The Exchanges

Q I mean, are these riots more or less than a Lakers championship? Uh, how concerning are they to you? Who's to blame?

A Well, as measured by violence, they're less profound than, you know, what happened in 2020 after George Floyd died. They're way less dangerous than, say, the Watts riot, um, or the Rodney King riots in LA, but they're much more profound. I mean, it, it really does, there's certainly a bigger deal than anything can happen in Fort Sumter, for sure, which kicked off the bloodiest war in American history. The federal government has, as a core duty, Uh, the right and responsibility to enforce immigration law and police the borders. That's what the government is. That's what the federal government is really. And so if you can test that, it is like a threat to disunion fundamentally. I mean, I think there's a lot at stake and we reached this point because a series of paradoxically weak federal governments allowed sanctuary cities to continue literally for decades, each one its own form of insurrection against the central government and maybe Maybe you don't believe that the federal government has a right to pass laws restricting immigration. It's not in charge of the integrity of the borders. You know, that, that's a kind of philosophical or constitutional case I guess you could make, but most people accept that those are federal duties, and once you accept that, you can't allow states or municipalities to flout the law any more than you could allow Central High School in Little Rock …

AI assessment note: “a series of paradoxically weak federal governments allowed sanctuary cities to continue”

Q When did you get to that point? What, what led you to the point of breaking?

A Well, I went to Iraq, um, in December of 2003 to see where a friend of mine had been killed, and, um, so I was there right after the invasion, and I just immediately recognized this is not, we're not a good colonial power, because we won't admit that we are, we won't admit that we have an empire, therefore we can't administer, administer it in a rational way. Um, just the obvious stuff. But anyway, the point is, the last remaining kind of unexamined orthodoxy in my head was free trade, and I happened to be just by chance at the White House the day of that announcement, And I remember thinking, man, if this works, what a caper.

AI assessment note: “I went to Iraq, um, in December of 2003 to see where a friend”

Q Do you think the U.S. is driving this or Israel is driving this, and we're just, you know, having information?

A It's a combination of both, and by the way, Israel is a country with nine million people in it. I mean, it's, it's the Israeli government, um, but there are also elements of the U.S. government. The head of CENTCOM, you know, is in favor of this. There are a number of Republican senators who are in favor of this, who are lying, for example. Here's one, I think, interesting point, um, that's a statement of fact. There's no American intelligence, this is a statement of fact, that suggests Iran is in the process of assembling a nuclear weapon or within months of doing so. There's none. And yet, Tom Cotton of Arkansas, the chairman of the Intel, Senate Intel Committee, is out there saying, you know, we know that they're doing this. Well, actually, you don't know that. That's not true. Whether he believes it or not, I can't, you know, I can't say, but that's, that's a lie. Our intel does not say that. Period.

AI assessment note: “It's a combination of both, and by the way, Israel is a country”

Q Would you consider it if Donald Trump gave you that call?

A Well, of course I would consider it. I'd, I mean, you have no idea how open-minded I am. I would consider anything, actually. But, I mean, the truth is, I kind of don't respect people who do stuff like that. I really believe I've got a lot of theories which I will not inflict on you, but which I do inflict on my own four children. And my main theory of life is that you should do what you were designed to do. I don't believe this whole you can be whatever you want to be thing. I think it's an absurd lie. I think we're made for certain things. We have certain aptitudes. They're inborn. They can, we can hone them, and we need to through practice, repetition, but it's very, I, I think it's a, it's, it's a sign of hubris, which is always the death of, particularly of men, hubris, thinking you have more power than you do. When midlife, you're like, well, actually, what I really want to do is direct. It's like, you just won best actress, honey. Go back to acting. And I've never been involved in politics. I've never, I haven't even voted in all elections. I'm serious. So, like, the idea that I'm going to, at 54, like, run for national office, I, it's a little, You know what I mean? Like, I don't take myself quite that seriously. I mean, I, I can't imagine doing something like that.

AI assessment note: “Well, of course I would consider it.”

Q be a big democracy. There's supposed to be, you know, a lot of, uh, media channels, but yet they all enforce a certain narrative on pretty much every issue. But even, you know, again, I'm picking on, I think one of the biggest issues right now, which is this war we've got going on. I mean, how does that happen? I don't understand it. How do they maintain that control?

A This is one of my personal concerns about technology and about progress of all kinds, which is you don't actually know where it's going. You don't. I mean, your best forecaster or mine have very often been wrong, and the, you know, of course, the promise of the internet was diversity and access to information from a lot of different sources, unfiltered information. You can talk to people in foreign countries for free. You know, every American will have an encyclopedia at his fingertips, and people are going to be much more informed, Um, and no one will be able to control it, because it's, it's free and open. And, and the effect has been, you know, the opposite. There's less, I, I would argue, there's been, uh, less freedom, uh, in information than there was 30 years ago. How did that happen? I mean, that's, it's a very, I mean, you guys are much better situated to answer that question. Someone should think about that, I think. But the bottom line is, there are just not that many pipelines, actually. You know, in television, there were three big news channels. Cable, you know, broadcast kind of receded in importance. It's mostly about prostate health now, and, um, so there were three big channels. Two of them were on one side, one was on the other, and then there were the social media giants, but there are not that many of them, and they were all locked down, and they were all r…

AI assessment note: “the bottom line is, there are just not that many pipelines, actually.”

Q of telling his origin story. He was part of PragerU. He's got this really activated base. Why is he resonating at this moment in time? And maybe you could explain to the audience MAGA versus America first, America only, which I think are part of America first, but you, you, you tell us. Because I, I think these are just terms right now. They're not like political parties or anything.

A Well, there's a struggle over what those terms mean. It's very ugly, and probably necessary, because you need to define terms. Like, that's the first thing you do, I would say, when you think through what you should be doing with your life, for example. So, um, as for Fuentes' origin story is a little more precise, and I'll keep it short, but he tweeted something as a freshman at BU, critical of, pretty mildly critical of the Congress for doing the bidding of this foreign country, Israel. And somehow Ben Shapiro saw that and attacked him and tried to get him kicked out of his Republican club and made sure he didn't get an internship with some conservative organization. And I'm not attacking Ben Shapiro, but that kind of tells you what attempts to shut people down, to shut conversations down result in. They don't go away. They just fester in the darkness and they can sometimes become really ugly. So what Fuentes is among other, well, first of all, Fuentes is saying a lot of true things. That's why he's popular. He's funny. Uh, he's smart.

AI assessment note: “Fuentes is saying a lot of true things. That's why he's popular.”

Q Tucker, if you are running the Republican campaign going into the midterms. What do you do the same? What do you do more of? And what do you do less of?

A Uh, well, I would, you know, I'd, I'd focus on domestic economic issues to the exclusion of everything else. I would. And, um, I would. I think that's, that's the main concern. It's always the main concern. Now I'm entering into very banal territory because I'm repeating every, uh, you know, obvious observation in the past hundred years in American politics, but people do care about that. And they are concerned. AI is part of that. Probably not in its reality, but in its expectation, and it's the fears that people have about what's coming. Um, and so I would, I would try to address those issues at least by explaining them. I do think like, well, I'm in the explaining business, so I'm biased, but 80% of the problem, this is true in marriage and child rearing and governing as well, you need to explain What you're doing? What's gonna happen? I'm gonna give you the shot. Count backwards from 10. By seven, you're gonna be asleep. When you wake up, you'll be fixed. Like, that's what they tell you in surgery, and they tell you that for a reason. They don't just roll you into a dark room and start injecting you with stuff. They walk you through it, and that's enormously reassuring. In fact, it's critical, and so we just need a lot more of that from everyone, and not just government, but people with a platform explaining what the hell is going on, because we're getting to a place where …

AI assessment note: “I'd focus on domestic economic issues to the exclusion of everything else.”

Q To fight in Gaza, and should they be our number one partner in the region?

A I think, or the partner in the world, really. In the world, sure. I think, I think all of our alliances should be assessed and now reassessed through a single lens, does this help the United States? And in the specific instance, I'm certainly not against being allied with Israel, and I'm not against supplying Israel with weapons. Again, it depends what they're being used for. But I do think what's happened in Gaza does not help the United States at all. I mean, tell me how it does. And, um, so yeah, I, in fact, I, I'm not even sure what the argument that it has helped the United States would be. I've never heard it articulated. Instead, I've heard people name calling. You know, from my perspective, that's all I care about, and I got it, I never wanted to have this debate. I avoided it for many years. The only reason I get into it was the prospect of a, of a regime change war in Iran, and I just thought, man, there is no way that helps us in any way, so I piped up and said something, and my life has been a disaster ever since, but my views have not changed. Is it good for the US or not?

AI assessment note: “what's happened in Gaza does not help the United States at all”

Q And Tucker's our guest. I'm going to give Tucker the last word on this topic before we go on to the next one, and you are a hundred percent correct. Biden, ten million net immigrants, and Trump, three million, which sounds like a lot, but it's actually the lowest in like 10 administrations, the lowest since Reagan. Tucker, you're our guest. Wrap us up here. What should we think?

A I think that we should measure the health of a country, at least in part by the condition of its cities, including the cleanliness of its cities. And by that measure, our country is collapsing. Our, our cities are a disaster, and the, the richest part of the richest cities are fine, and the rest of them are just absolutely awful. And so I think that has got to be just job one. If you want to renew the United States, you have to make sure its population centers are clean, safe, orderly, but especially clean. There's something really important, and I know that the left just instinctively discounts that, But cleanliness is next to godliness, and your city is a reflection of your self-respect, how you feel about your nation, your patriotism, and if you allow it to become, like, Paris or New York, covered in graffiti and filth and random people from other countries selling fruit on the street and begging and having sex in ATM vestibules and just, like, the whole midtown Manhattan, central Paris experience, like, that's a sign your civilization is going under. I think it's really, really important, and I do think, you know, that decay is not entirely caused by mass immigration, but mass immigration has made it much worse, and I just know that from walking around, because I like to walk around cities. I think it's a national emergency, and the riots are just the most florid expression…

AI assessment note: “decay is not entirely caused by mass immigration, but mass immigration has made it much worse”

Q Uh, Candace Owen, Charlie Kirk's assassination, conspiracy theory. What's your take?

A I think it's important for, I mean, look, in the end, it's the job of federal law enforcement to find out who did it and then explain it to the public in a way that makes sense and can be proven. And I really hope that will happen soon. So they're, they're part, like in any, any, I mean, I was a crime reporter. I wrote a book on this. So there's, in any aftermath of any crime, there are anomalies, weird Coincidences, things you can't fully explain. I mean, the closer you look at anything, the more complex it reveals itself to be. So that's certainly true here. But because of the nature of this murder of our friend, um, I think it's all the more important to make sure the public understands how, who did this and, and why. And I would say the FBI doesn't have a lot of credibility. It's not the fault of Cash Patel and Dan Bongino. They inherited an agency with basically no credibility. There's Has a documented history of manufacturing crime. So, like, it's not enough to say the FBI says it. You have to explain how. And I'm not even doubting the, the core case they're making, but if they are telling me that this was a lone gunman, that no one else was implicated in this crime, I think it's fair to ask, like, how did you reach that conclusion? And did you look at this, that, and the other thing? And I don't think we should be intimidated out of asking those questions. Those are not …

AI assessment note: “I don't think we should be intimidated out of asking those questions.”

Q here. First, have you figured out why you were fired from Fox? And let's get into that a bit. And second, given that you were the number one host for, for much of the past decade, and I think probably in the top five highest paid of all time, what's motivating you now? What's the mission here as an independent journalist? Take those two questions in whichever order you like.

A I, I don't know why I was fired. I mean, it kind of is an Agatha Christie story. There are like so many suspects. You know what I mean? Um, but I, I don't know. I was never told I can only speculate. There were a lot of different things going on. I had a lot of opinions that were unpopular. You know, with people who might have influenced, ah, my show getting canceled, so I, I really don't know. I will say, you know, right after it happened, people said, well, how can they fire the top guy? And because that's what it is. I'm certainly not the first high-rated host to get fired. It's not only about ratings. There are a lot of different factors. It's a big company. You all have worked for and run big companies, and you know, it's, there's a lot of complicated stuff going on, and, um, and it's never exactly clear, You know, why things happen the way they do, but I was not shocked by it. I mean, I was shocked by it in a short-term sense. I didn't expect to have my show canceled that morning, but, um, but I was not shocked at all. Uh, when I thought about it for a minute, I'd expected that, you know, you can't kind of give the finger to everybody, um, and persist in a, in a corporate job. So I, no hard feelings. I, and I, and I, in fact, I said that on the call when I received the news, it's, it's not my company. And I never felt like I had a right to be on the air. I was, I was work…

AI assessment note: “I don't know why I was fired. I mean, it kind of is an Agatha Christie story.”

Q Chinese version or the American version with energy, with money, with know-how, et cetera. And then I think there's everybody else, and it almost creates this thing where if you are an importer of intelligence in the future, you theoretically are at risk of becoming essentially a vassal state. And so if you think about it at that level, Isn't AI something that is almost existential that we must win?

A I mean, for sure. I mean, at, at that level, for sure, and I would just point out that, like, almost every single state in the world is already a vassal state, so, like, no change there, but, uh, yeah, I mean, you don't want to be on the wrong side of it. That's clear. Is it containable to nation states? That's not clear, to be honest, to me at all, but whatever, I get the argument. I'm just saying at the consumer level, no one has explained why we should be excited about this, and if I, You know, I'm a gold buyer and ammo buyer and freeze dried food buyers already told you. So it doesn't kind of affect me as an investment matter, but like just, I, I think it would be, so I, I don't have a,

AI assessment note: “I mean, for sure. I mean, at, at that level, for sure”

Q Tucker, do you think it's because most people that get very wealthy very fast feel like it was unfair, and they feel guilty, and then they have to, like, destroy the system that got them there?

A I think there's a lot. I think that's such a deep point, though, because And you, I know that, you know, you live among people, I mean, you're familiar with this world, so, and only someone who is could say that, because you're absolutely right. Rich people are not all the same. If you meet someone who made his money incrementally over time, he's much less likely to have the desire, you know, you may not agree with him on everything, he may be a good person, a bad person, but he doesn't want to tear it down, and he doesn't feel especially guilty for what he has, and I have found just a non-political point, but as I get older, I want to spend less time with people who hate themselves, Because they're not capable of loving other people. Like, that's not a good place to start, actually, as a person, to hate yourself or feel super guilty. It really isn't. You don't end up helping others when you feel that way. But when you find people who inherited a lot of money, we never talk about that. It's a huge problem in this country. I'm not, I'm not arguing for the death tax at all, but I'm just saying, as an observation, there are awful, there's a huge class of people with massive inherited wealth, and they're almost all horrible. Not all of them. I mean, I know, you know, very well, I know some of them, and they're fine. They're, some of them are great, but as a class, they're awful, an…

AI assessment note: “you're absolutely right. Rich people are not all the same.”

Q Well, it's been true for the other side, right? They have been doing that exact policy. So if it's true for China and South Korea and Australia, why wouldn't it be true for us? It seems like we're the sucker at the poker table.

A Well, I think you're right. I guess what I'm, all I'm saying, I'm making a pretty pedestrian point, but I can't get past it, which is, this is so far from what the Republican Party stood for 10 years ago, which was neoconservative foreign policy, free trade, um, open borders, as, as you noted, maybe a little more than 10 years ago, but 15 years ago. Sure. Um, this is, this is the mirror image of it, and it just blows my mind, and it's, it's such a better version. It's such a more reality-based, flexible, Thoughtful, uh, version than we had before, and I'm just really, and most Republicans in the Senate are not even aware this is happening. They are the most recalcitrant people in the world, also the dumbest, so most of them, you know, don't accept any of this, but just as an observer, I'm thrilled to see it.

AI assessment note: “this is so far from what the Republican Party stood for 10 years ago”

Q Tucker, why are we not allowed to say we are absolutely saddened at the tragedy that happened on October seventh, and we're absolutely, um, appalled at watching people starve and innocents being killed in Gaza and not being able to get the maid? Why can't you say both?

A Well, you should be, and I've decided that I'm old enough, and I know, god, now I sound like such a fraud, I know my heart, but like, I, you can feel the hate coming off people or whatever. I, I would hear Obama talk, and I always really liked Obama before he became a senator, but I would hear him talk, and I'd be like, wow, that's animated by hate, and it would be in this, this is your captain speaking voice, but it didn't matter. I was like my dogs, like I could feel what was in him, and I feel very confident in my views. I like people, And I just feel that way, and I'm not going to play the game where I have to be like, oh, actually, my wife is part Jewish or whatever.

AI assessment note: “I'm not going to play the game where I have to be like”

Q were trying to light The Christmas tree in Rockefeller Center, I guess, and there was like a huge pro Hamas, I think, somebody check me out if this is wrong, protest, and then people were pushing back on the cops and all of this stuff, and all these folks were trying to do was just like the Christmas tree. Can you connect the dots? How does that cohort get to?

A It, it, no, but it, it's actually a branch from the same tree, Christmas tree in this case, um, because that whole conversation, while I think it's interesting, and I think it's, you know, geopolitically significant, and, and I've, you know, been to those countries, and I know people there, so I'm like interested in it, and there's a lot to care about and be interested in. But the displacement of all of our public passions onto a conflict in a foreign country, however important that conflict may be, really kind of tells you a lot. It's like, in other words, yeah, I care what's happening between Israel and Hamas. I have views on it, which are probably pretty mainstream views, whatever, I don't have any very interesting views on it, but it, it, it's a little weird for your entire country thousands of miles away to be so preoccupied with that conflict that they miss Big history-changing events happening, like, in their own country, and I think that's, again, a species of the same problem. We are unable to, the, the problems that confront us are so big that we can't deal with them, and I, and actually, my wife and I had this conversation the other night. I was, for years, a magazine writer, and I have to file every Friday. I worked for Bill Kristol at the Weekly Standard, and obviously, I regret that, but it was interesting at the time, and I have to file the story every week, and,…

AI assessment note: “the displacement of all of our public passions onto a conflict in a foreign country”

Q How can there be just a coordinated suppression? How does that happen?

A Well, that's, you know, this is how people wind up with really dark theories about what's happening, because why would you suppress that if a young woman, by the way, Ukrainian, I, I wish, I wish costplusdrugs.com was here so I could ask him, but like, if you really, Mark Cuban, sorry, costplusdrugs.com, I wish I could ask, if you care about the Ukrainian people, one was just stabbed to death on a train for being white, why doesn't anybody say it? Where all the, where's Bill Kristol on this? Like, we love the Ukrainians. One just got stabbed in the neck on public transportation, and no one cares? Like, what, I don't, I don't have an answer to your question. I will say that the one thing you have to worry about in a multi-ethnic society is ethnic conflict, because it's enduring, it doesn't go away. It's generational, and we're moving toward that. She was stabbed because she was white, and everyone knows that, actually. And knowing that, and not being able to say anything about it, because you fear you're going to be called names, doesn't make the problem go away. It makes you move to Bozeman, and it makes the problem worse. And that's what you're seeing. Everyone I know who can afford it is moving to Bozeman, or Jackson, or, you know, Sun Valley, or whatever, but they all have one thing in common, ok, let's just stop lying. And I don't like that, ok, because that suggests a futu…

AI assessment note: “I don't, I don't have an answer to your question.”