 kind of everything involved. And you listen to somebody like Chris Miller talk about geopolitics, China, Taiwan, I mean specifically China, Taiwan, United States, chip manufacturing and all of that. And it gives you such a contrast to the populist gibberish nonsense that presidential candidates express is expressed the right word on a debate stage. I mean, it's just, I mean, God, how this country, I mean, maybe the best illustration of how, how, how in decline this country is, is I, none of us have video recordings of the Lincoln-Douglas debates. But one can imagine, imagine those debates, right? And put them put that Lincoln-Douglas debate up against what we saw last night or what we see in every four years. I mean, last night was nothing unique in terms of the quality of just the rhetoric, the discussion of ideas. I mean, what Lincoln-Douglas debates were hours long and long expressions of ideas and about fundamental principles and about big issues and big things. And and yesterday was just, I mean, all of the debates, I don't want to, you know, say yesterday was extraordinary to be at because I don't think it was. It was just bad as usual, maybe a little bit better because Trump wasn't there. But just blah, just awful, just awful. And at this rate, Democrats will continue to win because if this is the best they can do, then, I mean, again, Democrat debates are blah too. I mean, they're all just awful. And it's not a projection on the candidates necessarily, right? Somewhat on the candidates. But it's a reflection on the American people, on the audience, on what people actually want and expect. They don't want thoughtful, deep, principal debate. They want sound bites. They love when these people start arguing with one another and insult each other. They love the fact that, you know, that somebody can rattle off 55 things they're going to do when they become president but can't discuss any one of them in a little bit of depth. And look, I get why they don't. I'm not blaming the candidates. It's not the candidates fault. It's the audience's fault. Like, nobody wants them to talk about it. Right? Imagine somebody up there yesterday would have come up and said, Social Security Medicaid is going to bankrupt this country. We need to really reform them. I suggest we privatize them over a period of 30 years. I mean, the booze would shut that down and this is Republicans, right? Imagine a Democratic convention. And nobody, nobody could, I mean, there's no discussion could happen there. People on the stage would be yelling you down. I mean, there were so many times where you wanted somebody like Vivek, you know, in a number of times had the opening and started to say something radical, interesting, controversial, meaningful and just shut himself down and said blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, you know, just, just to fill in the time rather than actually go depth. I think the most meaningful moment in that sense was when he talked about, he talked about the possibility of school choice and what he would do with the education department budget that he shut down. And it was a real opportunity to really dig in and attack government education and to attack government schools and to present private education as an option and to present a school choice as the, as a real ideal. And yes, can do much at the federal level. But here's what I can do. And here's how it encouraged the states to embrace school choice. And this is what I would do in order to push the states to embrace school choice. And this is how we change the tax code to make education saving accounts on a, on a, on a federal level, more meaningful. And I mean, you could really have come out with three minutes or what is it? It's not even three minutes. What are the 45 seconds? A 45 second answer or a minute answer that really encompassed a big chunk of that and just gave people a sense of, I'm really against government schools and I want to give you the parent options. I want to give you the parent control over the dollars we spend on your kids' education, but you get to control them. You get to decide this solves the war curriculum problem. This solves the transgender problem. This solves all these problems because you, the parent, you get to choose the kids' school. God, just 45 minutes, seconds like that, one issue dive into one minute with depth into that. But no, his, his, his introduction of school choice was latched on to a gazillion other things he wanted to do because he doesn't want to go deep because nobody wants to go deep into any particular issue up there. And if he'd done that, I think, I think he would have, I mean, as it is, there's no question that he won that debate and he, he got what he wanted out of the debate. I mean, there's no question about that because everybody else paled in comparison and everybody, everybody after the debate was only talking about one thing and that is about Vivek. How long that is sustainable? Whether he can maintain that, I don't know, but that was the debate yesterday was basically Vivek's coming out party. He did a great job at doing it. I mean, he did an awful job actually discussing ideas and, and, and, but he did a great job at bringing attention to himself. He got everybody to argue with him. He got everybody to attack him, which is exactly what you want in a debate because that way your name keeps coming up. You get those 30 second response times constantly. You get the same more than anybody else and you get the attention and what Vivek needs right now is attention because nobody knows who the hell this guy is. And yesterday millions of Americans learned who he is, like him or dislike him. Now everybody knows there's a Vivek out there and this is who he is and that is what he is. I wouldn't be surprised if he climbs significantly in the polls, particularly the national polls. I'm not sure how, how well he's going to do in Iowa, but I do think he'll climb in the national polls because of this. So, yeah, so in terms of content, thumbs down. It was awful. There was nothing good about it. Everybody said exactly what you expect them to say. Vivek, I mean, now the good line, the other only good line, Vivek had in a thing and this is Alex Epstein's direct influence. There's no question. This comes from Alex is the line about more people dying from attempts to, you know, to deal with climate change rather with climate change itself. That was really good. And it would have been, again, he could have said more. He could have gone deeper into that. He could have been less suggestive of this conspiracy, not quite a conspiracy theory, but this idea that this is all a facade for something, he could have gone more into this issue of energy and the importance of fossil fuels and why that is instead of just sloganeering. And again, Alex could have given him a one-minute statement about energy that would have blown everybody away and it'd be amazing and dramatic. He almost did it and then backed off just like he almost did it in education and then he backed off. And, you know, but, you know, he probably knows. He probably knows more about what the voters, what the audience actually wants than what I know. So I just know what I think would be effective intellectually, would be effective in terms of an argument, would be effective in terms of stimulating people thinking about this issue in a different way. But he knows what his audience wants and his audience, Republicans, Democrats, doesn't really matter. The audience doesn't want to think. God, the last thing they want is to think. I mean, if we had an audience that actually thought, if we had an electorate that actually thought, that actually used their gray cells, then, yeah, the world would be a different place. All right, so overall, I thought, I thought Vivek won, not because he made the best points, but because he got the most attention, because everybody talked about him. I mean, the stories are that afterwards, if you went into the spin room, the green, the room where all the press was, nobody wanted to talk to anybody except Vivek. They all waited for him to enter the room. They ran up to him. What are your takeaways? How do you do tonight? What comes next to the campaign? How do you build on the momentum? That was the story last night in terms of the press. And that's exactly what Vivek wanted, because that means he's going to be, he's going to hit all the new shows tomorrow. He's going to be on all the stages. He's going to be invited to speak everywhere. He is now the guy that I think everybody is chasing in terms of second place. I think you'll overtake DeSantis in the polls. I think you'll see that soon. Again, the national polls, I don't think I'll overtake him in Iowa, but in terms of the national polls, he's the interesting guy. He's the challenging guy. He's got something different to say. And he pissed everybody off. And wow, that's an achievement. How do you piss everybody off? I mean, a Pence looked angry and offended. And it's like, oh, I've got all this experience. Yeah. And that's why this country is in a mess, because people like you have experience. In terms of content, in terms of content, I think the best person up on stage yesterday was Nikki Haley. By far, she was good on foreign policy. She was good on, I mean, as good as you can be in that context on abortion. She's the only one who had a quote reasonable view on abortion. I think she had, she was the only one. God, she was so good on this. This, this, just on this, she should get, I don't know, some prize or something. She literally said, the reason we have a debt problem in this country, you cannot only blame on the Biden administration. We Republicans did it. Many people in this stage, DeSantis, Pence, others voted for, for, for government spending under Trump. The, the, the, the deficit and everything else is something Republicans made happen. Wow. Just for that, she should be the nominee. I mean, yeah. I mean, that made my day. It was the best statement of the night by far. It was, it was a, it was a, it was a grownup statement. It was again a statement that took, that took people seriously, that took the audience seriously and, and, and, and it absolutely true, a true statement without being sloganeering, without actually, actually explaining this. So I thought, I thought Nikki did really well. Nikki is not going to be Secretary of Treasury. I mean, she's, you know, she's, she doesn't have that expertise. You got to get somebody from Goldman Sachs to be Secretary of Treasury. That's a must. You know, if Nikki is part of it, a future administration, she might be Secretary of State, but she is the one candidate up on that stage. She is the one candidate up on that stage that I would suggest the Trump, that I think Trump would take as a, as a VP candidate. I don't think anybody else there, there's no way he takes Vivek. There's no way he takes DeSantis. Nikki is the one who I think he might. She's not going to overshadow him like Vivek would. She's, she's not going to out-energy him like Vivek would. And, and, and he hasn't said awful, horrible things about her like he, like he has about, about what's his name about DeSantis. There's no way he takes Rand Paul for VP. He gains nothing with Rand Paul as VP. It would be political suicide for Trump to do that. With, with Nikki Haley, he gets somebody who's, you know, serious, responsible, has, has, has foreign policy credentials, has, was a governor, and a woman, importantly, a woman, right? So I think that's, that, that, that's likely. So of all the candidates up there, I think the only one that is viable for VP is, is Nikki Haley. I thought DeSantis didn't do himself damage. He didn't do anything awful, but he didn't do anything spectacular either. He had a solid, boring night. This is not going to allow him to challenge Trump. Again, I think at this point, I don't, there's no way DeSantis challenges Trump. The only way DeSantis becomes the, the nominee is if Trump, some Lee, some, how it drops dad, implodes, falls out of a window. You know, if something happens and Trump is not running, it gets thrown in jail and, and actually decides not to run or somebody decides maybe it's not a good idea to run as a Republican while in jail. You know, that's the only way DeSantis might rise. But DeSantis is just, I mean, he was, he was, he's got the stupid expression on his face. He's not comfortable. Haley's comfortable up there is Vivek, except for the stupid smile. I mean, he needs to stop smiling so much. God. But except for that, you know, it's, you know, Vivek is, I think Vivek is more energetic, youthful, and with more ideas and more radical. You know, so, so bottom line is, I mean, this is how bad the Republican Party is. And the Republican Party is in really bad shape. And, and, and, you know, just horrible. Trump can, Trump cannot come to any debate. He can skip every single debate and he'll still win. And this is the other very disappointing thing about yesterday. The attacks on Trump mild. Even Christie was like mild. Like, come on guys. What do you have to lose? Trump is not going to take Christie as a VP candidate. Go after him. I mean, really go after him. He is a loser. What do you have to, what do you have, what do you have to lose? I mean, DeSantis, if DeSantis is serious about the nomination, I mean, serious about the nomination, who cares if he's going to be booed. You're not talking to that audience, and you're not even talking about winning. You're talking about chipping away a Trump's lead. So either DeSantis needs to bribe Christie to do it, or DeSantis needs to do it. And yes, he risks short-term booing. He's not winning anyway. Look, he's not, DeSantis cannot beat Trump right now. He cannot. The only way he can beat Trump is by chipping away at Trump supporters. And the only way to chip away at Trump supporters is remind them over and over and over and over and over again, that he's a loser. I don't see what else you can do. That he can't win now. Everybody was hinting, you know, DeSantis kept hinting, I won Florida, this big margin, other people haven't won. No, say it, he is a loser. He lost four different campaigns. I don't know who the strategy saw, but at some point you have to say, I'm going to swing for the fences, because unless I hit a grand slam home run right now, the game is over. I mean, I'm sitting there, bases loaded. You know, we're down three runs. The only way I can win is with a grand slam. And what am I going to bunt for those who know baseball? I'm going to bunt. And the probability of bunting is, I'm going to lose. It's not an issue of the testing. It's an issue of telling the truth, telling the truth about Trump. And again, what do you have to lose? You've got something to gain and you've got nothing to lose because you ain't winning this. So DeSantis, in spite of Scott's prediction, was not spectacular. He was okay. Again, didn't do himself harm, wasn't the scent of the tension. He wishes he was attacked like Vivek because then everybody would be talking about DeSantis. Nobody today is talking about DeSantis. Everybody today is talking about Vivek. You look at the headlines. It's all about Vivek. DeSantis, it was an okay night. Okay night. But it wasn't the kind of night he needs in order to break through. And again, I'll say what I've been saying for six months now. DeSantis will not be the Republican nominee, at least as long as Trump is running.