 So today, President Trump granted clemency to a bunch of people and pardoned a bunch of people. And as part of that, he granted clemency to real crooks, like the former governor of Illinois, Black Ganovich, something like that, right, a Republican governor who was clearly committed fraud, was caught red handed and should have spent the rest of his term in jail. He got his sentence revoked and basically he got clemency. He didn't, doesn't deserve it. I'm sure a lot of the other people that Trump gave clemency and so on didn't deserve it. So that's sad. And I generally think that presidents have generally abused, abused their pardoning and clemency giving abilities. So they have that, it's in the Constitution, but I think they've abused it. And this is not what the founding fathers intended and were real criminals. Like I remember Clinton, I think, pardoned this guy who gave a lot of money to the Democratic Party, but was also a fraud, a criminal, and was living in Switzerland and he pardoned him. So, you know, this stuff, this political favors, granting political favors through pardoning and clemency is, is, has a long tradition and yet still I'm going to criticize it when it happens. However, in spite of all the bad people that Trump probably, well, I know about Blankanovic and I'm sure others, there was one positive and the positive was that he, he granted, he basically pardoned Mike Milken. This is 25 years after, well, 20, I think 28 or 29 years after Mike Milken was sentenced to 10 years in jail, probably 25 or 26 years since he was released from jail because he had prostate cancer and was released so he could get treatment from it. He has been pardoned and this is a great act of justice. Mike Milken was not, in my view, guilty for the crimes for which he was prosecuted. I think, or for the crimes for which he admitted guilt, I think he admitted guilt because of the pressure, the blackmail of the prosecutors in the case, so basically threatened his family, threatened his father, threatened his brother, threatened to drag everybody in and put them all behind bars and Milken settled and, and pled guilty, I can't remember, I think for six counts. All those counts were minor, even if he was guilty of them. Not a single one of those involved, time spent in jail. If it had been anybody else other than Michael Milken, he would have been, got a slap on the wrist, a warning and a big fine. They were all like little things about helping people maybe cheat on their taxes or stuff like that, but nothing substantive, nothing significant, no, nothing like what people accuse of are like inside a trading. Not that I think inside a trading should be a crime, but nothing even of that magnitude. These things were certainly not even crimes when it comes to stock parking, you know, we can get into what that is if you really want, but it's, again, technical violation of security laws. Nothing justified him going to jail. Mike Milken, in my view, I've said this many, many times, and if you've listened to my financial, my course on the financial markets and the value of financial markets, I elaborate, Dave, Mike Milken, in my view, is one of the great business heroes of America. He is one of the giants of American business. He is one of the great innovators in finance and innovators in business of the last hundred years. He is the greatest banker, second only to J.P. Morgan in the history of the United States, maybe in the history of the world. He basically single-handedly made it possible to restructure American business. During the 1980s and early 1990s, he created a great financing tool that allowed for leverage buyouts and hostile takeovers and private equity and all the things that people like Techa Carlson, the left and the right today, hate businessmen actually going in firing people and deploying resources for better use. That was, in a sense, invented, made possible, financed and deployed by Mike Milken. He was the guy who basically held the hand of every hostile takeover artist of the 1980s, the heroes of the era, the people who saved American economy and set it on a course of significant economic growth in the 90s and 2000s. He was the man missing in Japan. If Japan had a Mike Milken, they wouldn't have stagnated for the last 30 years. He's the man who could restructure the European economy today and put them on a path to growth and he is heavily needed in America today. A stagnant America, a stagnant corporate environment, a stagnant use of capital where hostile takeovers are rare and where everybody is against them, including the President of the United States, where states are passed laws against them, where pro-encumbered management laws dominate across state laws all over the country, where shareholders' rights are not protected, and where finance has been handcuffed and shackled so that it cannot innovate, it cannot produce the kind of allocation of capital that would drive vast economic growth and would drive a successful economy. So Mike Milken was the right person at the right time. He saved the U.S. economy from a horrific economy in the 1970s, created the amazing economy the United States had in the 1990s and into the 2000s. Again, given how statist we are, it was stunning that we had such a good economy during those years and that is all, not a consequence of Ronald Reagan, it's not a consequence of Alan Greenspan, it's not a consequence of Bill Clinton. It is a consequence of the greatest businessman, one of the very top list of businessmen of the last 30 years and the greatest bank of the last 100 years, Michael Milken. And because of his success, and this goes to Jennifer's question earlier about hatred of the rich, because of his success, he was hated, he was despised, he was the villain, the left despised him, unions hated him. He was the target of the Justice Department. My hatred, I mean deep-seated hatred of Udi Giuliani goes back to the fact that Udi Giuliani accepted the job of District Attorney for the Southern District of New York, the job by the way that the District Attorney has in billions, at least in season one, that job that is responsible for disciplining, if you will, Wall Street, that is the job Udi Giuliani took. And he took that job, he left a very senior job at the Justice Department in Washington, D.C., to take this job in the Southern District with the sole intent of going after Michael Milken. And Giuliani then harassed everybody on Wall Street, trying to squeeze them to get dirt on Michael Milken, to get dirt on Michael Milken's firm, Drexel Burnham Lampert. They did whatever they could to try to catch him at something. He sent lots of innocent people to jail, many of his convictions were overturned, unappealed, but in the meantime completely destroyed the lives of financiers, of business people, real heroes of the era. He was the first to use RICO. RICO is a statue was passed to catch gangsters and it says that you can seize their property before the trial. So talk about due process, no due process. You can take their property before they've been found guilty of a crime. Now that's bad enough when you use it on mafia criminals. Imagine now using it on financiers, so you arrest them and you seize their assets. So they can't do business anymore because their asset is their reputation and their asset is their money. They're firm. I mean, the number of lives that really Giuliani betrayed is just, it's just unbelievable. Why am I hating on Trump? I haven't mentioned Trump. What's this got to do with Trump? Jesus. Giuliani is a horrible, disgusting figure. And I talked about this when he ran for president a few years. This is not new. I've always slammed Rulli Giuliani. I have been slamming Rudy Giuliani for what, 30 years now? Since the late 1980s. I've hated the guy. He is one of the most despicable characters in American politics. And his treatment of Wall Street and Mike Milken is a disgrace. So Giuliani went after Milken. Ultimately, it was his successors who prosecuted Milken, but with Giuliani like tactics and, you know, you can't talk about anything even close to Trump in the vicinity of Trump. You can't criticize anything that emanates from Trump without getting the lobotomized Trumpists all upset and jumping up and down and, oh, you're on a suffering from some Trump syndrome. Oh my God, look at yourselves in the mirror. Look at yourselves in the mirror. It's disgusting. Anyway, Giuliani is a horrible guy. Milken is a hero. I am happy, happy, happy, happy to see Milken get a pardon, even though it came as a package deal with a bunch of people who shouldn't have been granted clemency and granted pardons. I'm just happy for Milken. He is one of my heroes, and he should be one of yours. He should be one of yours. So, you know, Mike Milken is, it's great to see a pardon. And if you want more information about Milken, listen to my course on financial markets and institutions. And read the book on Mike Milken called, ah, does anybody remember the book I recommend about Mike Milken? This is where my memory lapses are problematic, right? Milken book. Yeah, I'm not sure. Not the usual ones. Don't read Predator's Ball. Don't read Fall for Grace. Where is it? Payback, read payback. Payback is a brilliant book, truly brilliant book. And he talks about Milken's, Milken's firm. It talks about Drexel, Burnham Lampert and the injustice of, of basically the government shutting them down and, and just it shows how corrupt the American government was back in the Reagan era. This is under Reagan and Bush. Under Reagan and Bush, the government was corrupt enough to go after Milken and to try to destroy Michael Milken. So, I mean, today it's so much worse, so much worse. It's really horrible. Anyway, good for Mike Milken for being pardoned. Another good thing that Trump has done, I think, accidentally, ultimately, but done. What we need today, what I call the new intellectual would be any man or woman who is willing to think. Meaning any man or woman who knows that man's life must be guided by reason, by the intellect, not by feelings, wishes, whims or mystic revelations. Any man or woman who values his life and who does not want to give in to today's cult of the stare, cynicism and impotence and does not intend to give up the world to the dark ages and to the role of the collectivist brought. Using the super chat and I noticed yesterday when I appealed for support for the show, many of you step forward and actually supported the show for the first time. So I'll do it again. Maybe we'll get some more today. If you like what you're hearing, if you appreciate what I'm doing, then I appreciate your support. 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