Knowledge Fight - #824: Tucker, The Man And His Twitter- Episode 3

Episode Date: July 3, 2023

Today, Dan and Jordan review the sixth episode of Tucker Carlson's very dumb Twitter show.  This installment is about how great Robert Kennedy Jr. is, but secretly may be about how one of his writers is taking a creative writing class.

I Read No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, It's time to pray. I have great respect for knowledge, but knowledge. I'm sick of them posing as if they're the good guys. Chang-E are the bad guys knowledge and fight and enjoy knowledge fight Need money And the advantage And the advantage and the advantage and the advantage And the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage and the advantage of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the Jordan work a couple dudes like to sit around worship with the altar of Celine and talk a little bit about Alex Jones. Oh indeed. We are Dan. Yep. Dan Jordan. Good question for you. It's up. It's a great spot today, buddy My great spot is that this weekend was money in the bank. Oh

Come into you live from London. Oh, yeah, they do want to went over to the UK money in the bank all right pounds in I was about to I was about to get there I think they still use the word bank. Yeah, I think yeah, yeah Um, it's good. You know bank is spelled Q. U.E. That's right. Yeah, yeah, yeah So you have the premise of the match, of course Sure. There is a briefcase on the top of a ladder or hanging from the ceiling The you have to get a ladder to get up to And then you grab it and inside as a contract that you can cash in at any time to become the champ

It's a great anticipation to go on. Yeah a bunch of nonsense Absolutely, anyway, I don't care about either of the matches. There's a men's and a women's I don't care about either of them because in the middle of the event you hear the those familiar sounds John Cena was there Out of nowhere John Cena comes running out of the back. I mean what a thrill. What is he gonna do? Fast ten is over right no peacemaker isn't even started again yet That gets there's the writer strike going on. So yeah, he might as well show up. I really got excited Probably more than I should have,

or had any reason to be, because I don't even love John Cena that much. I was gonna say, I don't know you, I find him incredibly charming, but whatever. So I texted Marty, oh my God, and then I looked at the phone and went, why did I texted that? But so dumb.

So anyway, John Cena goes out. Sure. It does an incredibly pandering. You crowd here at London, you are the best. Sure, sure. And like, the people in the back, they're all worried because you guys yell too much. This is a hostile environment,

but I say you are the best. Sure. You know, very much. First of all, I thought he was supposed to be the USA guy. Wow. What do you do? The marine. I mean, no, now he's fucking love the Brits. What are you going to go ape shit on how they still have a monarchy and be like, what are you doing? They have an outsizer amount of control over it. But still you think that they're basic figureheads, but it's not true. I would have enjoyed it. I would have too. So he was given this great speech.

Sure. And then he, his whole reason for being there, which was very unclear for minutes, while he was out there, was to rile up the crowd by saying it's time to bring WrestleMania at a London. Oh, that, and that was it? Well, here's the thing. What?

I started thinking, man, it would be funny if someone came out and their whole entire thing was, they didn't want WrestleMania to be in London and then Johnson to beat them up yeah absolutely that's perfect so Johnson it doesn't need to take long he trans water for a little bit longer and then this Australian guy comes out and he's, I think we should have had so many of the most straightly up. And they're jotsy to beat the buck. So the very thing that I thought would be hilarious

if it happened, happened. And I got a charge out of that. That is great. Yeah. That is a feeling of somebody pulling it off correctly. Yeah. It went too long, but otherwise delightful. Exactly what it was supposed to be.

Sure. Everyone went home happy. Fantastic. And, uh, yep. So what's your red spot? My bright spot is I finished Final Fantasy 16. You said that the last time we were recording. No, I didn't.

Privately. Well, I mean, I understand that, but I was, but there's a new game plus, man. Oh, that's right. That's right. It's a new game plus. I didn't even start the game until I beat the game. I retract my statement. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Anyways, a fantastic story. And you know what? It is very, very difficult to end things well. It's very difficult to end things. Are there multiple endings? Is that ever saying? Nope. There's one.

There's one ending. It culminates. I mean, it puts together all the themes of the story. It's successful and everything it sets out to do. And I think honestly, what's amazing about it is that they got away with telling one of the most, I mean, dangerous two capitalism stories that there's ever been. I mean, essentially what this is, is imagine, I mean, here's the story, all right. Jesus tries to free the slaves, realizes that it's actually God who is enslaved all of

us, and instead of being like, okay, I'm the son of God, they kill God. How about that? Is this actual Jesus or metaphorical Jesus? Metaphorical Jesus. Okay, because I feel like if it were literal, this would be trouble. But again, that's what I'm saying. Like this is so much like a story of a people overreliant upon one resource,

and a guy who is saying to everybody, listen, it is a bad idea to keep doing this. And regardless of the harm, it will cause. We must remove the resource entirely. So the point is he sets up the entirety of the harm it will cause, we must remove the resource entirely. So the point is he sets up the entirety of the people for a hundred years of extra emisory in order to free them from an evil God who tries to, you know, make them overreliate again on a specific resource. Yeah.

So when you say it's hard for it to end well, you don't mean for you as the player being for the story. No as the player for the story. For the story. As a writer it's difficult. For them it was difficult to rap things up in a satisfying way and then they pulled it off. Well I mean Game of Thrones obviously is an easy corollary. You know they fucked it up and in this story they nailed it.

I think it's time for a reassessment. I don't actually. I was gonna say how I was gonna say, you didn't even, did you even watch it? Yeah, I did. Oh, okay, you did, yeah. I joined Game of Thrones a bit late. That's true.

So I joined maybe in the fourth or fifth season or something like that, and I got up to speed and everything, and I don't know. I was like, I kind of like these kids, but the rest of this is a little bit, like I liked Arias adventures And I thought brand was pretty cool brand spreading out going hanging out with the tree. He's got a tree friend

Yeah, well who doesn't want a tree friend? I want a tree friend so bad Yeah, but all the politics and everything got a little annoying to me. I think God of the way Yeah, I was like I want more of the magic stuff and like kind of like why people just get along and hang out and have fun with tree folk Yeah, yeah and like kind of like why people just get along and hang out and have fun with tree folk. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No. I mean, you know, I think Martin had a sort of Magic should be the shark and jaws view of a game of thrones where it's like it's really there But it's never quite it's not like people walking around shooting thunderbolts at other people that kind of thing You know, yeah, but there are ice people who are constantly a threat. I'm not saying there aren't ice people who are constantly a threat. Yeah Maybe that maybe I thought life season wasn't as bad as people I think it might have been

I don't know. I haven't thought about it since it happened. We don't have to reclaim anything I don't have there was a I will a few months ago or a year ago or whatever though was there's a whole Effort to reclaim Phantom Menace fuck off that movie sucks. Wow. How dare you try and reclaim that shit. Oh no, we need a critical reason. We do not. Alex is going to charge in here like the Kool-Aid man and kick your ass. Somebody said he's a prequel guy. Somebody defended pod racing. How dare you? Hey, is it is pod racing? It wasn't Greg Proops who is a defining part racing. I don't think he defended pod racing once. I think you apologize but said I had a great time. I made a lot of money.

I'm Greg Proops. I should not have been in a Star Wars week. So Jordan, today we have an episode to do. We're going to be talking some tuck some Tucker. Now here's where things get messy. We're going to be talking some tuck, some Tucker. Now here's where things get messy. Tuck, we're gonna be talking about episode six of his show. But there's this episode three of our series about Tucker. So how do we title it? I mean, are they serialized?

Well, I mean, there's an order of show. Sure. In terms of when they come out. Right, right, right. So I don't know whether we should call this Episode three or episode six because if we call it episode six people are gonna be like where's episode three four and five sure Sure, if we call it episode three. It's actually episode six of Tucker show that might confuse people all right Let me throw this out at you. All right. We call it episode three tuck 60. No, okay.

I'll figure it out. I'm not gonna get any help from you clearly. I'm gonna get jokes. I come to you for serious advice. This is what I get. Fair enough. I actually, I, you know, having some fun, but like I really don't know what to title it.

Because the first episode of the Tucker thing was about the first episode of his thing. Sure. Second episode, about the second episode. Sure. I mean, by the time anyone's listening to this, it'll be a dead question. Yeah, they'll have already figured it out. Anyway, here's the reason we're doing some Tucker. Mm-hmm.

Alex was still out of town doing his remote sort of rented studio vibe. Sure thing where he's on the big screen. And Roseanne filled in in studio. Sure. On Friday. And it was, you know, her being on was huge and like bizarre. Yeah. And we talked about that when that happened. Yeah.

And then the second time it's not really all that bizarre anywhere. The seal has been broken. Yeah. And we talked about that when that happened. Yeah. And then the second time, it's not really all that bizarre anywhere. The seal has been broken. Yeah. And it's not like she was talking about anything that was all that interesting. I found it to be a dud. And so waste of time. Alex, while he's been in Florida, did a Q&A at the Church of Pastor Howard Brown, Robert Howard Brown, whatever his name is. And that was hard to watch. A Q&A. Yep. Yep.

What? Yep. A Q&A at the church. I mean, who? Of all the, listen, I mean, even if you're a fan of Alex, Q&A is a bad idea, right? I don't know. He's a performer. You know, like, he turns it on. You know, like he turns it on.

You can see him turn it on. You can see him like dodge questions in real time kind of, but not in any way that I felt like, oh, this is interesting. There was one guy who was insisting that Alex debate the JQ with Nick Fuentes. And that, you know, there's nothing quite more deserving of a house of God

Then yeah, I don't even like saying those two words. I don't like saying the two Yeah, I was thrilled with it either so you started yelling and Holy ghosting He got up he stood up and then the audience got other feet. He was like, oh, God. I'm a die, I'm a die, I'm a die. Just such a distraction. I have been given a translation of Alex by the Lord. It was horrible.

So then I was like, let's go to the past. I always love, it's kind of a self-care for me when I get to spend time in the past. But unfortunately, March 2nd and 3rd were a zero. Nothing is happening. Alex does not recant the story about Kerry hanging out with Anton Levay. Why would he? This was the only thing that I even found at all. Okay. This is from March 2nd. This was ridiculous. That's why America's degenerating. I do have to say this, I can hardly go see any film.

What? Open rain or the passion of the Christ or any of the last few films I've seen. Paycheck, I saw that. A big fan of Philip K. Dick, a sci-fi writer. I mean, it doesn't matter what movie you go to, there will be five to twenty, frying infants. And I mean, who does that? just a few years ago people didn't do that

it we really are degenerating in this country i mean that's just an example i mean women look at me like i'm weird when i open doors for them at restaurants or uh... at the shopping mall you know older women don't but the young ones think you're hitting on them or something you're opening a door for me well i'm sorry my mama taught me to do that uh... you know it it's and i'm not even that polite or nice of a person

what i got my own problems i'm pretty aggressive what it's just i spent their movies and i can never have to spend this belief uh... because uh... you know mainly the third world populations are here and then they just think you bring babies to movies. I might as well just move to China or move to Venezuela or something. I don't understand it.

That took a weird turn at the end. That was very odd. Yes. I mean, you know, in comedy, you know, I've heard plenty of the black people in movie theaters trope type jokes. That's not quite what he's doing. No, that's the thing. That's very strange. That's a strange interpretation of it.

He's complaining about the inability to suspend disbelief to get into a movie because there are babies there, which I would argue that Alex lives in a constant state of suspended disbelief. Yeah. He sees demons everywhere he goes.

Yeah. But I thought like, oh, this is fine. This is kind of like a trite point that he's making and he's saying that society's deteriorating because babies are movies and I'm annoyed by it. But then bringing in third world immigrant populations as like they're the ones with bringing babies to movies. There's a baby breakers.

Like I don't even know that that's not even a stereotype. Exactly. It's a big tree that like you could never see coming. It was fantastic listening to it. But I was like, there's nothing else going on here. Yeah. So there's no episode for that. Brutal.

Yeah. So we're gonna cover Tucker because of this right challenge of content. Yeah. And so we'll do that. But before that, let's say hello to new ones. Yes, that is. That's the preamble.

So first, Ryan and Lena, thank you so much. You're now a policy won. I'm a policy won. Thank you so much. You're now policy wonk. I'm a policy wonk. Thank you very much Thank you. Next in the fuck you and your horse you rode in on technocrats sound clip Alex is babbling translates to I'm the devil I've got to be taken off the air. I did all this. I'm a policy wonk. Thank you so much. You're now policy wonk I'm a policy wonk. Thank you very much. What a translation. Yeah, that's true. Next Really loving the show. Keep up the great work. Hopefully Jordan's writing something new that will get I will get to read in the future and maybe get to meet you in September so you can sign a copy of your book for me

Thank you so much you're now policy wonk. I'm a policy wonk Thank you very much. I know the fuck you think we're gonna be in September. Yeah. Oh wait We already said we're gonna be in September. Oh wait, we already said we're gonna be in Manchester. Yeah, next I Wanted to the east I want it to the west I want it to the policy that I love best. I'll be walking. You're now policy wonk I'm a policy wonk. Thank you very much. Next someone's got to come up with a dark end of the street come up with a dark end of the street, parody for the longs. Yeah. You have a made policy in the backseat of a car.

Ooh, ooh, ooh, I don't even know. Children, I remember one time I made policy in the backseat of a car. I don't know how that's somehow more uncomfortable for me than usual. Mm. That's where people go. You know, the dark end of the street.

To make policy. Yeah. Some people, the rich people that go out on a boat and make policy Some people they go way up in an airplane somewhere and make policy But for those of us who don't have nothing and he never had never got to have anything that sounds like it ourselves and two dollars worth of gas Congressional aid pick-up line like hey, do you want to go make some policy with me like that's that's That sounds like a fucking $2 worth of gas. A congressional aid pickup line. Like, hey, do you wanna go make some policy with me? Like, that's, that's,

next, you need to close, you need to close to the toilet, lead in porta-potties for them to work properly and not smell. Thank you so much, you're an aisle policy won't. I'm a policy won. Thank you very much. It's like an extra word in there.

So also we got a technocrite in the mix, Jordan. So thank you so much to Zap Raus, Dauer, and the Razz Dauer Mobile. Thank you so much. Sure now, a technic rat. I'm a policy one. Thank you very much. I'm the honky mother. Tell her you're brilliant.

Someone, someone, Sotomite sent me a book in a poop. Daddy Shark. Bum, bum, bum, bum, bum. Jar Jar Binks has a Caribbean black accent. He's a loser, little, little kitty baby. I don't want to hate black action. He's a loser little, little kitty baby. I don't want to hate black people. I renounce Jesus Christ. Thank you so much.

Thank you very much. My daddy was a big old man. I can see him with some policy in his hands. Policy, we never heard. Oh boy. This is what we do. But we do the walking wind of times cup, man. That's hard.

That's your ending bit. Now, you just put policy and songs and Clarence Carter Yes, absolutely What would I do if it just a few policies? No slip away doesn't work. Yeah, that's fair. So we're going over number six all right in the line of Tucker monologues. He's stretching out a little bit. He's doing a little more time.

This one's about 18 minutes long. Okay. So it's very dumb. That sounds right. Yeah. Yeah. So here we go. We'll start and you'll get the theme right away.

Okay. Hey, it's Tucker Carlson. I'm Tucker. I've been a candidate for president. The media hated more than Robert F. Kennedy Jr. You sure? He thought that title belonged to Donald Trump, of course it must. But go check the coverage. Trump got a gentle scout massage by comparison when he announced.

When Trump rolled out his presidential campaign in 2015, the New York Times waited until the 17th paragraph of the story to attack him. But as well known as he is, the paper said at the time, Trump is also widely disliked, and then they cited a poll to back it up. That was the attack on Trump. Eight years later, the Times attacked Bobby Kennedy in the very first sentence of the story, quote, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the paper declared, announced a presidential campaign on Wednesday built on relitigating COVID-19 shutdowns and shaking Americans' faith in science.

Wait, shaking Americans' faith in science. Imagine if you're an ordinary New York time subscriber reading that over coffee in your pre-war rent control duplex on Columbus Avenue. What? You'd think Bobby Kennedy had just declared war on the Enlightenment. My fellow Americans, I have come to shake your faith in science. Join me as I drag our nation back to the medieval period.

You'd be appalled. I imagine those readers already would know who Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is. I would assume. I mean, I- You're reading the times you probably have an awareness. You've created a very strange fictional human being for 2023. You know, like that's not,

that can't be that many people anymore. Probably not. No, they're most of the people. They're pre-war rent control. Rent control departments, most of the people who had rent control departments died a long time ago, right? I don't know, I'm not sure.

I don't have a lot of experience with that. I think that's evidence of my claim. Yeah, perhaps. So what do you think about this premise, though, that RFK juniors the most hated candidate ever, more than Trump? I kind of don't even think that that was an insult in their first... No, I don't either. I don't think there was an insult.

I think that was descriptive. I mean, honestly, I think that was a little bit like compared to what it deserves. Yeah, certainly could have been a little harsher. Yeah, absolutely. But back to so you would say no. No, I would say no. I would say that around not too far into the campaign season, a video was released of Trump saying you should grab him by the pussy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I remember that. That did happen.

That happened. And I don't know if I've ever hated anybody more than everybody who's like, but the media, the media, the media didn't even really go too hard on that. Which is, again, amazing. Because we're not talking about the most hated politician. We're talking about the media treating them the hardest. Okay. And I think that Trump, for everything that was insulting that was said about him in the press,

he was not treated as harshly as he should have been. Oh no, absolutely. Nor is Robert Candy Jr. But I would say that neither of them probably get the title. I mean, what about Ross Perot? He was given a pretty shit head. He was definitely that.

There's definitely that. Or Ralph Nader, he got beat a pretty shit. There is definitely that. There is definitely that. Or Ralph Nader. He got beat up pretty good. No, any, any, any, any closeted gay politician ever. David Duke. David Duke. I don't think he got that match of it.

Richard Spencer was treated very, very nicely. I think they treated David Duke very, very, very. But Richard Spencer didn't run for president. No, me, well, I mean, David Duke ran for president. And he almost won. No, he didn't. But I'm saying, I'm saying that there are, there are other people who the media was linden lorouche. Oh, the lorouche lorouche got it. He was not treated nicely by the press. Yeah, yeah, yeah, lorouche made it to the news radio joke room. Pat Robertson also ran for

president. No, he was given a lot of, he was given a lot more, he was given a TV show for fuck's sakes. Did he give himself that TV show? Oh, that's fair. So anyway, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is obviously the premise of this piece because, you know, I mean, Tucker is very invested in the Democratic primary. Yeah, I'm very concerned about who the Democrats pick. I think this is, I think what I feel like is starting to come to my theoretical understanding

of this is that they're trying to push RFK junior for the primary in the same way that some people tried to push Trump for the primary as like, hey, listen, crazy, crazy, man, if we get it in there, we're going to change the the window if you will and somewhat also the last time around with you know Tulsi you had all the people who were the you know sort of right wing folks saying that like oh, you know Get Tulsi in there. That's gonna be it. Choose the favorite Democratic primary candidate of the right.

Right. And now RFK is basically that. Yeah. But way worse in many ways. If I was the Democrat who was like looking around at my rally and being like, yeah, we can do it. There's a bunch of Nazis. I'd be like, maybe I shouldn't run for president.

If I were in a debate with Robert Kennedy, like if he gets to that stage, I would not even address him. I don't know. Anyway, media is mean. Yeah. Probably not as mean as I'm going to be, but they're mean. The LA Times called him a threat to democracy. At the offices of national public radio in Washington, a full-blown category five hysteria typhoon broke out. NPR devoted an entire segment to savaging Kennedy, not just a candidate, but as a human being. NPR described him as someone who, for his own perverse reasons, has made, quote, debunked and false, and misleading claims that undermine trust in vaccines. And who, in his spare time, provides moral support to crazed extremists who, quote, rally

under the banner of what they call liberty or freedom. People magazine didn't even bother to report a single word of anything Kennedy said at his announcement. Yeah. And instead wrote an entire story about how his relatives had him. Yeah. Well, the story was about how his relatives had him

and not about his true. And all of the stuff that he was saying that NPR said is true. Like all of that is just saying it in a derisive tone. It doesn't make it any less like fair. Oh, you go to the store on Wednesdays. Yeah. Why'd you say it like that? I don't know. That's weird. That's weird.

Also a category five, hysteria typhoon is great. Someone's taking a creative writing class and that's a person who's hired by Tucker. I think it's a real evocative imagery. It is. I think so. Yeah. If we were workshop and I'd be like, well done. I think I appreciate that because they lived in an alternate reality so much that it's controlled by, you know, their own perceptions and projections, right? If you're a Tucker listener listening to this, then you think, yeah, Tucker is saying that MPR savaged him because we think that media network savaged people because we watched

Tucker, right? Probably, yeah. MPR hasn't savaged anyone in their entire existence. They go, I really don't appreciate his policy positions, but I think we can respect each other's differences. And while we can't come to a compromise, I think it's still possible for us to say goodbye as equals. So thank you very much, Robert. What do you think the Fox equivalent of like Lake Wobbacan would be? If they had a garrison keeler type who was just telling old quaint stories about an angry, angry fucking town

Who just chased off outsiders. Yeah, I mean, isn't that the isn't that the inverse of Tucker saying an innocuous thing with a with a very a innocuous thing with a very, a very, uh, derisive tone of garrison, Keeler being like, and he went to the goddamn store on Wednesdays. Yeah. He, uh, so yeah, RFK is views, you know, they, they, people say they're bad. I think they're great.

Kennedy's young sister, Kerry, the magazine reported solemnly, does not approve of Bobby Jr's harmful views. His harmful views. Bobby Kennedy's thoughts alone are evil enough to hurt people. That's been the tone of the media coverage around Bobby Kennedy Jr. for the past 18 years. Obviously Tucker is saying that RFK's ideas are evil enough to hurt people as a way of mocking the very notion that such a thing is possible, but that's really dumb. When someone's pushing a false ideology that leads people to make a misinformed and dangerous choices,

as it relates to their healthcare and the healthcare of, say, their children, those ideas are capable of hurting people. And Tucker knows that. This is, I, there is stupid and like, Tucker's not that stupid. No, no, no, no. This is one of the things that somebody says that I really think has to be like, yeah, I mean, no, no, no, this is one of the things that somebody says

that I really think has to be like, you and I both know what's going on and my response to that is all right. And then we stop like, I can't, if you're not going to acknowledge what you just did, there's no point in us continuing to talk, you know, sure. And that's probably why, you know, we don't want to talk to Tucker. Yeah, absolutely. We can talk about him. That's why N we don't want to talk to Tucker. Yeah, absolutely. We can talk about him. That's why NPR didn't savage.

Wait till they do fuck, I can't remember. What do you know? Isn't that a show on NPR? NPR Saturday mornings? Michael Feldman? I've never listed to NPR. No, no. You didn't listen to Prairie Home Companion?

Never. Wait, was that on NPR? Yeah, that was like one of your skiers. Yeah, I was a kid and listen to Celtic connections. No, I didn't listen to that I didn't listen to hearts of space not once. No, I have never chose it. I've never been like let's put on NPI What about? You've already You've already considered that's just the news. You're just the news. The all things considered. I've never actively listened to NPI Every day it was on in my household. That's my parents listening to that damn That's not that's nuts. Yep. Yeah, listen to that that Irish music. Obviously

Obviously, it's better, but I feel like that is just as much an annoyance as if somebody has Fox News on every all day Every day. Well, yeah, I guess it wasn't all day, but it was like, you know, there were things on the weekends when people were home That like they listened to regularly. So there's like Saturday mornings maybe with Sunday mornings. I can't remember the day Exactly, but they're in the mornings. there was what you know with Michael Feldman. There was a fun quiz type game show. Sure, sure. And then there was a Perry home companion. And then in the evening, there was Celtic connections and hearts of space. Right.

And then every day when they'd be cooking dinner, you know, they'd have all things considered on. Gotcha. But I think the reason that it's less toxic maybe than Fox News is that some of it is entertainment. Like, obviously, Garrison Keeler's a weirdo creep. We didn't know that at the time. And nobody did. I mean, he's on the radio.

At the time, he's a just folksy storyteller. And there's that. And then it hearts of space space and Celtic connections just music You know, it's not even like and it's not even someone yelling your political ideas. Yeah, so I don't know Oh my god, I wish it was annoying an hour just of Celtic Yeah, and then another hour of weirdo space techno Yeah, at a certain point it just becomes MTV in the 90s just playing music videos. Oh, I would love that. I really, okay, now I would love

curated by Tucker, but it has to follow the format of Sundays on NPR. The furious hearts of space. Well, actually, I mean, like hearts of space was a show that it would explore themes. And so there'd be like, anger, or like, heartbreak, or whatever. And then the music would explore that. I feel like fuckers who play a lot of partner.

But it would just be like, boop, boop, boop, boop. But that Bui was like a comet going, good, sure, sure. I'm gonna have to go with Conor a rung being on uh... on repeat anyway clearly don't want to talk about robber can i know but we must okay so anyway the media has hated him for a really long time

and rightfully so that's been the tone of the media coverage around bobby kennedy jr. for the past eighteen years since july of two thousand five that's the moment the kennedy published a magazine article suggesting their with immediate coverage around Bobby Kennedy Jr. for the past 18 years since July of 2005. That's the moment that Kennedy published a magazine article suggesting there might be a link between the rise in diagnosed autism cases and the ever-expanding schedule of mandatory childhood vaccines. The day that story was published, Kennedy's reporting was considered so solid that two

outweighed simultaneous reporting stone and salon.com. Unfortunately neither, one of them understood what they were up against. The pharma lobby rolled out the most ferocious public relations campaign in memory, and both publications swiftly caved, both pulled the story, and then disavowed it, groveling as they did.

No one in the national media bothered to explain why autism diagnoses had skyrocketed. If it wasn't the vaccines and maybe it wasn't, then what was it? To this day, there has not been a convincing explanation. Instead, reporters just attack Bobby Kennedy. Tucker sure is having a lot of fun with details. Yeah, I was going to say. The piece that Kennedy wrote in 2005 was titled Deadly Immunity,

and it was making the argument that Thymarisol and vaccines were responsible for the rise in cases of autism. Slondon caved to big farm of pressure. They were bombarded with corrections and had to add five different major corrections to the story in the immediate days after publishing that an editor said, quote, went far in undermining Kennedy's expose.

The media didn't hate Kennedy for this article. If he's even hated it at all, it's because of all the shit he says that's long debunked. And he just continues spreading the same bullshit, pretending that no one has provided any reason that he's wrong. And when that doesn't work, he just moves goalposts. If he'd published that article, then seen the corrections

and said, oops, my bad, then no one would be mad at him. It might lead to a reconsidering of his credibility and his ability to investigate things, but he would show a measure of goodwill, and people would be like, man, whatever it happens. Instead, he's just doubled down and led tons of people down a really dangerous road. And guess what, ding dong? People not having an easy answer for the question of autism diagnoses doesn't mean that Kennedy just might be right. Because that's the game that Tucker's trying to play, insinuating that because no one's fully solved this issue that leaves

some room that Kennedy could be right, he has given an explanation. And guess what else, Ding Dong? There are a number of very well understood reasons why autism diagnoses have gone up. One is greater awareness in the wider population of the autism spectrum with a greater likelihood that parents seek out appropriate care, and that will likely come with a diagnosis. There's also some screening that people do in well-child visits. Now, that wasn't routine before, but has become more now. There's also a number of other ideas like genetic predispositions, but the vaccine link has been investigated and found to be bullshit. And yet Kennedy pushes the same shit that he pushed years ago.

And that's why people hate him and Tucker fucking understands this. It's nonsense. He's playing a weird game where maybe he's right. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I agree with everything that you said. And I think that those are good concerns, but my biggest issue is whoever gives him adjective should be fired and in trouble. Talk because yeah, these are

a little overwrought maybe look, they, they fucking groveled at the face. When you're in the creative writing class, it's a process. That's what I'm saying. This is a high school student. They're in the middle of the semester. Shoes it up a little bit. They haven't seen it. They don't have anything good. Right.

But look, you see little signs that there's progress. It's like Jesus Christ. Call it down. Yeah. It's like Jesus Christ. Call the doubt. Yeah. It's tired. So if you're wondering why this is happening, it probably is because Robert Kennedy was on Rogan. Oh, for fuck's sake.

So Tucker's going to play a clip of that. At this point, most Americans have heard a lot more about Bobby Kennedy, Jr. than they've heard from him. Bobby. He doesn't get paid. He offers to speak from big platforms. But last week Joe Rogan gave him one. Here's some of what he said.

Well, I do five of my seven kids' allergies. You know, it's weird. And, of course, we know why. As aluminum adjuvants give you allergies, they're designed to make you, you know, to create a hyperimmune response to, you know, to foreign particles. And the last category is the allergic disease, is peanut allergies, food allergies, eczema, which I never knew anybody with eczema when I was a kid. I never, asthma, I knew people with asthma, but it wasn't one in every four black kids

like it is today. So, you know, all of those things, now we went from six percent of American having chronic disease. By 1986, we're starting to have the vaccines and we got an 11.8% of kids now, so it's doubled. Why do five of my seven children have allergies? Now we don't know the answer, of course, but it's an interesting question. In fact, it's an important question that deserves an adult answer not that you should hold your breath waiting to get one. Bobby Kennedy asks a lot of questions like that. He notices things.

Kennedy pays attention to the world around him. And he wonders why it's changing. Bobby Kennedy is not wondering why his kids have allergies. He asked that as a rhetorical question then gave his answer. Tucker is acting like this guy is just out here noticing things and playing the role of an observational comic, pointing out things that seem weird. Kennedy is not doing that. He's using his children's allergies to push his antivacs world view. There are a lot of theories about the rising number of people with allergies, but there isn't a full consensus on the matter. One of the most popular theories has to do with children being exposed to less microorganisms early in life than they were in the past, but there's another co-founding factor that's difficult

to deal with, and that is it way more people think they're allergic to things than actually are allergic. According to a paper published in 2018 in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, quote, quote, People aren't reliable reporters of whether or not they're allergic to something or really just don't like it or maybe they got sick from it once and decided it was an allergy. I've been guilty of that even myself. Sure, sure. I thought I was allergic to avocados. I think it was just because I got sick eating some bad guacamole when I was younger and I made a bad data set there. Based on everything else I know about Robert Kennedy Jr. I am going to have some

healthy skepticism about whether or not five of his children actually do have allergies. Maybe they do, maybe they don't, but the thing to note about this that is really important about the way Tucker is playing this game is he's acting like he's just asking questions. When in fact, Robert Kennedy is making very emphatic statements. Yeah, this is not questions. Well, that's, but that's the trick there is because he's asking rhetorical questions. If you leave off that he gives answers at the end of it, then you give the viewer the idea of this person being an open-minded truth seeker and then when you go listen to it, you come back and you say, oh, this open-minded truth seeker has found an answer.

Not just is asking questions anymore. And because I know he's an open-minded truth seeker, I can trust him. Yeah, it's dumb. Is that what he sounds like all the time? I've never heard him speak before. Yeah, I regret not knowing the specifics, but he had some health condition that led to,

I apologize that I don't I apologize that I don't know the exact details. But he had he had some health thing a number of years ago. And so he has a throat. Okay. Well, then he won't be president. So I'm not worried. Well, he sounds like that all the time.

People are shallow, but maybe not. I don't know. Sure. I don't know. I. I don't know. I don't think it's disqualifying necessarily. His ideas are disqualifying. Oh, I know. I think his ideas are disqualifying, but I think that the reason is...

So, look. He says the Robert Kennedy. Bobbie is really an observer. He sees things. He notices things. He's a falconer. Sure. What?

Bobby Kennedy asks a lot of questions like that. He notices things, Kennedy pays attention to the world around him. It's a bird! And he wonders why it's changing. He's an outdoorsman of falconer and a fly fisherman. He's interested in how nature works. He's curious. Not so long ago, these qualities were considered essential to the practice of science.

All science would be discovered. I think he're from observation. Falcon and piercing. Falcon and patient watching. Without the willingness to put aside your pre-assumptions and assess with honesty the things you see and touch and smell, the changes taking place right in front of your face, you can't do science.

You can't create art either or journalism or theology. You have to be willing to notice the obvious and they tell you're not allowed to notice the obvious. You should be concerned. Imagine you were on a commercial airline flight. The plane is just leveled out at 37,000 feet, you're closing your eyes for a nap, and suddenly you smell smoke. And it's not your imagination. You can see it starting to fill the cabin. All around you people are hacking and choking. The guy in the next seat has a napkin pressed against his mouth, and he's mumbling what sounds like Psalm 23.

What? Value the shadow of death. Clearly, the airplane is on fire. Okay. But almost unbelievably, no one has said a word about it. There's a man on the wing of the plane. He's acknowledging this is happening. Everyone is silent.

So in panic, you yell for the flight attendant. They're smoke in the cap, and you say as if she hasn't noticed. But she stares at you with hard eyes. Shut up racist, she replies. That's a dangerous Russian conspiracy theory. Stop spreading this information or I'll call TSA and have you arrested when you land. That sounds like a fever dream.

It's also pretty close to the experience of living in the United States at the moment. Not for me. Doesn't sound at all. That's a genuinely funny story. Look, Kennedy, he can be a stoic and observer as he wants, but he's not a scientist. No amount of hiking and playing with Falcons is going to change that, but I don't really care.

I want to talk about Tucker's metaphor, because I think there's something slightly off about it. In the context of talking about Robert Kennedy, the points of comparison are pretty obvious. The people coughing and the smoke in the cabin are things like more people having allergies or there are more autism diagnoses than there used to be. Kennedy is seeing those things and pointing them out and people are yelling him down as a racist or a Russian conspiracy theorist. When in actuality he's just being observant and pointing out the things that he's seeing and no one else wants to accept.

But here's the problem with the metaphor. Kennedy isn't observing things and pointing them out. He's also ascribing a reason for the things happening, and he's wrong. He says that vaccines are doing all the things, like causing allergies autism. So in the plane metaphor, what he'd actually be doing is yelling at the flight attendant about what he's decided is causing the smoke in the cabin, but he'd also be wrong. Maybe Kennedy would be telling the flight attendant

that the way landing gearer installed create fires, but in reality it was just someone vaping in the bathroom. Then Kennedy would start a lifelong highly funded campaign to get rid of land, to gear on planes, and then need Mary Cheryl Hines. My point is that this metaphor is dumb. Tucker is trying to play fast and loose about what Kennedy does. He doesn't observe the world and ask questions. He has a dogmatic answer to those questions already in place, and whatever observations he

does have are merely meant to prop up the already determined conclusion that he's based his life on. So fuck off. Yeah. Yeah. It's Cheryl Hines on the plane in this metaphor though. She's the one on the wing. Tucker didn't make that clear and I feel like that's a huge detail for me. It depends on that changes everything.

Because then I want the plane to... I mean, I've got nothing there. Yeah. I mean, it's just dumb get I get the point that he's trying to make, but there is such a refusal to accept that like this is not just a person who's like pointing things out and observing things. That's that's the entire shell game he's playing. And it's ridiculous to anybody who has any familiarity with the people involved, the history of this. No, I think what I find so fascinating about that

is that from the writing of that, I do feel like all I would need to do to make a solid bit about that is be like, oh, Tucker is saying things like, and then say that word for word and people will laugh at it at the beats. If you just change the inflection points and you calm the beats and the timing down. Let me ask you this. What's that? From a creative writing perspective. Sure. Pretty good. No, that's why it's a bit is because it's overwritten. It's a waging. But dramatic.

The high school staffer is getting better. Well, that's true. I will say that there is a full narrative conclusion there. There is a problem that the entirety of the piece is uneven. Internally, and just taken as a whole. Yeah, there's a little bit of a problem there. So look, man, there's something going on,

but no one admits it. Much like the plane with the smoke. Right. All around you, things seem to be fraying and getting worse. Your gut tells you there's something very bad going on and all the evidence suggests that there is. But the people in charge won't acknowledge that. Everything's fine, they scream, stop noticing. But wait, I don't remember this many kids having allergies or asthma or eggs

More autism or for that matter body dysmorphia and why so many suicides what's going on here shut up stop asking questions That's their answer But Bobby Kennedy won't stop asking and that's why they hate him So all the things that Tucker brought up there is pieces of evidence that there's something really bad going on are things that serious people study and questions are asked about them all the time honestly a bizarre idea to say like all of this stuff, the people in charge, by the way, who are the people in charge? Yeah, exactly. Very unspecifically.

Yeah, totally. They're just like, oh, no, everything is fine. This is all, no, everything is good. No questions. Countless pages of media have been written on these topics. And for Tucker to pretend otherwise is honestly embarrassing. And again, no one hates Kennedy for asking questions. pages of media have been written on these topics. And for Tucker to pretend otherwise is honestly embarrassing.

And again, no one hates Kennedy for asking questions. They hate him because he won't stop making the same debunked arguments he's been making for years. Yeah. That's it. Yeah. I mean, I genuinely believe this. And I think this is kind of funny in light of Tucker's comments is like, if we had a

full on tech, you know, recording of every single American's day on the day he recorded this, I guarantee you before 8 p.m. every human being would've been like, this is not fine about something. Sure. Every single one of us, that butt, what about the people in charge who are not specified and we don't know who they are? See, those are the people with that we have documented video of saying this isn't fine on that day.

Big to differ. I just heard a very reputable source name, Tucker. Fair enough. Tell me that they don't. People are screaming, things are fine. Yes, sure. So, Robert Kennedy was on Rogan. But then someone at Vice wrote an article

about him being on Rogan. As Kennedy spoke on the Rogan show, a reporter for vice.com called Anna Merlin was watching. Merlin was so enraged by what she saw that she dashed off an article attacking Joe Rogan's employer for allowing the conversation to take place. Spotify has stopped even sort of trying to stem Joe Rogan's vaccine misinformation, red-the-head line. The piece never even described much of what Bobby Kennedy had actually said. Merlin dismissed the entire interview as, quote, a detailed survey of Kennedy's most dangerously incorrect views, a far too extensive list to outline in full.

In other words, we here at Vice don't have time to describe all of Bobby Kennedy's lies, but trust us, they were lies. Look at that delivery. Yeah, that was probably where still it was. That was Tucker getting fancy. Yeah, that's cute. That's troublesome. So he's also just lying.

Yeah. Anna's article is pretty specific about the claims the Kennedy made on Rogan and the, like, which ones are bullshit. Tucker took that line that said it was too long of a list out line and full and then he just lied to the audience that was the extent of the discussion. In fact, the next paragraph starts quote, they included innumerable talking points that have already been debunked. At one point for instance, Kennedy falsely suggested the vaccines cause autism, which has been repeatedly and randomly disproven,

with Rogan interjecting supportively. Kennedy also trotted out one of his favorite talking points that vaccines contain a dangerous form of mercury, something he says a lot. As ever, he conflated Ethel Mercury, which is not considered hazardous to human health, and a methyl mercury, which is considered dangerous and even small doses. Both of these points are backed up with links to supporting research in Anna's article. Anna goes on to point out the Kennedy also said that Wi-Fi, quote, degrades your mitochondria

and it opens your blood-brain barrier with no evidence at all. Well, no, that one's true. Tucker's just straight up lying about this article because he knows the audience isn't gonna check and he doesn't care. The image that vice is just posting essentially empty attack articles is what the audience wants to hear.

So that's the image that Tucker paints for them. To make sure that they don't consider any criticism of Robert Kennedy for somebody. Right, right, right. And you know, it would be ironic if he were unaware of it. But appropriately, his last line is they're just saying things and then asking you to trust them. Yeah, in essentially the exact thing of of his crime Yeah, I'm done to people. Oh, and then he does a fancy voice over it. So fuck off But then he also in the next clip he he's going to say more about the article from later in the article

So he would have had to read the beginning and let skip to the end right in order to not get the part where and I went over the Specifically, yes, it's not ironic because he's a lot appropriately lying about it. Yes, it's a fucking malicious liar Yeah, yeah, and then goddamn it. I'm sorry about this, but we're about to get back into Peter Hotez No Then Merlin called Spotify to see if she could get the episode censored Much to her profound frustration Spotify refused to censor the episode and kept the interview on its website. So she spent the next several days ranting about all of this on Twitter. People were listening to the wrong things and Anna Merlin was mad about it.

So it was Peter Hotez. Hotez is a pediatrician from Texas who became moderately famous on MSNBC during the COVID lockdowns as a Biden's shell and a vaccine promoter. Hotes read Anna Merlin's piece and then hopefully retweeted it. Hots. Hots. Hots. Hots. Hots.

Hots. Hots. Hots. Hots. Hots. Hots. Hots. Hots. Hots. Hots. Hots. Hots. Bobby Kennedy on a show you claim he's wrong why don't you explain why he's wrong that's seem fair yeah but why why your question is why not and why yeah is the brutal why do

that yeah stupid that simple yeah but it's really uncomplicated yeah so now that we're getting into the Peter Hotez of it all great great I mean it's just the derisive tone towards moderately famous. When it's like, the guy didn't want to be any of this. Yeah. You should have not had a pandemic assholes. I didn't like, I didn't like to start a TV show. Later Tucker does call it a so-called pandemic. What?

So there may not have been one. Motherfucker. Jesus Christ. Uh. He didn't start a podcast. He didn't like go out and he he wasn't like on the open mic Circuit and then he he got his big break at JFL and then he finally but he never made it to the big times He's just a fucking doctor. That's where you're wrong. Okay. He did make JFL new faces, the actress unsigned. I would watch that show. Here are the all-pandemic with no agent. It would be good, it would be a good show.

Oh, we could write that, Betts. So anyway, Peter Hotez went on MSNBC instead of talking to Rogan. To Rogan, because he's a coward. Yeah, sure. But Hotes wouldn't bite. So Rogan offered to give a hundred grand to Hotes' favorite charity if he agreed to come on. Soon others made their own pledges and the pot swelled to over a million dollars. But still, Peter Hotes wouldn't come.

Instead he scampered back to MSNBC where one of the channel's oilier host assured him he was doing the right thing by dodging the debate. Arguing with Bobby Kennedy is morally equivalent to debating a Holocaust denier, the host said, no decent person would do that. And of course, Hotez agreed, quote, 200,000 Americans needlessly perished because they believed the anti-vaccine disinformation and refused to take a COVID shot. So really talking about B. Kennedy would be a lot like a bedding murder.

And Peter Hotez, MD, PhD, was not going to do that. But wait a second, you ask yourself. Let's think about those numbers. 200,000 people died because of vaccine disinformation from Bobby Kennedy and people like him. Hmm, how do we know that? Is that really science? No, it's not science because we don't know that. We can't know that.

There is no way to know that. Wait, wait, wait, wait. Peter Hotez's claim is a political attack posing a science and he specializes in those. He's a specialist. Is he literally trying to break people's faith in science? It seems like it. Yeah.

So you can probably bicker about the exact number, but you'd have a really difficult time refuting that there was a large number of excess deaths caused by vaccine refusal. Just to start, in November, 2022, Yale School of Public Health released a study that looked at excess death numbers across partisan lines. The authors found that the excess death rate was 1.6% for Democrats and 10.4 for Republicans, specifically after the vaccine was released.

They said, quote, the gap in excess death rates between Republicans and Democrats is concentrated in counties with low vaccination rates and only materializes after vaccines became widely available. Other research has done that's tried to disambiguate these variables and look at vaccine refusal and health outcomes, and it doesn't look great for people who are telling people not to get vaccinated. And all likelihood 200,000 is a pretty fair estimate of the deaths caused by anti-vax profiteering during the pandemic. And Tucker is most likely just really upset about that because those people's blood is on his hands too, and he knows it. Yeah.

But also, like, he can always hide behind the impossibility of drawing straight lines between like, why exactly did someone not get vaccinated? You know, like, right. Did, was it because of my telling them not to get vaccinated? You can't prove that. And that is true, that is fair. And that's probably why people shouldn't be charged

for like manslaughter for disseminating misinformation. Sure, sure, sure. But you can look at the numbers, you can look at differences in excess death rates and vaccination rates and right right? It's pretty clear that the spirit of what Peter Hoteza is saying is accurate. Yeah Yeah, I mean, but that's that's kind of the problem is that if we're so obsessed with only dealing with straight lines then boy There are so many ways to get to a different point

that aren't a straight line. So if the problem is the point we get to, then you have to deal with where we start and not the line. Well, and if we're adhering to this rigid a standard for proving things, there's a whole lot that's already been said by Tucker in this episode that's going to fall the fuck apart. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So, I don't know. Yeah. I would say that, that, like, A to B relationship is messy to delineate with a straight line. Sure.

And you could probably argue about the precise number. And that's fair enough. Right. But for him to be making a mockery of this and saying it's a political point that has nothing to do with science and all this is ludicrous. And Tucker, he knows well enough. Well, he knows well enough. His job is to force people to be so angry and pointlessly combative about a superficial problem.

So it avoids actually dealing with the fundamental problem. Yeah, man, there's actually a really great example of that later on in this. We're like, you know, he's talking about this, like, big pharma cabal that's trying to attack Robert Kennedy because he's a threat to it. And meanwhile, Tucker's spending all his time demonizing Peter Hotez, who tried to make a patent-free vaccine for coronavirus,

like which is a giant attack against Big Farma. I mean, it's absurd. It's forced for the trees, definitionally. Of course, and I mean, just the idea, the idea that you can give a fuck about the number. That's bananas to me. 200,000 is an unconscionable number. Do you know what else is an unconscionable number of people to die because of lies that get other people made?

101. Oh, yeah, I'll go with you on one. You know? So why are we fucking talking about this at all? Because Tucker wants to create an argument out of something that is inarguable, right? And he wants to just shit on Peter Oates. Yeah, well, that's fair. Here he is on television during the so-called pandemic.

It's all about mass compliance. That's going to be absolutely critical. Because if you don't have mass, remember this virus aerosolizes. So even six feet is not enough. It can go 17, 18 feet, several meters. What you really have to do is have vaccine not in the schools. We should have a rule that anyone who walks into a school over the age of 12 has to be vaccinated. This is the nature of the anti vaccine movement

in this country. It's got it's somehow married now to far right wing extremism and and white nationalist group. Anyone who's unvaccinated and has been lucky enough to escape COVID, your luck is about to run out. I call it anti-science aggression, coming from Senator Rand Paul, Senator Johnson, members of the House of Representatives

in addition to those two senators are killers. It's all about mass compliance. We must have vaccine mandates for children. Take the vaccine or you will die. Anyone who disagrees with me is a white nationalist and a killer and probably an agent of Putin. Do we say probably, let's revise that. Certainly an agent of Putin.

Again, here's Dr. Peter Hotez. We're starting to see now those same anti-vaccine messages that's coming out of the U.S. and now we're finding it in Africa and Latin America. those same anti-vaccine messages that's coming out of the U.S. and now we're finding it in Africa and Latin America. And remember what the other reason we're seeing this is the Putin government has, this has been reported by U.S. and British intelligence,

has been piling on with this whole systematic program of what's being called weaponized health communications, trying to destabilize democracies with anti-vaccine anti-science messages and targeting. So according to British and US intelligence, anyone who disagrees with Dr. Peter Hotez is a disloyal American working to destabilize our democracy. I'm sorry, well, half of Vladimir Putin.

Yeah, it all makes sense. Yeah. Yeah, like that's so-called pandemic in there. That was a super good touch. Wow. Hotez's points were totally fair and Tucker is misrepresenting what he said in order to pivot the argument and to say for waters. Hotez didn't say that if you were

anti-vax, then you're a white nationalist or whatever. He just made a very accurate point that opposition to vaccines became involved with white nationalist groups during the pandemic. It's a fertile recruitment pool that extremist groups used to grow their ranks and they associated intentionally. Hotez also didn't say that if you're anti-vax or even if you're spreading anti-vax messages you work for Putin. That's ridiculous. These are interpretations you might make if you had a difficult

time with reading comprehension, but that isn't the case for Tucker and his staff. They're just liars. Yeah. Who are hiding behind poor comprehension as a way of sort of passing off their lies. Yeah. I mean, on the other hand, one of his writers did give him the word, Huffley, which I mean, that's just... Huff, huff, huff, huff, huff, huff. That suggests a poor reading level.

It's a bad sounding word, it does a bad rhythm. So, Hotez thinks that if you're antivacs, you're a white nationalist, you work for Putin. Also, I've everyone who criticizes him should be arrested. Fair. Now, by comparison, never in his life has Bobby Kennedy Jr. said anything half that demented. What? Peter Hotes claims to have a valid medical license.

Clang. He treats patients. After a while, even MSNBC viewers were going to have some questions about a guy who talks like that and apparently some of them did. As the lockdowns were on, the population started to notice that many of the core claims the TV doctors were making were untrue. You don't need one shot. If you got the shot, you would never get sick.

You would never pass the virus to others and so on. They said these things as you know again and again ultimately they are proven wrong, but they never admitted it. They just attacked the people who noticed. Here's Dr. Peter Hotez calling for the Biden administration to arrest anyone who questions the COVID vaccine. The Biden administration has to realize that that anti-science is a killer disinformation. It's not even just disinformation. I guess this is an anti-science empire right now and we need Homeland Security.

We need just this department. We've really got to figure this out. And the health and health human services will not be able to figure this out on the room. It's not a medical problem. It's a law enforcement problem. They've doubted me arrest them. It's a law enforcement problem. They've doubted me, arrest them.

It's a horrifying outburst if you think about it. If you were on tape saying something like that, you would be deeply ashamed. But Peter Hotez is not ashamed. He's become even more grandiose. He's emboldened. I am so speechlessly angry about this. Yeah, and if you watch the larger context of that clip

that he played, they're talking about how you could save more lives now. You could still save lives. And like people dying because of still. Yeah, and so, you know, I don't think I would hear that clip and I would have follow up questions about exactly what the roles of the like Department of Justice would be, you know,

but I don't hear that is arrest people who disagree with me. I would hear that as sue people and see some desist letters to people who are like making money off. Don't do nothing. Your job is to do something to save people's lives and you're doing nothing about it. So do a different thing.

Yeah, not necessarily like arrest Tucker. I mean, I don't want you to arrest people. I want you to do a thing. Because arresting people wouldn't do any good either. Yeah, it would just create heroics or martyrs out of those arrested. Yeah, no, I find it unacceptable on a human level for Tucker to say that it was other people providing a shit time.

It was doctors who are providing misinformation during the pandemic. That really is unacceptable shit. It is, it is. And it's always going to be easy when you have an evolving public health situation and a novel virus that you are able to create a vaccine for in such a brief window,

that there's going to be times where you're wrong about something. You're not providing this information, you're wrong, and then because you're wrong, you're wrong for all the right reasons. Exactly. And maybe you. And then you correct it.

And also maybe you were right at the time. And then there's another variant. You know, like that can happen. And you're always going to be able to make mileage out of misrepresenting things that doctors and such said earlier. And then also there were some people who were maybe a little capricious with their messaging. But that wasn't the lion's share of the folks. Right. Right. Right. Right. We were in support of the vaccine. I just, I mean, it's just so, you know, the feelings that the pandemic arose. So-called pandemic.

See, you know what I mean of like, this is something that I do not feel was reckoned with. No. The pandemic was not reckoned with, no, and it still hasn't been, no, and until it is, where we're guaranteed for chaos. We don't do that here. See that's, I don't know.

Our costume doesn't reckon with stuff. We need to reckon with things. Yeah, definitely. There's so many things that need a reckoning. Yeah. And if we don't reckon with them, we will be reckoned with. Yeah.

And it's not going to be good for us. Nope. It never is. Nope. And we dononed with. Yeah. And it's not going to be good for us. Nope. It never is. Nope. And we don't learn. Nope. So someone who does learn as Peter Hotez, he learns to be emboldened by getting away with it all

in plain view of these emboldened doctors. And so, a doctor in order to take him down a peg besides to read his bio. Ha, ha, ha. Okay. But Peter Hotez is not ashamed. So talk in order to take him down a peg besides to read his bio. Okay, but Peter Hotez is not ashamed. He's become even more grandiose. Hotez has written a self-congratulatory new book called The Deadly Rise of Anti-Science. A scientist warning as if you were a scientist. Here's how Hotez describes himself in the book's promotional literature. Quote, during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic,

one renowned scientist in his famous bow tie, appearing daily on major news networks such as MSNBC, NPR and BBC and others. Dr. Peter J. Hotez often went without sleep, working around the clock to develop a nonprofit COVID-19 vaccine and to keep the public informed. During that time, he was one of the most trusted voices on the pandemic and was even nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize for his selfless work.

He also became one of the main targets of anti-science rhetoric that gained traction through conservative news media. Here you have a renowned scientist, selfless, trusted, going without sleep, self-denying, persecuted by extremists for daring to tell the truth. The Albert Schweitzer of Cable News. That's Dr. Peter J. Hotez. The fact that a partisan buffoon like Peter Hotez

can describe himself this way with a straight face and the backing of a publisher makes you despair for the country's future. But don't despair. There is hope. There's hope, Jordan. Wow. Brass balls for Tucker to joke about Hotez's bow tie. I am beyond...

Yeah, also Tucker really slipped over something there that him and his ding-dong friends all ignore. And that is that Hotez is, you know, I would say his primary claim to fame at this point is the work towards creating the nonprofit COVID-19 vaccination. Yeah. It kind of makes him like legit an opponent of Big Pharma in a way that Tucker could never even pretend to be. Yeah, no, one of the, I mean, the greatest thing you can do to Big Pharma is threaten them economically. In service of providing something for people. Yeah, absolutely. That's what Hotez and his team were nominated for a Nobel Prize for.

They're making a patent-free COVID vaccine, which could help people in the developing world. Millions of doses have been administered in poor areas of India and other countries, but you won't hear about that from Tucker. The guy who applaud dumb fuck Robert Kennedy is some kind of a maverick standing up to Big Pharma. Skies are just jokes, idiots. Yeah, I just don't, I just don't. And like we can play the same game that Tucker wants where I go find one of his bios from his books, and I read it in a snarky voice, but where does that get us?

No, it doesn't get us anywhere, and it is, it is what, I mean, it's so fucking annoying because he's correctly grasping a serious issue and distracting from it and then giving power to the people who are causing it. What, uh, lay it out. I mean, like, the reason that you're willing to go along with with Tucker's dumb shit is because Big Pharma is fucked up. That is true. You cannot deny that. They're fucked up. Yeah, maybe. I don't know if that's why you go along with Tucker's stuff. No, no, no, no, I understand. But the reckoning never came for the secular family.

You know, like all of these things are there. Right. You know, there is a problem. Right. Yeah. And then you come to it with like, oh, this person who gave people millions of doses of a vaccine that they don't have to pay for is evil and a murderer. And that's why we need Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The guy who is almost directly responsible for hundreds

of thousands of deaths to become our leader. Arguably, like, so, you know, with Peter Oates, with his, you know, patent-free vaccine, he is providing something for people. It benefits their health at the expense of Big Pharma. Right. They're not able to charge for it and what have you. Right. Conversely, if you really look at it, if you're a cynical, evil, big, pharma person,

you're probably thrilled with Robert Kennedy. Totally. He's advising people not to get vaccinated, which will create more health conditions that they have to deal with with medicine later and throughout their lives, perhaps. And so it's actually the reverse. Hotez is doing something that helps people at the expense of big pharma

Kennedy is doing something at the expense of people right helps big far well I mean, but that I mean that's what Tucker's avoiding All medicine should be non-profit. Mm-hmm Well, you he doesn't touch on that surprise and like yeah exactly But Peter hotes is a coward because he won't debate Robert Kennedy, but there's still hope. Is there? But don't despair, there is hope.

Hotez will never debate Bobby Kennedy Jr., but it doesn't matter. Kennedy is already one. He's more honest than Dr. Peter Hotez, and that's obvious to anyone who's paying attention. A new economist poll shows that Kennedy is more popular and far less hated than either major party frontrunner.

After almost 20 years of being silenced, Bobby Kennedy Jr. is being heard and why wouldn't he be? He was on. Kennedy's theory is about vaccines maybe right, maybe partially right, that could be even utterly wrong. No one's proved it. I'm sorry, what? But what we can say with certainty is that America's medical establishment has beclowned

itself for all time. What? Beclowned. What? Yeah. What fucking asshole wrote this shit? I'm telling you, creative writing class. My red pen would tear this person apart.

Beclowned. Ugh. So that's a really weird formulation on Tucker's part. Basically, he's saying that the audience shouldn't despair because Kennedy may be totally wrong in misleading hundreds of thousands of people towards risking their lives for no reason, but a recent poll said he was popular. And Peter Oates beclowned himself. Biden, Trump and Kennedy have pretty similar favorability numbers in that poll that he's talking about. Although, Kennedy does come out ahead a bit in net favorability because he has higher number of people who answer don't know about him. They don't have an opinion. Biden and Trump are well-known quantities at this point. They've much heavier

unfavorable abilities built in because of that. Also in that poll, the Tucker's, he's not mentioning this, but they have a question if the GOP primary was held today. Uh-huh. Trump would fucking cook everyone. Yeah, of course. He destroys DeSantis at, oh, bet. Yeah. I think it was like 51% for him, and then 20 something for him.

That sounds right. Yeah. That poll didn't have voting metrics for hypothetical Democratic primary, but the most recent poll that's available has Biden at 64% of Kennedy at 17. And that was a Fox News poll. So not Biden favorable territory. Right. But but clowned.

That's insulting the noble profession of clowning of which I count myself a member. I will say that I don't know the word, but I typed it into my word processor. Oh yeah? And I do not have a red line under it. No, it's a real word. But clown is a real word. It's a real word.

Yeah. That's not the problem here. The problem is not that words aren't or are real. It sometimes is. Well, that's in this case or not. I prefer there are so many unreal words that are so much better than beclowned. It's certainly attention grabbing, though.

So anyway, medicine is witchcraft now. Sure. But what we can say with certainty is that America's medical establishment has becloned itself for all time. You want to hear a gandis? It's official positions on vaccines, psychiatric drugs, puberty blockers, reassignment surgeries, a long

list of other politically fashionable priorities have no connection whatsoever to legitimate science. It's all effectively witchcraft. At the annual meeting of the American Medical Association in Chicago last week, for example, delegates issued a statement attacking the body mass index as a tool of, quote, racist exclusion, which has caused historical harm. Next year, they will denounce thermometers and stethoscopes. They're insane. Ha ha. So the importance or significance of BMI or body mass index has always

been kind of shaky. The idea of putting one number on body mass is a bit simplistic and the medical community is known about that for a long time. It's a foundation for a measurement that could be important, but it needs a lot of work to account for various things like fat distribution, age, and ethnicity. The reason that it was called a tool of racist exclusion is explained this way in an article

from the Washington Post from over two years ago. Right, right, right. Quote, BMI was invented about 200 years ago in an era that saw the creation of pseudoscientific theories such as social Darwinism that was used to justify nationalism, racism, and eugenics. The index was established by Belgian mathematician Lambert Adolf Jacques Quilette, Quittelecht, who sought to measure the height and weight of the average man

based on a sample of white European men. He saw this average as, quote, ideal. Right. It's not a universally applicable number, but most experts recognize the BMI idea is a jumping off point for a measurement that could be more meaningful, but it just hasn't been developed yet. Whatever that more meaningful metric is.

This isn't an instance of the medical community being insane, unless you're a white identity zealot like Tucker, who thinks that everything about the world should use white people as the default and the ideal. Then the idea of reconsidering that legacy might seem insane, like it does to Tucker. Yeah. What I find fascinating, all right.

Now, Tucker lives in a world where witchcraft is real. I think that might have been a flourish for him. But this is what I'm saying here, right? Alex lives in a world where witchcraft is real. In their world, if you call doctors witchcraft, I feel like that means they are effective at doing what they are asked to do, right? They have power

They have the ability to heal through witchcraft. I don't think that's the conclusion he wants to lead you I understand that but if I am listening to this I'm thinking oh shit Witches can save me. I think it was meant as just strictly a pejority Sure sure, but I feel like we need to reexamine whether or not witches are real because Tucker is clearly considering them. Listen, hopefully in episode eight or whatever of this show we'll get to the bottom of whether or not there are witches. I hope he doesn't witch episode. I want to do that. Please, Tucker. Do a witch episode.

Please. So compared to these witches, yeah, who are talking about BMI being racist, they're all on these witches on another planet. Compared to them, Robert Kennedy's sane, man. Next year they will denounce thermometers and stethoscopes. They're insane. Compared to them, Bobby Kennedy is a mainstream figure and people understand that.

That's why he's winning. And you know he's winning by how his critics are doing. So, just four years ago, Anna Merlin was regarded as an important expert on conspiracy theories in misinformation. She written a book on the topic. Here she is talking about it. I've always thought that in the case of conspiracy peddlers,

it's not necessarily a super profitable enterprise to ask whether they really believe it or not, because I don't know what's in their hearts. I don't know what's in their minds. I don't know what's in their minds. All I know is what they spend their time doing, which is promoting conspiracy theories. In the case of ordinary people, conspiracy consumers, and most Americans are to some degree,

consumers of conspiracy theories. All the studies that we have show that like one in three Americans believe in some conspiracy theory to some extent. For the people in the very sort of deep end of the conspiracy pool, people who are consuming a lot of conspiracy content, I think it's really important to look at the way it helps them make sense of the world and make sense of our political moment and make sense of a lot of times like what's happening in

their own lives. All the studies that we have show that, like, one in three Americans believe in some conspiracy theory. Uh? You'll notice the upspeak, the rising inflection at the end of the sentence. That's a familiar tick in Brooklyn. It's familiar.

It's a familiar tick for you. Narrative sentence into a question and thereby belittle the listener. Do you follow me? Is this too complicated for you? So the lady in the nose ring wants you to know. She's smart, but she's not. Damn.

What the fuck? I feel like listening to Anna speak was far less condescending than listening to Tucker's bizarre vocal flirt. Amazing. I don't know what's going on. Sounded like a completely normal person to me. I don't know what the point of this is to be totally honest.

It feels unnecessarily mean. And don't know what the point of this is to be totally honest. It feels unnecessarily mean and the larger point of the segment legitimately makes no sense. It's Tucker trying to say that compared to a medical establishment that he defines as insane and beclowned, Robert Kennedy is not quite so insane or beclowned. Like I'm not sure that's a great point. Are you saying that like look at where his critics are? What? Listen, doctors are witches and Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

might be completely wrong. Mm-hmm. But, that one poll said he has more favorability. There you go. Then Biden or Trump. Then we've gotten to the bottom of it. B1, the popularity contest in this one economist poll. I feel like Tucker is trying

to create the platonic ideal of gaslighting. Like he is literally embodying the concept of aggressively existing in one reality and trying to force a false reality on whoever is around him. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's, it's a, maybe that's the around him. Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's, it's a, maybe that's the mission statement of his Twitter show. That could be. That could, I mean, somebody who's eventually going to have to create the platonic ideal of gaslighting.

That's just simply, once something exists, a human must create it. Well, now that you've spoken into existence, episode nine, this is a show. After the witchcraft episode is going to be, Yes, we got to do the witchcraft first. Yeah. So here's the dismount. And I think he's like legitimately, I think his final argument is that Robert F. Kennedy

is pretty cool because Anna Merlin's dumb because vice is going bankrupt. I think that's the point. Okay. So the lady in the nose ring wants you to know, she's smart, but she's not. When Merlin recorded that interview, Vice, where she now works, was valued at more than $5 billion. Genius investors like James Murdock

were showering the company with money. Everyone wandered in on the future of media, which was uptalkers like Anna Merlin lecturing you about racism. Sorry for me. What? That is changed. Last month, Vice filed for bankruptcy.

Anna Merlin is still on Twitter, screeching about how her critics are transphobic, but nobody cares. Nobody wants to hear from Anna Merlin anymore. The gatekeepers are transparently ridiculous. Everyone can see that. People are starting to notice. And that's the end.

Really? Yes. I don't know what's happening. I mean, this show is so dumb. I honestly, I think I'm sure Anna's overjoyed. I feel like that's pretty funny. It is. It's pretty funny. Yeah, I did not reach out for comment.

Yeah, obviously. But, I mean, this ending is a little incoherent because Anna's reputation is still quite good, even if ice goes bankrupt. It really is not, it's not like, oh no, she got a sued and that's why they're bankrupt, much like, talk her with Fox News sued and that's why they're bankrupt, much like

talk to her with Fox news. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, they didn't go bankrupt. He's still did. Did Anna lose vice $800 million? No. Oh, okay. Well, then I think we're probably okay. But also like, I don't know what the bankruptcy has to do with like whether or not Robert F. Kennedy is cool. Well, as everybody knows, she was criticizing him being on Rogan. This is the connective tissue is thin. And then also like if going bankrupt somehow has anything

to do with like your intellectual like credibility, what about Alex? Yeah. And in four words, they both are bankrupt. Yeah, I mean, you see, so what happens, and I think a lot of people know this now, right, is that the writers control the finances of most media companies. They really want the input of the people who make their content, right? That's definitely not like, I don't know, groups of rich hedge fund investors who saddle the company with all the debt that they use to buy the company, and then they declare bankruptcy and sell it for parts

because they've actually, and they make money coming and going. I'm honestly shocked that he didn't somehow tie this into Gavin McGinnis and the proud boy. I was kinda feeling like, I'm like, I'm gonna shoot a showdown! Yeah, that seems like fertile ground for him to get into. Yeah, I think that's the way to do it.

So yeah, I mean, look, I don't know what the point is here. I mean, obviously this is just meant to be a defense piece of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. I guess. But it doesn't at all deal with any of the criticisms that are really being levied against him. No. And it seems to mostly be like but i don't like hoes and a merlin sucks but he's and i don't really think that that's

powerful yeah no i mean it is it is a little bit like listening to uh... well no it's not a little bit like listening to a high school kid this is listening to an annoying freshman high school kid who This is listening to an annoying freshman high school kid who comes to school in a suit and you're in the same English class and he won't shut the fuck up about Lord of the Flies for some reason. And you're like, when we get to catch her in the ride, I'm going to kill myself.

You're describing his head writer. I think so. Apparently, yeah. I think so. Oh, category five typhoon. Oh, boy. What was it? Hesterix? Yeah, Hesteria typhoon.

Woof. Good stuff. Yeah. So, I mean, look, I continue to be bewildered by this show. I, like, as somebody who's used to, somebody who has no point at all. Yeah. But it's forgivable that he has no point because he's just rambling.

That's the idea. It's very jarring to listen to this and see like, I think I get what your point is supposed to be. It's flawed. The premises upon examination fall apart. And it becomes entirely unclear what you're trying to say. Yeah, the point, like I get the anger behind it, but like, there has to be a second pass at this.

Like, you wrote this. You need to edit it. You need to do a better job of making this argument stand up to scrutiny, because it's silly. Alex doesn't try. He doesn't have a teleprompter. He's just talking shit. Yeah, I get it. This is unpolished garbage. It is, it is a bit like, um, uh, so, so Alex is like a roller coaster that is poorly made and it might fall apart in any second. It's like that New Jersey park. Yes.

The Danger Park or whatever, action park. The one where, yeah, yeah. People die. And but Tucker is like the hall of warped mirrors. You know, you walk in there and you're like, I none of this looks like this and I can't escape. This is horrific. Yeah, I, that metaphor is as good as anything

as writers are gonna come up with it. Probably. So Jordan, we'll be back for another episode in the near future. Hopefully Alex will be back in studio. But until then, we have website. Indeed we do. It's KnowledgeFights.com. Yep, we're all on Twitter. We are on Twitter, 10 KnowledgeFights.

Yep, we'll be back. But until then, I'm Neo, I'm Leo, I'm DZXClark. Boop, boop, boop, boop, boop, boop. Your time'm Leo, I'm DZXCl him a huge fan. I love your work. I love you.