The Michael Knowles Show - Ep. 1159 - In With Tennessee N-Out With California

Episode Date: January 11, 2023

Click here to join the member exclusive portion of my show: https://utm.io/ueSEl The most California burger company flees to Tennessee, Diamond of Diamond and Silk fame dies along with an entire political era, and the globalist elites meet up in Davos to turn the West into China. - - -  DailyWire+: Become a DailyWire+ member to access the entire content catalog of movies, shows, documentaries, and more. Use code KNOWLES and get 2 months free on annual plans: https://bit.ly/3SsC5se Get your Michael Knowles merch here: https://bit.ly/3X6tlKY   - - -  Today’s Sponsors: Helix - Get up to $350 OFF + 2 FREE pillows with all mattress orders: https://helixsleep.com/KNOWLES  Mizzen+Main - Get $35 OFF any regularly priced order of $125 with code 'KNOWLES' at https://www.mizzenandmain.com/. - - - Socials: Follow on Twitter: https://bit.ly/3RwKpq6  Follow on Instagram: https://bit.ly/3BqZLXA  Follow on Facebook: https://bit.ly/3eEmwyg  Subscribe on YouTube: https://bit.ly/3L273Ek Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We have just gotten wind of the best political news in many months. No, I'm not talking about Republicans taking over the House of Representatives. No, I'm not talking about Republican candidates surging in the 2024 polls. I am talking about In-N-Out Burger coming to the great state of Tennessee. Hey, Tennesseans, we have some very exciting news today. A great American company, an iconic brand, In-N-Out Burger, has decided to place their first corporate hub. in the eastern United States right here in Tennessee. In-and-Out Burger is a great family business that's been operating for decades in this country with a value

system and a way of serving their customers that lines up just right here in Tennessee and it means a lot of opportunity and a lot of jobs for a lot of Tennesseans. We are excited about the opportunity that in and out's going to bring to Tennessee plus we're going to get to have double-double fries and shakes right here in the great state of Tennessee. Welcome in and out burger. You're going to love it here. The news is so great, not only because I will soon be able to eat double doubles whenever I want. It's consequential because in and out is about as California a company as ever there was.

You think in and out, you think California. But In and Out Burger has a deeper identity than that. In and Out Burger is a Christian company. It's got Bible verses on all the rappers. And we all know that it's getting harder and harder for Christians to do business in aggressively anti-Christian states. Frankly, forget for a moment that In-N-Out is a Christian company. In-N-Out is a company. And it's getting harder and harder for any company of any kind to operate in left-wing states that are hostile to business altogether. That is why we here at the Daily Wire all fled New Salini's Hellscape for the free air of Tennessee two and a half years ago. That's why countless other companies have left over the past few years. And that is why I promise you

in and out will not be the last to leave. I'm Michael Knowles. This is the Michael Knowles show. Welcome back to the show. My favorite comment yesterday is from the drummer's workshop at Norm's music, who says, FBI stands for forget Biden's irresponsibility. You know, I am a sucker for a good play on words. You know, I'm also a sucker for a good night's sleep. which is why I strongly recommend Helix mattress. Right now, head on over to helixsleep.com slash Knowles. With everything going on in the world right now, you could use a good night's sleep. That is why you've got to check out Helix mattress.

Helix is a premium mattress brand that provides tailored mattresses based on your unique sleep preferences. The Helix lineup includes 14 unique mattresses, including a collection of luxury models, a mattress for big and tall sleepers, and even a mattress made just for kids. I have had my Helix mattress for about three years now. I absolutely love it. Are you nervous about buying a mattress online? You do not have to be.

Helix has a sleep quiz that matches your body type and sleep preferences to the perfect mattress. Because why would you buy a mattress that's made for somebody else? Go to HelixSleep.com slash Knowles, take their two-minute sleep quiz, find the perfect mattress for your body and sleep type. Your mattress will come right to your door for free. Plus, Helix has a 10-year warranty, and you get to try it out for 100 nights risk-free. They will even pick it up for you if you don't love it, but you will. Helix has over 12,000 five-star reviews. Their financing options and flexible payment plans make it so that a great night's sleep

is never far away. For a limited time, Helix is offering up to $350 off all mattress orders and two free pillows for our listeners. This is their best offer yet. So head on over to helixleep.com slash Knowles with Helix. Better sleep starts now. I left California a few years ago. I have very little business that I still conduct in California.

The very teeny little bit of business I do is two or three times a year. I fly out to California because I host a show called the Book Club at Prager You. And we film them in blocks. So we'll do three or four or five books even in one long couple days of filming. And I was supposed to fly out this evening to get to California. Speaking of not only California, but also getting in and out. I was supposed to fly out this evening. And then I wake up this morning and sweet little Elisa turns to me on the bed.

She goes, Mac? Say, yeah. My mom's at the airport in New York and says the flights are delayed. And I said, well, good thing I'm not flying out of New York. I don't think that I'm going to find your mother. They are not surprised that flights out of the New York airport. She says, no, Mac, it's not just New York. It's all the flights.

So what do you mean? It's all the flights. I pull up my phone. And the top trend on social media is the FAA because for the first time, because for the first since 9-11, all domestic flights in the United States have been grounded. So I would just like to, before we get to anything else happening today, just congratulate Pete Buttigieg on a job well done. He, you know, Pete Buttigieg just keeps impressing us day after day. It was really good that he returned from his, I think, three years of paternity leave. He was able to stop chest feeding long

enough to go in and do his cabinet-level job. And he's been back in the job for a little while now, and all of the airplanes go down for the first time in 22 years. That's really great. Really good keep it up, Pete. Keep it up. It's not just Pete. Keep it up Biden administration. This is really, really great stuff. We've got the latest news on it now. The FAA says they are working to restore the notice-to-air missions system and performing final validation checks and reloading the system now. operations across the national airspace system are affected. Pete Buttigieg is trying to run some damage control here. He said,

I've been in touch with the FAA this morning about an outage affecting a key system for providing safety information to pilots. FAA is working to resolve this issue swiftly and safely so that air traffic can resume normal operations and will continue to provide updates. That's really great. And so why is this happening? There are a couple theories as to why this is happening.

there are three, actually. The first is this is potentially some sort of attack. Could be, is it just a computer glitch that just accidentally happened, or is there some targeted attack that is going on right now at the FFAA? Could be that. Is it because of wokeness? John Cardillo just posted this theory to social media. He pointed out, now hold on, it disappeared from it. There we go. He says, below are the Department of Transportation and FAA focus points in the 2023 budget. The kind of words that you see pop up are racial equity, inclusion, income inequality, environmental justice, and climate change. We know that Pete Buttigieg, when he took over the FAA, or rather the Department of Transportation

entirely, Pete Buttigieg said that one of his key focuses was going to be on those racist bridges that in the New York area, there were bridges and roads that are racist somehow. He's going to root out the racism from transportation. Okay, if you're going to focus on that, you might not be putting sufficient focus on keeping the airplanes up in the air and people traveling to where they need to go. It could be wokeness. That's the second theory of what it was. The third theory is just that this administration is incompetent. And that bleeds over a little bit into the first two possibilities.

Maybe the Biden administration is so incompetent that they let some attack get through. Maybe the Biden administration is so incompetent that they put all of their attention on wokeness and weren't able to keep the mechanics of the government running. Maybe the Biden administration is just so incompetent. They push the wrong button. We don't know exactly what it is. Apparently, the system has been restored, at least to some degree now. So one hopes that everyone's airplanes get off the ground and that I can make it to, to, to,

Los Angeles, so I can talk about dusty old books on Prager U, which would be a lot of fun. But it's a metaphor. I think that this morning's government malfunction is a metaphor for the broader dysfunction within the political system. Because if you have ever flown on an airplane at all, you know, just one flight delay can affect the whole system. just one delay because when there's one delay on one airplane, that means that it's going to arrive at its destination a little bit later, which means that the flight that's supposed to take off

from the gate after that or from that very same airplane is going to take off a little bit later, which means people are going to miss their connections, which means people are going to have to be rebooked on different airplanes, which means that there might not be enough seats on that airplane, so some people are going to have their flights canceled, they're going to have to rebook the next day, which means you're going to see ripple effects the next day. And that's just one flight being delayed from one location. What happens when you shut the whole system down? It's really hard to put the system all up again. These stupid minor little errors can have huge ripple effects. You certainly saw that with COVID. You can't just shut the system down and then expect the whole thing to turn back on again

just like that. That's not how it happens. When the government imposed those lockdowns during COVID, it has led, it continues to lead to mayhem throughout the economy, throughout the political order, throughout the legal system, even the rights that were taken away from us. That is why I always go back to this line from the first season of the crown that the head of the royal household tells to Queen Elizabeth, who says, oh, it's not a big deal when there are these little mess-ups, these little fudging of the rules. And he says, no, it's in the little things that the rot begins. It's in all of these little tiny things where sometimes even we conservatives, we say, oh, who cares, it's not a big deal. Oh, yeah, there we go, some stupid error or some ridiculous woke agenda item. Oh, it's just a little thing. Who cares? Who cares about

the bathrooms? Who cares about this? Who cares about that? Government, society is made up of lots and lots and lots of those little things. And when all those errors creep in, they can have outsize influence. You're seeing this right now, speaking of flyover country, you're seeing this right now in Idaho. You're seeing parents pushing back against all these little tiny things because for so long, conservatives just took it. So, okay, these crazy libs, they want their weird sexual agenda in the public square. They want their parades. They, okay, whatever, who cares? All right, they want to redefine marriage. Okay, who cares? All right, they want to bring the drag queens into the schools. Okay, all right, who can. They want to let boys go into the little girls room in the elementary

school. Okay, I guess who cares? Who cares? Well, if we don't care about any of these things, then I guess we just don't care about our politics and we've surrendered our self-governmental. And fortunately, parents are standing up where spineless Republican politicians have failed to stand up. You're seeing this in the Caldwell School District right now. There was an agenda item before the school board. It was called policy. I mean, it still is called Policy 3-281. And it's a policy that would let the boys go into the girls' bathroom, among other aspects, of the trans agenda.

And what you saw occur at this school board meeting was you saw the people broadly, pushing back against this. And one state senator in particular, but a representative of the political order coming in pushing back as well against a corrupt school board. And I'll tell you they looked good doing it. When you want to look good, you got to check out Mizzen and Maine. Right now, head on over to Mizzen and Main.com. Use code Knowles. Misen and Maine are the inventors of the performance fabric dress shirt. Is there anything worse than wearing an uncomfortable kind of dress shirt that gets all wrinkly and terrible? and Maine doesn't think there is anything worse at all. That's why they made the most lightweight,

breathable and moisture wicking dress shirt that you can buy. Their high-performance dress shirts are warm in winter and cool in summer. Think of their clothing as your secret weapon for any occasion. I am confident that if you give Mizan and Maine a try, you will never go back to conventional men's clothing again. Mizzin and Maine's dress shirts are absolutely phenomenal. And by the way, it's not just the dress shirts. I love in particular their polo shirts. Oh my gosh. Not only because the fabric is so great, and as an Italian-American, I perspire a little bit, but they look so smart. Man, are they, they are really, really clean, elegant shirts. That's why Mizan and Maine has over 30,000, five-star reviews online. Look your best this season with

Mizanin-M-N-M-M-N-M-N-N-N-N-N-N-N-N-N. Right now, if you go to M-N-N-N-M-O-Les, you'll receive $35 off any regular price to order of $125 or more. M-I-Z-E-N-A-N-N-D-M-N-O-com. Promocode-N-N-N-N-N-R-O-C. state senator Chris Trackel stood up to this school board with a broad representation of his constituents behind him, standing up to the people who want to trans the kids. You claim you want people to follow the rules, but you break the rules left and right. Last month, you allowed two people to speak without being in this meeting. We will recess for 15 minutes.

I'm sorry. We have asked you absolutely know the protocol. You're not following protocol yourself. Madam Chair, I move to adjourn. Okay, I have a motion to adjourn. Do I have a second? I love this woman who's trying to run the school board meeting. She goes, the moment she gets pushed back, she goes, okay, I'm going to adjourn the meeting. I don't want to have to answer these questions. I don't want to have to explain the policy. So I move to adjourn. Do I have

a second? Because you need someone to second your motion and nobody in the room wants to do it. Do I have a second? And you hear the parents in the crowd, they say, no, you don't have a second. Answer the question. Stop transing our kids. And this woman looks to her fellow school board members. Do I have? Do I have a second? And then there's all this dead silence. Finally someone's seconds or much. She goes, okay, second in the motion. We're journeing. See you. Bye-bye. absolute embarrassment. So it's important to see these things happen at the local level. It's important to shine a light on these movements at the local level because it is in those small things where the rot can begin, and it's in those small, tiny little things where a return to sanity can begin

as well, where recovery can begin, where a restoration of our country can begin as well. The other reason I bring up this clip is because conservatives are fond of saying, politics is downstream of culture. And if that means that conservatives should take over Hollywood again, great, I agree. And if that means conservatives should produce great works of art that shape one's mind and soul good. And if that means that conservatives should, I don't know, should conservatives start exercising some control over education? That's cultural to a degree. But now we're starting to get a little bit political, isn't it? Because the government has a over education. And if a state senator wants to show up to a local school board, and with a group of

parents, is that cultural or is that political? I have long been skeptical of this phrase, politics is downstream of culture, because, not because it isn't true in the sense that we need to make movies, but because I think it lets Republican politicians off the hook. I think it is a kind of libertarian cope to say the government is always bad, the government can never do anything right, so we just need people outside of the government to do everything for us. It's a way to say, okay, we're going to surrender the entire political order. But we live in a republic. We live in self-government. So in self-government in all states, but especially in self-government, the distinction between the culture and the politics is pretty blurry because we the people are

supposed to be doing both of those things. What was that meeting last night? What was that episode? Was that culture or was that politics? I bet that a ton of those people, probably every single person in that room, saw the Daily Wire, Loudoun County story where we exposed what happens when boys are allowed to go into the girls' room and it can result in rapes and all sorts of cover-ups and just terrible disorder. I bet you most people in that room saw Matt's movie, what is a woman, which exposed a lot of the transgender. I bet they've been following a lot of cultural outlets on this question, sure, but there's a state senator there. And the people would not have been nearly as effective if the state senator had not come in as well. And it's the people fighting against a political body. And what

they're trying to do is get a law or a school rule to be shot down, to change the way that the school is going to conduct business. Is that politics or culture? It's both. That's both. And conservatives, I think we've gotten the message. This was the thesis of my book, Speechless, Controlling Words, Controlling Minds, which is still available for order and selling like hotcakes. I really appreciate that.

There we go. A little light on the bell today, but that's all right. We'll pick it up. It's early in the morning. All the flights are grounded. Everything's chaos. We'll probably get the bell a little bit quicker

next time I mention. Speechless! Guys, come on. Where's the... All right. Okay, we got to... We'll try a little bit later in the show. Regardless, my point is

that I think conservatives have gotten the message in recent years is that there's nothing wrong with wielding the government within just limits for good ends. There's nothing wrong with that. We have to do that. Otherwise, we're surrendering not just our politics, but our whole culture. We're surrendering the whole country to the libs, and that's not going to turn out very well. Because very, very quickly, the political predations of the libs are going to go from hiking our taxes a little bit and kind of putting some annoying regulations on us to transing our kids. It's going to go, it's having to have.

very, very quickly. It's happening before our very eyes. You want to talk about culture and politics coming together. It's the story I meant to get to yesterday, but certainly want to get to it today. Diamond of Diamond and Silk Fame has suddenly died, unexpectedly died, very, very sad. If you can spare a prayer for Diamond, I think that would be a wonderful thing to do. I did not know Diamond particularly well. I did her show at least once, I think maybe 12. We'd, we'd, they've been on my show. We, we have, we interacted a fair bit. And they were, they as a duo, Silk is still alive, but Diamond and Silk is a duo, were so funny and so perceptive. I, I was going back through some of the best of the other day and just thinking,

man, what a great, what a great something this was. I didn't, I couldn't, I could, is it an act? Is it a political campaign? Is it, whatever it was, it was really, really great. Hey y'all Okay so I'm sitting up looking at my TV And I'm disturbed by what I see Okay Now you got everybody all upset Because now people are talking about

deporting illegal immigrants back to their country Okay Well they came here Illegally And see now you have the president done weighed in and in on it And he said It's not who we are as Americans

Okay And I say no Mr. President It's not who you are as an American That's right We as Americans want our border secure That's right we can feel safe in our country. We as Americans want our jobs back here in our country where we can thrive again.

We as Americans, baby, want to know that we matter first before outsiders so charity starts at home. Okay? We as Americans want our government to realize that it's easier and cheaper for you to deport instead of support. Okay, all right? Now, I know that we're the land of the free, but it doesn't mean for people to come over here in our country illegal. and get free food, free housing, free education, free medical. It doesn't mean that. Illegal immigration you are.

It is wrong. It is wrong in this country. When we as Americans, if we go to somebody's house uninvited and we go right up in their house, they call that breaking an interest. They don't rent us no amnesty. What a great bit. What a great performance that is. But what is it?

Is it just a show? Is it just entertainment? It's certainly entertaining. is it education? It is educational. Diamond in particular, with silk as the cheering squad in the act, was explaining the illegal immigration issue as well as I've heard it explained and knocking down the Democrat talking points on immigration in a way that was funny, but was educational. Is it philosophy? Actually, there was a fair level of political philosophy in that conversation. The analogies that she's drawing. She says, you know, when I go into somebody's home, if my friend and I go into somebody's home, that's called breaking and airing. Why is it different when a foreigner comes into our country illegally? I know it seems basic, but we're in an age of such chaos and confusion that that's an illuminating analogy to make. What is it? Is it political activism? Is it campaigning? Is it politics? Diamond and Silk would go all around with Donald Trump. So what is it? Is it culture?

is it politics? I don't think you can distinguish the two, between the two. I agree with Ronald Reagan. Someone knocked Ronald Reagan back in the 80s for being an actor. So do you really think that an actor can be the president of the United States? And he said, how could the president not be an actor? So much of the job is theatrical. So much of the job is cultural. When you think of the great achievements of Ronald Reagan, probably the biggest achievement was a cultural one, which is that he made Americans feel good about themselves again. That was the point of mourning in America, which is his most famous head. It's mourning in America. He accomplished a lot of great concrete things. He got the economy going again. He defeated the Soviet Union. I'm not downplaying any of that.

But the longer lasting, deeper accomplishment that Ronald Reagan had, probably, was a cultural one. And so it should not be in either or. Okay, we should, yeah, we want people who have a good show business knack in politics. And we want people in our culture who are unafraid to wield the political order. But the other reason that I was so sad to see Diamond die is that with Diamond's death and with the end of the Diamond and Silk Act, I think it symbolizes the end of an era, an era that we know has passed away. But we're not really conscious of that fact. until a moment like this. Diamond and silk are as significant to the Trump era as any other symbol I can think of. When I think back to those wild, crazy days of 2015, 2016, that today

feel like just yesterday until you begin to remember, oh yeah, Donald Trump coming down the escalator. And oh yeah, Hillary, everyone thought Hillary Clinton was going to be the president. It was just a guaranteed thing. And then, oh, yeah, we had these women diamond and silk, and they became so popular. They ended up getting a show, and they ended up campaigning with the president. Oh, yeah, that feeling of when Donald Trump won and the MAGA hat. Oh, yeah. Do you remember this feeling of hope?

And that was a long time ago. That was seven years, eight years ago when the Trump campaign began. Eight years ago, that's almost a decade ago. And the thing about eras is you don't feel them passing away. You only realize that they're gone when you think back on them. But it's not as though you're in a moment. Most of the time you just think, okay, all right, now, today, June 5th, 2021. This is the day that one era passed away and we're into a new one.

No, it's just, it happens subtly. And then you look back and you say, oh my gosh, yeah, that era is over. And so then we have to ask ourselves, what is the fight now? What are people going to remember now? I also don't mean it to say that Donald Trump is done and he's totally cooked and there's no way he's going to win the presidency again. But he and his campaign certainly has to recognize this, and we all also have to recognize this. Whatever Trump 2015 was, whatever that moment, that moment is over. And in fact, the reason that Trump was able to win, I think, in 2016, is because he recognized that the moment that all the other GOP guys were campaigning in, which was really like a 2010, 2012 Tea Party-ish moment. Or in the case of Jeb,

it was a 2005 kind of Bush era moment, that that was all done. And so Trump says things that would have been completely unacceptable during the early Tea Party era and during the Bush era. We need to we need trade tariffs. We need to build up a wall. The illegal immigrants are murderers and rapists. I'm going to lock Hillary up in jail. All these sorts of things, virtually every Canada on that stage was uncomfortable with something that Donald Trump said, because he was campaigning on the new thing, on the present, while they were campaigning in the past. So the question for us is, what is the issue now? What is going to define 2023 and 2020? 24. The issue now, I have argued for some months, is more meta-political than political. By which I mean,

it's not just that we're fighting one issue or another. We're not just fighting taxes. We're not just fighting regulation. We're not just fighting abortion even. We got the Dobbs decision. Roe v. Wade is dead. There's still a lot of work to do in the pro-life movement to protect babies, but even that, that's not the most important issue in most people's perception, even if it is the most important issue ultimately because it's an issue of human life. What I think people are focused on and will increasingly be focused on is meta-politics, the politics of politics, how decisions are made, how power is wielded in our country, knowing that our government is not run like the bill up on Capitol Hill, like our founders and framers intended. I think,

this is probably why the House GOP, which for all their faults, at the very least, they usually have a decent enough sense of what issues people care about, because what they're often focused on is just getting themselves reelected. The House GOP has just voted to defund the IRS. Specifically, they voted unanimously to repeal the Democrats' army of 87,000 IRS agents. The very first act of the new Congress, says Kevin McCarthy, because government should work for you, not against you, promises made, promises kept. Now, the establishment GOP can justify a vote like this on its usual grounds, which is that we just want to cut taxes. The only thing that Republicans ever seem to agree on is that we just want to cut taxes. But this is about more than that. It's about cutting the

agents. It's about shrinking the agency. It's about stopping Joe Biden's massive increase to one of the executive agencies that has been used since at least the Obama administration. to persecute conservatives. This is really not about taxes. I'm all for a tax cut. Please cut my taxes. That sounds great. But it's really not about that. What this is really about is how power is wielded in the country. Who has that power? Who can wield it? And who is going to wield it against whom? Because right now it's being wielded by the libs against us in increasingly arbitrary ways or capricious ways. It's not arbitrary in the sense that we know who's doing it and who they're doing it against, but in ways that are unmoored from any kind of principle or rule that applies to everybody.

Politics is being set at levels much higher than the U.S. Congress. I think this is why people have an increased focus on the World Economic Forum. I think this is why a lot of the political debate in recent years has not been about the left versus the right or the Democrat. versus the Republicans. A lot of the political debate in the last six or seven years has been about the nationalists or the patriots versus the globalists. That's a big shift. And you are seeing globalist political power represented in its clearest expression just this coming week at Davos, at the World Economic Forum. Most people don't know what the World Economic Forum is. The World Economic Forum

is this nonprofit organization that was founded in 1971 by Cloud. Schwab, who looks and sounds like a James Bond villain and acts like one too. But it's not a governmental body, exactly, and it's not a private organization, exactly. The World Economic Forum gets government funding from governments all over the world. The World Economic Forum hosts tons of heads of state, 53, I think, this year, 52 heads of state are participating in the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum. 52 heads of state. That's a massive number. And nearly 300 government ministers are going to be participating in the World Economic Forum. And what is the purpose of the forum? The purpose of the

forum is to bring together the public sphere and the private sphere all over the world. Exactly what we've been talking about in this show. To bring together the politics and the culture. And to pull it all together so that when we decide, in Davos, that climate change is a really big problem. After we fly in on our, I think, at the current moment, it's something like 1,500 private jets. It might be more like 2,500 private jets. Fly into Davos, and we're really worried about how you, you, Hoy, Palloy, are using gas stoves. That's very bad for the environment. I was reading an article about it on my private jet, flying into my Swiss mountain town in Davos. It's very bad. And so what we need to do,

is not only pressure the governments to take away your rights and traditions and way of life. We're going to pressure the companies, too. And we're going to pressure the nonprofit organizations, the NGOs that have a lot of power around the world. And we're going to force them all working together, conspiring, you might say, to pursue our agenda, the Davos agenda. The agenda of the Davos man. That phrase has come into vogue in recent years. The Davos man is the sort of person who doesn't feel any particular local or national allegiance. The Davos man, who all he ever does is works on his laptop. He could work anywhere in the world. He feels far greater camaraderie, a far closer kinship to the same sort of people who just jetset all over the world.

And they mock things like patriotism. They mock things like tradition, like our ordinary way of life, like having a family, like being rooted in a place. They mock that. That's not for them. That's happening right now. And so how does this work in practice? A lot of that sounds kind of abstract. Well, the way it works in practice is right now, the Davos agenda is to make the rest of the world look like China, to make the West, which has a tradition of freedom, a tradition rooted in Christianity, a tradition of the most impressive civilization to everything. to grace the earth. Yeah, that's all, that's no good. All that freedom, all those rights that you say that you have, that's really, that's hurting Mother Gaia. That's, that's provoking the sun monster to

destroy us all. That's not giving these people enough political power in Davos. No, no. You're a tradition of political freedom where you have your own representative bodies and you make your own laws for your right, that's not good in our increasingly globalized world. And so what the W.EF has suggested is that the model for the future is the China model. What's the China model? You don't have rights, you don't have freedom, you don't have your tradition, you have constant surveillance, and the people at the tippy, tippy top tell you exactly what you do all of the time. That is, in fact, a bigger political issue than whatever the marginal tax rate is in the United States. and conservatives are waking up to that fact, and you are seeing it reflected in our activism.

You know, in 2022, we launched Jeremy's Razors as a joke. But just because it was a joke did not mean it was not real. It was an important joke. Now, just nine months and 15 premium products later, we have amassed the largest social media following of any brand in the category and taken over $10 million away from so-called men's grooming companies that despise masculinity. That was just the beginning. This year, we've got even more great products.

and woke scorching endeavor is in store. So skip the resolutions and join the revolution. Together we will upend the woke economy and finally give conservatives a return to what they believe. Are you ready to really make a change this year? Pick up Jeremy's Razors, hair, skin, beard, and body care products today by going to dailywire.com slash knolls, K&WLES. How do you think I get this quaff? This is Jeremy's shampoo. Go to dailywire.com slash knolls. The situation of the meta-political situation of these Davos-like people, these geniuses, these self-appointed, benevolent bedders who are going to take all our rights and sovereignty and traditions away, and they're going to tell us exactly how to live. They are so brazen in their approach to things,

and their vision is so, so hideous, that you are seeing even the Pope speak out against it. and I say this with some surprise, or at least recognizing the surprise that many of you might feel when you hear this, because Pope Francis has a reputation of being a little bit more on the liberal side, a little bit confusing in some of his statements, a little bit soft maybe on the Chinese government, a little bit more favorable toward these liberal globalists around the world. that is at least the public perception, and I think that the public has reason to understand those things. But as I have tried to point out time and time again, Pope Francis is not just the communist caricature that you read about in the newspapers. People try to portray Pope Francis as pro-LGBT agenda. They forget that he said when he was Cardinal of Buenos Aires that gay marriage, quote-unquote, is not merely a political campaign, but rather, quote,

a machination of the father of lies who seeks to deceive and confuse the children of God. And when he was asked specifically by the German bishops, but by a lot of the libs within the Catholic Church, to permit blessing ceremonies for gay marriage and that sort of thing, Pope Francis said that the Vatican cannot bless sin. And so he's been very clear. He sounds extremely right-wing and based on an issue such as that on abortion. Some people might suspect because Pope Francis sounds kind of liberal sometimes, that in our secular world, if you don't understand the history and the inertia, the authority of the church, you might expect Pope Francis to be pro-abortion. He's not. He said that if you go and get an abortion, it's like hiring a hitman.

You can't be any clearer than that. And even on this issue of the big libs, the globalist-type people who want to bring us the fourth industrial revolution, as the World Economic Forum calls it, this complete upending of society where artificial intelligence and computers are basically going to run the show, and we're going to cede all of our political rights and traditions to the computers, basically, to technology under the control of an increasingly globalized elite. Pope Francis says, hey, watch out. There are strict limits here that you cannot pass. A really important statement he just made to the renaissance conference in Rome, the renaissance with the AI capitalized in it, is a Catholic campaign focused on the ethics of artificial intelligence.

And Pope Francis said, we are all aware of how artificial intelligence is increasingly present in every aspect of daily life, both personal and social. It affects the way we understand the world and ourselves. It's really important, too, because, you know, we're all afraid of being turned into cyborgs, but in many ways, we already are cyborgs. When you are walking around, how often are you not looking at your phone? When you are just walking in your day-to-day life or at the office or in school or wherever, how often do you not have your phone on you? I try to not have my phone on me, and people get angry at me. They say, I just texted you. Why didn't you text me? Because I never text anybody back. I just called you. I said, oh, I don't know my phone on me.

What do you mean? If your phone is always on you and you're always plugged into it, then you are, in a way, sort of a cyborg. And it affects the way that you've used. you, even who you are. But Francis goes on. He says, innovation in this field means that these tools are increasingly decisive in human activity and even compelling in human decision making. Now, let's put a pause there. He's saying it's not, the technology does not merely facilitate the decisions that you want to make. The technology increasingly pushes you toward the decisions that it wants you to make. That's what social media algorithms are. That's what, when you go shopping on Amazon, that's what Amazon is doing, it's pushing you toward purchasing certain products. The TikTok and the Instagram

and the who knows what of it all are pushing you toward consuming certain images, which is pushing you toward cultivating certain desires, which is pushing you even further toward the ends that it has in store for you. And it's not just the computer that has these ends in store. It's the people running the computers. And so rather than just seed our lives away to the people who make the algorithms and run the computers that motivate our decisions. But for instance, says, I encourage you ethicists on AI to continue in your endeavor. I am pleased to know that you also wish to involve the other great world religions and men and women of goodwill so that Al Gore ethics, ethical reflection on the use of algorithms, will be increasingly present not only in public debate, but also in the

development of technical solutions. Put a pause there. This is a really strange statement to come from the Pope. He says, I'm glad you're involving the other great world religions. Hold on. The claim of the Catholic Church is that the Catholic Church is the, the divinely instituted Church of Earth, the spiritual Israel, the bride of Christ on earth, and the Pope is the vicar of Christ. And so this relativistic language of all the other great world religions, oh, you know, we're all accessing the truth, man, and, you know, we're all, I grab the truth. And I think that God is like a tree, a big tree trunk. And I think that God is like a fire hose. And I think that God is like a big wall. And actually, it turns out when we all see how we're really thinking of these things

someday, we were all touching an elephant. You know, and one person was touching the leg, and one person was touching the trunk, and one person was touching the side. So we were all, all the religions are kind of getting at the same thing, man. You know, we're just, no one has a monopoly on the truth. That's not a Catholic idea. Okay, the Catholic idea is actually, yes, the church does have a monopoly on religious truth, because God has a monopoly on religious truth, and Christ on earth instituted this church and gave a special role to the apostles and specifically to the successor, to St. Peter, and to the successor of St. Peter. So Catholics in particular are going to look at this statement from Pope Francis and say, wait, what's going on here? Come on. And maybe it's

because Pope Francis is a big lib or something. But I would prefer to interpret this in a more charitable way, which is, I think Pope Francis is rightly observing that the immediate battle that we have to fight right now against this Leviathan that stands before us, this battle that we have to fight right now against the increasingly technologically powerful atheist, globalist, secular elite, means that the battle lines are not going to be the Catholics versus the Presbyterians. That's not the, that's not, maybe that's a battle for another day. I don't know. Arm up, you Presbyterians. Someday, someday we'll hash out that battle, but that's not what's going on right now. The battle is not even between the Christians and the Muslims. We've had those battles called the Crusades.

Battles not between the Christians and the Jews. The battle's not, that the battle right now, is between, it's on a much lower grounding, actually. It's sad that it has to be on this really basic level, but it's between people who recognize that there is a metaphysical reality, that God exists, that the soul exists. The World Economic Forum says the soul doesn't exist. Yuval Harari, who is one of the philosophers of the World Economic Forum. He says, the soul, this is fake news.

The resurrection of Jesus Christ, this is fake news. Human rights is fake news. And so the battle here is, yeah, if you want to, if you want to get anything done, we need supporters here. And so the battle is between people who recognize God exists. Humans are made in the image of God. And we're not just, we're not just stuff and matter to be dragged along by a computer and an algorithm. That's how I'm choosing to interpret that. And I think, I think if that is the correct interpretation, it certainly, if that is what Pope Francis had in mind, or whether it isn't what Pope Francis had in mind,

it certainly is true of the situation nevertheless. He goes on. He says, indeed, person must be able to enjoy a human and supportive development without anyone being excluded. We must therefore be vigilant and work to ensure that the discriminatory use of these instruments does not take root at the expense of the most fragile and excluded. Let us always remember that the way we treat the last and least of our brothers and sisters speaks of the value we place upon human life. We could take the example of asylum seekers. We could take the example of all of the marginalized people who are fragile and excluded. Let us remember that it is a not acceptable that the decision about someone's life and future be entrusted to an algorithm.

And this is really important. You are seeing here that the real line in the sand is humans must remain the stewards of creation. We can't just delegate that away. Like the Congress delegated away so many of its powers to the alphabet agencies and the executive branch. We cannot just delegate away our stewardship of the creation to a computer. We cannot establish the domination of technology over the origin and destiny of human life. This is one of the strong arguments against in vitro fertilization. We're increasingly, you're hearing really messed up stories.

There's one I wanted to get to today. We don't have time to do it. About the actress Anna Kendrick, who was lamenting her breakup. She said, I've had this boyfriend, and we made embryos together. And then we broke up, okay, well, it means you had children together. And you've got souls on ice over there and you say, I no longer care about my children.

Let them freeze forever. Or let them be destroyed or let them die or whatever. One of the arguments against things like in vitro fertilization, there are many arguments, but one of which is it establishes the domination of technology over the origin and destiny of human life. It disrespects our own humanity. and we as people who are made in the image and likeness of God. That is a huge threat. There is always a political battle between policies that will degrade human beings

or policies that will recognize the dignity of human beings. What's happening right now, because of the means and opportunity afforded by technological advancement and globalization, we are at the precipice of a major battle, and it's not a battle over tax cuts. It's a battle over who controls us. It's a battle over what controls us. It's a battle over what will human beings even be going into the future. Now, we have got a wonderful movie trailer that I am assured by my producers provides ample fodder for our reflection on our decadent culture.

Because it is Woke Wednesday. But if you want to give me your brilliant thoughts on this trailer and you want to hear my cultural musings as the most fresh, hip, cool, youthful, vibrant cultural commentator out there, you've got to become a member at DailyWire. So head on over, dailywire.com slash knolls. Use code Knowles at checkout, yet two months free on all annual plans. We will see you at the member block.