The Young Turks - God, Beer & Mustangs

Episode Date: May 20, 2023

DC cop charged with helping Proud Boys during Jan. 6 Insurrection. The House Freedom Caucus vows no further negotiations on the debt ceiling until the Senate passes its bill: "We have a winning hand." “Sure, the US secretary of transportation has thoughts on building bridges. But infrastructure occupies just a sliver of his voluminous mind.” Man wields ar-15 near school bus stop to protest gun laws. HOSTS: Cenk Uygur (@CenkUygur), Max Burns (@themaxburns), John Iadarola(@johniadarola) HOSTS: Cenk Uygur (@CenkUygur) & Ana Kasparian (@AnaKasparian) SUBSCRIBE on YOUTUBE: ☞ https://www.youtube.com/user/theyoungturks FACEBOOK: ☞ https://www.facebook.com/theyoungturks TWITTER: ☞ https://www.twitter.com/theyoungturks INSTAGRAM: ☞ https://www.instagram.com/theyoungturks TIKTOK: ☞ https://www.tiktok.com/@theyoungturks 👕 Merch: https://shoptyt.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Drop it like it's-B-D, D-W-D, D-A-D. Drop it like it's Biden's so-called agenda. All right, Power Panel, Jay Heger, John Iiderola, Max Burns. John is, of course, the host of damage reports, which you should check out at 1 p.m. Eastern every day, Monday through Friday. Max Burns is not only a contributor to Rebel headquarters, he's also Democratic strategist and the founder of 3rd degree strategies. Max, welcome back. And at least I can see your shirt. I mean, it is. I like it. Pop of color. I like it. I'm in that Friday mood. What can I say? It's great to be back with you. All right. Good to have you and your shirt. So I have a shirt too. In fact,

you could get this shirt at ShopT, YT, no big deal. Yes. In fact, I've gotten about 12 of them. So shopTYT.com for that for sure. All right, guys. Lots of stories, the Pete Buttigieg one is amazing. Amazing. Corporate media is hilarious, okay. I have mixed feelings about that one. I do not have mixed feelings. So, and then of course Biden's pathetic weakness throughout the show and Republicans being bad guys. So it's a normal news day, but we're going to have fun with it, John. We will, we will. Although perhaps not with this first story. A police officer in Washington, D.C. had apparently been communicating for multiple years with the then head of the proud boys, Enrique Atario. And when he found out

that the head of the proud boys was going to be arrested, he leaked the information to him. And then lied to investigators about that. Probably in for a penny, in for a pound. At that point, why not lie, I suppose? This is Shane Lamond, we're talking about 24-year veteran of the D.C. police and then the department's head of intelligence, a lot of leaking going on in the intelligence lately, indicted on one count of obstruction of justice and three counts of making false statements will be arraigned later on today in U.S. District Court in Washington. You can see there his official documents. In any event, he had apparently begun communicating with Tario in July 2019 and continued on until January of 2021. That seems like an important month for some reason.

And I don't remember exactly why, but anyway, according to the indictment, they were in regular contact regarding the proud boys planned actions, which included attending a Trump rally in D.C. So we have worried since, you know, the events of January 6th about potential, you know, behind the scenes dealings or communications between law enforcement and those who had done the rioting. There had been a lot of actions that were taken on that day by law enforcement that seemed at least suspicious. This might not be linked to literally any of that, but it is worrisome at the very least. And here's an idea of how strong their relationship actually was. Between July 2019 and January 2021, they communicated at least 500 times using cloud-based messaging services like Google Voice, Apple I messages, and Telegram. By the way, Telegram is encrypted and also has the ability to destroy messages automatically.

and it appears like more than a hundred of those messages were destroyed. In any event, back on December 18th of 2020, Lamond revealed information about the investigation to the burning of a Black Lives Matter flag after a rally in D.C. And on January 4th, as Tario was on a flight from Miami to Washington Reagan National Airport, Lamont sent Tario noticed that a warrant had been signed. Now, Tario eventually pleaded guilty to destruction of property and attempted possession of a high capacity ammunition magazine when he returned to Washington. And as a result, he wasn't actually there with the proud boys on January 6th. So we have more details, and obviously we'll have to

talk about this. But it's one of the big fears that we have raised over the last few years that gets pooh-poohed by members of the right-wing media, by Republican politicians, the idea that there could be people in the police force, in the armed forces that don't necessarily have the interests of like democracy or the people foremost in their minds. Yes, there's two parts of this story in my mind. And I think the most interesting part is the things that this guy caused and then the reaction of his police department afterwards. So all right, so he tipped off Tario to not only that he was going to be arrested, which already is enormous, enormous. And you're going to see it as reverberating consequences, but he tipped him off to evidence that the cops had

Ontario. Not only that, he told him to delete the evidence. I mean, it doesn't get any worse than that, right? And he's the head of intelligence for the D.C. police. So he's getting the intelligence and then giving it to this right-wing group who's planning an insurrection against the government. And he's giving them hints on how not to get arrested, right? And then he's saying, oh, the other cops are asking me about you guys. So make sure you're getting rid of the evidence, et cetera. I mean, it's as bad as it can get, right? Except for the fact that when he told him he's going to get arrested,

he then went and told the rest of the proud boys, Tario did. And then the proud boys start writing in their messages, then F the blue. Okay. And so when they go to January 6th, and this is because he got the warning just a couple of days before January 6th because he was going to get arrested right before January 6th for that flag situation that John told you about, right? So then the proud boys get all riled up against the cops because of this cop who was head of intelligence in the DC police bureau. He basically betrayed his own. He betrayed everyone. He betrayed the government. Because of that,

he was put on leave February of 22. I looked into it, paid leave. And he's been on paid leave till today, when he still didn't get fired, he got an indefinite suspension. That guy who might have even gotten other cops killed was on paid leave for like a year and a half, paid leave. As a cop, apparently, there's nothing you can do that'll get you fired. Nothing, including handing all of the evidence over to the criminals. Unbelievable. Except, unfortunately, in America, very believable.

while, every day in America and every day this week, I see right wingers crying all over social media. Oh, the government is picking on us. We're the victims. Are you insane? The government has been helping the right wing for my entire lifetime. It is a preposterous proposition that the big government tough guys are out to get conservatives. You don't know any history. You don't know 1% history if you make outrageous claims like this. Guys like this are far more the norm than the exception. Max. That's absolutely right. I mean, there is a reason that every single Republican member of the House voted to oppose an effort for a federal probe into white supremacy and neo-Nazism in police

departments and the military. It's because they knew what we were going to find. It's not a secret. The Department of Homeland Security says it's a threat. The FBI says it's a threat. And we see every day seemingly stories of police officers, members of the military, who are exposed as white nationalists, as senior officials in neo-Nazi groups. And the only people standing in the way of holding them accountable are the Republicans who need their votes. By the way, the people of D.C. paid this guy's salary. So the people that he endangered, by the way, very largely African-American population, has to pay that guy. Had to pay that guy. Full well-known, he's a traitor. and helped criminals and helped attack our government.

No, because a cop, nope, nope, nope, nope, always have to pay a cop. Cops are the most sacrosanct thing in the whole wide world. And now the right wing has this lunatic conspiracy theory that cops, the FBI law enforcement are all left-wingers. Since when? But yet, that maniacal theory is believed by almost 100% of the right wing now. Yeah.

Let me give you some more of the background details. We've hinted a little bit of this, but he said at one point, we don't have access to the vast majority of those many, many, many messages that were sent over a couple of years between Lamonde and Tario. But he said at one point, this is on January 8th. So the immediate aftermath of January 6th, country's still reeling. And he says this, of course I can't say it officially, but personally, I support you all and don't want to see your group's name or reputation dragged through the mud. Yeah, it would be bad if that happened. But again, if anyone was dragging their name through the mud, I feel like their members should deserve some acknowledgement for their efforts in that area. We're two days out from this riot.

People have died already, and his concern is that some of the people who might have been in the area could potentially get in trouble. That's his concern. His concern wasn't that dozens and dozens of cops were in the hospital, or at least that's not what he was saying to them. Like, you know, I really hope that you guys had nothing to do with the actual violence because I've been communicating with you for years and that would be a massive betrayal. If there were messages like that, we haven't seen them yet. Perhaps they're forthcoming. But in any event, he says, because there has to be a defense now, of course, this is back in February. His attorney said that his client did nothing to aid the rioters. And look, so far, we haven't seen anything that's specifically about helping out people.

who were rioting on January 6, or at least I haven't seen anything like that. So that seems fair, but was quote, only communicating with these individuals because the mission required it. He added that Lamonde was instrumental to Tarrio's arrest and that there is no legitimate law enforcement officer who is familiar with the facts of this case who would opine otherwise. Obviously a lot of people don't agree with that. Michael Fanon, by the way, notably having that horror horrific experience on January 6 says, this wasn't just an aptitude and poor decision making.

There was a level of betrayal. Yeah. Look, again, there seems to be nothing directly linking him to assisting in the rioting that was going on on January 6th. But to say that he was only communicating because the mission required it, which part of the mission was it that required you to message him saying, you know, by God, I hope you guys get through this without getting in trouble. Is that part of the job? It seems like support. It seems like some sort of ideological overlap there. And instrumental to the arrest, you tipped him off to it. He might, he was still arrested anyway, I suppose that's true. But attempted ruining an arrest is not instrumental to

it. You just were inept at what you were doing. Yeah, here, look, let me give you a paragraph here from Huffington Post to give you a sense of how much he helped Tarrio. According to the indictment, Lamont kept Tario abreast about whether law enforcement had video or images of him during the destruction of the banner. So that's the thing he was arrested on originally. It also alleges that as Tario traveled to Washington on January 4th, 2021, that's two days before the ride, obviously, Lamond warned Tario that a judge has signed an arrest warrant for him, but didn't tell his colleagues inside MPD that Tario knew about the warrant.

He was arrested without incident as he entered the city that day. He tells the guy, hey, other cops are coming to get you. That could put the cops lives in danger. They're lucky that it didn't, right? And then Tario tells all of his co-conspirators that are going there two days later, January 6th. Like I said, the cops are coming to arrest me. They get super riled up and decide to attack the cops. To me, that is aiding and abetting what happened on January 6th.

And it is obviously aiding and abetting Tario as he leaks evidence against them, the arrest warrant against them, et cetera. So no, this guy, like, I don't think if this case is close at all. at all. I know with a cop, you have to prove it beyond 400% reason, right? And there can't be any doubt at all in the beloved frickin' cops. But no, he's constantly feeding him evidence behind the scenes to help him because he's a right-wing fascist wannabe. I don't know what his political leanings are in terms of whether he's literally a fascist or not, but he's helping this quasi-fascist organization in every imaginable way behind the backs of his fellow officers and getting them endangering their lives for his far right probably.

By the way, hey, right wingers who think the FBI and law enforcement is so liberal these days, can you name one cop we have ever caught leaking information to the left wing or to Black Lives Matter? One, one, never, I've never heard of a single case of it, never. Like, oh, oh, guys, left wingers, let me help you on, I'm with the government and I'm with the I'm with law enforcement. Left wingers, I'll leak you information. Make sure you're okay.

Zero cases in American history. You right wingers who think that the government is against you and the cops are against you and the FBI's against you when they help you in every imaginable way. Please get a sanity check. Really fast to your point also. We could do a hypothetical for this. I am willing to bet. And feel free to send in messages.

We're going to be responding to some in the break. Check Fox right now and see if they're talking about this. I have a feeling they're probably not. If he had been communicating with Antifa, do you think they would find time to cover it? That's a great question. Let me come on. And by the way, right wingers, please, please, like, learn 1% of American history. How many right wingers were executed by the FBI?

NCA, zero, zero. How many left wingers were executed? Dozens and dozens. The FBI is left wing on which planet? Please, go buy a clue while you're busy. I hope I don't interrupt your insurrection and treason plans while you're looking up 1% of American history. We should probably take our first break. But when we come back, we do have a lot to talk about, including there had seemed to be some progress on raising the debt ceiling earlier today.

Well, apparently they've hit a brick wall. We'll give you the details after this. at YouTube. I'm sorry, t.w.t.com slash join or hit the join button below as they did if you're watching on YouTube. We really appreciate we can't do it without the members and the members make it stronger. And so that's awesome. Thank you, John. Let's do it. You're welcome. And here's the news. I'm not going to accept anything other than what we've put. I would I would suggest that I admit, McCarthy not meet until he put something in writing. His words have no meaning.

Put it in writing. And if it's anything less, we're not going to accept it. You don't think he's going to make any changes and a compromise with the White House? We have a winning hand. We saw there were members of the House Freedom Caucus, Ralph Norman, Bill Good, saying, these negotiations with Biden, you can't trust him. Like, what's the point? Why are we doing this?

We've got a winning hand. They are obviously feeling like they're in a very strong position, or at least that it is advantageous for them to project that they feel that they're in a very strong position right now. The caucus is a whole, by the way, put out sort of a warning saying no more discussion on watering it down. All of these negotiations, the bill, the compromises, period. And so we are in a bit of an impasse because on the Senate side or the Democratic side, Chuck Schumer says that the House bill is dead on arrival. That's the one, of course, that would raise the debt ceiling but would also cut spending by $4.8 trillion. And we came into this morning with both Biden and Kevin McCarthy saying that the conversation

is still ongoing. They see sort of a structure, a path ahead. But as of when we're about to begin the show today, Republican negotiators apparently walked out of the room where negotiations were happening and blamed the White House for holding up discussions. We don't know a lot yet about what happened in that room, but we do have a couple of statements from Representative Garrett Graves. He says, until people are willing to have reasonable conversations about how you can actually move forward and do the right thing, then we're not going to sit here and talk to ourselves.

We decided to press pause because it's just not productive. Bear in mind, look, we've done a lot of coverage about what it is that they're asking for. And we will continue to update that because they keep adding new things to it. In fact, we have a little bit coming up later on in the show. But they are not only just freezing government spending, they're dialing it back to the previous year's spending, significant cuts across the board. And if it seems weird to you that they're so willing to let this entire thing just blow up, well, I mean, they don't want even the limited spending to go through. They want to cut all of these programs to the bone. And so we'll see what ends up happening, perhaps over the weekend, perhaps cruising in the next week.

But we do seem to have hit a little bit of a rough patch. Yeah. So it might surprise you to find out that I agree with both of the Republican congressmen in part. So the first guy said put it in writing, otherwise it doesn't mean anything. That is correct. That is actually correct political strategy. Perhaps Representative Jayapal could learn a thing or two from that. When her earlier strategy was do not put anything in writing, just go with the strategy.

And this is a literal quote, trust Biden. That was the name of the strategy. Biden of course screwed progressives and gave them none of what they wanted and not getting it in writing was a disaster. And so here is the Freedom Caucus playing correct politics. We draw the line and we stick to our position. The other side is super weak slash agrees with us and we all know it. So you just stay in this position and Biden will give you everything you want. The progressives had the 100% wrong strategy, which is, I don't know, forget our agenda, just whatever you want Biden. Okay, oh, you would make it.

they're going to give it to us later. Did they? Did they? Was that a good strategy? So I'm not talking about policy. On policy, the Republicans are 100% wrong, but on politics, that is correct. The second guy said, we have a winning hand. Now, why would they have a winning hand? Biden can at any moment say, use the 14th Amendment that very clearly says that he can do this. He can raise the debt limit, okay? So this is a nonsense conversation in the first place. Imagine theater. The Democrats have agreed to this theater because they also want to cut spending. It's super obvious.

And on top of that, they're saying, oh, the one's like, oh, yeah, well, crash the American economy. Well, any politician that isn't brain dead would say, go for a big guy, see how it turns out for you. Remember when Bill Clinton said to Newt Gingrich, go for it, shut the government down, let's see how it turns out for you. And it turned into an absolute disaster for the Republicans. The same thing would happen here, but Biden is a Republican.

He is a Republican on these issues. There's no reason in the world to offer any of these cuts, let alone the Trump. drastic cuts, except for the fact that he agrees with them. But not one mainstream media reporter in the entire country has written the possibility that Biden, who has offered those same cuts throughout the entirety of his career, he's offered these kind of cuts dozens of times in his career. It has not occurred to a single national reporter that maybe he wants the cuts. And that's why he's, oh, golly, gee, I have such a weak hand, I got, oh, do I have to

The Republicans everything again. It's only the 20th time in a row. But hey, listen, your national reporters, shut up and write my propaganda, which is that, oh, there's nothing I could do, there's nothing I can do. There's a million things you do. Here's one last one. This is now like eighth on the list, right? He can just say 14th Amendment, I'm done with this conversation.

At a bare, bare minimum, that would lift a debt ceiling and they would go to the courts, and the courts would take about a year to decide it, at a bare minimum. And the courts would have to say it's a political decision. But that's so easy, all that is super easy. But the eighth priority could be like, oh, you know what guys? 76% of Americans want tax increases on the rich. Three quarters of the country, including a majority of Republican voters. You see me criticize Republican voters all the time?

Here the Republican voters are correct. The majority of them also want tax increases on the rich, increases. They're not getting $1 of that in this. so-called compromise or whatever the hell they're calling this load of crap. Why? Because Biden doesn't want tax increase on the rich, because all of his donors are the rich. But this hasn't occurred to a single national reporter covering politics in America. Not one of them. Oh, come on, man. It's as I'm, look, there's a thousand stories just in today's news. As I read it, I was like, oh, I forgot. People actually believe this crap.

No, it's all propaganda. Mainstream media just does marketing for corporate rule. They're not at all in the news business. It's outrageous that they force this theater upon you and go along with the charade of the Democrats and the Republicans with their good cop, bad cop strategy. All of this is crap. Max. I just can't get over those clips you showed. I mean, I think it shows a Republican Party completely disconnected from reality.

I mean, we have a winning hand. Are you serious? Kevin McCarthy's debt deal is hanging by a single Republican vote. You've got George Santos, who's about to rent a seat at Rikers. You have one congressman who's saying in public that Kevin McCarthy's word is worthless to him. And a party where the hardliners don't want any talk about raising taxes or cutting loopholes. And some moderate Republicans won't vote for it if they don't. So forget negotiating with Joe Biden. I'll be a amazed if Kevin McCarthy can actually get this deal through his own caucus. I mean, it would be fitting, though, if the only way we get to actually raising taxes on the rich is the complete collapse of the GOP, essentially forcing Biden to do it with no other option. He won't, that's about how hard we'd have to drag him there. There's no way that Biden will increase tax on the rich. He won't do it. If the Republicans said, yeah, we're okay with it, go ahead.

He'd be like, oh, the postman said I couldn't do it. I found someone, the parliamentarian. I fell off my bike. The door dash driver said I couldn't do it. Golly, gee, only three quarters of Americans want it? I couldn't find a way to do it. They're liars, total and utter liars, and the tough guys in the fourth estate haven't figured out that maybe politicians might be lying to them. Yeah, as Max pointed out, the Republicans in reality have the weakest hand I have ever seen.

But every, not just Biden, everyone in Washington is particularly. But they have a super strong hand and that Biden is forced to negotiate with them and give them everything they want. before I move on to possibly the best story of the show. I do want to add more of the Republicans are now pushing for some sort of big border crackdown to be a part of this bill. Because obviously how could you pay off your country's debts without doing something about the border? I don't know.

That's what they're saying. I also, I know that it doesn't matter. I know that nobody cares about what's true or whatever. And I'm sure at some point we have covered this on TYT, but I just looked up previous previous raises to the debt ceiling. Did you know Ronald Reagan raised it 18 times? That is crazy. Donald Trump raised it twice and suspended it twice

while adding over $7 trillion to the debt. That is just amazing. By the way, Barack Obama had to raise it seven times. And I really just wish, I know that they won't. You've sort of sketched out why having this sort of constant crisis is a good thing for both the Republicans of the Democrats. But this is like theoretically bad for Biden right now because the Republicans can hold it hostage. But it's also theoretically bad for whoever, you know, President Carlson next time around

because the Democrats could hold it hostage. In theory for the proper functioning of government, you'd want to get rid of this. But again, if you don't want government to really function, if you want to be able to set aside several months a year to just debating this sort of thing and using it as an excuse to constantly cut spending, that it's useful to have an inherently broken system. But that said, this new push to get Biden to use the 14th Amendment to make sure that the debt ceiling is raised has received some strong pushback from a completely unbiased party, the Chamber of Commerce. They warned that there would be potentially disastrous economic effects if he were to use the 14th Amendment to avoid the country defaulting on its debts. And that is at least mildly interesting because one would think that a business lobbying group would be least interested in the global economy being destroyed.

But here is their argument. It is the Chamber's view that attempting to invoke so-called powers under the 14th Amendment would be as economically calamitous as a default triggered by a failure to lift the debt limit in a timely manner. And by the way, one of the argument that he gives, I think there's maybe worthy of discussion, is that sure, he could use it, he could raise the debt ceiling, but that would at least have some sort of legal challenge to it, which would take time. and what if the scotist says you can't raise it while we're waiting for the adjudication and thus we pass past the X state, then okay theoretically I guess that could be a problem.

It doesn't seem like an unavoidable one, but it's potentially a problem. But to be fair, that is not the case that Neil Bradley is making, the chief policy officer for the Chamber of Commerce. He's not just saying I don't support it because there isn't time. He also says they don't have the power. So like one of the head guys and one of the head business lobbying groups wants this sword to continue hanging over the neck of American democracy. So think about why guys. But John's of course right, Chamber of Commerce represents business interests.

If we don't lift a debt ceiling, then the market crashes, the economy crashes, it's the last thing Chamber of Commerce wants. So why are they saying to take away a tool from Biden making sure that the debt ceiling is lifted? It's because they know with absolute certainty that this is theater. They know with absolute certainty the Republicans and Democrats are bought because they're the ones who bought them. If they thought there was any chance that they are not going to lift the debt ceiling, they would never be in favor of taking away the 14th Amendment as a tool in this case. Never. They know with more certainty than anyone else that they're never going to do it.

It's just an excuse to cut spending and make sure all of the money goes to business interests. But not a single national media reporter has faded out, right? So guys, we live in totally different realities. We don't have to discuss the right wing reality with all the doctors are wrong, all the scientists are wrong, there was no racism in America. So we know about their alternate reality, that's well known. But mainstream media and everyone in Washington lives in a completely different reality than the rest of us. Because like sometimes I'll say these things on social media and everyone who's under 35 will say,

Cenk, that's so obvious. Why would you bother stating that the Democrats and Republicans are engaging in theater? And of course they could lift the desk ceiling at any time. And the Democrats want to do just want to do the same cuts. That's so obvious. Did you just catch on to that? And everybody in Washington would be like, you think the Democrats also want to do the cuts?

No, that sounds crazy. They haven't even thought of it. Again, not one article on it. It's amazing. Isn't it amazing? At a bare minimum, no matter who's right or wrong, it's amazing that we live in three completely different realities while in the same country.

Yeah. It's almost enough to make you think that the people who own the media companies also want the cuts to happen. No, really? Why, John? Are they multi-billion dollar corporations? who also would gain billions of dollars from these tax cuts, huh? And they want to protect those by making sure that we get the money instead from

payments that would go to the average American, an average American that they couldn't give a rat's ass about, and instead they want to protect their interest? Sounds like a conspiracy theory. Yeah. I once had a reporter telling me, are you saying that these multi-billion dollar media corporations are interested in profit? Yeah, I am saying that. It's the playing pretend that really does make your nose bleed.

I mean, there are solutions for this debt ceiling problem. And Democrats don't want to use one, the 14th Amendment, and Republicans on the Supreme Court are getting ready to take away another one. When they overrule Chevron, you won't be able to give this to a nonpartisan person or put it with the Federal Reserve to deal with it. They want this tool to stay there so they can keep this drama going. It works for the people in power even if it doesn't work for us. And that's what's really what no one wants to say out loud. Yeah, yeah. Well, are you guys ready to have a little bit of fun.

Okay, I think we were just critiquing the media. So I think it's time for us to transition to going easy on the media a little bit as we talk about this. Secretary of Transportation, P. Buttigieg has had, I think it's fair to say, a difficult run of things. He's in charge of transportation and across pretty much all the different areas of transportation I can think of, it's been rough gas prices have made driving hard. The planes haven't worked in like two years. and a train travel, especially freight travel, has been, to face some obstacles in terms of the trains not being on the tracks where they should be. So if you have an opportunity to talk to Pete Buttigieg, I can't think of a more interesting member of the Biden cabinet to speak to. And Wired actually just recently had an opportunity to talk to Pete Buttigieg.

There are any number of interesting questions to ask him, but you'll have to wait for the next interview, I suppose, for that. Because instead we got this. And I love this article because there's nothing. I enjoy more on the internet, then really not being sure if something is satire or not. Now, I come out of all of my research, I have found no evidence that this is satirical. It's being presented as 100% honest. And yet there is something inside of me that does not want to accept that. Let's see if you experience the same sensation.

First of all, the name of the article is Pete Buttigieg loves God, beer, and his electric Mustang. How come you guys are a joke? A hilarious joke. I thought it was parody, John. I really did. Yeah, look, the sentence below it is maybe even more embarrassing, which is why I think they made the font smaller. Sure, the U.S. Secretary of Transportation has thoughts on building bridges,

but infrastructure occupies just a sliver of his voluminous mind. You're not legally allowed to say that the person that you're interviewing, It's a member of like the government as a voluminous mind. Apparently you are, I guess freedom of speech. Elon Musk did bring it back. Anyway, I want to read the first two paragraphs of the article because if I don't read every word, there's no way that you're going to believe that this is actually what it's said.

And again, could be satire, but I've seen no proof of it. The curious mind of Pete Buttigieg, my favorite movie after all, holds much of its functionality in reserve, even as he discusses railroads and airlines, down to the pointillus data that is his current stock in trade. The U.S. Secretary of Transportation comes off like a Mensa black card holder, who might have a secret go habit, or a three-second Rubik's Cube solution, or a knack for supplying off the top of his head, the day of the week for a random date in 1404, along with a non-condescending history

of the Julian and Gregorian calendars. That can't be an actual paragraph that a person wrote that went through editors that was not intended to satirize modern media. That has to be what's behind this. Let's dig deeper. As Secretary Buttigieg and I talked in his under furnished corner office one afternoon in early spring, I slowly became aware that his cabinet job requires only a modest portion of his cognitive powers. Jesus. Other mental facilities, no kidding, are a portion to the Iliad, Puritan history.

history, historiography, and Nosgord Spring, though not in the original Norwegian, slacker. Fortunately, he was willing to devote yet another apse in his cathedral mind to making his ideas about three mighty themes, neoliberalism, masculinity, and Christianity intelligible to me. Oh, thank God he was able to finally get through. By the way, it could be satire, because there's no doubt that this writer is obviously very intelligent. I have always prided myself on my vocabulary, and there's like three or four words there. I don't even know what they mean. So clearly the writer is an intelligent person.

But those, like I have written anniversary cards to my wife, I wrote my vows. I have written things that are designed to demonstrate the deep connection I have to another person that is deeply complimentary and supportive. And I have never written anything of my wife that is as supportive of a person as this writer just did for. for the person that they're supposed to be having a critical interview with. No, guys, you gotta be thinking at this point. No, really, it's 50, 50, right? Whether it's satire or not, swear to God, it is not at all satire. You read the whole thing, it's super earnest, and he's, they're actually calling Buttigieg,

this is mine, a cathedral mind, okay? And guys, I went to the same schools as Buttigieg. So not the exact same schools, but went to, here, I'm gonna force to say it, I went to Wharton, the top business school, Columbia law school, et cetera, and I know guys who literally went, we're in the same class as Buttigieg, okay? These are party tricks that he's doing, it's not actual intelligence. I'm not saying Buttigieg is dumb. People say he's smart, everybody seems to agree is smart.

He's perfectly intelligent, but the idea that he's some sort of beautiful mind genius that you can't understand because he's so busy reading Faustian, whatever, go you're kidding me, are you kidding me? Party tricks. Noskord is acclaimed. So look, here's what I used to do to give you a sense of what like cheesy guys like me did in school. Okay, which I, that's why I can see his party tricks from a mile away, because this is the kind of crap I used to play when I was a kid, okay? You read the first chapter of the book, you read the last chapter of the book, then you read three very specific details in the middle, okay?

Then when you go to write an essay or talk to an reporter, you mentioned three very specific detailed points. And they go, he has such command of the material. What a cathedral mind. It works on teachers as well as it works on reporters. It's all a trick. Okay. So, and why are they doing this marketing job for Pete Buttigieg? That's the more interesting question. These stories come out when someone's about to run for office. This story is out right now because they're worried about Joe Biden. And they think they might have to send in Pete Buttigieg. And that is why mainstream media has been unleashed to go back to philadium.

That's what happened the last time in 2020. Everybody was all over them. The greatest. Did you know he once learned Norwegian just to read a book? How do you not see that that's like? To be fair, I didn't see it in the beginning either. And I've hated myself for not realizing that in day one minute one. You learn Norwegian just to read a book.

You liar. Norwegian reporter asked him something in Norwegian. He's like, what? What? He did not know Norwegian? Okay, these guys, come on, guys. In the middle of this article, they're like, they talk about masculinity. And he's like, well, you know, masculinity is a new definition, et cetera.

On the one hand, I'm gay and I like rearing the children, et cetera. You know, and he says, so that's part of the new masculinity potentially. I'm like okay great I agree with that totally right and he's like on the other hand you know I've got the traditional things like I like drinking beers and working out with weights and splitting wood I was like splitting wood splitting wood you're going out with an axe in Washington D.C. and splitting wood in the backyard for why you're the transportation secretary this is such an obvious lie. Hey if I'm the reporter he's like I was out there I just started this afternoon splitting wood with my axe like really really really?

Can I see your axe? Can I see the wood you split? Because I think you're monumentally full of crap. Instead, Wired Magazine's like, a brilliant cathedral, mine. If Biden doesn't run, he should definitely be him and not a progressive. Oh, wait, did I say that out loud? Okay, no, you didn't. This is pure propaganda disguised as journalism, which to be fair is almost the entirety of mainstream media. Max. McKinsey's secret. I can't believe you said that on the air. You showed people how to read a book like a Harvard student. Front cover, back cover, and a couple points in the middle. And you're right. I mean, the transportation secretary proving to have a little bit more tough time managing this than he thought it would be at McKinsey. And part of the reason that he gets this glowing press is because one of the open secrets of D.C. is he spends a lot of his day working with press.

having lunch with reporters, managing his brand. And I would love to talk to Pete Buttigieg and explore his cathedral mind. But I can't because the plane from LaGuardia keeps getting canceled because the transportation secretary isn't working. Yeah, I'm going to read you guys one more example because, look, Buttigieg, the reporter could, lengthy interview, could have asked him about all of his failings. Hey, Pete, the planes don't seem to work. You're the transportation secretary.

Hey, Pete, there's like a mushroom cloud over Ohio. You're the transportation secretary, right? Instead, super vague general questions, which Buttigieg responded to with word salad, as he always does. And then the reporter was like, oh, so brilliant, okay? So let me give you an example. And this, every paragraph, every question has this. But it's just a random one, not even a particularly good one. Climate change.

Here's what Buttigieg said. The lived reality of the younger generations is that they are experiencing climate issues, not as a theoretical possibility, but as a clear and present danger. These are generations that have experienced their reality, that disparities, including racial disparities, left alone, will only compound. They won't cure of their own gravitational tendency. Yeah, but what did you just say? Did you propose a policy? No, there's not any policy in the whole interview.

No policy at all, at all, at all. It's just these, the climate change with the gravitational tendency of the younger people. And that's why we're gonna do nothing. Yeah. And you thought that was a cathedral mind. Maybe like a small rural church. Something like that. Not to take away from the cathedral mind, but if you say something is a lived reality,

you don't also need to add that it's not theoretical. That's what lived reality means. Definitional, yeah. Yeah, yeah, I agree. most of what he said there, that does not mean that he's, if he, like, God forbid, becomes president, that he's going to do literally anything about it. Again, final point. That's my point.

Like, there was nothing wrong with what he said. It was just gobbledygook. Like, it didn't propose any policy. It just made it sound like, oh, a gravitational tendency has not been met. I now refuse us to what we're going to do. Gravity science. You're going to do nothing. That's what you're going to do.

Yeah. But let's go to the levers reporting. So real quick, what I wanted to say is if you cared about actual reporting, the independent progressive out looks like the lever are doing amazing work, okay? Because they did an article about Buttigieg and not because it's about Buttigieg, but because oh my God, they're about to approve this rail that goes through land right next to the Colorado River that could, if there's a spill, which there almost certainly will be, could infect that water that serves millions of Americans. There's absolutely no reason to approve it.

And Biden and Buttigieg are going to approve it. Why? Because it's a private equity company that has bought this rail and they're demanding $80 million in public money. Why? Why would I give you money to make my profit? Well, obviously because compensation for their great experience in building these sorts of railroads, as you will find out. So here's the details from the lever. You can look at the lever for their full reporting.

But they say in the parched southwest, one in eight Americans rely on a single drought-stressed river that carries snow melt from Rocky Mountain peaks down to desert communities. But instead of strengthening protections for that crucial water supply, the Biden administration has quietly laid the groundwork for a financial firm full of former government officials to use it as a route for oil trains amid heightened concerns about derailments. The Utah project, which already received federal permitting approval, is audacious. It aims to run trains full of petroleum from northeast Utah's Uinta basin along the banks of the Colorado River as it winds through treacherous canyons prone to rock slides and mudslides. So difficult route, basically, is what they're sketching out. this would be tough for anyone, any firm. Unfortunately, for us, this is not just any firm.

This is a firm that has never successfully developed a major infrastructure project, though it says it has, quote, leveraged a proprietary set of relationships that its executives built during their time in government, which is good because if I had time for a fall question, it would have been have you leveraged a proprietary set of relationships. So check that off, they have. And so the project's developers are planning to ask Buttigieg to approve private activity bonds subsidized by $80 million per year in federal tax breaks to finance

the railroad's construction. The Center for Biological Diversity is calculated that the bonds, which should be offered at a 6% interest rate compared to the typical corporate bond rate of 10% would cost U.S. taxpayers $80 million annually for the 40-year term of the bond. So look, I can't calculate how much that is. I don't have a cathedral mind, but it's a lot of money. Yeah, so they're going to give a gift, an $80 million gift, pay for, by us, the taxpayers, to their donors. Their donors are filled to the room with private equity guys. Pete Buttig's entire career is based on serving private equity and his donors.

Has mainstream media mentioned Pete Buttigieg's donors once? Not to my knowledge, okay, they're too busy complimenting him on his wood splitting and his Mustang that he drives around, but not for political purposes, okay? He just happened to get a Mustang that happens to be American made and look kind of cool and tough. It's electric. And it's electric. It's, oh, what a, it is cool.

Perfect combination, but not for political purposes. Julia Rock, who wrote the lever piece, an actual journalist. Hey, they're gonna approve that thing, it's gonna spill into the water, and they're gonna make us pay for it. And Buttigieg is totally in favor. He's actually making things worse and not better. That's real journalism, not, oh my God. Have you taken time out from not?

reading all of the work of Camus to do just 10% of your time for the Department of Transportation, because that's all you need. That's all you need. Jesus, mainstream media reporters humiliate themselves on a daily basis. Yeah. Any final thoughts, Max? And quite frankly, I think the description of the project undersells it. This is the most American project of all time. Really, you have an existing railroad that just needs some repair to be less dangerous. But they're not going to do that. What they're going to do is build a whole new separate track next to it. And through perilous ground at huge expense. And the only real beneficiaries here are some of the companies, people who did you just work for. Yeah. And look, I'll close

with this. If you were going to have a firm that was going to do this sort of project, you'd want one with a lot of experience. But since we don't, I'd like to offer a tip. If it is gonna go through an area with like really thick forest, I know someone who could help you get through there. Oh yeah, we got a worse splitting expert. And the Department of Transportation is a tough guy. And remember everybody when he runs, much better than every progressive who cannot win.

How do you say timber in Norwegian? I don't know and neither to see. Anyway, with that said, we have one more awesome story to close up the hour, so we'll be right back. I'm working up to what I want to be able to do to learn it more, is i want to read harry potter in spanish what are you mental i think it's weird do it all right back on t y t yank john max with you guys also larry lee russell britt therian and kyle marks they're all american heroes who just joined by hitting the

join button below the video on youtube you guys can do likewise at t yt.com slash join. And I also want to thank DeGitt Schrifty. You give the 20 subs on Twitch. That's amazing. You're awesome. And we appreciate you. By the way, we also appreciate our moderators on all these platforms, including it on YouTube. They're doing great work. Thank you for looking out for us. Thank you all. Yes. Let's, I was going to say have a little bit of fun, but it is what it is. But let's talk either way. A man in Severn, Maryland has decided to take a stand and protest against some pretty minor gun control by hanging out at an elementary school bus stop with an AK-47.

He's identified himself as Jaden McAdory. You can see photographs of him with the gun there. According to parents, at least, it appears that this has been going on for a few weeks. And when interviewed, he says that he's doing it to protest the recent gun control measures Governor Westmore signed a law. So we're to give the details of what the bill actually is, and then how he explains what he's doing. So this was a side Tuesday, May 16th. It's the Gun Safety Act of 2023. Moore said that it will help keep our communities safe from gun crime and help get guns off

our streets. It prohibits a person from knowingly wearing, carrying, or transporting a firearm in certain locations, including schools. So look, across the wide spectrum of all possible gun control from like a little bit of training or disclosure to complete banning of all guns. This is very much on the minor part of the spectrum, but he's protesting against that. He says guns can be safe if they're controlled by the right person. I really wasn't coming out here for the kids. I was coming out here to show people that this is legal. But of course, the kids are scared. The parents obviously are very worried

about what this represents. One parent, Jamie Sparrow says, I feel like if we don't do something about it now, then we'll be talking again, and it'll be too late at that point. I think that lives could be lost or people could be harmed. Sparrow said McInery made a concerning comment when he walked by him in his family recently, saying, you guys are looking at me like a bunch of scared bowling pins. Wow, I guess you're the bowling ball if we're the bowling pins. Anyway, he says, I really want people to understand, I mean no harm to no one. I'm actually deterrent away from the crime we always have here.

So he's been talked to many times and he keeps saying, this isn't about the kids, I'm not trying to hurt anyone, but obviously a person with an AK-47, is inherently threatening. I think most people can agree on that. What do you guys think? They're asking for vigilante violence. So look, I hope it doesn't happen. But I mean, I wouldn't let someone walk around with that kind of weapon near my kids.

I just wouldn't let him. And so I don't know, what does that mean? I wouldn't let him. I don't know. I don't know what it means. I don't know what when there's a parent that thinks like me, Oh, I'm casually bringing an assault weapon right next to your 10-year-old daughter's head. No, no, you're not, okay?

And so we're going to have massive problems in this country. And I don't even understand the point he's making. Is he saying that this is great that I can terrorize your kids every morning? Is that supposed to be like, or is he saying it's bad? Well, he says that there is nothing inherently dangerous about a gun. Having a person with a gun makes the area safer. You know, people who like guns say that quite often. So I'm going to demonstrate that me doing this is not hurting anyone.

That's what it seems like he's doing. Yeah, well, that's the dumbest point in America. And so, no, it's showing people how unsafe the guns are. You think, like, but that's the thing, man, there's like literally millions of mentally unstable people in this country that have access to assault weapons like that. And they're like, oh, yeah, I'm going to show you how safe these guns are by having them right next to your kid's head. No, you're not. No, you're not. This is going to get really stupid and ugly soon and I'm so I'm super worried about it and but there is one thing that he is proving our gun laws are mental mental we allow this near

our kids we all should have our brains examined for allowing these corrupt politicians to ruin our lives Max well this guy hasn't thought his own ideas out to the end of his first sentence I mean he says he's standing there with a gun because a person with a gun makes a community safer, but he's there because there's so much gun violence. I mean, if he just listened to his own second sentence, he'd realize it makes no sense. But this is just another example of Republicans who talk about the importance of traditional society, who are some of society's most anti-social actors. I mean, just on a basic human level, you should see it's making people uncomfortable, that you're either going to hurt someone or yourself unintentionally, and that this is a

recipe for a problem. But he loves the attention, and that's what matters the most here. Yeah, or he just strongly believes it. And like, you can protest. You can protest. Do you have to have the gun? You could have a sign that says you'd be safer if I have an AK-47. That at least can't go off and kill someone. Like, I don't know anything about this guy's politics or anything like that. But what I do know is that pretty much everyone who owns a gun thinks that they're a responsible gun owner, because you occupy your own body. Every other body, you have to try to come up with how they're thinking. And it's easy to assume that they're going to have faults or make mistakes or whatever. But we always assume that we know what we're doing. And yet guns go

off accidentally. Guns get stolen. Things happen. They happen all the time. And they always, they happen to people with guns. And every single one of those people think that they're a responsible person with guns. I have no doubt that he thinks that he is an incredibly responsible person with a gun. And maybe he's more responsible than most, but this is still inherently threatening. Thankfully, there has been, he has proven that he can be reasoned with. He had an agreement with school district officials that he's no longer going to protest in public during a school pick up and drop off times. So when the kids are actually there at the spots are getting dropped off, he's not going to do any more. I'm sure that'll help ease of ease the frame of mind to the parents a little bit.

And cops are saying that they're staying in the area. He's fully legally able to do this, but they're in the area to try to make people feel better. I just, it doesn't seem like the best way to push your message to me. Look, if he was trying to make the opposite point that, hey, obviously, this is not safe. Are you kidding me? I have an AK-47 right next to your kids. This is the least safe thing in the world. I would still be against making the point in this way, because it is unsafe and it is next to the kids.

Guys, just think about this. all he has to do before they talked him out of going there in the morning in the afternoon, all he would have to do is raise the gun and start firing and he'd kill dozens of those kids. But in America, him walking around those kids with that weapon and war is perfectly legal. Do you understand if you live in America, just to John's point about how we all occupy our own headspace? In America, we think that's normal. Do you understand if you live in America that the rest of the world thinks we are lunatics? Like no one thinks that's normal the rest of the world.

The rest of humanity thinks we've lost our minds and we don't even care about our kids' lives anymore. What kind of sick people live in America? Now it's no longer theoretical or anything. I have now heard many people and our members write in all the time. People saying, oh, canceling trips to America. No, America is like one of the most violent places in the world. You'd be nuts to go visit America. I'm going to go America and somebody's going to murder me with an assault weapon.

They have mass, they have a massacre. They have literally, we literally average more than one massacre a day in America. And so we've become, like Afghanistan is looking safe compared to America. And it's not hyperbole. So under no circumstances, does this make sense? Even if he was trying to make the opposite of point of what he's making. But there's nothing we could do about it. Because even, by the way, over 60% of Americans want to ban assault weapons.

But it's not like we live in a democracy. Every Republican says, no, I take money from the NRA. I take money from gun manufacturers. And those bribes are worth way more than your kids. And we don't vote them out of office. That's amazing. And that's why you have this. Daily terrorism of us and our kids being terrorized by people who own weapons like this.

And guys, as a last point to just to what John was saying. The gun owners, I happen to know, half of them are very, very responsible. They really are. They put away their guns, super safe about it, et cetera. The other half are jackasses, okay? You think every gun owner is super responsible? Have you met human beings? No, we've covered a thousand stories.

I left his gun right next to his kid. The kid picked it up, blew him away. Kid picked it up, blew himself away. Kid picked it up, blew his sister away, right? Thousands of those stories, right? Because people are human, and half of them are not that responsible. And so the idea that these guns are safe is statistically incorrect, factually incorrect. And but yet, oh my God, I love the freedom of having this toy.

This toy murders your kids. But whatever, I love toys, plus money. Welcome to America. Soon we'll have no tourism left. Who the hell would come here? I just wonder why this guy wasn't at work. I mean, I'm sure that the double cheeseburger brigade is missing their top agent. Jesus.

All right. Guys, everybody check out Max on Rebel Headquarters. Everybody check out John on Damage Report. We got to go. We got an amazing second hour coming for you guys. So stay right here. Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks. Support our work.

Listen ad free. Access members. bonus content and more by subscribing to Apple Podcasts at apple.com slash t-y-t. I'm your host, Shank Huger, and I'll see you soon.