The Young Turks - The Young Turks 12.22.17: Tax Bill Signed, Thanks Trump Ad, and Elderly Weed Bust

Episode Date: December 23, 2017

A portion of our Young Turks Main Show from December 22th, 2017. For more go to http://www.tytnetwork.com/join. Hour 1: Cenk, Brett Erlich, & Mark Thompson. President Donald Trump signed the Republican tax cut bill Friday morning before leaving for his Christmas break in Florida. He also signed the continuing resolution that will keep the government open through January 19. That includes $4 billion for missile defense.  Hour 2: Cenk, Mark Thompson, & Hannah Cranston. Sam Haskell, chief executive officer of the Miss America Organization, was suspended on Friday after a report revealed purported emails from him, board members and others disparaging pageant contestants, the organization said in a statement. The U.S. State Department has told refugee agencies it will sharply pare back the number of offices across the country authorized to resettle people in 2018 as President Donald Trump cuts the number of refugees allowed into the United States. Life expectancy possibly down third year. A political action committee (PAC) supporting President Trump is set to release a new ad that depicts multiple people thanking Trump for various reasons, including for “letting us say 'Merry Christmas' again.” The ad, which comes as part of a $1 million ad buy from pro-Trump PAC America First Policies, is set to begin on Christmas Day. It was beginning to look a lot like cannabis.Deputies in Nebraska said they first noticed a strong stench coming from a truck they pulled over during a routine traffic stop on a highway this week. Upon further inspection, large bags discovered inside allegedly contained 60 pounds of marijuana. An elderly couple — Patrick Jiron, 80, and his wife, Barbara, 83 — said they were transporting the drugs from Northern California, where they live, to Vermont. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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All right, back on the Young Turks, Jank, Brett, and Mark with you guys. Unstable Canadian Rights in, Jank, you should stop calling them donors and call them what they really are, owners. Ooh. Hmm. Yeah. I think you are pretty stable, actually. I'm going to agree to disagree with you. Just the owners. The owners. The owners. Like the bears. Oh, the owners, that's not bad. The owners. Kind of like that. And the justice is, the owners.

Oh, man, I really like that. Yes. We got something here. I did a thing this year. But you know what? Unstable Canadian, that was a collabo. So I'm going to give you a T-shirt, okay? Nice.

Yeah, so shop, t-y-t.com, everybody. What do I? Lapell pens are apparently almost sold out. That's the thing to panic on today. But we're not kidding when they sell out. They used to sell out. It takes a while to get bringing back. And a restock of mugs along with new items like license plate covers and lanyards are now finally in, apparently, because those sold out earlier.

So shop, t.com for the holidays. And Bud Askin says, Nikki's friendship party includes many countries that will not be with us much longer due to climate change and rising ocean. That's so true. That's a great take. That's hilarious. But apparently you're getting a T-shirt too. Or one of those rare pins. Those pins are awesome, by the way.

They're like heavy. They feel expense. They're good. Okay. Peter Hamby wrote in on YouTube Super Chat, which we appreciate. I want to wish everyone of the Young Turks a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. That includes you, Jenk, Anna, J-R, John Brett, and everyone else. And Mark.

Merry Christmas to you, too. Finally, Chelsea Charles says, T.Y.T. perspective and led me out of my quote all lives matter mode of thinking as long as we continue to grow and progress and progress. That is what's important. Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays, TYT fam. Oh, that's nice. Chelsea, thank you so much, Ben. I super, super appreciate it. Every time I see one of those tweets or emails or comments where you guys say we helped to change you hopefully in a positive direction. That's literally, by the way, in our mission statement, which we've never read to you guys.

But it's to try to bring, and it's a grand one, but we're trying, try to bring positive change to the world. So if we've done that in a micro or a micronisia kind of way, we really appreciate you sharing that with us. All right. Let's do it, Brett. All right. We don't always have ambassadors to countries these days, but when we do, they put their foot in their mouth. So this is an amazing moment from our ambassador to the Netherlands, Pete Hoekstra. He took the job on December 11th.

he did an interview when he was asked to explain some of his statements about Islam in the Netherlands and whether there were no go areas of the country. And he gave a weird response calling it fake news. The video put together from the news organization in the Netherlands that he was doing the interview with just is so crazy priceless. Let's take a look. Speaking of threat, at one point you mentioned in a debate that there are no-go zones in the Netherlands and that cars and politicians are being set on fire

in the Netherlands. I didn't say that. That is actually an incorrect statement yeah, we would call it fake news. I never said that. Because it's what you literally said. No, it's not what I said. The Islamic movement is now gotten to a point where they have put Europe into chaos. Chaos in the Netherlands, there are cars being burned, there are politicians that are being burned. Yes, there are no-go zones in the Netherlands. Oops.

So good. And it gets even we're even we're saying it's fake news. So we have called you out for saying it's fake news. And then we proved it wasn't fake news. They follow up on his having just called it fake news. Here's his response to that. And look, please, at the interviewer when he hears the response. You call it fake news.

Obviously, I didn't call that. That's fake news. I didn't use the word this today. No? No. I don't think I'd yet. Okay. I think.

He looks like, can we roll the tape immediately? Is that possible? Am I the one who took the crazy bill here? We don't have enough playback machines for this thing. But, you know, I mean, this is the post-truth world. This is exactly what they're talking about. Where you just keep on lying, no matter what. Like, what you just said fake news, no idea.

But you're on tape saying it, we can just play it back. No, you can't. You said the cars and politicians were burning. No, I didn't. Cars and politicians were burning. No, it's wrong. Yeah, that was that. What do you do?

But that's exactly like our overall macro dilemma here in America and now it's spreading to the rest of the world. What do you do when someone or a lot of people refuse to acknowledge reality? They just, no, they don't care about the truth. And that doesn't compute. Then we're talking different languages. And I literally don't know what to do with that. That is the, I'm so glad you mentioned this, because to me, this is a real serious issue.

And one of the great things about TYT, and you got in that one tweet is that we try to get all the facts in. And sometimes the facts are balanced in a way, meaning that our position isn't always the one that carries the day. In some moment, we try to say, well, we try to be fair to. Anyway, overall, then, that's the way dialogues progress, right? That we have facts, they have facts, they examine our facts, we examine their facts, and then consensus is actually reached. But once you decide that your facts are the facts, and I don't care about the other person's facts,

in fact, I'll even deny my facts and the fact that I've said what my facts are, I mean, all of a sudden you're in crazy land, and now, and that's where we are. And it just becomes identity politics, and that's what is being played out right there. That was Hoekstra saying, the people who support me don't care about the truth at all. So all of this is irrelevant. You guys will have fun with it. It doesn't matter. They'll look at that and go, oh, yeah, Hoekstra nailed it.

Yeah, there was a, there's a great quote, because Hoekshire was born in the Netherlands and his family emigrated to America. He was a... Build the wall. Build a wall. Keep the water out. That's what they do in the Netherlands. Or just, anyway.

So he moved out, and he was a Republican senator, or a Republican representative in Michigan for over a decade. And when asked, what is it like for having an American ambassador to the Netherlands, who's actually from the Netherlands, one person said he's a Dutchman, but he's from the Netherlands of the 50s. Because he has a number of positions that are just out of place in the Netherlands now. He's against same-sex marriage, gay rights, abortion, the death penalty. He's for the death penalty, and he's against refugees. And it's just not a popular person there.

It's strange. And like, you're an ambassador standing up in front of their media and just saying fake news and lying. Like, that is not a very, you know, diplomatic thing to be doing. But the reference of the 50s puts him in lockstep with where this country is now, right? The ruling leadership of this country now is old white guys who are making it 1950 again. That's exactly what's happening. And so he's perfectly in concert with the administration that he's serving. Yeah, all the hats, make America great again.

It doesn't mean great for everyone. It means make America 1950 again. And the 1950s were great for some people. And they were terrible for some people. And that's exactly the 1950s they want to go back to. And Netherlands, bless their hearts, has advanced way past that. So when you throw this barbarian into their mix, they're like, what is this? I don't know what to do with this.

Who's this time traveler? And then here's my favorite part of this. Hostra, when he was in Congress, served as the chair of the House Intelligence Committee. My goodness. All right, let's move on to Trump's trips. How about that? How many times has the president been to his own properties now that the year is coming to a close? Well, the answer is over a hundred.

According to a report from CNN, Trump's Friday arrival at Mar-a-Lago on the heels of signing the tax bill. He just left and went to Marlago. It's a hundred and six day he's visited one of his properties as a president. A fact that critics argue helps the businessman turned politician boost, the bottom line of the Trump organization. Just a quick recap of all the days he spent, how that breaks up. We don't need to go to the graphics. 34 days at Maralago, 40 days at Bedminster, 23 times at the Trump International Hotel, just blocks down the street from the White House on Pennsylvania Avenue, which is weird. He's been there five times during his presidency.

And then he also went to the Trump International Hotel at Waikiki. This is, this costs, you know, the taxpayers not only an average of about $3 million for every four days that he's away, according to analysis of one Obama administration trip that he made. But also, it costs a lot of money toward local law enforcement, $60,000 in overtime per day, according to CNN, the cost to the local government for protection. him. So a couple of notes here. One is that stop that Brett mentioned. So on his way to Asia, Trump stopped for no reason at all in Hawaii so that he could go to Trump International Hotel Waikiki. It's just on our dime a massive ad for his property. I mean, there's no reason to stop there. But he did it obviously for marketing. He's supposed to turn over his properties when he's America because he's not supposed to serve himself when he's president. He's supposed to serve

all of us, right? And he won't do it. At a minimum, you're supposed to put it in a blind trust. He's like, I did. Well, where is it? It's in my son. Like my son's trust, he's handling it. Well, then it's not blind. Right. You know what all your properties are. That's why you're stopping at them. And you know your kids are running it. And he said about the tax plan, he's like, it's so good, I might go back into business. You are in business. That's what you're doing. except you're doing it on our dime. But to me, the numbers that really stand out is his 106th day. It's been less than a year.

It's been 11 months, 106 days on his own properties, 80 days golfing. And he had the temerity to criticize Obama for golfing too much. I haven't golfed 80 days in my life. Okay, and I like golf. I like pitching pot. I like the three par thing. It's fun. I'd love to go.

I feel like I'm too busy to go on the weekends. The president of the United States has gone 80 times in 11 months. That's unbelievable to me. Where have you been 100 times? Where have you spent 100 days this year? Like, I can't think. I got a gym membership. I'm like, I'm going all the time.

40. Like, that's super max this year. There's, where have I, I've been here a hundred times and I've been to my house a hundred times? That's it. Well, and look, the Trump hypocrisy is now, I mean, it's just, it's almost mythological, the way he was banging on Obama about, as Jank says, about taking so much time, golfing him. That was his big.

This guy plays golf more than the pros, you know? And then, of course, Trump does that. How he's banging on Hillary about the email server and what do we find out? Everybody, with everybody, first of all, conflict of interest, he's surrounded by everybody who's got one interest or another at the White House, and they're all on private servers. I mean, sending government documents.

So this cascade of parity continues. And he's an utter hypocrite. But ultimately, you get to the cost. And that's what really pisses me off. I mean, we're talking about hundreds of millions of dollars of our money. And again, from an administration that says, oh, we're going to cut the waste. And, you know, again, he was singing that tune.

So it's hypocrisy on top of just profligate spending to secure a president who's just doing a big commercial for his own properties. That's what it is. Like, I mean, you can argue that the Democrats don't care about the deficit. Now you can absolutely say the Republicans don't. Don't care about the deficit. Now it's down to how they spend the money they don't have, and I'd just rather spend it on people who need it. That's the difference.

All right. And then one last thing is Trump was being sued by someone for the violating the emoluments clause, which basically says it's illegal for you to give, you know, use the government to give yourself profits to your own business. That was dismissed recently because the plaintiffs in the case lacked standing, not due to the merits of their argument. So it was like, these people can't sue him, but they didn't say you can't sue them because of that. So keep an eye on that. This guy's a parade of violating that clause, right? Oh, yeah. Yeah, he's a, for another time.

He doesn't have Santa Claus. He has Emoluments Clause. That's his favorite call. All right. Emoluments is thinking, he gets the North Pole. I get Trump. All right, one last thing. Hundreds of EPA employees are no more under Trump, according to Times and ProPublica report.

They say that. Let's go to this graphic. They say, actually, I don't know if we have it, but the Times in ProPublica reported that the departures were buyouts, retirements, and individuals quitting, but totaled more than 700 employees, including more than 200 scientists, have disappeared from the EPA. Despite the decrease in science posts, there has been an uptick in political appointees, according to this ProPublica and New York Times report. report at the EPA. According to Friday's report, 73 jobs have been filled at the EPA, but in the office of EPA administrator, Scott Pruitt, to replace 53 openings. There's been a hiring freeze at the EPA. One person, one of the EPA workers unions representatives, says that there was a hiring freeze of, and the Trump administration seeks to get rid of 3,100 full full-time employees, and the budget

hints it upwards of 4,000. So of course the EPA is under attack in addition to, you know, Scott Pruitt being in charge of it, who is suing the EPA when he took the post. But Trump is still building walls

to combat climate change. That seems to be the only place he's taking a stand against climate change. He's building two walls. One wall will be 2,000 feet long, while the other will be 840 feet long. The time said the barriers will be made out of limestone rock and placed in front of holes 1,9 and 18

at his golf course in Ireland. The Irish Independent reported there will be 38,000 tons. And so he's taking apart the EPA, which seems to imply that he does not believe in climate change. However, his permit application to get the walls in 2016, he cited rising sea levels and extreme. weather as its reason to build the wall. My favorite part of that story is we just earlier in the week told you that the Trump

administration made the Pentagon take out climate change as a threat to our military and to our country. He made them take it out, even though they actually think it is a security threat. And they've been saying it all along. But when it serves his purposes, he puts it in the permit to build a walls in Ireland. Oh, my God, climate change. Did you guys know about rising sea levels? Nobody knew about rising sea levels until now.

So I need the walls. And unfortunately, they approved it in the case of Ireland, because actually there are rising sea levels. That part is true. And what's going on at the EPA has more to do with a lot of things that affect the quality of water and air and what's leaching into the water supply from the earth, then even climate change.

You know, EPA deals with the Superfund sites that have been vastly compromised during the hurricane. Remember in Texas, the Texas hurricane? We found out there were all these superfund sites. Those are toxified areas that were being inundated with water so that all that toxic stuff was going everywhere. Well, those are superfund sites that now a defunded EPA and gunned EPA can't address. So we're talking about real pollutants that are getting into the water supply of Americans. Add to that, all the EPA restrictions, which are being lifted, I mean all those restrictions, regulations, as he's called them, that affect clean air and clean water across the board.

So what you're seeing played out of the EPA extends beyond climate change. It extends to the air that we breathe and the water that we used to be able to drink. Yeah. And in terms of the damage that they're doing at the EPA, so 700 employees gone already, as Brett told you. But according to their budget, they're going to actually get rid of 4,000 employees at the EPA. So if you thought put aside climate change, pollution, the super fund sites, all those things, the streams in your neighborhoods. Well, there's no more, you know, you like cops, blue lives, these are cops to protect your family from something equally dangerous, which is the poison in the air and the water, et cetera. And they're taking all the cops away.

So the robbers are thrilled. Yeah. And his cherry picking of when, like it just proves that Trump is disingenuous, period. When it comes to his interest in preserving his own property, he is saying, I only essentially believe in climate change in the coast around my golf course. That's the only time he thinks that it applies to anything. And then when it comes to the EPA where you live, he's like, oh, it's not a problem. climate change is not a thing. Don't worry about it.

It'll be totally fine, which it just proves that he only uses these arguments when they literally benefit him personally. Look, this is a guy who doesn't know climate change from non-con. He is regurgitating that which he knows is the party position on climate change and that would be the assault on the environment that he is unleashing. And the EPA and the gutting of it is just one part of it. The other part is allowing all of his corporate pals to do whatever the F they want in terms of polluting those streams, in terms of fracking and mineral exploitation on U.S. parklands. I mean, what you're seeing is a selling out of this country and an assault on the environment on an unprecedented scale.

And I think the EPA is the tip of that iceberg. Yeah. But to be fair to him, he loves walls. He does. And he knows how big the ocean is. If you remember during the Puerto Rico disaster, he said, Puerto Rico is an island, surrounded by water, big water, ocean water. So maybe he realized, oh my God, Ireland also surrounded by big water, ocean water. And you know what?

The ocean is sending a lot of trouble to Ireland, sending some of its worst. Some of it, you know, some, I'm sure it's good ocean water, okay? But they need a wall. Ireland needs a wall to keep out the dangerous ocean, big ocean water. I'm just trying to be fair to it. Yeah, yeah. He's been consistent on that. Goodness.

Well, that's what we have for me. I'm done. Okay. You are indeed. Brett Ehrlich, pleasure to have you. Everybody check out Pop Trigger on the TYT Network. And watch honest press conferences. We do them weekly.

Very funny. We take the press conferences from the White House. And instead of letting Sarah answer the questions, I answer the questions, but instead of the way she does it, I actually tell the truth. It's very good. No, you guys are going to love honest press conferences. Yeah, it lights Twitter on fire, let alone everywhere else it is. And then Hannah Cranston from Think tanks coming up next.

There's a controversy surrounding the Miss Pagent, Miss America pageant, and it doesn't even involve Trump. So, man, that's a, there's a controversy within the controversy in that story. We'll tell you all about it when we come back. Thanks for listening to this podcast. You're only halfway through. So hold, hold, stay right here. Just want to remind you if you want to get all five segments of the Young Turks commercial free. These are just two of them.

Every day we do it. So go to t-y-tnetwork.com slash join, and you'll get the whole five segments, two hours. Add free. Do it now. All right, back on the Young Turks. Mark, Hannah, and Jenk with you guys. Member shoutouts today are JJ Dawson. Leanne Garcia. You guys are going to get a fun Christmas special post game today with Matt

Achnie, Francis Maxwell. Somebody else was on it. They played a fun game. I think Michael Scher was on it. Michael Schor. How's that for fun? Okay. And they played a game show basically. Of course Michael was on it. No one likes trivia in game shows more than Michael does. Smangman says, I watch pageants for the articles. And Kara Curley says pretty dresses are fun. But Why is that the focus of our worth? It's a very good question. All right, Hannah, what's next? All right.

The U.S. State Department has informed refugee agencies to downsize their U.S. operations, despite the massive refugee crises that we have around the world right now. Now, this announcement came on December 1st for many of these refugee agencies and has just become public. And this comes right after Trump said that he was going to be cutting the number of refugees allowed in the United States in 2018. Now, this decision is likely to lead to the closure of dozens of resettlement offices around the country, potentially leaving some refugees without access to services that help them integrate into American life. Now, these services include enrolling children in school, helping with doctors' visits,

applying for social security cards, and other documents. So needless to say, there's very important services that are provided. Now, there are about 300 resettlement offices spread across 49 states, and advocates estimate several dozen are at risk. Now, this is in conflict with the fact that the Trump administration has said that they want refugees to assimilate quickly, so the fact that they are, you know, really downsizing the amount of refugee agencies that can help them assimilate is a little perplexing. Now, a State Department official confirmed the December 1st meeting and said that the agency

is looking to reduce costs and simplify management structures to help the U.S. refugee admissions program run in a way that is fiscally. responsible and sustainable. So they are trying to reduce the offices. They're also reducing, like I said, the caps of refugees that are allowed into the country. Now, Trump in 2017 reduced the amount of refugees that we were letting into the company from 110,000, 100,000, excuse me, to 50,000 in 2017 and 45,000 in 2018. So we're reducing it even more. And this is the lowest number of refugees that we have allowed in the country since the U.S. refugee program was established in 1980. So this is pretty notable. And it's really discouraging

when you read about all these things that are happening around the world, when you read about what's happening in Myanmar with the Rohingya and Syria and Yemen and Afghanistan in Syria. I mean, the list goes on and on and the fact that we're saying, oh, no, no, screw you, is very upsetting. And it makes me not as proud to be an American. Yeah, it's a peak. It's a peak crisis for refugees worldwide and to see the American posture be, as you say, to wall up, I mean, if not literally, figuratively. And then I think you make a really good point when you talk about the fact that you want these people to productive members of society, you want them to integrate in a healthy way

and actually embrace America as opposed to these enclaves that can exist and they can be cultural enclaves as well as complete enclaves. That is to say there are many parts of immigrant communities that never successfully integrate in many societies because they are cut off. They're cut off by language. They're cut off by custom. They're cut off by law. And so to the degree that you can integrate them so that it can be productive Americans, these agencies are being boarded up. So it does work against, even with the small numbers of refugees that he's permitting in, it works against them becoming integrated into society.

So I'm going to do a little apples and oranges here, but I think get to the overall point. So I was not a refugee, but my family came over as legal immigrants who got green cards and citizenship. And when I got here, I didn't know any English. I knew three words. Yes, no and girl. And for whatever reason, I was eight years old. And I did not get English as a second language. They basically had one teacher who had me, a Vietnamese kid and a Korean kid.

And she would just put up pictures and say cat. And they have a picture of a cat and it would say cat. And we'd be like, oh, that's a cat. And we would learn that way. So I grew up thinking that's the right way to do it. Just throw them into the deep end, they'll be okay because that's what was my perspective. But throughout all these years, I've learned that you should think about other people's perspectives, right? And for some people, that's a better way.

It was for me. And for a lot of people, it's not the better way. And they need a little bit more help and assistance. And that was just on language. So when you're a refugee, which means you're in a much tougher situation than a legal immigrant, my dad was an engineer, my uncle was a doctor, these people have suffered through some of the worst atrocities in the world. They come here, they've got almost nothing to rely on, I was super lucky.

I lived in the suburbs. I happened to have a friend, a Turkish-American friend that lived across the street that would translate for me. Come on, I mean, who's that lucky, right? So if we want these folks to simulate to Hannah's point, maybe we should have. help them assimilate. And so then if you don't help them assimilate, then don't turn around later and go, why won't they assimilate? Right. Right. No, I mean, I think that's a, it's a really good point, right? It's like, we do need to help the people that are coming here

assimilate, of course. But I'm also, like, it's really hard for me to be, like, sitting here in America, and I'm going to go home and I'm going to go sit on my couch and watch TV tonight on a Friday night. But there's a genocide that is happening right now. There is a genocide, and there are systematic killings and systematic rapings that are happening across the world and we're just letting hundreds of thousands of people die, be raped and flee to Bangladesh, which is another poor country where they're in these poor camps. We're just sitting here and we're like, okay, for the people that we do let in, like, nah, figure out your own documents, like figure out your own schooling.

You're totally screwed. Like, it is so messed up and we're complicit in what is happening around the world right now because we're not doing anything to help these people. Yeah, we've talked about that hypocrisy in regards to the Rohingya several times. on the show. But it's not just the Trump administration. It's also, the media's complicit in it. I mean, if it was anyone murdering Christians instead of murdering Muslims, let alone if it was Muslims murdering Christians, you're telling me the world wouldn't be up in arms over hundreds of thousand people being killed. Millions moved. The systematic rape that Hannah's

referring to, we did a story on it on the Young Turks before. I mean, it's just the worst thing you've ever seen in your life, and we're doing basically nothing, nothing to help them. And with this story, with that story, what was great about America and part of the reason my family came here was because it was the shining city on a hill. It was an idea worth fighting for. But that idea isn't one of meanness and cruelty and exclusion. It's the one of the Statue of Liberty that says, give me your tire, you're poor, you're downtrodden. And we're going to give them hope. That's America that we should stand for. You know, that last point that Jenk just made is, I think, the most important takeaway to use that term that's overused.

And that is that it's inconsistent with American ideals. This is what I'm so troubled by. The turning our back on these refugees and on this worldwide refugee crisis, even to have a conversation about it, even to send our money, even to try to build international systems to accommodate it. I mean, leave aside getting these refugees to this country. But some of those things would be consistent with this wealthy nation, which is what we are, and the ideals that this wealthy nation is supposedly representing. And so I find to orphan these people this way, and even the refugees who have made it here.

And as Jenks says, I mean, there's PTSD and all kinds of crises that they're facing. and then to leave them without the means to integrate into the society. It's un-American, if I can say it, just not consistent with the country that we've built. No, I mean, you're completely right. I mean, our country was founded by, you know, refugees, religious refugees, and we look at these, and we look at the history of our country and how we, you know, failed Jewish people during the Holocaust. And we said, you know, never again, not on our watch, that thing.

But consistently, time and time again, it's been on our watch. And it's happened again and again and again. And now we're seeing, you know, a slave trade arise in Libya because we're not taking in refugees. We're seeing, you know, these people just wiped off the face of the earth in Myanmar. And we're just letting it happen again. And, you know, I understand that covering Trump's latest tweet or how he holds a water cup is sensational.

And we can, you know, that's going to get more clicks. But the media needs to be held accountable, too, in covering this so that we hold our government accountable in helping these poor people? And by the way, you know, I was, New York Times has done some great stuff on this and some exposés, and they followed a lot of these refugee families and they personalize these stories, which is really what you need to do. But I find that television media, you know, the cable news networks and all the rest, the evening news, I mean, they do, they do little or nothing.

Now, you can say their, their demographic is sort of being X'd out. But they are the people who voted in this administration in large measures. So I wish that story, to Hannah's point, was getting into some of the mainstream media beyond the written word. It's just that it must be the pictures or their ability. Or as you say, it's just simple distraction. There's enough of a smokescreen with whatever Trump's saying that it just makes better copy. Yeah. Yeah.

All right. We need to talk about a relatively new show called Un-F-B-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. Moving on. The CDC announced on Thursday that life expectancy is expected to decline this year for the second year in a row, marking the biggest hit our country has seen in almost a century, all right? So, excuse me, the life expectancy figure is actually based on the year of people's birth, current death trends, and other factors, and for decades, it was on the upswing, rising a few months nearly every year. But last year marked the first time in more than half a century that U.S. life expectancy fell two consecutive years, all right? A baby born last year in the U.S. is expected to live about 78 years and seven months on average. Now, typically, life expectancy goes back up after a one-year decline.

So this two-year decline is particularly notable. The last time there was a two-year drop was 1962 to 1963, and it also happened twice in the 1920s. Now, the CDC, is attributing this hit to fentanyl and its opioid cousins because drug deaths are at 63,600 this year up from about 52,000 in 2015. Now, experts are worried because we are not addressing the opioid epidemic in a particularly effective way, that this might continue the trend and we might see a three-year decline. We haven't seen a three-year decline since the 1916, 1917, and 18, three year decline, which was accounted for for the Spanish flu. All right.

So this is a pretty big deal. Now, death rates continued to go down for people who were 65 and older while going up for all younger adults who were most affected by the opioid epidemic. Now, obviously, Trump has said that he might say that this is a public health crisis. Now, just to give you guys some numbers behind. behind that. The public health emergency fund only holds around $57,000. All right. And last month, the White House placed the true cost of the opioid epidemic at over $500 billion in 2015. So that's a very wide range where we are missing money. And the last, you know, the tax

reform bill only took more money away from that. So we're on the right track. They just couldn't find the money to deal with an epidemic so large, it's knocking down all of our life expectancy. Right. I mean, that is unreal for one thing like that to affect that national average and to bring down how long we live on average in the nation. But that's not important. Tax cuts for the rich, that's really important. So they found all the money in the world for that. They found trillions of dollars for that. For an opioid epidemic, not as much.

So the second part of this story, in my opinion, is the degree to which the legal drugs turned out to be the gateway drugs. So two-thirds of last year's drug deaths, 42,000 involved opioids. Yes, heroin, methadone, but prescription painkillers like Oxycontin and fentanyl. So what are we doing here? It's super obvious that, remember when they used to say marijuana was a gateway drug? And doesn't that seem quaint and ridiculous and ancient now? But marijuana is still illegal in most places in the country, and certainly at the federal

level. And Trump is still talking about cracking down on marijuana. Meanwhile, you got Oxycontin and you got all these prescription drugs that are clearly, clearly leading to such a degree of death in the country, let alone all the people who were addicted in their lives ruined, but who didn't die, right? So much death that it has brought our national age down. and yet we still do nothing. And yet he declares it as, I mean, as a talking point, he declares it as a priority, right?

Do you know why he does that? Because it affects white men and white men in the most. So he's talking to his base without actually doing anything to help that. Sure, West Virginia, I think, is the state with the greatest fatality number. Right. And I think, I mean, I think that's just, it continues a trend that Trump has, you know, perpetuated in that he has these talking points to appeal to his base, right? Where he says he's going to give them tax cuts, where he says he's going to drink.

this opioid epidemic that is affecting all of them, and then does the exact opposite. So I think they need to wake up and look that this man that they're voting for and still supporting is not helping them. He's actually doing the exact opposite. And by the way, some of that money, this is one of those situations in which, you know, federal dollars really could make a difference. You know, you can, these programs that are designed to get these people off of this stuff. I mean, it's a, they really need help. And it's a, I think it's a program, these programs, this is a classy example where the government

really could make a difference with some government spending and marginally well thought out program. So to get people off of drugs, we have experience with it. All too much experience, but it does take money. Of course, the racial disparity drives us nuts. When it was crack, oh my God, criminals, criminals, now a more lethal epidemic opiates. Well, I mean, they're innocent people. Why are we treating this as a crime that's treat it as a health issue?

But God bless, it is a health issue. It's always been a health issue. It was a health issue back then. It's a health issue today. So we can keep beating up Trump on it, and we should because we've got to create pressure to get that money so that real Americans are helped. Even if they voted, like we're not like the other guys. You voted for Trump in West Virginia, and you did in large numbers.

We want to help you. We don't want you to suffer under this epidemic. But also, I know this is a silly public service announcement, but be really careful with painkillers. I'm not saying don't take them, but be really, really careful. It depends on who you are, too. It depends on your body makeup. And you might be more prone to addiction than others. So that's why you should be weighed into that territory very carefully as opposed to what we've done for decades where we're just handing them out like candy.

Yeah. All right. You want to do one more, Hannah? Sure. The pro-Trump action committee, America First Policies, released a bizarre video thanking Trump for all he's done this year, including thanking him for a lot of. including thanking him for allowing them to say Merry Christmas again. Take a look. Thank you, President Trump. Thank you, President Trump. Thank you.

Everyday Americans are standing up to thank President Trump. Thank you so much for making America great again. Thank you for cutting my taxes. Thank you for fixing our economy. Thank you for keeping my family safe. Thank you for putting America first. Thank you for supporting Israel. As veterans, thank you for reminding us to stand for our national anthem.

Thank you, President Trump. Thank you, President Trump. for letting us say Merry Christmas again. All right, so if you're not familiar with America First policies, they are funded by the Mercer family who also funds Breitbart. So they have a lot of blood on their hands already, but they put out this. It's a longer video if you want to watch the full video. It's about a minute long. Now, they have put it online thus far, but they're planning to put it on TV as well on Christmas Day.

to thank Trump for all the things that they said he's done for them. I imagine when you're waiting to get into the White House for a meeting of any kind that that's playing, like in a waiting room in the doctor's office, you know, that just over and over again. I think it's just like played in reverse on the tracks of everything we're listening to to, like, get in our psychees. The place where it's playing on a loop is in Trump's room. Oh, yeah, absolutely right. So that was aimed at Trump more than anything else. Look, when you have a campaign, they're going to make ads showing them as wonderful people

on the other side is terrible. We all get that. There's no campaign right now. We're in the first year of his term. This is just a weird ass-guising video for no apparent reason. And it's so over the top that even if, like, I think, like if you're a MAGA guy, you're probably like, yeah, man, he brought Christmas back. That's awesome, right?

Like, what, Obama had kidnapped it. I'm pretty sure we celebrated. So I had a Christmas tree in Obama. How many years? Obama said Merry Christmas. Hello. He says he didn't, but Obama said Merry Christmas. Look, the whole like war on Christmas thing is more, it's like, it's more bigotry than, I mean, it's so fun, it's like so absurd and funny that we don't really get into the bigotry that much. But the thing that I always stuck with me was yelling at Starbucks to demand that they say Merry Christmas. Starbucks is run by Howard Shultz or founded by Howard Shultz, who's not Christian. Like that,

Why does he have to say Merry Christmas to everybody? What a weird thing. That's not what this country's about, let alone Ignatis, Buddhism, whatever, right? And saying Happy Holidays is not a rude thing. It's a wonderful thing. Yeah, that's what's so bizarre about the entire war on Christmas is that saying Happy Holidays is just more inclusive. It just includes more holidays within it.

So I don't understand why. But that's what it is. They don't like being inclusive. They want to be in charge. And if they're not in charge, you're super mad. And to them, and I read this great alternate article a couple of years back about it, and they really view, and it just was trippy, because, you know, we asked people to look outside their own perspective, but when you, I'd never consider that conservative perspective. And I don't agree with it. But when they, when they took away slavery in the old days, this goes, and they did a wonderful tracking of history through it and to show that how would that mindset develop. And the southern is at the time, not today, but at the time. thought, you're taking my freedom away. But wait, you are enslaving other human beings.

Yes, but it was my freedom to enslave them. And so unfortunately, that has actually trickled down, if you will, through the generations. Now, people don't think that harshly now, but there is a sense of like, if you are taking away my freedom to be in charge. And I've been in charge the whole time. So I used to make you say Merry Christmas, even if you were a Christian. Now it's really annoying me that I have to include you. Yeah.

And so that goes to the heart of this. And to have like a little girl like that. I mean, if somebody did a video like that about me, I'd be like, no, well, that's embarrassing. Like, I'd be a little, like, awkward, right? As a full version, they have multiple kids thanking Trump for different things. What I thought was most bizarre, I mean, besides the whole Christmas aspect of it, is that they thank Trump for cutting taxes. And that just happened like a day ago. You know what I mean?

And so, like, a video production here takes a little long. You've got to film, you've got to edit. Like, they were planning on dropping this for a while, so they felt that this was just a done deal. They were like, oh, we have these Republicans in the bag. Like, this is happening. I find that also a little bit bizarre, you know? I'm sure they could have cut that. I'm sure they could have lifted that if they had to.

But I, but which those kids at the end, it makes it, which makes it kind of feel like a bit. Like, it really felt sort of S&L-ish to me. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I mean, I didn't, and as Jane says, I mean, it's just so weird that you would do this, this big, wet kiss to the guy, which clearly is just designed for him. He loves this stuff, right? They prepare the dossier for him every day, about, with all of his positive clippings, you know. And this is right there in that same space.

You know what? Hannah made a great point. I think the Mercer's probably financed this. as a big wet kiss, as Mark is saying, for the tax cuts. What do they care about the Christmas? They know Christmas was here last year, right? So this was all like, and they know that Donald Trump, as Steve Bannon apparently just described him, it's like an 11-year-old child. And so you have to go to him and go, good job, Donnie.

Yeah. Way to go on the tax cuts and Christmas. Yeah, yeah, and all the other things. It's like, it's like the same thing when he had like those little girls in the American outfits, like dancing behind them and like singing. that weird song, like that bizarre, like North Korean-esque song. It's like, he wants to have these, like, little kids being like, thank you, thank you. It's the kids. Like, they know what they're talking about.

That's another great point. Remember when Obama went to the school and they're like, he's trying to indoctrinate the kids. They've got these kids like in a hostage video going, thank you, Mr. President. We really appreciate it. Do it again with a smile. Take two. Thank you again, Mr. President. No, bigger smile.

All right, okay, we're done? Yeah, unless you want. Oh, yeah, sure, if you want. You know what, an extra Christmas. I'm sorry, holiday. This one is actually, this one is a Christmas gift. This is actually a Christmas gift, so enjoy. A couple in their 80s was caught with hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of marijuana in their car.

And according to authorities, their explanation for why they had 60 pounds of marijuana in their cars because it was a Christmas gift. So you can take a look here at all of the marijuana that was claimed from the couple's car. Now, Patrick Giron, who is 80, and Barbara Giron, who is 83, were pulled over Tuesday during a traffic stop by deputies with the York County Sheriff's Department, and the Giron's had 60 pounds of high-grade pot in their pickup truck. Now, the couple from North Carolina, I mean North Northern California, excuse me, told authorities they were in route to Vermont and that the marijuana was for Christmas presents, according to the sheriff's lieutenant Paul Rubka. And so they estimate that the worst of this marijuana is about $336,000. They're very generous.

They're very generous. A lot of pot-reep. And so, you know, different outlets have sort of followed up on this story. to ask if they were in custody, and apparently they're not actually still in jail. She couldn't answer, a woman who answered the phone couldn't say where they were, but she said that they weren't there and they weren't in the jail that they were arrested. So I don't know where they are. Let him go! Let them go!

You can age out on the marijuana thing. Come on. So this is like, you know, 80-year-old Bonnie and Clyde here, right? And I love the balls on these people to be like, oh yeah, it's a Christmas gift. me and my friends were going to smoke $380,000 worth of weed. Is this a new thing you kiss under the weed? They're either like selling it or they're the best grandparents in the entire world. You know what I mean? Or they're just like, no, we have like 40 grandchildren.

And we're trying to like hook them up. We have 40 baked grandchildren. We've got to get this back to it right away. I mean, if these, if that is Santa and Mrs. Claus, I don't know who is. They're 80 and 83, and they're on it, they're smoking out, they're making money off of it. Go get them, man. Keep running. Keep running.

The whole country's behind you. Let him go. I love it. All right. Can I take it down one notch? Oh, boy. I know. I'm sorry.

The only thing, like, I'm happy if they're out, they're out. That's great. But marijuana obviously contributes to our mass incarceration. And so at TYT, we frequently talk about all the way. 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

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with this exclusive link just for TYT fans. That's EXPRE S-SVPN.com slash TYT. Check it out today. I mean, if they were African-American or black, this would not be the case. And so, like, we can laugh about this, but we also need to recognize that we need to change the laws because we should not be incarcerating people for having the small amounts of marijuana. And these people are carrying, you know, 60 pounds, $100,000 worth of marijuana, and they're probably out. So let's just.

Oh, of course you're right. All right. I know. I'm sorry. I'm a downer. No, no. Legalize it. Legalize it.

In all seriousness, like, there's two things. Now you're going to make me go on this right. But real quick rant, one is, it drives me, every time we do these stories and we go on a serious level, it drives me crazy that Bush, Obama, Clinton, they all smoked pot, none of them went to jail because they're relatively well-to-do and the powerful and the elites and the establishment. All those kids who go to Princeton, Yale, schools I went to, et cetera, nobody ever gets punished, right? But if you're poor, you're middle class, and it doesn't matter, yes, they target African-Americans more. like four times as much, right?

But if you're poor in West Virginia or Kentucky, they're going to come for you too, okay? And so it's an incredible injustice, and we just stand by it. We just, there's two different justice systems. And then to the incarceration for African Americans based on this, it's we should never stand for it. It is unconscionable, right? And then you make them work for a dollar a day. I can't let that go.

That's modern day slavery. Eight cents an hour. That's not a wage. That's slavery. And so to arrest people for something that all of our presidents have done, right, for decades now, that we never arrest them for. And then they use them as modern-day slaves, by the way, to go fight fires in California. They were using prisoners. And then when they get out, because of their criminal record, they're not allowed to be firefighters.

Like, ah, it's maddening. By the way, one of those prisoners died in the firefighter in California. Yeah. Anyway, but to the Giron's back to end on a merry Christmas. Yeah, thank you guys for bringing a little bit of joy to the Christmas season, or maybe a lot if you hadn't got caught. But do it again. Anyway, much love. All right, guys, happy holidays, Merry Christmas.

Much love from us to you guys. So, bye, bye. Thanks for watching what I hope was a lovely edition of The Young Turks. Now, you know that that is two of the five segments that we do, because that's free. We want to have you support independent media and come watch the whole show that we do every day. That's five segments overall. No ads at all. That's at t-y-tnetwork.com slash join.

Come become a member. Thanks for watching either way. Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks. Support our work. Listen ad-free. Access members, only bonus content, and more. more by subscribing to Apple Podcasts at apple.co slash t-y-t. I'm your host, Shank Huger, and I'll see you soon.