The Ricochet Podcast - Unlikely Alliances

Episode Date: May 7, 2015

This week, we turn our attentions across the pond and call on the endlessly entertaining and insightful James Delingpole to walk us through the intricacies of today’s elections in Great Britain as only he can. But that’s not all, we also cover the Texas shootings, the latest Presidential aspirants, Brady’s Ball-Ghazi (yes, a rare Ricochet Podcast sports topic), and if you live in Iowa or New... Source

From big brands to local heroes, Hansenburger, Supermax, Sansab, Shupa, Grilla, Bujum and Galorella. No hassle delivery direct to your door with Just Eat. Delivery and service charges apply. See JustEat.ie for details. The only way to understand the press is to remember that they pander to their readers' prejudices. Don't tell me about the press. I know exactly who reads the papers. The Daily Mirror is read by people who think they run the country. The Guardian is read by people who think they ought to run the country. The Times is read by the people who actually do run the country.

The Daily Mail is read by the wives of the people who run the country. The Financial Times is read by people who own the country. The Morning Star is read by people who think the country ought to be run by another country. The Daily Telegraph is read by people who think it is. I'm the Prime Minister. What about the people who read the Sun? Sun readers don't care who runs the country as long as she's got big tits. Hello, everyone. I'm not going to get, I don't know what's going to happen here. I don't have any information on that.

They don't understand what you're talking about. And that's going to prove to be disastrous. What it means is that the people don't want socialism. They want more conservatism. Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall. What it means is that the people don't want socialism. They want more conservatism. Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall. It's the Ricochet Podcast with Rob Long and Peter Robinson. I'm James Lileks and our guest today is James Dellingpole who's going to tell us about the UK elections.

Too Brit to quit. Let's have a podcast. Yes, welcome everybody to this, the Ricochet podcast number 258. It's brought to you by Casper Premium Mattresses. What are they? Well, they're mattresses. They're premium mattresses and they're brought to your door for a fracture of the price of you. You don't pay as much and you don't have to go to a shop. Marvelous. Casper is revolutionizing the mattress industry by cutting out the cost of dealing with resellers and showrooms and passing that savings directly on to you. And you are also probably at this very moment

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And we're also brought to you, of course, by the founders. Those who are corporeal manifestations of this thing that we call together Ricochet. Why, Ricochet is just another word for something we all do together, but not all of you pay for it. And here's Rob to guilt you again, as he does every week.

No, I'm not guilting anyone. I posted something on the site this week, and I said, we had this fantastic event last week at a National Review Institute dinner and conference, and our Reagan members came for dinner. If you're a Reagan member, that's one of the perks of being a Reagan member. But then we sort of gathered in a bar afterwards with a bunch of the NR people and hung out and drank some and toasted some and got to know each other.

And that really is the microcosm of Ricochet. It is a community. And I posted about that this week. And a very smart, very articulate member said, hey, why am I paying? I feel like an idiot. I chomp here. I listen to the podcast. I don't go to the site that much.

I don't want to post or comment. Why am I paying? And I. I chomp here. I listen to the podcast. I don't go to the site that much. I don't want to post or comment. Why am I paying? And I said, well, listen. I actually waited and all the members sort of chimed in. And one member, Cyclin, said, you know, I thought that too. And then I joined. And before I knew it, I was responding to a comment. And then I was part of the community.

So listen, I'm not going to tell you to come and join Ricochet out of guilt. If you listen to the podcast and you listen, we have great sponsors. They help keep the podcast going. I will tell you I'd like you to patronize our sponsors. That's fine. But I would also like you to come and join for 30 days for free. Use the coupon code JOIN. You get 30 free days.

And see, check it out. I know that it's not for everyone, but I'll bet you it's for a bunch of you. We have hundreds of thousands of podcast listeners. We don't have hundreds of thousands of members. We don't need 100,000 members. We would like our magic number for us is somewhere around 10,000 members. And I will stop – you will stop hearing the thin whine of desperation in my voice when I make this pitch.

The community is great. Check it out for free for 30 days and see for yourself. Go to ricochet.com slash membership. Use the coupon code JOIN and try it. It's risk-free and I guarantee a whole bunch of you will feel like you have found a civil, fun, interesting online community. Our members have meetups all over the country. They do it themselves. They set it up themselves.

We have our own meetups all over the country. We're trying to get one set up in New York soon. It's really worth it, and it's a great community. And let me say one more thing. I know I'm going too far. If you're listening to this and you are in Iowa or you are in New Hampshire or you're in any one of the early primary pages. And if you're a listener and you're not a member of Ricochet, we're going to try to get you not to join. You don't have to join, but you're a verified citizen of those states and you're really going to vote in the Republican primary. We want to give you a page. You can interact with our members and our contributors. contributors, and we want to see just what a civil and polite

grassroots online community can do to affect the political direction of this country. There. I'm done. Of course, we'd rather have you do it as a member, but if you're stingy and skinflint and you live in New Hampshire, by which I repeat myself, we still

want to try this experiment. I think it'll be a lot of fun and very very very interesting and we want you to be part of the ground floor of something we think is going to get big so end pitch end uh importuning of um iowa and new hampshire residents uh over to you Thank you. And now I'm going to speak slowly because some people just speed up the podcast until they figure the pitch is over. That's right. And we just got them. But if you did, if you did, if you did that, go back. I said some other stuff. So he had a secret word in there. Yeah, there's all kinds of stuff, really. I mean, Rob embeds something

in that pitch every week that will pay off for you down the road, and I just don't mean in the wonderful rewards that Ricochet gives. You know, last night, guys, I was watching Wolf Hall, which is this extraordinary masterpiece theater show about Cromwell and Henry VIII, and there was a moment, and the thing is so beautifully shot.

It's a master class, as the cliche says, in lighting and how to make everything look natural. For all I know, actually, they're using marvelous lens and new techniques and don't use actual trickery at all. This is the natural light. But there was one shot that was so painterly that I stopped and froze it and took a picture of it with my camera on my cell phone, which is a low-tech thing to do, because it was very familiar. And sure enough, they had recreated the setting of Cromwell's portrait by Hans Holbein, the younger. Beautifully so.

And I tweeted about this at some point in the evening, and I got angry tweets from people who are still mad about Cromwell and Thomas More and the whole business. To this day, to this day, it persists. I love that. And I understand that. I really do.

But the one thing that I didn't get, probably won't get or ever get is some nasty finger wagging about the fact that this is a graven image and that we have here a picture, a representation of a human being, which itself is offensive to some. Very offensive to some. And it was other people who would be so offensive that matters might be taken to a ballistic level. We had last week in Garland, Texas, this example of something that really laid it open clear for a lot of people, that Geller was the problem, that provocation was the problem, that actually doing something as uncivil as depicting something that another culture tells you that you can't is the problem. I've been stunned at the number of people who believe that the First Amendment here doesn't cover this because them's fighting words, don't you know? It's hate speech, don't you know? And hate speech is in the Constitution, don't you know? Let me get your take on that. We haven't heard from Peter yet.

Peter, from sunny California where things are grand. How did you view this week's events as a triumph for the constitution or a revelation of the ignorance of many? I am still stuck on two things that have already happened in this podcast. First, Rob used the word importuning, which just right there, no matter how low we sink for the rest of the podcast, that just set a tone. I think so. An elevated tone, wouldn't you say, Peter? Oh, definitely. Definitely.

Super high class. We are high class here at Ricochet. Exactly. And then I am, I mean, I know that James is a master of popular culture, but the idea that you pulled out your iPhone to take a shot of your television, I just, somehow, James, that seems too self-referential or too – who's the artist who writes Ceci Ce n'est pas un peep? Do you know what I'm –

Yeah, I know exactly what you mean. But there's no other way for me to immediately capture that thing because I don't yet have the technology to pipe what's on my DVR into my home system and get – for image capture. Okay. So as between – I know this is – you didn't, you just glossed over this one, but I would just like to stick up for the people who are ticked off about the portrayal of Thomas Moore or to me and my co-religion is St. Thomas Moore.

It's really shameful. It really is shameful what they do to Thomas Moore in this. It's a historical, it's wrong. What's your important issues? we have to fight these issues out right now so you've seen wolf hall then i've seen bits of it yes oh and i agree the use of natural lighting or whatever whatever they're doing to make it feel as though you're watching a scene by candlelight or you're watching a scene by the light of a two or three candles

in the fireplace that's quite amazing. Wait a minute. Ryland's performance is a little bit slow for me. Oh, I love it. It's the Thomas More staring impassively at things in People Show. But you're telling me that you've only seen bits of it, but you believe that its characterization of More is incorrect. Oh, no. I've watched, what, I think two whole episodes.

So what are there? There have been four, three, four? Four or five. Probably about half of it, I suppose. And then I've dipped, what, I think two whole episodes. So what are there? There have been four, three, four? Four or five. Probably about half of it, I suppose. And then I've dipped in a couple of times. I see. Okay. Well, again, we're going to have a civil conversation about this, which we're capable of doing.

Oh, yeah? Let's go back to the imagery then. Let's clear things up 500 years ago. First, let's wake me up a little bit. Let me see. I just nodded off a bit for the past five minutes as we talked about a pbs show but yeah okay now i'm awake go ahead says mr television go on oh exactly shall we importune you rob to i am importune i could i importune you to talk about the uh the gun attack in uh in garland texas yes the gun attack in garland texas uh yeah no i'm on james's side on that one the idea that

george uh the uh at your alma mater rob there's a some kids founded something called the william f buckley junior society society of conservatives at yale and they had a wonderful dinner about two weeks ago called the Disinvitation Dinner at which they invited people who had been disinvited as commencement speakers at various colleges last year. Yes, funny idea. Good idea. Very good idea. Wonderful idea. Smart kids. Good for them for doing it. George Will gave what I think was really quite a brilliant address even by George Will's standards, making the point that in days past in the history of this republic, when free speech corpus during the Civil War by Abraham Lincoln.

These attacks on civil liberties were for specific reasons and time-limited, so to speak, so that when the conflict ended or the controversy died down, the civil liberties were expanded again. And George Will made the point that for the first time in American history, the left is now arguing against the very idea of free speech. They are arguing against the First Amendment in principle that you do not have the right to engage in whole categories of expression and that what took place at the museum in Garland, Texas, that Mohammed cartoon competition fell within that category of what should be, what rightfully is proscribed speech.

What we have here is a direct attack, not oblique, not mealy-mouthed, but a direct attack in principle on the First Amendment. Outrageous. I agree. What I find so strange is the vocabulary is at least at root the same as the left, progressive left used – not even progressive left. I would just say the establishment left has used at every moment before we should say September 11, 2001, which, which is – they protect – they would – more in sadness than in anger, they would say, well, as much as I loathe the speaker, as much as I loathe the message, I will – I have to support it. I have to support Nazis marching down Skokie. I have to support you piss Christ.

I have to support all this. And what they would say is they would say well you know there is a value to provocative speech and when someone said something that upset religious traditional religious uh americans or or social conservatives or conservatives any stripe they would say well yeah but you know there's a value in a republic and having uh in our encouraging even provocative speech and now after garland suddenly it's well that speech is provoking that's provoking provoking is bad provocative is good it just shows you the absolute bedrock hypocrisy the inability the inability to

frame a coherent world view on the part of people who really only have results in mind, which is I want to win and I want you to lose. And if that's – if those are your only principles, then of course the First Amendment is – should go. So should the Second Amendment and all the amendments, right? They're all just simply fungible tools to get what I want or to use as a brick bat against you. So it is worrisome.

But thank God I think the American people kind of know that. Bedrock hypocrisy. What a beautiful phrase. You've done it again twice and we're still not quite halfway through. I importune you to use that. By the way, if you want to read a classic, maybe I'll dig this up and post it on Ricochet. But Mr. Justice Scalia, this is in the flag-burning case of, oh, Lord, it must be at least a decade ago now, a decade, 15 years ago. Everybody expected Scalia to uphold the law against burning American flags.

And Scalia was right there voting against it on First Amendment grounds. The only reason anyone could possibly burn an American flag, it doesn't throw off much heat. It's not for warmth. The only reason you could do it is to make a statement. Therefore, it is speech. Therefore, it is protected by the Constitution of the United States. And notice the snickering and the insulting rhetoric from the left when right-wing politicians, conservative politicians, in my view, simply pandering, nonsensically pandering

about the flag burning amendment, all that stuff. Notice how all those people suddenly have decided that although you were a cretinous fool or a cynical pandering politician back when you were in favor of a flag burning amendment, now they've suddenly switched. And now, well, we can't have people drawing pictures of the prophet. We can't have that. It's remarkable the level of hypocrisy. Yes.

But speak of hypocrisy. Well, we can't – bedrock hypocrisy. Leave the segues to James. James, show us what you can do. No. I'm sorry. I'm just – my microphone sounds a little hot here, which is perhaps appropriate because the issue steams me up a great deal. It's your hot, James.

The microphone is just reacting to your hotness. It's not only the people on the left who are very easy to carve out a little space for hate speech, a little space which, of course, will grow and grow and grow over time until hate speech is simply dissent, hate speech is simply arguing with them. There's also the factor from the other side that people like Hillary Clinton want to diminish the First Amendment when it comes to the ability for people to band together and spend money to influence politics. It's just an indication that the most bedrock example of what makes our institutions

and our country different from, say, Britain, to talk about one of our guests who's coming up here, is the First Amendment. And these people are willing to dilute it. And the ones who have the good motives believe that just a little dilution is all that's necessary and none will come after that. This is the beginning of the end of the bedrock notion of free speech as an unalloyed American right. And it's stunning to watch it happen before my eyes. Unless, of course, I'm just over-exaggerating this. But if we can't draw this,

then eventually we give space to the people who are saying you can't draw anything because it's not in the Quran, but in the Hadith you are not to represent the human figure. Ergo, our art becomes nothing but spirographs and calligraphy. And that's not something I want to go down I mean it's one of the things that not you know it's not just the first amendment that characterizes the United

States as an epitome and summation of the values of Western civilization it's what our museums are full of and I have the feeling that all these people would gladly see half of it fed to the pyre if it meant that we were to have a more inclusive and welcoming space amen bro so I can't take any of that.

So anyway, here come the trigger words, James. Yeah. I didn't hear the early part of the debate, but I so totally agree with you. The point about free speech is it's not the easy stuff that needs defending. It's the hard stuff. Well, before we should introduce James Dellingpole, we should introduce James Dellingpole.

That was not Peter Robinson just speaking in a plummy English accent. That's an actual plummy Englishman. How are you all? We are just fine. Some of us are a little bit more spun up than others, but then again, I've had 17 cups of coffee. James, how is the horse? Oh, listen, there are so many horses. I am just totally in love with horses. I'm like a little, I'm like a 14 year old girl. I've fallen in love with a pony. I, what, three years ago, three and a half, four years ago, and you started fox hunting two years ago? This is your second year at it? No, no.

I've actually been fox hunting on and off for at least 10 years, but just very sporadically because you can't a it's it's heinously expensive and b um when you live in the city it's quite hard to get out to go fox hunting but now i'm here surround i can ride regularly so i can get riding fit which is one of the keys for for going hunting okay so so so here is here is i i'm sure that the blogosphere over in britain james uh james writes for the no you, you can't. I have to hear about this. But before you do, can we just make sure – because James – I should say Delingpole came on before Lilacs could introduce him properly. Oh!

If you're listening to this podcast, you kind of – all of a sudden we have a guy from Wolf Hall on. Okay, sorry. I will fall silent. Sorry. For those of you who don't recognize the dulcet tones of James Delingpole and for those of you who are not anticipating a series of trigger words to send you into some kind of anxiety and shock where you have to go to a safe room with crayons and cushions, James Dellingpole is a libertarian conservative who writes brilliant books and brilliant articles and is really great on TV and he wrote these words. He's also great on the internet. You should follow him on Twitter, at James Dellingpole. We'll put that link in the show notes.

And he is a fantastic writer. And I would actually describe you, James Dellingpole, as fearless. Is that fair? Well, I don't want to have my head chopped off by ISIS, for example. So you're a coward. I don't want to get eaten by a great white shark,

and that's been happening to people in the last week as well. So there are some things I don't want. Okay. But any man who's willing to be public about his love for fox hunting at this late stage in the decline of British high Toryism is in some sense fearless. So, James, of course, you write for the London Spectator and the argument would be that James Dellingpole,

poor chap, he used to be such an interesting, sprightly figure, but now he's turning into one more hidebound, self-parodic Tory. He's moved to the country, he's taken up fox hunting. Good Lord, why take him seriously any longer? I think, look, the people who are not going to take me seriously have long since given up taking me seriously. I mean, this goes back a long way. For example, when I took the position I did on climate change, a lot of people said, well, James Dunning-Pole has joined the ranks of

the Froot Loops. We have nothing more to say to him. So I've taken great personal risks with... Yeah, I have. Do you know what? I want to retract my point about ISIS and sharks and stuff. I am probably the bravest man alive, certainly career-wise. I am totally...

By the way, don't forget to give a plug to Breitbart London, which is the place where I write a lot as well. And I'm the executive editor, and I'm trying to save the world single-handedly from that perspective as well. Yeah, I'm fighting a lot of wars on various fronts. You are, you are. But you're also regular with the London Spectator now, aren't you?

Oh, no, I've been doing that for years yeah okay all right all right so both of those are accessible to any american with a computer breitbart london and the london spectator so james the election is taking place this very day let me give you a pricey of what we're reading about it in the united states first of all we're not reading that much to be perfectly honest it looks as though britain doesn't matter to American journalists that much anymore. Is somebody playing an Atari game in the background? I just wanted that. I'm trying to get rid of my

stupid phone. Somebody's ringing me on the phone. This phone has featured many times on Ricochet podcasts. It's not a phone. I appreciate you translating, but isn't it a mobile, as they say over there across the pond? No, no. This is the landline. I don't actually get any mobile reception in the country. It's a proper phone.

It's a proper phone. It's cool. Well, let it ring for the kids. The kids should – we should tell all you kids that's what that was. That would be a plastic thing. It would sit on a desk and it would make noise every now and then. I can't wait to hear the clacking of a morse lamp later in the show as you communicate to your fellow – Don't go away.

All right. So the election. So the election. What we're hearing is that British politics have become unmoored, that for centuries now it's been essentially a two-party class-based system. Tories represent middle and upper class. Labor Party represents working class. And as recently as the 80s, those two parties between them would take up to 85, 90 percent of the vote. Now things are falling apart.

Neither the Tories nor Labour is expected to get much more than 30 percent. The Scottish National Party is expected to wipe out Labour in Scotland, eliminating some 40 seats, Labour seats from parliament and reigniting the drive for independence. And then there are these Fruit Loops – you use the term Fruit Loop parties such as UKIP, the United Kingdom Independence Party, which is going to siphon votes from the Tories and the Green Party and I think one or two others which may siphon from Labour. That's what we're hearing. Can I correct you, sir? Sorry? Go ahead.

Yes, please do. No, no. That's why I'm setting it up so you can knock it down. Yeah, yeah. I think your analysis is near perfect. But I would not call UKIP a Froot Loop party. No, no. Yes, yes. Go ahead.

And it's interesting, actually, that you sort of presented the left-wing caricature of my position on fox hunting and so on. And I think that the idea that UKIP are Froot Loops is again, a sort of, not just a left wing caricature, but also a conservative caricature, which suits their purposes. The basic problem is this, that the Conservative Party has been taken over by what you would call rhino squishes. David Cameron is not a conservative. He's certainly not a conservative in the traditions of Margaret Thatcher. And I think that UKIP represent the Thatcherite tradition more closely than any other party. And I think that the fact that if you look at the opinion polls, you will find that the parties of the right, i.e. loosely the UKIP and the Conservatives, command a greater than 50% of the electorate. So in other words, the right,

Britain is in its heart and its brain at the moment, it is on the right. And yet, we are likely to wake up tomorrow to find ourselves being governed by a bastard coalition of these, I would call them borderline fascist or possibly even fascist Scottish National Party up north. Fascist? Where does that come from? No, I mean, even, even, even to revive a sense of national identity james and wear their little skirts and you are playing the devil's advocate there i know you are yes yes yes you are you are way too well informed about the snp not to realize that they are very aggressively nationalistic i would say that their attitude to english to, if one cares about such words, that they are racist.

They are the most left wing party in Britain at the moment, although they're getting stiff competition from the Greens and from and from Labour, which is far more left wing than it was under Tony Blair. So in other words, Britain is in severe danger of being governed by a coalition of three uh very left-wing parties um and i'm seriously considering moving towards a to a more stable economy like maybe ukraine or um venezuela um maybe democratic republic of congo something like that because james if i make by the way if robert james lilacs wants to jump in actually just just just so I get a little bit of the tick tock here. The elections today. It looks like no one's going to get a majority. Right.

Not even. So what are the likely or unlikely alliances now? So you're saying SNP and whom? Who else? Okay, so we've got, in the current polls, we've got the Conservatives and Labour, the two main parties, both polling about 35%. And so you can see that that is not a working majority. So I think the slight likelihood is that the Labour will end up in coalition with the Scottish National Party in the north, perhaps with aatives, they have said that they will be the party of unity, the party of stability. So they will – they're basically whores. They're basically saying, look, nobody likes us, but we will whore ourselves for whatever party happens to be in power. Hey, it's a proven model.

We've never been in power before or not in sort of 60 or 70 years. The liberals have been, we have been the nothing party for years. And we rather like the fact that the conservatives have favored us with certain places in the cabinet. And therefore, we don't want that to go away. So that's quite likely what to happen. If not conservatives, it depends on how many seats UKIP win. They're not down to win too many seats. I mean, some polls on how many seats UKIP win. They're not down to win too many seats. I mean some polls say they're likely to win no more than one seat, which would be shocking. Can I break in there, James? Yes.

Is there – because there often is here in the United States a hesitancy from the voter to tell the unnamed anonymous pollster who's called him on the phone or the person sitting in front of the shop who's saying, please sign this – please answer this poll the truth if they are supporting a, quote, controversial, end quote, party or candidate. So what do you think the – is there a differential between the people who are actually going to cast a vote for UKIP or are those polls – Yes, I think so. So what do you think the is there a differential between the people who are actually going to cast a vote for ukip or um are those polls so what what do you think 10 more this is this is my this is my personal view and i don't know whether you're going to hear it from anybody else but i think what this make this makes this election the only thing that makes this election interesting because

it has been a very very boring boring election with no parties really speaking truth to power except for UKIP, actually. What I think might possibly happen is this, that UKIP may win more seats than the polls or indeed the bookies, the bookmakers have been predicting. And the reason I think this is because UKIP have been the victims of the most toxic smear job from the political establishment I have ever seen in a lifetime of following politics. It is quite extraordinary. To listen to the BBC, to listen to the Daily Telegraph, which used to be a conservative newspaper, to listen to the Conservative Party, listen to Labour, you would think that voting UKIP was, to listen to the Conservative Party, to listen to Labour,

you would think that voting UKIP was akin to voting for the Nazi Party. And why is that? Is it just because of the leader of UKIP, Nigel Farage, and UKIP in general, is it because of their anti-immigration stance? Is that really it? If you look at UKIP's manifesto, you keep asking yourself yourself what is not to like here it's very very measured reasonable they're not against all immigration they just want to kind of an australian style point system where where you don't get um unskilled labor coming in and essentially leeching off the benefit system you want skilled labor. Other countries practice this, yet when Farage argues for it, he's sort of dismissed as a kind of xenophobe.

So there... But now, just because you compared him, you said that UKIP is the most Thatcherite of all parties. But do you think Margaret Thatcher, were she alive today, do you think that she would be she would have that position on immigration in

Britain? And the only reason I ask is because I remember years ago there was a great movie called My Beautiful Laundrette in 1982 I think or 1984 it came out. And it kind of illustrated the class and immigration status conflicts in Britain. The young toughs who were probably laborites were against immigration and the Thatcherites were all Pakistani entrepreneurs. you know Sikhs or actually even I think some of the sort of Eastern Europeans who've been living here a few years Jamaicans whatever

they all say the same thing they want something to be done about the immigration problem everyone feels threatened by it they all feel that we're a crowded island since that film you cite was made, probably the British population has increased by about 10 million

from about 55 million to 65 million, something like that. So it's increased significantly. It's put tremendous strain on the transport infrastructure, on the healthcare system, on schools and so on. So everyone agrees that something must be done. It's the kind of liberals of the BBC who want to make discussing immigration a dirty word. When you have your overclass devoted to a multicultural project

where the stated intention is actually to dilute the Britishness of the place in order to gain power, gain favor, gain the wonderful European ideal of nations being dissolved into this wonderful hand-holding kumbaya, happy, clappy world. Sure, there's going to be pushback from the echelons, from the top, from all of those voices and mouthpieces of the overclass. And then, of course, as you have – as you've been noting about the Conservative Party, from here, the way they have backed away from essential pride of Britishness. I mean you're a fox hunter. The only way that you could possibly now even hope to seek to defend that would be to say well the meat is locally sourced because that would give it a newer perspective and i'm waiting

for the moment when actually when guy fox day is the bonfires are banned and replaced with led bonfires and that people stand there and toast foam marshmallows over so that no carbon is emitted from it you know nice foam, firm marshmallows. But when it comes to the kind of foam that they would want to use, I would recommend that they examine the composition of a Casper's mattress because there is something magical in what they have achieved in this thing

that makes it, well, you almost hate to get out of bed. And I know that's probably not something you want to say. You're going to be late for work. You're going to be late for your appointments. Your kids are not going to, well, you know what? If you are late for work because you've slept so soundly on a Casper a couple of these times, it's going to be worth it. Let me tell you a little bit about Casper before we get back to James. They are, as you probably know by now, an online retailer of premium mattresses for a

fraction of the price, just a, just a tidy little fraction. Why? Because they don't have to pay that guy who stands outside the shop, spinning an arrow around. They don't have to pay for the shop. They don't have to pay for the guy who puts you down in the bed and gives you the hard sell. No. What they've done is they've eliminated the middleman, figuratively, of course, and they've passed the savings on to you. Everyone says that. They really do it. They're revolutionizing the mattress industry by sending it to you, mailing it to you, a mattress, imagine. What it does is provides resilience and long-lasting supportive comfort. And I speak personally as somebody who every day lays my corpus down on one of these things with a sigh of delight. It's one of a kind. It's a hybrid mattress that provides

premium latex foam with memory foam. Now, mattresses, you know, can often cost over, you know, $1,500, but Casper's are a fraction. $500 for a twin-size mattress, $6 for a twin XL, $750 for a full-size, $850 for a queen, and $950 for the king. That's what I'm on. It's good to be king. Casper understands that buying a mattress online can have you a little wondering about whether or not it's possible. What are you going to do with the thing if you don't like it? Well, here's the deal. It's risk-free.

Free delivery and returns. Free returns with a 100-day period. You sleep on the thing for 100 nights, and if at the end of it you say, nah, then you send it back at no cost to you. It's that simple. Now, statistically, they say that lying on a showroom bed for, you know, four seconds has got really no correlation as to whether or not it's the right bed for you, and that's why Casper turned that old brine process into a risk-free experience. They understand the importance of trying it out, so you spend a third of your life on something. Why spend just three minutes testing it? So obsessively engineered mattress at a shockingly fair price, just the right sink, just the right bounce and

two technologies, the latex foam and the memory foam that come together for better nights and brighter days. Risk-free trial, as I noted, in return policy, shipping free, a hundred days, made in America. I can say no more except go to casper.com and enter the coupon code RICSHAY. You'll get $50 off any mattress purchase. And do so to thank them for sponsoring this, the Ricochet podcast, and to reward yourself for all the time you spend on your feet. When you get off them, it ought to be a delight. And that's what Casper provides. Now, then, James, we were saying about the election. All I've been hearing about it, interestingly enough, has been BBC reports from PJ O'Rourke. Are you aware that PJ O'Rourke has been opining at length on your elections on your radio?

Are you boycotting the beep? Had I known that the great PJ was opining on the BBC, I would have listened. But he's very much the exception to the rule. The BBC swings very left. Indeed, I was actually contemplating writing a piece on this very subject today on how BBC Radio 4 lost the election, i.e. for people like us. Because one of the things I'm going to do when I become dictator of this company, and I will generally be a benign dictator. Obviously, I will make fox hunting compulsory and stuff like that. But one of the things I would definitely do is abolish the BBC. I think so much of what is wrong with Britain can be traced to the prevailing cultural hegemony, which has been created by the BBC. For example, on any BBC news programme,

the BBC's default position will be, why isn't the government doing more to deal with this problem or that problem? The question is never, why isn't the government butting out of this issue and leaving us all alone? It's always, always the assumption is the government is there to do more.

It's NPR and then some. Oh, totally. And you should go to Australia, by the way. Australia is even worse. I mean, BBC is bad. Oh, goodness me. Australian Broadcasting Corporation. You have no idea.

It has to be heard or seem to be believed. Hey, James, may I take you back briefly? Peter here once again. Hey, Peter. To the question of James Cameron, the current prime minister. David Cameron. David Cameron. Not the terminator guy excuse me i'm i never had that firm of purchase on him in the first place but i'm already training myself to forget uh so james i think you may have wronged him and to play the devil's advocate advocate here i need only refer to the editorial that appeared

yesterday, I believe it was, in the Wall Street Journal on the British election. And it went through the Tories' record. And on all matters not social, that is to say fiscal policy, the Tories have done a remarkably good job. They've really been quite Thatcherite. The government spending as a proportion of GDP has shrunk under the Tories they've permitted schools greater freedom so that there are some experiments not charter school style experiments to give the American analog they've done they played the Thatcher game in every way except talking it and you're being too hard on them for that aren't you i can see look there is a certain desperation at the moment um which is that everyone is

terrified that we are going to end up with a with a kind of um all armed style you know what what monsieur holland has done in france um I turned it into a left wing basket case. So this could happen to Britain any second now if Miliband gets in, gets in. I did a, I did a sort of rant about this, about why I totally hate the Conservatives. Let me just read you this one little bit, which is on the economic issue you speak of. I said, they haven't even been good at the one thing they're supposed to have been good at, the economy. Sure, it has grown, but then so do fingernails on a corpse. The real problem is that none of the underlying problems of the 2008 crash have been addressed but because the

conservatives haven't had the moral courage the ideological rigor or indeed the inclination to admit what the real problem is free markets have been killed by an unholy alliance of crony capitalism a too big to fail financial sector and a lawyer parasite tyranny of compliance qe quantitative easing far from making money more available to the small businesses which really needed has simply served to empower the bloated city and concentrate still more money in the hands of the asset owning classes this has created the disparity of wealth which has fueled the hard left rhetoric of everyone from the snp and ed milliband to to russell brand and who can blame

the new reds for seizing the opportunity when cameron has created such an open goal for him cameron is incapable of defending capitalism because the bastard variation he has helped engender is indeed indefensible so that's my line cameron is a crony capitalist. He does not so much devil's advocate. I actually do think there may be something in this argument. But the point here is to try to cheer you up on what otherwise may be a gloomy day for you as the returns begin to come in in an hour or so in Britain. And here's the argument. All right, look. Everybody in England fought a good fight on the independence referendum in Scotland and it went down.

You did what you could. And I'm not talking about just David Cameron, but every English politician on either side, Miliband, Gordon Brown, actually, as far as I can tell, distinguished himself for the only time in his career arguing for union in Scotland to his fellow Scots. Do I have that name right? Former Labour Prime Minister, it's Gordon Brown, isn't it? Yeah, Gordon Brown, that's right. Okay, right. So everybody's tried and the Scots simply haven't listened. They're about to elect the Scottish National Party. They're going to wipe out Labour. And at that point, the idea that Scots nationalists should hold 40 or more seats in the British Parliament and get to

vote on laws that bind Englishmen as well as Scots becomes untenable. And the slow motion process, it will be slow, it'll be years, it won't be decades, but it'll be some years. But in one way or another, Westminster will be unwound and England will be free to be England and bugger the Scots. And what that means is, where does Nigel Farage poll best? In the home counties, as I understand it, English will be free to be English. They'll be free to embrace Thatcherism. It has the chance to become, well, this isn't quite right, but you'll take my point, the Hong Kong or the Singapore of Europe. Cut taxes, free the schools, let England, it won't happen with Britain. The Scots have been a dead weight, but you'll be free of the dead weight in a matter of years, James. Just you wait. Things are going to get better. I love your analysis, Pollyanna. And I wish I could share it. I think the only part where I do agree with you is that there will be the most epic schadenfreude

as we allow the Scots to cast themselves loose from the rest of Britain in their leaky boat. We can watch their boat slowly sinking. Because after all, the Scottish economy is built on welfare and subsidies from what they call the Westminster government. I say, good luck with your economy once you leave us. And I hope to God they do not get to get to keep sterling because if they do they will abuse sterling in the same way that the greeks abuse the euro and that and that is indeed worrying and i worry that maybe they'll cut a deal where they do get to keep the pound and then we'll be in trouble but the rest of it yeah maybe when england is is independent of scotland uh there will be a sort of realignment of politics and maybe we will get something sound.

But look, I'm 50 this year. Are you really? I haven't got that much longer. Yeah, I am. I haven't got much longer on this planet. I don't want five more years of misery and despair. And actually, this was all avoidable had Cameron been less of a squish,

had he campaigned on genuinely a conservative message in the last election, which he failed to do. So we are where we are, and it's not a happy place to be. Rob, I tried to cheer things up. Over to you. So can we just, I mean, I need to, I tried to cheer things up. Over to you. So can we just – I mean I need to – I mean I wanted – I guess what I'm asking is for a cheat sheet for the returns when they come in.

What could happen tomorrow that would make you jump out of your seat in surprise and joy? And what could happen tomorrow that would make you think to yourself well it's all over uh may as well just kind of you know run a warm bath and uh you know call it quits what what where where what should we uh three thousand miles away ten thousand miles away be looking for uh well i think that the the best thing that could happen tomorrow is that the most important thing is for Nigel Farage to win his seat south of Thanet, which is very, very closely contended. The guy has fought such a good campaign against such vicious opposition. He deserves a place in Westminster, adding to the gaiety of nations, holding the Vichy Tories, i.e. the Conservative Party, to account. That's number one. It would be nice if you could run a few more seats.

That would be good, too. I think the worst thing that could happen, well, actually, in a way, another almost good thing that could happen is if Labour win and decide to try it out as a minority government. This is my best case scenario. This is my fantasy. So Labour wins a small majority. They try it out as a minority government. The markets do not like it one bit. The British economy tanks. It's just chaos breaks out. And there has to be

another general election in, say, December, at which point the Conservatives have ditched David Cameron, who is a squish, appointed somebody like Boris Johnson, who was probably the only really popular Conservative, the current mayor of London, appointed them as their leader. And the conservatives can go to the next election sort of leading a conservative UKIP coalition. Because after all, that's where the majority of the electorate is. They are on the right. It's what they want and it's what we deserve. And then I think that Britain could become great again. And any other option is going to be disastrous from one way or another.

But that's not bad, and that strikes me as quite likely. But one question, you approve of Boris, do you? Boris is a pretty good egg. He's certainly preferable to David Cameron, yes. I mean, he's a politician, which for me rules almost anyone out of contention. It's why I hate politics actually. It's full of politicians.

It's full of politicians and that's the problem. And also I believe that politics is essentially a left-wing process because ultimately government is a left-wing thing. Once you become a politician, you start believing in government. Once you start believing in government, you start drifting leftward. It's the way of things. Before we let you go a politician, you start believing in government. Once you start believing in government, you start drifting leftward. It's the way of things. Before we let you go, James, am I correct in understanding that you are actually enshrined somewhere in statuary form, constantly drenched in oil? Yes, indeed.

I did win a major art competition. Well, actually a minor art competition. I won the sustainability prize. I was only one major art competition. Well, actually a minor art competition. I won the sustainability prize. I was only one of several winners. I won it in the same way that Michael Mann won the Nobel Prize when it was given to the Intergovernmental on Panel on Climate Change. But yes, I won. I appear, my name appears on this slab,

along with the names of several other British so-called climate deniers, and they include the former Chancellor of the Exchequer, Lord Lawson, so I'm in good company. And some kid created this artwork to show how evil deniers were, and he symbolized this by having oil dripping down the face of this sculpture to symbolize, I suppose, something meaningful to do with pollution and future generations and not caring and not worrying about polar bears and stuff. So, yeah, I have been celebrated, immortalized in art. Well, we thank you for coming. Look on my works, you might despair. Well, enjoy your enshrinement. And we all know that you're a climate denier.

And so when they actually prove that there is a climate, you're going to be in trouble. But we look forward to hearing that on your next podcast, which, of course, people can hear in Ricochet. James Delling Ball, enjoy the rest of the election day, and we'll talk to you down the road. Good luck, James. Bye-bye. I'm curious always to find out. You know, the etymology of names is interesting. I don't think my name is a village somewhere. I just wonder if there's some old British tradition of the Delling Pole, if it's something

that on May people festoon with ribbons and dance around or something like that, or if it's actually some old British word for a barber pole, you know, which as a child, those things fascinated me, the way it revolved around and seemingly put those little ribbons up into the ether and disappeared. And yet they came and were renewed from below. It's almost like a sort of a yin-yang snake eating its tail symbol of eternity, that little barber pole. But those are the days, of course, when people went downtown and paid money for somebody to shave their face. And we don't do that anymore. We do it at home.

It's not always a good experience, is it? Even if you get a good blade, sometimes you're thinking, what did I pay for this? What did I pay for this? Well, if you want a good shave and a good price, of course, that's where you know where this is going. That's where Harry's comes in. You've heard about Harry's. Unless this, of course, is your first Ricochet podcast, which I hope you like it, this is completely typical. And if you don't, boy, we're off this week.

In any case, Harry's has been with us for a long time, and there's a reason for it. We're proud to have them, and it works. It's good. So if you're wondering, how does Harry's.com deliver a superior shave? It's very easy. They bought a blade factory in Germany, which turns out fine, high-quality blades. They own it, so they're not worried about the supply. They cut out the middleman.

It seems to be a thing in the old disrupting internet, doesn't it? So they can offer an amazing shave in a fraction of drugstore prices. And they ship them right to your house at a factory direct price. Now, the starter kit's $15. That includes the razor, three blades, and your choice of Harry's shave cream or foaming gel. And as an added bonus, you can get $5 off your first purchase with the code RICOSHET. And after using it, you get an entire month's worth of shaving for just $10. And of course, that's assuming that you shave normally if you are absolutely covered in gorilla-like hair. It might only last you three

weeks. Shipping's free, which is so nice that you don't have to run down to the store because the blade that you're using is like something that Winston Smith used in 1984. So if you go to harryscoot.com now, Harry's will give you that $5 off if you type in the code RICOSHET with your purchase. That's H-A-R-R-Y-S.com, coupon code RICOSHET. Five bucks off. Start shaving smarter today. Yes.

Here's why I did not interrupt that segue, besides the fact that I was just taking a few notes. I wanted to add this. On last Thursday night when we did our live GLOP podcast segue besides the fact that I was just taking a few notes. I wanted to add this on last Thursday night when we did our live Glop podcast with John Podoritz and Jonah Goldberg. I, James, live, like

live radio, did the spots. And when I did a Casper's mattress spot, I mean, there was like one person applauded, but I think Casper mattress is kind of new. But the Harry Shave spot, people applauded. People in the audience were Harry Shave customers. And there were a bunch of Ricochet people in the audience too.

So, you know, I don't know why I'm saying that. But the people like these products. That's all I'm going to say. Anyway. Well, it's that wonderful intersection of commerce and ideas that Ricochet embodies, right? And also meetups, people getting together, whether or not they're giving each other the signal, the secret handshake in a cab ride, as we read on Ricochet last week. Yeah, wasn't that wild?

Extraordinary. The guy's Uber driver. If you're not a member of Ricochet, you're not reading Ricochet, you really should. A guy was in an Uber, and the Uber driver, they started talking about the world, and the Uber driver said, hey, have you ever heard of this site called Ricochet? They're both Ricochet members, so. Oh. Yeah, isn't that amazing?

How do I get that Uber driver? Yeah, that'll come. That'll come. Well, gentlemen, speaking of Ricochet, on the member feed this week, there have been some interesting conversations, as always, and one of them was from Western Chauvinist, who was talking about presidential disqualifiers. What knocks somebody out of the ring for you?

And it was interesting. Polled, Democrats said that the highest negatives were a leader of the tea party movement which of course is our ukip no previous elected experience as opposed to the the wonderfully storied and experienced president we have today uh no college degree because that signifies apparently that you're not a member of the proper credentialed class what can you know if you didn't go to four years, sit in a class, take notes, pass your geography test, and come up with a thesis paper on why Great Gatsby is inherently racist? And finally, if you're an evangelical Christian, say no more. Among Republicans, the highest negatives are no previous elected experience. Interesting again. Sorry, Ben Carson. A person who's gay or a lesbian which is really good

for the party's image in the future going forward no college degree also as well which indicates as with so many things that the right has bought into the terms of the left, they buy the terms of the language, they buy the terms of the credentials and thus does the culture inexorably drift and finally

they don't like the fact that somebody might be a first term wrestler I'm sorry, did I say wrestler? I meant senator they're probably Finally, they don't like the fact that somebody might be a first-term wrestler. I'm sorry. Did I say wrestler? I meant senator. They're probably very happy if somebody is a professional wrestler because it indicates a deal of competent theatricality. So we seem to be in agreement then, right and left, that no first-term senators, you need a lot of experience, better have a college degree.

Scott Walker, beware. After all, Scott Walker, he didn't finish college. He's got to be an idiot, doesn't he? No college degree thing throws me. that for both these parties that completely contradicts these terms. I mean people – I don't think that Marco Rubio is by any means out because he's a first-term senator. I think that's going to be litigated throughout the primary but I can't imagine Republican primary voters are going to hold it against him if they like his message and they like his energy and they like his ideas. I suspect that among Democrats, highestakes are a leader of tea party

movement is true but i think that's a tough time logically so uh... and i i i i think that you did you a christian is not i think that is not a disqualify for for for for democrats really i think you know i was right yet jimmy carter sure you know it's it's i it's in this season people want to kind of frankenstein monster their perfect candidate. But the perfect candidate is the one who's really in front of you and is really sort of touching you in a lot of ways.

Like I would say I would give no odds that Mike Huckabee is going to be the president of the United States or no odds that Mike Huckabee is going to last past a couple of primaries. But he gave a very good speech, I thought, in joining the race. I really – I thought it was useful. I disagree with him on a lot of policy. But I think he made a good case for himself. Same thing I think – Ben Carson is going to make a good case for himself. Ben Carson, we know him. He's been on the podcast several times.

He's a very articulate guy. I don't think he's got a hope in hell. But I'm – I wouldn't write him off. I don't think he's got a hope in hell. But I wouldn't write him off. I think he'd be useful on the dais there. I like the idea of a Frankenstein candidate. I really do. I like the idea of a Frankenstein president because at least you know where you stand with a guy. Sir, how

do you feel about fire? Fire! I mean, you have a directness of purpose and conviction there. You know where you stand with Frankenstein's monster. Can you imagine Frankenstein's monster sitting down across from the Iranians? It would be pretty good. Well, I'd like that.

Yes, yes. Peter, you were saying? No, I don't. I'm not catching the connection between Ben Carson and Frankenstein's monster. Well, it has to do with Thomas Cromwell, don't you? Well, he's a neurologist. He's a brain surgeon. That's right.

If there's anybody who could have put the, the old, uh, he's, he's, he's, oh, he is a brain surgeon.

That's right. Okay. Okay. All right. All right. Carly Fiorina. I have to say, I don't think she has any more chance than Ben Carson or Mike Huckabee,

but boy, is she producing good, tough, polished, impressive interviews. Yeah, she's going to be your veep. She's going to be your veep. Well, she is running for that position almost self-consciously. The guy on the second part of the ticket is the attack dog traditionally.

And that's what she's doing. She is attacking the frontrunner on the other side and she's doing so with incredibly passionate articulate but devastating when we had her here on ricochet and one of us asked listen mitt romney was a businessman your background is business how are you going to be different and she said this is almost a direct quotation she said mitt pulled his punches. I'll fight. Yeah. Yeah. And she meant it. She really meant it. And she does. I heard her yesterday on Michael Medved's show where somebody asked her, you know, you're going to get it with the outsourcing question. How do you respond to that? And she had a twofold response. She said, one, most of the jobs that we outsourced went from California to Texas, which is which is sign them all.

And the second was she says, yes, we have jobs in China and they are serving the Chinese market. So there you go. No, she was – and it wasn't something that – I never get the sense to her that she is trotting out something that has been manicured and shaped on the lay of focus groups. I mean there's a directness and an authenticity there that people like, and that's why I think Perry Fiorina was going to be the ticket for 2016. But of course people scoff at him. I'm in favor of a lounge singer. Hey, by the way, boys. Perry Fiorina.

By the way, boys, lest you write off Rick Perry too quickly and too easily. I'm not. I think you're both a little tempted to do it. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. I have been saying Perry is going to be the contender for a long time. The contender or a contender? The contender because I – what do I know? I could be wrong.

But the guy is – if you are – if you expect that there's going to be gunfire in the valley ahead, perhaps you hang back and let the first guys and the scouts get slaughtered before you trot in. And there's a reason that he's been doing the speeches – making the speeches that he has. There's a reason that he's just sort of popping up now and then to remind everybody of his presence. I think he's going to announce after everybody's tired of everybody else and he'll be the fresh face around which the people can agree. But anyway, Peter. So here's, so just a couple of observations. Point one, what's the rap on Perry? He's not very bright. Point two, if we were, the three of us were to name the three to four to five to six smartest guys on domestic policy we could come up with. Every one of us would include on that list our friend, someone who's been on Ricochet

on this podcast, Ovik Roy. Point three, who just joined the Perry campaign as his top domestic policy advisor? Ovik Roy. Pretty interesting. Pretty interesting. Anybody thinks that Perry isn't smart is making an unwise decision. Yes. An unwise choice.

Rob is strangely silent in this conversation. No, I'm thinking about that. Look, I think – I don't know who's going to win or who's going to be a contender or who's not. I mean I think we know that there's some candidates that are probably mired in a small minority group of Republican primary voters, which is not a great place to be. But I don't think that this will be a primary devoid of real ideas, and that's exciting. I don't think we've had a primary in the Republican Party that's been more idea-filled, genuinely idea-filled since – I can't even remember when. This is going to be – these are a bunch of very, very accomplished people arguing slight versions of a basically directionally center-right platform. It will be kind of fun to see.

That's if the media allows, of course, that argument to be brooded about in the public sphere. The media and many of the Democratic handmaidens are going to do their best to cast this in the usual terms, which makes whoever's up there a knuckle-dragging Cro-Magnon who wants to drag us back to the Dureta 50s. But the good news for us is that we have

over a year, a year and a half, to run these primaries. The primaries seem to be slightly be a slightly better than they were last time, meaning Hugh Hewitt's going to moderate one, which I think is a great sign. He's going to be fantastic. And he's going to be tougher than any liberal, progressive reporter. He's going to be actually tough on the issues. They're just going to be tough. They're going to ask gotcha questions. He's going to really put these candidates to their paces. And yeah, and right. And the general is going to be kind of They're going to ask gotcha questions. Who's going to really put these candidates in their paces? And yeah, right.

And the general is going to be kind of what the general always is. But we've won general elections before. We can win them again. I'm looking forward to the primaries. It's going to be exciting. Okay. We've talked about American primaries, the British election. I say to both of them, phooey.

Let's talk about something important. Rob, James, what about tom brady and the deflated balls rob doesn't even know what i'm talking about that's how out of touch i was just on mute for a minute um while i was uh having to sip my coffee i i um i don't i don't who i don't know what the punishment's gonna be um it uh first of all are you disappointed are you disappointed or did you think oh what the heck it's all just a big business anyway they'll take any advantage they possibly can who's surprised i was disappointed at the emails and or the texts that we i read last night yesterday

um you know it's disappointing. You don't want to – I don't know. You don't want to look behind the curtain too much. And I like Tom Brady and it does seem like they knew they were deflating the balls on purpose and they were deflating them below the regulation. That's what it seems like to me. I mean there's actually wiggle room as it were in the regulation. That's what it seems like to me. I mean, there's actually wiggle room as it were in the regulation. So Joe Theismann

has said that, you know, you give him two footballs, one where Tom Brady played them, inflated to the pressure that Tom Brady prefers, and one to the pressure, the lowest allowable pressure, and he can't tell the difference. So, all right. I mean, maybe, but it's just, you know,

I just, i didn't like it it just made me sad kind of that's that's my my intellectual analysis made me sad james i would not be surprised if it came out that before the game they were injecting methamphetamine directly into the spinal columns of the players nothing about this is but revelations about the nfl would surprise me. So and I'm really indifferent about it, even though I work or used to work mere blocks from this enormous edifice, a new NFL stadium that is rising by our by our former site, an extraordinary structure that I really can't wait to go sit in because I best because we're all chipping in there because god forbid these guys can actually pony up all the shekels themselves so yeah um no it's it's it's not a story that uh i mean if you're if you reload deadspin like some people reload cnn or you know instapun it in ricochet then i then i imagine yes but there are other things i mean it's it's, it's, I suppose it's like Gamergate consumes or Hugo gate consumes

people on the nerdy side of the web. It's one of those things that, uh, what are they going to do? They're going to take, are they going to take the ring back? Are they going to melt them down and build a statue? People can throw tomatoes at, I don't know. I like the idea of a statue constantly covered in oil right up there with James Dellingpole well there's um this was one of the items that was brooded about on ricochet and i like with most sport things i didn't click i'm sorry then but there was a conversation i believe or there should be a conversation about mcdonald's as well and we probably should go out with this because if there's somebody right now who america can unite against, it may be their choice of – I hear Rob. Yeah, I was just going to say before we – I know and I want you to – I'm not trying to stop you.

I just remembered that when we were just talking about Carly Fiorina, we should say that on Ricochet, Ricochet member David Sussman wrote a very interesting piece about – he called the Carly Trap. And so if you're interested in more, you should go there because I thought it was really kind of a really interesting analysis of how she might want to run the futures. But anyway, I just want to make sure. It didn't have to do with the fact that we're always saying that gender politics, identity politics are the bane of our days, and yet then we embrace

somebody who seems to exemplify that for our side. It's a good piece. We'll link to it in the show notes, but once again, a ricochet members, um, kind of are already,

already there. But is there, is there any way to avoid that trap these days? I mean, is there, is there any way since that's, I mean, someone on MSNBC or elsewhere was talking about the,

the general white male field that the Republicans are fielding this year. And you can have Ben Carson. You can have Ted Cruz. You can have Marco Rubio. And yet still – and you can have Carly. And Fiorino, if I mention her first name only, of course, that's sexist. You can have all of these people which are far more diverse in assembly than the Democrats are putting up. But yet still, still, still, it's a pale, ancient, irrelevant male that's being dragged before the public on the GOP side.

So while I don't like identity politics and gender politics, I do like to point out the fact that whatever argument they make for Hillary, i.e. she has a uterus, if that's all it takes, we got that and a lot, lot more, folks. So yeah. But pushing back on that I think is a good thing lot more, folks. So, yeah. But pushing back on that, I think it's a good thing, just as you did. And I think that's kind of what our site needs to do, especially this year. I mean, we've got, as you said, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Ben Carson, Carly Farina, a couple white guys from the Midwest. And the big money raiser, Jeb Bush, is a member of a biracial household. He's got biracial kids. And by the way, he speaks very good Spanish.

Oh, yeah. Did you see that? He put up a YouTube video, a happy Cinco de Mayo, in which he yammered away for 90 seconds. And really, my wife even approved of his. It's not unaccented. You can tell right away he's a norteamericano. But it's pretty darn good Spanish. He pulled it off.

Yeah, look. He had to learn Spanish because he fell in love. Yeah. And he had to learn Spanish to talk to his wife. So there you go. Ooh, that almost sounds like – are you pitching a new show? The Language of Passion. It's going to be a big show though, right?

Yes. The answer to that is yes, I guess. Well, indeed. So even though Jeb Bush can speak wonderful Spanish, that's going to be seen as pandering. And it's going to be inauthentic because he doesn't have the right position papers, which of course is to advocate for unrelieved immigration as – unrestrained immigration as Hillary Clinton seems to be suggesting. Bring on the executive orders, a natural path. How did she put it? To make them equal in all sense. There was some term that she used.

She used the words equal as though somebody who was born in this country as an actual citizen is equal to somebody who hopped over the border 30 minutes ago for whatever reason. That simply, to use the phrase that Andrew Wilcox uses, it's mere territorial occupation that defines citizenship and nothing more. Very nice. Whose phrase is that? Who argued that?

Andrew Wilco. By the way, what's the dog saying in the background? I can almost make it out. The dog is upset that somebody is trying to occupy his territory as well. It could be a squirrel, it could be a rabbit, it could be a raccoon. He's escaped several times lately because... The dog opposes the path of citizenship. Dogs agree with the border fence, that's for sure. Yes, well, we have one and the dog doesn't like it very much because he can't get through it. This dog is like somebody who's trying to chase Pancho Villa into

the deepest reaches of Mexico. So anyway, so Hillary Clinton, who was a while ago, was talking about the need for immigration reform and to tighten the borders and have E-Verify. Now, two, three years later, sounds like somebody who oddly enough seems to have moved to the left. Are we going to see her move more and more and more to the left? And B, do you think anybody in the media is going to point it out and hold it to her in the general when all of a sudden she gets a little bit more squishy on the things. Well, I mean I think she's going to – yeah, I think she's going to run a progressive primary campaign and then she's going to – I mean immigration, she doesn't have to move on. Immigration – Democrats believe that immigration is a wedge issue that cuts for them. So she's going to take a – she could take whatever position she wants, and she's fairly certain that Republicans will shoot themselves in their own foot and alienate Hispanics and other people, and it will be sort of a repeat of the demographic splits of 2008, 2012. I don't think she's necessarily correct there, but that's but I'm almost certain that would be her strategy.

There is no downside for Hillary Clinton for the next 18 months in running to the left, none at all. She can change her mind at the last minute. She can start attenuating it later. Her best bet – her biggest challenge right now is galvanizing support behind her because she knows, Barack Obama won twice big, by the way, would get out the vote by energizing voters who had not voted before. So that is the pathway for Democrat for Democrat success in November, the general. And then I don't think she's going to change that. Well, in the meantime, the enthusiasm gathers ready for Hillary, say the bumper sticker, which has all the enthusiasm of somebody who's waiting for the Novocaine to kick in so they can be ready for the drill.

And the drill is this is where we end it all. Just for a week, though, of course, not to end it all in a great sense. We'll be back next week, and next week we hope that you not only will join us, that in the intervening days, you will have gone to Casper.com and used the coupon code Ricochet in order to get $50 off an incredible

mattress delivered to your door. No risk. Sleep on it for 100 days. Send it back if you don't like it. What do you got to lose? You got nothing to lose except, of course, some tossing and turning. What a mattress. I sleep on it.

I can't wait to sleep on it later. As a matter of fact, I'm going to advance my nap schedule so that I plop down on that thing ahead of time to give myself a few more Casper moments. And, of course, we thank Harrys.com, Harry's Shave. You get $5 off your first month there, and you will never even consider there ever being a last month once you draw one of those blades across your face. Thanks to our guest, James Dillingpool, who right now is probably spitting out nails as he... You know, he said the interesting thing that nails grow after you're dead.

Yeah. That's not true. No? No, it's not. And how would you know? how would you know one way or the other what it is is very good point thank you prosecutor first of all my next door neighbor is a mortician i hate to appeal to authority but uh it's it's because the nails stay the same but the skin around them recedes which is actually just as good a metaphor for socialist capital – crony capitalist governments because as the actual quick – as the live part of the economy recedes, the adamantine slab of the state does not.

It looks like it's growing when in fact it is a corpse. You know, could we go back to St. Thomas More versus Thomas Cromwell? I really think that was much more relevant to today's politics. I don't know. I think that James is correct. That is a metaphor for the big government socialistic state. When they point to their stats, it only looks like growth. That's like the fingernails on a corpse.

It's not growth. It's that the corpse is slowly decaying. Exactly. And also to the point that Wolf Hall itself shows you how endless, tortuous arguments over legality and documents and law can be bent to the will of men. And in that sense, those of us who despair about our civilization and our republic today should note that actually what we're facing with executive actions and interpretations of constitutions and the like isn't exactly new. It doesn't mean it's great.

It just means it delays with everything else in human history we've been down this road before. We thank you for walking down with us this week, and we look forward to starting on a new journey next week. We'll see you all in the comments at Ricochet 2.0. And if you are from Iowa or New Hampshire, join, please, and message me because we've got a big plan. Hey, so are we on next week or are we not? We are on next week. It's going to be a group performance of John Cage's 16th, I think it's called 422.

We're going to be playing it several times. That piece, of course, consists entirely of four minutes and 22 seconds of silence. But Rob's going to do it. Peter's going to do it. We're going to get many commentators, many people from Ricochet in to do it. So it's going to be A group performance Sequentially of John Cage's 422

No I'm sorry There's no podcast next week We'll see you in a couple Alright boys See you in two weeks See you in two weeks Well I got a friend Who's a man

Who's a man What man The man who keeps the company He's the only He gives me what I need What you need? What you got? I need it all so badly

Oh, anything I want He gives it to me Anything I want He gives it but not, anything I want. He gives it, but not for free. And before, I'm so good for, to be nowhere. This year I've lost a friend. My friend, I don't know, I ain't even noticed. You see, I gotta get out again

My friend, I gotta see the man Oh, anything I want He can ship to me Anything I want He can ship, but not for free If I And it's made for I'm so grateful

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