Ray Epps and

you look into every aspect of him, you are not going to find that Ray Epps is an FBI agent or an informant or anything like it. But that's just me. You can bet a different way if that's what you want. Also on YouTube, John Holm says, David Parkman, whoever that is, I see put all media people in jail and that includes yourself included. Why the grammar is almost criminally bad in all of these. I don't know, but it's inappropriate to point that out. I'm being classist if I point that out. OK, but I think it's more about what lack of education does to your political views.

And I think that that's quite, quite relevant and quite germane to what we talk about on this show. Uh, the idea of jailing media people always leads me to the same question for what crime for what crime? And do I get due process? Do I get a trial? Do I get all of those things or do I skip go, do not collect $200 and go directly to jail? This is once again, the epitome of the people who scream the loudest about being for law and order and all of it actually not being for law and order.

We on the left actually support law and order. We want everyone to get due process. We want everyone to get a competent attorney and to have their constitutional right to the best possible defense. We do have a two tier justice system and it's the elites rich and people in positions of power and everybody else. And so when I see, oh, put, put the, put the media people in jail for what crime as if you even care, but maybe we could actually get back to supporting law and order the way

you claim might be a nice thing. Diggity D says on YouTube, remind me when is the democratic primary debate? Oh yeah. The DNC said they're not going to support anybody other than Biden. So much for letting the people decide who they should vote for. Huh? Listen, um, this is one of those scenarios where I have my personal preference and then I also, as someone who analyzes the political world, understand completely why there is not going

to be a primary. This is not unique to the Democratic primary. This is also something that happens in the Republican primary. Your best bet. Let me back up. The Republican and Democratic parties exist primarily to justify their own existence. The way they justify their own existence is by getting people elected president. And sure, if you can get control of the House, if you can get control of the Senate, that's

great as well. The best way to keep a president of your party in the Oval Office is to reelect your sitting president if you have a sitting president. So when Barack Obama was up for reelection, they did not do a real primary. Sure, people go, I'm running, but there's no debates. There's not a real primary. When Donald Trump was running for reelection in 2020, the Republican Party didn't do a real primary.

This is not unique to the Democratic Party. Personally, would I like to see voters from every party reconfirm that they still think the person in the Oval Office should get another shot? Absolutely. When Donald Trump ran again in 2020 and there was no real primary, I would have loved to have seen Republican voters reaffirm in an actual Republican primary with debates, with the whole thing. We want Trump again. And then if it goes south and you say, hey, they really picked him again in the same way. There are concerns among some about Joe Biden's

health and, you know, the rapidity of his thinking or lack thereof and all of it. I would love to say, or, or even concerns that Joe Biden isn't left enough. For example, I would love to see there be another democratic contest primary within the democratic party and say, do they want, do they choose Joe Biden again or not? That's my personal preference, But let's be honest. Both parties do this. When you have someone in the Oval Office, it is considered the safest possible thing

to just try to get them reelected, period. That's why the Democratic Party is doing it. There's nothing special about 2024. There's nothing special about Joe Biden, and there's certainly nothing special about the DNC doing this. The RNC does the exact same thing. User CR five VC six XQ three B says Trump is more popular than comma Joe Biden. Random comma that has no business being there.

That comma has less business being in this sentence than Trump had being in the oval office. Also the wrong then it should be TH a N. But let's imagine that we understand what this person means because we do. What they're saying is Trump is more popular than Joe Biden. Okay, I guess we'll see what happens in the election, right? Oh no, because if Biden wins it will be stolen. But if Trump wins, it will have been fair.

These are the sorts of people you really shouldn't argue with. There is no point. It's a time suck. It's a black hole. Don't even bother. Just find a couple of people who aren't sure if they're going to vote and convince them about the importance of voting. Don't even bother with people like user. Here's Harry B, who says you're a freaking freak show. The one man that can turn

around that beautiful country is facing jail time. You've lost your marbles. I challenge Harry to give me one metric, one metric that is a problem right now that you have evidence Trump would be able to turn around unemployment rate. Now it's better now than under Trump inflation. It's way down compared to where it got under Trump. Give me the metrics because it's very easy to just show up in people's comments and say, Trump's the only guy you can save this country save from what? And what evidence do you have that Trump would actually do that again? I don't know how much time we want to invest in talking to these people. All right. Nicole Johnson, Nicole Johnson makes a really interesting comment. Nicole says, I disagree about Vivek

Ramaswamy coming off as energetic in a positive way. He comes off as manic, over the top, smug, super arrogant. Every time he talks, it's like nails down the chalkboard. The guy is incredibly annoying. Also, I think the other candidates go after him because they're genuinely irritated by him, not because he poses any threat. I want to address that threat part specifically. Anytime I talk about Vivek Ramaswamy or Robert F. Kennedy Jr. or Cornel West, generally it's those three. type folks around them will email me and go, you know, David, for someone who says these guys stand no chance, you're sure talking about them a lot. You must see them as a threat. This is a very fallacious thing to say. These are folks who are getting attention for different reasons. Vivek got attention because he made a splash during the debate and he saw his polling go from one to seven and Cornell West is getting attention because he's the green party nominee.

A lot of people like the green party. A lot of people like Cornell West. Robert F Kennedy Jr is getting attention partially because he says crazy things about vaccines. He's also appealing to Maga people even though he's nominally a Democrat. Is it not possible to talk about someone just because there's a comment to be made without, quote, seeing them as a threat? The polls suggest Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has no chance. Cornel West has no chance.

And at least for now that Vivek Ramaswamy has no chance of being the Republican nominee. That's the empirical reality. I don't know why that means that I see them as a threat just because I'm talking about them. By that standard, I really shouldn't be able to talk about anybody ever unless I'm threatened by them, which really just doesn't make any sense. Kyle wrote in, I think this is an insult from a different country. Kyle says, you're a fanny. I don't I've not heard that insult before. But Kyle says you have no clue which you're talking about, mate. You're wrong. You're a effing spastic. Who the F even listened to your opinions and goes, oh, I made that spot on effing American retards.

I believe this is foreign hate mail and I am not going to indulge it with a response. Richard wrote in about my debate commentary from the Republican debate. This is emblematic and representative of what many right wingers said to me about my debate commentary from the Republican debate. This is emblematic and representative of what many right wingers said to me about my debate coverage. Richard said, watching the debate through your feed for some odd reason, all progressive communistic governments rise to power in the past has finished its ride, its rise with genocide and authoritarianism. This is a disaster. Again, the grammar is a disaster. I'm sorry. Russian Revolution, Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, Venezuela, Cuba, Nazi Germany, Nazi Germany

was not communistic. I'm sorry. All all examples you should know. I love debating people like you. Your arguments always fall apart when put to the test. So if you're totally honest all the time, as you claim, can you admit we have a dual justice system? We do. We do. We have one for the rich elites and powerful and one for everybody else. And Richard finishes by saying

you and all the progressives should move to a better country. I suggest Venezuela. It has everything you want in a country. Venezuela is not for me. I'm not a socialist. I'm not a communist. And I am not a supporter of the Chavez Maduro regime. Anyway, you're a bonkers retard and a lunatic. And Richard signed his email, Kurt. I don't know why Richard signs his email, Kurt, but I want to remind everybody in my audience, why would I go to a country whose governance I disagree with? I have never defended the Chavez Maduro regime in Venezuela. So why on earth would I go there?

I'm an American citizen. I want to improve the United States. Give me a break. Truly give me a break. We have a fantastic bonus show for you today. Make sure you sign up at join pacman.com. It is a doozy. No holidays next week. We will be here. you you you