The Michael Knowles Show - Ep. 272 - Last Call For The Wall

Episode Date: December 21, 2018

Defense Secretary James Mattis resigns over President Trump’s decision to pull U.S. troops out of Syria. But what if Trump's bluffing? Then, Planned Parenthood targets pregnant women (SHOCK), Masterpiece Cakeshop owner Jack Phillips is back in court, and the top five moments of 2018! Date: 12-21-2018 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Defense Secretary James Mattis resigns over President Trump's decision to pull U.S. troops out of Syria. But what if President Trump's Syria move is nothing more than a border wall bluff? We will analyze. Then Ruth Bader Ginsburg, left-wing Supreme Court Justice, undergoes surgery to remove cancerous growths from her lungs. What will the political fallout be? Leftist agitators once again try to ruin masterpiece cake shop owner Jack Phillips' life and the top five moments of 2018 on this. the last episode of the year. I'm Michael Knowles and this is the Michael

Knowles show. It's the last episode before Christmas. It's the last episode before the New Year. So we're probably just winding down, getting ready to see our families, sit around the table, maybe go to midnight mass, right? No, right now we're facing a possible government shutdown. The U.S. is pulling out of Syria. James Mattis is resigning. Mitch McConnell may end the filibuster once and for all in the Senate. And Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Left wing, far left justice is undergoing surgery for cancerous growths on her lungs.

This, just a week after she said her health is fine. You knew this would have to happen, didn't you? You thought it would be a nice end of the year? No, President Trump is the reality show business president. Of course, he's going to leave us on a cliffhanger. We'll get to all of it. But first, let's make a little money, honey, for the last time in 2018 with Pro Talas. You know Pro Talas with over 1 million happy pain-free customers and a 97% success rate.

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You've got major change in foreign policy. You've got all of these crazy things happening. How are the mainstream media reporting it? I'll let them show you. The walls are closing in on Donald Trump. As the walls close in on Donald Trump, he is going to be more desperate. The walls are closing in on the Trump presidency. I want to begin with the walls.

really closing in. The walls are closing in. The investigative walls are closing in. The walls are really closing in. The walls are closing in. Walls are closing in. The walls seem to be closing in. I'm using overusing my cliches. I hate overusing this metaphor of the walls closing in. I mean, we've been saying the walls are closing in for two years, but it feels like they're actually closing right now.

And as the walls start to close in on the president, as the walls close in... He feels the walls closing in. The walls are closing in is the wrong. closing in is the wrong image, but the bricks are sort of making the roof, you know, buckle. That's the definition of the walls closing in. And if this president feels as if the walls are closing in tonight, he's right because they are. But boom, boom, boom, boom, it's almost like they're all talking to each other.

It's almost like they're all getting on board with the same tired, untrue talking point. The walls are not closing in. He's getting some bad news. He's getting some good news. He's actually standing for something. That's what's really happening. You are getting a dramatic climax to 2018, and it's not all roses. The Jim Mattis resignation is a big deal, and it's a big blow to his administration. But the walls are not closing in. The walls are getting 10 feet higher. So why did James Mattis resign? This is the biggest tough news for him. He resigned over Syria. Initially, President Trump came out and said James Mattis is retiring. Look, at this point in an administration, two years in, it would make perfect sense for his first Secretary of Defense.

to retire, it's a tough job, and there is turnover. James Mattis then came out and said, no, no, no, he didn't explicitly say this, but he released his resignation letter. And his resignation letter was both respectful and brutal to Donald Trump. He basically implied that Donald Trump does not share his worldview of preserving our system of alliances and of checking power in the Middle East and of intervening elsewhere so that we don't need to deal with bad people at home. Why does Syria matter?

Why is Syria the straw that broke the camels back? You know, James Mattis, it had been reported that he felt that he was in the administration to be the adult in the room and it was his duty to serve his country. So why would this Syria move, just pulling 2,000 troops out of Syria, when you've got another 5,200 still in Iraq? Why did this break the camels back? Syria matters because of the Kurds. If we pull out of Syria, the Kurdish forces that are fighting there, who are our allies

in the region, are probably going to be slaughtered by Turkey. I don't mean to laugh. It's just really dark. Slaughtered by Turkey and Bashar Assad, who's ostensibly running Syria. This is really bad. I mean, this is the strongest argument for keeping an American military presence in Syria. Kurds, the Kurdish forces are our allies there, and we don't want to look like we're betraying them. A lot of people in the military community are saying it's going to feel like a betrayal if we pull out. Fair enough. Now, I think some conservatives are taking criticism too far. Beyond the question of the Kurds, they're taking, and whether the Kurds can withstand an assault from Turkey or withstand an assault from Bashar Assad.

Some are taking it too far. One of them seems to be the president's biggest television ally, Fox and Friends, there was a very testy exchange this morning between Brian Kilmead and the administration. Sarah, he's giving Russia a big win. Vladimir Putin praised him. He also is doing exactly what he criticized President Obama for doing. He said President Obama is the founder of ISIS. He just re-founded ISIS because they've got 30,000 men there and they're already striking back with our would-be evacuation. The president's got it, he's really on the griddle with this. Brian, but Brian, I have to respectfully and vehemently disagree with you. The idea that the president has had anything to do with helping ISIS reemerge is absolutely outrageous.

Outrageous. Leaving is helping. The president has put so much emphasis on rebuilding and making sure we have the strongest military on the face of the planet. If ISIS wants to pick a fight with somebody, they sure as heck don't want to pick one with Donald Trump because he will destroy them and defeat them. And he's made that extremely clear. We've wiped out 99% of ISIS in Syria. The president doesn't want to be in the middle of a civil war in the Middle East and continue to put American lives on a line. Words are, if we need to fight ISIS again, the president's not afraid to do that. All right, Sarah. Thank you so much. We wish you a very merry Christmas. Thank you very much.

You're welcome. This takes it pretty far to say that President Trump is re-founding ISIS. This is a, I mean, there is legitimate disagreement here on the question of Syria, obviously with our relationship with certain forces on the ground, and whether or not it's in our interest to oust Bashar Assad, and whether our military objective out there is to oust Bashar Assad, what we're doing in Syria in the first place. I had one person describe it to me who said our actual military goal is to prevent another 9-11. So there was an op-ed out today in the Washington Post from Dan Crenshaw, which said, we fight them over there so that they don't come over here and fight us. Fair enough. That's actually the strategic objective. There can be fair disagreement over what will accomplish that. But to say that President Trump refounded ISIS is taking it too far, and to suggest this is coming out of the blue, is also taking it too far,

President Trump promised all along will kill ISIS and we will get out of Syria. We won't stay there unnecessarily. Here's President Trump on the campaign trail talking about Syria. A very bad thing. Now, she talks tough. She talks really tough against Putin and against Assad. She wants to fight for rebels. There's only one problem. You don't even know who the rebels are. So what's the purpose? And one thing I have to say, I don't like Assad at all. But Assad, is killing ISIS. Russia is killing ISIS. Mr. Trump, let me repeat the question. If you were president, what would you do about Syria and the humanitarian crisis in Aleppo? And I want to remind you what your running mate said. He said, provocations by Russia need to be met with American strength and that

if Russia continues to be involved in air strikes along with the Syrian government forces of Assad, the United States of America should be prepared to use military force to strike the military targets of the Assad regime. Okay. He and I haven't spoken, and I disagree. I disagree with you running away. I think we have to knock out ISIS. He speaks pretty clearly there. He's speaking in a way that contradicts certain people around him, certain more established ideas, and he's saying this is what we're going to do in Syria. But the question is, we talked yesterday about Syria, so I won't go into Syria itself too much. My thought on it is that this is from a geostrategic standpoint, largely inconsequential. I don't think that this will have, I don't think this will rebound ISIS. I'm not sure that this will be a wonderful win for America. It could be a blow to some of our allies.

It could empower certain bad actors slightly, but let's not pretend that we're pulling out of the Middle East entirely. We didn't have that many forces in Syria to begin with. We're only talking about 2,000 forces. So why Syria right now, the actual answer, is that this is all. about the border wall and people are not talking about it. We will talk about it in one second, but first, let's make just a little bit more money. This is the last money we're going to make in the new year. So let's do it. We'll talk about Brownells, a big proponent and supporter of the Second

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me. You say, oh Michael, I really like this show. Let me do something good for you. Buy me gun gift cards from Brownells. Go to brownells.com. Put some freedom in your loved ones Christmas. Don't you love me? Come on. Give me a little Brownells gift card. why Syria right now? This is all about the border wall. What is our budget in Syria? The budget in Syria is pretty substantial. It's over $15 billion. Now, if Syria, 2,000 troops there is largely inconsequential, what if this is a bluff? Because it can go either way. President Trump talked about we're going to go kill ISIS. We're not going to be there longer than we have to. But if it's 2,000 troops, which, you know, we're not talking about some overwhelming force of 30,000 or 40,000 troops. What if this is a bluff? President Trump, on the border wall has no leverage with Chuck Schumer. He has no leverage with Nancy Pelosi.

He has no leverage in this shutdown. If they shut down the government and they say, we're going to shut down the government, we're going to demand that you give us $5 billion for the border wall. We're not going to reopen it. And they wait. They could wait into the new Congress. But what is going to be the lever that actually triggers them to give the funding, especially once Nancy Pelosi takes the reins as the Speaker of the House? What if it's this Syria question? Because the Democrats are in a very tough spot right now. Chuck Schumer in particular is in a very tough spot. He is held captive by his left-wing, far-left activist base, which will not tolerate any money for border security. They want to abolish ICE. They want open borders. But we know that border

security is very popular among the American people. The majority of Americans want the border wall. The majority of Americans don't want amnesty. They don't want open borders. So the Democrats now have their main guys who go out and canvas for them, who give them money, who are essentially their candidates who are now their up-and-coming candidates, and you've got, you're looking at national elections and you think they're not going to be able to win these elections if they cater to that base. This Syria question might be a way to do it, because if they can go to their base and say, look, we didn't want to give them the money for the wall, but they were going to take that money out of the Syria budget.

We're going to be the adults. We're not going to let that awful petulant Trump give up Syria and play into Vladimir Putin's hand and abandon our allies. and we did the responsible thing, they were going to get the border anyway, and we decided to save Syrians while we were at it. That actually might play. That actually might give Chuck Schumer an out.

And it will, look, this is not a major campaign promise to pull 2,000 troops out of Syria. If it were a huge force, then you could see how that would really play in 2020. But if President Trump can use that as leverage, as a bluff or not as a bluff, whatever, to build that wall, it is a big win. Because he has to do it. He has to build this way.

wool. Anne Coulter has made this clear. Mark Meadows, we've all been saying you've got to put up on this issue or you're not going to have credibility in 2020. And right now, by the way, Mexico is actually doing a better job of securing our border than we are. How are Dems going to be able to answer that? Sarah Sanders made this excellent point just today. What we have worked out, what this administration has been able to do in conjunction with the Mexican government and the massive and monumental moment that took place yesterday where catch and release has ended. And it's a sad day in America when the Mexican government is doing more to protect the American people than Senate Democrats. I hope that they will not let that be the case by the end of the day. And they will work with us

and work with the president and Senate Republicans to get this done and let everybody go home and let us start building the wall and let us start protecting our border. Absolutely right. It's really hard for Democrats to refute nationally. So what is their answer? Sir, how do you think the Democrats are responding to those very simple, obvious points? They're calling everybody a racist. Of course, that's the only thing that they can possibly do. Here is Senator Chris Murphy, formerly my senator, Democrat from Connecticut. He said, you, he was talking to Marco Rubio on Twitter. He said, you and Trump are advocating putting up a wall on only one border.

No wall for the country filled with mostly white people with Canada. So now the Democrats are so confused on this. issue. They're so broken up about it that now it seems they're advocating for two walls. I thought it was zero walls or two walls, all or nothing at all. They must think that we have an epidemic in this country of 3,000 Canadians per day coming into our country and they're bringing drugs. They're bringing all of those cheap socialist drugs with them from their government health care system. Is that what's happening? No, of course it's incomparable. Now, they have to make it about race down there. It's not about race. It's about crime. It's about drugs. It's about depressing wages.

and it's about the actual problem. There are no Canadians pouring over the border. There are 3,000 Latin American immigrants illegally coming into the country every single day. So you build the wall there. I don't know, should we build a wall along our western shores so that Filipinos don't illegally swim into this country? Or the Chinese citizens?

No, of course not. That's not a problem. That's a fake problem. And as we talk about frequently, the Democrats live in a fantasy. They live in a fantasy world, and this is a fantasy problem about fantasy racism. So, looking at the new year, looking at the end of this year, on balance, what happened?

James Mattis leaving, that's a big loss. He's a big loss, really, because he has these great quotes. I don't mean, he's been a very able Secretary of Defense. He's the most popular member of the Trump administration. There was a morning consult poll that showed that he has 35% approval rating. You know, not saying that that's a great number. That's kind of sad that that's the highest approval rating. But his disapproval is only at 19%.

And it's because most people, most people couldn't even tell you who the vice president is. So most people are not up to date on who the cabinet secretaries are. But he was the most popular member of the administration. He said these great quotes. I mean, when I think of James Mattis, I just think of this interview moment. What keeps you awake at night? Nothing. I keep other people awake at night.

You knew that he was just working on that for years. He just had that one in the back of his head. There are other famous quotes of his. He was speaking to people in Iraq, and he said, listen, please don't make me do this. I don't want to have to do this. I really want to help you. But if I must, I will kill every last one of you.

He's a pretty tough, umbrae. You know, the monk warrior, never got married, reads voraciously. So this is a big loss. It is a big loss to lose James Mattis. Not building the wall would be a bigger loss. It would be much harder for President Trump. It would cripple the administration if he doesn't fight to get this wall built.

And if President Trump thinks that the way that he's going to get this wall built is by making a concession in Syria over 2,000 troops to have access to $15 billion, at the very least to call the Senate to the table and make them fund it, or if not, to actually be able to fund it, and that means you're going to lose your Secretary of Defense, that is a trade that President Trump has to make. He has to come through on the wall. Look, he's come through on more campaign promises than just about anybody. I was driving around in Uber last night on my way to Moralago, of all places. And the Uber driver was this woman. She said, you know, she had a very thick Hispanic accent. She said, I didn't vote for Trump, but I really didn't like Hillary. And I thought they were both bad. But say what you will about Trump. At least he's honest. Do you think he's honest? She goes, yeah, he keeps his promises. At least he keeps his promises. That Hillary is a liar. She doesn't, she'll just say whatever people want to hear. But Trump keeps his promises. Trump's biggest promise is this wall. He's got to come through. If you got to make a hard decision on that, you got to lose a really valuable player of the team. so be it. What else? We know that Democrats know that they're in a bind here. We know that they're in this

really tough position. As tough a position as the Republicans are in and President Trump is in right now, let's not forget Democrats are in a really tough one. Just looking at the early 2020 field that's shaping up, you can see this. It's a ton of infighting, a lot of racial infighting. You heard Kirsten Gillibrand say, she doesn't want two white men at the top of the ticket. So there's this gender sexual infighting. It's all about identity politics. Nothing really seems to unite the Democrat Party. You hear about the Green New Deal. You've got the environmentalist left.

You hear about certain law enforcement, anti-law enforcement policies, a little bit on health care. They can't really agree on anything other than that they hate Donald Trump. But they're really going to have to answer for this immigration thing. It's bigger than the Democrat Party. And so they're really caught on this issue. And I hope we drive this issue home. I hope if need be, we shut down the government. And Chuck Schumer has to deal with a party that is split apart.

What is the most darkly funny story of today? We have to get to this. The New York Times has a bombshell report out that Planned Parenthood is accused of mistreating pregnant employees. Now, this should not come as a surprise to anybody who has any sense of humor whatsoever. But this is what they write, quote, Employers that champion women face accusations of discriminating against, their pregnant workers, showing how widespread the problem is in American workplaces. This reminds me of this classic, I think it was Fox Butterfield headline in the New York Times

that said, crime rate continues to fall despite prisons filling, or prisons continue to fill despite crime rate falling. Now, we would all assume if you lock up more criminals, the crime rate will fall. There is a causal relationship here where the crazy left-wingers see a paradoxical relationship or a contradiction. That's the same thing here. You've got an organization that exists singularly, simply to end pregnancies and kill babies, and the New York Times is shocked

that that agency, that that organization would not treat pregnant women with respect. They're shocked. This is such a contradiction to them because they don't see the contradiction and the paradox of abortion. It goes on, they say, Planned Parenthood, which has been accused of sidelining ousting or otherwise handicapping pregnant employees,

according to interviews with more than a dozen current or former employees. The organization exists to end pregnancies. They always say that 3% of their services are abortion, and everything else is not abortion. This is because they count little nothings as services. So if you hand somebody a condom, that's a service. If you kill a baby, that's a service. And they give out a lot more condoms or referrals to,

actual doctors or whatever. 94% of Planned Parenthood's pregnancy-related services are abortion. They are abortion services in 94% of cases. It's hard to arrive at a really precise number with confidence because Planned Parenthood doesn't actually admit the number of women who go into their clinics every year who are pregnant. They can't admit it because the reason you go to Planned Parenthood is to get an abortion. So using various other statistics that they've arrived at, it seems that the number of pregnancy services that are related to abortion are 94%. This is almost all of them. This story exposes just one contradiction of abortion, which I want to talk about.

It's if pregnancy doesn't matter. If pregnancy is just, you know, it's like getting your appendix inflamed, then why does special treatment of pregnant women matter so much? If the unborn baby is insignificant, then why is pregnancy so significant? Why is this such a big issue? We talk about pregnancy, leave, maternity leave. This is a national issue. Ivanka Trump tried to make this into a national issue.

The New York Times is making it into a national issue. Why? If the pregnancy is nothing, if it's just a little inconvenience that can be wiped away with no greater care than if you're cutting your fingernails, then why is the pregnancy so significant? It doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Before we get to the biggest stories of the year and a little Christmas. story. I also got to talk about my old pal Jack Phillips. Jack Phillips, the head of Masterpiece Cake Shop. He is the guy who was dragged into court. The Colorado Civil Rights Commission

tried to ruin his life because he wouldn't participate in a gay wedding ceremony. He's now back in court for refusing to bake a cake for a transgender identity switch party. And the argument here is not that he won't sell cakes to anybody. He's willing to sell cakes to anybody, but he won't design with his artistic skill at his own he won't put in his own art and craft into participating in something

that he violates his religious views. So this is a total setup here. It's by this transgender woman who's a guy who thinks that he's a woman named Autumn Scardina. And it was the very day

that the Supreme Court agreed to hear Jack Phillips's case because the Colorado Civil Rights Commission was going after him so unfairly. The very day the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case. case, this guy, Autumn Scardina called up and said he wanted a cake that was blue on the outside and pink on the inside to be part of his gender transition party. Jack Phillips said, no, they've

dragged him to court again. Other news right before we leave here, Ginsburg, Ruth Bader Ginsburg is in the hospital. Ruth Bader Ginsburg took that fall, she broke some ribs. She was asked about her health just last week. Here's what she said. The question that probably, oh, I don't know, 70% of America wants to know the answer to, that would be the 70% who offered you their body parts and organs in case you needed them. How's your health? It's fine, thank you. And those ribs you busted? Almost repaired. That's good. So her health is apparently all fine, she says, and now we find out she's just undergone surgery to remove cancerous growths from her lung. She's now at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, one of the best cancer centers in the world. Now, look, what they're saying is that

they found the cancerous growths because she cracked her ribs. So they went in there to look at her ribs and they found these cancerous growths and now she's recovering from that. We wish her well, wish her a speedy recovery. But the question is, why didn't she make this clear? Did she not know a week ago that she was going to undergo surgery, fairly extensive surgery, to remove cancerous growths on her lung of all places, not a good place to find cancerous growths? No, I think she probably knew that. And they're trying to play this very coyly because this will be the most significant event of 2019. I'm willing to predict it now. That's hard to predict the future. Who knows, you can have some crazy war or awful attack or something. This, nine out of ten chance, this will be the most

significant event of 2019 or 2020 or 2021 or 2058. Whenever Ruth Bader Ginsburg goes to her eternal dessert and rest, that will be the biggest issue. That, you know, this question, because we've given so much power over to the courts, this question of the Supreme Court is going to be major. If you have President Trump still in office, it's why they're ramping up talk of impeachment, it's why they're ramping up talk of indictment. If he is still in office and he appoints an originalist judge to the court, this will significantly swing the court. By replacing Scalia with Gorsuch, nothing changed. By replacing Kennedy with Kavanaugh, maybe nothing changed. Maybe nothing changed. I mean, it could be a swing.

His recent decision on Planned Parenthood is not a good sign, but it could be a swing to the right slightly. It could be a swing in favor of originalism. Maybe not. We don't know. And you saw what fight they put up there. But if we replace the most left-wing judge on the court with an originalist, you could have riots in the streets.

You will have riots in the streets. This is going to be the most significant event of 2019. We have the top five most significant events of 2018. We've boiled them all down. The news cycles are so fast. They're moving 24-7 that I've been able to boil them down for you. But unfortunately, you're only going to be able to get to that if you go to dailywire.com. I do want to say also to everyone who's watching or listening and not just the subscribers,

thank you very much. It's been a wonderful year. It's been my pleasure to be able to do this show every day. And I really appreciate all the tremendous growth we've had on this show. And it's just really nice. I appreciate you subscribing to the show on. iTunes and giving us five stars and watching it on YouTube and sending it around and posting it. We really, really appreciate it. It helps keep the lights on, except when I'm in my boudoir here

in Palm Beach, Florida, on the road. But it's just been a blast. We got a lot of great stuff planned for 2019. I can't wait to see you guys on the road at colleges and universities and obviously every day on this show. If you're not on DailyWire.com, though, here's the rub. Go and subscribe. Give us your money. Give us $10 a month or $100 for an annual membership. You get me. You get the Andrew Claven show. You get the Ben Shapiro show. You get to ask questions in the mailbag. You get to ask questions in the conversation. You get to ask questions backstage. You get to, you get everything. You get another kingdom, a major show, lots of great reviews on another kingdom. And you'll, we'll be getting season three, hopefully coming out sometime next year. None of that matters. What really matters is the leftist,

tears Tumblr. If we shut down the government, and if President Trump backs Democrats into a corner here, where they're willing to actually come to the table over the Syria question, because he's going to have the money or he's not going to have the money, Your Leftist Tears Tumblr, it's not going to be enough. You actually will need to go and subscribe. I've estimated about 15 times. You're going to need to buy 15 Daily Wire subscriptions per person just to be able to collect all of the salty, salty snowflakes because it's more voluminous.

When Leftist Tears freeze, they increase in volume, and this can really crush you under the weight of an avalanche. So go to DailyWire.com. We'll be right back with the top five moments of 2018 and a Christmas political sign-off message before the new year. The top five moments of 2018. I got to tell you, when I was looking at these moments, I was trying to think back on all of the events this year.

The news cycle is so fast right now, I couldn't even remember them. The Kavanaugh confirmation seems like it was years ago. The Michael Cohen stuff, the John McCain, all of these things. Everything that's happened this year seems so long ago because the news cycle is so frantic. Even this government shutdown debate, which has been going on for a matter of days, It feels like we've been here for two months. So what are the top five moments? I will give them to you in this order

from least consequential to most consequential. Number five, the sentencing of Michael Cohen for campaign finance violations. Doesn't seem like maybe a question of huge political import. It is. It really matters because when they sentenced Michael Cohen, they went after the president's personal lawyer, kick in his door, take his files,

you know, run roughshut over his own. office. Ostensibly that was for the Russia probe, the probe into Russian interference in the election. Okay, that's ostensibly the purpose of the special counsel. Now, this whole investigation was rotten from the beginning. It was used as an excuse to spy on the Trump campaign. It involved bought and paid for Democrat research to spur it that was not verified at the time. Huge FISA abuse, totally weak applications. It was rotten from the beginning. But at least you could understand the narrative. The narrative was Russia interfered in the election. We allege that President Trump committed crimes with Russia in the course of that interference, and we're going to

investigate it. Okay, I get that. So Michael Cohen is going to go to jail, is going to go rotten prison for campaign finance violations. Well, now I'm kind of, what does that have to do with Russia? That doesn't have anything to do with Russia. That has to do with porn stars. That has to do with his work at the Trump organization. What on earth does that have to do with Russia? It doesn't. But what it exposes is that this Mueller investigation and the Southern District of New York now is simply trying to end the Trump presidency. They are simply trying to overturn the 2016 presidential election. And if they can't do it, if they can't oust him from office, they're going to make him so toxic that no one's going to be able to elect him in 2020. That is their mission. That's what they're after. They don't care about

Russia. They don't care about Vladimir Putin. They don't care about Boris and Natasha. They care about ousting President Trump from office. The sentencing of Michael Cohen showed that once and for all. The fact that we're talking about campaign finance with regard to the special counsel probe is on its face absurd. You're going to see this only heat up in the new year. I mean, at least now the blinders are off. We don't have to think that this is some fair investigation, but it is going to get ugly. Bob Mueller is saying that they could have a report by mid-February, or that's at least the reporting that's coming out now. We'll see. We've heard this before. It was supposed to end in September. then I was supposed to end in November, then it didn't happen.

That's number five. Number four, the deaths of John McCain and George H.W. Bush, most consequential. Number four. The reason for this is not because it was so shocking. We all knew John McCain was dying, and we all knew that George Bush was dying. George Bush was very old. John McCain was no spring chicken either. The reason that it was consequential is it showed the depths of degradation to which the mainstream media will subject themselves, just. to attack incumbent sitting Republican politicians. During John McCain's life,

whenever he posed a threat to a Democrat, the media were vicious against him. They were brutal to him. George Bush, the same thing. He was out of touch. His wife was ugly. He cheated on it. All of these things, no evidence of that,

that they would throw at President Bush. He didn't care about people. He didn't know how to use a grocery scanner. He'd all of these canards. And then when he died, oh, those were the good old days. Oh, those, I have a strange new respect for George Bush. That's what they all say, because I hate Trump.

And it's BS. And guess what? Even Donald Trump, who is an extreme personality, even Donald Trump, when we get 20 years down the line and we've got some other Republican in office, they're going to say, that guy's Hitler and Donald Trump, those were the good old days. That's what you're going to hear. They're going to give him the Nixon treatment. They're going to give him the Reagan treatment. It was so, they turned the John McCain funeral, especially, into a sense. spectacle, an anti-Trump spectacle. And it just showed how shallow it is because these guys

live good lives. Both were war heroes, John McCain and George H.W. Bush, George Bush, such a model, father, grandfather, statesman. He held all of these offices, CIA director, loyal vice president. And they tried to shrink his life and make it a referendum on Donald Trump and juxtapose it with Donald Trump. And it was really sad. And it should, again, take the peel back the layers and the facades and realize that they just despise Republicans and conservatives and you're not going to get them to like you. You know, you're not, John McCain always tried to get the New York Times to like him. And they like him when he doesn't pose a threat. And then when he did, they would ditch him. They would stab him right in the back.

Don't do it. Don't try to say, oh, I'm a Republican, but I'm not that kind of Republican. Oh, I'm a Republican, but I hate Donald Trump. Really like me, like me, mainstream media. It is pointless. They will go after you. They will use you. They will abuse you. shamelessly. Number three, most consequential event of 2018, the banning of Jesse Kelly from Twitter. Again, you don't think that this is of geopolitical importance. It really is. Jesse Kelly, he's an Iraq war veteran, he's a congressional candidate, he's a radio host, totally mainstream guy. And Big Tech censored him. They banned him without any reason from Twitter. They didn't give any explanation. They couldn't show what rules he violated. And they banned him from Twitter. The uproar,

the outrage was so great that eventually they had to reinstate him. It was just, too absurd, but they're coming after us. The reason this is one of the most consequential events is because tech censorship has been creeping along the whole year. You saw this in Google's firing of James Demore. You saw this in the banning of Alex Jones from social media platforms. You saw this in the deep platforming of Gavin McGinnis, the conservative comedian, Owen Benjamin, another comedian. On and on, you see constantly going down this path. And people would always say, well, it's Alex Jones. He's a shirtless vitamin salesman. Oh, who cares about it? Oh, Well, Gavin, he shouldn't have said that.

Owen Benjamin, he took that joke too far. But then you get to Jesse Kelly and you realize, no, those were all just test shots. They're really just going after conservatives. They think conservative ideas are hateful. They now think that it's hateful to say that a man is not a woman. There was a feminist author in Canada who said, a man is not a woman. She's an editor of a feminist journal. She's now blocked from Twitter.

She's banned. You can't go follow her. She's gone. This is a big deal because it's going to raise big questions. about how conservatives should fight big tech. It's going to raise some questions as to whether we should use the government to do it, as to whether we should regulate them as publishers, as to whether we can, if it would even be possible to build our own platforms.

Because the issue is, if they kick you off of, I don't know, Twitter, you can go somewhere else and maybe you've got to raise money on Patreon. Okay, what if Patreon kicks you off? These crowdfunding platforms, GoFund me. Well, then you're in hot water. What if they don't kick you off, but then the leftist, mob is so great that they get the payment processors to refuse to do business to pay you your money. What about that? How far down the line does this go? Do we need to wield the power of the state here?

Do we need to find some other way to subvert the industry? This is going to be a dominant theme in 2019. The number two, most consequential event of the year, I'll let Kanye show it to you himself. Let me ask you this question. You're in the Oval Office. How does it feel to be in the Oval Office? Oh, it is good energy in this. And a good energy? Yeah. It's a great place. The problem is illegal guns.

Illegal guns is the problem. Not legal guns. We have the right to bear arms. You know I love you. I know. But I don't want to take, I don't want to put you in that spot. No, I'm standing in that spot. I love this guy right here.

Let me get this guy above here. I love this guy right here. That's really, yeah. That's really nice. That is really nice. That's good. Why is this the most common? Most people thought this was a circus. They said that why would this be a consequential event? It is because it showed that President Trump is a unique candidate. What was the last Republican who was able to connect with the biggest pop star in the world? Who was the late? It's really about pop culture. Most people just view the Kanye Oval Office meeting through the lens of race. And that does matter because President Trump's approval rating among black voters has increased dramatically. It's really very high for a lot. a Republican politician. So that is great too. You saw Candace Owens. I just saw her last night. She's leading the Blackxit movement, the black exit from the Democrat Party. And there is this idea that's floating around, which is that if there is a race of people who are voting

uniformly with one political party, something has gone seriously wrong. Because you look at other races here, the Italians, for instance. The Italians come to America and they don't all vote in block. You've got Nancy Pelosi is Italian. Andrew Cuomo. Cuomo is Italian. I'm Italian too. Anthony Scaramucci is Italian. You've got other, you've got conservatives, you've got left wangers, you got the whole spectrum. Same thing with the Irish. You got really conservative Irishman, and you got the Irish Democrats. And yet with black voters, they are voting or have voted historically uniformly Democrat. And a little bit of that began to crack. But I think what's even more important about that Kanye meeting is the pop culture of it all.

Kanye West is the biggest pop culture star in the world on planet Earth, other than Donald Trump. Donald Trump has used the culture in his campaign, obviously in his entire career, but in his campaign and in his presidency. He's created an exuberance. He's used humor constantly. Finally, conservatives are the ones who can laugh, who can tell jokes who are the cool guys and the left-wingers are the mean old scolds. This is really important. It's really helpful. It really helps people to connect to politicians. I hope, look, Donald Trump is a unique figure. He's an American original, but I hope conservatives can try to take that spirit and bring it in with their other politicians. And the number one most consequential event of 2018.

I like beer. I liked beer. I still like beer. Had beers, have some beers. One beer, drink beer, drinks beer, drank beer and drinking beer. You've probably had beers, Senator. Beach Week Ralph Club biggest contributor. You know, I got a weak stomach, whether it's with beer.

I like beer. I like beer. I don't know if you do. Okay. Do you like beer, Senator, or not? Um, what do you like to drink? Next one. Hanging out and having some beers with friends, which I gladly do.

I like beer. I like beer. What can I do like beer? This is the most consequential event of the year. It's not just the Kavanaugh confirmation. It's Brett Kavanaugh fighting back. And it's the Republican president standing by his choice. Virtually any other Republican president would have caved, would have withdrawn his nomination. Maybe any other Supreme Court nominee would not have gone out there and fought. And he went out there and fought and he used the culture and he made fun of those senators. And they said, they tried to make this. Imagine living so squeaky clean of life. that the worst thing you ever did was drink beer in high school. Imagine you would be, you would get a straight shot up to heaven. Do not stay in purgatory. Do not stay there for a thousand years ago. Straight to heaven. This guy, he has to defend himself for drinking beer in high school. What does he do? Does he say, I'm sorry, I shouldn't have had a beer in high school? No. He went right in their face and he said, yeah, I liked beer. And you know, I still like beer. And hey, Senator, have you ever had a beer? When you were 18, did you maybe have a beer or two? and obviously they're the scolds now.

Sheldon White House, oh, we're not talk, blah, blah, blah, blah. Okay, I love that he fought back. This was a big issue. They said, he has to be more judicial. Well, then the Senate should be senatorial. He has to be more civil. Yeah, then his inquisitors should be civil too.

And if they're not going to be civil, who cares? Why on earth would he play by rules that they won't play by? We're in a brawl here, folks. We're in a political brawl. And he shouldn't be expected to be playing by all of these beautiful rules while they're going to go out there and shiv him right in the gut. It's ridiculous. And he came out and fought and they got him through. And this was so important. It was important to Republicans doing as well as they did in the midterm elections. It was important to feeling that elections do have consequences. A really beautiful moment, the most consequential. And if, God forbid, anything happens to Justice Ginsburg, 2019 is going to make that look like a Katewalk. Okay. Before we leave here for the break before Christmas and New Year's, I do want a little Christmas rundown. There's a new NPR, PBS. NewsHour Marist poll out, which found that adults under the age of 30 are the only age group

that prefers to pay for Christmas gifts on credit cards. They're the only age group that strongly prefers to say happy holidays to Merry Christmas. And they're the only age group which loves Christmas trees but wants fake Christmas trees. They prefer fake Christmas trees. Talk about the war on Christmas. This is a new flank. The millennials coming in and attacking Christmas. This poll should be unsurprising. This poll describes exactly what we would expect of millennials. Millennials, as the left broadly does, they want the appearance of the thing, but they don't want the essence of the thing. They want the appearance

of whatever they're talking about, but they don't want to do what actually makes that thing, that thing. So, even with the paying, they want to pay on credit card rather than cash. I do too. I pay for almost everything on credit card. But what is cash? Cash is a symbol. Right? Cash is a symbol of labor of productivity, of trust in a system. And so cash itself is a symbol. And credit cards are a symbol of a symbol. Credit cards are one step to remove from that. You use that to count dollars and cents, but really it's just a symbol on cards. They prefer happy holidays to Merry Christmas. What does Happy Holidays refer to? It refers to Christmas. It doesn't refer to Hanukkah. Hanukkah's been over

for weeks. It doesn't refer to the New Year. That's in the new year. It doesn't refer to Thanksgiving. It doesn't refer to Arbor Day. It refers to Christmas. And they want that Christmas feeling, but they don't want it to be Christmas. They want to call it something else, happy holidays. And same thing with the tree. They want the tree. They want all the stuff. The stuff is really nice, but they don't want the thing that makes the tree the tree, which is the tree. They want a fake tree.

And maybe they'll spray some fake Christmas tree smell on it. They don't want the real thing. They probably drink decaf coffee too. A classic millennial story. And also just a little inspiration for Christmas. We all know the real story of Christmas, the incarnation, the birth of Christ. How wonderful. I want to tell one side story about Christmas.

Then we can meditate on the incarnation and the greatest event in the history of the world, tied, I suppose, or only second to the resurrection. At the Council of Nicaea, picture it. AD 325, you've got their saint Nicholas of Myra, Jolly old St. Nicholas, and you've got a heretic, Arias, Arias, who's a heretical Christian who denies the divinity of Christ. And they're there, they're debating, they're being really civil, they're being really collegial, and then Arias spouts his heresy and denies the divinity of Christ,

and jolly old St. Nicholas, Santa Claus himself, gets so irritated that he gets up and he punches that heretic right in the face. Now, did this story really happen? It's unclear. There is some dispute in the historical record. It's certainly in the tradition. In Eastern Christian iconography, you see it all the time, the image of St. Nicholas slapping Arias across the face. The story has changed a little bit over time.

It was initially that St. Nicholas slapped an Aryan, a follower of Arias, but not Error. himself. And then in the earliest texts we have from the Council of Nicaea, there's really no evidence that St. Nicholas even was there. But this story has endured for a millennia now. So I like it nonetheless. It clearly has some explanatory power, which is we are told that we have to, we just have to be civil. We just have to be nice. We have to be tolerant. We have to, don't yuck my yum. Don't be so judgy. The truth is arrogant. The truth is arrogant. And the truth makes claims. It asserts things. We're in a culture that doesn't want to assert anything.

We don't want to say, I think, we don't want to say I believe, we don't want to state facts, we just want to say, I feel like, we want to distance ourselves. Well, maybe that's true. That's your truth. That's not my truth. Sometimes you've got to stand up for the truth. And sometimes the truth is going to push you to such a sense of assertiveness that you've got to punch areas in the face. I'm not advocating violence, but I am advocating assertiveness. I am advocating rhetorical violence if there were such a thing. I am advocating. I am advocating. standing by your guns. We're seeing it play out right now in this government shutdown, this Christmas government shutdown. President Trump is there. He's going to stick by his guns,

or he won't have stood for the main central promise of his campaign. Is he going to stick by it? Are we going to get it? Classic cliffhanger from President Trump. We'll see what happens in the new year. Have a Merry Christmas. Have the Happy New Year. I'll see in 2019. I'm Michael Knowles, and this is the Michael Knowles Show. The Michael Knowles Show is produced by Sennia Villa Real, executive producer Jeremy Borey, senior producer Jonathan Hed, Our supervising producer, Mathis Glover, and our technical producer is Austin Stevens. Edited by Jim Nickel. Audio is mixed by Mike Coramina.

Hair and makeup is by Jesua Olvera. The Michael Knowles Show is a Daily Wire Forward Publishing production, copyright Forward Publishing 2018. Hey guys, over on the Matt Wall Show today, we're going to be talking about the continued persecution of the Christian Baker, Jack Phillips. They're coming after him again. We've got to discuss that. Also, the Trump administration is instituting new rules,

requiring food stamp recipients to work. I think that's great. We'll discuss that. And finally, what is the worst Christmas song of all time? We'll have that conversation today on the Matt Wall Show. Come check it out.