The Megyn Kelly Show - Was Air India Crash Deliberate, and Previewing Next Epstein Shoe to Drop, with Fifth Column and Aviation Experts | Ep. 1110

Episode Date: July 17, 2025

Megyn Kelly is joined by aviation experts Captain Steve, Whiz Buckley, and Patrick Smith to discuss new evidence suggesting the Air India crash was a deliberate act by the pilot, how the sequence of s...witch movements raises suspicions, why a criminal investigation may be opened, new reports that the Air India crash pilot suffered from mental health issues, the challenges pilots face, and more. Then Kmele Foster and Matt Welch, hosts of "The Fifth Column," join to discuss reports of an upcoming corporate media story linking Trump and Epstein, the media’s renewed focus on Epstein's past associations after the DOJ memo, ongoing backlash from within the MAGA base, how the Trump administration's bizarre handling of the Epstein story has suddenly made left-wing media and Democrats interested in it, new scrutiny of the DOJ’s 2008 plea deal, the viral video of the married CEO caught in an embrace with his HR chief at a Coldplay concert, the awkward cover-up attempt, Scottie Scheffler’s humble and vulnerable interview answer about the falseness of winning, the important of fatherhood and family, the truth about success in work vs. success in life, the absurd New York Times column from a former Obama speechwriter showing what a jerk he is, “forgiving” his Rogan-listening brother-in-law, and more.More from Fifth Column: https://www.wethefifth.com/Buckley- https://nofallenheroesfoundation.org/Scheibner- https://www.youtube.com/user/peterscheibnerSmith- https://askthepilot.com/ PrizePicks: Visit https://prizepicks.onelink.me/LME0/MEGYN & Download the app today! | Use code MEGYN to get $50 after your first $5 lineupBeeKeeper's Naturals: Go to https://beekeepersnaturals.com/MEGYN or enter code MEGYN for 20% off your orderRiverbend Ranch: Visit https://riverbendranch.com/ | Use promo code MEGYN for $20 off your first order.Paleo Valley: Visit https://paleovalley.com and use code MEGYN at checkout to get 15% off your first order 

Transcript
Discussion (0)
Starting point is 00:00:00 Welcome to the Megyn Kelly Show, live on SiriusXM Channel 111 every weekday at noon East. Hey everyone, I'm Megyn Kelly. Welcome to the Megyn Kelly Show. I'm like a little jarred right now given the story that we're opening with. We have a huge show for you. We've got the fifth column. Love these guys. But we're gonna start with a shocking report that just hit on what we know about Air India Flight 171, which horrifically crashed soon after takeoff just a couple of weeks ago, about a month ago, June 12th, killing all but one of its 242 passengers
Starting point is 00:00:40 and reported 29 more on the ground. Think of that. So 241 passengers killed and reported 29 more on the ground. Think of that. So 241 passengers killed and reported 29 more on the ground. That Boeing 787 Dreamliner, which took off from India and was headed to London's Gatwick Airport, seemed to run into problems almost immediately after takeoff. Stunning footage of the crash emerged online.
Starting point is 00:01:03 Watch. Horrific. For the listening audience, you just see a plane, the huge white plane that looks like it might kind of be trying to land, but this happened on takeoff. And then you just see the fireball. Incredibly, somehow one person survived. A 40 year old British man, Vishwas Kumar Ramesh. He just walked away. It was incredible tape. You've probably seen it in the
Starting point is 00:01:46 past five weeks. Just walked out of the fireball with only minor injuries. It's not clear in the moment that I knew what had happened to him. He later told local media I was going to die, but when I opened my eyes, I realized I was alive. I pulled out the belt from under my seat and tried to escape, and then I managed to do it. I saw others and the air hostess in front of me who could not escape. Air India said those on board included 169 Indian nationals, 53 British nationals, seven Portuguese, one Canadian. The youngest victim believed to be just four years old.
Starting point is 00:02:39 And according to a new report in the Wall Street Journal, a black box recording indicates it was the captain who turned off switches that allow fuel to flow into the plane's engines right after the plane took flight. The journal's reporting cites people familiar with the US officials' early assessment of the evidence in the crash. According to the journal,
Starting point is 00:03:04 the first officer asked the captain why he turned off the switches, allowing the fuel to flow, and then you can hear the first officer panic. The captain apparently remains calm the entire time. India's Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau, or AAIB, first revealed the exchange last week without specifying which pilot made each comment. That report says one pilot asked why the other turned off the switches and the other denied doing so. But clearly we now know that it was the second in command, but the one who was actually flying the plane who said, why did you just turn off the fuel switches?
Starting point is 00:03:47 And then the captain calmly, this is obviously in a moment of dire situation for the plane, says he didn't do it. The report says the switches were moved one second apart and turned back on after they had turned off the fuel about 10 seconds later, but it was too late. The report also made no conclusions on whether the actions were deliberate, but it's easy to see why there are now reports hitting online from several aviation experts that there is no way this plane
Starting point is 00:04:21 went down other than intentionally, that the captain of this plane deliberately brought down this flight. According to the journal, these preliminary findings have led some U.S. officials to believe that a criminal investigation must be opened. The AAIB issued a statement to the journal Thursday evening stating, we urge both the public and the media
Starting point is 00:04:44 to refrain from spreading premature narratives that risk undermining the integrity of the investigative process. Well, too bad, because these folks have been notoriously secretive in other investigations and in this one, and US officials think a criminal investigation should be opened up. So we're not going to honor your request.
Starting point is 00:05:05 They added that at this stage, it's too early to reach any definite conclusions. Okay, that's fine. But you don't stop speculation from a country that is not exactly known for its transparency on this kind of thing. And when you're talking about hundreds of people who may have just been mass murdered.
Starting point is 00:05:25 Joining me now to react to all of this are Captain Steve Scheibener, Captain Steve on YouTube, Matthew Wiz Buckley, decorated US Naval Aviator and Top Gun graduate, and Patrick Smith, who's an airline pilot and air travel blogger at Ask the Pilot. Basketball season may be over, but the action doesn't stop because baseball is just heating up.
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Starting point is 00:06:38 Visit prizepix.com for restrictions and details. Guys, thank you so much for being here. Wow, this is really stunning. This was a Wall Street Journal exclusive posting these new details, that it was the first officer questioning the captain's apparent actions. He expressed surprise and then panic. The captain remained calm and the names of those who were flying. It was first officer Clive Cunder.
Starting point is 00:07:05 He was the pilot flying the plane, age 32. The captain who remains calm and is under suspicion was Sumit Sabrewal, a decades long veteran. He is the one who flipped the switches, age 56. Wiz, let me start with you as our top gun grad and pilot. What do you make of this information? Initially, Megan, it's an absolute horror. It looks like a murder suicide. As you alluded to, 787s just don't simply rotate, get airborne, and then settle back down. It looks like the
Starting point is 00:07:36 captain for whatever reason wanted to check out that day. And sadly, Megan, this isn't the first example of a pilot just wanting to take an aircraft down or take people with them. Egypt Air 990 or the German wings mishap, I believe in 2015. Before I started flying for FedEx, there was a famous incident with a former Flying Tigers pilot who was going to jump in the jump seat and crash a plane into FedEx headquarters so he could get the insurance. And you know, he didn't want to look like a murder. So he wanted to crash the airplane. So Megan, all indications are that the captain selected the cutoff position on the fuel
Starting point is 00:08:19 switches, about 10 seconds for that first officer who was flying the airplane to be a little confused and look around going, hey, what are we doing here? And then to put them back on. And sadly, one of the motors spooled up a little bit above idle and the other one was just trying to come online, but it was too late. Real quick, Megan, I know pilots unions hate this, but we have like HD cameras on the other side of the moon. If we had some HD cameras in the other side of the moon. If we had some HD cameras in
Starting point is 00:08:46 the cockpit instead of just a voice recorder, we'd know for absolute 100% certainty what happened. But for whatever reason, pilots unions don't like a camera looking over their shoulder. Maybe this will change that. I mean, it's like being a cop. You're in, you've got other people's lives potentially in your hands. And unfortunately you have to sacrifice a bit of privacy because this is not the first time this has happened. I mean, just researching for the show, we have seen pilot, you know, death by suicide, but while committing mass murder before.
Starting point is 00:09:16 I mean, that crash, that German air, that German pilot in 2015 was the most recent, but there were many prior to that. Captain Steve, as you hear, as you look at the video of that plane, it was taking off and then of course comes back down and it almost looks like a gentle come down, but obviously it wasn't, and it wasn't supposed to be coming down.
Starting point is 00:09:32 And you hear these facts as reported by the journal, what conclusions do you reach? Well, at first when you see that video, it doesn't make any sense. I've never seen anything like that. An airplane that takes off, it looks like it achieves flight fine. And then seconds later, maybe four or five seconds later,
Starting point is 00:09:50 you can see the nose kind of come over. Clearly the wings are losing lift and the airplane then begins to settle in to the buildings off the end of the runway. And it does look like it's landing, but it's not. We clearly know that at this point. The only answer to that is it's a dual engine failure and what caused the dual engine failure. And I think now with this Wall Street Journal confirmation, plus preliminary report, which, you know,
Starting point is 00:10:14 they parse their words a little bit. They said the fuel control switches transitioned from run to cutoff. They don't transition. Somebody has to place them there. It's a three step process. You have to grasp the switch. It's a three-step process. You have to grasp the switch, pull it up because it's spring loaded, pull it down and let it go. So that's only a human has to do that. And there's no known procedure that I know of
Starting point is 00:10:36 at 200 feet off the ground on rotate where you would grab those switches and put them to cut off. So either way it was pilot error, whether it was intentional or unintentional, I think now the Wall Street Journal has kind of concluded that it's intentional and that's no surprise. And my understanding is, and maybe you can speak to this Patrick,
Starting point is 00:10:55 but my understanding is they put a little guard on the control panel dashboard. I'm not exactly sure what the right term is, but where they keep those fuel switches, there's like a little guard so that a pilot can't inadvertently like knock it with his hip or his hand while he's reaching for something. So it really does look like by all accounts,
Starting point is 00:11:14 here's a picture we got from the Daily Mail for the listening audience, it shows a little control panel and you can see the tiny little fuel levers, but to the right and to the left of them is like a little metal guard that stands up. And my understanding is, Patrick, that's that's to prevent anything inadvertent from happening. That's that's correct. And I think we need to start out by saying that there's a lot here that we just don't know.
Starting point is 00:11:41 The report that came out the other day was was very preliminary. We don't even have a report that came out the other day was very preliminary. We don't even have a CVR transcript yet. We've mentioned a few times what we know, what we know. Well, what about all the things we don't know? And as a result, I tend to be a little more reserved and conservative in my assessment of what happened. What do you think happened? I don't know, we don't know. Well, you say you're more reserved.
Starting point is 00:12:09 How are you more reserved? What conclusion are you reaching? I don't necessarily buy the murder-suicide scenario. I'm not saying it didn't happen. There's evidence leaning in that direction strongly. But the dynamics of the crash don't quite make sense that way. So let me get this straight.
Starting point is 00:12:30 You're going to shut the engines off at the moment of rotation and glide to a crash? There are so many unknowns in a scenario like that. There's no guarantee that the crash would be catastrophic, that everybody would be killed, that the person who did it would be killed. Just to the left of the impact area where the plane hit is a mostly open stretch without buildings or larger obstructions.
Starting point is 00:12:56 If the plane had just been a little more to that side, the crash could have been at least partly survivable. It just doesn't seem like the way somebody would go about doing something like that. You go back to Egypt there and German wings and MH370, which almost certainly was a murder suicide. It feels different. There remains the distinct possibility, this is going to sound preposterous, that the fuel control switches were shut off accidentally, inadvertently in a moment of
Starting point is 00:13:32 absurd absent-mindedness. And while it sounds preposterous, that sort of thing has happened before. For the listening audience, Patrick speaking and both of our other pilots are shaking their heads no. But I like the disagreement. I appreciate the different opinions because we don't know what happened. Go ahead with I Just couldn't disagree more Megan if there was anything but what we've been talking about They would go out of their way in this report to say it if there was a hiccup in the electrical systems Megan these jets you wouldn't know that You would not know any of that yet.
Starting point is 00:14:06 This is so early on. You absolutely would know that. You would absolutely know that because these jets are tattletales. Okay, let Wiz finish. Go ahead, Wiz. No, those engines, they data link stuff directly to GE. The flight control computers,
Starting point is 00:14:19 they know just about everything at this point. If there was any other straws they could be grasping at, they would throw that in the report right now. They did not. There was no electrical hiccups. There was no contaminated fuel. They put in this preliminary report, very preliminary stuff, obviously, what they believe.
Starting point is 00:14:37 If there was any other thing on God's green earth, they probably would have written that down. Go ahead, Kevin, Steve. You heard your thoughts. I'll come back to you in a second, Patrick. I'll come right back to you. Let me get Captain Stephen. Yeah, I agree that there's no way that those switches moved
Starting point is 00:14:54 from run to cutoff. And that's what they said in the preliminary report, that they didn't say place, they said transition to cutoff. Let's assume for a minute that there's some reason that there was an electronic glitch. You would have to believe that it happened on both switches one second apart. And if that were the case, they would be grounding every single Boeing airplane on the planet. They all have those same switches. There would be an investigation into what was wrong with
Starting point is 00:15:22 those switches. None of that has come out of this. And so what's not being reported in the report is, or what's not taking place is just as important as what you do read in the report. I don't think Boeing or anybody else suspects that there's anything wrong with the 787 because there's not. Correct. Megan, they release. And I'll give you the floor in one second. One second, but I just want to say this.
Starting point is 00:15:43 We also have the other piece of evidence, which is the copilot, the one who was actually flying the plane believed the captain did it. 100% believed he did it. And then the captain denied it in some sort of calm manner, which was said to be his manner. And then we'll get to the reports about his mental state, which vary. Okay, go ahead, Patrick. You wanted to defend your position. Again, I'm not concluding anything.
Starting point is 00:16:07 I'm leaving open the possibility that this indeed was a murder-suicide. And as I said, it is certainly trending that way, but it's not, we don't know for sure. There's a lot we don't know. And what of the possibility that he simply shut them off by mistake? It has happened before, and I'm sure my guests know that. It sounds ridiculous, but it has happened. And there also was mentioned in the report of a Boeing service bulletin that was put out a few years back regarding fuel control switches that would not lock into position
Starting point is 00:16:42 and could potentially slide back to the cutoff position on their own. What of that? To me, that kind of jumped out. It's not likely, but it's also not likely that the captain shut the engines off and crashed the plane. I don't find that unlikely at all. I actually don't find that unlikely. It's happened. We're just pulling the... Well, so has the other scenario. But nobody wants to talk about that because it's not- We're talking about it. It's scandalous. You're having your say, Patrick. What are you complaining about?
Starting point is 00:17:09 Here's some examples. You've got, this is from the FAA. They call them aircraft assisted pilot suicides, saying they're rare. They include the November, 2013 crash of Mozambique Airlines, a plane bound for Angola, which was eerily similar to the Germanwings plane one.
Starting point is 00:17:28 That was Germanwings flight 9525. That one was so eerie where that pilot died taking 149 other people with him. He was depressed and flew the plane right into the side of a mountain. That was absolutely awful. He was 27 years old. We know he was determined to kill himself. Okay. And then there's, let's see, there's a bunch. Egypt Airlines, you guys mentioned Flight 990 off Nantucket in 1999, killing all 217
Starting point is 00:17:53 people on board, caused by deliberate action according to the NTSB. In that case, a relief pilot, Gamil al-Butudi, waited for the captain to leave the cockpit, then disengaged the autopilot. As the plane descended, he could be heard saying in Arabic, I rely on God over and over and there are more. I mean, you could keep going. Hey, Megan, real quick with the Egypt air. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:18:14 With the Egypt air mishap. So the captain actually came back from the head or whatever he was doing and saw this going on, he jumped in, pulled back on the control yoke and he's fighting with the FO, the first officer at the time and the Boeing at the time, the captain would override the first officer's control inputs. Guess what he did to take the airplane down after that, he reached over and shut the fuel to the engines off. So another instance of that, but let's be clear, Megan,
Starting point is 00:18:44 whether it's the India board, the NTSB, history has shown us that we want to have preliminary reports. Why? Does the flying public want to wait 12 to 18 months to find out why an airliner crashed? No. So they want to compile as much facts as they can,
Starting point is 00:19:00 as quickly as they can, as Captain Steve alluded to, if there was something going on in these brand new 787 airliners where just magically the fuel switches go to cutoff, they would be freaking the hell out right now. They're not. I'll support Patrick a little bit and say, of course there's all sorts of slim to none possibilities going on here, but all the evidence
Starting point is 00:19:22 is pointing in this direction. And Megan, it sounds like we're gonna talk about mental health stuff here in a little bit, but Yeah, let me tell you what the reporting is from poor mental health. The captain we're talking about here, Sumit Subbarwal, the one he's now dead, age 56, who we are speculating may have brought down this plane. So this other captain is saying that he's spoken with several Air India pilots who allegedly confirmed to him that this pilot had suffered from poor mental health. Speaking to the Daily Telegraph, he claimed, quote, he had taken time off from flying in the last three to four years.
Starting point is 00:20:09 He had taken medical leave for that. This captain is understood to have taken bereavement leave after the death of his mother. Again, this is from the Daily Telegraph, though it's believed by this man doing the reporting, a different captain, Rung Ganathan, that he'd been medically cleared by Air India prior to the fatal crash. The Telegraph said that while Air India declined to comment, an official working with their parent company, Tata Group, told the publication that Captain Sabarwal, the guy at issue, had not taken any medical leave with the preliminary report failing to obtain any significant findings. They added that within the last two years, both pilots on board the flight had passed
Starting point is 00:20:47 the Class 1 medical exam, which makes an evaluation of their psychophysical capabilities. Unfortunately, some of those other pilots in the cases that we just went over also passed their exams and were not identified as having mental problems, but they clearly did. Your thoughts on that, guys? Well, Megan, we just went out with a video about mental and emotional health and I interviewed Dr. Charlie Carreri, who's really the pioneer in this field. He's the guy responsible for, at least at American Delta United and Southwest, their programs that are in place where pilots can go self-report without any fear of incrimination or losing their
Starting point is 00:21:30 jobs, which is hugely important because there's a big stigma with mental health. And I think that's the direction that all this is going, is to sit and talk about what's the mental health issues with pilots. And it's a very stressful job and you have to balance on the road with at home. And those two things don't always go together very well for people that travel all the time. And then there's a stress and the responsibility that goes with the job. So I think there's never a bad time to have that conversation about mental health. Certainly now this is kind of a springboard into having that conversation. And it's certainly one I think is important to have. Hey, Megan, a quick, quick update with the German wings.
Starting point is 00:22:10 They actually knew a lot of his doctors knew. But apparently the German medical system, it's to steal a phrase. It's verboten. Those two systems weren't allowed to talk in Germany. Apparently you could say I'm absolutely nuts and suicidal. I'm going to crash an airliner. The doctors were forbidden from telling whatever the German is about any of this. Oh, yeah, trust me, after that, I think
Starting point is 00:22:34 they've hopefully made some changes in the German system. But at the time that all the doctors after they had to shrug their shoulders and say, that thing was so disturbing by law not to do that. Yep. That thing was so disturbing. It was it was very clear in that case that it was it was a murder suicide. Right. It like my husband and I have, you know, as one does, and Gallows humor made jokes about it.
Starting point is 00:22:56 There's I'm down here at the Jersey Shore for the summer. And we always take our kids to this amusement park at least once this summer. And there's one of those rides, the scrambler at this amusement park. And there's something crazy about this particular scrambler. It goes to like a gear that you've never seen before, where you really feel like you're gonna be flung right off the coast of New Jersey into the ocean. And one time, like one of the first times I ever wrote it,
Starting point is 00:23:18 I looked at my husband and our kids, and I tried to get a look at the guy operating it. And I said to my husband, Doug, I'm like, he's like the German pilot. This is it. You're like, it's Gallo's humor. But like, there are people who are extremely sick. And that's what's so disturbing about this is one thing if you're sick and you commit suicide, but if that's what happened here, we're talking about a mass serial killer. Same thing with MH370. You're beyond suicidal. You're one of the worst homicidal maniacs in world history. We're talking about hundreds, hundreds
Starting point is 00:23:55 of murders in an instant, which to your point, Patrick, is why we should be cautious before completely throwing this captain under the bus. And by the way, as Steve alluded to, airlines, regulators, the pilots unions, at least in the US, we've come a long way. There's a lot of, I guess you could call it proactivity now towards self-reporting and being open and upfront about mental health issues to keep trouble from being driven underground where it could cause some sort of accident or something awful. That being said, I mean, there are people with mental health issues in every line of work from
Starting point is 00:24:48 Surgeons police officers airline pilots, so whomever It's very important to emphasize here very important that that having a mental health issue having even depression Uh does not turn you into a psychopathic mass murderer Um for that to happen there has to be something else going on. What it is, I don't know, how is that diagnosed? How is that discovered? How do we know who those outliers are? What do you do? Like when you get on board the plane, when you guys fly commercially, you know, my friend mentioned this before, my friend, she's always giving the pilots boxes of chocolates. Like, yeah, Al, that's not gonna save you.
Starting point is 00:25:25 Okay, but she does. What do you guys do when you get on board the plane? Do you look at the pilot? Like, this is something that's gonna be running through the minds of people. I realize it's like the chance of getting hit by lightning. It's extremely remote, but like, it's going to be through us nervous flyers,
Starting point is 00:25:40 through our heads the next time we get on board a plane. Captain Steve, what do you think? Well, Megan, we've talked a lot about this on my channel. I'm coming up to my retirement date in three months and I'm, you know, just because I turned 65, I'm done. And it's kind of a one-size-fits-all position. But I tell people, look, when you get on an airplane and you can look up into the cockpit, you don't care what gender the person is, you don't care what color their skin is. What you're looking for is a little bit of gray hair. And if you see gray hair, that reassures you.
Starting point is 00:26:08 If you see somebody up there that looks like it's one of your teenage daughter's dates, it's not cause for concern. Or your teenage daughter. Again, and I was young at one point, I get it, but I also wasn't the captain at that point over the years I've aged. And I think it's a little, I get it, but I also wasn't the captain at that point. Over the years I've aged and I think it's a little bit of gray hair is reassuring,
Starting point is 00:26:29 especially in a position where you're sitting in the back and you're trusting somebody basically with your life. Yeah, although the older one here is the one who is allegedly culpable and the younger one who was 32, the co-pilot was 32 who was flying a plane, first officer, and the guy being possibly accused was 56. Go ahead, Patrick, you're gonna say something.
Starting point is 00:26:49 I would somewhat disagree with that. I understand that it's reassuring to people, but it's also not necessarily meaningful. There are a lot of younger, fully qualified, excellent airline pilots out there. So the extrapolation you made maybe without meaning to is that younger pilots aren't as safe as older pilots. And I just can't accept that. Well, it didn't work on this point.
Starting point is 00:27:14 Hey, man, I'm not saying that. They're unqualified. What they lack is the experience and the judgment. And that's what you pay for with the captain on an airliner is somebody that's been around the block a couple times that can say a certain times slow down that's that's the experiences you can only get that audience a little bit about you captain steve because i neglected to do that but you joined the navy after college graduation you were commissioned and trained as a pilot back in 83 84 commercial pilot for 40 years. And you were initially scheduled to fly American airline flight 11 on September 11th, 2001, the first plane that hit the world trade center. My God, I didn't know that.
Starting point is 00:27:54 That is really chilling. I was originally scheduled to be the first officer on that flight and due to kind of an extraordinary circumstance, I was bumped from the flight the night before. And there's a documentary called In My Seat that's available on YouTube that tells my story. But I travel now all around the world talking about living on borrowed time. So that was my near death experience.
Starting point is 00:28:15 But yeah, it kind of gives you chills on the back of your neck thinking about how close it was to being basically the pilot on the first airplane that flew into the first world trade center. Yeah speaking. Hey Megan, I want to drop anchor a little bit on the mental health stuff not to freak the flying public out even more. Pilots are either gods and we're flawless or we're not which clearly we're not. Megan if you go to your FAA doc or Steve will know, in the Navy flying fighters, we had a flight surgeon. Of course, a flight surgeon would say,
Starting point is 00:28:52 hey, if anything's wrong with you, you make sure you come and tell me. That was the last person on this planet we would tell anything was wrong to. Why? Because then we're grounded and we're not flying and we're not doing the one thing that's probably making us happy. So if you tell your FAA doctor and your annual physical or every six months or whatever it is like, hey, I'm not feeling too good, I'm a little depressed, guess what's gonna happen? You're gonna get immediately grounded most likely
Starting point is 00:29:17 and you're put over in this filing cabinet and it's an absolute nightmare. Megan, this is one of the reasons I started the No Fallen Heroes Foundation four years ago is because of aviation mental health. We have got to hide anything that's wrong with us. You're gonna lose your job or potentially your license. It is a perverse system right now
Starting point is 00:29:39 where pilots are forced to either self-medicate, drink, hide what's wrong with them or lose their job until the FAA steps up and says, hey, we're gonna have a no kidding serious conversation about this. Pilots and mental health is the elephant in the room that nobody's really talking about. That is really terrifying and makes perfect sense.
Starting point is 00:30:00 What you're saying is that my friend needs to board the aircraft with like a pot of coffee and maybe a breathalyzer. It's going to get really awkward. Megan, real quick. Sully and Miracle and the Hudson, everything like that, obviously a great aviator did some good stuff. It's funny in the movie because they're like, oh, hey, they kept doing the count. Like, hey, we saved this many. I got to be honest with you, Megan. Maybe I'm just speaking for me.
Starting point is 00:30:22 If both engines flamed out and I'm sully, guess who I care about in that moment? Me. All interest is self-interest. The fact that I saved 150 people sitting behind me is gravy. But remember, unless you're a suicidal captain, as potentially in this case, if something goes wrong with the airplane, I'm caring about me right now and my beautiful bride and my kids. Oh, and everybody else too, if they do a documentary about it. Well, we have to find out. I don't know whether he had a family or what.
Starting point is 00:30:50 Obviously there's one report suggested he had a mother who died recently. There was an interesting report about this captain from a long time ago. This is in the Wall Street Journal. They said that he started his flying career in the early 1990s. He attended the Indira Gandhi Academy.
Starting point is 00:31:06 It's a prestigious flight school run in India. That a friend of his who overlapped with him for one year in flight school said he stood out among their classmates, very polite, never cursed, never drank alcohol, spoke softly, so softly that sometimes they had difficulty hearing him, had to ask him to speak louder. Unlike other students, messy quarters, Sabarwal kept a Spartan room filled with the bare minimum. If you open his cupboard, said the friend, there were two formal shirts, two t-shirts,
Starting point is 00:31:32 two pairs of shoes, one slippers, and one bag. So it wouldn't be unusual, I think, to find a pilot who's meticulous. Then figuring out where, if at all, he turned homicidal is a different question altogether. Can I ask you something, Wiz, on Patrick's point of like, if you wanted to bring down the plane, this doesn't really seem like the way you would do it.
Starting point is 00:31:55 Like, you know, it is strange to like, it's all on cam, you know, as opposed to the MH370 guy who, it's never been confirmed, we can't, because the plane disappeared, that that was a's never been confirmed, we can't, because the plane disappeared, that that was a murder-suicide, but I agree that that's overwhelmingly likely what happened. He got the plane out over the Indian Ocean, which is huge and vast, and you know,
Starting point is 00:32:15 you're guaranteed to kill everybody, to have almost no evidence of it. Like, why, if you were going to do this, would you do it so soon after takeoff, and in an area where there's a field right there where maybe it could be recovered by the copilot or something had happened? Megan, that airliner was gliding like a set of car keys at that point.
Starting point is 00:32:35 That's exactly when you'd want to do it. It was enough time where they, like Captain Steve said, just got airborne and immediately the engine shut off and it's gonna settle right back down. Any higher altitude, unless he knocks out the first officer, the FO is gonna have time to put those switches back. There's a horrific 10 second delay. God bless the first officer for, whoa, what are you doing?
Starting point is 00:32:57 Remember, Megan, in the West, we got rid of the Imperial captain years ago, like you can't question the captain and they're a god on the flight deck. We don't do that in the West. In some of these other countries, Asian and Indian, the captain is still kind of revered as a God. So you can tell in that 10 seconds maybe that the FO is like, what are you doing? Why did you do that? And then the guy just kind of sitting there as the plane's descending into that neighborhood, the FO puts the switches back on. Maybe if he had done it a little bit quicker, he could have gotten some thrust.
Starting point is 00:33:27 So we're never going to be able to know until we all transition and meet this guy again, why he did this. It's just, you know, I don't think he's going to be in the same place you and I are. And it's interesting because some people online are like, well, he, he replied with, Oh, I didn't. Hey, man, if you're about to commit murder, suicide, telling the truth probably isn't high on your list of things to do in that moment. So clearly, and he knew there'd be a black box recorder.
Starting point is 00:33:55 You knew it was being recorded. Correct. Go ahead, Steve. And you're you're asking why with a rational mind, we're trying to make sense out of something that's completely irrational. Now when he stepped over that line, none of us is really ever gonna know, but what we do know is that what he did was completely psychotic and it doesn't make any sense. But I agree that if you're gonna do what he did, that's the perfect place to do it. 200 feet off the ground, there's no recovery from that and that airplane is gonna crash and most likely everybody's gonna die.
Starting point is 00:34:27 I think he was just thinking about himself in that moment clearly. But the rational mind tries to make sense of the irrational and it doesn't work. It doesn't. I'll give you the last word, Patrick, go ahead. So why glide onto the roof of the building? Why not simply push the nose down
Starting point is 00:34:43 and crash into the ground at that point why why the the glide it I'm not saying it didn't happen that way but it doesn't make a whole lot of sense and meanwhile here I want to point out I think where the whole conversation is veering in a little bit of a sensationalist direction and I don't want people to have this idea that when you get onto a commercial flight, you should start psychoanalyzing your pilots. In the hierarchy of threat- It's not that you should.
Starting point is 00:35:14 My point was, I will. The idea that your pilot is gonna crash the plane is like so out there among the possibilities and things you should be thinking about. I just- Hey, Megan, real quick. After 9-11, there's a famous story of a US Air Captain in Philadelphia.
Starting point is 00:35:32 I love the Jersey Shore reference. I was born and raised in Margate, so nice job there. But this guy was in Philly and he went through TSA. You remember when they were stealing, you know, tweezers and fingernail clippers? Well, they took his fingernail clippers and he looked at the TSA agent or whatever and said, go ahead and take that.
Starting point is 00:35:49 I have these. And he held his hands up. He's like, I don't need my nail clippers to take the plane down. I have these. Guess what happened? They threw that guy in jail and it took the union like a couple of days to get him out
Starting point is 00:36:00 and fight like two or three years to get his job back. So he said, I have these. I don't need a fingernail clipper. So I know I said that Patrick was going to have the last word, but I know some interesting points that no, no, no, because he raised some interesting points. Like I love to hear you respond, Captain Stephen, why wouldn't he just put it in a nosedive and take it down? That's actually a good question. Well, again, we're trying to make rational sense out of something that's completely irrational.
Starting point is 00:36:24 Maybe he's fantasized about turning the fuel control switches to cut off. They were placed one second apart from each other, which is consistent with the way we turn them on and turn them off. It's a one-handed operation. One, two, it goes like that. So he probably was fantasizing over that on some level, thinking about just watching the airplane descend. The reports are that, I guess apparently
Starting point is 00:36:46 he was very calm in this. He was the only one on that airplane apparently that knew what was coming next. If I was the first officer, I would absolutely be in a panic about it. You're transitioning from flying out normally to what just happened. The fact that the first officer had the presence of mind to reach down and put them back to the run position is semi incredible in my mind. Good on him for doing that. He almost almost saved the day because of where it was done. It was done so low that there was really no recovering from it. Megan with the German wings. Remember what the German
Starting point is 00:37:21 wings guy did lock lock the cockpit captain's beat and trying to break down the door. He put the autopilot in a gentle descent and flew into the out. So why didn't I'll answer a question Patrick's question with a question. Why didn't the that guy just rolled a plane inverted and fly straight into the ground? He put it into a gentle descent like Captain Steve just said, maybe add some sort of weird fetish about I'm just going to watch this thing slowly
Starting point is 00:37:44 flying to the side of a mountain. So again, you can't question crazy. Can I can ask this one other question? What about the survivor? Do you think he could be important? You know, like there's a survivor. Right. Unlikely. He was seated right in front of the wing spar, which is the heaviest,
Starting point is 00:38:04 strongest part of the airplane. It's a steel girder basically right behind where he was, and that probably took most of the impact. The fact that he said one of the initial reports was that he heard a loud bang and the lights flickered. That would be consistent with the Ram Air Turbine. The right eyewitnesses in that situation are not necessarily reliable, but with all the other information we have that his account fits with the deployment of the rats. So he's one part of this that, that seems to be accurate with the whole transition of what took place in those
Starting point is 00:38:36 basically 60 seconds. Megan, if you, having observed the pilot in, in a sort of mental state, which are very slim, I think, go ahead, Wiz. Well, if he was in our fighter squadron, his call sign would be Highlander. You have Gallo's humor, so do we. So you gotta cut that guy's head off to kill him clearly.
Starting point is 00:38:55 So his new call sign's Highlander. It's true. When you're in a dangerous business, you're actually in one. I just report on many. And so you have to go to that. Otherwise you're just, you're crying every day guys. Thank you Patrick we gave you a hard time, but you kept the discussion interesting with your
Starting point is 00:39:11 Thanks to all All the best Wow, what a story So disturbing I totally accept that the odds of this happening to you are Incredibly small and it is not something that you need to worry about at all. But then you think about what Wiz was saying about the mental health screening and how it's not set up to encourage honesty and transparency from our pilots and you think,
Starting point is 00:39:34 well, there is an action point here that we need to really think about. Thankfully, we've got Sean Duffy running transportation. So maybe this is something that we can actually, a message we can get to him. This did not happen in America, this happened in India,, you know, message we can get to him. This did not happen in America. This happened in India, but you know, there but for the grace of God, God rest those souls. All right.
Starting point is 00:39:51 We'll be right back with our friends from the fifth column. Here's one way to clean up your medicine cabinet this season and replace toxin-filled conventional products with more natural ones. Propolis Immune Support, Throat Sprayay and Propolis Plus Vitamin C Liposomal that can be must haves in the medicine cabinet as seasonal germs start to hit. Did you know that germs can enter through your nasal passages just as easily as through your mouth? Propolis Nasal Spray is a great non-toxic swap for other over-the-counter drug-filled
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Starting point is 00:41:22 us through the next hour. Will he or won't he? But in the meantime, you can find all of their work at wethefifth.com. Okay, and you can subscribe there too. Guys, great to see you. It's a pleasure. I wanna start with- Do we have the Mark Halpern site, you guys, my team? Okay, oh, all right, standby, I have it in front of me.
Starting point is 00:41:42 So I went on with my pal Mark Halpern on his Next Up show this morning. We taped it before I taped my show. Well, we're doing this live. And Halpern is everywhere. He does that show and he does Two Way, and he's like, you know, whatever. And apparently on his Two Way show today,
Starting point is 00:41:57 and even in our interview, he raised this with me, and I knew what he was talking about, but I want to tell you what happened. On Two Way, he said the following, everyone I know believes a major newspaper, one of the top three newspapers in the country, is about to publish a piece about President Trump's relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.
Starting point is 00:42:13 Everyone I know knows that, and people in the White House know that too. When that story drops, if it drops today, and some people think it might, it could drive the day. Then he asks the following questions to Dan Turrentine and Sean Spicer. Either answer them or say, in fact, we don't know. How did Trump and Jeffrey Epstein meet?
Starting point is 00:42:29 I don't know, they say. Did Trump ever go to Jeffrey Epstein's townhouse? Yes, it's not a townhouse, it's a mansion. How many times? I believe many. What occasions? One-on-one parties? What did he go for?
Starting point is 00:42:40 I don't know. Okay, he's just asking these questions. It's fine. These guys don't know. I think I know the answers to a lot of these and I answered them on Halpern's show. So if you want to hear my answers, you can tune into Next Up. Not that I'm some expert on Epstein. I've just been neck deep in all of these reports over the past couple of weeks for obvious
Starting point is 00:42:55 reasons. But I can tell you, I don't know why we're afraid to say it's the Wall Street Journal. Maybe that will turn out to be untrue, but I've been told by multiple sources that the journal's working on a piece on Trump and Epstein. And guys, there's no question in my mind that there's gonna be a lot there because they knew each other for 15 years. They were actually close friends for 15 years
Starting point is 00:43:17 prior to Epstein's troubles. And I'm sure they did spend a lot of time together, but what does that tell us? And he spent a lot of time with a lot of luminaries and they weren't all pedophiles, right? It's like a lot of them, some of them were women. The Dalai Lama was over at Epstein's house. Michael Wolfe just told Vicki Ward that a couple of days ago and we could go on. It doesn't make Trump look bad or it doesn't incriminate him in any way that he was friends
Starting point is 00:43:46 with the guy. He's already admitted that. The question is, are you going to produce evidence that Trump took advantage of an under aged girl? Now, if they're there, then we're talking a scandal. But honestly, if somebody's got that proof, we would have seen it by now, would we not? Yeah. Yeah. The Biden administration had access to all of these files, at least the Biden Justice
Starting point is 00:44:10 Department did, whether or not the president or any of his people looked at it. The possibility that this information, disdaining and incriminating information that would have devastated Donald Trump's future prospects for its politician, or perhaps even brought him under criminal suspicion, the likelihood that that would not have already come out years ago is unbelievably low. I just can't imagine it. We've seen leaks of absolutely everything else. We've seen legal trials that have been completely prosecuted on much thinner, thinner, thinner, less sensational grounds. We would have seen this already. He was accused of rape. So that doesn't seem to be what's hidden here
Starting point is 00:44:46 or obscured anyways. Right. E. Jean Carroll accused him of rape, which was a completely bullshit allegation. I don't believe one word that E. Jean Carroll said, but Trump is on camera with the, you know, you can grab him by the P word and they let you get away with it when you're a celebrity.
Starting point is 00:45:03 So it's like the fact that Trump might've had a handsy forties and fifties or even earlier than that, I don't know, it's not going to come as a huge shock, Matt, but it's if there were proof that he had a thing for underaged girls, you don't think we'd know that by now? I think we would know that. I think the potential political damage of this story, and let's keep in mind, the Wall Street Journal was not alone, but they were ahead of the pack mostly in writing about the Biden White House Operation Bubble Wrap coverup for months and years.
Starting point is 00:45:38 They did really good work. Wait, is that a real term or are you just saying that? Cause I love that. No, no, that was the term. That was the term among both the journal and the New York Times reporting about the hands are forgotten that Joe Biden, that's awesome talk about on this show. They use Operation bubble wrap to describe the Dr. Jill Biden
Starting point is 00:45:56 kind of initiative. And maybe we'll even talk about that later on in the episode. Who knows? But anyways, they it's Wall Street Journal does good reporting, period. But right now, I think the fact of the matter about the politics of this is that Trump is facing a political challenge the likes of which he hasn't really seen in a good while, which is that some people in his base are like, I don't know, dude, I don't like how you're you're handling this, or I don't like how your administration is handling this. And at a time when there's a lot of people who are more of the independent bent among people in media,
Starting point is 00:46:31 the conservative media, podcasts, and Substack, who are dissatisfied with the level of disclosure so far in Epstein-related information from the Justice Department, having the story drop to remind you of what we already know on the record is that he does have a relationship as does a lot of people, including several people that all three of us know have been to Epstein's Island and or have had interactions with him, scientists and people like that. But the timing of that information at a time when
Starting point is 00:47:02 there's these struggles between Pam Bondi and Dan Bongino. And when there are people who haven't gone full Charlie Kirk in that they haven't gotten a call from the president and said, okay, I'll stop talking about it. People are still talking about it on the right. Well, Charlie is too. He had that one day of like, I'm not doing it. And then the next two days, the shows have been heavily. Good on Charlie, which is not something that I say every single day. But Trump just went out and called those people on the right and within MAGA who are talking about it still, he called them a bunch of losers. He said he's lost respect. Bad people who are weaklings. Weaklings and that they're working for the fake news and that this is all
Starting point is 00:47:39 like a fake news plot or a liberal democratic the Democratic plot that you fell for. It's a hoax and et cetera. It's going to be really interesting against that backdrop to see what those people do. You have just been insulted by the president. I don't know, Megan, if you know this, but sometimes Donald Trump insults people in the media on the right. It's a day ending in why? I will say for the record, my advice to all those people who are on the right is just keep doing your thing.
Starting point is 00:48:12 You can't run a show that way, a journalistic outfit. You really can't run that way. President Trump will get mad at any journalist who is doing their job. And I don't forget the fake news. They got their own issues. But I mean, honest reporters who actually like Trump and are fair to Trump. And you just, you know, it's part of being a journalist.
Starting point is 00:48:31 You are disliked more than you're liked. And that's just the way it goes if you're doing your job right. Yeah, I mean, there's, it seems to me though, without having seen the Wall Street Journal reporting or the reporting from whomever is going to be publishing this story, there's no possibility that we would be talking about this or that this story would be coming out if there
Starting point is 00:48:48 was not this profound mishandling of the disclosures related to the Epstein investigation. Like everything about this has gone badly for the administration. The messaging around it has been absolutely terrible. Like someone should absolutely lose their job about over it. Whether or not it happens this week or a couple of weeks from now is the only question I suppose that actually ought to be seriously entertained. But they mishandled this. Like one doesn't have to believe any sort of conspiracy theories to look at the situation, to raise an eyebrow and say, what on earth is going on over there?
Starting point is 00:49:21 Who is responsible for actually talking to the public? When I think about like, I don't know what they have. Is it a picture of Trump with like a young girl? Like it's not gonna be with some really young girl, but let's say like as a 17 year old girl. If that had come out, if they have that and that comes out on any other day, it'd be like, all right, whatever. You know, everybody knows that Trump was a bit of a playboy
Starting point is 00:49:46 when he was younger. He's had multiple wives. He was a man about town when he was younger. And it wouldn't have been a total yawn, but it would have been mostly a yawn. Certainly his supporters would not have given two figs about that. But now would be a terrible time for that to drop because of the way this is all snowballed
Starting point is 00:50:08 into like, why is he so adamant about not releasing another document? And then if they drop this story with that kind of thing now, it could potentially hurt him because now even his own supporters have been insulted for actually caring about child issues, including potentially sexual abuse. And then you see that and you think, oh, how much is there in this lane? And why does that explain?
Starting point is 00:50:33 I'll give you the last thought on that. Whoever wants to take it in the 30 seconds we have before a break. Just to say that Trump has over the last 10 years successfully used insult comedy to kind of bring his base into line and into check, most famously in my point of view with the House Freedom Caucus, which started off as an antagonist and then he whipped them into line by the end of 2017. Can he do that with his base?
Starting point is 00:50:57 People who are independent in media, we are going to find out. Yeah, we're in the process of finding out. Okay, be right back with the fifth column. Don't go away. I've been talking a lot about River Bend Ranch steaks lately, and for good reason. The ranch is just a few miles from West Yellowstone, Montana, and their steaks are amazing. They're incredibly flavorful and surprisingly tender. Our listeners have shared so much great feedback.
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Starting point is 00:52:12 Camille Foster and Matt Welsh of the fifth column. I mean, Moynihan's not here, so I think we can just say the two best, the best two have made it. We can say that anytime. He's very busy trying to get his name scrubbed off certain flight logs I don't really understand the exact thing, but hopefully it'll be finished
Starting point is 00:52:30 You never know he's a bomb of on I mean who knows where he's been My team did send me this it's just for what it's worth. Okay, Michael wolf like He's like to me. He's like a Gabe Sherman type we're like He's like to me, he's like a Gabe Sherman type, where like 50% of what he writes is explosive and spot on and jaw dropping and the other fifth is totally made up. That's my own impression. And he, but he gets all these very, very famous billionaire type people to let him follow them around
Starting point is 00:52:59 like a fly on the wall, you know, like the Murdochs and many others, and then they all regret doing it. Trump, anyway, he dropped a book not long ago called Too Famous, like TOO, and he wrote this in the book. The FBI did not list in its findings of the Epstein resident search, a set of pictures that Epstein sometimes removed from the safe to show friends,
Starting point is 00:53:23 a dozen or so snapshots from shortly before their quarrel in 2004 of Donald Trump at Epstein's Palm Beach home, posing with a variety of young women in various stages of undress. Some topless, sitting on his lap, touching his hair, laughing and pointing at a suggestive stain on the front of the future president's pants. Now that's, that's Michael Wolff, yeah.
Starting point is 00:53:47 So I have no idea whether any of that is true, but again, you know, this has been out there and if this is now somebody's gonna produce this photo, my first question will be, where'd you get it? What other photos of Jeffrey Epstein's do you have and why haven't they been made public before now? That would be the kind of thing Trump wouldn't want hitting, but that doesn't prove he molested anybody. And let's not forget that one of Epstein's lawyers, not Dershowitz, the other guy whose name is
Starting point is 00:54:14 escaping me right now, but he is on the record as saying there's nothing. Jeffrey Epstein had nothing on Donald Trump. I asked him, I specifically asked Epstein whether he had anything on Trump and the answer was no. So, you know, it's one thing- That lawyer also supports Donald Trump, correct? Like- Yes, but it's one thing to show like the present, you know, the current president, but then, you know,
Starting point is 00:54:38 he owned a beauty pageant and he was just like a rich guy. It's sort of frolicking about with young girls. And I don't, I mean, the stain is just, that's so nasty. If they're all making fun of it and having fun with it on camera, the odds are it's an absolute nothing burger. And just like, you know, these are people letting off some steam, having fun,
Starting point is 00:54:56 not thinking he's gonna be the future president. I can see why Trump would be like, yeah, this is not ideal. I'm not gonna be putting that out. Or I don't wanna invite somebody to put that out. But again, it sounds like that's not in the government's possession, that that's in somebody who knew Epstein's possession because it was not seized.
Starting point is 00:55:11 That's Michael Wolff's point, not seized. So this is some private individual. Could it be Michael Wolff? I have no idea who's been holding onto it for however long. Michael Wolff dropped tapes of Epstein right before the presidential election. They just didn't get any attention because we were focused on saving the world and he couldn't stop Trump's reelection with his last 11th hour hit piece on Trump and it had
Starting point is 00:55:36 to do with Epstein in any event. That's where things stand. Any thoughts on that, on the picture, on the details? Wolf, it's a 50-50, it's a 75-25. I'm not sure in what direction I would go, probably 25-75 with his veracity. He's just been historically kind of loose and sloppy, but he also does have access, so it's always buyer beware.
Starting point is 00:55:58 I would caution that if there is a photo, anything like what you describe, that's trouble for Trump. There's such a difference between visuals and non-visuals. And this is gonna sound like a strange comparison, but I'm gonna make it anyways. With the Abu Ghraib photos, right? The prison that the US military ran in Iraq and abused prisoners and it was bad.
Starting point is 00:56:20 When those first photos came out, it was awful. America had a reckoning along a conversation. Then candidate Barack Obama said, when I'm president, we're going to release the rest of them. And then when he became president, he changed his mind. Partly because, and their stated reason was not that Barack Obama was in the photos, but like, this is gonna make life difficult.
Starting point is 00:56:43 The Abu Ghraib photos changed or impacted American foreign policy. And it absolutely cut into trust for the government and the military and a bunch of other things besides. It makes things uncomfortable. So it's just the visuals of seeing this. There can be totally documented center reports. Well, how would you recommend he handle it, Matt?
Starting point is 00:57:01 Like at this point, if you know, he were taking your advice on what to do right now, what would it be? My advice is not for the health of the political prospects of any sitting politician. My advice is I wanna see everything as long as it doesn't abuse the individual rights of some of the people in the images.
Starting point is 00:57:20 And it certainly would not abuse Donald Trump's individual rights to have that released in any shape or form. I want to see all those photos. I want to stress the Abu Ghraib photos too, not that I relish looking at them. I want the maximum transparency. And let's just remember that again, regardless of what one thinks about, um, you know, the, the Epstein files being a skeleton key towards everything. And I don't at all think that, um,
Starting point is 00:57:43 one can look at the real reporting from people like Julie Brown, heroic reporting at the Miami Herald that basically reopened the case in 2019 because of them working hard to uncover previously covered up files. Not even covered up, just unreleased files. We should be in favor of transparency. And one reason that Pam Bondi is rightly in the crosshairs
Starting point is 00:58:04 in my opinion, right now, is that she could have said in February, she could have said, I'm in favor of transparency. And we're going to see and do the serious work to try to release as many files as possible. And we'll go over which names need to be redacted and which don't. And that's difficult work. And we're going to do this also in light of, Jelaine Maxwell has an open appeals process going, you don't want to jeopardize that. That's not what she did. She invited influencers to the White House and gave him Trapper Keeper
Starting point is 00:58:30 photo. The fan service, not transparency. And then when those fans- And they read phase one, they were phase one, like there were more phases coming. They did. So there's two things that I want to say, one of which I'm actually a little nervous to say, and I kind of don't want to say it, but I may say it anyway. They did, they did. So there's two things that I wanna say, one of which I'm actually a little nervous to say and I kinda don't wanna say it, but I may say it anyways. Good tease, do it.
Starting point is 00:58:49 The first thing is perhaps a disagreement with you, Matt. I love transparency, secrecy is for losers. This is what makes you guys the top two, just FYI. This is what makes you the top two. Keep going, Neil. Thank you, thank you. The secrecy is for losers, et cetera, et cetera. That said, there is a reality here. Like libertarians are both concerned about transparency and checking government power,
Starting point is 00:59:12 but also checking government's ability to abuse that power. And in a high-profile investigation like this, what we all know is that if your name is published, even in a totally innocent way because of your own personal affiliation with Epstein, which might not have been criminal in any sort of nature whatsoever, to have it publicized in a sloppy way, or at all even in this particular climate, is tantamount to accusing you
Starting point is 00:59:37 of something really, really nefarious. So I appreciate the restraint on the part of judges who've been involved in this case. And now, even with respect to federal disclosures, that's at least a worthwhile consideration. Now that's a bit of a nuanced point. It just kind of brings two things in tension. Now the other thing that I wanna say
Starting point is 00:59:55 that I'm a little reluctant to say, but I can't be the first person to think this is, why the hell haven't we seen some AI generated video of Donald Trump with Epstein, or even AI generated photo of it? It would be so easy to do. You have memory. Especially when you have things like this out, you would expect it to spread
Starting point is 01:00:12 like wildfire. It is just odd to me that something like that hasn't happened yet. I don't necessarily want it to. In fact, I don't want it to, but it is interesting that we haven't seen more of that. No, Adam Schiff is in his basement right now creating these personally.
Starting point is 01:00:24 I'm stitching it together. I'm sure it's gonna of that. No, Adam Schiff is in his basement right now creating these personally. He's stitching it together. I'm sure it's going to hit soon. Here is- I don't know if he has the technical prowess, but I believe he has the motive for sure. Here's the tweet I was referring to, the guy, it's the lawyer David Schoen, S-C-H-O-E-N, who did later, he represented Trump, I think maybe it was at the first impeachment trial, earlier, I guess I should say. He said, second impeachment trial,
Starting point is 01:00:46 he said, this is a tweet, I was hired to lead Jeffrey Epstein's defense as his criminal lawyer nine days before he died. He sought my advice for months before that. I can say authoritatively, unequivocally, and definitively that he had no information to hurt President Trump. I specifically asked him, exclamation point.
Starting point is 01:01:05 So that's, you know, as close as we're gonna get to hearing from Epstein himself, that he didn't have any real compromise on Trump. And if there's a picture, okay, fine. It'll keep tongues wagging. But look, the reason why I really think, I don't know how long this goes on. You know, if there's a drip, drip, drip
Starting point is 01:01:23 in the journal or whoever else, and like the problem for Trump is now the left wing is suddenly interested in Epstein. You know, like these absolute cretins who had absolutely nothing, not a care for who might've been hurt behind the scenes by, you know, some pedophile ring or just freaks who hung out with Epstein.
Starting point is 01:01:38 Now suddenly there are everyone's savior, like, oh, I'm on it, I'm on it. In fact, there was an extraordinary exchange on Morning Joe where Jamie Raskin, a villain, went on, to his credit, Scarborough asked him something along these lines. Look what happened. They think we're gonna get that from 21 to 25
Starting point is 01:01:53 when Democrats controlled the DOJ. Why, it was a crisis then, it's a crisis now. Why didn't Democrats call for it from 21 to 25? So, I mean, you have to go back and look specifically at particular prosecutorial decisions and what was taking place in terms of the other cases. So I don't know, we could try to reconstruct that record. But the point is that Donald Trump is the one who has led the crusade to say that Epstein,
Starting point is 01:02:32 who was his very close friend, and there's all kinds of pictures of them. Hmm. So he has no answer. Donald Trump did not lead the crusade. Trump, sir, gets definitely, we're into the Epstein thing. Trump himself has always been very measured. Yeah, family. I'm Don Jr. Yes, that I mean, that's true. But how about Jamie Raskin? I don't know. There may have been issues going, but Trump, but Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump,
Starting point is 01:02:55 Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, shit what he's thinking or doing, but now suddenly you're gonna have the New York Times like, oh, well, it's a chance to hurt him, great. And I don't know whether that's gonna help or hurt Trump because it's gonna generate a lot of additional coverage of it, but as soon as the Times and the Guardian and the Washington Post are on the story and CNN's doing it wall to wall,
Starting point is 01:03:19 that's when all of us on the right are gonna start defending Trump because we can't stand those people and it's just too cynical. I mean, without going back, just the, you know, in general, always those legacy media institutions have so much less oomph and power and influence than they used to. Um, so it's always worth keeping in mind. I think what will drive some of this, these headlines, what we're already seeing,
Starting point is 01:03:41 which is that Democrats in Congress are going to say, Oh, we're going to need to have some hearings on this in August. And the thing is, you know, maybe we're already seeing, which is that Democrats in Congress are gonna say, oh, we're gonna need to have some hearings on this in August. And the thing is, you know, maybe we should have hearings on this if it means that we need to figure out the behavior, particularly the Department of Justice way back in 2007, the first time around, like,
Starting point is 01:03:57 why did these decisions get made? And what were the contours of it or whatever? There might need to be those things. Why did Alex Acosta cut such a sweetheart deal? And by the way, I had Vicki Ward on the show two days ago, the reporter who wrote for Vanity Fair for all those years and then wrote that piece in the Daily Beast in 2019 saying, I spoke with a member of Trump transition team.
Starting point is 01:04:17 That person said they weren't worried about Alex Acosta getting confirmed because he told them the reason I gave Epstein the sweetheart deal is because he belongs to intelligence. This is above my pay grade. Basically I needed to make it go away. So she stands by that 100%. She go back and look at the clip. It's on our YouTube feed right now.
Starting point is 01:04:34 She was like, I have absolutely no doubt about my reporting. I stand by it 100%. The person was in the room with Acosta and heard him say it. And I have never gone back even once in Tila on my reporting. So she's, you know, she stands by her reasons on why Acosta did what he did. And you're right. If we're actually going to have a special counsel, I don't think we're going to have congressional hearings because Dems would have to control the House.
Starting point is 01:04:54 Now they might in 2026, but right now they don't, so they can't have hearings. I don't think we will have hearings, but if we were going to, we definitely have to keep 2007, 2008 in the mix. What was George W. Bush's, you know, in the last year, his attorney general doing? Why did Alberto Gonzalez or his top team sign off on this? Cause Alex Acosta said, main justice vetted everything
Starting point is 01:05:20 and it proved everything I did. And we know what that means. Now later he told the office of professional responsibility, reportedly we've never seen the actual Q and A and it proved everything I did. And we know what that means. Now later he told the Office of Professional Responsibility reportedly, we've never seen the actual Q&A, that he was not told to drop it because of any intelligence link. So anyway, that's just yet another something
Starting point is 01:05:34 that they'd have to look into. All right, I wanna shift gears now. This is not an important thing. Actually, before I get to this, but this is my second, this is my, after the plane crash, this is my second favorite story. But before I get to it, I just is my second, after the plane crash, this is my second favorite story. But before I get to it, I just wanna say this.
Starting point is 01:05:47 It does occur to me, this is a self-inflicted wound because of Pam Bondi. I don't think there's any question. I don't know why she thought it would be a great idea to drop this two page memo in the dark of night, in the middle of the summer, during a slow news time when people have nothing to chew on, but that, right? Like- Sunday night.
Starting point is 01:06:02 What? For Monday, for Monday. Yeah, yeah. Like if you want to bury a story you bury a story during a busy news time not during a slow news time. Somebody when Elon and Trump were fighting on Twitter and we were all refreshing our ex. You know like people addicted to crack you know like every two seconds like refresh refresh somebody tweeted out like by the way if you have any bad news you wanna drop, now would probably be the time to do it. Like, no one cares. She did the opposite.
Starting point is 01:06:31 But I wanna say this, as we're talking about all this today, National Review had the headline that, I'll read it to you. Exclusive, Trump administration to cut off federal funding to hospitals that provide gender transition services to minors. Yes, right on.
Starting point is 01:06:52 They're in the process right now in the Senate of approving $9 billion worth of Doge cuts. It's not the full gamut, but it's a very nice start. That's $9 billion we're going to have in the pocket that we didn't. Today, one of the other great news stories we'll get to is we appear to be about to defund officially NPR and PBS to the tune of a billion dollars who should not be getting one more penny of taxpayer money. In June, thanks to Trump's tariffs, that's according to NBC, which hates Trump, we had a surplus for the first time in forever in the month of June.
Starting point is 01:07:26 Again, thanks to the tariffs, we were not deficit spending in June. We were spending in the black, like people who have a budget and are going to live up to it and actually have savings to put away. It doesn't sound like the United States. He just this week signed the Halt Fentanyl Act, cracking down on fentanyl and the people who deal it, which is a scourge across America really devastating to working-class communities and middle-class communities to across the country So he's just racked up a ton of wins a ton of wins and things for which he should be celebrated so I understand Trump's frustration at
Starting point is 01:08:00 Having to talk about this cretin Jeffrey Epstein having to talk about this cretin Jeffrey Epstein. Again, for that, he needs to blame Pam Bondi. He doesn't seem like he wants to do that. Anybody wanna comment on the Trump W's before we move on to my second favorite story of the day? Just as the libertarian jerk hole here in the corner. You might be slipping out of the number one position. Yeah, whatever. I've been on the show before.
Starting point is 01:08:26 I know where I belong. It ain't number one. But $9 billion operates the federal government for one half of a day. It is much less than the $500 billion dollar rescissions package that Rand Paul was looking for, obviously much less than the initial claims of Doge. I like 9 billion. It's better than zero, but it's only nine billion better than zero.
Starting point is 01:08:48 And I'm glad for the PBSNPR thing, which you alluded to, and some other things besides, but I want more government cutting period. And I would co-sign and just say, trimming politically divisive things that the federal government is funding, I mean, probably appropriate. The federal government shouldn't be throwing tons and tons of money at things that most Americans aren't particularly interested
Starting point is 01:09:11 in. That doesn't make a lot of sense. But we can talk about it. Okay, no I want to talk about what happened at the Coldplay concert. I'm sorry but it's everywhere. It's all anybody's talking about and we just got some news on it. So in an extraordinary chain of events, there was a Coldplay concert. And where was the Coldplay concert? I was at Gillette Stadium, home to the NFL's
Starting point is 01:09:35 New England Patriots in Foxborough, Massachusetts. And here is what happened. They had like the kiss cam kind of thing that goes around and I guess we should play it. Do we have the video? That zeroed in on this one couple and I'll describe it for the listening audience. Though I imagine 99% of the audience has seen this clip already
Starting point is 01:09:53 because it's gone totally viral. Let's watch it. Oh, look at these two. All right, come on. You okay? Uh oh, what? Either they're having an affair or they're just very shy. Oh!
Starting point is 01:10:09 At the beginning of the clip, it's got the man behind the woman like holding her with his arms around her and she's swaying in his arms. These are two obvious lovers or in some sort of romantic relationship. It's not how I hold the head of our HR. It's not existent.
Starting point is 01:10:26 We don't have that person, but anyway, it turns out the man is, hold on, his name is, he's an astronomer. He's a CEO of a company called Astronomer. Andy Byron, I think is his name. Thank you, thank you, Andy Byron. And his HR director, that's who he's holding in there,
Starting point is 01:10:47 and I'll give you her name too in a second. I got it all in here, it's spread out across my packet. Stand by, this is, if it's my favorite story, I should have been more prepared. Oh, it's in the update, is it in the update? Yeah, yeah, yeah, sorry guys. Bear with me. I'm sorry.
Starting point is 01:11:02 So much paper and so little time. Okay, his name, yeah, is Andy Byron, Bear with me. So much paper and so little time. Okay. His name, yeah, is Andy Byron, B-Y-R-O-N, and he's the CEO of a company called Astronomer, and that is his chief people officer. Is that what we're calling HR now? That is so weird. Chief people officer, Kristin Cabot, C-A-B-O-T.
Starting point is 01:11:23 The problem here is that Andy Byron is married to someone other than Kristen Cabot, C-A-B-O-T. The problem here is that Andy Byron is married to someone other than Kristen Cabot, who again, the irony of her being head of HR, and he has two children, and it appears that they were caught in what appears to be an affair, and here's the latest reporting. Okay, that Byron and his wife, both 50,
Starting point is 01:11:48 live in Northboro, which I think is by Foxboro, Massachusetts. And per Mrs. Space X, on X, who is heavily covering and tracking the story, his wife has now deactivated her account. The wife later dropped her married name on her Facebook account, to the delight of Mrs. SpaceX, who wrote, what a class act.
Starting point is 01:12:10 Go, Megan, get that divorce lawyer and get the money. Okay, so this is all speculation because none of this has been confirmed by the relevant players. But what we do know for sure is that this is the guy that is his head of HR. They were caught in an obvious embrace. And as soon as that cam went on them
Starting point is 01:12:28 and they saw their image up in the thing, it was the worst coverup ever. She turned her back to the camera and he just like, he looked totally humiliated, embarrassed. It's like, hello, everybody knows to just act like you didn't do anything wrong. You gotta keep the, keep holding and then make it into like a dance. That's all it was. It was a dance. It wasn't an embrace.
Starting point is 01:12:49 I do something other than turn and cower in humiliation. Camille, he did so many things wrong. I mean, the very first thing is and look, I've never cheated on my wife, not cheating on my wife. I love you, baby. It's her birthday. I'm happy birthday. Great. But if I did it to tomorrow a phrase from O.J. Simpson, I sure as hell am not going to take my side chick to a stadium with 65,000 strangers and just kind of march through the crowd and go up to our box and then be holding her in a warm embrace at a Coldplay concert.
Starting point is 01:13:22 I think that the actual star of this story, though, is Chris Martin, who decides, given an opportunity here to let these people off the hook and just let the camera move along, to suggest explicitly that these people are either having an affair. I mean, seriously? You just throw the fans under the bus
Starting point is 01:13:39 who paid their hard-earned money for these tickets? Maybe he's just being- For a very expensive box? You're just decimating it. He Just being an accelerationist, Camille. Trying to get them faster to where they were maybe going all along. Maybe he didn't believe it. It feels like the only reason he would say that is if he didn't believe it.
Starting point is 01:13:55 If he just thought they were camera shy and he's giving them a hard time. But as it turns out, he may have been correct. We don't have confirmation of that. Take it with a grain of salt. There could be some other innocent explanation. As much as we all trust Mrs. Space X and her reporting, we really don't have this confirmed, but it's everywhere.
Starting point is 01:14:14 It's everywhere. And honestly, it's just, it's alarming because every woman sees that and has like a shutter go down her spine that like your marriage could go up in an instant based on really bad judgment. People do this, they have affairs, you know, marriages fall apart, normally not in such a public way where you've got Chris Martin involved.
Starting point is 01:14:38 Here, we've got the right clip now, let's watch it. All right. Yes, oh, look at this. All right, come on. You're okay? Uh oh, what? Either they're having an affair or they're just very shy. Oh, she's talking to her friend.
Starting point is 01:14:53 That's her friend. She whips her back to the camera. Yeah. And he actually, he actually beds down to get out of the, like squatting, to get out of, like squatting to get out of the sight. Honestly, they should have listened to me. Look, well, he's really hugging her. It's tight.
Starting point is 01:15:13 Yeah, you just lean in. You have to lean in at that point. Right? You really do. You gotta like kiss her on the top of her head and be like, she's so cute. My head of HR, she's been through a lot. Somebody just died.
Starting point is 01:15:22 That's why I'm holding her like, I don't know. I'm not sure what you do, but I don't think this is it. It is a pity Moynihan isn't here because he would have great advice. He just would. Well, he wouldn't be turning and shying away. I think he has a certain transparency in the way he lives his life.
Starting point is 01:15:38 Megan, I'm just alarmed a little bit by the level of specificity in your suggestions for how to avoid the VA with your side piece. You know what, it's because I'm an actress now. I don't know if you caught my premiere in With Love, Megan, my Megan Markle parody, but I'm an actress now. I did see. Yeah. And let me explain to you how it works in the improv world since you clearly don't know. It's just all, everything's a yes. You don't say no. It's like, yes, I'm on camera. Yes, I'm hugging.
Starting point is 01:16:06 Yes, it's no problem. Yes, it's never like, no, no, I wasn't doing it. You threw something at me and we're gonna go with it. Okay, he's trying to keep up. Well, okay. Yeah, it's great advice. Yeah, yeah, this is the problem. When you haven't been the way I have to outer space,
Starting point is 01:16:22 you don't know things. See, this guy and I will probably get along. He's an astronomer. I'm an astronaut. We should probably connect. He should give me the exclusive. Are you auditioning for something here? Yeah.
Starting point is 01:16:32 Yeah. Yeah. It seems very loving. Definitely not. I feel about my spouse the way Camille feels about his. Okay. It's not related, but it kind of is. Forgive me, because we're taking a,
Starting point is 01:16:43 usually we do harder news and then softer news, but I'm taking a, usually we do harder news and then softer news, but I'm taking a different route. Scottie Schaeffler, you know me in the sports. Do I have it wrong? The golf, Schaeffler, the golf champion. I'm not a golf guy, I don't know. Look at this, I got nothing here.
Starting point is 01:17:00 I got, I'm talking to two like intellectuals. I, and Moynihan would not help here either. We go to other sports. No, he doesn't know golf either, but basketball, football, I'm your guy. Yeah. Okay, all right. Well, golf is a sport too.
Starting point is 01:17:13 And this guy, Scottie Schieffler, is very popular and very successful in his accomplishments. I'm gonna tell you all the stuff that he's done in one second. He's number one in the world, just in case you didn't know that, which I didn't. He's 29, three time major champion, has won the Masters twice,
Starting point is 01:17:32 and the PGA Championship this year. He's looking to inch closer to the career grand slam at the Open this week at Royal Portrush. 16 time PGA Tour winner, and he's been the number one ranked golfer for over 100 weeks. So it's crazy. I don't think you can get any more accomplished
Starting point is 01:17:53 in the world of golf. And he just gave a press conference. I saw this on X, and it's rare that I sit and I watch the whole four-minute clip of somebody I don't know at all. I was fascinated by what he said. I'm gonna play play you part of it and you'll see why I was. It feels like you work your whole life to celebrate winning a tournament for like a few minutes. It only lasts a few minutes. That kind of euphoric feeling. It's like, okay, now what are we going
Starting point is 01:18:21 to eat for dinner? You know, life goes on. I love the challenge. I love being able to play this game for a living. It's one of the greatest joys of my life, but does it fill the deepest wants and desires of my heart? Absolutely not. You know, that's why I talk about family's being my priority because it really is. You know, I'm blessed to be able to come out here
Starting point is 01:18:38 and play golf, but if my golf ever started affecting my home life or it ever affected the relationship I have with my wife or with my son, you know, that's going to be the last day that I play out here for a living. This is not the be all end all. This is not the most important thing in my life. That's why I wrestle with why is this so important to me because I would much rather be a great father than I would be a great golfer.
Starting point is 01:19:01 He went on. Amen. Right? He was talking about how you work all day, you're out here on the course all day, the links, whatever, and you're practicing, practicing, practicing, you get up early in the morning, my wife always says thank you to me when I go
Starting point is 01:19:13 because she knows I'm really putting it all out there for the family. And then you win and you're like, yay. He really talked about how winning's great, but it's really not that great. Like you make such sacrifice, you put so much effort into getting the win. When you get it, there is that moment of euphoria,
Starting point is 01:19:35 but then it's quickly over. He's like, well, so I won, I can't remember which tournament, but one of them, and he's like, and everyone's like, yeah, and you're hugging. And then that night, we went out, like, watched a movie. Like, we went out to dinner. You know, it's like, and then you're right back, the questions that come your way immediately are,
Starting point is 01:19:52 what are you gonna do for the next one? Like, can you do the next one? Like, what's gonna have the next one? I could totally understand what he's saying. I'm not an athlete, but it reminded me a little bit of back when I practiced law, and you would kill yourself getting ready for this big trial. You know, it's like the Super Bowl of law.
Starting point is 01:20:10 And I mean, night and day with no sleep and like years that way. And then you'd try the case and yes, you would win. I lost one, but we got it reversed on appeal. Any event. So it was all net, it was all wins. And you'd be so thrilled at having the W and you would go out and celebrate that night. And then the next day it's just done. It's done.
Starting point is 01:20:31 But the pain of losing was so acute and would weigh on you for weeks. You know, like, ah, it's so far outweighed the joy of winning. And I've never heard a professional athlete just be so honest about it and just get like really real about how that high is a bit of a false god and what's real is sitting in your living room. Yeah. I mean, and you mentioned his age. I don't remember how old
Starting point is 01:21:02 you said he was. It's not so sub 30. He's fortunate to have figured it out so early. I don't know that most people do. I mean, I think we are people of privilege. We live pretty, pretty, pretty extraordinary lives in many respects. We get to talk to really prominent people in all kinds of public contexts, occasionally come in for controversy. But we've been able to do a lot of stuff. Before I had kids, my wife and I visited every continent,
Starting point is 01:21:20 including Antarctica, and done all kinds of cool crap. But what I've come to realize, and I think the knowledge I have, that I've learned from my wife, is that I've been able to do a lot of stuff. Before I had kids, my wife and I visited every continent, including Antarctica, and then all kinds of cool crap. But what I've come to realize, and I think the knowledge I have that other people don't, having already done a lot of the bucket list stuff that I could have imagined before we had kids, is the most important thing I do every day is like wake up and try to be a great husband and try to be a great father.
Starting point is 01:21:42 And that doesn't mean I don't care about other things, but I've put those things into the right context. I think my daughter and my son really helped crystallize what my priorities are, like my marriage and my own kind of personal happiness and my ability to be present in any given moment. And we used to have one of those posters in the office that said something like, you know,
Starting point is 01:22:04 it's not the destination, it's the journey. And I hated it for years. I was like, I wanna win. But I have come around to completely understanding it. Like it is those quiet moments. The best moments of my life are those quiet moments where, or not so quiet moments, where everyone is in the bed together for 15 or 20 minutes.
Starting point is 01:22:25 And to be able to recognize it in that moment is an extraordinary privilege. And we don't, we don't do it enough. We're consumed with politics, we're consumed with career advancement or the next thing that we want to do. And we forget that the moment you achieve the great thing you've been thinking about, you're immediately thinking about, okay, what's next? What other thing am I striving for? Just things, however things are in your life right now, it could be so much worse. And it may be, like eventually the void, the void is screaming out for all
Starting point is 01:22:56 of us. But we have this moment to be present, to be grateful. And I love that. I mean, it's such a great sentiment. I don't really watch golf, but I'm an instant fan of his. Yeah, same. Cause you look at those kids, like I think about my kids when they were babes in their cribs and they smell so good and they're so happy to see you in the morning and going to get them.
Starting point is 01:23:15 You've already won. This is daily winning. The W staring you in the face. It's not to say you shouldn't have any professional ambition. It's just when you have that satisfaction, that true, like true real love and joy, it's like everything else is kind of gravy. I'm not even sure if you can get the high
Starting point is 01:23:31 from winning on the golf course or whatever. Now in my case, in the ratings or whatever God you're chasing, once you know what really matters, right? It's like that fulfillment is up here. Maybe you can bump up a degree or two, but I don't know, even people who don't have kids, Matt, I think can recognize the disappointment
Starting point is 01:23:51 of chasing something that's kind of false, whether it's an Oscar in Hollywood or a trophy in sports, you know, not to undermine the whole process and the discipline and, you know, being great at something, but like the win isn't necessarily all it's cracked up to be. First of all, I need to take credit. I was badgering Camille Foster to have kids
Starting point is 01:24:12 for a very long time. That's true. Bro-natalist on the film podcast. That's true. I love how kids don't have any idea what you do for a living. Not what you do, Megan. In particular, my 17 year old knows exactly what you do for a living. I what you do, Megan, in particular, my 17 year old knows
Starting point is 01:24:25 exactly what you do. Dad, you were on Megan Kelly. I see you on TikTok. So that's why I put up with this abuse. Basically, but there was an interesting interview that we just had the baseball all-star game, which was really terrific this week in Atlanta, in Atlanta, where it had been banned by idiots a couple of years ago. But there was an interview with Francisco Lindor, the great Mets shortstop that was kind of similar. Reported just like, you know, what is your motivation to go out there every day? Just a little 30 second clip I recommend looking at it.
Starting point is 01:24:56 And he's like, kind of giving Alan Iverson almost, you know, like motivation, but like, no, it's not about motivation. It's about work ethic. Motivation is like, you know, is temporary. It's about work ethic. Motivation is like, you know, is temporary. It lasts for a while. It's on your shoulder makes you think it to do a thing, but to do the grind every single day to pursue a consistent level of excellence to be the best at what you do. That takes a lot of discipline. And it takes work ethic
Starting point is 01:25:22 and kind of long term thinking. And that way, you're much more at peace, actually, about whether you win and where you lose. Did you put in your best effort? Great. And then if hopefully if you have some kidlets around who don't even know that you play baseball or or a host of podcasts or do whatever, it's incredibly rewarding. You feel like you've done your best. And if you're fortunate enough, like all of us are in this conversation to know that that work that that attempt to
Starting point is 01:25:46 strive for a consistent excellence, and the work ethic that goes into it, can contribute to you be able to provide some stability and and comfort for your kids to pursue the things that they want to do. It is so satisfying. It's as satisfying as like growing a garden and eating your food. Like, oh man, there's just something elemental about that. And it's not necessarily chasing immediate spike of highs.
Starting point is 01:26:14 It's about a long-term, I'm grinding, I'm working, and I'm putting in long hours, but I'm doing it for this reason. And that reason is the true source of the happiness. Yeah, it's a good reminder, you know, not to get too drawn into. It could be anything in your life, even for like my work, my stay at home moms who watch or listen to the show. You're on social media, you make a post, you check it over and over to see how many likes you've gotten. The same false God, you know, as like thinking winning the PGA tour is going to be the thing that fulfills you or winning the Oscar, you know, for whatever movie is going to be that.
Starting point is 01:26:50 It's exactly the same thing. You know, we all get sucked into it and it's a what a great gift he gave us a great reminder that whether it's this huge goal that everybody in the world, well, most of us have watched and know about, or it's something in your private life that you've prioritized like getting a raise or getting a new job title or getting a social media like, or whatever, getting the right invitation to the right cocktail parties.
Starting point is 01:27:17 They're all false. They're not gonna do the thing for you that you're looking for. Really, book inside your living room. That's where the answer is. Guys, stand by, more coming up when we come back. Don't go away. Let's be honest. No one has time to simmer bones for 24 hours, but our bodies could use the benefits of real bone broth, especially as we get older. That is where Paleo Valley's 100% grass-fed bone broth protein powder comes in. It's made from
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Starting point is 01:28:07 It's perfect for busy people. Use it in coffee, smoothies, or hot water. Chocolate, vanilla, salted caramel. All those flavors turn in your morning drink and they turn it into a collagen-rich treat. Or you could just try savory original in soups and in stews or unflavored when you want a clean boost. Get 20% off your first order now at paleovalley.com slash Megan with code Megan. Check it out. We just had the one year anniversary, one year mark since Butler, Pennsylvania, which
Starting point is 01:28:46 was just a sea change moment in America politics in a way. I mean, Trump was on his way toward winning the election, but that moment and the way he handled it just galvanized support behind him, even amongst disaffected Republicans who were sort of about him after that moment, didn't feel that way. Now, if you were a member of the press and a normal person, you could at least begrudgingly say, wow, he really handled that like a champ. Gosh, if you were a lunatic member of the press,
Starting point is 01:29:15 you speculated on MSNBC about how he faked it, how it was all, the whole thing was fake. Totally disrespectful to Corey Comparatore and his widow. They've never explained that piece of their bizarre theory nor apologized to her for saying such a thing. And if you remember the press, you might, who is a lunatic, have made it all about you, your trauma. And I don't mean that you were almost shot,
Starting point is 01:29:45 which is something Selena Zito can say. By the way, thank you, Megyn Kelly show viewers. Her book debuted at number one on the New York Times bestseller list, which I'm sure did not wanna put her there. So God bless all of you for buying her book, Butler. She was there with the president on that day. So if you're a real loon, here's where you go with it.
Starting point is 01:30:02 This is CBS's Seth MacFarlane, who appeared on Chuck Todd's cast. Sorry, sorry, Scott, Scott MacFarlane. Seth is a different guy. Scott MacFarlane, who appeared on the Chuck Todd cast, which has the same number of viewers as people who are in this screen right here. And here's what he said about Butler.
Starting point is 01:30:26 For those of us who were there, it wasn't an immediate, or even a long term reflection on Secret Service. For those of us there, it was such a horror. Because you saw an emerging America. And it wasn't the shooting Chuck. This was I got diagnosed with PTSD. But in 48 hours, I put on trauma leave, not because I think of the shooting, but because you could you saw it in the eyes, the reaction of the people, they were coming for us. If he didn't jump up with his fist, they
Starting point is 01:30:57 were going to come. I know many of us on press row as we talked about this on our text chains for weeks after we're quite confident we'd be dead. If he didn't get back up. There was a subset, not everybody, there's dozens of people in the crowd who started comforting us saying you did this, this is your fault, you caused this, you killed him. And they're going to beat us with their hands. I mean, they were going to kill us and respectfully, this Secret Service had bigger issues than protecting us. We would have jumped up triumphantly. It saved us.
Starting point is 01:31:29 But that's the thing. I can't eliminate from my mind's eye the look in their faces. That's what America is right now. It's not rational. It's an irrational thought to think the media shot somebody from from a top of building. But the lack of rationalities would connect January 6 to this. Gosh, what? Wow. He's the CBS is j six reporter, by the way. Do you believe that lunacy?
Starting point is 01:31:58 I can't. I'm just trying to I'm out here with like, with diagrams against Bolton board, just trying to, oh, what the? What is the theory exactly? I'm talking about here. Yeah, that the mob was going to kill them. That it was gonna kill the media. The totally peaceful mob that didn't even stampede
Starting point is 01:32:19 out of the joint before Trump jumped up. That was there, you read Selena's's book lovingly, happily celebrating him. And then to their enormous credit, stayed calm even after the bullets were flying. And then yes, when Trump stood up and heroically did that felt inspired. But who was ever talking about the mob turning on the media? This is the first I've heard anything like that.
Starting point is 01:32:43 And it's totally inconsistent with the actual tone and tenor of MAGA rallies. That guy, I'm just going to say it, is fucking making that up to the same way AOC wants us to believe she was almost raped on J6 when she wasn't even there. He's imagining, he's imagining things, making media the center of the story, and also transposing his personal grief at an electoral outcome with the reality in front of him. He's mad that people responded. Trump stood up there. I didn't vote for Trump, as we know.
Starting point is 01:33:17 He got up, blood coming out of his ear, and said, fight, fight, fight. You can't, I think it's really, really difficult to look at that and say, wow, that that's scary. The way he acted there or that response there. No, it was awesome. He got up, the shooting was horrifying. And we could have had the only fair thing to say to Scott McFarland about his scenario planning here. And it's something that we talk about constantly into the column podcast. America has a problem with political violence. That assassination attempt was very much part of it. Kill the man.
Starting point is 01:33:50 And it's terrible. And it's an unresolved problem with political violence on the right and on the left in different ways. And we don't talk about it honestly, all that is true. If Trump would have died that day, I shudder to think what would have happened in America. We all dodged a bullet, Corey Campanturro sadly. We really, we all dodged a bullet Corey, come to Torrance, sadly did not. But the country dodged a bullet and we still have that problem
Starting point is 01:34:11 in front of us. So that part of it is true. That's the only part of it. That's semi. But it's not what the what are you doing? That's not the story from that day. Yeah. And he didn't, he didn't even seem to get there. Yeah, he didn't even get there to that conclusion. Like the grappling with the reality. And honestly, on the fifth column, there are many things that we talk about regularly. The surging, not the surging, but the persistent growing problem of political violence that
Starting point is 01:34:38 we've had in this country, which became really prominent and undeniable in the summer of 2020, which certainly played a part on January 6th, which has risen up in so many other occasions. And honestly, when President Trump was elected, that assassination attempt at the baseball field during that congressional baseball game, we've seen so many instances of this. We should be trying to connect it,
Starting point is 01:34:59 not in a way that directs blame at either of these political parties, but in a way that acknowledges this is a reality in our politics and we need to do something about it. And doing something about it means sober, honest, thoughtful engagement with one another, talking honestly about ways
Starting point is 01:35:15 that we can kind of ratchet down the temperature of our political exchanges and debates. We don't do that, honestly. For the most part, we're looking for who to blame in various circumstances as opposed to, and this is interesting because it has a parallel to the very first segment on your show today, Megan, but like the kind of NTSB style investigation
Starting point is 01:35:34 of what happened with this particular plane crash, what went wrong, how can we avert it and make certain it doesn't happen again. I'd love to see us have a serious bipartisan investigation and inquiry into what happened during the summer of 2020, into what happened with COVID and why we didn't do a better job with messaging there, into what happened with January 6th.
Starting point is 01:35:53 But we won't have a sober, honest, not at all politicized investigation into these things because our politics is utterly broken and our politicians, generally speaking, are not really in the business of actually trying to get to the bottom of things nearly as much as they are at assailing their political enemies. And quite frankly, you just saw an example of a journalist who is similarly in curious about the nature of things. And I think actually journalism.
Starting point is 01:36:17 That's where I come in on it. I agree. That's a member of the media lifting up the veil. This is what I think of Trump supporters. They're deranged, googly-eyed mad men who wanna kill members of the media like me and would in a New York minute. That my life was the one you should have been worried about the day of Butler as a member of the media.
Starting point is 01:36:41 I was almost killed. I could see it in their eyes. Trust me. Now CBS sends that guy out to go do reporting on January 6th, on ongoing on Trump, on anything involving Trump supporters. And they're supposed to watch CBS and watch this guy come on camera and think, I can trust him. He's fair. He gets me.
Starting point is 01:37:03 He's made the effort to get my side of the country. Bullshit. That guy should actually be fired. He should be fired. Obviously he's not well. Yeah. That is not the way. There's a new book out about the COVID disastrous response. And one of the, and the others are not in front of you,
Starting point is 01:37:25 is two Princeton sociologists actually, who describe themselves as left of center. And it's an absolutely harsh indictment on what we're supposed to be the truth seeking institutions in this country, in science, in government, and in the media, in academia. And everyone really, really failed during COVID. And as a result, really like helped erode and shred trust and, and impringe and impinge on civil liberties and such.
Starting point is 01:37:54 Like we see this kind of example here, the journalism industry, as it has been collapsing through things that are may or may not be related to this has been covering itself in this type of kind of openly partisan. And what's the worst thing he said there besides all the words? It's that me and all the other reporters were text messaging each other with this kind of sentiment. Then you're all crazy.
Starting point is 01:38:16 I hope that's not true, honestly, because that's not- And Chuck Todd, they're like, yes, yes. This is like the main face of NBC's political coverage for many years. Like, yes, right on, yes. No pause at all. Like, gee, do you this is like the main face of NBC's political coverage for many years. Like, yes, right on, yes, no pause at all. Like, gee, do you think you might want to pause before condemning the entire group that was there that themselves had been traumatized by this?
Starting point is 01:38:34 No, not a thought because he was like right on. By the way, we don't have time for it, but Francis Collins, he was on late night on Colbert just last night, maybe we do have time. Let's play it really quickly. We're gonna play it. Stop 35. Boo. Steven, we have other deficits that politics aren't going to solve.
Starting point is 01:38:53 Maybe they're making it worse. There's a truth deficit. We're in a place now. Yeah, we're- It seems to be no real penalty for saying something that's demonstrably false. It just- No no it's not. Irony. Oh yeah, we have a trust deficit. Because people don't know if they can be sure somebody's telling the truth, why should I
Starting point is 01:39:13 trust that person? So we stop trusting each other most of the time and that's dangerous also for our future. Oh gee. Wow. No introspection. How did that happen, Francis Collins? You guys, you have to stay for two more minutes and we just have to talk about that clip. No introspection. How did that happen? Francis Collins. You guys, you have to stay for two more minutes and we just have to talk about that clip.
Starting point is 01:39:27 Don't go away. I'm Megyn Kelly, host of the Megyn Kelly Show on Sirius XM. It's your home for open, honest, and provocative conversations with the most interesting and important political, legal, and cultural figures today. You can catch the Megyn Kelly Show on Triumph, a Sir serious XM channel featuring lots of hosts you may know and probably love. Great people like Dr. Laura, Glenn Beck, Nancy Grace, Dave Ramsey, and yours truly, Megyn Kelly. You can stream the Megyn Kelly show on SeriousXM at home or anywhere you are, no car required. I do it all the time. I love the SiriusXM app. It has ad-free music coverage of every major sport, comedy, talk, podcast and more. Subscribe now, get your first three
Starting point is 01:40:11 months for free. Go to siriusxm.com slash mk show to subscribe and get three months free. That's siriusxm.com slash m MK show and get three months free. Offer details apply. Okay guys, so Francis Collins who ran the NIH and the COVID response above Fauci says, we're at a truth deficit and this is really unfortunate and lamentable. This is the man who decided to try to ruin people
Starting point is 01:40:45 like Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, who's now running NIH and in the Francis Collins seat, because he said maybe we should do focus protection and just focus on the people who are really vulnerable and ask them to, you know, lock down and not the entire society. That might make more sense than having totally fine, perfectly healthy children and young people run around masked or not run around at all or arrest them while surfing or out in a public park, not near anyone. And so he decided he had to be labeled fringe and ruined.
Starting point is 01:41:18 This is one of our best scientists in America at Stanford. Now that guy wants to turn around, that's the least of his sins by the way, and lecture us on how it's really sad we have a truth deficit in this country and something ought to be done about it. Thoughts on that? Let's evaluate the truth-seekingness
Starting point is 01:41:36 of the following quote, the science-ness of the following quote. When the Great Barrington Declaration came out in the summer or early fall of 2020, that Jay Bhattachary and others signed, basically saying we won't focus protection. His words, Francis Collins's were, we need a quick and devastating takedown of these fringe epidemiologists. Okay, quick and devastating takedown. That is some clown talk, bro, to paraphrase Bryce Harper. What are you doing? There's no truth. There's no science. That's a political hatchet
Starting point is 01:42:12 job. And what effect did it have? Jay Bhattachary was censured by a hundred faculty members at Stanford, censured. The amount of chilling effect, there's a great piece by John Tierney in City Journal a couple years ago, talking about all these different places where peer review was happening in epidemiology sciences related to COVID after this intervention by Francis Cole. It had a huge chilling effect on scientific discourse. And meanwhile, then the Biden administration did all kinds of jaw boning against social media companies to have them suppress people. Just like go ahead and kick them off your platform of people,
Starting point is 01:42:49 not just Joe Rogan from Spotify was their attempt that they talked about on a daily basis, but people like Rand Paul from YouTube successful. They kicked him off for a while. Amazing mass kind of censorship job boning event. He was in the middle of this. I don't want to hear a single damn word coming out of his mouth about truth and freedom and science and anything like that,
Starting point is 01:43:12 unless the first one is I'm sorry, I screwed up. I'm not sorry. He's totally screwed up. And Stephen Colbert, who was doing dance routines with giant syringes about the vaccine is also not the place to have that conversation. No, and lets him totally get away with it, Camille. Yeah, I mean, well, he's not a journalist,
Starting point is 01:43:32 so I don't expect him to do much better. And he came there for a PR opportunity, but it would have been much better to have him do a little bit of introspection. During our moment of most profound need, our public health infrastructure completely failed us. Just in terms of messaging and communicating with people in an honest and transparent way, communicating both our certainty and our uncertainty, really profound uncertainty at
Starting point is 01:43:55 various moments, that's what they should have been doing. They failed profoundly. We don't even have to get into debates about vaccine efficacy or anything else. I think the quote that Matt just cited and the many, many, many instances of people getting way out over their skis, openly misleading the American public about the use of masks or necessity of masks in certain instances, only to reverse themselves later. All of that has not only had consequences, it didn't only had consequences during the pandemic, it has contributed to this circumstance we find ourselves in where people don't know who to trust. They only trust people who kind of openly agree with them. They're upset with the bureaucracy,
Starting point is 01:44:33 they're upset with the institutions broadly. Like there is an absolute need for us to go back, think carefully about what happened there. And it isn't too late to do it. Like we can still do it at this point, but it is definitely the case that a lot of these people just need to get it. By the way, he didn't get a pardon.
Starting point is 01:44:48 It gotta be cleared out. He didn't get a pardon. Fauci got a pardon. But he was on all those emails too, when those two decided to stifle any discussion about whether this thing originated in a lab. Remember that explosive story where it was like, I mean, now we all know.
Starting point is 01:45:03 It could not talk about it. It definitely started in a lab, but you couldn't talk about it. And those two got those ridiculous epidemiologists together who had all privately, we found out things to the house, the Republican led house that investigated it and got the emails. Privately, they were like,
Starting point is 01:45:18 this doesn't look like anything in nature that we've ever seen before. Kind of looks like we grew it in a lab. And then those two went in there and brow beat them. And then within literally like hours, they all did a 180 saying, it's natural, it's natural, came from a pangolin or something like that. Definitely, definitely, definitely not in a lab.
Starting point is 01:45:38 And the nerve, so okay, you're gonna be a dishonest, disgusting broker on a pandemic that took a lot of lives. That's okay. That's your decision. You'll have to live with that and face up to it when you meet your maker. But then to have the nerve to go on a truth tour, trying to lecture the rest of us, I actually want to hear it one more time. Now having had that discussion, let's play SOT 35 one more time. Steven, we have other deficits
Starting point is 01:46:05 that politics aren't going to solve. Maybe they're making it worse. There's a truth deficit. We're in a place now, yeah, we're, it seems to be no real penalty for saying something that's demonstrably false. It just, it's okay. Oh my God. No, it's not.
Starting point is 01:46:20 Oh yeah, we have a, we have a trust deficit where because people don't know if they can be sure somebody's telling the truth, why should I trust that person? So we stop trusting each other most of the time. And that's dangerous also for our future. It's very meta. You know, like what he's saying applies 100% to him. And you're watching it thinking, I agree with every word.
Starting point is 01:46:43 It's just, you're the one who created the trust deficit. You're the one who said the untruths for which there was no accountability. Just as a reminder, in those emails, he gives the order in the emails writing that it's important to settle the matter, to quote, put down this very destructive conspiracy about COVID starting in a lab, lest the experts do quote,
Starting point is 01:47:06 great potential harm to science and international harmony. What? A counter conspiracy. Never been held accountable. A counter conspiracy. I do. It's crazy. Using the word settle. I'm going to pre-settle the science in the name of science. Why? Why was it so important to have it settled when you could see the debate was raging within
Starting point is 01:47:29 the top experts of the world saying, okay, it could it be natural? Might be, but geez, we don't think so. He wouldn't let it play out. He wanted a conclusion because he knew we funded it. That's the reason he knew that we were funding gain of function research in that COVID lab. He knew that we were paying EcoHealth Alliance to partner with the Bat Lady to do it. And he didn't want it to come out that he and Anthony Fauci were likely behind the entire pandemic. That's what was going on there. And now he's given red carpet rollout on Stephen Colbert and not asked about any of that shit, it's infuriating. Now wait, now I've taken, I've abused you,
Starting point is 01:48:08 I've kept you seven minutes over. Do you have another few minutes? Because there is one other thing I wanted to get to. Yeah, we got time for you, Megan. Okay, okay, God bless you. Because there's nobody else I'd rather do this with. I've been waiting all week to do this with you guys. Did you catch the piece in the New York Times entitled,
Starting point is 01:48:26 is it time to stop snubbing your right wing family? Yeah. Fantastic. It is, it's so good. I can't wait to talk about it. And if you haven't read it, Camille, fear not. I have it here and I'm going to bring you the highlights. Thank you.
Starting point is 01:48:45 Now the man's name is David Litt, L-I-T-T. However, the term does not apply with respect to his piece, as the kids would say. That's slang for cool. Okay, I'm just gonna give you a little from the top. Published July 13th. Not too long ago, I felt a civic duty to be rude to my wife's younger brother.
Starting point is 01:49:06 I met Matt Kapler, names him, in 2012, and it was immediately clear we had nothing in common. He lifted weights to death metal. I jogged to Sondheim. I was one of President Barack Obama's, who does that? I was one of President Barack Obama's speech writers and had an Ivy League degree. He was a huge Joe Rogan fan and
Starting point is 01:49:26 went on to get his electrician's license. Can you imagine? Basically like what a rube unlike me. My early memories of Matt are hazy. I was mostly trying to impress his parents. Still, we got along chatting amiably on holidays and family events. Then the pandemic hit, and our preferences began to feel more like, feel like more than differences in taste. We were on opposite sides of a cultural civil war. The deepest divide was vaccination. I wasn't shocked when Matt didn't get the COVID shot, but I was baffled.
Starting point is 01:50:00 Turning down a vaccine during a pandemic seemed like a rejection of science and self-preservation. It felt like he was tearing up like he was tearing up the social contract that until that point I'd imagined we shared. Had Matt been a friend rather than a family member, I probably would have cut off contact completely. As it was on the rare and always outdoor occasions when we saw each other, I spoke in disapproving snippets.
Starting point is 01:50:25 Then he quotes, works been good? I guess that's Matt saying works been good and David with the, it's my disapproving snippet of you, Matt. My frostiness wasn't personal, it was strategic. Being unfriendly to people who turned down the vaccine felt like the right thing to do. How else could we motivate them to mend their ways?
Starting point is 01:50:53 This is not a parody, this is real. He's actually writing this in the first person. I wasn't the only one thinking this. A 2021 essay for USA Today declared, it's time to start shunning the vaccine hesitant. An LA Times piece went further, arguing that to create teachable moments, it may be necessary to mock some anti-vaxxers deaths,
Starting point is 01:51:14 which he brings up again here as like, these were my teachers. Shunning as a form of accountability goes back millenniums. And then he goes back on the Hester Prynne and the Scarlet Letter and what that was meant to do. That was before social media, blah, blah, blah, blah. What people used to do, he says, few people who lost friends over the vaccine
Starting point is 01:51:35 changed their minds. They just got new friends. Those exiled from one version of society were quickly welcomed by another, an alternate universe full of grievance peddlers and conspiracy theorists who thrived on stories of victimized conservatives. So he goes on about how he really wrestled with this and he really kind of tried to shun poor Matt. But then they decided to start surfing together. Matt, like a typical right-winger, surfing together. Matt, like a typical right-winger, didn't write him off, didn't take it too personally, continued talking to him, was nice to him, and actually
Starting point is 01:52:11 volunteered to help him learn how to surf. And he says, okay, I wish I could have learned the lesson that ostracism doesn't help, doesn't work. I wish I could have learned this through self-reflection and study. What actually happened is that I started surfing. After moving to the Jersey shore, oh great, in 2022, I signed up for lessons. Despite my advanced age of 35 and lack of natural talent, I got hooked.
Starting point is 01:52:37 Matt was the only other surfer I knew. I put my principled unfriendliness aside. Listen to the guy, cloaking himself in glory for being a dick all the way through Matt, not abandoning him and continuing to help him. From the moment we began paddling out together, I could tell my cold shoulder strategy had backfired. I'd spent the peak of the pandemic in a cultural bubble,
Starting point is 01:53:03 and he had done the same. Driving to a break or changing into our wetsuits, he'd often express opinions about the merits of vigilantism or the health benefits of Mexican stem cell injections that I found slightly unhinged. Where is this coming from, I wondered. The answer was nearly always Joe Rogan. I assumed our surf buddy experiment would either fall, fail spectacularly, or
Starting point is 01:53:26 would bring Matt over to my side. Neither of those things occurred, however. Instead, the connections we found were tiny and unrelated to politics. And then he goes on to talk about common ground they found and non-political matters. And he forgave Matt for being a crazy Joe Rogan fan and started to rethink his decision to completely ostracize Matt from his life. And he decided that this was a better path. That shunning, he writes, plays into the hands of demagogues, making it easier for them to divide us
Starting point is 01:54:02 and even in some cases to incite violence. So he hasn't learned anything about his worldviews other than when you have the hateful, awful people on the other side, the shunning isn't the most effective way of getting them to change their worldview because you drive them into the arms of the true lunatics. That's what he learned on the surfboard with Matt. There's so much in here. I'll start with you, Matt Welsh. You're a, since you're a Matt and you read the piece, your thoughts on it. There are so many aspects of that that make me want to, uh, both punch the window that I'm looking through right now and also just laugh myself to death
Starting point is 01:54:46 because the lack of self-awareness is so fantastic. But there are public policy aspects of this that are worth thinking about. End of 2021, we were just talking about when Francis Collins was in office, the president of the United States was calling this the pandemic of the unvaccinated. That sense of
Starting point is 01:55:07 Absolutely divisive and accusatory You don't like you're not doing what we want you to do And so therefore your death is your fault That was widespread in mainstream media and mainstream democratic discourse and a democratic governance During the Biden administration and it is and it was sick. Joe Biden accused Ron DeSantis and all these governors who were not doing exactly what he wanted to do in terms of like schools and other aspects. He was accusing them of playing with kids lives. Remember I wrote about all the stuff in real time like you're accusing a governor of a state during a pandemic of being more interested in politics than his own children in his in his family because DeSantis has a governor of a state during a pandemic of being more interested in politics than
Starting point is 01:55:45 his own children in his, in his family, because DeSantis has as much kids. Um, and his children in the state living or dying. That is so warped. Um, I mean, it's a terrible thing to a terrible place to be as a human being. Like maybe I shouldn't ostracize people like my principled unfriendliness, like, dude, you've got you, you need to touch a lot of grass. Yeah, yeah, some weed while you're talking. Go somewhere.
Starting point is 01:56:11 Smoke out a lot and smoke it and figure out why you become a monster because you kind of have just as an interpersonal way of going through things but also these theater kids held power he still has the power to get Matt isn't out there writing in the New York Times op-ed page think about about reconsidering. And let's be honest, this wouldn't have been published if Kamala Harris would have won because he wouldn't be going through the same levels of introspection. Same reason Gavin Newsom wouldn't be going on bro podcasts now if Kamala Harris would have won. Now suddenly the New York Times is like, Oh, maybe we should, I don't know, profile Andrew Schultz or something. Like there's a palpable difference. Like maybe
Starting point is 01:56:50 we can't just pretend like half of the country is irredeemable bigots that we should just sort of shun their way into modifying their behavior. It's a whole- I guess CBS's McFarland didn't get the memo. No, it didn't. I mean, the Times was still going after Schultz in that piece as well, where they were profiling him. Look, I wholeheartedly agree with everything that you all have said about this situation. I mean, especially like the notion of casting you just deliberately being an asshole to
Starting point is 01:57:21 everyone in this self-serving way is just so obnoxious. It's merely beyond belief, except we've all lived this. We've watched this happen. We know people who have done this themselves. And I will say, for my part, I've had weird politics. It is always the case long before COVID that we would be in circumstances where people would meet me,
Starting point is 01:57:43 discover something that I think, like, I don't know, the Department of Education should be completely shuttered and think what a monster you are. I can't even talk to you. And I think for people like us, we've long had this given that experience, you have to be pretty generous to people, even when you have a severe disagreement and looking for those areas of common ground and trying to persuade people on the basis of the things that we have in common, as opposed to trying to castigate everyone who is imagined to be somewhat different from you
Starting point is 01:58:12 or diverges from accepted opinion on something and attributing the worst possible motives to them. Like, that is just a monstrous way to live. I do have real concerns, though, that this has been a hallmark of the left, that they've been uniquely censorious in many instances, that they've been, interestingly, because many of them aren't believers, they've been weirdly puritanical and kind of prone to condemnations. But some people on the right have adopted some of these same approaches to politics and to kind of social interactions in victory.
Starting point is 01:58:48 And I'm someone who in that summer of 2021, I remember, and we were talking around that time, Megan, and some periods after as well, I got published two pieces within the space of a couple of months and found myself at the center of like a hate storm. Like the first was in June, where I was skeptical of the critical race theory bands, not critical race theory itself. I have nothing but contempt for those ideas, but I didn't think the bands were a good idea. And I said so in a public place
Starting point is 01:59:15 and a lot of conservatives got openly and secretly angry with me. And a couple of weeks later- I remember that debate. I was down here at the shore when we had it. Yeah. And a couple of weeks later, I published this story about Amy Cooper, the central part Karen,
Starting point is 01:59:28 quote unquote. That was amazing. And people on the left were not impressed with it. And it was the same exact thing in the other direction. And there was never really an interest in maybe we should have a conversation. Perhaps Camille is an honest broker. And the fact that he manages to piss off people on both sides has something to do with the fact that he's just trying to get at the truth. We don't seem to have an appetite for that.
Starting point is 01:59:49 And my Joe Rogan bro who serves, who's still cool enough with you to take to invite you out to surf despite the fact that you've been strategically and deliberately an asshole to him systematically for years. He deserves a medal and you desperately, desperately, desperately need to touch grass as has already been said and think carefully about the kind of person you wanna be. Just be better motherfucker, come on. Cause you know, yeah, be better motherfucker.
Starting point is 02:00:15 You know, like he's putting all those things in there to win him plaudits from the left wingers he assumes correctly are reading the times, right? Like I was a complete douche to him. Let me reassure you. At every turn I treated him like absolute shit. Let me reenact the dialogue. How's his work going okay?
Starting point is 02:00:35 Hmm. I mean, I think we've also determined that David is a gay man. No, he's not, cause I think it's his sister-in-law, but he's certainly acting a little on the edge. Anyway, he's doing it because he wants snaps, right? He wants snaps from the Times readers. That's why he's, and what does he think
Starting point is 02:00:58 is going to get him snaps? Being a complete asshole to someone he loves, someone who's in his family, someone who's been nothing but nice to him. And none of that matters. All that matters is he didn't get the COVID jab, people. He watches Joe Rogan. So we have to hate him.
Starting point is 02:01:13 I mean, truly, even his on paper indictment of the guy doesn't go beyond that. Like where is Matt's terrible sin? You didn't even say that like he listens to Tucker Carlson, like Joe Rogan, he's kind of middle of the road. Like, what do you mean? Anyway, I just think it's such an amazing window, right? Into how the left is.
Starting point is 02:01:34 And is anybody surprised that this was a speechwriter for Obama? Nope. Just zero. I would just add there's a cautionary tale for everybody. You know, we're talking on a podcast that talks about politics, the people who are going to be higher than normal, um, a sense of involvement or consumer interest in politics. You don't have to bring your politics into everything.
Starting point is 02:01:57 You don't have to bring it into your baseball or your golf. You certainly don't have to bring it to your family, especially in ways where you're naming them out loud. You certainly don't have to bring it to your family, especially in ways where you're naming them out loud. You don't have to. Like the world is a big and beautiful place. Anytime I go anywhere in America, which I do as often as possible, because America is awesome.
Starting point is 02:02:16 You know, the first conversations that you have with people aren't about politics. You know, I spent the fourth of July on the 13th deck of a cruise ship in Boston moored with a bunch of senior retirees standing up and putting their hand over their heart as the military anthems of each branch of the military were played as we're watching it on a big screen. What's wrong with you? Am I going to turn to the lady next to me and say, I don't know, man, did you vote for someone I didn't like? That's right.
Starting point is 02:02:42 I'm asking two-year-olds. You look like a Trump bird. That's actually not how normal humans live. You go in any direction in America and no one really is having those conversations except when you've over politicized everything and too much of your brain space on a daily basis is taken up by politics.
Starting point is 02:03:00 Don't do it, you don't have to. Don't judge people that way. We're all awesome in our way. Even our theater kids are awesome. They just need to maybe have a little bit less power. I have like dear friends, like truly very, very close friends who are diehard liberals and also woke, not just liberals. I mean, I don't have a lot of friends who are woke, but I have a couple of girlfriends who are woke. And people ask me, like,
Starting point is 02:03:26 how have you maintained those friendships through like the last five years in particular? And we, not all of them has survived. I told the audience months ago that a friend did break up with me not too long ago over politics. But for the most part, my dearest friends are still intact. And the reason is, with some we sometimes discuss politics,
Starting point is 02:03:45 but we do it totally respectfully. I am completely open to their worldview. And there's so many things on the Republican side that you can criticize. I'm happy to give them all their main points, which are never unreasonable. You know, they're not like nutcases. And they give me mine too about the Democrats.
Starting point is 02:04:00 And so if we go there, we go only 10% into the politics. And usually there's plenty to criticize on both sides. And I'm delighted to give it up about the right. And they're usually fine giving it up about the left. But the vast majority of our time together, we talk about our lives. You know, like who's running around all day thinking about Trump or politics?
Starting point is 02:04:19 Like we do it for our jobs, sure. And that's fun. Like when I'm with my friends, we talk about our lives. We talk about our kids, we talk about something funny that happened with other friends or a dinner we went to or a party we went to or what's going on with your mom, how's your mom doing? Where did you guys vacation?
Starting point is 02:04:33 What was it like? There's so much you can discuss that doesn't come anywhere near the political sphere. And there's so much within politics that you can discuss that's like fair game and isn't gonna upset anybody. It's just these people who are so hard partisan, like you David Litt are the ones who ruin it for everyone, for families and friend groups.
Starting point is 02:04:54 He's the one who should be kicked out. He's the Hester of the group, Hester Prynne, right? Was that her last name? Yeah, Prynne from the Scarlet Letter. You're Hester, you get the Scarlet Letter, not sweet Matt. Matt, I hope I see you here on the Jersey Shore and I hope you come up to me and you tell me, it's me, Matt, and I will give you a hug
Starting point is 02:05:14 and we can talk about your jerk relative. Guys, thanks for doing overtime. It's always a pleasure. And all the best to Moynihan. Hope whatever he's going through resolves quickly. Yeah. Amen. We'll work on it. Antipyro, back to you. Oh boy.
Starting point is 02:05:29 Thanks, Megan. See you soon. Alrighty. Awesome, what another great show. Love those guys, what a day. Thank you all for tuning in. Please tune in tomorrow too. We're gonna have Maureen Callahan, the one and only.
Starting point is 02:05:42 She and I have a lot to go through, including the sit down on Michelle Obama's. Remember Megan O? Michelle O has an update to her podcast that stars Barack O and we both have a lot of thoughts. Tune in then. Thanks for listening to The Megyn Kelly Show. No BS, no agenda, and no fear.

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