Back From Bibi's Back Office

the States. I'm glad you're back. Michael. Good to be with you. So I want to hear all about Israel. I want to hear about this meeting with bb net and Yahoo. You were with him on actually rather an historic day. But I don't want to talk about that right now. I want to be very selfish and first get to things that directly affect me. Namely, there is a new rule being passed by the ATF. That's the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and firearms, three of my favorite things.

We were warned that the new ATF picks were on the radical side, but the headlines I'm seeing is that there are new threats to very popular weapons and the Second Amendment. What is happening? Well, so the ATF put out a new rule today that prohibited stabilizing crips on pistols, so shoulder stocks on pistols, and under the law, what basically they say, if you attach a shoulder stock to a pistol, you turn it into a short armed rifle. And short armed rifles under the law have to be

specially registered. Now why does this matter? Well, it matters because according to the Congressional Research Service, they're anywhere between ten million and forty million of these stabilizing grips that are out there that Americans own, and so by the flip of a pick in ATF may be making anywhere from ten million to forty million Americans into felons unless they suddenly go and register their firearms. And all of this is being done by arbitrary fiat. Now, is there

any legitimacy to the argument? I mean, I see your point, the political point that this is going to basically just take a ton of guns off the table, which seems to be the ultimate goal of the Biden administration. But is there any legitimacy to the argument that, Well, actually, when you put this sort of stabilizing grip on actually it does kind of turn it into a rifle or

is it just an excuse? So if the objective is preventing crime, there are no data to suggest that that adding a grip to a pistol suddenly makes it more dangerous, suddenly leads to more crimes. That those are not the weapons that tend to be used in crimes. The most common weapons that are used in crimes are revolvers. You know, you go to the city of Chicago where you have gang members shooting each other, They're not using stabilizing grips.

They're just shooting each other with handguns. This is Look, you could debate what the rules should be on the front end, but this is worse than changing the rules on the front end because it's arbitrary under the fact. After the fact, if you've got ten, twenty, thirty, forty million people that have pistols at home, have these stabilizing grips at home, yesterday they were perfectly legal. Now you know, presumably those forty million people, not all of them know

that the ATF suddenly issued this new rule. And it's really dangerous when the government can turn you into a felon without your knowing. You know, you're doing something that it was perfectly legal when you bought it, but suddenly the Biden administration decided they don't want it to be legal. And the problem is are they going to arrest all

forty million people? Probably not, but you can count on them using it as an arbitrary club that if they want to go after you, suddenly you've committed a crime that you had had no idea about it. And it doesn't It doesn't accomplish anything. It's not actually stopping crime. It's just with the stroke of a pen, turning people into criminals. That's a point I had not considered because I could see these this quibbling over. Well, now it looks more like a rifle, and in a way, it

kind of find what is a rifle really? You know, I could see all of that as a way to obscure the issue. But your point is the point of these regulations is to prevent crime, and we know that forget this particular kind of alleged rifle, but rifles of all kinds are really not the guns that are used in most crimes. It's really just revolvers or as standard issue semi automatic pistols. So I think that does tip the argument. It's actually good, good Ammo, to use in

a debate, if you'll, if you'll pardon a labored metaphor. Well, and I'll point out, Michael, you know you mentioned the nominees for ATF, so that dominated me. The head of ATF is the sky David Chipman. We had his hearing in the Senate Judiciary Committee couple of weeks ago, and this guy is extreme when it comes to gun control. He works for one of the major gun control organizations in this country, and it was interesting at the hearing.

I asked him if he wanted to ban AR fifteens, which are the most popular rifles in America, and he said on equivocally yes, he wants to ban them all. And the leading Senate legislation to do that is Diane Feinstein's legislation that would ban some two thousand different types of rifles that she specifies. And Chipman made the argument he said he thought Feinstein didn't go nearly far enough and he would go much further. So Feinstein would ban

the sale of new AR fifteen's. Chipman wants to make it illegal for anyone to own one, which sets up the same scenario we're talking about, which is the federal government being able to knock in your door and confiscate your guns or declare your criminal otherwise. And it's striking Number one, this is who Joe Biden is picked to lead ATF. But number two, this new rule on the stabilizing grips didn't come from Chipman. He hadn't been confirmed yet.

So this is just the career folks at DOJ at ATF listening to the political folks at DOJ that it's really ominous for the direction the Biden administration is going in terms of arbitrary power and hostility to law abiding gun owners. Right, this isn't even the entree. This is just the appetizer. This is the amuse boush to the kind of radical rules we're going to see it. Okay, I'm sorry, I don't know what a namuse Bush is well putting putting the boushes aside here. Yes, this is

a terrible announcement. We'll see when this rule actually goes into effect. Hopefully hopefully it does not. But not looking good, Senator, if you wouldn't mind now that we've out with our freedom of self defense I'd like you to disappoint me on another aspect of our freedom. These vaccine passports, Yeah, seem to be cropping up on the international stage, and there are a lot of politicians in the United States

pushing for them here at home as well. Now, actually, I should say, there is a little glimmer of hope here, and it came out of you. You introduced a bill to ban this stuff. So I did. I introduced a bill that would ban mandatory vaccine passports, would ban the government issuing vaccine passports. Now, listen my view on it. I support vaccines. I think vaccines are a good idea. I've gotten the COVID vaccine. Heide's gotten the COVID vaccine.

My parents have gotten it, her parents have. God did I think it makes sense for most people to get it. We've not given it to our girls. Our girls are ten and thirteen, actually ten year olds. There is in a vaccine that's recommended for kids that young, and I'm not sure the cost benefit analysis makes sense for a teen ager. But I think whether you get the vaccine

or not should be a question of individual choice. It should be up to you, as as an individual, to look at your own health situation and decide do I want the vaccine or not? For me, I wanted it. I wanted the peace of mind, I wanted the freedom that comes from getting it. But you're right, there are a whole bunch of politicians that are wanting number one, the government to issue a vaccine passport, an official thing like your passport, like your driver's license. But number two,

for that passport then to be mandatory for certain activity. So, for example, a lot of people are I think understandably concerned about airlines. Are they going to not let you get on a plane unless you can prove you've had a vaccine employment. We have seen instances across the country of people being terminated if they don't get vaccinated. And my view is that's wrong, that that that that should

not be permitted. And so what my legislation does is prohibits the federal government from issuing a vaccine passport, prohibits the government from requiring proof of vaccine status. It protects the privacy of your healthcare information. And you think about everything else that your healthcare information, that that privacy is protected by law. And then it adds whether or not you're vaccinated to the list of federal civil rights protections

that are protected in the course of employment. So just like you can't be fired from your job because of race, because of ethnicity, because of gender, because of religion, it likewise says you can't be fired from your job because of whether or not you've chosen to be vaccinated. And on this piece, essentially, what the legislation does is it

incorporates the framework of the Americans with Disability Act. So there may be some jobs for which being vaccinated is an employer could reasonably conclude that that is necessary for that particular job. You know, maybe dealing with patients who may or may not have have COVID and may be immunocompromise. That might be one example where where you could conclude it was reasonable to want care providers to have to

be vaccinated. But but the way the Americans with Disability worked, the way the Americans with Disability Act works is if you have a disability, your employer has to make a reasonable accommodation. And likewise, if you choose, as a help, as a matter of personal choice, not to get the vaccine, if my bill passes into law, the employer would have to make a reasonable accommodation for that individual choice you made.

I was so pleased when I saw this headline. I really I'm I'm not flattering you in any way, because we've seen some moves to ban these things at the state level, but we hadn't really seen anything at the

federal level. And I just thought, the way this issue is being presented, you have to either insist that everybody get the vaccine immediately to a regardless of circumstance, or you have to say that the vaccine is going to cause you to grow a third eye in a tail, and it's got, you know, the worst thing in the world. And what you're bringing into this conversation two very important things.

Choice that you know, you have faculties of reason you can kind of figure some of these things out yourself, and prudence, which is a related virtue, the idea that for certain people it might make a lot of sense to go out and get this thing right away, and for other people the risk is just lower. And we're free people and we should be able to make that calculation ourselves. Well. And look, I can say in my family,

my dad was pretty skeptical about the vaccine. He didn't want to get it and I spent probably a month arguing with him, saying, look, Dad, you know you're in your eighties. You have been staying home mostly, you've been social distancing. You want to get out. He's a preacher, he wants to be back out with people. I said, you know, you'd be much happier if you get the vaccine and you can go out and interact with people and return to some semblance of normal life. And ultimately

he was persuaded. But I think families can work through this and consider the pros and cons. Are there risks to any experimental drug. Of course there are, and that's where rational adults can make their own cost benefit analysis and decide what makes sense for now this issue, I suppose it's it's more on the conservative side of things. I've noticed the left and the Democrats tend to be much more more in favor of government mandates generally, but

certainly with regard to this. Is there any way to price some Democrats over to come and support a federal ban on the vaccine passports. I don't know. I'll confess I'm skeptical. I have not seen any Democrats in the Senate expressing concern about vaccine passports. Now, the most promising aspect is actually the Biden administration. Jensaki, at a White House press briefing said the Biden administration would not be requiring vaccine passports and would not be issuing them. That

the federal administration wouldn't be a shooing them. That's good, and so part of what I'm saying as well, Look, if Joe Biden is saying this, then we ought to be perfectly willing to codify it, to put it into statute, and more importantly, to provide some protection so that you can't be fired arbitrarily if you choose in your own life not to get a vaccine. And in a normal circumstance, there would be Democrats willing to protect health privacy that

that that often is a bipartisan issue. Sometimes protecting civil liberties is a bipartisan issue. With COVID, I don't know that I'm all that optimistic that Democrats are going to be interested in doing so, because they're they're really vested in the authoritarian state when it comes to COVID, and so I'm certainly going to try. I hope Democrats will agree, But but you know, if you ask me, I'm going to hold my breath on this Now, I'm not going

to hold my breath on this one. Well, there may be some hope here, I suppose because of the timing of this all. You know, I know how much you hate to say I told you so. You know how much I hate to say I told you so. However, we told you so. On this program. We raised a lot of questions about the prevailing narrative on the coronavirus, on the lockdowns on China, on all of these things well over a year ago, and people called us koops and conspiracy theorists and rubes and all sorts of things.

And it turns out that we, and not just us, there were other people too, were completely right. And that seems to have been proven this week with the release of doctor Fauci's emails, three thousand emails obtained through an

ordinary Freedom of Information Act request. Does the release of the Fauci emails change any of the political situation on COVID in Washington, Well, let me point out, as a matter of logic, just because we were right doesn't mean that you and I are not kops and conspiracy theorists and a bunch of rubes. Your good point, as the old line says, just because you're Parinois does not mean they're not out to get you when it comes to the origin of the vaccine. Actually went back and looked

and this podcast in March of last year. We were one of the very first podcast news outlets kind of

outlets anywhere. So we had two different episodes, one in March, one in April of last year where we went through in real detail the evidence that we knew at the time about COVID, about where it came from, and we walked through how Wuhan they're two different labs, Chinese government labs studying coronaviruses, studying coronaviruses from bats, that one of the labs is four hundred yards away from the wet market, that the odds were statistically really slim that this was

a coincidence. And we said on this pod in March of last year that the preponderance of the evidence supported the conclusion that this escaped from a Chinese lab. Now I'm amazed we haven't been banned yet so far. Verdict is out there. And I say that midway through this episode, and suddenly I may stop mid sentence, So I don't know but you look at these Fauci emails. I gotta say this, This Fauci guy is a piece of work, you know, smug, condescending, willing to control people arbitrarily, and

the emails. So you have emails where where scientists are raising with him in the spring of last year, Hey, this virus looks like it may have been manufactured in the lab. And actually when we talked about it, we broke it down into two aspects of the theory. One was did it escape from a lab in other way? And two was was it manufactured in a lab? And what we said a year ago is we said on the ladder, the evidence supports the conclusion. Yes, we don't

have we don't have direct evidence. We need an investigation to determine if that in fact happened, But the proponderance of the evidence we have suggest that it escaped from the lab. On the first question, was it manufactured in a lab? You recall there were several that were Washington Post fact checks and others that had scientists saying, we've looked at the virus and concluded that based on the characteristic of the virus, it's naturally occurring. It wasn't made

in a lab. And listen, you and I aren't biologist. We don't I don't know how to look at a virus. So I was like, Okay, if the scientists say that, I guess that sounds So we said at the time, okay, I'm not not maintaining that it was manufactured in a lab. Well, unbeknownst to you and me, at the exact same time, all of the press was orchestrating these stories. Scientists within the NIH were saying, gosh, looking at this virus, it looks like it may have been manufactured in a lab.

And there's something called gain of function research. And I think it's worth Michael pausing and reflecting on that because people are hearing that term and they don't necessarily know what it means. I mean, that's kind of a weird term, particularly if you're not a virologist to know what it means.

And my understanding, kind of a layman's interpretation of gain of function research is that you take a virus and you alter the genetic code in it, and you alter the genetic code to make it more deadly, to make it more contagious, You change it to basically turn it into a supervirus. And it's a very controversial type of research. It is research that FAUCI and congressional testimony insisted, No,

that wasn't going on in Wuha. No, the federal government wasn't funding it, the US federal government, And we now know from the FAUCI emails and other sources, Yes, it was going on. There was gain of function research going on. Yes, the federal government was funding it. Yes, FAUCI was funding it, and we now know from the emails. There were scientists raising at the time that it appeared this may be a virus genetically modified by the Chinese labs to make

it more contagious among humans, if that's true. Look, it's one thing. If if sloppy security at the wuhuant Institute for Virology resulted in an accidental leak, that's that's really bad, and China bears culpability for the millions of death and trillions of dollars of devastation that have come from this. But if on top of that, they made the virus and then screwed up and let it leak it, it is a level of responsibility that is really I don't think earth shattering is too strong a term for it.

And that Fauci was getting emails suggesting at the time, and then he would go out publicly and adamantly conclude, no, this wasn't manufactured in the lab. We know that it occurred naturally. I'm sorry. That's not science. That's propaganda. And and and the most disturbing aspect of these fouch emails is his consistent willingness to be a propagandist, that he has a political message, and it's his decision making is not driven by the science, not driven by the evidence.

He's not going, oh, well, that would be highly concerning if it was gained a function. How can we examine the virus? How could we examine what the science tells us. That's not his concern. His concern was this is a bad political story, so let's make sure we quash it. And I got to tell you on top of that, Michael, I don't know if you read a story that came out a few days ago in Vanity Fair. I try to avoid Vanity Fair, but I did not see it now,

so I'm not a reader of Vanity Fair. I don't believe I've ever actually held a copy of the magazine Vanity Fair. That being said, there is an investigative journalism Peace and Vanity Fair that is jaw dropping that goes through the massive cover up that was occurring within the federal government, within the State Department with NIH of essentially deep state bureaucrats trying to cover up information about GATA function research, information about federal taxpayers funding it, information about

this might be a lab leak. And one of the stunning things is the individual Peter Dazak, who received the grants from the NIH to do this research. Vanity Fair revealed he is the one that organized the list of scientists that wrote a letter in Lancet denouncing this theory, and he literally was covering his own ass. He was organizing a bunch of scientists to put out a statement that all of the press treated as conclusive, and that Facebook went so far as to ban anyone who disagreed.

This is propaganda of an Orwellian nature and it's really it's corrupt, it's frightening, and it's wrong. You know. To be fair to Vanity Fair and other outlets too that are left wing outlets, every now and again you will get a really great piece in there. And now we

can see the emails for ourselves. It's also worth pointing out on this question of a Michael, how damning is it to the Washington Post and the New York Times and the self declared arbiters of news that Vanity friggin fair kicked their ass like that they actually went and did journalism a year and a half late. But it's a really good, carefully research story. And are you telling me there's no reporter at the New York Times that

could do this? And they just they didn't care because the political narrative didn't suit what they wanted to say.

And every one of these self declared arbiters of journalism who have stacks of Pulitzers on their shelves, ought to be embarrassed and they ought to fundamentally, they ought to have a public discussion about why they didn't investigate this, why they didn't ask these questions, why they stepted the government Propagain, I don't believe any of them will, but if they had even the tiniest shred of journalistic integrity,

that's what they should do. I won't hold my breath on that, of course, but worth pointing out too before before we move on. Not only is there this issue of the sort of research that was going on at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Not only is there the issue of the total cover up by parts of the government and by the media, but you have doctor Fauci on record defending this type of research. This is very dangerous research. He acknowledged it was very dangerous research, and

he said it was worth the risk. He said the potential benefits outweighed the risk. So I agree. It seems like we're all being distracted here. We're all being told we have to talk about the passports and all of our measures of how we're going to protect ourselves. I want accountability. I want accountability from China yep. I want accountability from the political operatives in our own government who

knew about this, who covered this up. Hopefully we'll be seeing more of that, Senator before we get to Israel. I actually have to take a detour on our way maybe to Israel, to take a detour down to Nigeria because there was a very strange political story that came out there. Twitter is at the moment, for all intents and purposes, banned in Nigeria because Twitter took down a post from the President of Nigeria and the circumstances of this post involved various conflicts and factions and all sorts

of accusations of terrible things. That's not really what I'm interested in. Well, I'm interested in it generally. We can talk on some other episode. But here, from the big tech aspect, you have Twitter going in and saying we're going to censor the president of Nigeria and if you don't like it, build your own Twitter. And Nigeria responds and says, well, we're going to censor Twitter and if you don't like it, build your own Nigeria. Where is

the freedom here? What is the argument? I mean, what can we learn about from this in our own situation because we face something very similar a few months ago in our own country. Well, you're right, and there's actually

there's a third and fourth iteration to this. So once Nigeria band Twitter, Twitter came back and put out a statement denouncing Nigeria and saying that that communicating on social media is an essential human right in modern society, which which I read and it's it's you know, from Twitter itself, and I couldn't help but but retweeting that and you know, ironically on Twitter and pointing out that in Twitter's own words, they have willfully denied the former President of the United States,

Donald J. Trump, what they characterize as a quote essential human right in modern society. So that's that's their terminology. And I got And today, I don't know if you saw Trump put out a press statement crazy Nigeria's decision and saying he wished he'd done the same thing when he was president, which I don't actually think the President of the United States can band Twitter, So I'm glad he didn't do that. But it does highlight the the abundant hypocrisy a big tech of course, and I do

I get. I love the sentiment that President Trump put out there. Yeah, if it is not workable in reality, I think the sentiment is something that we all agree with. Now, finally, Senator, you have answered all of my questions on this individual freedom stuff. I have to hear about your trip in Israel. We have not spoken in a couple of weeks. You were hanging out with cooler, more impressive friends. That's fine, notably Prime Minister bb Net and Yahoo, who I believe

is now about to he's about to leave power. He's holding onto power. I have no idea. So last weekend, I flew to Israel and spent about two and a half days there. And in Israel, I went the first day went down to examine where the war fighting had been and so went down to the border of Gaza, went and met with IDF Israeli Defense forces soldiers, met with General Harris, the military attache of the United States

Army that is down there in Israel. Went to an Iron Dome battery, which the Iron Dome is this amazing missile defense system that Israel's developed with the United States as assistants that shoots down rockets and it has over a ninety percent intercept rates. It's an incredible piece of technology. And so the first day was visiting all of these locations.

The second day I was there, I met with various government leaders and so met with the Foreign Minister, met with the Defense minister, met with Energy minister, met with the President the Knesset. But the most interesting meeting was the meeting with Prime Minister nat Yahoo And and part

of what made it interesting is the circumstantial timing. So I booked the trip just because Israel had just had over four thousand rockets raining down upon it and I wanted to go and show my support for Israel and to hear firsthand what they needed and what their assessments situation was. But the day we're there is the day it's announced that essentially there was a revolt. And as we sit here today, at least it looks like there's

going to be a new government in Israel. So what happened while we were there is there's this guy named Naftali Bennett who leads a small party just has six seats in the Knesset, so very small, that is ideologically to the right of net and Yahoo. It was announced while I was in Israel that he was forming a government with the left wing parties, and among the left wing parties, he's also forming a government with the Arab parties,

who are sympathetic too, if not actually Muslim brotherhood. That is, it's a little bit like maybe a US analogy would be, you could say, Mitt Romney forming a government with Bernie Sanders because they both hated Trump. That might be an analogy, but it's actually starker than that, because it would be you know, if tally Bennett is considered, as I said, to the right, a bby, so it would be almost like I don't know a Jim Jordan forming a government

with Bernie Sanders. I mean, it's just weird. So they announced they were going to do so. Now to do so, they had to get a letter to the President of Israel by midnight Wednesday night. So my meeting with Bebe was scheduled for two pm on Wednesday. So it's the day that the opposing government is supposed to file. And so we go ahead and go to the meeting with Babe. And I actually told him and I I have gotten to know Bbe quite well. I consider him a friend.

He's a remarkable guy. I told him at the beginning of the meeting, I said, look, I recognize today as a wild day and a consequential day potentially. I mean, it was the day he may well have lost power, could be the end. And I said, if you if we need to cut this meeting short, if you need to be on the phone working the votes and talking to people who can esset, I'm a big boy. My

feelings won't be heard. It's good to see you. We've got your back, but if we need to end after five minutes, I get this is this day is a big deal. Totally understood. Yeah, and he actually he was fine. He said, no, let's sit, let's talk. I spent an hour and a half with him on what may prove to be the last day of his prime minister ship. And so the meeting, and I was there with Bill Haggerty, who was a senator from Tennessee, a Republican who I

invited to come with me. So the two of us were there, and then BB Senior Leadership, and we're in the conference room and we have a discussion about Israel, about Iran, a lot of discussion about Iran, and a lot of concern that the Biden administration is going to go back into the Iran deal and give the Aetola billions of dollars and that's going to be really dangerous for both Israel and America. And I'm very worried about that.

But then afterwards BB does what he's done before. He says, hey, Ted, come on back to my private office. And Bill Haggerty came with us too, So the three of us just when we left all the staff and just went back there. You and I have talked about how previously I went back and smoked a cigar with him. We didn't smoke cigars this time. But we just went and talked and look, he's pissed. It is not complicated that he's pissed, and

he expressed frustration. He said, listen, and the people voted for a majority on the center right and they're about to not get that. And he further said he's been pushing for a direct election of prime minister. He said, you know, if the voters in Israel could vote for prime minister, just vote for do they want me to lead or not? He thought he'd get north of sixty percent. He said, it's not even close. The voters are strongly with me, but more broadly than that, and there are

some parallels to the United States. What he is very worried about is if this new government comes in, and the final step for the new government to come in is the Knesset has to vote, which is expected to in the next week or so. Once it votes, if they're sixty one votes, there's a new government and he's not prime minister anymore. If that happens, Boebe is very concerned that their first order of business is going to be to change the law in Israel so that net

and Yahoo can never run. That as he put it, they can't beat him at the ballot box, so they're going to rig the game so he could never get elected. And it's reminiscent of what we're seeing the Democrats doing with S one the Corrupt Politicians Act, trying to change the law, rig the game so that they can't lose an election. He was very unhappy about that. This brings us to this mailback question from Christian Hello, Senator Cruz.

There's been a lot of attention put on Senator Joe Mansion and to a lesser degree, Senator Kirsten Cinema about blocking the Biden agenda, specifically S one hr one with the Corrupt Politicians Act. Because of their unwillingness to end the filibuster, do you think that they will hold strong in their beliefs despite the pressure. I would bet that they cave Right now. They're both holding the line, so as best we can tell, they're forty eight Democrats prepared

to end the filibuster. The two who are outspoken against it are Kirsten Cinema from Arizona Joe Mansion from West Virginia. Cinema. Cinema is an unusual character um She had been a left wing activist at times. She wrote a book called Gucci Socialist. Um. She wears bright pink and bright purple wigs on the Senate floor, but she also fancies herself a centrist and and has at least so far. Um said she intends to behave like a centrist, and so she has. She has said she doesn't want to end

the filibuster because it promotes bi partisanship. Mansion. Look, Joe is a really nice guy. He's affable guys West Virginia. Was governor West Virginia before he was a senator. He was a the college football quarterback. I mean he's a you know, good luck and jock. Everybody likes Joe. You can't not like Joe. He's just an easy going guy.

He actually has a boat, sort of a small I guess a yacht, you know though that you could sort of laugh at calling something a small yacht, but a boat that he has in the Potomac that he periodically invites senators to come out and to go like on a cruise up and down the Potomac and you know, have a glass of wine. And so I've gone out with him on it it's it's and he tries to get bipartisan senators. Very hard to dislike Joe Manchin on

a personal level. In the nine years I have served with him, he has never once stood up to Chuck Schumer on any issue that matters where he's the deciding vote. If Republicans have fifty one votes, Joe, give you a fifty second, He'll make it bipartisan. I hope they do the right thing. Will they? I don't know, a little a little pressure might help, a little gratitude and a little pressure before we go, Senator, we have mere seconds left,

but I really need your answer on this question. I'd be curious to see how you answer this from Patrick says, for either of you to answer, do you recommend going to an Ivy League school? Given the woke takeover that has happened? What are the alternatives? If you want to jump start a career, would you would you send someone to if you had to do over? Or you you know, for a child, would you send your kid to an Ivy League school? You know, I would listen. Just about

every college and university right now is messed up. I went to Princeton for college. I went to Harvard for law school. I really enjoyed both of them. What I generally advise people is go to the best school you can get into. I still think that's good advice. That an awful lot of what you get in either college or grad school is credentially is credentially to get a job,

to do something going forward. So I was very much purchasing the diploma and I learned and the relationships actually is I ordered what I was the the commercial transaction I was engaged in in in going to school. The credential was number one, and number two was the relationships the people, the other students who were there, the other

professors that were there, which which are very beneficial. Um, they can open doors, they can uh that it can make you know, my best friend in the world other than Heidi was my roommate at Princeton and Harvard's got named David panton As Jamaican. UM. Incredible guy. And and and he was best man at our wedding. And I think those relationships are valuable. That being said, the schools are worse than when you and I were there, and and and I don't know that I would survive at

an Ivy League school today. That that that that I don't really have a great feel for just how whacked out the cancel cultural culture is. Let me ask you, Michael, what would you advise. You're a new father, so so this is not theoretical. You maybe get a little while to make that decision, but would you advise, Well, just like you, My best man was my best friend in college, and I'm the best man at his wedding, and I

totally agree. The credentialism is a reality, and that's true, and the relationships are good, and you can get an education, though it seems increasingly tricky. Yeah. Actually, going back to the Brooklyn schoolyard guy who was a professor of mine, Don Kagan, when he was dean of Yale College, I think he said something to the effect of it's getting increasingly more difficult to graduate from Yale with a liberal education. You used to have to have a liberal education to graduate.

Now there's the question of whether or not you can even get one. I think there are schools, a handful of schools in this country, you know, but there's only a handful of Ivy League schools. And I think there are schools where you can get or where you are more likely to get a better at liberal education than at the Ivy League. And you know, the question I would ask my son is one ties right in with what we're talking about. I'd say, what do you want to do? What do you want to do? What do

you want to do with it? What is the purpose of this? Yeah, and it's a question that I guess increasingly we're not allowed to ask. And a lot a lot of those rights and liberties and traditions are under threat. Hopefully we can hold on to them a little bit longer, but we've got to leave that there today, Senator, see you next time. I'm Michael Knowles. This is Verdict with

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