Will Cain Country - Joe Rogan's Faith, AI, and the Fight to Save Western Civilization with Michael Knowles

Episode Date: May 27, 2025

Story #1: Off The Weekend: Democrats botch Memorial Day as Rep. Glenn Ivey heads to El Salvador and Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson celebrates "Africa Day" over American war heroes as Will shares his Memorial Day experience.  Story #2: Will is joined by the Host of 'The Michael Knowles Show,' Michael Knowles to talk about Joe Rogan’s rumored religious conversion, the collapse of new atheism, and how the cultural problems in America, from AI fears to gender confusion, are rooted in spiritual emptiness. Can wisdom and humility save us from the machines and ourselves? Story #3: Rabbit Hole Quiz: Will and The Crew went down different rabbit holes over the weekend. How well will they be able to answer questions about the others' adventures into gnomes, the Karen Read murder trial, and the Alamo? Tell Will what you thought about this podcast by emailing [e-mail] Subscribe to The Will Cain Show on YouTube here: Watch The Will Cain Show! Follow Will on X: @WillCain Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Book club on Monday. Gym on Tuesday. Date night on Wednesday. Out on the town on Thursday. Quiet night in on Friday. It's good to have a routine. And it's good for your eyes too. Because with regular comprehensive eye exams at Specsavers,

you'll know just how healthy they are. Visit Spexsavers.cavers.cai to book your next eye exam. Eye exams provided by independent optometrists. For a limited time at McDonald's, enjoy the tasty breakfast trio. Your choice of chicken or sausage McMuffin or McGrittles with a hash brown and a small iced coffee for five bucks plus tax. Available until 11 a.m. at participating McDonald's restaurants. Price excludes flavored iced coffee and delivery. One, it's an absolute shambles.

while the rest of you spent the past weekend celebrating and honoring Memorial Day Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson celebrated Africa Day Democrat Congressman Glenn Ivy goes to El Salvador to see one of his quote constituents symbolizing the absolute shambles of a Democrat Party

Two, Joe Rogan's found religion, has Jordan Peterson in its AI the end of humanity with the host of the Michael Knowles show, Michael Knowles. Three, our weekend deep dives. Tinfoil Pat, two a days, Dan, and myself all fell down various rabbit holes. How much do we know about each other's? Weekend of Learning. It is the Will Cain Show streaming live at Fox News.com on the Fox News YouTube channel. And the Fox News Facebook page, as we do every Monday through Thursday at 12 o'clock Eastern Times,

set a reminder, drop into the comments section, become a member of the Wallitia. If you're listening on Terrestrial Radio, where radio ratings like television ratings, have been winning, then we encourage you to also subscribe to us on Apple or Spotify, and that way you can listen to the Will Cain Show at your leisure on your schedule, on demand at Spotify or on Apple. We're back. We're all back to a day's Dan Tinfoil Pat. We should note, young establishment James has gone to the hill.

A few people have asked, hey, where's young establishment James? We haven't heard much talk. And the answer to that is he's gone to the seat of power. He has gone to Washington, D.C., and we wish young establishment James the best of luck as he begins to shape the future of the United States government. We have no doubt that he will drop right in and make that town his own. So a hat tip, and we wish him the best of luck, young establishment James. Do you feel like we are back? There's this weird feeling on the Tuesday after Memorial Day.

it is the unofficial start to summer and it feels like summer in my house it is now past the last day of school today's the first full day of like well how are you going to spend your time what are you going to do what's your self-improvement plan for the next three months how are you going to come back a better student how are you going to be bigger stronger faster on the soccer field all the things that kids love to hear their parents say one of my kids said listen listen last night. I like to think of summer as an open landscape. No schedule, no plans.

And on that landscape, I can build whatever I want. I can build a town. I can build recreation and playtime. And you're over here trying to figure out how you're going to build an office park on my open landscape. I don't want your schedule. Yeah, but it is sort of the unofficial first day of summer. And I have to say, it feels that way.

It kind of even feels that way. in the news cycle. How does it feel to you guys? I mean, does it feel like we're back, or does it feel like it's the beginning of a long, long-awaited respite? I mean, I feel like for almost two years, we've been running like Fred Flintstone in a car with our feet pedaling as fast as we can underneath us with a presidential election, the first 150 days of Donald Trump. and it kind of feels like for the first time you get a little bit of relaxation. Is it summer?

I feel like so much has happened since January that this is the first time I feel like I can rest in terms of the news cycle and in life. And it feels like summer. I smell like campfire and I feel like it's summer. Yeah. I just think that if we wait until 4 o'clock Eastern time,

President Trump will hit the ground running once again. Barney Rubble, Fred Flintstone, feet, and our breath, our moments of an extended weekend will quickly be over. But people didn't take a break. There was a lot going on over the weekend in terms of honorance, remembrance of those who've given everything for this country, and those that seem to can't just grasp where they fit in this story of America. Let's get to that with story number one.

Over the weekend, Secretary of Defense, Pete Higgs-Seth, was the Grand Marshal at the Coca-Cola 600. It felt like the entirety of the Fox Enterprise was in Indianapolis for the Indy 500. There were Memorial Day celebrations and Memorial Day ceremonies all throughout our country. It comes at a bad time for Democrats to remind everyone exactly where their priorities lie. Former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel announced, and many people are expecting him sometime in the near future to announce he might be running for president, that the Democratic Party is in shambles. It's weak and it's woke. And almost to prove his point over the weekend, several Democratic congressmen showed us where their minds and their hearts were over Memorial Day. Congressman Glenn Ivy, who has appeared on the Will Cain Show and had a debate, and he is a very adept debater as a former prosecutor, decided now was the time to go to El Salvador and.

take like the sixth, maybe a half a dozen trips by Democratic members of Congress to visit Kilmar-Abrego Garcia, the alleged MS-13 gang member, wife-beater, human smuggler, and most certainly an illegal immigrant living in the United States. Now, having been deported to a jail in El Salvador, but Glenn Ivy, the congressman, tried to go see Abrago Garcia. I'm the congressman that represents Tomar. I came all the way down from the United States after we've contacted their ambassador, after we've made formal requests to our ambassador to the El Salvadoran government.

And we came here to visit him today. And now they're telling us, we got to go all the way back to San Salvador to get a permit. That's ridiculous. We ought to have a chance to come in and visit. They knew we were coming. They knew why we were coming. And they know we have the right to do this. So they need to just cut the crap.

Let us get in there and have a chance to see him and talk with him. We've got his lawyer here. We've got somebody from the unions here to talk with him. Let us end. Stop playing games. Let us have a chance to talk with. Congressman Glenn Ivy seems to have some misconception of the extent of his power and the constituency with which he serves.

The power of the United States congressman simply does not extend to El Salvador. It doesn't matter how many times you say ridiculous. He doesn't have the ability. to barge in like congresswoman la monica mciver at delaney hall in new jersey now facing charges of assault and obstruction of justice he does not seem to have some sense of the limits of his jurisdiction as he goes to el salvador and calls their permitting process ridiculous but more importantly he also called kilmar brego garcia his constituent and i think symbolizes a real problem for the democratic party on what they represent do they represent americans do they represent

the United States of America. It seems a pretty simple test. You are elected by people who are citizens of this country to serve the interests of the people of this country. That's why we have such a problem when we see various elected members of the United States government taking money, lobbying efforts, or showing allegiance to any foreign country. And I say that with respect to any foreign country. I did not like it when Congressman Brian Mast, Republican, shows up on the floor of the House wearing an IDF uniform. Defense Forces. You are elected by Americans to serve the interests of Americans. I do not like it when members of both parties take vast amount of monies from the nation of Qatar. I do not

like it, nor do I think it's appropriate. When a congressman flies to El Salvador to serve one of his constituents who is an illegal immigrant, presumably not someone who have been able to vote for him and who does not pay taxes, at least legally in this country outside of whatever is confiscated from his wages and earnings. This is not a path to victory for Democrats, and I think it is a path of corruption for a United States representative to be representing the interests of people

who are not citizens of the United States. And again, while the rest of you remembered those who gave everything for this country over the weekend on Memorial Day, Mayor of Chicago, Democrat, Brandon Johnson, took time to go to social media to celebrate another holiday. Hello, I am Mayor Brandon Johnson, and I am proud to join you in recognizing and celebrating Africa Day. The continent of Africa is made up of 1.2 billion people with diverse countries full of rich traditions, cultures, and heritage. The African diaspora can be found in cities and countries around the globe.

And right here in Chicago, our proud African communities have made indelible contributions to the growth and fabric of our amazing city. So this Africa Day, let us take a moment to celebrate the achievements of the people of Africa, the progress made by African nations and the traditions and culture. Africa Day? How about the Musak Elevator version AI created African music playing in the background?

Has anyone heard ever of Africa Day? Tinfoil Pat, two a days, Dan. Have you ever heard of Africa Day before today? I have not heard of Africa Day before and that is

pretty interesting. That's the first time I've heard of that. I've heard of Memorial Day. Never heard of Africa Day, much less to be celebrated when everyone else is acknowledging Memorial Day. This is just proving Rahm Emanuel's point. The Democratic Party is at an absolute shambles. At a minimum, at a minimum, your path to victory is maybe to step away, yes, from weak and woke, but maybe to serve, you know, the culture, the interests, and the people of America.

and that brings me to another thought from over the weekend if you will indulge me and tinfoil pat in two a day's jane dan you're welcome to join in to this conversation i want to take a moment to talk about well memorial day and how i spent my weekend you know cliches are cliches but they also become cliches for a reason i find myself spouting them sometimes not even when i have a microphone in front of my face and saying to myself yeah but it's true Like, I've turned to, I don't know how many people who have a kid that's like three or four years old and said, hey, be careful, it goes fast, sounding just like a grandma from when I was a kid, but it's true. And as the father of two boys who are 17 and 14, I can literally feel it going fast. Again, another cliche that is absolutely true is time is your most valuable resource.

I even A-I'd in Google, hey, what are the most famous quotes on time? Because that's where I find myself today after this past weekend, after Memorial Day, thinking about time. And maybe this is the best, and everyone has a quote on time from Elon Musk to Benjamin Franklin. Jim Rohn, who is a pioneer in personal development, said, time is our most valuable asset, yet we tend to waste it, kill it. and spend it rather than invest it. Going into Memorial Day weekend, I didn't want to have any big plans. I didn't have plans to visit a lakehouse.

I didn't have plans to go out of town. In the past, when I've had different jobs, the family and I have taken the opportunity to take a week and explore a week, literally five days. We've explored Italy, we've explored Spain. We've explored Puerto Rico. Well, with the new show and the current job, there's not a lot of time to take five days away. So we had Memorial Day weekend, and we thought, well, let's just kind of spend time, the four of us together and explore.

And this year, we went to San Antonio, the exotic and distant locale of San Antonio. Well, before we left on Friday night, I took my 14-year-old son to game three of Stars Oilers. And it was a bummer. It was a bummer. stars lost star's lost game four as well we'll wave our towels for a few more games see if they can pull this thing out

before we head off into the off season thank you and we're thinking of you as well pulling for the New York Knicks I think all the conference finals and the NBA and the NHL seem to be headed for non-competitive gentleman sweeps but

that being said it was an awesome time to spend time with my 14-year-old. He's been into hockey lately. He's starting to figure out how exciting playoff hockey is. And it was great to spend time. And that's what this weekend was about. It takes four hours to drive from Dallas to San Antonio. And that part was probably some of the best, just the time in the car, talking, having conversations, doing two shows a day. Not unlike your life, I'm sure, it just starts to go fast. And when it's not going fast, it's going completely wastefully. It's scrolling. It's sending each other videos. Not enough time to just talk.

but four hours in a car it's great you never know where you're going to go in the conversation we checked into a hotel that made me realize how old i was i mean it's like one of these like resorts but feels like a disney cruise set on land water slides a lazy river and most people there families with like kids who are five six four years old i'm sitting here with two teenagers and we have aged out of this hotel that didn't stop us from going down the water slide or floating the lazy river. But it did make me feel old. We spent Sunday and we visited the Alamo.

Now, I'm going to deep dive down into my thoughts on the Alamo in segment three here today. Two days, Dan fell down the rabbit hole of the Karen Reed trial and apparently tinfoil pats thinking this weekend about garden gnomes. So we're going to quiz ourselves and each other on our deep dives over the weekend. But what the visit to the Alamo afforded, me and my family, is a moment to reflect, if not on those who have given everything for the United States of America, for then the Republic of Texas. And I'd like to think those aren't necessarily mutually exclusive. 182 men died at the Alamo. It's pretty fascinating to sit there and go through it and see where they died, how they died, how long they held off the Mexican army that outnumbered them.

10 to 1, where Davy Crockett fell, where Jim Bowie fell, where William Barrett Travis fell, and it gave me an opportunity to think about everyone who has sacrificed. I got to do that as well last Thursday night. Last I spoke to you last Thursday, I went to the Medal of Honor Museum in Arlington, Texas. It's new. It's only been up for three or four months, and it honors the stories of roughly something like, I believe it's 60 or so exhibits to the men who've received the Medal of Honor. I always have to correct myself and stop myself down and don't say who have won the Medal of Honor.

You don't win the Medal of Honor. You don't win the Medal of Honor. You receive the Medal of Honor. But aside from seeing the stories, which I encourage you to do, if you're ever in Dallas, Texas, or Fort Worth, Texas, and say you go to a Ranger game or a cowboy game, the Medal of Honor Museum's right there on the same grounds as those two stadiums. And it's worth your time. I met Flo Groberg, who received the Medal of Honor in 2012 from President Obama. Flo is an incredible guy. Floe Groberg immigrated to the United States at the age of 11.

He told me he became a citizen, but he hadn't earned his citizenship. So he needed to enlist after college in the United States Army. He became a ranger, captain. On patrol in Afghanistan guarding high-value assets, he noticed one day. the village eerily quiet and all of a sudden motorcycles come bearing into their formation it's a distraction mechanism before he knows it he looks to his left and there is a young kid 1718 he knew it was off right away

kid wouldn't make eye contact yelled for him to get back he didn't he kept walking forward he knew he couldn't shoot him he said then I'd end up in Leavenworth so he punched him with the butt of his rifle the minute he did he knew it was bad news he felt it the robe comes open it's a suicide vest he grabs the kid he throws him as far as he can when the kid falls he's holding a dead man switch that means he's already got the plunger depressed and then he lets go it's over when he fell thumb comes off suicide vest explodes takes away part of groberg's life takes the life takes away part of groberg's leg takes away

the life of four u.s army personnel for his actions that day and saving 24 others, Groberg received the Medal of Honor. But the conversation with them is fascinating because the Medal of Honor is not something of these men that I've learned where with a great amount of pride. It's actually soaked in shame. Because anytime something happens where you receive the Medal of Honor, it's always a bad day. It's a bad day. That you did something heroic, but it rarely accompanies a total escape from loss.

So he thinks about that day and the four men that he didn't say. and that's the Medal of Honor. That's Memorial Day. To remember those who no longer have this time, the time I got to spend with my family, the time I hope you got to spend with your family. Sunday morning, my boys and I watched the last game of Kevin DeBrona

playing for Manchester City. He's my favorite athlete, probably, I mean, really honestly, probably outpaced his Dak, Prescott, Troy Aikman, maybe even Dirk Novitsky. I've loved watching Kevin DeBrona. He's a genius. He's an absolute genius on the soccer field. He lives like a time traveler four seconds ahead of everybody else.

He sees something before it happens. But really honestly, the reason that I loved, Breonna has less to do with how great he is. He'll keep playing, probably in Italy, maybe in the U.S. It's a passing of the time my boys and I spent together watching him. They both were number 17. They both have idolized him the way of I have. and watching him play his last game for Manchester City was like watching the end of the time I get with these guys

and I feel it coming to an end like I have a 17 year old right the clock is ticking towards midnight and it doesn't end and I hear all these people go oh it gets better when they go to college it's even more fun yeah but I know that I watched my boys in waco Texas at the chip in Joanna area juggle a soccer ball I think about the time when they were 8 and 9 doing that on a beach in Spain or playing soccer volleyball with some kids in Italy. Good one, Charlie, not capable of speaking English,

but they all could do something with soccer ball. And I just keep thinking about time. It's all I keep thinking about. I know it's cliched, what a valuable asset it is. And I think about my time slipping through my fingers, and I think about the time that so many gave up their time so that we could have it here in the way we want to spend it freely.

and the United States of America and that might be something to remember more than Africa Day on Memorial Day. All right, coming up, who was the Politburo that was running the presidency under Joe Biden and planned to do so after he left?

Plus, there's a new article out that scares me and that is that AI literally will be the end of humanity. We're going to break that down with the host of the Michael Nulls show. Michael Noles coming up on the Wilcane show. Tonight, my wife, one of my sons are out of so what will I be doing? And I mean this. It's 100% true. My other son and I, we are going to be

putting smash burgers on the griddle. It's like I said, the unofficial start of summer and nothing feels more summery than a smash burger. Okay? You know the kind, crispy edges, caramelized beef, tons of flavor. They're incredible. But they are a pain to make sometimes at home. Cast iron, griddle, grease, you know, total mess. But I'm going to be able to pull it off. And I'm going to tell you how. And I'm serious because I'm going to pull out of the freezer, Omaha Steaks Smash Burgers. They are legit pre-smashed patties, 100% extra-aged Omaha Steaks beef. They're designed for the grill, no griddle needed. They don't fall apart.

They syrup beautifully and you go from the freezer to the bun in five minutes. It's what I need because I don't do prep time. Freezer to bun, five minutes. We're going to do it tonight, straight from the freezer, right onto the grill. Minutes, done in minutes. Perfect crust, juicy in the middle. honestly, they taste like something you'd get out of a high-end burger spot. I've got a freezer full of Omaha Steaks, not just the Smash Burgers, everything.

Filets, steaks, chicken, you know the quality. They're fast, they're flavorful, they're coming from a company that's been doing this since 1917. It's family-owned, it's American business, five generations of butcher experience. Here's the deal. Right now, when you order their built-for-the-grill pack at Omaha Steaks.com slash smash. They'll throw in 16 free smash burgers. That's 16 free smash burgers. Go to Omaha steaks.com slash smash.

Again, that's Omaha steaks.com slash SMASH. Seaside for details. And a big thanks to Omaha Steaks for supporting the Will Kane show. Michael Knowles next. This is Jason Chaffetz from the Jason in the House podcast. Join me every Monday to dive deeper into the latest political headlines and chat with remarkable guests. Listen and follow now at Fox Newspodcast.com. Or wherever you download podcasts.

I'm Janice Dean. Join me every Sunday as I focus on stories of hope and people who are truly rays of sunshine in their community and across the world. Listen and follow now at Fox News Podcast.com. Come. Joe Rogan seems to be finding religion just in time for AI to end humanity. It is the Will Kane Show streaming live at Fox News.com on the Fox News YouTube channel and the Fox News Facebook page. We hope you'll hit subscribe at Apple or on Spotify.

While you're there, you can also check out the Michael Knowles Show and its host Michael Knowles, who's now with us on the Will Kane Show. What's up, Mike? Good to see you, man. Good to be with you, sir. Thanks for having me. It's the first time we've got to have you, and I'm really happy to have you here today, man. How did you spend Memorial Day?

So I just stayed at home. I did nothing, which was a beautiful way to do it. But the week prior, I did what you did. I went on the big trip with the family, and I had to convince my wife on this because we've traveled. We've got a family in New York and Florida. So we've taken the kids on the airplane. That's its own thing. But I said, girl, we've got to do a road trip.

We haven't done a proper road trip. We've now invested for our three boys. in the minivan. We're living that full-on American suburban life. We got to go drive seven, eight hours down to the beach. My wife had never done road trips as a kid. Me, I would do 14 hours, 20, 21 hours. And so I said, you don't understand. The road trip is part of the experience. It's part of the fun. And she said it sounds miserable. I said it is miserable. But paradoxically, that's part of the fun. And you get the Buckees and you get the Arbys and you get what it's just a delight. truly. I mean, I'm joking

a little bit here, Will. But when you were talking about time slipping out of your fingers, I had this thought. I'm driving. My kids are screaming for a little bit of the ride. They're being good for the rest of it. But I thought, I said, you know, I'm going to miss these days. A time will soon come when I miss the screaming

in the car. So it was a great time. It was a wonderful time. You know, when COVID hit, like I was switching jobs. At that point, I switched from ESPN to Fox. And I had a gap between the two companies and took a month. And my wife and two boys and I, we did that road trip. And by the way, I think we did it in a Toyota Highlander. We didn't have a minivan.

We didn't have an SUV or a real SUV. We had a crossover, you know, an SUV on estrogen. We took a Highlander across the country and did the national parks. We did like Mount Rushmore, Yellowstone, up into Montana, down into the parks of Utah like Bryce and Zion. And then to Grand Canyon. And it's probably the trip of our lifetime. And you're right, like, there are a lot of quit fighting in the back conversations and who's going to get their music choice or whatever it may be, but it's all the good stuff. That's it, man. And because it is time. And I do think about this. And I don't want to be sad. I don't want to be sad about the time that I'm going to lose with these kids. But I also think of the way we just waste it. And you may, you know, I watch your

content and you're full of wisdom. And when I see somebody with as much wisdom as you, I can't imagine you're doing too much doom scrolling. But for the rest of us... I appreciate it. Will, it's very nice of you to say that. I am burning my precious life, just like most people are. Just scrolling. It's a horrible waste of time. On that note, hey, what do you think?

You're always, like I said, and I don't say it gratuitously, you're full of wisdom and on a lot of subjects. But one of the places where I really feel like you stand out is when you talk about religion, and I wonder what you think about Michael, these stories coming out about Joe Rogan finding a religion. In fact, a guy who's a recent guest on his show, Wesley Huff, he had this to say about Rogan apparently showing up a church. Joe Rogan and I have had on and off communication since then, I can tell you for a fact that he is attending a church and that that has been a consistent thing. And so, you know, things are happening.

And he's a very inquisitive individual. And I think for the better in that he's communicating with me and other people in his life who are influences that can speak into, you know, these issues of reliability and trustworthiness and verisimilitude of something like the pages of scripture and where he should and shouldn't be looking for the information in regards to that. It's pretty fascinating, Michael, and I think it's even more fascinating we have put into context of Rogan was an open skeptic and perhaps atheist. You know, as was Russell Brand, who we've seen a big conversion in Russell Brand. And then I wouldn't say Bill Maher's moving, but he had a fascinating conversation with Charlie Kirk about religion.

Yes, he did. I think that this is such a great story, not only for Joe's soul and for Joe personally, he's a great guy, and I hope he comes over to religion, but for all of us, because Joe Rogan is the median voter. I mean, this is part of his brilliance. He's obviously a generational talent in media, in communication, but part of the reason he's so great at it is because he is a perfect avatar of the median voter. He understands the concerns that people have. He understands the inclinations. He really understands the spirit of the age. And right now, we are past that mid-2000s atheism.

I remember I came up in it that Christopher Hitchens era, all the stupid people were religious. and all the smart people were atheists, and the Richard Dawkins' God delusion and blah, blah, blah. That has flipped. That really isn't true anymore. It was never really much of an intellectual movement because I think it was really a publishing phenomenon. They didn't, even in Christopher Hitchens' book, God is not great.

He never even really makes that argument. They just kind of whine about religion. A lot of that, I think, was because after 9-11, there was a pushback against Islam, which then became a pushback against Christianity for some reason. That's over, man. think that the people now have realized that the old eternal questions continue to present themselves, the gods of the copy book headings, and that shallow atheism of the 2000s, it's not working.

It's not helping their lives. And so people are returning to the much deeper tradition. I think even among religious people, you're seeing a turn toward traditional liturgy, more orthodox theology. And so the fact that Joe Rogan is making this turn, yeah, to me, that's the cherry on top of the Sunday, that's something major, is shifted in the culture. It's interesting how you couch that in a mid-2000s, Christopher Hitchens' rationalist perspective, of which I would say I was guilty.

You know, I grew up, Michael, you were, really. I didn't know that about you. See, I grew up, really. I grew up in the church. I grew up going to church every Sunday, youth group every Sunday night. I would think my biggest step away was probably

not unrelated to when I started to become a little bit more conservative in that Ayn Rand was a big influence on me and she was not kind to religion she was a rationalist reason, logic, faith is not a good human

driving decision-making factor so you know I headed down that path I never would have described myself as an atheist by the way but I probably would have said agnostic don't know, can't know so I would have gone down that path

but have changed have come back you know because reason can't simply answer everything and the power and life has a way of humbling you and you know you think less of your own brain you know and what you're able to rationalize and I think that's part of it but we keep seeing stats about society itself becoming less religious so if rogan or russell brand are changing, I would have to hope they're at the very forefront of some of this changing, because I don't know that it's gone society-wide. No, as you say, you know, the stats in recent years have been pretty troubling. However, there was a survey came out just to think about a month or so ago, that the decline

in religion has leveled out. So I'm hoping that we've reached the bottom here, and people are ticking up again, because I agree, even the way you're describing Chris Hitchens as being this rationalist kind of figure, and that's how I thought of him. I fell away from religion because I was a punk 13-year-old boy who thought he was smarter than he was. And that's who I think those new atheists really appealed to. But then you have to think about the greater scope of Western history. I would call St. Thomas Aquinas a pretty rational guy, you know, I would say one of the most intelligent guys who ever lived.

And all of a sudden, this kind of glib atheism from the 2000s gives way to the real arguments, you know, because the atheism doesn't answer how we got here or where creation comes from. I mean, for goodness sakes, the guy who first theorized the Big Bang was a Catholic priest, Father George Lemaître. So, you know, they really haven't held up over time. And I think people are beginning to say, well, you know, this rationalist movement from the 2000s, it seems pretty irrational. You know, it's led to men thinking they're the opposite sex and open borders and an ugly society, a violent society. Man, something isn't working. Well, hey, when was our society working?

Oh, well, it really reached its heights under the church, you know, when it was. when it was inspired by Christianity. We've heard these things from our founding fathers, the great men who built our country, but even long before that, you know, well, maybe, as you say, I think you put it really well, Will, our reason is not all that large. You know, I'm actually not that smart a guy. None of us is. And so if we could have a little humility before the greater stock of reason in our civilization, maybe we could learn a thing or two. Maybe we could restore our society. The only thing I disagree with what you had to say is I don't think rationalism, reason or logic led to men can be women and the insanity of the last decade,

that is a form of subjectivism that I feel like is totally divorced from reason and rationalism. That is, I am therefore, you know, I am right. It's a self-validation philosophy that is totally divorced from objectivity or reason or logic. And to me, it's the antithesis of those things. It's the humility argument that you made there at the end that has really brought me around. and also just depth of meaning. Like, reason doesn't provide debt for you in the end. And reason can lead you into places that are devoid of morality.

That's the other thing. You know, it can be right, but it can be grounded in immorality. That's the problem with reason. And I actually think that's important with the second subject I was going to go to with you, which is like this AI. I read this article, Mike, and it's pretty terrifying. It's on zero hedge, and it's by a guy whose name is escaping right now, but it basically makes the prediction that AI

is the end of humanity that it's incapable of being harnessed or controlled that the speed with which it will involve and its intelligence will make us all pale in comparison, slow and stupid and will become extraneous figures I don't know. I don't know if there's a dystopian angle to me

that wants to believe that or what it may be or just the the fearful little creature inside me of where this is going to go, but I don't know. I guess I am pretty scared about this whole future with AI. No, it's certainly could. I mean, that's true of any weapon. And I think that's how you have to think of AI. AI is not really intelligence. I mean, it's not, it's not doing the thing that our intellect does. But it's a tool, like a bomb or like a computer or like a hoe in a farm or something. You know, it's a tool. And so these tools and these weapons can be used to destroy us, you know. And actually, I think this is, AI shows a great point

on what we're talking about here with reason and how when you exalt reasons, sometimes it becomes really irrational paradoxically. And how does that work? Well, we all know that with AI, because you plug in a question to AI, and AI has this perfectly laid out sort of logical algorithm and but it'll spit you out false information a lot of the time because reason that is untethered to reality and to truth is going to go off into all sorts of crazy directions. And so that certainly could happen with AI. I mean, we know that people have tinkered with AI. And the fear, this prediction from the technologist is that, no, no, no, it's not just that it could be misused. It's that inevitably AI is going to kill all of us

because it's going to amass a superintelligence that can then send DNA strands into laboratories to create proteins, to create super creatures that are going to kill us all. And I suppose that could happen. The one area where the technologist is putting a little too much faith, I think, is in the efficacy of the technology. It's growing rapidly. It's extremely impressive. But we're not just passive creatures here to fate. We do still exert control over this. The fact that now technologists are changing the algorithms in AI to make them less, I don't know, racist or something, to make them, to kind of tweak them to make them more socially acceptable. Sure, that's actually the sort of thing that we do with technology all the time.

It's very unconservative of me to not be waiting for the world to end 90 seconds from now. But I think we have a little bit of time if we can exercise our prudence. That's an interesting word. Prudence. If there is a salvation, if there is a source of hope, and it's not, like you said, it's not untethered to the conversation we're having about religion, is the older I get, the more I begin to understand the difference between knowledge, information, intellect, and wisdom. And wisdom is a whole different creature than those things.

and that's not yet what we think. I don't yet see, because wisdom is grounded in judgment and context and morality and all of these other things that are passed down over generations, not in one simple lifespan of education. And I would like to think that's ultimately humanity's trump card versus AI. Yes, I mean, fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. So what is that? Humility, that's awe, that's wonder.

Chesterton has this great line. He has many great lines. one of them is that the world will not perish for want of wonders but for for want of wonder that you know you can still you kind of look up and be amazed at this whole creation much of the push for AI a push toward the singularity a push toward as Yuval Harari the left-wing writer calls for a homo deus you know man to basically abolish homo sapiens and turn ourselves into gods plug into the matrix what could go wrong a lot of put that push I think comes from the same impulses that we've had going back to the beginning beginning of liberalism, really going back, I think, to the Garden of Eden, which is for a self-deification, you know, to ye shall be as gods. I think that's what it ultimately comes down to. And happily, there's been a lot of suffering in the meantime, but happily, that hasn't worked yet. And so I suspect we will not succeed at it this time either. Okay, I have to ask you, because it's on this topic to some extent, and it's a source of curiosity today for a lot of us. I know he's your

colleague, and I don't have a pointed question to ask you. But Jordan Peterson just did this Jubilee debate with like 20 college kids. It's billed as one Christian, 20 atheists. And the videos are going around. And I'll admittedly, like probably, oh, 99% of people who are listening or watching if it's come across the radar have not seen the whole thing because who does anymore? No one has. You see clips.

Right. But he does seem to be put in an awkward position where either they sold it to him as, you know, branded and billed wrong one Christian versus 20 atheists. or he's, and I've had Jordan on the show, and we've talked about this, he's somewhat reluctant to define himself as a Christian, and he gets into it with these kids. I thought that's what we were here for. We're 20 atheists. You're supposed to be one Christian. You know, I wondered how it was sold to him, because he clearly was not informed of the premise, and anyone who is friends with Jordan would have corrected Jubilee and said, well, you know, the guy doesn't really call himself a Christian. I remember years, many years ago at this point, first time I ever interviewed Jordan, I said, well, do you believe in God? And of course, he said, the classic. Jordan answer, well, you know, it depends on what you mean by believe and what you mean by God.

And, you know, Jordan is, and he's an intellectual, he's an academic and a scholar, and a psychologist, crucially. He's not a theologian. He's not a philosopher. And so he's interested in this particular aspect of human nature and of human life. And I think this is also why the format doesn't totally work for Jordan is he's not a guy who wants to go out and own the lives with facts and logic. That's not really his thing. I mean, this is an academic who, wants to explore the meaning of questions, who's very taken with Carl Jung's approach of archetypes and meaning, and he's written multiple books on the subject. And so, you know, people are knocking him because he refused to say that he was a Christian on the show. I hope he becomes a Christian

and converts and goes to Latin Mass every week. That sounds wonderful to me. But I think it's kind of unfair to knock Jordan for it. To my knowledge, he's never called himself a Christian. Have you done one of these? I can't remember if I've seen you on one. Have you done? Have you on a Jubilee? I did. I just did one, not that long ago. And it was versus over 20 LGBT LMNOP activists. And it was a great deal of fun. But you have to remember, Will, I'm not a Jungian psychologist from Harvard. Okay. I kind of like the polemicist back and forth a little bit more. So we had a great time on the LGBT elementop issues. And I'll tell you, I think it's another one. I mean, I encourage people to go watch it over at Jubilee. But I think this is

another one where much like the new atheism of the 2000s, I think this radical sexual ideology that really took off in the 20 teens, I think it's over, man. I think it's deader than disco. I think that New York Times, a report that came out just yesterday about how you have almost half the counties in America are triple trending Republican, you have basically none triple trending Democrat. I think that's over. I think we just won. And so people have brought agreement on what has destroyed our society, the religious collapse, the radical selfishness, all that. I think we agree on that. I think now the question is just, well, what do we do to rebuild it? I was saying I was just reading Virgil yesterday, book six of the Aeneid, and I was

going back to it for a very specific reason. You know, it's got longstanding political advice in it. And there's a great line. It says, the road to hell, the road to the underworld, very easy. You'll have no problem getting down there, Aeneas. Getting back up. That's the problem. Good luck with that. Right, right. How do we rebuild out of this? I think is a great question. I think that's one that has political

and philosophical implications. We're debating it politically right now. Like, how do we do this with Donald Trump? Before we move on to some of those topics, just as a point of curiosity for myself, and for those listening at home or watching who don't know, Jubilee is like a YouTube series where it usually looks like about 20 oppositional voices

against one who holds a position. In your case, it was you, Michael, surrounded by something like 20 college kids on LGBTQ issues. They hold like a red flag, and that's my curiosity. How does it work? Like, you've got 20 kids in a circle around you, and I can't tell when the debate is over,

like when enough red flags are raised, and who are they voting against you or the person you're debating? Because they're all against you, so I don't, it looks fun, it's visually interesting, like, oh, that's a format that makes debate kind of fun, but I can't totally put my arms around what the what the stick is i i love the format you've described it well you're sitting there in the hot seat you're debating a couple dozen people who disagree with you and when the person

your interlocutor starts to flail in his or her arguments then they start putting these red flags up when a majority have the red flags they boot the guy out what's really funny about it though i mean i told the producers of jubilee i said i wish i had thought of this this is a great format you know it really works because it shows you the dynamics of even how people understand debates the funniest thing on that show i'm debating this kid who was wrong but he was he was making better arguments than everyone else there i mean he was at least making kind of intellectual arguments he got voted out in two seconds they didn't want to hear that they want to hear the you know the 30 year old guy who thinks he's a woman just sort of berate the conservative and that's what

even the LGBT advocates in the room, thought would make great TV. So it does. It makes great TV. And I think it's also a little bit of evidence that whoever loses his temper first in debates usually loses the debate. You know, if you're confident in what you believe in, you can take it. You can, you've probably heard the contrary views before. You can answer them.

And if you find yourself constantly pulling your hair out in debates, maybe you don't really believe your point of view as strongly as you think you do. More of the Will Cain Show, right after this. From the Fox News Podcasts Network. Hey there, it's me. Kennedy, make sure to check out my podcast. Kennedy saves the world. It is five days a week, every week. Download and listen at Fox Newspodcast.com or wherever you listen to your favorite podcast.

Following Fox's initial donation to the Kerr County Flood Relief Fund, our generous viewers have answered the call to action across all Fox platforms and have helped raise $6.5 million. visit go dot box forward slash tx flood relief to support relief and rebuilding efforts welcome back to the will cane show okay how do you find that road out of hell to your point of bringing in virgil if we presume that what we have been doing for the last decade descending into a cultural hell in the united states i think you bring up a great point how do we climb out down is easy up is hard and up really challenges us in the current environment in a lot of ways to say

well, are we staying true to our principles? Are we staying true to what it is we think? And I think that I have also become less ideological while becoming more religious, Michael, probably less ideological. And you probably would say the same to some extent. We all have over the last 10 years. So practicality has imposed itself on the current environment. But the new story that I bring to you with this is the Trump administration's attacks on, and I think that's a fair word. I don't, on Harvard, going after the money that's going to Harvard, looking at student enrollment. It's a shocking figure here.

25% of Harvard's enrollment is foreign students, which, I don't know, just at a gut level of like American colleges should be in the business of educating Americans. But the Trump administration doesn't like a lot about what Harvard teaches, what they have cultivated on campus, they want information on foreign-born students, and they want to cut off a lot of the money now going to Harvard. I've had conservative friends say they don't like this, Michael. What do you think about this in the Trump administration at Harvard?

I've been waiting for Harvard to collapse for the majority of my life at this point. Talk about going straight to hell. I mean, I think when you get all the way down through the underworld, you land at Harvard Yards. So I love what Trump is doing here. Politically, it's brilliant because it's forcing Democrats who are already perceived as out of touch to defend Harvard. They've got a $50 billion endowment, super elitist, very anti-American. anti-Semitic, anti-Western civilization, all these sorts of things. So I think politically it's really smart.

And still got $4 billion in government money over the last decade. That's right. That's right. And so when you bring up the foreign percentage of the classes, you know, the argument that Harvard would make is, well, it's good that we're bringing these foreigners here because we're going to inculcate all of these American values, and we're going to send them out, they're going to go run all these countries around the world. And I understand that in principle. The problem is Harvard doesn't inculcate American values. Harvard inculcates anti-American values and all kinds of radicalism,

and we don't want it, and most people don't want to have to subsidize that. So Harvard's not the place you're going to get it. People forget these days. Harvard is the first American college, and it started out as a seminary. Yale started out as a seminary. All the early colleges did. And they remain seminaries in a way. They're seminaries of leftism or liberalism or progressive,

or whatever you want to call it. But the reason they start out as seminary is the reason that universities in the West start out of the Catholic Church is because any institution that claims universal knowledge needs to talk about the ultimate questions. You know, Cardinal Manning had a good line. He said all human conflict ultimately is theological. You can't argue about parking tickets without talking about morality. You can't argue about morality without talking about human nature and on time.

and epistemology, and eventually you're going to get to theology. So when you say, what's the way out of hell? There is no way out without getting to the ultimate questions which are religious. Because we can say, well, we need to defend our liberty. Okay, well, what do we mean by liberty? Do we mean liberty of the way the left does? Like you go shoot heroin? Do we mean liberty like Christians do or like classical thinkers do,

which is the right to do what you ought to do? And we'd say, we've got to defend the Constitution. All right, where's the Constitution come from? As far as I can tell, the Constitution looks like it's a facsimile of what St. Thomas Aquinas said government should look like. Why did he think that? You know, you just can't avoid it. And so we have avoided it. We've had our heads in the sand because of the fashionable atheism of the 2000s that we were talking about earlier, but that's not going to work. You know, the same great conversation that our founding fathers were engaged in, that the great

statesman threat history have been engaged in. That's going on right now. And you will not fix mass migration, the weird sex stuff, the collapse of the family, the actual dying of our civilization, of low birth rates, the geopolitical threats, you will not fix any of it if you can't come down to a basic, moral, ethical, and ultimately religious kind of understanding. It's just not going to work. So I was at the Stars Oilers game on Friday night, Michael, and it was in Dallas, and the Oilers are from Edmonton, and I think every hockey game plays the Canadian National Anthem, even if there's not a Canadian team playing. But obviously with the Oilers there, this night. I listened to O Canada before I listened to the American National Anthem. And it struck me

as I was sitting there. And, because I don't think I've paid a lot of attention to O Canada throughout my life. But to listen to the singer, just pound the notes. We stand on, I think it's in the Canadian National Anthemps, we stand on God over and over. We stand on God for thee or something like that. Oh, Canada. And it got me thinking about how, to your point, Virtually every Western civilization nation state is founded upon those ideals. To your point, the founders of the United States of America thought that the country couldn't afford these freedoms from their government unless they had other limiting factors like self-discipline and adherence to morality and religion. It only fit a religious people.

That was their thoughts. Like this level of freedom only fit a society that was grounded in this kind of religion. And listening to O Canada made me think about, well, all of these free Western civilizations were found. upon these very same ideals and how far we've gone from that and I would imagine not just a leftist listening to you talk to me about this and listening to me talk to you about it would think oh my gosh they sound like Christian nationalists but that's what the project was and so if a great percentage of the population doesn't understand the very nature of the project and in fact demonizes it as though you are a quasi intellectual terrorist I don't

don't know how you climb back up. You know, if that hypothetical leftist doesn't like Christian nationalism, just wait till he finds out about unchristian nationalism, because I promise you that one is a lot worse. It's a great point on O Canada, but also our own national anthem in one of the later verses that we usually don't sing.

We say, conquer we must when our cause it is just, and this be our motto in God is our trust. God is in the American political order, going back to the very beginning. Obviously the Pilgrims on the Mayflower, obviously Governor Winthrop calling this country a model of Christian charity, but all the way up through the colonial and state charters in Rhode Island and New York, which told people, they said, you cannot abuse your liberty to licentiousness, you're going to lose the whole project. The founding fathers, as you say, the famous John Adams quote, another famous John Adams quote,

he said Christian principles, Christian morality are the principles on which independence was one. John Jay saying, thank God we were founded with a common religion. the way up through Ike Eisenhower and all the way up through the ages, I guess the question you have to ask yourself, if you're in 2025 and I don't know, you're not that religious or you're exploring or whatever, is say, what is more likely that all of these great men who built this great country before me and great civilization, that they were all just totally wrong, diluted Mincompoops who believed in a fairy tale in the sky, or that maybe I'm not quite understanding something here. And that maybe my individual stock of reason is there's something

a little limited about it. Yeah, that's a great point. All right. Lastly, on current events in politics, the story continues to drip and drab out day by day over how bad Joe Biden was during his administration, but it's less about Joe Biden to me. First, Jake Tapper has said something that now sounds like it would have been dismissed as conspiracy on Fox News for the last five years and that is something that I repeat last week. This is one of the biggest scandals of the last half century. That seems to be affirmed now by Jake Tapper. Watch. It is a scandal. Yes. It is, it is, it is, it is without question and maybe even worse than Watergate in some way. Right. Because Richard Nixon was in control of his faculties when he wasn't drinking. And, you know,

so the idea that, yeah, we don't, we don't mean to exonerate. We just, we, the only reason that we have the Watergate thing is there because we quote Archibald Cox, who was a Watergate investigator, talking about how powerful the presidency is and how presidents get surrounded by people who have a vested interest in keeping that president propped up. So that's the only reason we invoke Watergate is just to make clear, like, it's not Watergate, this is an entirely separate scandal, maybe even worse. Maybe even worse. Jake Tapper on Pierce Morgan saying it's worse than Watergate. But the key there, I think, that is of interest to us is him talking about the people around Joe Biden that wanted to

maintain power. And as this story moves forward, I think that has to become the focus. Who did he give pardons to, first of all? Because I think that's a huge red flag. And it includes, by the way, his wife and his son, Hunter Biden. And then Alex Thompson, Tapper's co-author, talked about the Pollock Bureau around Joe Biden. In terms of who was running the White House, It's a small group of people that have been around. Some people within the administration called them the Politburo. That's the term we use in the book. Give us the names of the three or four.

Mike Donnellin, Biden's longtime political liaison, Steve Rischetti, who was sort of the legislative liaison plus like a friend, Bruce Reed, at times, depending on his situation with the Biden people, Ron Clayne. And then there are some people outside the Politburo that are closer to family, which would be obviously Jill Biden, Hunter Biden, but then Jill's main chief of staff, Anthony Bernal, and sort of his sort of like deputy in some ways, Annie Tomasini, who is often Biden's traveling chief of staff.

So, Mike, that's the question for me. Who was running it and who was going to run it? Should he be reelected in 2024? These are important questions, and you as a serious, fair-minded journalist are asking them, and that's all good. But there's a part of me. I don't call it vindictive, call it a little.

The question I have first is, where were these people when I needed them? Where was Jake Tapper when I needed him to tell me the truth? You guys were talking about this. I was talking about this. We were called crazy radical conspiracy theorists. I don't want to hear it. I don't want to hear one compliment of Jake Tapper ever again for the rest of my life.

Because this guy and all of his compatriots in the liberal media, they denied, they neglected, they looked away. In some cases, they outright lied. and then when it no longer mattered, the stakes were over, the election was finished, then they said, oh, golly, okay, I guess we'll allow you to see what was before your eyes. I'm sick of it. They can take their book and put it someplace that I shouldn't talk about on the air, okay? Because it was such an egregious violation of the viewer's trust. By the way, I'm not a CNN viewer, so it wasn't even a violation of my trust.

It was a violation of their mostly liberal audiences trust. No wonder that their mostly liberal audience has tuned them out. Then you turn to the substantive matter, which we've been trying to talk about all the time, which is, who was running the country? And we have the answer that we all knew, that we talked about and we were called conspiracy theorists for, which is this immediate circle, including the political aids. Okay, fine, that's pretty normal. And the family, the family which received an unprecedented blanket 10-year pardon, including the son, Hunter Biden, this bag man who filmed himself committing crimes and was taking bribe. apparently, but if you just read his own plain text all over the world. Hold on. Now we're talking about a level of corruption that I don't know that we've ever seen in American history.

And there needs to be some accountability. And I don't know what there is. And I get, I get tired of the accountability is political. The argument would be that they've already paid the prize. They didn't win the election. But there's just got to be. And by the way, I want accountability in the media as well, to your point. Now, the accountability like politics has been played out. Their ratings are meager. Their reputations are in tatters, but it just feels like there has to be more. And I don't know that there can be. Like, I don't know. I don't know what we can expect. But I know that everybody watching wants it. I see that comment all the time. I don't want a congressional investigation. I don't want to hear a congressman talk about this panel they're

going to put together. They want real accountability for the way they were, the American people were deceived. You know, Trump put it well, because I think Trump sees this very clearly. He's, he's had lot of injustice thrown his way and he knows that they're not going to, you know, learn their lesson, look in the mirror and make right. So he says, well, my revenge is going to be my success. And we are seeing that right now. You know, the Democrats are acknowledging it lots of elected officials and the Ram Emanuels and the James Carvilles and all of them are saying, yikes, we are toast, even looking ahead to the midterm elections. But they don't really know how to do it. So they say, well, we need to change our language. Not that we have to change our unpopular

Not that we have to stop lying to people. No, we just need to use different language. We sound too professorial, as if to say that all the American voters are dummies and they can't understand our highfalutin language. I mean, they've learned absolutely no lesson. So, okay, fine. Do I want real justice? Yes. Do I want the Bagman Hunter Biden to pay up for his apparent obvious crimes?

Yes. Do I want the liberal media to be, you know, marched out and shamed in the public square? Yes, I do. But I'll settle for success. for success. Success is a pretty good consolation. Virgil, St. Thomas, Aquinas, Chesterton, John Adams, John Jay. Good luck being more high flute in this conversation. And Hunter Bites, that great artist. And Hunter Bites. Hey, I'm a fan, Michael. I really am, and I appreciate you being on the show today. I hope we can do it again sometime in the future. Everybody check

him out at the Michael Knowles Show at Daily Wire. Thanks, Michael. Back at you well. Thank you so much. Great to be with you. All right, again, check him out at the Michael Null's show. All right, when we come back, our deep dives, we all fell down the rabbit hole. Me on the Alamo. Two of a day's Dan on Karen Reed and tinful pat on gnomes. Let's quiz each other next in the Wilcane show. all of it, giving your customers more ways to order, whether that's in-person with Square kiosk or online. Instant access to your sales, plus the funding you need to go even bigger. And real-time insights so you know what's working, what's not, and what's next. Because when you're doing big things, your tools should to. Visit square.ca to get started.

This is Jimmy Phala, inviting you to join me for Fox Across America, where we'll discuss every single one of the Democrats' dumb ideas. Just kidding. It's a only a three-hour show. Listen live at noon Eastern or get the podcast at fox across America.com. I stand corrected on the Canadian National Anthem, but will I be right in our deep dive quiz from Memorial Day weekend. It is the Will Kane show streaming live at foxnews.com on the Fox News YouTube channel and Fox News Facebook page. Hit subscribe at Apple or on Spotify. Two of days, Dan is quasi-Canadian.

he's married to a Canadian. You're telling me two days, it's actually, it's stand on guard for thee, not stand on God for the. Yep, exactly. Stand on guard for thee. But there is a mention of God. In a stadium full of hockey fans, in the stadium full of hockey fans, it sounded like stand on God. And the Canadian accents, too. It changes things.

I was like, damn, look at the Canadians. But you're right. There is a line that says, God, keep our land glorious and free. Not hidden the foundations of Western civilization in every single. nation state all right we each spent a little time this weekend falling down some sort of rabbit hole which to me is the marker of good time off what did you think about michael knolls just told us he spent some time over the weekend reading virgil so every time you think that you're smart can to spend a little time around michael knolls um so let's just go around the horn real quick and tell me

what the hell tinfoil pat nomes you spent your weekend thinking about gnomes yes so um um I was thinking about, you know, a potential video game, making a video game. And my son and I were discussing, you know, what could we make a video game about? And we thought about gnomes. He was originally talking about elves. And I was like, well, people make games about elves. So what about gnomes? I wonder if there's something about that.

Is it a gnome? No, no, no. It's an elf. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So then I deep dive into it. You know, what do gnomes do? You know, I want to know more about them and all the stuff they do.

Do you think they're real? Do you believe in gnomes? I don't know. Probably. The lawn gnomes come alive at night and they wreak havoc on the neighborhood. That sounds absurd, Dan. That's insane. Is it, though?

I was prepared for you to say you do believe in gnomes. I mean, look, the thing is, all of these, all of these. all of these mythical creatures I think there's got to be some grounding in some kernel of truth for most mythical creatures I do believe that

like anything that has stood the test of time I'm not saying there are gnomes but was there something that led to people believing they were gnomes or there is gnomes and I want to that's what is curious to me like you know I've fallen down the vampire rabbit hole before

you know and and Dracula and all of that. And it's pretty fascinating to think why people began to believe in vampires and there's real historical context for that. So I don't know what it is for gnomes and maybe you're going to tell us about that

in your deep dive. All right, Dan, why did you fall down the rabbit hole of Karen Reed trial? So I didn't really follow this at all, but my wife was super interested and there was a documentary on it. So I watched it.

And, you know, you hear something and you just have an assumption about who's guilty, he's not guilty. And it is a crazy story. So I deep dove into the logistics of it and the trial and what was going on with it. It's fascinating. All right.

We're going to quiz each other on what we know about each other's deep dives. My suspicion is I will do better on Nones than I will on the Karen Reed trial because I've not kept up with that at all. And then, of course, mine's quite obvious. I went to San Antonio from Memorial Day weekend, spent two hours touring the Alamo. and so we will have a quiz on that as well. And we're going to go one, one, one, one. Once you hit a little music for us, two days, we're going to do this quiz,

and we'll each take a turn and see what our score is at the beginning. I'll start, okay? The Alamo in San Antonio. A brand new museum has opened up outside the Alamo, full of memorabilia. I'm talking about swords. I'm talking about guns.

I'm talking about items that were at the Alamo, in addition to stuff generally around the Texas Revolution. The majority or the largest amount of memorabilia was donated to the museum by one individual. This individual is famous, but not famous for history. He wouldn't be in your mind as anyone who is like a historian or even a wealthy billionaire. collector. He is famous for music. He is a very famous musician. Can you guess who the world's largest private collector and donated to the museum is of Alamo memorabilia? Pat, you got one? Either of you. I think I've heard this and I can't remember. I'm really mad at myself right now. Merle Haggard. Okay. No. Now I'll give you a hint because

it's more fun that way he's not American he is from the UK and I would say his biggest hits were in the 80s into the 90s David Bowie

George Michael no no it'd be funny if it was George Michael for some reason I don't know why I just think personally bottom of my head okay

you both strike out on this question it is Phil Collins no way fascinating. I would never have guessed him. Phil Collins, huge Texas Revolution Alamo enthusiast. Okay, tinful pat, what do you have? First question on gnomes.

What are gnomes day jobs? What do they do for a living? Ooh, I know Keebler elves make cookies, so it's not that in a tree. Trolls. Trolls guard bridges. They live under bridges. That's a troll, not a gnome. Elves make cookies.

A gnome? Is it tied to the garden gnome? Do they protect it? I'm going to go, they... Sorry. Go ahead. I'm going to say they tend to like trees and plants. I'm going to say they protect homes for people.

Holmes knows right. Dang. They're guardians of the forest. I am? They tend to the forest, yes. 100%. Wow. Nailed it.

Dang. Pretty good. Nailed it. knowledge one nothing nothing all right dan what do you have for us on karen reed trial a little more serious than noam sorry but who is john o'keef and what is karen reed accused of in connection with his death who's john o'keef and what is karen reed accused of in connection with his death are you read in on this trial patrick i have never heard of what we work in the news i don't know i don't know i don't know

I think John O'Keefe is the police officer who was accused of killing Karen Reed's husband? No. Oh. No, John O'Keefe was a police officer, but he was the boyfriend of Karen Reed. I was close. There was something there. I was in the range. But Karen Reed, Karen Reed's accused of killing him.

Oh. By hitting him with his car. She's accused of killing John O'Keefe. Vehicular manslaughter, second-degree murder, but is very highly contested. Round two. Who was the president of Mexico who led his own federal troops, marched them a thousand miles into Texas, won the Battle of the Alamo, but ultimately lost at the Battle of San Jacinto to Sam Houston, and lost Texas to its republic. I want to say Santa Ana, right? Dan?

I know they say remember the Alamo, but I remember nothing about the Alamo, so I don't even have an answer. Okay, correct, Patrick. Wow. Enrolissimo, what is it? Antonio Lopez de Santa Ana. Pretty sure.

Santa Ana is the villain of the Alamo. All right, tinfoil. all right are there any bad gnomes you know like i'm so happy noms is part of this uh are there any bad gnomes yes there are bad gnomes i'm gonna say there are evil gnomes i'll go a little further wow wow no there are not really bad gnomes or evil gnomes there are mischievous gnomes But no, not evil and bad. No, mischievous is much different than evil. Yes.

Definitely different than evil, but is mischievous different than bad? Bad dog. Yeah, mischievous is just like... Bad gnome. I guess it's semantics. Noes. Nomes are good. Huh.

Okay. All right. Did not know that. Go ahead, two days. All right. So based off that information I gave you about Karen Reed, she's accused of killing her boyfriend, police officer. officer, John O'Keefe, what's the central argument of Karen Reid's defense?

What is she arguing why she's innocent? That she didn't do it, but someone must have killed him. Or he died accidentally. That. Her defense? That. Someone must have done it, so what's her defense in that case? and she was at the house of other police officers that night.

See, I'm, I was, I think I was on the, she suggests, she wasn't there, first of all. She was there. But she's just another police officer did it, right? That's, that's the thing. She says another police officer killed John O'Keefe. That's right. I'm going to second wills.

Yeah, sure. she contends that she's being framed by the police department so they're covering it up and framing her that someone at that house that night at the party did something to him and she did not and they're blaming it on her huh all right is that do i get that point you do all right two and since he kept coasted on my wake there he gets it too i guess two two points each for me and him zero for you dan Yep.

Okay. This Alamo thing is stumping you guys. I'm going to go, well, Patrick got Santa Ana. How easy should I make this? Okay. There is the three most famous figures from the Alamo include the leader of the Texan forces, William Barrett Travis. I wouldn't expect you to get his name. He famously drew a line in the sand and said, cross over this line, and basically, you will defend the Alamo to your death or leave.

Don't cross and leave the Alamo. They all knew they were going to die. Davy Crockett and his Tennessee volunteers, I figure you probably would know Davey Crockett's name. But who would be the third of the three most famous men at the Alamo, Travis, Crockett, and this man, who? You want a hint? Do you need the hint? I don't want a hint. I don't want a hint, because I know the hint. I can give the hint. I need it. Help me out.

Okay. He made a famous type of knife. Yes, correct, Patrick. You're going to get it. Bayonet. William Bayonet. No. I was going to say. Patrick Bayonet. No. I know what? I don't know. I don't know. Sam Bowie.

Go ahead, Patrick. What? Sam Bowie? No. No. What's a booey knife? The buoy knife, right? It's a booey, it's a booey knife, but I'm afraid you're caught somewhere between Daniel Boone and Jim Booy.

Jim Booy. Jim Bowie. Wait, what am I thinking of? Sam Bowie. You said Dan Bowie. I think a lot of people mix up Daniel Boone. Oh, you said Sam? Yeah.

Still wrong. Still wrong. I don't know. invented the gun that tamed the West, Samuel Colt. I'm going to give you credit, though. No, no, no, no, no. I'll give you credit. The last name.

That's half. That's half credit. It's half credit. Okay. You're at two and a half. That's not right. You're at two and a half. By the way, half doesn't matter.

I guess if I get this last one, then I win. Except you can get it too. So you really put that half point you docked yourself, it's really hurting you here. That's fine. So I'm joking. It was like a nothing sacrifice. You'd give away that.

half point i'll give it away zero i'll give all the points away that was that was bs i can't believe i did that that's ridiculous all right nomes final round all right we know noms are the guardians of the forest now where do they live like what kind of dwellings do they live in mostly what is the most common dwelling gnomes live in trees is my answer like a kebler elf yeah like like in the cut out of a tree. Maybe that's where I can start. Do they live in nests? Do they live?

Nests. Oh, gnomes live under the ground. I think gnomes live under the ground. Instead of in the trees, I think they live under the ground. Well, they do have some homes in like little garden nooks, but the most common are tree root homes. So technically in the trees, but in the roots blow. So that's under the ground.

I guess technically, yeah? Yeah, but how do they get into him? Do they get into the base of the tree? Yeah, see, that's in the tree. I win. That's my point. But in the root system would be in the ground. Nope.

I think I get a half point. I think both do you get it. Go ahead. A half point? Okay, so, okay, two and a half for me, two and a half for Patrick. A half point for Dan. Thank you, so smart. And Karen Reed is going to be the tie break.

All right. This is not fair because Will was a lawyer. but what was the outcome of Karen Reed's first trial and what's happening now? Wait, she already was on trial before? Mm-hmm. I don't know. This is crazy. We should probably cover this.

Fox does. We don't. Oh. Okay. What's your answer, Patrick? I'm guessing she killed somebody else with a car. No. Or what was the outcome of her first job?

The outcome? Not guilty, because she's walking around. killing people with cars, apparently. I think he's misunderstood. Don't correct him. He's wrong. It's the same trial, second go-around. So that means... Oh, really?

That's double jeopardy. Not... No. That's right. That's why you're wrong. It's not guilty or non-guilty. Not guilty. It's got to be hung jury or mistrial. And I'm going to go mistrial.

It was a mistrial due to a hung jury. So she's being retried right now as we speak. which actually I meant to ask you a question. So what does that mean? Do they have to have the exact same witnesses and everything and the exact same evidence? I'm sure. Can you bring new evidence in? I don't know.

Maybe if there was more discovery. I don't know the answer to that. Don't pump me up as a lawyer too much. And I don't know how quickly, how quickly have they, do they schedule the retrial after the mistrial? It was a year later. I don't know. A year later. Okay.

Well, so what we learned is we know. know more about gnomes than we do about karen reed we need to read in on karen read in the news cycle and patrick knows a little bit about the alamo proud of him dan meanwhile nothing up there northeast god we don't learn about that stuff up here sam houston i'm probably thinking of right was he somebody probably yeah sam houston was the he was the general the leader of the texas army he was not probably but he was not at the alamo he won at the battle of san jacinto um um Some, what was it, 30 days later, I'd say, something like that, to win Texas independence. All right, that's going to do it for us today here on the Will Kane.

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