The Young Turks - Kavanaugh Updates, Republicans and Trump Respond

Episode Date: September 19, 2018

Kavanaugh Update-Republicans on the defensive, Request Needed From Unwilling White House For FBI To Investigate Ford’s Accusation + Prager, Kavanaugh spokesperson. Get exclusive access to our best content. http://tyt.com/GETACCESS Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You're listening to The Young Turks, the online news show. Make sure to follow and rate our show with not one, not two, not three, not four, but five stars. You're awesome. Thank you. Why just survive back to school when you can thrive by creating a space that does it all for you, no matter the size. Whether you're taking over your parents' basement or moving to campus, IKEA has hundreds of design ideas and affordable options to complement any budget. After all, you're in your small space era. to own it. Shop now at IKEA.ca. All right, welcome to the Young Church.

Thank you, Granite, Kisperin with you guys as we shuffle papers heading into the show here. All right, we got Kavanaugh. That's coming up in a minute, you guys are all going to get that. And then a little bit later, Rick Scott's in trouble in Florida, Wilbur Ross is in trouble on on the planet. Speaking of that, the China tariff situation explained a little bit more thoroughly and why it might talk about a global economic collapse. It's at least some possibility.

Women that voted for Trump turning on him. Lots and lots of news in this show. Of course, as always, he has the whole show anytime you want, become a member at t. com slash join. All right, Casper, let's do it. Let's jump right into it. All right. We need to talk about a relatively new show called Un-F-The-Republic, or UNFTR.

As a Young Turks fan, you already know that the government, the media, and corporations are constantly peddling lies that serve the interests of the rich and powerful. But now there's a podcast dedicated to unraveling those lies, debunking the conventional wisdom. In each episode of Un-F-The Republic, or UNFTR, the host delves into a different historical episode or topic that's generally misunderstood. or purposely obfuscated by the so-called powers that be. Featuring in-depth research, razor-sharp commentary, and just the right amount of vulgarity, the UNFTR podcast takes a sledgehammer to what you thought you knew about some of the nation's most sacred historical cows. But don't just take my word for it. The New York Times described UNFTR as consistently compelling and educational,

aiming to challenge conventional wisdom and upend the historical narratives that were taught in school. For as the great philosopher Yoda once put it, you must unlearn what you have learned. And that's true whether you're in Jedi training or you're uprooting and exposing all the propaganda and disinformation you've been fed over the course of your lifetime. So search for UNFDR in your podcast app today and get ready to get informed, angered, and entertained all at the same time. Following attempted rape allegations against Brett Kavanaugh, and of course the accuser is Christine Blasey Ford, the smear tactics from the right have begun, and they have begun

aggressively, they are relentless, and it also includes quite a bit of funding, and I'll give you some examples of how it's all going down. So first, there is the judicial crisis work, this is a group of conservatives who aggressively fight to have pro-corporate conservative Supreme Court judges nominated. And so they have decided to put $1.5 million behind a television ad blitz that features a person who has been friends with Kavanaugh for 35 years. Okay. So that's the beginning of it. Also, the judicial crisis network has already pledged to spend $5 million back in Kavanaugh. So their first ad was released immediately. They released it last night, Monday,

And we have it for you just so you get a sense of the tactics they're planning on using. Take a look. Her allegations cover a whole range of conduct from boorishness and too rough horseplay to actual attempted rape. And so obviously if you go to, if you go to rape, yes, that is a really serious. All right, a little technical difficulty there, no problem. We're going to get the video for you in just a minute. Just give me a thumbs up when it's ready.

All right, let's go. Friends with Brett Kavanaugh for 35 years. I've never thought about doing a TV commercial. I'm not involved in politics. I'm a teacher. I'm a coach. I believe that we need to have bright, curious, open-minded, thoughtful, empathetic people who are judges. And I trust that Brett is that person. He's dedicated to his work. He's dedicated to his family. He's of the highest integrity as a person. And I believe that he would be a great Supreme Court Justice. So that ad features a teacher who claims to have known him for 35 years. The tactic is, hey, look at all these people who can vouch for him, vouch for his character. Because, you know, people who have been accused of rape, you know, everyone has to dislike them throughout their entire lives. It's impossible for that person to have a group of people in their personal lives that like them and respect them while they could also in their, you know, in private do things like attempted rape. So, I think the substance of that is pretty weak. A lot of people liked OJ, too.

That didn't mean he didn't do it. He was a very likable guy outside of murdering two people. So, but I think the more important part of this is, that's fascinating. So $5 million they've announced that they're going to spend, and one and a half they've already put into TV ads, where's the money coming from? Is it concerned citizens who are genuinely pro-life and they care about that and they think Kavanaugh is pro-life? Is it genuine citizens who think, no, I know, I don't know anything about Kavanaugh being

against Roe versus Wade because that's the official Republican stance, right? I just think he's such a wonderful principal jurist that I'm looking forward to having him confirm on the Supreme Court. I'm gonna give five bucks, 10 bucks, 27 bucks to make sure I run these ads. No, no, no. The funny thing is, it has nothing to do with the hot button topics that you're seeing. No, the ad is funded by very wealthy people and corporations because Kavanaugh is massively pro big business.

So they need his vote in there, not for Roe versus Wade, not for anything else. They need it to make sure that he advances, advances a pro-corporate agenda. So those donors are like, oh, he's accused of attempted rape. Whatever, roll in the $5 million, let's get this guy in the court so you could rule against our employees all day long. That's what's being played here. You think $5 million materializes out of nowhere for this? No, there's people who think, I'm going to make a buck off of Kavanaugh being on the Supreme

Court. Yeah, absolutely. And he is a pro-corporate judge. His past rulings and decisions prove that. And the fact that they were able, you know, this organization, the judicial crisis network was able to get this funding secured so quickly tells you something. There are people who are worried about their bottom line. At the end of the day, rape doesn't matter.

Attempted rape doesn't matter. His character doesn't matter. The rulings that he might have in regard to social issues or women's health doesn't matter, doesn't matter. And by the way, the judicial crisis network is just. one organization that includes people that are now attacking Ford and her allegations. There's also Dennis Prager, and he wrote an op-ed for the National Review that was disgusting. And so I'm going to give you a few of the excerpts. Let's go to Graphics 62.

Prager, who once called the idea of college rape culture, a gargantuan lie, argues it is a piece for National Review that the allegations against Kavanaugh should be ignored because they tell us nothing about Brett Kavanaugh since the age of 17. So there's two different parts of that. One is the general of the rape culture being a gargantuan lie. You know, I don't know what he means by that, but I know what he encourages by that. He encourages people to go, it's not a big deal. Just don't worry, don't spend too much time on it.

So when victims ask for more protections from universities, don't sweat it. It's all a lie. It's all a lie. So that's a terrible thing to spread. The second part of it is him saying, look, this happened when he was 17 and doesn't tell us anything about him being 53. Then actually, I find to be the least offensive of all the defenses of Kavanaugh. But hold, he's going to get to really, really offensive in a second. I disagree with you.

I think attempted rape at any age says something about a person, right? No, I'm not saying it doesn't. I'm saying of all their defenses of Kavanaugh, that's the least offensive. Do you see what I'm saying? It's a low, low bar. Yeah, I hear you, it's a low bar, but look, and we've had this discussion before. So if he was accused of this a year ago when he was 52, well, it's a no-brainer, everybody knows that he's responsible for it.

If he was accused when he was, as we talked about on Friday show, I believe, 12, well, that's a different situation when he was 12. So I think that their best defense is, well, 17 is closer to 12 than it is to 52. I don't, it doesn't mean that I believe in that defense. But the other defenses are way, way worse because they're saying like, oh, what happened there is not that big a deal. And now, Prager's about to make those arguments. The Judicial Crisis Network spokesperson is about to make those arguments on CNN.

I think those are horrific arguments. They should go nowhere near them, which only leaves them this or she's just made it up entirely. I think that's their, otherwise they got nothing. So in this national review piece, he also writes, this is another example, keep in mind, like this is what he's focusing on here. This is another example of the moral chaos sewn by secularism and the left. Okay, let's stop for a second. By the way, Dave Rubin, you should feel really proud of yourself for working for this guy.

That's the problem. Secularism is the problem. Yeah. The chaos sewn by secularism is the problem. You don't think that it's problematic that someone who might be a new Supreme Court justice in the highest court in the country might have carried out attempted rape. You don't think that that's the problem? You think that secularism is the problem?

I mean, but get a load of that inverted logic where they live in the upside down. So he's like, if people were more religious, they would realize that charges of attempted rape are no big deal. He's arguing that, Prager's arguing that that is the more. position. The immoral, secular left position is attempted rape is a big deal. Okay, look, you make your own decision on which one you think is moral and which one is not moral. But the way that they turn things on their head is amazing. Somehow he's made it so that the moral position is supporting attempted rape.

Okay, but look, look, keep going, keep going. I'm telling you, it gets really, really, really In any society rooted in Judeo-Christian values, it is understood that people should be morally assessed based on how they behave over the course of their lifetime, early behavior being the least important period in making such an assessment. Okay, so I have a billion things to say about this. First of all, I got to go back to the whole secularism. So you don't believe in secularism? Do you believe in the Constitution?

So do you think that we should be forced to believe a religion? Like, what does that even mean? Prager is like the, what drives me crazy about the right wing is that they respect guys like Prager because it's such a low bar. Like, most of the people in the party are total morons like Donald Trump and George W. Bush. So when somebody with a pulse shows up, they're like Dennis Prager. Oh my God, he's got a university where he teaches how bad the secular left is. But think about how he rationally is on every front.

To Anna's point there, you don't believe in secularism. So you think what? Church and state should be combined, the religion should rule us. But Prager, you're Jewish. I got news for you. Your religion isn't going to win. And I've got further news for you because apparently, even though you've got a whole university you've named after yourself, let's just note how obnoxious that is.

And the other guy who did that was Donald Trump. Anyway, historically, which you've apparently never studied, when Christians or any religion rule over Jews and other minorities, it doesn't end well. When they say, I'm going to use my religion to rule, and by the way, you're in a minority religion. Have you studied any history? Do you know how that ends? Oh, yeah, I've got a great idea. Let's make sure that we don't do secularism.

We combine church and state. Oops, I'm in the minority religion. I didn't think that through because I'm one of the dumbest guys alive. Okay, so let's get to the second part of that excerpt that is insane. So, look, I don't care if he did this at 17. For me, it doesn't matter. Because guess what normal people don't do at the age of 17, attempted rape, right? So it's one thing if, hey, when I was 17, I decided to drink and get behind the wheel

and I got caught in a DUI. Like, if that was an allegation against Brett Kavanaugh, I'd be like, okay, come, like, we've all made mistakes, let's move on. This is attempted rape, okay? This is different from any other youthful indiscretion that people could be accused of. So look, in DUI obviously is very serious. And that's why it's an important, interesting conversation, et cetera. And that's why we said in the beginning, if you're gonna go back to high school, it's gotta be a high bar.

It doesn't get much higher than attempted rape. And in terms of some of the attacks against Kavanaugh, they're all pointing to how he used to admit to drinking a lot in high school. Look, for people who are looking to corroborate Professor Ford's story that he was stumbling drunk, that is relevant. For people looking to say he was a bad guy in high school for over drinking, that is not relevant. I want to be clear because they're going to set up straw men arguments. We don't care that he drank too much. We care about what he did on that day when he drank too much and allegedly did the attempted

rape. That's what we care about, not about the drinking. So, but for God's sake, let's get to his mom and his wife and what he thinks. So he tries to make it seem like, you know, getting groped is not that big of a deal, that, you know, people in his personal life had to deal with it, and they handled it just fine. My mother was groped by a physician. She told my father about it. My father told the physician that if he were to do that again, he would break his hands.

And then he talks about his wife. Let me get to this, because this gives you even more detail into his way of thinking. He says, when my wife was a waitress in her mid-teens, the manager of her restaurant grabbed her breasts and squeeze them on numerous occasions. She told him to buzz off, figured out how to avoid being in places where they were alone, and continued going about her job. That's empowerment. No, it's not.

No, it's not. So you think the right approach for, my God, your mom and your wife is when men grab their breasts. There should be no consequences. There should be no legal consequences. That's not sexual assault. that most of the consequences should be, hey, I told them to buzz off. No, that the onus is on the woman, right? Because if your manager or a higher up in the company that you're working for gropes you

and makes you uncomfortable, tell him to buzz off, and then the onus is on you to avoid contact with him. The onus is on you to make sure you're not in a room alone with him. That's not, what part of that is empowerment? He's a clown, I mean, come on. And he noticed, he said his wife was in her mid-teens, so she was, what, 14? 15, 16 years old, and this guy's constantly sexually assaulting her at work, he puts that as a positive example of, come on, what's the big deal?

Everybody played with my wife's breast when she was a teenager. Everybody played with my mom's breast. What's the big deal, man? They just brushed it off. But even if you don't think that's a big deal, and there's something really weird and off about you if you don't think that's a big deal. But remember that those things often lead to the guy not buzzing off. But being encouraged that no cops were called and that there were no real consequences

and leading to much more serious things. It reminds me of the Roy Moore story where he kept hitting on a teenager who was a waitress at a restaurant he used to frequent. And then one day he tricked her into getting in the car, according to the allegations, and then started ripping her clothes off and forcing her head down onto his lap. Oh, well, there goes your buzz off strategy, Dennis Prager. What a brilliant thing that was. Hey, Dennis Prager, if somebody comes and punches you in the face, why don't you just

tell him to buzz off? What's the big deal? Man up, Dennis, man up. Oh, God, these days, when everybody wants to go to the police and actually press charges on assault or attempted rape, oh, in the good old days, we just spit on it, right? I remember those days, our coach was telling us you get hurt, you get spit on it, right? Now, I don't want anybody punching Dennis Prager. I don't want anybody doing anything physical.

But these guys, they're abhorrent. I knew that they would go to the bottom of the barrel and immediately they're like what's I mean he's basically saying so he pinned her down tried to rip off her bathing suit held her mouth closed down while his friend turned up the volume so they couldn't hear her screams what's the big deal why don't you just tell him the buzz off that's who Dennis Frager is any right winger who looks up to Dennis Prager I feel sick to my stomach for you because that's so embarrassing that's the intellectual of the right wing? It's pathetic. So finally, another part of his op-ed, I guess, touches on what

he thinks if these allegations are true. Even if true, what happened to her was clearly wrong, but it tells us nothing about Brett Kavanaugh since the age of 17. But for the record, I don't believe her story. The whole

setup is, who cares if it's true? At the very, very end, he says, by the way, of course, I don't believe her a story. On what basis do you not believe her a story? So for example, we explained in the beginning, we don't know, more evidence came out, then we explained, hey, listen, she talked to her a therapist. The therapist wrote down the notes in 2012, 2013, that's a good reason to believe her. There's at least some evidence. It's hard to know what happened on that day.

We're trying to have a reasonable assessment of the facts scenario. His reasonable assistance was, of course, I don't believe her. I don't believe her. So what if it happened? So what if he tried to rape a 15-year-old? What's the big deal? Wow, that is quite intellectual of you. So there's one final component to this story.

And, you know, I'm sure that there are more smears happening as we speak as we do this video. But there was an individual who appeared on CNN. Her name is Carrie Severino, and she's with the Judicial Crisis Network, the same, you know, group that we talked about earlier. And she had an interesting way of describing the allegations. Take a look. Her allegations cover a whole range of conduct from boorishness and two rough horseplay to actual attempted rape. And so obviously if you go to rape, yes, that is a really serious allegation. I don't think anywhere in there she's saying this is boorish horseplay at all in her letter.

I don't think that's at all what she's suggesting. She's certainly implying that it's attempted rape. But I think you have to look at, there's 30 to five years of memory. that we're trying to play with here. And I'm saying that the behavior she described could be interpret could describe a whole range of things. I know her, I know her perception of it was what it was one way. I'm just saying, I think, I think we have to get all of the facts.

That said, Judge Kavanaugh says this didn't happen at all. So under any interpretation, he says, no, that I was not at a party like that. This didn't happen. Wow, Carrie, you really need to work on your spin, you know, skills because you were really struggling there, weren't you? Yeah, well, because they have to have a woman go out and say it. So they're like, hey, Carrie, you drew the short struggle, go out and defend attempted rape.

Well, how are we going to do that? Well, look, you're going to have it in the range of options so that you don't seem like the worst person on earth. You don't seem like you're Dennis Prager. But in there, you're going to inject talking points and we're going to test them out. Remember, Judicial Crisis Network, as we explained earlier, funded by these huge, and it's all secret corporate and really rich donors who want Kavanaugh on the court for their own financial purposes. And so they're like, hey, listen, you're paid to do this for us.

So describe the attempted rape as, quote, rough horseplay. And what they do is they send out somebody to do that first. And then if it works and people like it, then they repeat it. And then it becomes a talking point. Oh, it was just rough horseplay. It was just rough horseplay. And you'll see it over and over and over again. That was them testing it out.

I got news for you. That test didn't work. So, as you could tell from the reaction of the anchor at the time, who's kind of taken aback by it, the reaction online, our reaction, any decent person's reaction, you could have left it at, hey, it's so hard to know what happened on that day 35 years ago. No, you had to inject that talking point. And when you characterize attempted rape and covering a woman's mouth while trying to rip her clothes off as rough horseplay, well, it harkens back to, well, that's not torture, that's just,

enhanced interrogation, and those aren't detention centers, what were they calling them, family residences or something along those lines? So no, it's not rough horseplay, and it's sick that you're being paid to say that, to see if you guys can get people to believe that it wasn't what it actually was, apparently, according to the allegations. In America, you can pay anyone to say anything, doesn't matter. So let's take a break when we come back, some of Trump's reactions to this story. And then later in the show, we will touch on the U.S. relationship with China following

this whole tariff and trade war. All right, back on a young church. Quick note from a sponsor, that's Down Ticket. So you guys know, I've talked to you about it before. I really like these guys because they even the score between the big money and us. So it's Downticket.com. Go to your mobile device and put in Downticket.com. I put my watch list and my opposition list on on election night.

Last election night, we talked about it. I've got Democrats and Republicans on my opposition list and I don't have a lot of Republicans on my watch list. Other people I'm in favor of. So please check that out, make your own list, and they're exactly the kind of sponsor we like that allows you to track the candidates you like and the ones you distance. like and make a difference by donating or at least just getting the news about them. So downticket.com.

Okay, now I wanted to read one quote from a member here that they sent in earlier. This is Atheist Snail, so already we're having fun, or Atheistic Snail, I should say. Just signed up as an activist member without the TYT network and my online atheist community. I would be depressed into inaction by current events. Instead, I'm motivated and excited to fight for progressive secular values. Thank you, TYT. You've earned my support and my respect. Oh, that's weird.

Dennis Prager thinks that your secular values are sowing chaos in the country. The kind of chaos that might actually prevent rape. Anyway, tyt.com, I join to become a member. Speaking of which, let me read a couple of quick member comments for you. A lot of people talking about community here. So, Cuezi writes in, I'm so excited that I finally made it to home from work and Time to watch live. The only downside is that I have nothing to look forward to tomorrow at work.

That's funny. You guys seriously get me through the day. It's so refreshing to know that there is a community of people who actually care about fixing what is broken in our country instead of just putting a Band-Aid on it. Well, we're right here for you, no question. Tamara 517 says, super excited to watch live. I've been an activist member for over a year and I've wanted to participate forever. To keep it simple, thank you for giving me a gym to work out the muscle that is my brain.

Love you guys. Thank you, Tamara. That's really, really good for you. And last one here, Paul Sullivan says, funny how none of this matters since he was in high school. Almost like the black young men in prison for life for nonviolent crimes are different people from when they were 17. Thank you. Strange that it doesn't apply to them too.

Yeah. So, you know, that triggered an interesting idea. If the Republicans say, yeah, he might have done it, but he was 17. Maybe we can have a deal if you release everyone in prison who got caught for doing something when they were 17. Do you want to make that deal? By the way, I don't even know if I really want that. I mean, of course when it comes to drug offenses, I agree wholeheartedly.

But rape and murder are serious, like serious crimes. And 17 is different from 12. So. Yeah, no, of course I don't want that deal. Some of the people that would be released are worthy of that release. and some people that committed terrible, terrible crimes in 17 are probably potentially still dangerous. So, but it makes no sense to have two different standards. Right.

So that's a great point by Paul as well. All right. What's next, Anna? All right. Donald Trump continues to support Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh. And even though Democrats in the Senate Judiciary Committee are calling for the FBI to do an investigation to either confirm or find some information, about whether or not these allegations against Kavanaugh are true, Trump says that it's unlikely that the FBI will conduct the investigation. Now, part of the reason why is the FBI can't do

that unless the White House signs off on it. And Trump has been clear in saying that he's not going to sign off on it. Now, before we get to that, though, I do want to show you the messaging from Trump that will be repeated over and over again. And it is to attack Democrats or rather than address the real allegations lodged against Brett Kavanaugh. Take a look. Judge Kavanaugh is one of the finest people that I've ever known. Never had even a little blemish on his record. I wish the Democrats could have done this a lot sooner because they had this information

for many months and they shouldn't have waited until literally the last days. They should have done it a lot sooner. But with all of that being said, so you would have thought, certainly that she would have brought it up at the meeting, not wait till everything's finished and then have to start a process all over again. But with all of it being said, but again, this is something that should have been brought up long before this. They had the information in July, as I understand it. It's very, you know, it's very unfortunate that didn't mention it sooner. But with all of that being said, again, this should have been brought up a long time

ago. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. No, no, we didn't repeat any of that. He does the repetition by himself. And he keeps saying, with all that being said, that's why JR left that in there, because he's supposed to get to the actual point. But he can't help himself. And in fact, when asked about attacking the Democrats another time, he's like, well, I'm not going to do that today. I might do it in a couple of days.

Okay, well, what difference does it make that? And besides what, you couldn't help yourself? And a good and fair question that we've been asking for a couple of days now is you're claiming, Okay, that's what some Democrats knew. How about the Republicans? Right. How did they have that letter ready of 65 women that knew Kavanaugh back when he was in high school? How did they have that done in 24 hours?

Seems like they knew too. Mitch McConnell, why did he warn you not to appoint Kavanaugh in the first place? As Anna pointed out days ago, did Mitch McConnell know? So those are good and important questions. Democrats, you should be asking those questions too. Now, in terms of the FBI getting involved, Senate Democrats have been clear in that they don't, they're not calling for a criminal investigation. They are calling for the type of investigation by the FBI that was conducted when Anita Hill

came forward with her allegations against Clarence Thomas to, you know, if Kavanaugh didn't do it, maybe there's a way to clear his name. They just want this to be investigated and they want the FBI involved. And Trump doesn't seem willing to get the FBI involved. Now remember, he doesn't seem to have much love for the FBI in the first place. But the Justice Department released an interesting statement. They said the allegation does not involve any potential federal crime. The FBI's role in such matters is to provide information for the use of the decision makers.

Okay, so the DOJ acknowledges that the investigation would be for information so people can use that information to either confirm or vote against Kavanaugh. But they don't want to do that either. And then Trump addressed this as well during his press conference. And here's what he had to say. We have time available. We will delay the process until it's finished out. I guess we've invited everybody.

I know I can tell you this, that Judge Kavanaugh is anxious to do it. I don't know about the other party, but Judge Kavanaugh is very anxious to do it. And a delay is certainly acceptable. I don't think the FBI really should be involved because they don't want to be involved. If they wanted to be, I would certainly do that. But as you know, they say this is not really their thing. Really? I haven't seen anything from the FBI indicating that they don't want to be involved in this.

The only thing I have seen from the FBI is a statement indicating that they can't do the investigation unless the White House sanctions it. Well, this is a man who thinks cooperating with federal law enforcement maybe should be outlawed. So it's unsurprising that he doesn't want federal law enforcement involved in actually gathering evidence. So, of course, the FBI said no such thing. And it's not that complicated. It's true. It's not a federal crime. The FBI is not investigating to arrest Kavanaugh or anything. It might be a state crime, but not a federal one. It's, but the FBI does background checks. This is the most important background check there is. This is exactly what they did, as Anna pointed

out, with Anita Hill and Clarence Thomas. So why wouldn't you just apply the same standard? Or are you afraid what they would find? And then one final thing is Mark Judge, who was allegedly the other person in the room when this attack happened, says that he does not want to testify before the Senate, specifically the Senate Judiciary Committee. Both Dr. Ford and Kavanaugh have agreed to testify. However, Mark Judge says, no, I did not ask to be involved in this matter, nor did anyone ask me to be involved.

The only reason why I am involved is because Dr. Christine Blasey Ford remembered me as the other person in the room. He also says, in fact, I have no memory of this alleged incident. Brett Kavanaugh and I were friends in high school, but I do not recall the party described in Ford's letter. So his defense so far has been, I don't remember, I have no recollection. I think that's an interesting way of handling it. There hasn't really been a flat out denial of what's going to mention.

No, there was, there was yesterday. So it went like this. At first he said, I have no recollection. Then he said, no, it's absolutely nuts. Oh, he called it nuts. Yeah. But today it's interesting that he went back to, I don't recall. And remember, he's written books about his struggle with alcoholism, et cetera.

That might be one reason why he doesn't recall. Or it might be that he's like, what if they get other evidence? So it's easy for me to say, I don't recall. I was been drinking at the time, right? So, of all people, I think Megan Kelly made an interesting point yesterday when she said, why would Dr. Ford put Mike Judge, a friend of Kavanaugh, in the room if she made it up? If you're going to make up a story, you wouldn't put a corroborating witness for him in the same room. And Dr. Ford's a 51-year-old professor.

She's not, and again, she'd have had to make it up in 2012 when she talked about it earlier. So none of that adds up. One more thing, at least judge was sophisticated enough to say, I don't remember if I was at a party like that. Orrin Hatch screwed up while defending Kavanaugh and recently said, Kavanaugh told me in a meeting that he wasn't at that party. Wait a minute, she never said which party. She never said which date.

So then people were like, what do you mean? Was Kavanaugh, was Kavanaugh know the party that she's referring to? And then Orrin Hatch just spoke to people out to be like, no, no, no, no. Kavanaugh didn't say that to us. He said he doesn't remember being at a party like that. What does a party like that even mean, by the way? You don't recall being at any party where you were drunk, where people were going swimming when you were 17 years old in the summer?

Okay, so that little backpedal I thought was a little telling too. And again, these guys seem to have known for a long time that this might become an issue. How would they know it was going to become an issue if they never heard from her? That means they might have heard from him. And if they heard from him, then she's clearly not making it up. Let's take one more break in this hour. When we come back, we will talk about China. There's a lot that isn't really being reported.

So we'll go into those details. And then later on, some of the women who voted for Trump now, possibly regretting their decision. That's a really interesting story. All right, for all the members, you're going to get the whole show whenever you want, obviously. For some of you, the episode ends here. But remember, there's a whole two-hour show. Make sure you get that anytime you want by becoming a member, tyt.com slash join.

All right, we'll be right back. We hope you're enjoying this free clip from the Young Turks. If you want to get the whole show and more exclusive content while supporting independent media, become a member at t-y-t.com slash join today. In the meantime, enjoy this free second. All right, back on the Young Turks. All right, we worked ourselves up into being bitter over the break.

Yeah, sorry. I'm being a bad influence today. I'm going to, I'll try to cheer up. By the way, it said in the live stream there, seven and a half billion views in one of our little videos that we were run for you guys. So I just saw the August report and we're up to over 9 billion views now. So God bless. Anyway, Dan Campbell writes in on YouTube super chat. Hey, you bums, just saying hello regards to the team. Right back at you, Dan. How you doing, you bum? All right, math and magician

on Twitter says, Trump doesn't trust the FBI because he's a criminal, period. And alleged rapist as well. So there's that. And then in the member comments, Ruth and H.R. Pets writes in, wow, I thought that was a strange editing. But no, Trump just keeps saying the same thing. Like, he keeps saying the same thing. You know, the same thing. Yes, he does. Yes, he does, Ruth. Okay. Now, Now, one more comment actually from membership drive. Greetings from Canada, Craig Wrightson, became a TYT member on the first day of the membership drive.

I've been watching since the 2016 primary debates. I wanted to watch as much TYT heading into the midterm elections already booked a day off from working and plan on watching TYT. Well, bless your heart on that one. November 6th, don't miss it, that's the general election. and it is going to be a bonanza. We got Ted Cruz story coming up for you. He's up for election of Rick Scott, same thing.

Oh, that Ted Cruz story brings such joy to my heart. I know. Okay, just one last thing about programming notes. Today on Rebel headquarters, Wesley Bell, he's the guy that defeated Jerk of the year Bob McCullough in St. Louis. So an American hero, and he'll just going to tell us how he did it and how he plans to do criminal justice reform in St. Louis. That's on Rebel Headquarters immediately after the Young Turks.

And then in the post game for the members, Eric Biler's in the studio. So Eric has done a great number of interviews out there. He's right there. There's some madness in the control room. And he's going to come and talk to us about the interviews he did with Trump supporters. He has a unifying theory on Trump and race, et cetera. And then he's got a movie coming out about some sort of headless Klansman. So that's fascinating as well.

That's for all the members, so t-y-t.com slash join. All right, what's next, Dana? All right. It was reported yesterday that Donald Trump will increase the number of products coming in from China that will have to deal with tariffs, and this trade war continues. And just last week, it was reported that the Trump administration is thinking about sanctioning China following their treatment of minority Muslims in their country. which was strange.

And so I was curious why Trump, who's been pretty brutal in his rhetoric and his actions toward Muslims, would care about human rights abuses in China. Well, it turns out that it's part of a larger issue that Trump has had with China. And he is approaching our problems with the country in a way that's very different from previous presidents, including George W. Bush and Barack Obama. Now, to be fair, there are a number of issues with China. Vox did a great job listing all those issues, including the fact that Beijing has stolen U.S. technological and personal secrets for its own advantage, antagonized U.S. allies in the South

China Sea, killed or imprisoned more than a dozen American informants, and taken millions of U.S. jobs over the past 15 years. Now, we hear Trump talk about the jobs quite a bit. We hear him talk about how he believes we're being taken advantage of by China when it comes to trade. But this administration isn't really focused on one thing or on a couple of things. It's focused on everything related to China and what we perceive to be their wrongs. So that's an expert saying that Bonnie Glazer from Center for Strategic and International

Studies. And the reason she says that is now people are concerned that Trump isn't just trying to gain an advantage in trade in one particular area or do a deal to block North Korean nuclear program in another area, that what he's actually trying to do is actually create a downturn in the Chinese economy so they are not as big of an economic competitor to us. But that is a very, very dangerous game to play, because if you have a significant downturn in the Chinese economy, it could have not just ripple effects, but tsunami effects throughout the entire global economy.

They're the second largest economy in the world, and it could come back to bite us. But that would require an understanding of consequences and a chessboard and how you do strategy. That's why I thought the most amusing part of this story was a quote from another so-called strategist saying Trump is engaged in a sophisticated form of economic warfare. to confront the Chinese. When I read that quote, I thought, which strategist is saying that he is doing sophisticated format? I'm gonna make note of who this guy is, so I never pay attention to him again.

And then I saw the quote is from Steve Bannon. I was like, oh, okay, got it. Okay. So it's not sophisticated, that's part of the problem. And look, I want us to be, believe it or not, I want to be fair to Trump because there There are issues with China, and we've had issues with China. And the approach from previous presidents has been very different. The approach has been more diplomatic because the thinking was, and I think that I agree more

with this than the way Trump is handling it, if we try to engage with them in a diplomatic way and we actually open up the economic possibilities with China, there's a possibility that they are more willing to work with us and do something about the human rights abuses that they're committing in their own country, just as one example. But no, Trump comes in and he's like, I'm gonna crush them. So tariffs, just random, sporadic, arbitrary tariffs, I'm gonna slap them onto Chinese products that we import, and then we're gonna crush their economy. And then they're gonna be so desperate that they're gonna do what we want them to do.

But it doesn't work that way. I'm not sure that I agree fully with either option. So the Bush-Obama option was total engagement. So if we bring them into the, you know, developed countries and we do an engagement policy where we consider them, quote unquote, responsible stakeholders, that they will then act in a responsible way, look, I get the upsides of it and they have joined the world community in other ways and foster trade, et cetera, that has been positive. On the other hand, it is a tiny bit naive.

So what they are much more likely to do is what they've done. Thank you very much for all the things that you've given me. I'm still going to go and take your secrets and do the cyber attacks and take every advantage that I can. And it's a relatively smart strategy. But they do it behind the scenes so they don't seem like the bad guys. Now, Trump, on the other hand, comes in like a bull in a China shop, if you will. And he comes in and goes, me do terrorists, me attack you. Well, okay, but you were so unsophisticated.

Now, we look like the bad guys. Okay, so look, the way that Obama and Bush handled it, I get it, there is a certain level of, you know, being naive and thinking, oh, if we work with them, they're going to give us what we want. And of course, it didn't really work out that way. However, there are some major issues where it did work out to our advantage. So, for instance, look, one of the bigger factors in North Korea being a threat to this, the United States or to any other country with their nuclear capabilities, quickly developing

nuclear capabilities, is, hey, you know what, there's China. And China is really the only country that continues to support North Korea. So if we can get China to agree with us and to actually impose these sanctions, economic sanctions against North Korea, well, then you strip Kim Jong-un of some of his power. But here's the thing. China had agreed to do that. China had agreed to play along with the sanctions. until Trump started attacking them ruthlessly and, you know, incessantly and started going

after them with these tariffs. And now they're like, no, we're going to open up our relations with North Korea again. We're going to go ahead and help them out economically again. And that's what's happening right now. So look, I think that there's some middle ground. I'm not a foreign policy expert. I don't know exactly what that middle ground is. I do know that I would prefer the Obama Bush, you know, strategy way more than what we're seeing

with Trump. And remember, there's also the added after effect of increased consumer prices here in the United States. Because one of the things that Trump thinks is going to happen is, all right, well, Apple, for instance, relies heavily on Chinese labor to make its products. And so if the tariffs are high, maybe Apple will bring jobs back here to the United States. Except Apple has said, no, we are not going to do that. We are going to, they literally said we're going to pass the costs onto the consumers. So Trump hasn't thought any of this through. He just thinks by bullying China, they're going to go ahead and cave or concede to what he wants.

But it's not working out that way. So look, I'll give you my quick take on what I would do instead. But first, to Anna's question, it's a no-brainer. Is it Bush Obama policy that I think is a little too trusting versus the Trump policy of break everything in your path? No, of course I take Bush Obama in those two situations. Just if those are the only two choices, Trump is, doesn't even realize the overall Chinese strategies to wait them out.

They're like, at most, he's gonna be in office six years. That's the law in America, whereas Xi, the leader of China has basically declared that he's gonna stay there for life. So he's like, we'll just wait for a new administration. So if I was in charge, I would realize that dynamic and realize, hey, I can't play the the long game here, because they have a much easier way of waiting us out than we do of affecting them in the long run, besides which, I don't want to crash their economy. That is obviously going to have effects on us.

So I would do likewise. Like, for example, the Chinese, we believe they hacked into the Office of Personnel Management and stole sensitive information on millions of Americans. So what would I do? I would hack into all of their, for every system of ours that they broke into, or government, office of ours that they attacked with a cyber attack, I would do three times as much to them. But publicly, I'd say, oh my gosh, China had a cyber attack against them, where all the sensitive information, their sensitive information is now in the hands of other people.

Well, golly gee, I wouldn't know anything about that. As a Chinese wouldn't know anything about the attacks against us. Well, I can't imagine who would be doing that. So you would send a message to China, look, my button is bigger than yours. Okay, you want to attack us, we'll attack you, but we're not going to get you. get caught with our hand in the cookie jar. Why, why is that relevant? Because you want to appeal to other nations to work with you instead of China, including

on trade deals, so that helps lift your economy up. Instead, what has happened, because we're, as Trump's lawyer called him, he's a goddamn dumbbell. So now China has run into the open arms of the rest of the world, including Russia. Russia. Yeah, so I'm glad you brought that up because that's an important part of this equation as well. Look, the United States is not the only country in the world, right? We are not the most powerful country in the world. Yes, we're powerful. But you also have to keep in mind that

there are other countries with massive economies that- At TYT, we frequently talk about all the ways that big tech companies are taking control of our online lives, constantly monitoring us and storing and selling our data. But that doesn't mean we have to let them. It's possible to stay anonymous online and hide your data from the prying eyes of big tech. And one of the best ways is with ExpressVPN. ExpressVPN hides your IP address, making your active ID more difficult to trace and sell the advertisers. ExpressVPN also encrypts 100% of your network data to protect you from eavesdroppers and cybercriminals. And it's also easy to install. A single mouse click protects all your devices. But listen, guys, this is important. ExpressVPN is rated number one

by CNET and Wired Magazine. So take back control of your life online and secure your data with a top VPN solution available, ExpressVPN. And if you go to ExpressVPN, VPN.com slash T-Y-T, you can get three extra months for free with this exclusive link just for T-Y-T fans. That's E-X-P-R-E-S-S-V-P-N dot com slash T-YT. Check it out today. China can do business with, and that's exactly what's happening right now. They decided, hey, you know what, let's increase business with Russia and Iran. And so these are, like, the after effects of Trump's policies, his ridiculous, not so well thought out policies are not so good for Americans.

Like, while he thinks that he's actually helping Americans and he's attempting to bring jobs here, he's not. I think that there is a way to do it. And I'm not saying you let China do whatever it wants. But the way that Trump has handled this has been childish. He hasn't thought it through. It's unnuanced. And so, I mean, we'll see what happens.

But China has already responded to the latest round of tariffs coming from Trump by saying, all right, well, we're going to retaliate. more tariffs for America? The dumbbell really thought that China would just cave, that he'd go, oh my God, you put tariffs on us, I'm so sorry, I'll do whatever you want, Mr. Trump. Of course they're not going to do that. They're the second largest economy in the world, so what did they turn around? So one of the things that Trump did to punish them was, you're not allowed to participate

in our war games anymore in the Pacific that we do with 22 other countries. Okay, I mean, that's a debatable strategy, but what did it lead to? led to China, four months later, making a deal with Russia to participate in war games with them. And then that led to honoring Putin, and Putin honors Xi, and then next to you know they're doing more trade, and their boats are being lifted up while we're getting less trade and less good results in our economy. And so, and what is the net result?

Remember, Trump is obsessed with lowering the trade deficit, but all it's done since he's been in office is go further up. Just last month, it went up by $31 billion just against China. So it's an epic failure on every front. He's weakened us throughout the world. And then he says outrageous things like this. Like, you can say China's done wrong things. We say it. We just said it on the show. And I told you how I would fight back and it wouldn't be pleasant. But he says we can't continue to allow China to rape our country. And that's what they're doing. Come on, man. You're supposed He just to do a tiny bit of diplomacy. He says it's an economic enemy because they have taken advantage of us like nobody in history.

It's the greatest theft in the history of the world what they've done to the United States. No, I don't know what you're talking about. I feel like that's a perfect strategy to get China to work with you. Yeah, they'll do exactly what you want after you accuse them of raping us. Yeah, there has to be carrots and sticks. But if your stick is a chainsaw verbally and actually has no real stick economically, well, you've got the worst of all worlds. We've got a lot of bluffing and a lot of bluster with no actual effect.

And so even people in his own administration don't agree to this. The Republicans don't agree to this. No one thinks this is a good idea outside of Donald Trump and Steve Bannett. Yeah. All right, moving on, stick with this master because there's a second component that I want to get to. Donald Trump recently increased the number of tariffs or a number of products from China that will have to deal with taxes through trade.

And China has responded by saying that it will continue to retaliate against these tariffs. Now to be specific, America's trade deficit in goods and services with China was about $335.4 billion in 2017. In August, though, it grew by another $31 billion, meaning that Beijing exported $31 billion more goods to the U.S. that month than the U.S. sent the other way. Now, this is all incredibly important information for you to know about because it proves that these tariffs are not working. China has not conceded in doing anything that Trump wants to do.

In fact, they've doubled down, they've added more tariffs to retaliate. And the people who will suffer are U.S. consumers because many products are either manufactured in China and then brought here to the United States. or U.S.-based companies that manufacture products here rely on Chinese parts to be imported to the United States so they can make their products. So as a result, manufacturers are going to spend more money on manufacturing. And so the cost will be transferred to us, the consumers. And recently Wilbur Ross was asked about this.

You know, is this good policy? Isn't this horrible for consumers? And here's what he had to say. Average American family making $50,000 a year, let's say, how much do you expect these tariffs will impact them, meaning have you done the math? Well, you can do the numbers this way. If you have a 10% tariff on another $200 billion, that's $20 billion a year. That's a tiny, tiny, tiny fraction of 1% total inflation in the U.S. because it's spread

Over thousands and thousands of products, nobody's going to actually notice it at the end of the day. So he believes that the middle class and the working class in the United States will not feel this. Keep in mind that Wilbur Ross might feel that way because he is worth $2.9 billion. So he doesn't understand what it's like to be an American who has a household income of $51,000. has already responded to Trump after he claimed that, you know, maybe Apple will manufacture everything here in the United States so they don't have to deal with the tariffs, they responded

by saying, no, we're going to increase our prices, so consumers will have to pay more. Yeah, it doesn't work the way that Wilbur Ross explained it. God help us, this guy's the Commerce Secretary. And so it's not like, since it affected the overall economy by a small percentage, then Apple will only raise their price by less than a cent. No, Apple is directly affected, so they are affected way more than the average of the entire economy. There are parts of the economy that are not affected, and that affects your overall average.

So the price of Apple is going to go up significantly, the iPhones, et cetera. Air conditioning prices have already got up, steel prices have already gone up, and it's not By 1%. I think the reason the CNBC anchor goaded him that way is because he knew he'd make news, because Ross has said this on two different occasions earlier, where he made a claim that it's only going to go up by three-tenths of one cent or six-tenths of one cent. So he's like, oh, tell us about the math. He's like, watch this idiot embarrass himself again.

That's not how it works. It goes industry by industry. When their prices are affected, they increase prices on those particular products. Yeah. We have a bunch of dumbbells running the country. So meanwhile, on the other hand, China is going around brilliantly isolating us. So you know how many countries are down to recognizing Taiwan? We think Taiwan should be recognized as its own country.

China thinks it should be part of one China. We're down to 17 countries. El Salvador just pulled out. And what is China doing? They're going around. They're providing economic benefits to people. And another thing that you don't hear about, and this is really interesting. They're providing aid all across the world.

Here in America, we go, oh, don't give anybody any international aid. It's a stupid idea. We should just keep everything, right? You know how much aid China is giving to the rest of the world? According to their plans, a trillion dollars, a trillion dollars to the rest of the world. Now, you think China, the Chinese government is doing that for the health of El Salvador? No, they're doing it to gain allies because it benefits them. Because, and now that Trump is withdrawing from the world stage, he's withdrawing the United

States, China has now stepped up. After we withdrew from the Paris Climate Accord, China stepped in and said, we will now lead the world in fighting against climate change. And then after Trump attacked our allies in Europe and throughout the world, China steps up every time and says, that's okay, we are the new global leader. And by the way, we got a trillion dollars in aid to help you out to back. Back that up. And next thing you know, China starts winning more agreements and more votes, whether

it's in the United Nations or anything else. Because they are actually acting in a way that is rational for their self-interest, whereas we have a bunch of goddamn dumbbells running this country. Let's take a break. When we come back, Trump wants to release classified documents, unredacted pertaining to the Russia investigation. Yeah, look, that story, I thought originally it was political. I actually now think it's more nefarious than that.

So we'll explain when we come back. Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks. Support our work, listen to ad-free, access members-only bonus content, and more by subscribing to Apple Podcasts at apple.com slash t-y-t. I'm your host, Jank Huger, and I'll see you soon.