 The radical, fundamental principles of freedom, rational self-interest, and individual rights. This is The Iran Book Show. All right, everybody. Welcome to Iran Book Show on this, I don't know what it is, Tuesday, February 8th. Beautiful day in Puerto Rico after nonstop rain for like three, four days. The whole place was flooded. We finally had some sunshine today. It was gorgeous, beautiful. Hope weather and everything else wherever you are is good and everything is going well. We continue to get lots and lots of views, not quite as much as last week, but viewership is up, watch time is up, subscribers adding anywhere between 100 and 200 subscribers a day. All of that is going great. So thank you for all of you who might be sharing or whatever, liking and stuff like that on these videos. We're putting up these one minute videos and they really have taken off. There's a bunch more coming, so there are going to be a lot of these one minute videos going out. And my hope is that as they come out, viewership will increase even more and we'll get a lot more subscribers. I'm also really curious on these shows. If anybody who subscribed as a result of a one minute video is ever on the chat, please just identify yourself. It will be cool to see people move from the one minute videos to the longer videos. That'll be great. That'll be great to see. So yeah, looking forward to having all the new subscribers and all the new people who are joining the channel, looking forward to having more interaction with you guys. And maybe for some of you actually appearing live here and joining our chat, our super chat and everything. As you know, the super chat is how you can interact with me directly, ask questions, make comments and support the show, importantly, contribute and support the show. Jeff E. Miller, who owns and is the chef at one of my new favorite restaurants in New York, he says, I think you've said you like Fargoire. Do you also like monkfish liver? I love monkfish liver. Monkfish liver is a real delicacy and really fantastic. So yes, I love monkfish liver. Yeah, I've had it in a number of sushi places over the years. Yeah. And I love Fargoire. I love liver, which Americans look at you like you're weird when you like liver or hearts or, you know, awful, you know, those kind of things. But it's very healthy. It's very good for you. And it really tastes good. All right, Steven Pettit, thank you for the support. Really appreciate it. Really appreciate it. All right, so we're going to talk about the convoy. We're going to talk about the Canadian truckers and the convoy. We will get to that in a little bit. We're also going to talk about Macron's meeting with Putin. I've got some images of the Macron meeting with Putin, which I think are quite interesting and entertaining. I thought I'd start to show off today with a quick quote from David Brooks. David Brooks from The New York Times. The one of the, I think, two token or maybe three token conservatives at The New York Times. And it just, this quote is so good. It's like, I can't just let it go. So we're going to talk a little bit about this quote. Not spent too much time on it. I'm sure we'll come back. It is a topic, as you'll see, dear to my heart. So we'll keep coming back to it. But I didn't want to let it just sit here. So I thought I'd jump in. Scott says he's not a conservative fine. David Brooks is not a conservative. He's just a middle of the road Republican. He is. You can define him however the hell you want. I don't really care. So David Brooks writes, it doesn't change anything about my criticism or conservatism, whether you want to include David Brooks or not. But this is just such a perfect quote. So synced and captures the world in which we live, the America in which we live, the state of our intellectuals in the world today. And I know David Brooks, he doesn't represent us. But he does, because this is so good. It's so, so good. So here it is. So this is David Brooks. He wrote this on Twitter on February 5th. It's short, two sentences. He writes, we're entering a post-individualist age. America needs a liberal, and here put classical, because it doesn't mean liberal in the leftist sense. It means liberal in the classical liberal. So America needs a classical liberal collectivism to compete with nativist collectivism of the right and multiculturalist collectivism of the left. I just think that's brilliant. That's perfect reflection of the world in which we live today. Basically, everybody's a collectivist. You've got collectivists of the left. You've got collectivists of the right. And now David Brooks wants collectivists of the center, or the classical liberal collectivists, or whatever the hell you want to call them. Centrist collectivists. But it's perfect because it basically clarifies that today everybody, everybody on the political spectrum, everybody we interact with, everybody that's talking, everybody that references anything is talking from a collectivist perspective. There is no, there is no individualist perspective represented today in American politics. There's no individualist perspective today represented among American intellectuals. We are in a post-individualist era. And this is why I've done debates with the collectivist rights. I do debates with the collectivist left. And I have no home anyway along that spectrum because basically the spectrum, all they do is naval gazing between collectivists and arguments about the extent of the collectivism and the collectivism, what type of collectivism and what, you know. But nobody, nobody, nobody, nobody out there is challenging the actual premise of collectivism. Nobody out there is standing up for individualism. There's just no voice for individualism. There's plenty of voices criticizing the left. And there's plenty of voices criticizing the collectivist right. But where's the voice standing for individualism? Where's the voice criticizing all forms of collectivism? All forms of collectivism. Because they're all evil. Maybe the gradients of evil or maybe some are more evil than others, but they're all evil. The very notion of collectivism is evil. Anytime you place a group above an individual, anytime you're willing to sacrifice the individual for the group, that is evil. That's evil in the context of politics everywhere. So we stand alone as a small minority standing for the voice of the individual against the collectivists of the various tribes that exist out there against the collectivists of left and right. And now, according to David Brooks, the collectivists of center, liberal collectivists. I love it. I, if Aldrin says left and right will cringe at you, not for the first time, believe me, and not for the last time on this show. I suspect that when we get to the discussion of the Canadian truckers, I will have both left and right cringing at me because my perspective on the Canadian truckers is different than the left and the right's perspective on those. What a shocker, right? I wonder how, you know, what my subscriber count is gonna do after the show today. We are, by the way, at 30,500. 500 additional subscribers since we crossed that 30,000 mark. When was it? Just a couple of days ago, I think, or Saturday, I think it was Saturday. So we're doing great. Thanks, everybody, for helping get those subscriber numbers up and hopefully the numbers will keep going up. All right, let's see. Yeah, I wanted to talk about Macron and Putin. So just again, this is not gonna be a big topic. This is gonna be quick. But you know, Russia is amassing troops in the Ukrainian border. Everybody is panicking because this could lead to war in Europe. The statists on every side, you know, are pretending to be tough and are pretending to be strong. And, you know, so abidance sends 3,500 troops to Europe as a show of strength as if 3,500 troops could do much. And, you know, everybody's making noises and everybody's trying to figure Putin out and everybody's, you know, shaking their muskets and, you know, showing their muscles. And, you know, pretending that they understand the conflict, that they have anything to add or that they are going to make any difference. And of course, you know, Putin is just sitting back and watching the West just grovel and give him attention and play with him. And he will get whatever concessions he will get, he'll get a bunch of concessions. And that's what he wants. I don't think he wants to go to war. I don't think he wants to occupy Ukraine, maybe Eastern Ukraine, but not all the Ukraine. It's too costly. He's too, you know, the Russian economy is too weak to sustain a war. He knows it. But he's playing a great game and he's bluffing brilliantly. And he will keep playing this game and he will keep getting the full attention and the full respect, which he does not deserve, of Western leaders. And of course, Macron represents the French, the French that are always looking to be relevant and always looking for attention and always want to everybody to look at them and think that they are contributing and add any kind of value and that they are still important on the world stage and that anybody gives a damn about what the hell they care about with regard to Ukraine, because nobody really does. But the French want to be relevant so they're going to be the peacemakers. And so Macron flies to Russia to meet with Putin, Putin accepts a meeting with him and they have a five hour meeting. And all you need to know about the meeting between Macron and Putin is one photograph. I don't know if you guys are ready for this photo. This is the photograph of Macron. I mean, this is not, this is real photograph of Macron and Putin meeting. I mean, what do you do with that? They could play tennis. I don't know what, that is an amazing table. That is the kind of table that you seat a guest at if you basically want to tell him he's irrelevant, you're not listening to him and you don't give a damn about what he's going to say. I mean, look how far away he is. This is like the most non-intimate meeting you can imagine. I mean, why not just do it over Zoom? I've just been laughing all day from when I saw this photo. It's just so perfect. Putin is basically saying to Macron, you're irrelevant, you're small, you're at the end of the table. Nobody cares what you have to say. You can't yell at me because I can't hear you anyway. And this is the kind of thing that, this is like a scene, this picture is like from a comedy. Like, I don't know, The Great Potato or something, a comedy where the authoritarian wants to make fun of the other opposing party and puts them at a table like this. This is what happens. So, Macron went there with a lot of bluster and a lot of thing. He came there, Putin basically ignored him, told him to go shove it. They did a press conference together in which Putin basically reasserted everything, he's always said, said stuff in front of the press and in front of Macron. Then Macron in Europe has rejected in the past like said that Crimea is part of Russia. And Macron just stood there and said nothing and pretended he didn't hear and just folded. And Putin is just, he is a strong man who knows what he wants and knows what he aims at. And he is basically making fun of a weak, pathetic West that has no clue, that has no standing, that is not willing to fight for anything, that is not willing to fight for its cause or anything like that. Yeah, Jennifer says this looks like a Mel Brooks movie. It does, it's exactly like a Mel Brooks movie. Now, if you really wanna see a real table, now what happens when two authoritarian leaders meet and they're trying to outdo each other in terms of the size of the table, right? So this is Putin putting Macron down. But what happens when Putin goes and visits China and has a meeting with Xi? Now, it's not exactly the same comparison because Xi and Putin are with their advisors. But look at this table. I mean, God, this isn't a table from communication. This is a table for alienation. The same phenomena, what's going on? I mean, who are they talking to? That I know they're talking to a little microphone they have on the lapel probably. And somebody is translating into the ear of the people across the desk. But again, why not just zoom? If you're gonna be like not arms length away, but a massive table away. I mean, this is the Chinese putting you in your place again. You wanna play big table politics with us? We can do big table politics. This isn't formality. This is nonsense, right? So this is a, this is what diplomacy is. This is disgusting, ridiculous, and pathetic. All right, I'll take this question. Scott Amm asks, the act of unemployment recently suggested the US be split evenly between party lines. Say it was hypothetically, which country would you prefer to live in? In a country with liberals or the conservatives? Well, let's be real here. Would you rather live in California, Mississippi? Would you rather live in New York or Alabama? All right, why take the worst, well, I'm taking the worst representative of both sides, right? I would rather stay and be in New York and California than Alabama or Mississippi. Texas maybe, maybe I'd rather be in Texas than California but in Texas with no constraints of the Supreme Court. I don't know. So where would I rather be in a country with liberals or a country with conservatives? I would leave America. I would leave America. I didn't come to America, I'm an immigrant. I didn't come to America to live with a bunch of rednecks, conservatives, with a bunch of red states. I have no interest in living in that America that is completely decoupled from the Constitution, right? We're talking about a conservative America where there's no Constitution anymore. And I don't wanna live in a, I left a socialist country, so I don't wanna live in kind of a semi-socialist or a country drifting towards socialism again with no constraints of the Constitution. I moved to America because of the Constitution, because of the Declaration of Independence, because of the spirit that is America. And my view is neither conservatives nor liberals, liberals is a bad word, I hate liberals, progressives, neither conservatives nor progressives today represent the spirit of America. Neither one of them represent the spirit of the Constitution or the spirit of the Declaration. And in that sense, I don't know that I wanna live in America in that case, right? And there are lots of places around the world to live and there are lots of places around the world where you can have conservatives or you can have liberals, but you just don't have America. And if you split America along those lines, what you have is you don't have America anymore. And fine, you guys, Scott, I know you'll have your chances with the deployables. All of you can have your chances with the deployables. I mean, I was once up for a position at the University of Mississippi. I would have rather been unemployed somewhere than go to Mississippi. I just don't want, not an insult to people in Mississippi, but as I've traveled through the South, I've been to the deep South and I wouldn't wanna live there. It's not a place I wanna live. I mean, I could live in a research triangle in North Carolina, I could live in Austin, Texas. But the reason I like the research triangle in North Carolina and the reason I like Austin, Texas is because it's a mixture of the two. Would I wanna live in just in the Hill Country, in a little town outside of Texas in the Hill Country in Texas? No, I would not, I would hate it. I mean, so you may like it or not like it, but the reason Austin is a thriving, prosperous, successful, high-tech, innovative, exciting, thrilling, foodie town is because it has both. And if you split, if you took Austin out of Texas and if you took all the leftists, if all the liberals left Texas and moved to the North and all the conservatives just clamored out, it wouldn't be a great place to live. So while I love Texas and love Austin, I love it because it's that mixture and that mixture results in a lot of the culture that unfortunately is something that the left has and that the right mostly does not. It has the high-tech industry that is dominated by the left and not the right. So it has industry innovation, science, which is primarily something of the left and not the right. And there's a lot of, and it has the culture, the theater, the concert hall, which are predominantly things of the left and not the right. And New York, I mean again, New York has always been on the left politically and yet it's vibrant and exciting and I wish I'd lived here 20 years ago. I wouldn't live there now, but I wish I'd lived there 20, 30 years ago, or at least spent a few years there. So do I wanna be in a place that is embracing of immigrants and open to immigrants and friendly towards immigrants and where they are immigrants and yes, would Red America be that place now? So I would leave, I would leave America. Ryan says, Americanism can be practiced anytime, anywhere. America is an idea and knows no borders. Thanks, Iran, keep fighting and growing your following. Absolutely right, I agree completely and I know that's not Tucker Carlson's view of America and it's not a lot of your views of America, but that's, yeah, red state, blue city is better than the other way around. Maybe, maybe Orange County, living in Orange County, which was kind of a red county in a blue state was pretty good, was pretty good. Now, unfortunately the state is the one that imposes the taxes, so you have to leave because the taxes get way too high. But yeah, because this state has taxing authority, it's better to live in a blue city in a red state. That's why I like Austin, Texas. And by the way, a lot of cities have become blue even in red states and again, but if you split the country up and you kinda migrated all the leftists to one place and all the conservatives to another place, so I don't even know if you wanna call them conservatives or whatever, would that really be good? Would that be an improvement? I don't think so. I don't think so. And again, by definition, that would be a state of nature that has abandoned the Constitution, that has abandoned the Declaration, that has abandoned America. And I would look somewhere else to try to bring about a new America. America is the Declaration of Independence. That's what America is. And that Declaration of Independence can be applied to any geographic area. I don't wanna live in New Orleans. I mean, tell you my New Orleans hitchhiking story sometime. For the right amount of money, I would tell you my New Orleans hitchhiking story at some point. All right, let's see. Let's see. Geoffrey says, if you magically replace someone like Tucker Carlson, I'm certain we would see a massive shift in the culture. So many people have never come face to face with the ideas you represent. I am so, I mean, really, I'm honored and pleased that you think that, but I'm not convinced. I'm not convinced. And look at that own audience here, people who lean in the direction of my ideas, and yet so many people here reject so much of what I have to say, and I don't know that I've moved many of them away from the right ideas. We would grow significantly. You know, and look, I had a radio gig on, what's his name on the blaze for a while, early on during the Trump presidency. And I could not make progress with that audience. I couldn't get anyway, because I was an anti-Trump. Basically, the audience would not grow, could not grow. It seemed to keep hitting ceilings, and I couldn't bring anybody towards me now. And this is why I'm not even sure, the Tucker Carlson's the right place for me, right? That was Glenn Beck's station, because I'm not sure if I could have more success, you know, on one side versus the other. I don't know where most of the people who are attracted to the Iran book show come from. Do they come from Tucker Carlson world? Do they come from the left? Do they come from the center? Do they come from kind of the rationalist community? I don't know. I mean, you guys know better than I do. Yeah, Glenn Beck ultimately betrayed his values by jumping on the Trump bandwagon, because he had to, because financially he was gonna get crushed if he didn't. I wouldn't say he came around. I say he betrayed everything he believes in by embracing Trump, ultimately. But yeah, I mean, that's my point. I'm fan fans and I can't even get through to you, so I wonder if I can get through to Tucker Carlson fans. Or rather, I'd be booed off the network very, very quickly. Bessford Hanks says he came from his mother womb. Yeah, I know you did. The question is, what was the intermediary step between your mother's womb and the Iran book show? I have a feeling there was one. Jeff says, I am anti-mandate, not pro-blocade. I don't understand using tactics used to spies as one, at one time then for your own cause, suddenly become acceptable. The convoy should have stayed in one lane and rolled on by. Jeff, I'll get to your question. Not a question, your comment in a minute. I have to comment on this. Frank says, Iran, I only disagree with your views on Christianity, legalizing hard drugs and abortion other than those I'm on your side. Those are pretty big. Those are pretty big because they each represent something pretty big, right? Christianity, big. Philosophical issue. Legalizing hard drugs, slippery slope. Once you're willing to dictate to people what drugs they can have and what they can have, why stop at hard drugs? And of course, abortion, there goes individual rights out the window. But, and of course, what about immigration and Trump and, yeah. All right, so let's talk about the convoy, the Canadian truckers and the right to protest. Because I think it's, I've been avoiding this because everybody wants me to say I have a particular view on this and I don't. Everybody wants me to be raw, raw, gung-ho with the truckers and the honking and I am not. So I've been avoiding this because I know the number of subscribers is gonna start dropping as soon as, as soon as Action Jackson makes a short video of my segment on the Canadian truckers. I come, so let's start with this. I completely agree with the truckers about what it is that they're protesting. I completely agree with them that mandates are authoritarian, that they should be abolished immediately. Mask mandates, vaccine mandates, mandates for jobs that are private sector jobs that government has no business, shouldn't be intervening, they should go, they should leave us all alone. I mean, this is true day one of COVID. You know, the lockdowns were immoral and wrong, politically wrong, morally wrong. And yes, you could argue that because government, it's screwed up so badly and because government's so involved in economy to allow the hospitals to survive, you needed to do a lockdown in New York for a couple of weeks. Maybe you could make that argument, but that would be it. Not the months and months and months and not all over the country and not whole states and whole towns and whole cities forever. That was always wrong. It was always ridiculous and it was always pathetic that we didn't stand up and protest and I will define what I mean by protest and how I think you should protest these things in a minute. So I'm against all these mandates. I agree with the truckers about leaving them alone. I agree with them that it's their individual decision about whether to take the vaccine or not. I also think that employers who decide they don't want to employ people who are not vaccinated or within their rights as well. I believe businesses should be allowed to discriminate, but it is not the government's business. The government has no right to discriminate. The government has no right to interfere. The government is supposed to protect our rights. The government is supposed to be there as a right-protecting agency. It is not protecting rights by mandating vaccines. It's not protecting rights by mandating masks. Indeed, it is violating rights. So I can have rules on who can enter my home and who cannot. I can have rooms and rules and who can be at my hotel and who cannot. The government cannot have those kind of rules. Bain1776 says he disagrees with me on trade, immigration, unrestricted abortion, some of my font policy and my snobbish attitude towards the rural areas and worship of big corporations no matter what. So he doesn't disagree with much just basically on the principles on which this country was founded. He disagrees about freedom. He disagrees about individual rights. He's a status, he's not an individualist, but other than that, he's completely in agreement with me. Of course, to be anti-immigration, anti-trade, anti-restricted, unrestricted abortion and to not have a positive view of big corporation, whoa. That means he's anti-reason ultimately as well, because... Yeah. All right. It's pretty funny. I find the chat always entertaining. Anyway, so I agree with the trucker's complaints. I fundamentally disagree with their methodology. You don't fight for individual rights by violating individual rights. And what the truckers are doing are violating rights. They're blocking streets, streets that have every right to drive through. They're hunking their horns all night, clearly a violation of my right to have quiet in my home. We have noise ordinances. We have noise ordinances justifiable, morally, legally. Audiences against noise. They're disrupting people's lives all over Ottawa, certainly, and all over Canada. In the name of protecting rights, they're trying to violate rights. And that is wrong. I don't think you have a right to protest. Not if the protest involves violating other people's rights. You can rent an auditorium. You can rent a hall. You can rent a whole piece of land. Put up signs and demonstrate all you want on the land that you own or the land that you rented. But not on the roads, not in the places where other people are trying to live. This is true of BLM. This is true of anybody marching in the street and demonstrating. This is true that if you allow BLM to do it, then you've got to allow the truckers to do it. But I was against BLM and I'm against the truckers. There's only two ways to fight back. And that is by making the argument... I mean, sorry, three ways to fight back. Three ways to fight back. One is by making the argument that you are right and they are wrong and trying to convince your fellow Canadians in the next election to get rid of these guys and put in somebody better. By the way, there was an election just recently. It wasn't a long time ago when all these mandates were in place. And whether we like it or not, Justin Trudeau won. I hate him. I despise everything he stands for. But he won. This is the system of government we have. You take it to the courts if you think you have a constitutional argument against it. You use the court system. So one is you argue against it. You use the courts. You rally the voters. You vote against it. That's option one. Option two, civil disobedience. I'm all for civil disobedience. But not civil disobedience that places other people in harm's way. Not civil disobedience that violates the rights of others. So for example, during lockdowns, if we had balls, if we were serious about protecting our freedoms and living up to our freedom, we would all have gone outside. We've all gotten driven in our cars and gone for a drive. We would all gone for a walk and told the police, come and arrest us. Come and arrest us. But you see there, you're not violating anybody else's rights. You're disobeying the government, which is appropriate. Yes, honking in the middle of the night in large numbers and creating that kind of noise violates people's rights. Blocking streets violates people's rights. Absolutely. Just as marching in large groups, down avenues and down streets and blocking traffic as BLM did violates people's rights. And that is wrong, protesting in ways that restrict other people's movements that put other people on massive traffic jams and inconvenience them dramatically is violating their rights. And you have no right to do it. You can't drive around them if your house is on the street where they are protesting. Protesting is wrong. So, you know, they're right on their demands, for the most part, the demands that I've heard. But it's a wrong methodology. And a methodology that plays into the hands of their enemies. Now, I think the Trudeau and the rest of the people in Ottawa are responding to this as poorly as one would expect them to. You know, defining everybody as a neo-Nazi and going after them as if they're, you know, they're all fascists is, you know, part of, is a horrible, you know, disgusting response. But it's part of what would, what happens when you violate the law, when you violate other people's rights in order to make your point. Now, the third option, so I have two options. One is civil disobedience that doesn't violate other people's rights. Second, as I said, it's educated, educated, educated. Make the argument, change people's minds. And the third option, and there is a third option, is revolution. When things get so bad that it's intolerable, and your rights will be violated left and right, there is a time for revolution. And I'm not saying now is not the time. I'm saying if it's a revolution, do it. And then the real question is, what are you offering to replace it with? Oh, the haters on the chat. Nice to see you all have arrived. So I am fine with declaring a revolution and, you know, going to Washington and overthrowing the American government. But then you have to have a plan and you have to have a declaration of independence and you have to have an alternative. And you have to make it a revolution, not a protest. So the three ways in which you get heard is, one, argue against it. Two, civil disobedience. And three, revolution. None of those criteria apply to the truckers. As good as they cause might be. They are not going about it the right way. And whether they win or they lose doesn't really matter because freedom loses. Freedom loses. And again, I know in America today, the right to protest is considered, oh my God, the most important thing in the world. But no, it's not. You have a right to speak. You have a right to speak on your property, not on mine. And roads should be treated as if they're private property. Sidewalks should be treated as if they're private property. Just like I despise and hate the fact that lockdowns destroyed small businesses because we couldn't, weren't allowed to leave. Imagine if during the lockdown, all the small businesses got together like the truckers and said, we're just going to open. Let them come and shut us down and arrest us. That I would have supported 100% because nobody's rights are being violated. That's real civil disobedience. You want to protest high taxes? One way to do it is not to pay them. That's civil disobedience. I don't recommend it. You'll end up going to jail and nothing much will be achieved. What's his name? Peter Schiff's father died in jail. Spent a big chunk of his later life in jail for not paying taxes. I don't think that's recommended. I don't think you achieved anything by doing it. But again, nobody's rights are violated when that happens. That's the kind of protest I think is legitimate. That's the kind of protest I think people should engage in. I don't think because I don't like what the government is doing even though I'm right. I have a right to infringe on your ability to do business. The truckers are blocking off streets. What about the small businesses who are losing business because of this demonstration? What about the small businesses that are going to have to shut down or make less money because of this demonstration? Anybody care about them? No, of course not. Because we love demonstrations when it's on our side. We have no problem shutting down businesses if it's our side. We have no problem disrupting human life if it's for our cause. Because we complain when it's the other people doing it for their cause. So if you approve of the trucker demonstration, then you have to approve of the BLM demonstrations and everybody else's demonstrations. Now, again, I'm for, I'm against mandates. All of them. And of all the mandates, you know, I'm against all regulation. I'm against all mandates, not just COVID mandates. I'm against actual all mandates. All taxes. This is just one more infringement by the government on our rights. And if you understand that, you put it in perspective. There is a battle here. And the battle is bigger than any one issue. The battle is about liberty. The battle is about freedom. The battle is about individual rights. The battle is, is my life mine or is it yours? Is it yours to do with what you will? Is it the majorities? Can they rule my life? That's the fundamental battle. It's between collectivism and individualism. And I don't see an individualist voice here. And I don't see the point of just fighting over one mandate. I want to fight over all mandates. And by the way, the mandates were almost as bad among Republicans as they were among Democrats. Trump was a big supporter of lockdowns, particularly early on. Lockdowns in New York. He criticized the mayor for locking down so late. He should have done it earlier. I mean, I know people like to portray this as a left versus right issue, but it's not. It never has been. It's a collectivist versus individualist issue. And if the right was individualistic in this country, then there'd be no issue. It would be easy. But we don't have a choice between individualism and collectivism. We have a choice between collectivism in the left and collectivism in the right. And then that choice is not always obvious. No, he wasn't. Well, I can show you video of him actually saying it, of actually criticizing de Blasio for locking down New York too late. And it's real video, not made up. I know you guys like to pretend that Trump did what he did, that he's some kind of, I don't know, saint and pro-capitalist, amazing, whatever. But no. I mean, Trump criticized Georgia for opening up too early. This whole speech criticizing Georgia for doing away with mandates. But that's okay. You guys only remember what you want to remember about Trump. Only pay attention to what you want to pay attention about Trump. Better than Biden. Fantastic. Let's celebrate in the street. Somebody is better than Biden. Collectivism in the right, collectivism in the left, a pox on both their houses. Collectivism is not America. All right, so, you know, I'm not a fan of the truckers. Although again, I agree with their grievances to the extent that their grievances are anti-mandates. I am anti-mandates. They should find a way to express their grievances that does not involve the disruption of the lives of innocent people. I didn't vote for Biden just for the record, you know, for what it's worth. As a Puerto Rican citizen, I do not vote on presidential elections. So I did not vote this election for either Biden or Trump. And I've talked about Biden-Trump a million times. I'm not going to do it again. So unless somebody puts significant money behind it, and then I'd be happy to tell you what my views are on Biden versus Trump. All right, let's see. We've got a bunch of questions. We've got a $50 one somewhere here. Here it is. $50 from Corey. Do you not violate rights in that revolution for those who do not want to fight? I understand this is a difficult topic, but what is the difference between protest that you are against and a revolution would both not violate rights? So, you know, I'm not... Okay, so let's be clear about a revolution. I'm not for any revolution. Because not every revolution is justified. Indeed, if the truckers declared a revolution tomorrow, I don't think it would be justified. Because I don't think they have a proposal that is dramatically more pro-freedom. So I'm not for any revolution. I'm for a particular type of revolution. And that particular type of revolution is a revolution for rights, a revolution that would instantiate rights, that would bring rights to even the people who disagreed with me about the revolution. So I'd be fighting for something positive. And of course, before the revolution, just like with the American Revolution, before the revolution, you know, you give the other side every opportunity possible to respect those rights before you actually launch a violent revolution. You launch a violent revolution when it is the only option to bring about the protection of rights, to the extent that people's rights are violated during that revolution. And they will be. The cause of that rights violation was the fact that the other side, that the people you are fighting against are not willing to respect rights. They're the ones who in a sense have forced you into the situation of a revolution. It is now war. And even in war, particularly in a revolution, it is not the case that you violate rights willy-nilly. It's not the case that because you're at war, particularly if it's a civil war, it's an inside, it's a revolution, you kill your own people, you don't do that. But people are going to die, poverty will get damaged. This is why a revolution is such a serious matter. But it is only justified in the name of rights and in the name of a complete replacement of a regime. The question is, is it okay to violate people's... So it's okay, in a sense, to embrace a state of war in which, in a sense, right are irrelevant because there is no authority, there is no government to protect those rights. It's only appropriate to engage and put yourself in a state of war when what you're fighting for is for freedom. Freedom, not just one injustice, but freedom overall. When you're fighting to establish something that is dramatically and significantly better than what exists, objectively better than what exists. And, you know, things are bad enough in America today that, you know, if there was enough of us and if people were serious enough, I'm not saying a revolution would not be justified because the extent to which government violates our rights today is so large, it's almost as significant as the extent to which the rights were violated under the British. But it would be only justified if that were the cause and the alternative we were fighting for was truly a right-respecting government. Not lower taxes. Not a little less regulations. Not a wall on our southern border. Not just get rid of mandates but you can keep all the regulation of business otherwise. That's not the fight. So, I agree, Corey, that a revolution is really serious issue. It's a big deal because people are going to die. Corey says, I see, so it's just like unintentionally killing innocent civilians and act, defending yourself in war. The fault of those casualty lives would take place. Yes, but again, a revolution is declaring a state of war. A protest is not. A protest, you've still accepted the regime. You've accepted the state of the world. You've accepted the way in which the political process functions. You're not challenging that, per se. You just disagree with a particular thing. A particular issue that you're demonstrating against. And that thing could be big. I mean, it could be, you know, look at the protests of the civil rights movement and I think the protest, to the extent that they disrupted life and so on, of the civil rights movement were wrong. To the extent that they were civil disobedience, they were good. They were good. No, I would be first in line for the American Revolution. It's you who, you who, Corey, not Corey Flores, Corey Winks, and many of the other people here criticizing me, who would cower and would be much more for the British because you reject the founding fathers. You don't believe in individual rights and the founding fathers vision. And you would much more likely rally around King Trump if that was an option rather than fighting for real liberty and fighting for real freedom. You would much rather build a wall than establish an America open to all and grow the country. If there's anybody on this call who represents the revolution, it's me. I'm a soldier. You guys, I've been a soldier. I know what it's like. Most of you have not. I suspect and don't know what it would be like. And I would bet you most of you would cower. And again, I'm talking to some of you, not all of you. All right. We did that question. Let's see what other questions we have. I'm not keeping track today of your contributions, super chat contributions. I lost track a long time ago. Catherine is not here. I don't see anybody volunteer, anybody who stepped in to take her place. You know, so I have no idea where we are. I can do kind of a rough estimate. You know, 45, 65. I'm going to do this 20, 40, 60, 80. Yeah, I think we're probably a 250 somebody like that. Yeah, I'm sure there's some soldiers there. 250 something like that. You know, we'll see when, you know, when we actually declare the revolution, how many of you rally to our side. And he's actually calculated. Well, Yana is actually here and she calculated $336. So we passed a halfway mark to a $600 goal. So $20, $20 super chat questions only because I have quite a few super chat questions. So let's do $20 super chat questions and let's try to get to, let's try to get to 600 bucks. Michael says, I think people who have lived under the level of wealth and feed and people in the west have experienced will tolerate outright fascism with no end date. Even Dawson meek populations like Canadians. We will see. I think Michael, I don't know how old you are. I think you're young. I fear you might live to test that hypothesis. I'm not sure I will, but you might because I think I think authoritarianism is coming from Americans more than anybody else. But the whole point is that the authoritarians do what they cannot to go against the grain. Authoritarians are great uniters. They unite the people and they get to a point where a majority of people, at least in the beginning of their rule, at the beginning of their rule actually support them. Cobb says, I don't understand war. That's a pretty strong statement, Cobb. But I don't know if you've been in a war. I have. So I'm not sure where you get the knowledge to say that. But I've been in a war. I grew up in a war zone. I think I know more about war than almost anybody. And I've thought about war a lot. Written about war. Got articles about war. I wonder what your qualifications are for judging me. You might not agree with me about war, but don't understand it. Let's see. Harper says, I knew some of the right answers to reason and individual freedom implicitly. But you and Ayn Rand helped me get it out in words. Thank you for that. Oh, my pleasure. And that's great that you had it implicit. When I read Ayn Rand, I don't think I really had it. I was very young too. So Ayn Rand has really shaped everything intellectually. It shaped me completely intellectually from the beginning. And, you know, from reading out the shrug, that basically wiped everything I knew before that clean and started over again. Ali says, why governments start taxing criminal money coming out theft and drugs? Huh. Ali, I'm sorry. Grammar is important. And, you know, I don't, I'm not trying to stand the question. Why governments start taxing criminal money coming out theft and drugs? Yeah, I don't, I don't understand the question. So maybe you can rephrase it and spell it out a little bit, you know, spend more than one sentence explaining it. I know English is not your first language. But, but let's see if we can, we can get an understanding of it. Ali also asked, what is a single test I can do to figure out if I'm one direct thinker in a kind of a cult? Good question. I see the left and right cultists, especially the progressive one act stupid because they are cultist collectivists. Yeah, I mean, I think, I think that's a really important question because I think a lot of people join objectivism and become objectivists as if they are in a cult. I think there's definitely a cultish attitude among some people around objectivism and you have to be careful of it. And, and ultimately the issue is you have to discover through introspection, looking at your own processes. And it has to be all you will need to question the ideas. And when you question the ideas, do you affirm them by reference to your own words, your own experiences, the evidence available to you directly? Or is the affirmation of the ideas done through what Ayn Rand said? If everything, every time you want to prove something to yourself, you go Ayn Rand said, I wouldn't say you're part of a cult because they're no cult leaders. There's no real cult here, but you're behaving in a cultish way. On every issue, you should be able to say, these are the facts in reality that give rise to this conclusion. This is why I believe it. Ayn Rand taught me this and now I understand that it's because of all of this. You have to become an independent thinker. You have to make the ideas that you learned from Ayn Rand your own by referencing those ideas to reality, by connecting them to reality, to the facts, to your own knowledge, to your own experience. That's what it means to be an independent thinker. And this is why I highly encourage everybody to really study the objective as virtues, what it means to be rational, what it means to be independent, what it means to be honest. And to get to the point of I agree with Ayn Rand with the emphasis on I, I agree with Ayn Rand. Because I see it, I understand it, I can prove it, I can show it, I can point to it. And that's the process of learning objectivism. The process of learning objectivism is not a rationalistic deductive process of connecting all these abstract concepts to one another. I mean, you've got to be able to integrate all those concepts and make sure that you understand the relationship between them. But at the end of the day, each one of those concepts has to relate directly to your experiences in reality. Each one of those concepts has to be linked to facts that you have discovered. All right, Ryan says, how does a revolution in today's world not violate rights, but the trucker method does? They are using a method that won't get them killed in a revolution. Why should they sacrifice an unwinnable revolution? I'm not saying they should, particularly given that they wouldn't know what they're fighting for anyway. It's not that they have a comprehensive enlightenment philosophy where they understand individual rights and the role of individual rights in man's life, and that's what they want to fight for. And as I answered this question before, a revolution is a declaration of war. And you only do that under very specific circumstances, and you only do that when you know clearly what you're fighting for. But short of a declaration of war, there's never any reason to, quote, violate people's rights. Again, I don't think in the declaration of war you are violating people's rights. But there's no reason for one issue to violate somebody's rights, on any issue. I mean, there are a million things I don't like that the government does. For every one of those, I have a right to restrict the freedoms of my neighbor in protest of every one of those. Where does it end? Does every group have that right? When they feel like they've been, that some wrong has been done to them, they should go out and do a wrong to their neighbors in protest. It's all in protest. But there are lots of ways to do civil disobedience where you don't violate other people's rights. Don't violate people's rights, period. And if you're for protests, then you have to be for everybody's protests. Ali says, when is the second part of criticizing Jordan Peterson interview with Joe Rogan? Really can't wait for that. Soon. I didn't want to just spend a whole week just criticizing Jordan Peterson. But soon, I've got a teed up. I'll do it at some point. It's more criticism of his epistemology than anything else. All right, that was the last $20 question. So if you've got any additional $20 questions, now is the time to ask it. We're at about $350 bucks. So we're about 250 short of our $600 goal. It'd be great if we reached it like we have almost every day in February and in January for the last two months, really. Yeah, Peterson at Sam Harris on his podcast. I'm going to watch that because I think there'll be a lot of juicy content there with both of them. Both of them are wrong. Gayle says, collectivism is evil rooted in altruism. Absolutely. All right, John has a $20 question. Are prisons moral? Absolutely. Specifically, is it moral to curtail a criminal's right to freedom life or forcing others to pay for their welfare? If not, is there a better alternative? So there's a number of implicit assumptions there that are not true. Absolutely. It's moral to curtail a criminal's right to freedom life because he is violated. Once you violate somebody else's rights, you lose your own. You lose your own. The principle of rights does not apply, certainly not in full to somebody who's violated rights. So once you have violated rights, then the question is, what is the appropriate punishment? What is justice demand in terms of what kind of curtailment for how long and what conditions do we curtail your rights? But once you have violated somebody else's rights, you have negated your own. You have negated the concept as applied to you. One of the reasons never to violate other people's rights is you're basically admitting that you think there's no such thing or it doesn't apply to you. And therefore your rights can be curtailed easily and in a rational society they are. Because you don't have them anymore. It's not that your rights are curtailed. You lose whatever rights you had. So your freedom, liberty can be constrained. If you're a rights violator, right? You have to be a rights violator. I'm not talking about breaking the law. I'm talking about violating rights. But then you say, while forcing others to pay for their welfare, I don't believe in forcing people to do anything. So I don't think people should be forced to pay. I don't believe taxes should be cursed. How exactly you raise revenue for the prison system is a good question. You know, we have plenty of time to talk about and figure out and think about and come up with answers for, you know, while we wait for government to shrink and to limit itself to get limited to its proper role where it spent so much less money than it does today. But I believe, for example, as a simple way of thinking about it, is I think Gomo's government will be funded voluntarily. And I think we all have a strong incentive to pay to keep people in prison for two basic reasons. One, people who violate rights, I don't want them as my neighbors. I don't want them anywhere near me. I want them in prison. Here, take a check, put them in prison. So I'm happy to pay for a prison system. And B, I pay because of justice. I think an objectivist world or world of lexific capitalism is a world in which we care about justice and we're willing to pay for justice. And we're willing to pay voluntarily for a justice system that puts criminal behind bars and makes sure that they suffer for the sins they have committed. Is there a better alternative? No, I don't think so. Not that I know of. And also, I think we treat prisoners way too well. That is partially, it's very expensive to run prisons because we treat them too well. I think certain crimes are so heinous that prisoners don't need the luxuries that prisoners have today. You know, don't call them luxuries, but relatively speaking, in our prisons today. So I think it would be cheaper and I think people would eagerly, voluntarily pay to have prisoners kept in prisons and not allowed free in the streets. Emmanuel says, he missed the first part. I thought the freedom convoy and any resistance against authoritarianism really encouraging. Yeah, I mean, we disagree on that. I mean, I find it encouraging that people are speaking out against mandates. It's about time, you know, it's only two years into this. Finally, people are speaking up. But I find, and if they just had a convoy and they driven around and gone back home, then I'd have no problem with it. But I think that, you know, any kind of protest that violates other people's rights, that prevents people from going about their business, that prevents people from getting a good night's sleep by honking through the night, things like that are indeed wrong. And I'm against it. Brian says, who is more virtuous? The Boston Tea Party is Tawn Featherers, i.e. rebel actors before the declaration we regard as heroes or the Canadian truckers. I mean, the Tea Parties were clearly better partially because they had no political outlet in order to adjudicate their claims. They had no way to, you know, to fight their injustice. They didn't exist in a place where they could educate people and then vote the king out or vote for different policies. We live in a particular system. They had a king. They had pure authoritarianism, which we do not yet have. And secondly, because they had a much broader conception of what they were fighting for. It wasn't just the T-tax. It was much more than that. And remember, remember one of the big complaints about that the founding fathers had against the English was, you know, no taxation without representation. No representation. Well, you can't argue that about the American system and you can't argue that about the Canadian system. We have representation. The representation sucks. The representation is lousy and democracy is not freedom. All that is true. But it's not the same as a king imposing his will with no way to change his mind and no way to question it. And in the end, if the Tea Party, just being the Tea Party and they'd never been a revolution and the King of Britain had loosened some of the restraints and, you know, we had stayed a part of England and so on, then I'm not sure the Tea Parties would be viewed as heroes. They are viewed as heroes because they are viewed as the beginning of something bigger. They are viewed as the beginning of a revolution. It's not an accident that revolution starts in Massachusetts. And it starts, you know, it starts not long after that. And before 1776, before the Declaration of Independence, you know, as the British come to confiscate the weapons and a revolution begins. Yeah, I know a lot of people are going to support the truckers. I mean, I get it. I get it. And I understand it because they support the spirit of it, but the spirit of something doesn't justify the actions taken. I think the actions, you know, the actions, the spirit does not justify the actions. And again, I agree with the spirit. I agree with the idea. I agree with the anti-mandate mentality. I like the idea that finally people are speaking up and standing up, if you will. I don't like the fact that they're doing it in a way that violates other Canadians' rights and without any kind of real freedom agenda. And look, I hate Trudeau. So, you know, I enjoy the fact that they're embarrassing Trudeau. I enjoy the fact that they are making Trudeau look like a coward and a meek, pathetic coward that he is. All of that is good. I just don't like protests of any kind. Ryan says, but maybe with protests like the truckers, you are non-violently getting warranted retaliation against the buster voters who violate your rights. No? No. I mean, which voters violated my rights? I mean, they're all violating my rights. Again, I mean, it's not that we have a party of liberty and freedom and a party of authoritarianism, and everybody voted for the party of authoritarianism, and therefore they're all authoritarian. I mean, God, is everybody you voted Democratic? It's okay to shoot them, it's okay to violate their rights, because they voted for Biden who violates your rights now? Really? Is that how you think? And Trump, of course, was a symbol of right protection, so anybody who didn't vote for Trump is violated your rights? That can be right. That can be right. I wish it was that black and white. I wish we had a political party in America that was white, but you've got shades of black, shades of black, Democrats and Republicans. And is it nonviolent? If my right of way to my business is blocked purposefully by a truck, is that nonviolent? How are you sounding like the left when they say it's nonviolent to smash a store's window and take the stuff from inside? It's not violent, nobody got hurt. But these truckers obstructing people's stores, they're obstructing small businesses, they're obstructing people's ability to get home, they're obstructing people's ability to sleep. Is that nonviolent? How is that nonviolent? Any more than the leftists walking into Louis Vuitton stores and just taking the stuff, all they're doing is redistributing wealth, and they're doing it in a nonviolent way. They didn't hit anybody. It's a very slippery slope, trying to justify rights violation because you agree with the cause. It's not peaceful. It's not peaceful to obstruct my path. It's not, if you come, if I'm parked in my parking lot and you come and you park and you block my car and I can't leave, and I ask you, please move your car so I can leave, and you say no, I'm protesting. Is that peaceful? How is that peaceful? Is it more peaceful than burning dumpsters? I don't know. I'd rather you burn my dumpster than block my car. I mean really, think about this. I know you like the truckers. It's great to like the truckers. They represent, I don't know, at least some of them, something good, a spirit that you admire. But what are they doing? What are they doing? Yeah, call a tow truck. Try to get a tow truck in Ottawa right now to tow away the trucks. Jeff says, for 100 Canadian dollars, thank you, Jeff. I guess Jeff's from Canada. Let's hear what Canadians have to say. Thanks for covering the Canadian issue. I agree with you. It is the few against the majority. The Truck Association was against the 10% who demand their individual rights. I support that individual, but not the disturbances that they have caused. Absolutely. I mean, I am absolutely with the people who want the mandates eliminated. And it's a difficult stand for me to take because I sympathize. And I like action and I like the people do stuff. But let me reiterate, when the lockdowns happen, the appropriate thing for liberty-loving people to have done was leave home. Go to the parks where they're not allowed to go to. Go drive around. Go do the things you're not allowed to do. And if you get arrested, you get arrested. That's proper social disobedience. That's a proper protest. I mean, there were restaurants in Orange County. Here, I'll give you an example. When I was in Orange County last year, they shut down all restaurants. And there was a point where there was indoor and outdoor dining was shut down. And there were few restaurants in town that refused to close. And I went to those restaurants. I bought food. I gave big tips. And I told the waiters and the managers when I was at the restaurant, good for you. Good for you for not accepting the authoritarian's dictates. Good for you for standing up for your rights. Good for you for keeping your businesses open. I will come and eat here and I will support you. That's proper civil disobedience because they won't violate anybody else's rights. They open their business. They have every right to open their business. They broke the law. I broke the law by going there. But nobody's rights were violated. And yet we committed act of civil disobedience. We made our argument that this was wrong by keeping the restaurant open and by going and eating at the restaurant. And you could do this on a bigger scale. You know, you remember Elon Musk saying that he would not shut down his factory. He would not stop working in the factory. If his workers wanted to continue working, he would not send them home. That was the right kind of civil disobedience. He's a good question. Stephen asked this is a good question. Was work a trucker vis-a-vis the apartments? No, the apartments were illegally built. Remember the war made sure that nobody was hurt. That everybody was evacuated. He didn't violate anybody's rights. He was dealing with stolen property. So put aside the fact that it's a novel. But morally, nobody's rights were violated. Iron man makes this point very clearly. So, no, now look, there's going to be a lot of disagreement with me about this. And I get it. And Corey says, Elon doesn't like it, but this is the first step of a nonviolent revolution. When do you think the nonviolent revolution will manifest itself? Because I'm willing to put money on, or at least my reputation on, that there will be no nonviolent revolution. Nothing exceptional will come of this. You know, Trudeau might back down. You know, Trudeau has a small government majority. Maybe the government will change. But what is the revolution? What are we replacing Trudeau with? I don't want you to take it. I want you to fight the way it's supposed to be fought. I don't want you to come to my home and keep me awake all night because you've decided that mandates are one straw too many. Some provinces have ended vax passports. They were all about to end them anyway. And yeah, no, this might work in terms of eliminating some of the mandates. I'm not saying it won't work. I'm saying it's not a revolution. There's no revolution happening. There's no big cultural change that's happening. Yeah, the mandates will go away. But if it's more than that, forget it. Nothing's changing. And Canada has an overwhelming majority of people who support the mandates. It is a small subsection of the population, unfortunately, who is against mandates. There are revolutions all over the world. Interesting, all right. I guess we'll be monitoring all the revolutions from here. I'll be watching for them. I'll be seeing all those revolutions. Pro-freedom revolutions, I doubt it. There are lots of revolutions all over the world that are anti-freedom. That they are. There's a lot of anti-freedom going on, stuff going on right now, all over the world. That I agree. Pro-freedom revolutions, there are none as far as I can tell. All right, Ali says, does existentialism intersect or complement objectivism? It doesn't intersect and it doesn't complement. I'm trying to adopt philosophy for life, currently considering stoicism, existentialism, and objectivism. Yeah, I mean, they're all three are very, very different. I think you should choose objectivism because I think stoicism and existentialism are wrong, harmful, destructive, and will not lead to a good, healthy, successful life. So I'm against both of them. I'm not an expert on stoicism or for them at existentialism. I know a little bit more about existentialism than stoicism. And existentialism is a very dark, not a good philosophy to live by. It doesn't really give you much guidance to live by. Objectivism is a philosophy to live on this earth to achieve happiness in this life. And that's unique and exceptional. We're still gaining subscribers, not losing them. That's a relief. I thought we'd be losing them by the droves during this. Maybe we're not gaining as many as we could otherwise. Alright, Colt says, Minecraft, a game where you can basically do what you want. So I choose to build, create, and trade. While I live in a rural area of North Carolina, Charlotte and Raleigh are awesome, but in time I fear they'll vote out my rights. But many of your rights have already been voted out. And it's not like you have different rights in the rural area, or your rights are being respected more in the rural area and less in those other areas. I mean, North Carolina's not that big and it doesn't have different governments that are that different. And as rights are being violated in Washington, D.C., nationally, and as rights are being violated at the state level, it's going to be very difficult for you, even living in a rural part of the country, to protect those rights. And then if you think about the benefits of living in a city, you're giving up a lot of benefits. I mean, the real advantage is the living in cities rather than the countryside. Now, different people are going to choose countryside versus city based on their own values. And I respect that. I don't say everybody should live in the same place. But you have to recognize there is a tradeoff. The tradeoff is the city tends to be a little bit more left, but the benefit is there's more to do, there's more restaurants, there's more arts, there's more culture, and there's more jobs. So that's the tradeoff. Let's see, that's cold. Okay, friend Harper, spent 9.99, spent from last time, but here's a small donation because you are value while I'm at work. A lot that I learn on here and power our, I share strategically and lightly with my coworkers were received. Excellent. I'd love to hear that you guys are taking what you learn and what you accept, what you agree with, and then use it to plant seeds all over the culture and try to influence people everywhere. That is fantastic, and that is really appreciated. All right. Let's see, where are we with the, oh, we're 566, 566, so we're only $30-something away from $34 away from $600 goals, so we're very, very close. Hopefully somebody will jump in here with a couple of $20 questions and get us over the hump, over the hump. Vinny says, thanks for your great work. You've changed my mind on a lot of things over the last year. I appreciate that. Thank you. I'm good to know that I do have an impact, because some of the people here, I don't seem to have any impact on, so it's great to know some people I'm having an impact. Dean says, I disagree with you about hip-hop music, and some are not, so just on aesthetics. Well, we're going to have to work on that, Dean. I mean, over time, we'll see. We'll work on it. We'll work on it. Dean also says, Revolution including killing people or using power. Revolution including killing people. Revolution people die. It's war. It's war, and you have to accept it as war. Oh, we've got the anti-Semites have arrived. All right. Cool. Let's see if he becomes obnoxious. I'll put him on time out. Hopper Campbell, if you live in a gated community, do you still think you should own a firearm for self-defense? Yeah, I do. You never know what's going to happen in the future. I lived in a gated community. It's always good to have a firearm for self-defense, partially because if things break down, the gate is not going to protect you. And I think it's always good to be prepared for the worst-case scenario, and that means a firearm doesn't have to be a shotgun or a pistol. Shotgun's probably the most effective weapon for self-defense. Or pistol. And some gold. Gold coins or something. Small denomination gold in a safe or a dug in the backyard. Just in case real bad shit happens. All right. Stevo, Stevo, Stevo, Stevo. $100. Thank you, Stevo. That is great. $600. And that's very generous. I really appreciate it. Could you comment on revelations about Hugh Hefner drugging and cursing many of his, quote, girlfriends into sleeping with him? Given that he was a fan of Irann, could you comment on people who admire a portion of our ideas but totally go against the core of those ideas? Yeah, I mean, I think to the extent that these stories are true, and I have no reason to think they're not, but I just don't know, right? I mean, we have to know what we don't know. But if they're true, then that's despicable, horrible. They should have gone to jail for doing it. It is a, you know, just a horrible thing to do. It's a scumbag-y thing to do, particularly for the guy you believed in who promoted the sexual revolution and promoted, you know, women's rights and women's autonomy in a sense. And, you know, and kind of women as a real value. And then you have to, you drug them and you, you curse them into having sex. I mean, it's, that's pretty disgusting. So I think it's the lowest of the low. I mean, I don't know that gets much lower than that. Then basically rape is one of the lowest crimes possible. Now again, I don't know if you did it, but let's assume that that was true. Now, lots of people are fans of Iron Man. Donald Trump claims to be a fan of the fountain. You know, there have been people who have committed horrible crimes that have claimed that where they found Atlas Shrugged in their room or whatever. I mean, lots of people are going to read Iron Rand and get some value out of reading Iron Rand. But, and then go on doing horrible things. And there's really no relationship necessarily between a fan of Iron Rand and living a moral life. One has to evaluate the actions of the person in question. And irrespective of whether they're a fan of Iron Rand or not, I know people who don't like Iron Rand, but live honorable good lives. And I know people who are fans of Iron Rand who are horrible human beings. So you've got to judge people by their actions, not by who they claim to like. And sadly, when people claim to be fans of Iron Rand and then misbehave and then act horribly, that is, that unfortunately gives Rand a bad name. So they do a lot of damage to the cause. Now again, I don't think anybody honest would judge the cause based on these people. But it discourages people from reading our books. It discourages people from engaging in the ideas, from digging deeper, from wanting to know more because the ideas are associated with bad people. One of the reasons I was so anti-Trump was the distance Trump from the ideas of capitalism, from the ideas of Iron Rand, is to not make that association because I thought it would be crucially and horrifically and historically damaging to all of us. Even objectivists, people who call themselves objectivists, are not necessarily good people. So you've got to judge people based on their actions. You've got to judge people based on them as individuals, not what they claim their philosophy is. I know a lot of objectivists who are horrible people. Maybe not a lot. I know some objectivists who are horrible people. You judge them based on what they do. Yeah, Mike says, Beethoven loved Hitler. Does that make... Sorry, Beethoven loved Hitler. God. Hitler loved Beethoven. Does that make Beethoven bad? No, it doesn't even make Wagner bad. Even though Wagner was admired by all the Nazis. So you've got to judge people again by their own action, not by what they claim to like or even claim to hold their philosophy. Really, really important. Thank you, Stevo. That's a great question and thanks you for the support. Adam says, Bad news for the haters. Iran just beat the $600 goal. Liberty, $5,000. Thank you, Adam. Really appreciate your support. And I will be doing the show you sponsored really soon. Really soon. Let's see. Stevan says, I'm an electrician. When I work with young appendices who is interested in philosophy, we listen to Alpy's History of Philosophy crossing our van. That's great. That's a great story, Stevan. That's wonderful. Yep. I mean, what a great way to engage with young people and get them to engage with ideas and engage with philosophy than listening to Landon Peacock's History of Philosophy. It's a great way to do it. Liam says, Is viewing certain jobs as beneath you come from a sense of entitlement or self-esteem? Well, it can... It depends what you mean by beneath you, right? If you really mean beneath you, then it can come from a sense of self-esteem. If you look at people who do those jobs and view them as beneath you, then it's a sense of entitlement and often represents a lack of self-esteem. A job might be beneath you in terms of your values, your skills, your interests, your passions, your potential. But that doesn't mean the job is low. And it doesn't mean people who do that job are beneath you. Right? So you've got to separate the two out. Seeker.87 asks, He's Canadian. Why is that all the model options for dissenting against unjust laws seem to be ineffective options? What is the most effective thing that people can do? I mean, nobody wants to hear it. Nobody wants to hear it. But the most effective thing you can do is argue against it. It's the only thing you can do at the end of the day, in the long run, to bring about change. It's to educate your fellow citizens about the wrongness of this. Even civil disobedience, which I'm all support of, is only going to work if you educate people. But if all you want are results, results, results, and you want them now, you're going to play right into the hands of the authoritarians. Because you're going to play right into this is what the modern conservatives want. They want to use the state to bring about their results. They're going to use the authoritarian power to bring about their vision of society, which they think is better than everybody else. But to, you know, to, there is no effective option to change the world other than to change the world. And the only way to change the world is to change the ideas. And the only way to change ideas is to argue for them. It's to engage in the intellectual battle. And using force doesn't work, particularly if you're going to lose. So if you want to use force, make sure you're going to win. Make sure you're using force in the name of justice, in the name of something, in the name of a significantly better world. The battle elf seems to have a lot of chips on his shoulder. Israel, the Sackler family, best friend Hank says, if you run was a trucker, what would his CB handle be? I think Moses would work. Yeah, I think the truckers need a Moses. They need somebody to lead them up to the promised land. Where is the promised land? Michael asks, what does vis-a-vis mean? I hear it used a lot. Could you give some synonyms and explain? By the way, once I get a better job I'll be able to give more. What does vis-a-vis mean? Okay, I'm blanking out here. Somebody in the chat used vis-a-vis in a sentence for me so I can project it because I'm drawing a blank. Do you keep a first aid kit in your house car? I keep one in my house, yes. I was saying in my previous show I cut up my hand pretty badly. I put it through some glass. And and it was very useful to have a first aid kit in the house. Absolutely. Yeah, I keep one. Battle elf, you want me to answer a question? You got to put money with the question. I only answer super chat questions. I don't answer questions just by anybody in the chat. No end to that. Let's see, anybody vis-a-vis is French and it means near in relation to with regard to. Yeah, so it's in relation to. Give me a sentence, guys. The left makes a self-center. Vis-a-vis cancer culture. That is it's related to cancer culture. It's the same as it's similar to that's what it means. Is a vis-a-vis is a haunting way of saying regarding. I don't use vis-a-vis a lot or at all. I don't think not kind of not kind of not kind of language I use. All right, guys, I think we're done calling tonight. Our 45 minutes. We're going to get to $723. It's almost seven. No, seven over 725 because Stefan came in and said have you ever purchased a painting from Brian Larson? Yes, I've got two or three of them. One in the other room which is the father and son watching the rocket takeoff. I love that painting. I love the colors, the vividness of the launch and just the whole spirit of it. I like that one a lot. In my show, in my previous office, I had another one of his posters on the wall behind me. So yes, I've got a few of I've got a few of his posters. I've got one hanging and I think one or two other ones kind of in some way, but yeah, I have. That was from Stefan. I think I covered all the questions. Let me just see quickly. Make sure I didn't miss anything. All right, everybody. Thanks, everybody, for being here. Really appreciate it. Don't forget that if you like the show, agree with it or disagree with it, but like it and get some value out of it. I'd appreciate showing value for value. I'm a supporter of the show. Allow me to do I produce about eight hours of this stuff a week and that does not include all the interviews that do all the debates all the lectures. A lot of the debates and lectures I get paid for but the interviews I don't get paid for is just I do a lot of stuff. So I appreciate I appreciate all of you subscribing and supporting. If you want to show value for value, it would be great to become a monthly supporter on bookshow.com support on Patreon and subscribe star. In particular, all of you who are new if you like what you're hearing if you're gaining a benefit from it please show your support by going to bookshow.com support again or Patreon or subscribe star. Have a great evening. Don't forget to like the show before you leave if you liked it of course and I'll see you on Thursday. Corey says, I want you to admit that you were wrong about it being better with Biden in office. I never said it would be better with Biden in office. You never understood my argument. My argument was not an argument that Biden's policies would be better than Trump's policies. I never argued that. I never said that. I did say that the future of America that America had a chance for a future that was free if Biden if Trump lost and if Trump won it didn't have that the chance of America succeeding in the long run was diminished by a Trump victory and I still stand by that and I think the worst thing that can happen to America the worst thing that can happen to America is Trump winning in 2024 and I if I was a praying man and I'm not but if I believed in some higher power that had any power over what was going on right now I would pray that the Republicans nominate anybody but Trump. Trump will be the death of this country not because he will bring that death about but he has already and if he gets elected again will put this country on a path towards death whereas as bad as Biden and he's terrible and on policy no question he's worse than Trump and I always said that because there's an opposition to him there is still an opportunity for something better in the future but not if the Republican party becomes unequivocally unquestionably the party of Donald Trump so if Donald Trump is the nominee I will again urge you to vote for anybody but Trump pretty much. We're going to argue about Trump for the next 30 years I suspect. What I said was dramatic and absolutely what I believe and what I believe for I said that in 2015 when he announces well not so much I said in 2016 when he became the candidate I said that he was potentially the death of this country and I still hold it. I still hold that he is going to destroy this country and he already has gone a long way and the Republican party took a step in that direction this week by vindicating what happened in January 6th and legitimizing it as legitimate political speech if you will. Legitimizing riots so we're on the path to a very very very nasty ending. Alright everybody a path set off by Trump unfortunately. I wish that was not true but that's the Republican party and we don't have another opposition party so we need to we need to save the Republican party from Trump so that we have any kind of opposition. Bye everybody. I will see you all Thursday 8pm 7pm.