Did Journos Really “Miss” Biden's Health Issues? - WHCA Dinner
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If the essence in the core of a White House Correspondents Dinner is to reward and celebrate fearless journalism, fearless, meaning you're not concerned about what happens to you based on telling the American people the truth.

Then Fox News, Siobhan Hughes, Annie Linsky and all of those people should have been having a ticker tape parade outside of the Hinkley Hilton. You're right. No, that's exactly right, because you have to ask yourself what constitutes fearlessness. And I think in my book, fearlessness for journalists in Washington is writing what the pack will not say.

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Welcome back. Good Tuesday to you. The Ruthless Variety Program. I'm Josh Holmes along with Comfortably Smug Michael Duncan, John Ashbrook, full cast and crew with you here today. Very, very big things, fellas. Yeah, I mean, a lot of news, especially for us over the past weekend. A lot to discuss. I don't even know where to start at some level. Look, we all had like spring break things and different things. Smug, you held it down.

Well, me and Duncan, I'd say. All of us, to be honest. Yeah, but you were there the week before with me. Well, these guys were gallivanting. Yeah, I mean, well, that's the thing is we have... We're like, you know, a strike team that like...

if it's one of us, if it's all four of us, the job is going to get done. It's going to get done. It's a rare thing to have a cast that you're like, I know the job is going to get done whether I'm there, whether I'm not there, whether I can be there, whatever. We're like special forces. You just drop us in the Horn of Africa with some grenades and some ammo and we figure it out. You figure it out. You're just like that. We're just grenades and ammo. Just like that. Nobody wants to let down their pals. Can I start with telling on myself? Sure. You notice I'm in a suit.

Purple tie. I got some purple socks on underneath here. It's compensating. What I'm doing is compensating because my wife is like a 10 of 10 Philadelphia Eagles fan. 10 of 10. So tough. That's tough. Grew up in just an absolute Eagles family. Her whole community, all of her friends, Eagles fans.

And my first son was born. He was born in 2017 when the Eagles played the Vikings in the NFC Championship. And we made a wager on this deal where, you know, whoever won and went to the Super Bowl, and if they won the Super Bowl, our kid would obviously have to be a fan of the situation. That's the source of it? Ugh.

So I fought back against, I made the wager. We lost the game. The game, they played the Super Bowl in Minnesota to add insult to injury. Eagles won. My son, my oldest son, just became an Eagles fan. Like he was aware of this thing, but he just became one because they were winning things. And I'm a Vikings guy through and through, hence the purple tie.

But my younger son, I thought I had a good shot at. Yeah. You know, we had like competitive teams. Eagles win the Super Bowl again. Yep. Last year. I'm done. You're done. It's ironed in. It's fully ironed in at this point. You've lost your sons forever. And like the one thing that dads look forward to about being a dad is watching your team

with your kids. Now, I still will watch it. They just have somewhat of a disinterest because their team is winning the Super Bowl. I

On a frequent basis. You know, it is true. When your team is winning, your kids latch onto that team. I remember the Bengals had a great run a few years ago. And my youngest daughter and I, with my other girls, we were watching the game. And then after the Bengals lost that Super Bowl, I was like, where did she go? I was like, honey, I can't find her. Where is she? I walked into the other room and she was gone.

Yeah. On the couch by herself because she wanted the Who Days to win that back. Well, that's how you know you're raising a quality kid. But it brings us to today, which the White House has graciously invited my family to go and celebrate the Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles. Amazing. I have no interest in this. No.

It pains me. I made a wager with myself. I've not been. I have many offers to go to a Super Bowl over the course of the last 20 years. I've never gone because I'm like, I'm not going unless my Minnesota Vikings are in it. 40 years, they're not. They have not been in it.

So now a White House thing. And it's like I'm conflicted at some level because, like, first of all, greatest people in the Trump administration, they're like willing to. They're like they know the situation. They're like, yeah, we'll make sure your kids can get up there and see everything. I'm eternally grateful for it. But the internal conflict of like, am I doing this? Yeah.

Am I arranging this? I mean, I say it's so wonderful, honestly. And good for your missus for getting your kids on the right track to support a team that actually can win something. I mean, imagine how disappointed they'd be if they're like, I guess we're waiting for the Vikings to win something? It's like, okay, you're going to be taking your grandkids to the White House to hope for it, then. You know what's sad? He's not wrong. I hope they put your wife and your kids front and center, first row, and they put you on the side in the cup chair.

I hope they don't allow me in the room. But listen, this is hence the purple tie. This is my little silent protest to try to keep a little glimpse of my own humanity. That's so awesome. I mean, good for the Eagles, too. Great team. Great. I know. They really do. And Saquon was out hanging out with the president playing golf yesterday. So cool. So cool. I mean...

It's getting harder. It's getting harder. Come on, J.G. McCarthy. I'm really counting on you, buddy. I'm really counting on you. But speaking of high-profile events, you fellas, the two in the middle here, Smug and Duncan, you managed to go, I think it's both of your first White House Correspondents Dinner. Yeah, not normally my sort of scene. We had some great friends invite us to join them, which we had a blast, an absolute blast. I would say like...

The first half of the program, I don't think you could really complain about. Yeah. You know, it was fine. Yeah. You know, they honored a reporter from ABC News for her reporting during the Butler shooting, which I thought was great. Doug Mills won for best photography. Oh, he should every year. Which is a great shot. But also, just real quick on that Doug Mills thing. They gave it to him for a photo of Joe Biden. What? Yeah, so Joe.

So Doug Mills is the guy who took the photograph of the attempted assassination of President Trump where you could see the bullet. With a fist in the air. No, no, the fist in the air was Vucci. That was time. That was time. So Mills took the one where you could see the bullet whizzing by. Oh. Right? They didn't give him an award for that because it makes Trump look unstoppable. They gave it for a photo of Joe Biden. Yeah. Get out of here. So this is – there's a reason why –

White House Correspondents Dinner is not for people like you that are listening and not for people like us in that it's a subversive little community that only talks to each other and gives each other awards and appreciation for things. And like much of what Ruthless was intended to try to combat was that cultural inaction

information flow problem. Yeah, and that was the entire second half of the program. It was like the first half I felt good about the people they were rewarding. They deserved it. And then it just devolved into some of the most sanctimonious fart-sniffing I've ever had to witness. Thank God we were well-lubricated with alcohol because I don't think I could have survived otherwise. There were so many moments. I remember...

your Mrs. Duncan started laughing at the face I was making, like listening to it because I was in genuine shock.

Because like, you know, with our friends who had invited us, we had been having discussions throughout the evening of like, are these people, do you think, you know, these journos, these folks on the left are so like willfully unaware? Or do they know how far to the left and biased? No, they're willfully unaware. And that's the thing that becomes apparent during White House correspondence. Johnny and I for 10 years used to go to this thing.

And you had an anniversary to celebrate. I was taking my kids down to see my parents in Florida, so we couldn't make it. But like the one takeaway that we've had for the last 10, 15 years is it's not like they're willfully liberal. Mm hmm.

It's that they just don't – the communication cylinder, which is our press, is so – it's an uninhabited island filled with a small tribe that has never been contacted by the outside world. Right? It's a good way to put it. It genuinely is. This is so accurate. Because that's the thing is after like a couple hours of this, I was like, my god.

These people, it's a million times or a hundred percent. It's like they're on their own deserted island where they only talk to each other. Yeah. They are completely cut off from everyday Americans, from rational, normal thinking. They're just in that. Like I said to our buddy who had invited us, I was like,

Sitting in this room, it's clear that these people only talk to each other. That's why they give each other these awards and come to this conclusion. That's it. And then you get the rare person who spends a day in a diner during the campaign every four years. And then they write up a story about it. And then everybody in D.C. is like,

Oh, we don't need another camp story about the diner. We don't need a story with these people. They do. They bully each other out of actually serving the audience who's hungry for information. Yeah. The thing that's really funny about this year's White House Correspondents Dinner is, remember, they had that comedian who they had to cancel because she said that all Republicans are murderers or whatever. Yeah.

Yeah, it's classic. Because again, this is the information silo they live in. Well, she was an African-American lesbian comedian with an anti-Trump deal that they decided to book for the first Trump White House correspondent. Real smart. Great idea. Yeah, that's smart. I mean, that's thoughtful. So I guess a lot of Hollywood sort of stayed away from this, and obviously Donald Trump didn't attend. And so the best star power they could bring to an event like this was...

show me your hog. David Hogg. David Hogg. And, you know, Smug and I were there basically like just to fuck shit up. Yeah, you're right. You know? Yeah. If we're being honest, yes. Yeah, honestly. And so Smug was generous enough to start like walking around the room and getting pictures with these people. Do you know what the best part about this part is for me? Is that for like, I don't know,

70% of America that follows politics closely, when they would see you two walk in, they'd be like, oh, shit. You know, left, right, or center, people were like, oh, my God. These people are so insular to the point that we're making further, they probably didn't know who you were. Well, Smug took his sunglasses off, and he's like the opposite of Superman. You know, when Superman puts his cape on, nobody knows he's Clark Kent. When he takes those sunglasses off, people don't know. No one. It's the whole point of it.

I mean, that's the best part of it, is that they live in such an insular society where you guys go walking in and they're like, oh, well, there's a fellow traveler here to celebrate my good works. And then it's Duncan taking the photo. I'm literally taking the photo. I'm taking the photo like the fan, like the fan of David Hogg. Can we put this first one up? Graphic one. Yeah. That's David Hogg. So show me your hog. No.

was a guy that we obviously we've been covering and we're going to continue to cover uh who's the vice chair of dnc that decided that his one mission in life is try to primary dude smug is the best because he goes up to david hogg and he's like please do not stop holding these democrats accountable and that's the thing is hogg was like i won't i won't stop no are you

I'm dead serious. I walked up to him and I was like, can I take a photo with you? And so then Duncan starts taking the photo. I was like, David, I just want to let you know, I want you to do not stop holding these elected Democrats accountable. The American people have had it with them. He's like, I won't stop. He's like, I'll do it. For you, fan. I will do it.

And so that picture is uncovered. And then the program commences. But before it does, you actually, I am told, got a picture with a potato. That's right. He was in the house. Do we have that one?

There you go. That's priceless. Perennial contender, one-time champion for hack madness and comfortably smug, taking a picture. He couldn't be happier. Brian Stelter looks so happy. He got his job back. CNN fired him.

Then they're like, all right, I guess we'll let you back in. So he's having the time of his life. He's gainfully employed again. You know, happy guy. Good for him. If you're listening to this on audio, you've got to go to the YouTube just to look at that photo because Brian Stelter looks so happy. Yeah, why are there like and subscribe? Because that's the only way anybody can see anything. But if you can see these pictures, you genuinely understand what these two idiots were doing. It was amazing. It was amazing.

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You got into the show itself. And the one piece of like news, I think, that came out of the dinner was this Alex Thompson award acceptance. He got this award for his Biden coverage and sort of made waves by criticizing the media itself. Let's play that clip. Clip one. To my bones, I believe that reporting and the White House Correspondents Association is as necessary as ever.

President Biden's decline and its cover-up by the people around him is a reminder that every White House, regardless of party, is capable of deception. But being truth-tellers also means telling the truth about ourselves. We, myself included, missed a lot of this story, and some people trust us less because of it. We bear some responsibility for faith in the media being at such lows.

Okay, so a couple things. First of all, Alex Thompson, both on social media and in the printed medium at Axios, was one of the first and the only to consistently point out that this man was sundowning.

Yeah, it's true. And he before he was at Axios, he was a playbook and he wrote this newsletter, West Wing Playbook, and he roasted Corrine Jean-Pierre out of the gate. He talked about Jen Rubin's tight relationship with the White House. He crushed Biden and like how the staff wouldn't even want to listen to his answers to the questions. So he definitely was an instigator very early on in the

Can I also say, though, Alex, if you're listening, that was kind of pathetic, how he tried to have it both ways, where he was like, it's important to note that no matter which party...

they are an administration can be dishonest. It's like, okay, you're saying only Republican administrations are dishonest, but this one instance of a Democrat for the first time ever being just like, get the hell out of here. Why do you feel like you have to kind of like have it both ways and be like, oh, you know, I don't want to make my journal buddies mad. It's like, if you're going to try to get up there and be a truth teller, just be a truth teller. Let them have it. Tell them the truth. Be like, listen, Biden lied. His people covered it up. Why did everyone in this room miss it?

Yeah, well, let that hang in the air. You don't need to be like, you know, for the first time ever, a Democrat lied to me. No, I did. You're right. You're right. And here's like the subsequent evidence. First of all, can we put graphic to we're talking about a palm card that was given to Joe Biden.

where they have both the face of the person going to ask the question and the question itself, and then the answer. And this is going to be the first question. It says question one. They like square it for the folks who are just listening. Yeah. And like, that is just one thing that was publicly available. It was everywhere that everybody knew about at the time. Now we, as a Ruthless Variety program led every show for three weeks or three years.

With either Joe Biden or Kamala Harris sundowning or being an idiot. Like this was not a story that you could have missed. Well, so I would also point out that that palm card that had the prepackaged first question for Joe Biden, that reporter was Courtney Sobermanian. Yeah. Sobermanian. Sobermanian.

Right. And so like the calls coming from inside the House. Totally. Like Alex Thompson is up there and God bless him for being one of the people who would actually point this thing out. But to get up there and talk about how the cover up within Joe Biden's administration, it's like you participated in that cover up.

that cover up. People on that dais on Saturday night participated in the cover. When one of the board members of the WHCA is up there, this guy's getting an award because he uncovered that, oh, it was a cover up. No one could have told that Joe Biden was sundowning. And then one of the board members is on a card that they have to set up and be like, Joe Biden is going to ask you the question first. Can you submit what question it is so that he knows it? And they're like, oh yeah, totally normal. This is how a working press operates. Like,

Two generations before this iteration of White House press corps, you were dealing with people who grew up idolizing, like, Pentagon Papers.

or Watergate with Deep Throat in a parking garage in Roslyn. And like real stuff that people were trying to keep secret. These people have no... They act as though what happened with a man publicly sundowning in our face was somehow something that they couldn't see with their very eyes. I mean, look, clip two, please, Spagats. Power. Power.

It is noteworthy that the percentage of women who register to vote and cast a ballot is consistently higher than the percentage of the men who do so. Women are not without electoral and or political power.

He reads end of quote and repeat the line. He's just reading Ron Burgundy style. The stage direction. It's just Ron Burgundy style. Write down the thing. Let's put up clip three. Imagine what we can do next. Four more years. Four more years. Pause. Pause. Pause.

I mean, Ron Burgundy style, right? He just, he didn't. And this is not before somebody is like, oh, well, Joe Biden was just sort of a colloquial idiot. He didn't used to do that. Like this was obvious. That's a stutter. That's a stutter. Let's play clip four. Clip four. Joe Biden wandering on stage. Doesn't know where to leave. Just standing there. Yep.

All of a sudden. Like you got Obama waiting. And there it is. Right there he's frozen. There he is. Obama leading him off. Oh, my God. He grabs him by the hand. Obama's got to grab Biden by the wrist, and then he's got to put his hand on his back and walk him. Like a nurse who works at a place for mom. I mean, so, look, this isn't a story that you could have missed. Yeah. I'll give Alex Thompson credit. He had actually the balls to report a whole bunch of things that nobody else would win his –

access to the White House mattered for his career. The rest of them did not. They worried more about the access to get into the White House to be able to report things out like the stupid fucking shit that they came up with on every Sunday night to roll out, you know, whatever week it was for the Biden administration. He actually had the balls to do that. But in that speech, he pretends as though

We're dealing with the Pentagon Papers here. There's a man standing before you who, like, can't complete a sentence. Pause. And you're all like, no, he's great behind closed doors.

Like, that's just a laughable proposition. Well, yeah, and that's the thing that's sort of offensive about all of it. It's like he gets an award for his colleagues, you know, for reporting on the obvious. Meanwhile, there were other people who reported this who just got dogpiled by the entire media. All of those people that were in the room when the Wall Street Journal put out that article.

saying behind closed doors, Biden is slipping. The media had an absolute freakout. They flipped out. And this was in early June. And it was Siobhan Hughes and I think Annie Lipsky. Annie Lipsky. They put together...

To be clear, they were the first. They were the first. They didn't get an award because they work for a Rupert Murdoch-owned newspaper. At the Wall Street Journal or at Fox News, you cannot get awards from the White House Correspondents Association. Yeah. That is...

Absolute fact. Yeah.

That just a couple of weeks later resulted in a debate performance where the rest of the world could no longer deny what was happening. Right. And what happened to them, Siobhan Hughes and Annie Linsky, I should say, what happened to them when the story was over?

printed, they got so much blowback from the other people in the press. It was insane. From the White House press office. I mean, the amount of pressure that was on them for printing the obvious, it was insane. It absolutely, and like, it shouldn't have been. It's horrifying because in America, you should be terrified that journalists, like, you know, these journos, especially in the room that night, they're like, oh, it's so dangerous. Such a dangerous time to be a journalist.

What's dangerous is the way that they brutally bullied and tried to keep silent...

They're supposed, you know, colleagues in this situation. That the journal had the truth to tell people in print, hey, Biden has kind of lost his mind. I mean, Shimon had to go on CNN and like they were tag teaming against her about how irresponsible her reporting was. Oliver Darcy did a whole media newsletter about how irresponsible the Wall Street Journal was. And it's...

To your point, three weeks before that debate, six weeks before Joe Biden is no longer the candidate for president of the United States. I mean, they look like Nostradamus. And here it is, Alex Thompson getting the award, not them. Also, like, look, if the premise of the award is uncovering an uncomfortable truth that nobody else could uncover.

Why isn't every single anchor of Fox News and the entirety of their digital department, why isn't the Ruthless Variety Program nominated for this award? Right.

Because we had been saying this over and over and over. A place for mom became like a colloquial hilarity on this show and on Fox News and amongst all of their commentators and their journalists over a several year period of time before, God bless them, Alex Thompson and even Siobhan was onto this stuff. And I,

I love the fact that Alex Thompson, Siobhan Hughes, Annie Linsky ultimately reported on what was happening with Joe Biden. But there's a whole bunch of internal political calculus that you understand by attending a White House correspondence dinner as to why they didn't do it earlier. Right. But if the essence in the core of a White House correspondence dinner is to

Reward and celebrate fearless journalism. Fearless, meaning you're not concerned about what happens to you based on telling the American people the truth.

Then Fox News, Siobhan Hughes, Annie Linsky and all of those people should have been having a ticker tape parade outside of the Hinkley Hilton. Right. No, that's exactly right, because you have to ask yourself what constitutes fearlessness. And I think in my book, fearlessness for journalists in Washington is writing what the past.

The pack will not say. You know what I mean? That's what takes fearlessness, because you know that every left wing editor out there for every major paper and every major network does not like that you're saying the thing that the audience actually wants to hear. And unless you are willing to do that, I just I just don't understand how you can.

where there's any fearlessness in Washington journalism. You know what I mean? There's just not because truth is truth. Untruth is untruth. And whether or not you're celebrating, in this case, they're celebrating truth, that it was uncovered at some point that Joe Biden was unfit for office.

But they're doing so in a manner that rewards people who played the game every single step of the way to get to the point where they knew it was no longer viable with the American people. Yeah, you can only get that award if you're inside the club. Yeah. Not if you were first. You got to be...

blessed by the club to be the person who says the thing. That's right. It's never the people who actually did the brave thing. Oliver Darcy. I just want to read this from his newsletter at, this is after the wall street journal story came out. Um,

The headline of it is, The Wall Street Journal's Story About Biden's Mental Acuity Suffers from Glaring Problems. This is the, of course, they're playing defense for the Biden administration. A spokesperson for the journal told me that the Rupert Murdoch-owned newspaper, which is under the stewardship of newish editor Emma Tucker. I love how they undermine the...

Yeah, right there. Absolutely incredible. They're trying to tell you two things. They're like, don't trust it because it's owned by Rupert Murdoch. Yeah. Also, like, Emma Tucker is kind of a newish editor. So that's already. Maybe she's in over her head. Yeah. You know, which sounds like a little sexist, I would point out. Some latent misogyny you throw in there. Right. Quote stands by its reporting. If Tucker is comfortable with such shoddy journalism, it is worrisome.

It is difficult to imagine that the newspaper or any outlet would run a similar story declaring that Trump is slipping behind the scenes. I mean, unbelievable. Like literally every newspaper ever for the first four years of the presidency. And this is absolutely incredible. Despite the fact that Democratic leadership has demonstrated a much stronger relationship with the truth in recent years. Unbelievable. Unbelievable. Do you think Oliver Darcy put out an apology?

To Siobhan Hughes? No. Or Emma Tucker? Do you know what he was doing at WHJ? First off, I saw that clown, but before, he has a new publication that he started. They were having a little party. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Celebrate. Just celebrate. How right they've been and how nonpartisan they've been about everything, I'm sure. Oh, my God.

So this is what you guys were up to. There's so much more from all of this that we want to get to. Incredible comical speeches. And one of them in particular blew my socks off when you guys texted me. We had fun. Oh, my God. It was unbelievable. We're going to get to all of it right after this. For too long, weak politicians have sold out America's steel workers and allowed China to flood our country with cheap foreign steel.

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All right. So, listen, fellas, when I saw your texts on Saturday night where you said you will not believe what just happened and then you explained it, I actually didn't believe – I thought it was like something you two clowns manufactured. No. Because it couldn't be more perfect. No.

Can you explain? Can you set this up? All right. So stunning. So Eugene Daniels, who, of course, spent so much of the of the show doing these just obnoxious. A number one seed in Hack Madness this year. He's just fart sniffing stem winders about, you know, how he's protecting democracy and all this sort of stuff. Truth to power. You know, he's the head of the White House Correspondents Association. They're nonpartisan. They want to get it accurate and fair.

although he's leaving in two weeks to go do primetime cable for MSNBC to fill in for Joy Reid. So I'm sure it'll be nonpartisan and fair. But he did this thing honoring April Ryan, you know, as being the longest serving White House correspondent who's an African-American woman. Good for her, right? Everyone in the ballroom on all of the screens, the jumbotrons, if you will,

gets a photo of Yamiche Alcindor no during the middle of this whole thing honoring April Ryan which I found hilarious because if like somebody on the right did this if Fox News did this they'd be called racist for a month oh it would be a never-ending discussion they put the camera on Yamiche right yeah while he's talking and then you know it goes back to Eugene while he's talking some more

And then they do it again. So this wasn't like, oh, you know, the cameraman actually. They do it again. And they keep the camera on Yamiche while Eugene is talking about April Ryan. And Yamiche goes, what? I'm not April Ryan. Right. So you got to see this clip of Eugene Daniels. C-SPAN doesn't provide the full in-house experience that you had. But they do provide his reaction. So we get to watch him squirm. So let's play that. Clip five, please.

He's shaking his head.

That's not her. That's not her. So he just mouths, that's not her, because he's looking down there at the monitor and it's showing you Misha Alcindor. It was amazing. Unbelievable. I said to everyone, everyone at our table was like, what are they doing? What are they doing? I fire out that tweet instantly.

Like, it gets picked up by a lot of folks on the right who are, like, correctly pointing out, man, if this had happened on Fox News, this would be, like, a month-long national conversation. Where are we as a country? Is this racism? Zero, zero, again, zero self-awareness. Dude, and I don't think it got any reporting. I saw...

I saw one single sentence in like a deadline Hollywood story after the White House Correspondents Association that mentioned it briefly. But like, it's not in playbook. You know, it's not like, ooh, you know, egg on the face of the White House Correspondents Association. They would never do that because again, protection racket. I mean, you can understand why they need a protection racket when you see the outfit that Eugene is wearing. Can we pop that? Can you just pop that back up?

Let's pop it back up. Are you kidding me? Look at it. What the hell is that? He's ready for Studio 54. I mean, literally. Can I say one thing about, so, yes, I think he looked like an absolute clown, but one thing that he said, many things that he said really bugged me. But one line in particular just really, really pissed me off. He said, the truth is difficult.

It ain't. The truth is not difficult, and that's one job where it absolutely should not be. The truth is black and white, and it's your job to provide it to the American people. When you get in the mindset of thinking the truth is difficult, there's only one word for it. You're biased. Right. It's difficult when you assume circumstances and environment that you think personally help you versus the truth. That's where it is. Like, that's why you come to the Ruthless Variety Program.

Tariffs. Am I wild about tariffs? No, I'm not. Am I concerned? Yep, I am. Taxes. Boy, they better get that stuff done. Doesn't feel like it's on the path right now. I'm willing to say it.

These people are not willing. We're a partisan. They weren't willing to be like, whoa, Biden's not all the way there. Pause for more. That's how crazy it is. Like, that's how crazy it is, is that they insulate themselves to the point where their career advancement is entirely related to.

Whether or not they think they socially can get ahead and career get ahead as a result of that social relationship by basically burying the truth. That's when the truth becomes difficult. Right. It's like a celebration of the exact opposite of what journalism was supposed to be. That's exactly right. It's just it's disgusting. It's it's completely ridiculous. We got more. Clip six.

From the White House to the town of White House, Texas, it's a real place, Peoria to the Persian Gulf, we at AP remain committed as ever to accurate, independent, nonpartisan journalism, to carrying light the world over. Come on. That's Ashbrook's good friend, Zeke J. Miller.

The AP, the AP who has been on a heater of a streak of just lies, absolute lies. And they could possibly be as of late. I mean, especially with this whole like Maryland man thing that the AP's been pushing. They could be the most partisan outlet ever.

There. Out there. Period. I'm not sure what's been going on over there the last five years. I really am not. I have no explanation for it. They used to be pretty reliable, and now it's very, very reliable. They're a wire service. It's supposed to be. Like I was saying, the truth is black and white. They used to be just like, here's the story, black and white, two sentences, and now they've turned into essentially like MSNBC's opinion page. Well, you don't need a time machine. Let's just put up graphic three. This is for March 18. We're talking like a month ago. AP was forced to withdraw...

A totally fake story revolving around Tulsi Gabbard. It was just— They were forced to retract a comment. It says right here for the folks who are only listening. AP was forced to retract a comment, made a story about Tulsi Gabbard after claiming the national intelligence director publicly said that President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin were, quote, very good friends. That was absolutely made up. Just didn't say it.

Just didn't say it. But they, I mean, this is the pinnacle of truth. Right? And this is what they're celebrating. Now, I understand, like company men, right? We've all done it at some level. You're a company man. You represent your company. You know, you got to put on a good face. I get that.

The problem is this event in particular is there to celebrate the ultimate pinnacle of political power in the world, not just America, in the world, which is covering the White House, the literal leader of the free world. And their whole goal is to try to reward excellence in communicating things that are difficult truths.

At no point did I hear anything that revolved anywhere close to a difficult truth. Like it was like an excuse for why they didn't get a story right. There is a company man –

Point of view on why their publication stands for acts like a like it's a bumper sticker, despite the fact that the mission statement of their organization is to inform the American people at a very fucking local basis of what's going on in Washington. And they refuse to do it.

So, like, this thing is broken. And I understand the Trump administration decided not to show up. God bless them. I appreciate it. Because they shouldn't show up. Nope. They should try to figure out how to... Hopefully in the next year, they can figure out how to rework this situation until it's something closer to truth-telling, which it certainly is not. And then in the end, like...

I don't mind people having big parties. Mm-hmm. You know, I don't mind. Like, I like to have fun. I like to have people in the industry that are involved. But let's not pretend that it's something that it's not. Mm-hmm. And they've gotten to a point where they actually are so cylinder-cylindered off that they don't know up from down. It's not that there's—many of them are malicious. They're not. Mm-hmm.

It's that they literally don't think your truth, the truth that is middle of this country exists because they've never seen it. Yeah, but what a gift. Like, here's the thing. Seriously, seriously, we've spent 20, 25 minutes talking about how insane and insular they are and naive they are and how they sniff their own farts. I hope they keep sniffing them. I mean, because honestly.

It's good for us because it makes our job so easy because we just got to call balls and strikes and do our thing. And they can all give each other awards and pat each other on the back for a job well done when obviously they failed the American people because the audience keeps shrinking and ours keeps growing. So I hope they keep doing it. But if they were literally committed, if anyone, anyone, I don't care what award organization, if you're committed to journalism, you'd mark Suzanne Scott.

And Jay Wallace up to the front of that stage would be like, you know what? You guys are the one people that got it right over the last year. Yeah, why did you get it right and we got it wrong? We'd like to actually think about that. We'd actually like to hear it. We'd actually like to hear what it is that you guys do. Besides triple our freaking audience. Right.

But they don't. And they don't even reward Wall Street Journal, two incredibly good reporters, for getting the story first. They've got to go to the follow-on situation because they played the game. Yeah, it is what it is. Listen, what a great experience for you two to see this with your own eyes because Smash and I have had to deal with this for quite some time. Again, we drank a lot. Yeah.

Our question of the day is what would a true reckoning for this group look like? What would a true reckoning for journalists look like? Is it simply out of business? Because, like, information flow has to flow one way or another. We understand, like, we're in a partisan business. We have a right-leaning point of view, which, you know, you know because you're listening to it. There's left-leaning point of view stuff too. But there's supposed to be people who just figure out things that

And we interpret those things as to whether it's good for the country or not good for the country. There's no longer anyone who's doing the interpretation of those things. They're not. They're doing the interpretation off the left-hand side of the map first and then feeding it back to us. And the question is, what's a reckoning look like? Is it bankruptcy? Is it gone? Is it jail? El Salvador. That's my opinion.

It's jail. Maybe you do a post-apartheid South Africa Truth and Reconciliation Committee where you just put them all on a panel and be like, why are you liars? I think it's simpler next year. They have their little award show. They're all celebrating, and then someone gets to the podium and says, no one freak out. The doors are locked. Kristi Noem is going to be directing you folks onto vans, and you're all going to El Salvador. Ha ha ha! Ha ha ha!

Oh, well, coming up, your comments from last episode when we asked you, will Democrats correct their course? Of course, we were talking about them emphasizing things like El Salvador and not things like the economy are obvious, like 50 plus one situations. Will they? I don't know. We get to your comments right after this.

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And we're back. And I am not Josh Holmes. Ha ha ha!

Unfortunately, we lost Josh to the Eagles celebration at the White House. Thoughts and prayers to him and his Minnesota Vikings. No, I'm actually happy for him, you know, that he gets to celebrate this Eagles team, which has done so much, and President Trump is recognizing them. And I'm so happy that Josh is there to enjoy this moment. Yeah, you know what? He's wearing his purple tie in protest. But I really hope somehow that Trump just...

Sticks. I really do hope. He kind of looks like a lib at the State of the Union with his silent protest. Okay, so we got to get to these comments from our last episode. The last question was, will Democrats course correct? And we always go first to the voice. Okay, first comment comes from DaGreatPanguini. Hmm.

And DeGrate writes, the Dems don't care or I'm sorry, the Dems don't dare course correct by going back to the middle because their base is too comfortable with political violence, which can be turned back on them on a whim. Their most active constituents are proudly and aggressively the 20 percent of every 80-20 issue in America and use the fear of the mob to enforce their will and

Don't like a presidential candidate? They've got people willing to take care of the problem. Don't like Jewish governor's support of Israel? They'll throw his family a cocktail party while...

Good writing. Yeah, great writing from our audience. He goes on to say, Poetic.

Great writing. I love that comment, dude. That's dead on. Dude, our audience is the smartest. De Great Pinguini. So maybe an Italian. Yeah. One of the few Welvers. Because that was just truth. Yeah. Sitting bars. Shout out, Pinguini. All right, Smug, what do we got?

This comment comes from Keith Morgenstern, and Keith writes, Let me explain.

DJT bucked the conventional wisdom on most of that, and he was right. I think Dems feel they are at the same crossroads. Witness, AOC campaigning with Bernie, more and more crazy. But the million-dollar question is if ours can deliver value to voters before Dems can nitpick some quote, parentheses, legit, but petty errors and paint the narrative against it.

And more parental advice for Smug. Quote, strafe like an A-10. I'm so lucky I wasn't taking a sip of coffee just then. Keep it up, fellas. And shout out Duncan for the advice. Like, I got so many replies and comments being like, actually, Duncan is 100% nail on the head. The guy's got like, what, two sons in as many years? I think you do know what you're talking about. I appreciate that. And that was a great comment from Keith. Thank you, Keith, for that. We love it.

When we come back, a wild weekend from the NFL draft, Shadur Sanders, also a super awkward interview with Bill Belichick that we got to cover. And also Smug has a secret surprise he also wants to cover. You're not going to want to miss this.

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Stop the B-Salt assault. Okay, so the NFL draft over the weekend, fantastic content. It's always great to watch your team in the NFL draft because it's always hope, right? No one's disappointed you yet, you know? It's all good news. We're going to get somebody who's going to fill a gap that we have. We're going to get this offensive tackle to protect a quarterback. But the real story that came out of the draft was the

unexpected fall of Shadur Sanders, like a mortgage-backed security in 2008. And I'm curious...

Thoughts on that? Well, here's the thing. As much as it pains me to say as a Bengals fan, I think the Browns had the best draft out of anybody. You start with the best defensive tackle on the board and you end with one of the best quarterbacks. Now, I know that Shudder Sanders had a lot of question marks over his head based on the interviews he had with teams and everything else. Terrible interviews, apparently. Terrible interviews. But the guy is pure talent. You can't take that away from him. And what the Browns are...

also got in this draft is a first round pick for next year. Everybody considers the 2026 draft is the quarterback draft. So if Shador Sanders doesn't work out, any of the other five quarterbacks they have on the roster don't work out, the Browns can pick another quarterback. So I think that

Shador Sanders can do good things with Cleveland. He's a great athlete. And, you know, there was a lot of controversy about the way he was treated during the draft. And somebody called him with a prank during the process. Yeah. I think ultimately the issue there, obviously the interviews were a big issue in the draft that he apparently interviewed very terribly with all of these teams. But like the other thing I noticed is,

Travis Hunter, his teammate, the wide receiver slash cornerback. Incredible player. Generational talent. Yeah, he could be an actual Deion Sanders two-way player in the NFL. How much he plays on both sides of the ball, I don't know. Because the game plays a lot faster than

players hit a lot harder. I'm being real. I think a ton. Really? I know I am very, like... I don't believe it. It's not a unique opinion. Or it is a very unique opinion to think that he is. I think he will. Really? If a team is smart, he is that good. Yeah. He's crazy. He is very, very good. But you know what? You tackle a couple of Saquon Barkleys at the edge. Mm-hmm.

And suddenly you don't want to go up and suit up to play wide receiver. I think he could. I don't know. He took 100 snaps. So there was a CU Boulder game two years ago when Travis Hunter was playing, and it was like 95 degrees or something. And he played over 100 snaps. Yeah. On both sides of the ball. No, I don't doubt his ability. I don't doubt his endurance. But I think like...

It stacks up in the NFL taking those hits and making those tackles. But the reason why I bring up Travis Hunter is you looked at Shadur Sanders' tape, you know, ahead of the draft, and half the highlights, let's be honest, were him chucking the ball up to Travis Hunter. It's a lot easier when you can just throw it to Travis Hunter. Yeah, you can just throw it to him, and he's going to win every 50-50 ball in college, right? And so I think people sort of doubted his ability to actually process the game and make the open throw when...

Maybe that's not going to be an option in the NFL. Here's my quick case on him. What he didn't have going into this draft was a chip on his shoulder. What seven rounds of him not being selected gave him was something he did not have. He's got a chip. He's got something to prove.

in his career in the NFL. He needs to be able to show people that he can throw the ball to somebody other than Travis Hunter. And that's why I think he gets an opportunity. It is healthy. You know what? It is healthy because I think the guy needed to be humbled a little bit. You know, I mean, can we play that? Can we show the clip of his draft room? This is the draft room he had. I mean, look at this with all the hats, legendary this and look at this.

Man, that has to hurt. Were you like, I am going to prep a draft room? It's like a huge building. Right. Yeah.

Right. It was nothing but embarrassment for him. Nothing but embarrassment for him. And so now he has to prove himself. There was a video, we were talking about this earlier, him and Cam Ward talking about, what do you care about? Cam Ward's like, I just care about playing football. Shutter Sanders is talking about other things. But the reality is...

If he wants to recover from the embarrassment that happened over the weekend, he has to do it on the field. And the only team that benefits is the Cleveland Browns. Yeah. No, I 100% agree. And honestly, I think Shadur handled it really well. Not the front end.

where he had that draft room and all that bullshit. Dumb. But, like, actually, when he slipped past the first round and the second round and he's doing these interviews, he handled himself really well. Honestly, I think he had a lot of maturity. I don't think he got the best advice from his father, frankly. I mean, it's tough. It's tough.

It's tough because I think that was clearly, you know, this is your own child kind of thing. Like you want to be a good dad, support your kid and get the best for him. Absolutely. But if you want to get out of the shadow of Deion Sanders, you have to do it

on your own. And this guy has the athletic ability to do it. It's just a mental thing. He literally is going to have to put his head down and produce over and over and over again. If he can do that, the guy's going to fly. And that QB room right now has Deshaun Watson, has Joe Flacco, has Kenny Pickett. It's got already an elite QB with Joe Flacco. And it's got Shadur Sanders and...

Dylan Gabriel, who the Browns selected before they took Shadur. Yeah. Tough. Tough deal. It's going to be tough. It is tough. All right. So next we have

a very interesting story. I don't know if you guys saw this interview with Bill Belichick where he's wearing the shirt with the holes in it and he's got his girlfriend who's 24 years old back behind doing comm support. Can we play clip number nine, please? The other change for Belichick is 24-year-old Jordan Hudson. His creative muse as he writes in his book. Make sure that that's the...

Jordan was a constant presence during our interview. You have Jordan right over there. Everybody in the world seems to be following this relationship. They've got an opinion about your private life. It's got nothing to do with them, but they're invested in it. How do you deal with that? Never been too worried about what everybody else thinks. Just try to do what I feel like is best for me and what's right. How did you guys meet?

Not talking about this. It's a topic neither one of them is comfortable commenting on. Oh, my God. I support that so much. So here's the thing. So he's going to be the coach of UNC Chapel Hill.

And that's tough because I'm an NC State guy. I'm not like a lot of folks here and that you see that are, you know, blue bloods. What do you mean here? I went to a state school and I fought my way. Okay. But still, I have to support... Even though he's at UNC, I have to support him so much. That is good for him. Good for him. He put in the work.

He won the championships. Now he has this wonderful, supportive girlfriend who's like on the fly running comms. On the fly. I will say that I respect absolutely everything that you just laid out about Bill Belichick. But what I remember is an interview that we did here on the Ruthless Variety program recently with Senator Tommy Tuberville. I asked him whether he thinks that Belichick will succeed at UNC, and he said no. Hmm.

And one of the things that stuck out to me about that interview, Bill Belichick in a Navy sweatshirt. He's the coach at UNC. You got to wear the baby blue, not the dude. Exactly. He's the coach. Yeah, he's the coach at UNC. And also, by the way, I don't remember Nick Saban doing CBS morning interviews. I don't remember Jim Harbaugh doing interviews where his, you know, some girlfriend is on the side doing like cover for him.

I really wonder whether UNC is going to benefit in the way they were hoping when they signed Bill Belichick as the coach. No, I hate it, honestly. Really? I think for all the reasons why you pointed out. But, like, Bill Belichick is the best NFL coach probably in history. No, no. Probably in history. It's all Tom Brady. None of it was really Belichick. No, no, no. What he was able to draft—

the veterans he was able to bring in and convince them to play. Because it's Tom Brady. Because Tom Brady's putting up Ws. Okay, fine. Let's be real. It was all Tom Brady. Well, okay, fine. It was all Tom Brady. Fine, but all I'm saying is... But that's why I say, like, shout out Belichick, get yourself a 24-year-old girlfriend, because now, like, you know, it doesn't matter anymore. But you know what? Being on national television and sitting in that chair as a 24-year-old Rasputin veteran

Cucks you and tells you what you're allowed to talk about is embarrassing. I think it's embarrassing You're a you think so staple of football that is I would be embarrassed to have somebody off If I'm some old dude who has tricked UNC into giving me millions of dollars and didn't they find like some job for his girlfriend too like UNC is also having to pay for like

Good for him. Do it. UNC, run yourselves into the ground. There's no question. He's living the dream of a guy who is in his age bracket. And I will not go as far as agreeing with Duncan that he's the best coach ever. But what made him one of the best coaches ever was that his head was always in the game. I mean, everybody said he wore the sweatshirt. He wasn't dressed to the nines like every other coach ever.

because he was focused on winning. And I wonder if you're doing CBS interviews and you got a 24-year-old girlfriend, is your head really in the game? Yeah. No, it's a good point.

I just want to point out that I say he's the best coach ever as an Indianapolis Colts fan. You know how much it pains me to say that. So you know it comes from the heart. Yeah, yeah. One more thing I want to cover here, Smug. Yeah. I saw some interesting transportation news, which I know is near and dear to your heart. 100%. Can we get that tweet on the screen? This is from Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy. He says...

Tell me how we can make traveling with family great again. There's no better place to start a family than the United States of America, so I want to make it easier for you to travel with your kids. Here's your chance to tell me, your transportation secretary, what I can do to make travel easier for your family. Send me your best ideas. I had maybe 200 to 300 people tag me in this tweet, and it had to be on the show. So first off, from the folks who do travel with family, I want to hear your thoughts.

Yeah. Well, I'll tell you, there are a lot of ways that you could improve the transportation sector in this country. And not for nothing, but the guy asking that question on a key weekend, of course, is going to just like invite the type of comments that you were getting over and over and over again.

I think Duffy has like nine children. He does. This is a guy who travels with the family. Yeah, nobody knows how to travel with kids quite like him. And to show the sort of humility to ask people and say, hey, what would make it better? You know that he's going to try to follow through on that stuff. Yeah, I would say, okay, so coming back from the Bahamas, you know, I was there for that water park spring break for our kids yesterday.

And we had a layover in Newark on the way back. Brutal place for layover. Okay, fine. Yeah, but they redid the A Terminal there. And I really, really shout out to the people at the Newark Airport for

They remodeled the A terminal there and they put a playground in and our flight was delayed by four and a half hours. Four and a half hours at the Newark airport. And if we did not have that playground there in the A terminal, I don't know. I would have put a...

a gun in my mouth. It was horrible. It was horrible. Nobody wants to be in an airport that long, especially with a five-year-old and a two-year-old. But you know what? Like having that, having that playground there made it go by so fast. Semi-related. You know what I really loved? So as we discussed earlier, Duncan and I and our missus were at the dinner over the weekend and,

And I tell everyone the same story about how, like, Duncan's oldest son is... Joey. Such an angel. Joey is such a well-behaved angel. And it's just...

the most kind-hearted person ever. And so I would always tell people, it's not tough for you, Duncan. Joey could babysit his brother. This is no big deal. And your missus is like, you don't understand. He's only nice in front of you. In front of guests, he's the kindest, most well-behaved child ever. Which was just us. I appreciate the fact that Joey is very kind to everyone he meets.

But when he's with us alone, it's like the Thunderdome. I still don't believe it. Because he is truly like the best behaved child I've seen in my life. And he is. And he's the best kid, dude. And he's like, he's really, really smart and really inquisitive. But like when it's just us alone and it was a long day. At the Newark airport, it was a nightmare. Yeah. It was a nightmare. The other thing I would say if, you know, Sean Duffy, if you're listening, is

There are a lot of people at TSA, a lot of people looking at my bag, a lot of people as it goes through the scanner and all. So if there was just like one person who was sort of like a family concierge who waits for you on the other side, that'd be super, super helpful because half the time, you know how this is. Stand with the kids. Yeah, stand with the kids because it's like –

You're trying to make up for the bag. Yeah, you're trying to corral. You're trying to corral. And half the time, they're like, oh, well, there's too many liquids in this bag. Or you got this diaper bag, and there's some food in there, and we got to check it. We got to wipe your hands, all this sort of stuff. And it's tough. It's tough for you as a young parent because you don't want to like – you don't want your kids to be in the way of other people. But your kids –

are inquisitive about the process and they, they like watching the bags and all this sort of stuff. But like you're stuck on the other side, trying to get through, you know, the metal detector and everything. And your kid, you push them through first and it would just be nice. Yeah. It'd be nice if there weren't nine people there who are wiping your hands. And one person was interested in like helping you with your kids. So that was part of my suggestion. Cause when so many people tag me in this,

So I know, especially now that Republicans have control and especially with like Elon and a lot of the folks on the right have been mentioning how we need to be more pro-family. Wouldn't it be great if beyond just having like TSA pre-check and clear and like all this, there was a line that was like,

Family like a family concierge line as a country if America wants to truly say that like oh we want to encourage Families we believe in families because everyone knows this you can't even argue the best unit for economic growth and prosperity in a country is families if there was a line Specifically for families where it's like, okay families go through here they have their stuff screened and baby bottles because like all the horror stories you hear and

of how families have been mistreated over baby bottles. Yeah. Get a family concierge line where it's free. First off, it has to be free. If you've got kids, you get through this free and it's the concierge service level that you get of like TSA pre-check. Dude, I would love that so much more, so much more than like when you get to the gate and they're like, you know, you know, families can board early. And so I don't care about boarding early. You know, we're here. We're glue.

We can be in line with everybody else. My kids need to learn to wait. Yeah. You know? But, like, the security line can be tough. TSA is the only point of pressure. Like, the one thing that people are like, I really hate this about traveling by an airplane is the TSA. And it's like, let's be real, man. The war on terror is over. We won. We won. Osama lost. Osama lost. Osama's dead. Stop having people get their, like—

breast milk x-ray three times. Get out of here, man. Like, it's over. Listen, I do not disagree with you on fixing the bottle situation. I do not disagree with you on a lot of things. But the one area where I will deport from most conservatives right now is on TSA because we had so many illegal immigrants coming into this country over the last four years from North Africa and Tajikistan and Uzbekistan and everywhere else.

And I do not want to get on a plane with those people if they are not searched beforehand. I really don't. Yeah, I mean, I think there's got to be a way to search them before they get to the terminal. And until this administration moves them all out of this country, I'm not ready to give up TSA. There were a ton of conservatives, all of whom I respect.

about eliminating TSA and changing TSA and everything else, but there were so many people who did not grow up in this country. If you're a non-U.S. citizen, if you're a non-U.S. citizen, there should be a thing that, like, if you have a driver's license or a U.S. passport, yeah, you enter the terminal or whatever. If you are a non-U.S. citizen,

U.S. citizen, then you have to deal with the bullshit. Because as an American, it's over, man. Like, get out of here. I do not think the war on terror is over. I think that we, unfortunately, have brought it across the Rio Grande over the last four years. That's probably right. That terrifies me. As a U.S. citizen, you should have carte blanche

Quick, fly through the terminal. If you're a non-US citizen, that's who TSA should deal with. The whole TSA thing should exist only for non-citizens. If you're an American...

One more thing I will say is, so my wife and I were in LaGuardia. We went up for an anniversary weekend to Manhattan. And I was sitting down and a lady with her husband was next to me, fans of the Ruthless Variety Program. Really? Yep. That's awesome. Big fans of the Variety Program. And they asked...

What travel stories do you have that Smug will tee off on in the next episode? It was so funny. They could not have been nicer. They're from Atlanta. Very, very nice people. And I was just hoping that we could talk travel in this episode. You can't ask for anything more. Oh, that's awesome. Dude, like the Minions are legion. They're everywhere. They are. All right. We got to get to this interview. Tim Murtaugh.

I want to welcome to the program a great friend of the program, a communications advisor to Donald Trump's 2020 campaign and senior advisor of the 2024 campaign, Tim Murtaugh. How are you? Doing well. Great to be with you guys. Happy to be with you as always. Thanks for having me. It's so great to have you back. I remember the last time we were talking was right before the election. Everybody was so hyped up. And you mentioned that you felt a little bit worried that you got a little too enthusiastic. But you were exactly right.

Well, I remember that, I don't know, what is it, a week or 10 days before the election maybe that I was here, and we talked about it. We went through all the battleground stuff and the messaging and the polling and all that, and I remember when we were done, I said to you off camera, like, boy, I hope I didn't sound too confident because I was really trying to keep it quiet confidence or cautiously optimistic, whatever, however you put it. But yeah, it all worked out pretty well. All seven battleground states went in the president's column, and it was great. Hardly could have seen it anything better.

You can't beat that. No. Yeah. And you're wearing your green today. I am. Yeah. I heard when you guys were doing the first segment talking about the Eagles being at the White House, I am going to go. I'm a huge Eagles fan, born and raised outside of Philadelphia in Delaware County. And I've managed to convince my two little boys, ages six and eight, to also be Eagles fans. And my wife is grudgingly going along. So we're all going to go see the Eagles today. So what's her team?

She doesn't really have one. She doesn't really have one. Well, you know, Holmes is a huge Vikings guy. Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah. And he's lost. Is that right? So he's in the opposite situation as you. He's lost his two boys to the Eagles and his wife. Is that right? Well, there you go. That's funny. You know, my favorite Eagle of all time was a guy named Randall Cunningham. Oh, yeah. He was really the quarterback. I mean, I go back as far as Ron Jaworski as quarterback. But Randall Cunningham was really my quarterback when I was becoming a real football fan.

And he also played for the Vikings. So there's a little crossover. Yeah, that's right. After the Eagles. That's right. The Eagles have had a lot of greats. This guy, I love, Vice Sikahama. Oh, yeah, sure. He's been a sportscaster in Philadelphia for years. Has he really? I didn't know that. So...

Saquon Barkley is getting a whole rash of shit for playing golf with Donald Trump. Can you believe this? Yeah. No. I mean, yes, I can believe it. But no, I mean, it shouldn't be happening. I mean, it's insane. Look, this is the same kind of thing that Bill Maher just went through, right? And then Larry David writes a really ridiculously titled column where he likens him, you know, my dinner with Adol.

Yeah, right. It's ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous. And they still have not learned a single lesson. I talked about this for a while. Since 2015, when Donald Trump came down the escalator for the very first time, the Democrats have awakened every single day, every day since then, with their central message of this guy is a bad person. He needs to be driven out of public life. No one should ever associate with him. They did that endlessly every single day for most of a decade.

And the result was he was resoundingly reelected. Right. Sent back to the White House for a second time with, of course, an unfortunate gap in between, of course. And so this has to be regarded as the greatest single failure of political communications in world history.

World history. Yeah. They spent every day doing this and they were completely repudiated, completely rejected. And some of them are still at it. Right? Now you can't even play golf with a guy. Give me a break. Give me a break. And in attacking Donald Trump, he's moved beyond political space into more cultural space. You look at the UFC and the podcast election and Saquon Barkley playing golf with him. It's like as the libs have lit their own hair on fire complaining about Donald Trump existing, it's

He's not just dominated politics, but now he's predominant in culture itself. Yeah, yeah. And, you know, the moment that I – I think I probably talked about this the last time I was here. The moment that I really saw that it was breaking through, that they had failed, and that he has really crossed over into lots of areas of life is the day – everyone probably remembers the day he went and worked the drive-thru window at McDonald's.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Right. That was great. Yeah, that was fantastic retail politics and all that. But what really stood out to me was on his approach to that McDonald's. A local newspaper had published earlier in the week that he was going to be there at that particular McDonald's. The campaign didn't grow that crowd. There were 10,000 people lining the streets just to see the guy arrive to go inside the place to make French fries. 10,000 people organically showing up. To me, that meant there

Their messaging, their attempt to try to make the guy something shameful to even support has completely failed. And I bet a lot of the Eagles players voted for him. And if they had a team meeting and said, who wants to go visit the White House? But they're like, yeah, because last time they canceled at the last minute. So now we're talking about multiple Super Bowl victories for the Eagles. He has the point. Of course they want to go because he's cool, because he's funny, because he's interesting. The guy is legit funny. Yeah, and even if you are...

maybe aren't totally on board with his politics, he is very entertaining. And you want to be around his magnetic personality. But I think you're right. I think a lot more Eagles players, a lot more people voted for him than anybody on the left would care to admit. And part of it is because they knew that he would follow through on the things that he was promising when he was campaigning. And

taxes, everything else, he's already working on it. Yeah, he is. And again, in another case of them not learning any lessons, the Democrats are continuously running the same campaign over again that they just lost. Every single sitting on the Capitol steps and speaking on the Senate floor for 25 hours in case anybody gives a rip about that, right? Especially on the issue of illegal immigration.

They are fighting the same fights that the country just told them. Unmistakable message from the entire country to the Democratic Party. We agree with Trump on illegal immigration, and they still don't get it. And the media doesn't get it. None of them get it. They don't understand when the nation looks at them and says, you know, guys, he's not really from Maryland.

Yeah, right. We all understand that. You don't have to keep telling us that he's some Maryland guy who got snatched off the street on his way to Starbucks. That's not what happened. Yeah. And that's not who he was. And I don't know how long it'll take for them to really understand, but they haven't learned any lessons yet. Yeah. So the next big fight we have here in Congress, and I assume we'll see a lot of those stunts from the Democrats, is this reconciliation bill.

And, you know, this is the big kahuna. This is like getting the president's agenda through Congress in a major, major way. What are the things you're looking at in this reconciliation bill? What do you want to see? This is a way to really get into the budget and ingrain the actual America First agenda. This is the way to institute the MAGA agenda in a way that really didn't happen the first time around, I think.

I just mentioned illegal immigration. I think border security and the administration is doing big things on illegal aliens, both deporting the ones who are here and preventing new ones from coming in. I mean, 99.995 percentage reduction. That's insane. That is insane. Just about perfect.

Reduction in the amount of catch and release people. Nine. Since he became president, nine people have been let go and pending their upcoming immigration hearing as compared to 184,000 under Joe Biden. Nine. Yeah. That's insane progress. I also saw –

Outside the White House today, they had all of these signs of all the illegal immigrants that have been captured, which I thought was a great messaging coup. Connected to a crime. Right. Murder, a lot of it's violent crime. Yeah. And I thought he had 100 of them. Did you say that? I think they had 100 for 100 days because this is the 100th day. Yeah.

Yeah, White House comms is doing a great job. Great job. With stuff like that. So that, I think there's going to be a lot of stuff that involved with the assistance to fight illegal immigration in budget reconciliation. And I think very key to the president's economic plans would be the extension and the making permanent of the Trump Tax Cuts and Jobs Act from 2017. Those, of course, come with an expiration date, which is rapidly approaching, and unless it gets passed,

memorialized again, they will in fact expire, which means an automatic tax increase on everybody who pays taxes. Again, contrary to what the Democrats talk about, these weren't tax cuts for billionaires. These were tax cuts for everyone who pays taxes. Even the Washington Post was forced to do an analysis of this back when it passed the first time, 2017, and they kind of said, yeah, it turns out

If you pay taxes, you've got a tax cut. Sorry to have to report it that way, everybody, but that's the fact of the matter. So I think that's very important, that extension of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, because the economy is set with all these businesses returning and onshoring of jobs, and the jobs numbers are unexpectedly high. Again, of course, economists are always surprised. They're always shocked by whatever the jobs numbers are.

And so getting tax cuts, keeping taxes low, and I think Congress will probably add some tax cuts to the mix as well, and that's key for economic growth. And then there's a third thing that I'll be looking for, which has really started to get –

lot of attention. And I started paying attention to it, too, because I have elderly family members. And it's something called the Biden pill penalty. Have you heard that? I saw the executive order that Trump put out on this. Right. So Trump issued an executive order about a lot of things about prescription drug pricing. And one of them was he instructed Secretary Kennedy at HHS to work with Congress to get rid of the Biden pill penalty, which was something that was included in the Inflation Reduction Act.

They're poorly named. The liberals are the kings of naming legislation exactly what it is not. The Inflation Reduction Act, which of course didn't do anything about it. But what it did do, what it did inflate was the cost of the potential cost of prescription drug medicine because it actually punished innovation.

in pill form medicine. It treated different categories of medicine differently. You have something called, this is a little bit technical, but they had something, you have something called large molecule medicines. These are things that are more inconvenient. You have to go to the hospital or the doctor to get them. They're more expensive. Think of things that you have to get injected, injections, infusions, IVs, those kinds of things. Biden favored

those types of medicines and discriminated against what are called small molecule medicines or pills, the way everybody thinks of medicines as pills, discriminated against them and actually discouraged investment in research and development. And that makes no sense at all because pills are 71% cheaper on average than those other forms of medicine. But by discriminating against those, cheaper, more convenient, heck, you can get pills through the mail. By doing that,

Exactly what everyone predicted happened.

70% of the research and development dollars went away from pill form medicine, either to the other more inconvenient, more expensive medicines or out of medicines entirely. And people are investing their money somewhere else, like AI or something like that. And if you read the press at the time, of course, they were never dialing in on Biden's discrimination between one version or the other. They were just saying, oh, Biden believes in science. Democrats believe in science. They would never tell the real story. You remember, you know, Joe Biden was going to do the

cancer moonshot. Oh, right. He's going to cure cancer. Yeah. Right? Was it cured? No. He said he was going to. I don't think it's cured. But I'll tell you what he did. He said he was going to. He said he was going to. But what he did was he made it more difficult because these, they're called pills. They're called small molecule drugs because they can pass through the blood-brain barrier, right? So you're talking about...

This is things that attack mental health problems, things that treat Alzheimer's disease, and also in other forms of pills, talking about cancer drugs. All right. Joe Biden made it more unlikely that a cure for cancer is going to be found because of the Biden pill penalty. And because of all this, what's what the University of Chicago isn't, you know, not some fly by night night school.

there. They did a study. 188 different cures or applications of existing medicines have not been discovered because of the Biden pill penalty. And that means 116, according again to the University of Chicago, 116 million life years

lost off of the life expectancy of American citizens who are living today. 116 million years off everybody's life combined. That's you, that's me, that's my kids, you know, whoever you're talking about. So if Congress can fix this, there's legislation that would do it, but most likely in budget reconciliation,

If and when they do that, it would kick off the golden age of innovation in medicine because pills are cheaper to make. They're cheaper for patients. They're cheaper for the entire health care system. And if you're not forcing people to go to the hospital to get their injections.

You're not instituting those costs in the thing. There's going to be greater innovation. There's going to be more cures. And maybe that moonshot cure for cancer would actually finally happen now that Joe Biden from outside the White House would no longer be standing in the way because that's what the Biden pill penalty is doing. Man, oh, man.

It just there's so there's so much that happened that people didn't even realize during the last administration. And there is so much progress that the president is making here in his first hundred days and that Congress can make with this reconciliation process that's coming up that nobody really knows. I mean, there's so much that's happening in Washington. Everybody pays attention to the big stuff, but stuff like this, too, can have a huge impact here.

even if you don't know it. Right, yeah. People always think about taxes or illegal immigration, all the things, the EOs that Donald Trump was doing early on. You forget how much has to be unwound from the damage that Joe Biden did over the last four years.

Sure, yeah. And a lot of it is tucked into this legislation and, you know, people are voting on it who didn't read it. And I would point out that when the Inflation Reduction Act passed with the Biden pill penalty in it, zero Republicans voted for it in either the House or the Senate. So this was entirely a creation of the Democrats and Joe Biden.

And they were told. Upfront, they were told. You had patients groups, doctors groups, pharmaceutical companies, business organizations, conservative groups. They all said, you know, if you do this, you're going to drive research dollars away from pills, and that's the kind of medicine that everyone uses. Right. And they went ahead and did it everywhere. They're also killing generics through this. Think about Lipitor, which is a cholesterol drug. Right.

Because of generics in that market, people can get your cholesterol medicine for pennies per dose, right? With the Biden pill penalty, there's no incentive for companies to go in and become the generic provider of certain medicines. So that method of bringing prices down has also gone away.

The whole thing is an increaser of costs in the entire health care system because people are not getting treated for things on the front end. And then years down the road, treatment for that is wildly expensive, and that upsets the whole system. I mean the more you learn about the Inflation Reduction Act, the more you're convinced that it is the worst piece of legislation that ever passed Congress because they –

Even what they set it out as, like the Green New Deal, that somehow was supposed to reduce inflation at the same time they're paying off all of the green energy buddies. It's also a Christmas tree for other friends of theirs that they didn't really talk about as much. Yeah.

Think about what they did with the Green New Deal when they did write that. They're trying to drive everybody away from fossil fuels, right? Because fossil fuels are the big bad enemy and you want solar and you want wind. And we're also going to require that you drive an electric vehicle. We're going to mandate you drive an electric vehicle. Well, windmills can't charge your electric car. So how are you going to get the electricity? Well, through fossil fuels. None of that makes any sense. The logic doesn't exist. There is no logic in the way that they do things, just like

How they name legislation. Inflation Reduction Act that raises inflation. It doesn't usually have to make sense. I mean, because Joe Biden called it the Inflation Reduction Act, that might have been a clue. Yeah. That is precisely not...

What it was going to do. Precisely not. Well, Tim, thanks so much for joining us. I really appreciate it. Appreciate you guys. Hopefully we can have you back in soon. I do a lot of interviews here and there about politics and stuff, and nothing gets mentioned as much as the time that I appeared on Ruthless. Happy to be back. Just a pleasure to have you, buddy. Thanks, guys. Appreciate it. Thank you.

Every time the guy's on, he is just so good. And, you know, we had him right before the election. We have him again now. We're going to have him again, you know, in the future. Yeah, he's great. He's great. And it's a great perspective of a guy who's seen Trump through both the 2020 campaign and the 2024 campaign. I think we were talking about priorities for the Trump administration. A guy like that's got a great insight into all of it. Again, our question of the day is...

What would a true reckoning look like for the journalists? We did all the stuff on the White House Correspondents Association dinner and then patting themselves on the back. How great they did. They are the beacons of truth. These people. Impartiality. Justice. These people. You know, what does a reckoning look like?

I recommend a truth and reconciliation like South Africa after apartheid. What do you think? I'm very, very curious. You got to like and subscribe. Like and subscribe. I see the number one comment, and I see this every episode. How don't these guys have a million? How do you have a million? You should have a million subs on YouTube and all this sort of stuff. You are a part of that process. Tell your friends. Tell your family. Share this episode. Get them to like and subscribe.

And we're going to get there. I think we're going to get there, folks. I think so. And this was a banger. It was. It's a great episode. I think we did it. I think so. Absolute banger of an episode. Gentlemen, thank you so much to Tim Murtaugh. Thank you so much to the Minions. Just like Duncan said, send it to your friends. Like and subscribe to the YouTube because it's more fun and video. So until next time, Minions, keep the faith. Hold the line and own the webs. We'll see you Thursday. Stay ruthless.

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