The Michael Knowles Show - Michael Reacts to the SPICIEST White House Memes

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Starting point is 00:00:23 So you can spend less time tackling dishes and more time together. Shop now at palmolive.com. focusing on President Trump's performance on the economy. The Dow is over 50,000. Or immigration. The president has now fired her as secretary of DHS. Or foreign affairs or whatever. And there's a lot, there's a lot, obviously, to be excited about it, talk about.

Starting point is 00:00:50 But people have not paid sufficient attention to the White House's supreme use of memes in the second term. You got to remember a lot of the people there were kids, teenagers just coming up during the meme wars of 2016. Now we're seeing that flower and those meme war vets are now in the halls of power. So the producers have compiled some of the greatest White House memes to be published to date. Take it away. This is actually from the administration like DHS and the White House. Mr. Davies, is that right? Yes, it is.

Starting point is 00:01:46 I wish I could pull up in front of me. that was supposed to be in the video itself where you could see it. But yeah, that is. Very impressive. It's funny, for all my doom scrolling, I don't know, my Algo is real niche stuff. It's basically like, you know, the Meravingian dynasty, like facts you didn't know and weird ukulele videos. So I actually haven't seen a lot of these. That's great.

Starting point is 00:02:10 Offer only valid to illegal aliens. Because it's one thing, that's a level of memory that I really like. The one level, the most obvious level would be, hey, you illegal aliens, you get out of here. We're coming for you. We're going to get you. But it's a deeper level of meaning and irony to come out and say, hey, great news. Illegals, we'll fly you anywhere you want to go as long as this your country of origin. Like, get on board right now. It's real exciting. Okay, next one. This one's to be expected because the postmodern philosopher that everyone's talking about right now in the kind of right wing, intel. intellectual circles, even somewhat mainstream circles, is this guy Jean-Boultriard. There are all sorts of reasons why he's the man of the hour and people like to cite him.

Starting point is 00:03:20 Many people haven't even read his books, but he's an interesting writer if you can make it through very confusing postmodern language. But anyway, one of the reasons is he wrote this book called, I think it was the Iraq War didn't happen or the Gulf War didn't happen. That's one of his that I actually have not read. But the idea being that we now live in a hyper-reality that is in many ways, divorced from the underlying reality. So our experience of war now, be it in Venezuela or Iran, is really no different than the

Starting point is 00:03:51 experience of a video game. With that meme, there's actually a pretty deep level of meaning in how the American right sees itself and sees the world. And I think mostly correctly. Okay, next one. This is from the official ex-White House, ASMR, illegal alien deportations flight. Okay. Just the sound of chains.

Starting point is 00:04:29 I was expecting like whispers. No, just chains. Well, much, much funnier than I was expecting. What are the sounds of deportation like, Ola, Jose, you're going home. You know, that would be the basic level meme. But no, just chains banging on a metal staircase. Yo.

Starting point is 00:05:08 But by the way, some people are going to say this is gratuitous. They're going to say this is, you know, performative and it's red meat to the base, whatever. It serves a strategic purpose. Because a ton of these guys reenter. You deport them. And then under Biden, under Obama, they just reenter. They just come right back.

Starting point is 00:05:25 I mean, some of these people have been deported like five times. So if you want to actually keep them out, you need to make the process of being deported a little less comfortable, let's say. And chaining people up and then videoing them being chained up and then posting that to hundreds of millions of people on the internet in America alone. is that's one way to do it. Okay, next one. Go to hallow.com slash Knowles, K&WLAS. We are deep in Lent, walking steadily toward Holy Week, the cross, and the resurrection. This is not a season for the half-hearted. Lent is a summons to conversion.

Starting point is 00:06:00 To strip away what dulls the soul and return to God with sincerity. This time of year demands movement, prayer, fasting, and self-gift. And our sponsor, Hallow helps you do that. Do not drift through Lent, live it. First, prayer. Hallow can help you build a daily habit that makes room for God's voice. They have meditations on the passion, scripture, reflections, and sacred music, real prayer that draws you out of noise and into encounter.

Starting point is 00:06:23 Next, fasting, yes, from food, but more often from what's poisoning your interior life. Gossip, constant scrolling, cynicism, complained. Fasting is not punishment, it's clarity. It frees the heart and makes space for grace. Finally, give. Real charity always costs something. Offer patience when you'd rather be sharp. Mercy when you've been hurt.

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Starting point is 00:06:57 All right, this next one's from the official White House Instagram, captioned Justice the American Way with 64 million views. Wake up, Daddy, Sam. Welcome, home, son. Strengthen honor. Strengthen honor. What will you do without freedom? Maverick's in doubt.

Starting point is 00:07:15 Can see of what I'm capable. up finishing this fight. Yeah, I'm thinking on back. I'm here to fight for truth and justice in the American way. I am the danger. Time to find out. Maximal method.

Starting point is 00:07:36 Finish. Here it comes. I'll end this. Flawless victory. Can I say something? Can I say something? This is Reagan-esque. And it's not Reagan-esque in the sense. that Reagan was really polished and well, you know, because the 80s were more restrained than now. But this is Reagan-esque in the sense that when Reagan came in, he made people for the first time

Starting point is 00:08:05 in almost a decade feel good about being Americans, feel like America was a good place, stood for good things, that we should be strong, that it is good for us to demonstrate our strength, all of those things, that Biden downplayed, that Obama more or less outright denied, that Bush fumbled. You get that. that. And you think, well, if America's big cultural export, sorry, our big export period is our popular culture and is Hollywood and are these narratives, then why aren't we using that for our own good? I am the danger. I remember, this was 20 years ago now maybe, when Superman got rid of truth justice in the American way as his motto. And it became truth, justice, and that other stuff.

Starting point is 00:08:51 Does he still stand for truth? Justice. All that stuff. Wait, what? They were embarrassed of America. It was so just cringe. It was kind of peak, uh, American decline. And then we come out and we use it again.

Starting point is 00:09:05 We say, yeah, this is who we are, man. Pretty scary, ain't we? This is, what, a message to terrorists from the White House TikTok. You want to see me do it again? You want to see me do it again?

Starting point is 00:09:23 You want to see me do it again? Yeah. makes it work, obviously, is SpongeBob. It's not enough to just post videos of the bombs going off. It'd be fine. That's what propaganda does. And it would be refreshing because America has been so weak and loath to show our strength. But the SpongeBob, paradoxically, makes it much more menacing. Makes it much more menacing than just the bomb. It's like that scene in casino. You know, a great scene in casino where Joe Pashy's talking to the banker. And he goes, hey, I want my money. where's my money? And the banker says, oh, well, you know, ha ha, well, I want my money because

Starting point is 00:10:05 what I'm going to do is go down to the bank. And if you don't give me my money, I'm going to crack your skull in with a crowbar. And then in 20 years, when I get out of prison, you might be coming out of your coma. And you know what I'm going to do? I'll crack your skull again. Because I'm stupid. I don't care about prison. And it's a very menacing scene. It's menacing because it seems irrational and absurd. That's SpongeBob. SpongeBob is Joe Pesci. Donald Trump is Joe Pesci in Casino.

Starting point is 00:10:37 Okay. Here illegally, the deportation Express, this holiday season, believe you can go home. Okay, that's what makes it make sense. So it's all that, you know, going home again. Hey, where you going? Oh, okay. Okay, good.

Starting point is 00:10:55 You are going home. That raises it from the level of just mere provocation to an actual work of, Mimetic art. I like it. Yeah, it's funny. It's funny because it's in your face. It's a pretty easily recognizable cultural reference.

Starting point is 00:11:43 You wouldn't get it if you're, I don't know, if you're like a boomer who only watches cable news or something, you wouldn't get it. But then you wouldn't be on these social platforms anyway. But if you're on the platforms, you get this Spotify thing. And I like that it's personal. You know, what makes this work, what separates it from cringe to actually pretty effective is that they're going after specific journalists is that you guys are,

Starting point is 00:12:04 like you, John, or whatever it was. You're the liar. That's good. It's got, it's edgy. Got edge. Next one. Yeah, the penguin, penguins great. The penguin stuff was great,

Starting point is 00:12:17 especially because it triggered the libs. Aren't any penguins in the Arctic. Did you know the penguins are in the Antarctic? You think, yeah, shut up, nerd. Yeah, you would say that nerd. Nerds. Guess what? We're going to add more penguins to our memes. We can give you a swirly.

Starting point is 00:12:36 Aren't actually penguins in Greenland. Did you know that? Yeah. We know. We know. We know. We always know. We heard your feedback. You can't believe this is the real White House. M. I can't. Well, I like that they capitalized the G, even in ONG. You don't want to use the name of God in vain or, you know, even the initial. But they did lowercase M and capitalized G. I kind of appreciate that. Maybe it wasn't intentional. But in any case, okay, I can't believe the White House posted this. However, the Dems shutdown means,

Starting point is 00:13:07 most of our team is furloughed. So we have an important announcement. We're doubling down. That's great. During the shutdown, when they started posting major White House events, but it was with pictures of a thumb in front of the camera or kind of sideways and blur. It says, sorry, our photographer is furloughed. We don't, we just, all we got is our cell phones now.

Starting point is 00:13:34 It's good. They get it, man. They get it. It's also because the median age of the White House staff is like 14. You know, I mean, it's young, it's vibrant, energetic, good-looking. All right, which one of the memes do you think was the most effective? Which one is your favorite? My favorite one of these, the most effective probably are the deportation ones.

Starting point is 00:14:01 Really, all of the deportation ones? Because they check so many boxes. They do send a message to the illegal alien. don't forget, over a million illegal aliens self-deported in the first year. Even as they were being processed, they just left because they gave up because they didn't think they were going to be able to stay. So, send a message to them. Send a message to the American people.

Starting point is 00:14:20 Don't forget, Trump won the popular vote running on that issue. And it was funny, and it was light. And, you know, one way the Dems used the immigration issue, the deportation issue, even though they lose on the issue generally, they were able to try to turn it against Republicans by making the Republicans seem scary and, you know, like they were the Gestapo or, you know, something. So when you have these light kind of funny deportation memes, it undercuts even that. It was very effective. The ones of bombing the terrorists and the foreign enemies and all that kind of stuff, they were good and the most effective one was SpongeBob for all the reasons I previously

Starting point is 00:14:54 said because the absurdity is so menacing. But I, no, I give it to the deportation memes. Really, I mean, the flight away, you know, get your vacation now. Or the nastiest one, the one that really resonated with me. Chains on a metal staircase. Ain't going to be entering the country looking at that. Okay, that's it. All right, I liked them. I liked them. See you next time.

The Michael Knowles Show - Michael Reacts to the SPICIEST White House Memes

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