Scott Horton

What's up, what's up, everybody? Welcome to a brand new episode of Part of the Problem. We have a great show for you today with the legend, Scott Horton joining us. I do, before we get into all of that, it is at the time of this recording is Wednesday, November 11, 2026, 1102 Eastern time. And as of the time of this recording, there's still no word about Mark Levin getting back into his AOL account. Obviously we will keep you updated with live updates, and we will interrupt the program if anything changes over the course of this. I've been eye-emming him all day. I shot him a direct message on my space. I haven't heard anything back, but Mark Levin's out there. By the way, great as Boomer moment ever. He didn't even know to tag AOL when he was complaining on Twitter. That's what you do. You have millions of followers. You tag the, anyway. Okay, so we have the great Scott Horton here. Of course, the guest who we've had on more than anyone else on the show. As I've been telling you guys for, I think, 15 years, Scott's the most important guy to listen to in the country. If you want to really know what's going on, you got to listen to his show, The Scott Horton Show. If you really want to know what's going on, you got to read his phenomenal books, Fools Arend, Enough Already, Provoked, All Fantastic. And then if you really, really want to know what's going on, you read those books, and then you check out this shirt that I am dawning, The Scott Horton Academy of Foreign Policy, and Freedom. You really, I mean, want to take it to the next level. That's where you go. Of course, also he's the co-host of Provoked, which is one of the best weekly podcasts out there with him and the great Daryl Cooper. So anyway, Scott, thank you so much for coming back on the show. As always, how are you this morning? I'm great. I'm also the director of the Libertarian Instagram. That's true. It's a real director event. I got a lot of jobs. You do have a lot of jobs. So check out all those URLs, everybody. I'm sorry. It is true. It is hard to get all of it in. I don't know how you get it all done in the day. So me and Scott wanted to come on and talk to you guys. The topic for today's show, I think broadly would be the future of the American right. And then within that, we're going to talk about some plans that some people have floated out there that Scott and me are both very cautious, or maybe that cautious isn't even the word, that we'd like to thwart if possible. First things first, I want to get your thoughts on this and I wanted to just say a couple words. Last, yesterday I recorded an episode and we talked a lot about Thomas Massey introducing articles of impeachment against Pete Hagseth. This was shut down last night after we recorded. So it was not able to reach the floor. I just as this conversation today is going to be about kind of the future of the American right and the future of America. We're coming off this, the Republicans really taking a historic loss. I got to say, man, it was something to me to see the Trump supporting commentariat trying to dunk on Thomas Massey on social media last night about like taking the, oh, take the L. You lost your primary and now you just lost again because he didn't get this these articles of impeachment to vote. First of all, it is really something to brag or to tell someone else they're taking an L one week to the day after just taking a historic slacking over the issue that this guy was right on. It was just, it really blows my mind like between soon becoming the minority leader and this, you're like, wow, dude, this is, I don't know, it really is something, but I just want to say in defense of Thomas Massey real quick and you can give your comment on this before we get into the meat of the episode. You know, I've watched presidents get impeached over lying about blow jobs. I've watched presidents get impeached over that Ukraine gate nonsense of an alleged attempted quid pro quo that never even ended up happening where they get the weapons and he doesn't get the investigation. By the way, totally legitimate to demand the investigation. Anyway, maybe a little Mafioso tactic, nothing impeachable. January 6th, that half inside job that we still haven't gotten to the bottom of it all. Oh, this is nonsense. You know, Thomas Massey introduced articles in impeachment for the Secretary of War killing little girls in a school. The most legitimate articles of impeachment I've ever seen introduced in my life. Massey has done good at moving the machinery of the Congress before. It's a tough thing to do when you go for it. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. And I would just say that as I saw Crystal Ball actually relentlessly posting on social media, I really appreciate this because I didn't even really think about this enough to focus on the Massey angle. But like, hey, these new Democrats had a mandate for this specifically. And seven of them didn't even show up. And they could have gotten this through two of votes. So that's like screw them and screw the Republicans who destroyed their own coalition in hand of the country to the Democrats. But good for Massey for introducing the articles. Anyway, any thoughts on that go ahead Scott? Yeah, I mean, it sucks that everything is so unserious because everything is so chaotic that you do something like this and it's not taken seriously really by anyone. And I have no idea the behind the scenes, you know, maneuvering here. It would have been really great if he had lined up the Democratic leadership and had a pledge from them that they're going to whip their membership and then they're going to do this or at least push it forward to some degree, some kind of thing. And maybe they made him promises and then stabbed him in the back or maybe he wasn't able to arrange that. But it is unfortunate in the sense that it's a swing and a miss. And it makes the charges themselves seem less serious, right? They're diminished in a way if the Congress has essentially agreed, you know, both sides that apparently this isn't impeachable. Then a new precedent kind of is set, right? In the in the failure there. So that's, you know, the the detriment of the thing, but it is the right thing to do. And it's so funny, man, we can go sometime, I mean, I try to mention as often as I can, but, you know, you listen to the discussion out in the world about anti-war topics. It's relatively rarely mentioned that the constitution does not provide the president the authority to start. And in fact, it says that it's the Congress, the legislative branch, which is presumably somewhat kind of sort of accountable to the voters that much more so than the president who have the responsibility to do that. And in fact, an article two in the commander in chief clause, which you know, the Bush people say, for example, gave him the ultimate authority overall life on earth and that kind of thing. Well, the commander in chief clause itself says he shall be the commander in chief of the army and the naval forces when called into the actual service of the United States by the Congress. And so it is criminal, absolutely criminal for him to launch this war. And not that I'm some kind of baby blue one-world communist because actually I'm quite a bit of a bircher at heart here. But the United Nations charter essentially outlaws war. The the states agree there is no world government to enforce it except Washington, but the the nations of the world agree not to attack each other, not to start wars. And you don't want to just throw that away and say, well, we're not pretending to abide by that anymore. I mean, it's just a tradition. It's not truly enforceable as law with a true monopoly state, thank goodness. But at the same time, treaties are supposed to mean something. And we just throw that kind of thing away. And the president starts a war out, going to the security council, and which is under the treaty, the only legal way to launch a war war to war. I mean, if you look at for example, I'm sorry, I don't mean to cut you off. Please, keep that point, but it's so that point is worth repeating because it's so frustrating that you get this from the hawks where they'll go like, oh, so now you're the libertarian who loves global governance or something like that. You want a global guy. And it's like, look, if there is a global governance organization that we've signed on to that says don't there we write a law don't torture children. And we all agree to that law. And there's no enforcement mechanism, but we just say, hey, let's follow that. That doesn't mean we believe in global government. That's just saying as long as there is this global governance organization, and this one law is pretty good about not just starting wars of aggression. And we've at least in in we have said we agree with that. Yeah, we should follow that part of it, not not have a global government enforcement arm. You can believe both of those things. Yeah, I mean, in fact, I mean, from one point of view, like this whole regime of international law, since the Second World War, it's just the window dressing on the American Empire, right? This is a very world regime. It was, you know, Nelson Rockefeller and his team were the primary authors of the United Nations charter in San Francisco. They put the Rockefellers donated the land for the building in New York City. This is not in Europe somewhere, not in Eurasia anywhere, but in the New World is where the headquarters is here for a reason. This is our world order. This is the world law. Our government has forced on the rest of the world, foisted on them to whatever degree, but then oh, no, I didn't break the law any time like a cop, you know, getting away with murder. And, you know, it's the kind of thing where, you know, we'll come to regret it later. There'll always be blowback later that we'll be able to trace back to like, for example, the way Vladimir Putin says, well, if Bill Clinton can do Kosovo and Serbia, and if Barack Obama can do Libya and George Bush can do Iraq, then I guess I can do Ukraine. Yep. Yeah. Well, I guess maybe you can't then, you know, no, it's absolutely great point. It's a great point. It sets quite a precedent. Yeah. And look, I think Massey's trying to do the right thing, you know, quite frankly. And I'm not sure exactly what it means for his political career. I know that, you know, Trump people have pissed off at him. But as he puts it, and I saw him tweet like this the other day, that, you know, he actually stuck with the MAGA America First program. And that's why they're mad. His, because he's trying to drain the swamp and then the wars and do all the things that America first was supposed to be about. So I think give people a little bit of breathing space and they'll come to recognize and appreciate that to a degree. You know, the same way people appreciate Dr. Paul that actually he really was right that whole time. We should have listened then. Yeah. And it's just so, it's so stark with Massey. I mean, it's just so clear that this got anybody who's on the right, who was against this war. How can you even argue about this? And I guess that's how we could set the table for the rest of this episode is like we just came off of, of an election where it, look, I mean, it's pretty overwhelmingly clear that this war destroyed the Trump coalition. Almost everybody has acknowledged that including the president and the vice president at this point. I mean, this is just kind of at this point. It's, it's as much as the, the, the only comparison I could think of immediately was after Joe Biden's debate. It's like after the debate. Okay. Now we can all admit that that he's seen Island. We have a problem that that becomes not what one half of the conversation is denying because that's what the last year and a half has been. And now it's what, okay, so we have this thing. It's quite something to still go after this got. But then the question kind of obviously becomes, well, what do we do now? I mean, Donald Trump ran and won carrying this coalition, promising no new wars. And he clearly destroyed it by launching a new war. This is the consensus down to the point that as really as something Scott, the Democrats, if you go look at the ads that they ran, they weren't running like 2018, you know, kids in cages, women's march, women's rights, Russia gate. It wasn't none of that. It was like America first campaigns by El Said. It was, it was like guys going, hey, we shouldn't be spending trillions over there when we have problems over here. And so it does seem like, hey, it's been demonstrated in the Republican party that like this coalition of no new wars can win. And yet we also have people. I think some people who mean you, well, I was going to say, I think we both like Brett Weinstein and I don't know him very well personally, but I like some of the stands that he's taken. I've enjoyed some of his podcasts. We love Michael Heiss. There's a dear friend of us. Both of these guys have been publicly talking about a third party move, a rebranding of the libertarian party to like an America first party. Obviously Tucker and Thomas Massey and Joe Kent and people like this have also floated out the broad idea of a third party. But then of course, there's also this thing of like, you just saw this coalition win in the Republican party. Why would we not pursue the path that could win? I don't know. Any thoughts or where you want to start on any of this? Yeah. Well, let's start with the Democrats for a second. Just as an example, on the Democrat side, you said she had the voters of the Democratic party versus the never minus swing voters, but I mean, the real population of the party versus the owners on, for example, most importantly, war and peace and Zionism and American support for Israel and all that. That entails including support for their slaughter in Gaza and in Lebanon as well as carrying their water into the war in Iran and all of that. And so, and then we could see already, like Hakim Jeffries is clinging on to power for dear life. And so there's going to be a fight between what do Democrats want and what do the Democrats want, right? Those are different things. And there's going to be a big fight about that. And the same thing is true on the right. Now on the right, you have a lot more people who are committed to Zionism for religious reasons and just for political reasons, you know, going back to previous eras of war and whatever. So it's not going to be, it is not, and it's not going to be for a long time, the population of the entire Republican party versus the leadership of it. But it is a much larger percentage than it has ever been. It's not like the kind of thing where in 2008, Dr. Paul said, you know, we don't have to do this. And about 20 million people went, well, we don't. And he went, yeah, that's right. We don't. And that was enough to, you know, really help. But it was still only 20 million of not enough voters, you know, Donald Trump came also. And for political reasons, but very forcefully insisted that the right wing turn against for an interventionism. And who could argue that no, we really would stay and win the war in Afghanistan. They like, no, he was obviously right. And they were right to finally pivot and change their mind and agree with him. Now the fact that he's pivoted again, they're still on flip and he's back to flop again. No way. What are you talking about? Now we're hawks again when they had been pretty convinced that no, we're not. And especially when it's based on such hollow reasons. And then so as you can see, you consider, you know, look at Rich Barris and all the poll breakdowns. I mean, it's the people who, you know, not just the narrow swing voters, but broadly speaking, the independents who came together and built this coalition to support Trump for his second presidency here are just absolutely against this and turned against it and not only stayed home. But when outside went down there and voted Democrat, you know, just like the normal joke about Trump and the American people hated Hillary Clinton so much, they voted for a guy they hated more than her just to make the point. Same thing here. Just to make the point, the Trump voters went out and voted Democrat to make sure that he knew how pissed off that they were. So in other words, the field on the American right is something like half and half. I don't know. It's very split and same thing inside the Republican party. Now the establishment of the Republican party is still the establishment of the Republican party, but the people of the Republican party were told you're going to, you know, have Jeb Bush and you're going to like it. And they insisted that actually, no, we're not, right? Remember the Democrats were good little boys and girls and voted for Hillary, not Bernie on when the insurgent came on their side. But on the right wing side, they were like, no, we will not accept a Bush and decided to have their way. So the truth is they cheated, they cheated more on the Democratic side to be completely fair. But yeah, but still a higher, but a higher percentage still did vote for Hillary. No question about that. And Bernie Sanders, we're talking to 2016. He wasn't even really trying to win anywhere. Yeah. Yeah. And realize that he could win way too late and whatever. But anyway, point being though that my real point was that right wingers have proven that they can have the candidate that they want if they insist. And despite what TV sets, remember right up to the convention of 2016, they were talking about trying to figure out ways to steal it from Trump and give it to face it or somebody. And Trump said, oh, yeah, well, there's going to be a riot. And they went, okay, never mind. So anyways, point is the the American voter got their way on that one. Not that it was not that he was a pure grassroots guy. You understand, but still it was not the wishes of the establishment of the Republican party that it played out that way. And it did anyway. So point is there's a big right wing field in America ripe for the fight and look at how, you know, strident and convinced and compelling the paleo conservative pro-Trump now angry as hell guys like or in McIntyre and Mike Cernovich and some of these other guys are now where they're just they don't, you know, or McIntyre is a great example where don't give me this. It was anything but the Iran war because it was too, you know, that kind of attitude is obviously based on historical reality, but there's real conviction and resentment there and and fertile ground on the American right. For somebody who actually means it who's not just, you know, Rudy Giuliani with a comb over, but like is somebody who is truly convinced and convincing to run for that mantle, the the thing that Donald Trump promised and did not deliver. And so that's, I guess, the background to in my mind, sort of the way I view the landscape and the aftermath of the election and in the at the dawn of the 2028 race here as we speak about this in 2026. That's the landscape as I see it. And then of course, the topic here, as you said, is the question of whether to do this third party stuff or not. So now, forgive me because I wrote down a lot of bullet points because I got a lot of points to make and I want to make sure to not leave any out. First of all, is I love Michael Heist. I consider him a personal friend and I know he'll probably he's probably already mad at me and it's going to be mad at me for this or whatever, but this is not personal. This is not business. This is just business. I mean, to say, and the same goes for Luke Ensor and Josiah Baker and Melissa Wong and all the great leaders of the Mises Caucus and all that assuming that they're on board for what the chief is doing here. Like this is I love these people and I have nothing against them to be clear for anyone to be clear for anyone who doesn't know like we're talking about people who are in the libertarian party great people really believe in the cause of human liberty and have been fighting the good fight and are not anything of the negative stereotypes you would think of libertarians. Like these are our guys who really are the ones, the Ron Paulians, like the good guys with their heart in the right place who want to like see a liberty movement and want to see the country move in the right direction. But anyway, yeah, so just to be clear for anyone who doesn't know who these people are, yeah. Right. And so and look, I don't think that I can convince Michael Heist because I already tried to, but I do want to like put this out there for other people to at least have these things to think about when they're deciding about where they stand on all this stuff. I will say up front that I know Michael has told other people that I refuse to listen to him. And, you know, I'm not calling him a liar or whatever I'm just saying, that's not true. In fact, I did listen him and I'll come back to that a little bit later, but it's not true that I just refuse to listen. I did. I just disagree and strongly about it. I'll also stipulate here in these very conspiracy and deconstructionist times that I have no conflict of interest here. Everybody knows me. I've been doing the same thing this whole time on the Director of the Libertarian Institute and EditorialDirectorvantiWord.com. I'm not quitting my nonprofits that I partially run and run in order to try to get a job doing electoral, politics stuff or anything like that. I'm sitting right here doing exactly what I always do, write my books and whatever the same thing. So, there is no ulterior motive here, other than just, I have an opinion about everything Dave Smith, as I think you know. And so, this is a thing. And so, I have an opinion about it. This is the way I think things should be. This is as simple as that. I know people are so deconstructionist like, oh, what's whoever are up to? And I'm not accusing anyone else of being up to anything here either, by the way, you know, or having any ulterior motives other than doing what they think is right. And also, I want to say that I totally understand the concept from the point of view of a member of the Libertarian Party, like wouldn't it be great if we could get some kind of star to come down from like higher ranks and be the leader of our party and represent us well and give the Libertarian Party that boost that we need so badly. And so, you know, Thomas Massey is a star, a nationwide figure from the House of Representatives. Of course, you know, Joe Kent is making a name for himself more and more as, you know, former director of counterterrorism and decorated veteran and all of that stuff. Tucker Carlson is, of course, other than the president himself, the most important man on the American right, I guess Shane Gillis, but and so these guys in Shane, I wouldn't recommend you throw your hat in this one, buddy. You could do better on the outside, man. I can promise that we can avoid that. Yeah. Yeah, good. So, but I get the idea though, I mean, hell, the Libertarians try to recruit Doug Stanhope because he believes in freedom and he's not a socialist type, like he might be a degenerate, but he believes in the liberty to be a degenerate and is not some kind of comedy. And so, like good enough for them, they put a Libertarian jersey on him, tried to recruit him. So, and I love Doug Stanhope. I got to meet him one time, right? He's great guy. Yeah. But so you, I get it that like we want someone important to come down and do. Maybe we can get that one guy who was that actor that endorsed Ron Paul, the tall guy from the movie. I know Vince Vaughn, Vince Vaughn, maybe we can get Vince Vaughn, right, Judgment of Autano. I get it, right? Like that. Yeah. Okay. So, but the thing is is you got to zoom out there's just more to it than that and there's more going on than what's just good for the LP and, you know, this little kingdom here to take into account here. So. All right, guys. 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I highly recommend it and they now have the Body Brain Creamer as well, and it pairs perfectly with the coffee. It's designed for the two of them to complement each other and they taste great together. So go get yourself some Body Brain coffee and some creamer and get 10% off plus a free Body Brain milk for author or a Body Brain mug when you use the promo code Dave gift at check out. The website is BodyBrainCoffee.com. The promo code is Dave gift for 10% off plus a free Body Brain milk for author or a Body Brain mug Body Brain coffee fuel your body sharpen your brain, be the best version of yourself. All right. Let's get back into the show. Well, like for example, just to say for example here because I, you know, I want to give my thoughts on this too is as you get into this because I know people want to hear from both of us. You know, just for example, let's just say the rock red revolution by Ron Paul and he's like, whoa, this just blew my mind. I'm really, really into libertarianism now. Now you could see from the perspective of the libertarian party, this would be the greatest thing ever if the rock, this a list celebrity, giant muscle man who everyone loves could come and be our ambassador. However, you could also see from the perspective of somebody who just wanted the rock to be as influential and famous as possible. How that would be the worst thing in the world for the rock to do for the rock to brand himself with libertarianism. I'm a gold bug now and I care about sound money. This thing that like a very small percentage of the population care about this would take this enormous a list celebrity and take him way, way, way down here like that's so if the goal and then if you had another avenue for the rock to pursue where it keeps him in a list celebrity and he can actually win and actually hold on to power, you can understand where the perspective of, oh, this would be the best thing for the libertarian party if the rock came down. That is true. But it's also missing a much bigger perspective here. Right? That's how I feel about this. Yes, that's that's basically the point, but I'm still on my disclaimers. So one of the things I just quickly LP a few weeks ago because of just the absolute degeneracy of some of the membership and in the obvious refusal of the leadership to do anything about it and all that. I'm just sick of it. But I have long championed the idea of members of the libertarian party, especially running against conservatives calling them rhinos and not constitutionalists and soft on guns and soft on gold and soft on defend the guard and attack them from the right as insufficiently constitutionalists and undermine their power even to help the bad guys win occasionally the Democrats, the worst side in order to extort those Republicans and tell them well, if you were just good on defend the guard and guns and gold, then we wouldn't have a problem here. That you're not so we do and let them see that look, the libertarians are not just a faction of the right. They're a faction of the right that has their own party and somewhere else to go. So we could even vote for you if you were great. We could stay out of your way if you were pretty good or we can ruin your life because we hate you because you're terrible and help the other guys win. So I've actually tried to explain that to libertarians before about how I capital L libertarians about how I think the libertarian party could be useful in that way. And they'll go, huh? No, because we're all about gay rights and open immigration, whatever. We're not on the right. We're all gay and whatever like, okay, well, so then that's you kind of, okay, never mind my great idea, but that would work and I have been for that. So I'm, you know, I could work at least. Yeah. Yeah, like the potential of using it strategically that way. On the other hand, though, if we call it the LP or call it whatever you want is right now, the time that we want to do that to the presidential candidate. I mean, maybe if it was like Mike Rogers was the nominee, hell might as well or something. I don't know. Even then, I don't think we really want to basically all other things equal. Just throw our group into the competition in order to help the Democrat win the presidency. Yeah. I don't want to do that. You know what I mean? I don't think I think it's great. I think the LP should be doing that to state senators and judges and whoever they can on the state level and show that we can be bullies, but also we can be negotiable too. We could take your, your margin of victory away, but if you do what we say, then we promise to stay out of your way in two years or whatever the deal is for those kind of policies. And the major, can I tell you the major, but let me tell you something and look, this is the truth. You both have really believed in that concept. Me and you both just to be clear for people on the record had not always applied it equally. Like for example, like when I tried to do the whole thing behind supporting Blake masters, you were very queasy about that. And you were on, we were all on the record about this. You were like, I don't really know if this is the one if this was the race for you to do it. I thought it was. I ultimately ended up endorsing Trump. You didn't. So like, but we both believe in this in theory. The ultimate problem that I've found with this over and over again in practice. And I will tell you, at big L libertarians, it's not just the bad guys I'm saying, members of the Mises caucus too, is that that strategy only works much like my strategy of supporting Donald Trump only works if I then turn on him over the war. Otherwise, you're just supporting a war criminal like, wait, this strategy doesn't work now. So again, that LP strategy only works. If you will punish the Lindsey grams, but look the other way or even maybe help the, say, whoever, you know, you want to think of an example, Joe Kenz or something like that when he's running for a cop. The problem the libertarian party has is that as soon as you ever get to that part where it's like, oh, we shouldn't run against this guy or we should support this guy, they will immediately pick the thing that's not pure about him. Start purity spiraling and start bitching about everyone's not a real libertarian. It's just impossible to separate like the The philosophy from this political strategy that we're trying to embark on, and there's no way to embark on a political strategy while maintaining your 100% purity score. It just does it. No one's ever done it. No, even Ron Paul. Like no one can go into Congress and maintain a 100% and cap libertarian score. And like anyway, so this is what I see is like, yeah, that's a nice idea. It never works in practice, even with our guys taking over the whole party when I tried to do it with Blake Masters, it was a revolt, dude, a revolt against me when I was going to run when I had my maximum juice, but and I had I had the candidate writing articles for Lou Rockwell.com about how we were lied into World War One. I was like, ah, pretty good, right, dude? Nope, not good enough. He's a border restrictionist. Well, all right, then, then this strategy's over, so that's why it just seems to me even with that being considered. At this point, look, I don't think we're trying to do a big thing where I run for president and we establish what the name of libertarianism, you know, that sounded like a good idea in 2020. It doesn't make any sense to me in 2026 right now be wisely decided that actually it wasn't a good idea after all at the end of 23 there, and I'm really glad that you did, especially in hindsight, that that would have been the worst move for the election of 24. Well, I'll tell you just got tonight, let me just come on one more thing. I'm sorry. I'll let you get back to your points here, but there is something because I know this is a little bit difficult of a thing. I've already gotten pushed back in the last week, over saying things like, man, I really do not want a Democrat to win in 28 because people then go, oh, so are you already like, like laying the foundation to sell out and support JD Vance or something like this? And it's like, no, dude, I'm not going to support JD Vance or Marco Rubio. I'm not going to support anyone from this administration short of, as I said, a miracle. This is what they consider leaving the door open short of some miracle happening here. No, I can't support it. But like, man, I know that even the war hawks, right? But they would always just demon out the left. The left is going to come and pack the Supreme Court and trans your kid and do all this thing. That's why you have to support Donald Trump no matter how bad this war was. Obviously, we've been fighting against that for a year and a half. But dude, now that the Democrats have the House and the Senate and are almost certainly going to have that. And the odds look like a Democratic president is going to take that too. I'm sorry, man, I am really concerned about that, really concerned about that. It is very hard to overstate how much the Democratic establishment overstepped even constitutional norms. And I don't even mean constitution, like your interpretation of the correct interpretation of the constitution. Like the way the constitutional norms already were, accepted post-bush. They even broke those. The level of interference in elections, of tech censorship, of intervention throughout the world, outright declaring that the world is a battlefield. The Obama doctrine was very different from the Bush doctrine. You know, there's so many things we could go through. I don't even hit senile presidents or COVID for God's sakes or Ukraine. But like, I'm very concerned about the Democratic establishment coming back in. And if you're telling me our project here has like a zero percent chance of actually influencing policy, but has a really good chance of handing the country to the Democrats, I am out. Like, as of right now, I'm not trying to do that, guys. I don't think it's a good idea. That's not good for the prospects for liberty. And look, and especially when we have a real potential of at least four different guys who could be credible, non-interventionist, Republican candidates, Thomas Massey, Joe Kent, Rand Paul, and Tucker Carlson. All of them are potential major party candidates who could potentially win. So it's not like, yeah, but we know it's going to be Jeb Bush this time or it's Mike Rogers is going to be the nominee or one of these. We do not know that. In fact, there is a fight for control of the right. It's going to be hard as hell and it's going to be a lot of fun to watch, but it has to happen. So the last thing we want to do is siphon off all of the non-interventionist right wingers from the battlefield when that's the battlefield, right? So now, and so this is the thing. And because there are nationalist paleo conservatives, libertarians, and just kind of plain old Republican voters, column T party, column, whatever, who are just over this, who just don't believe in the empire anymore. How could they? After all of this, nothing to show for permanent intervention since the fall of the Soviet Union. We've done nothing but drop bombs and what do we have to show for any of it, but bankruptcy and our society unraveling here. So everybody is over it except the very last to catch up or the 70 something year olds in power in the Republican party up there. But I mean, just look at how much excitement that did grow up around Dr. Paul when Bush was still in the chair and the consensus on the Republican right was for John McCain and whatever he's going to do. And yet Dr. Paul was able to drum up so much support because people knew he was speaking the truth. Now it was 20 years ago, okay? So which I can't believe that's how old I am, I guess you are. You and me both mine and yours too now, Dave. But so listen, here's a thing of it too. And I think people kind of know this, but maybe no one ever explains this very well or like says out loud in English in a way. So like people just think it's just a conspiracy of the some power that keeps it the two party system. But what it is is it's James Madison wrote it like this in the Constitution, everything is winner take all 51% and you win the district, the house, the Senate seat, the governorship, whatever it is, it's 51% winner take all. So that's why we have two parties. The Democratic party is essentially one unbroken chain since Thomas Jefferson resigned from the Washington administration and created the Democratic Republicans. And that's the party that became just the Democrats of Andrew Jackson that we've had ever since then. And the Republican party is the same Republican party and yes, they've switched, you know, policies and identities, you know, back and forth a little bit over the time but still it's the same party since Abraham Lincoln won the presidency in 1861 or 18, in the election of 1860. So the reason why that is is not just like, oh, corruption or whatever, like, oh, it's, they have unfair ballot access rules or whatever, like all those things are true, okay? But what it is is this, the two parties are coalitions of multiple different factions who are allied together for one overriding purpose, keeping the other guys out. They are worse, so I'm willing to ally with you against them. Like you're just talking about, man, these Democrats, I think I might prefer a right-winger. Like we know you're a libertarian, but hey, you know, coalitions sometimes are necessary in the face of, I don't know, a Kamala Harris presidency impending or something like that. I don't know. So if you look at the Democrats, for example, right, you have blacks, you have gays, you have trial lawyers, you have the Israelis, you have, you know, what are Hollywood, whatever. On the right, you have, you know, working class guys, you have country club, Republicans and business owners and Christians and the Israelis and, you know, Wall Street and these are these coalitions of these two sides. In the libertarian's part of that, loosely speaking, we count as more or less, don't lynch me on the right because we believe in property rights. We're not socialists and on that basic sense that makes us the right in opposition to the regime and their eminent claim of domain over all of us. So, we are just one of those factions. And if you include the Paleos and the non-interventionists and the more nationalist types and the anti-immigration and guys and whatever, then still we leave out factions. That's still only some factions of the Republican Party. So assuming you could get all the factions who are pretty dang non-interventionist to agree and leave the party, really all you're doing is leaving the Republican Party that ain't going anywhere in the hands of the same old war party that it's been in the hands of all along and you're in other words, arrest it out of their hands, rendering the field to them. You're essentially sabotaging the men of good will and good understanding who have the opportunity to do the right thing. And let me say one more thing here for us, which is that if you people have ever seen the documentary, Get Me Roger Stone. It's on Netflix or it was Get Me Roger Stone. And he is famously the Nexonian Rat Effor, who Dirty Trickster guy, and it's a fantastic documentary about him by the way. And one of the things that it shows in there was how he screwed Papu Cannon. And Papu Cannon was, you know, he ran in the primaries in 92 and I believe in 96 as well. And he was a real pain inside of the Republican establishment that wanted to push free trade and foreign interventionism and he was a protectionist and non-interventionist informed policy. And they want to rid of him. And so how did they destroy the great Papu Cannon? Well, Roger Stone tricked him into running as a third party candidate and into dropping out of the Republican nomination and becoming the reform party candidate instead, which what was left of Ross Perot's party at that time, which by the way, Ross Perot had billions of dollars and wasn't able to get very far with that thing whatsoever. But they convinced Pat, Roger Stone, the famous Dirty Trickster, convinced Pat to run third party and then what do you do? He sick Donald Trump on him, he had Donald Trump enter the race against him and he had Donald Trump call Pat Buchanan a Hitler-loving anti-gay, anti-women, right wing anti-immigrationist. And that's the true history of the world, I'm sorry people, that's what happened, okay? And so how do you destroy a good non-interventionist Republican in the Republican party and prevent him from having influence over the Republican right and prevent him from having a chance at actually sitting in that chair behind that resolute desk and calling these shots? You trick him into running as a third party thing. Now, I'm not accusing Michael Heiss of trying to fool anyone, but I'm just saying I'm, of course, just a mistake, right? He's de facto Roger Stone here accidentally doing the dirty work of the war party inside the Republican party, which those things have been synonymous, but they do not have to be. And so this was Roger Stone laying out the Primrose path for Pat Buchanan, oh, you know what you should do, Pat, you should go this way when that's right off a cliff. Yep. All right, guys, let's take a moment and think our sponsor for today's show, which is super power. People are always talking about getting healthier, making new years resolutions or plans for the summer to get in shape. If you really want to do something for your health, check out superpower. This is the future of how people are understanding their health. What superpower does is they send a licensed professional to your home, or you can visit a nearby lab if you prefer. It's one simple blood draw that gives you over 100 biomarkers, which is way more than you typically get. 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Not only did superpower reduce the price to $199. But for a limited time, our listeners can get an additional $20 off if they use the promo code problem. Just go to superpower.com and remember to use that promo code problem at checkout for an additional $20 off your membership. All right, let's get back on the show. Yep. So I mean, the other obvious example there for libertarians to have is, you know, Ron Paul ran for president three times. Ron Paul ran for president in 1988, excuse me, as a libertarian and nobody cared. And this is just the harsh truth of it. He ran as a libertarian and nobody cared. He ran as a Republican and it changed our whole movement. And many people's lives broke fundraising records generated enthusiasm amongst millions. And, you know, you know, I wanted to comment a little bit about what you said before, you know, because part of when we were launching the, the Mises caucus takeover, we had a lot of these conversations. People used to say things who were arguing, why don't you run as a Republican day and try to get in those debates or whatever. And it's like, Oh, because there was no path to that. That was the obvious reason why there's no path. I'm a shit talking comedian. I'm not a Republican congressman. How would I get onto the Republican debates? It doesn't even make sense. The we saw a unique position that was open where through the podcast, I could take over the party and we could get on these big podcasts that we could launch a thing and have a big speaking tour. Like, this is a totally different thing. But messy Joe Kent, Tucker Carlson, any of these guys can not only have the speaking tour they could have in the LP, have a much more enormous speaking tour in the Republican party, plus they can dominate the podcast scene in that same way. So it's just huge advantages. It's literally nothing, but big advantages to be in the Republican party rather than in the libertarian party. So it doesn't look, even if you rename it the America first party, I mean, even on that point, they could get the nomination, right? I know where I was going to go. Yeah, go ahead. No, look, I because I don't want to down where people will say, and I saw how you saying this and he's making some fair points. There's going to be a huge fight. The Republican establishment is going to do everything they can to not let you know you guys in and don't get it mistaken. Ian Scott or not arguing, no, they're won't be saying, yes, it'll be the fight of our lives. But it's a fight, but it's a fight for something. It's a fight for our country. It's not a fight for owning the gay libertarians and taking over a little social club and maybe breaking 5% and giving the country to the Democrats. It wouldn't. Now, look, I don't want to send people in there. If you were to pull right now where Tucker Carlson, I think he's going to get like 7% or something like that. Thomas Massey will probably be down all of that. I know there are, as I've talked about before on the show, there's the very shallow surface level talking point of he lost his primary in a district. How's he going to win the national election for someone like Thomas Massey? Same with Joe Kent. They say he lost a congressional race. How's he going to win the national race? But hey, if you guys, I'm sorry, if you can have enough creativity to imagine us transforming the most inefficient object in the history of objects, the libertarian party into something relevant and inspiring, then share a little bit of creativity with this. You're telling me that that candidate would stand with credibility owning the most popular issues of our time. That candidate would dominate the new media space. That candidate would dominate everyone 50 and under. I mean, we're going in almost guaranteed a Bernie Sanders type major cultural movement that is only going to build and build with time because they're right about everything. The only way, the only way that the only reason why even the boomers who used to love Tucker Carlson and Thomas Massey, they've only been convinced about this because they don't hear from them. They only hear from Mark Levin lying about them. So anyway, it's just like there's a world of potential to do a huge thing here. And we almost guarantee that at best, it becomes a side show that maybe can break 5% and open the door for something that maybe in the future will most likely just be taken over and fall apart, but like whatever, it could maybe that gets Democrats elected. And in 2028, we're looking at an immediate catastrophe for the cause of liberty, rather than potentially a situation where like we either just came damn near close to winning, which would really shake up the system. Or we want because by the way, coming damn near close to winning and making some noise or different things, they're different things. No one in the deep state, no one in the real halls of power ever feared Ron Paul was going to wrestle power away from them ever. The highest it ever got is what we see in the Epstein files. There's one candidates being a pain in the ass. You know, that's like the highest level people on Ron Paul. Why is this one guy an ass? Why is this one guy a jerk who doesn't support Warren Israel? Who's this guy's deal? But like if Ron Paul had ever really almost took the presidency, but failed. Dude, that may have shaken up the whole system to a point where they go like, okay, man, we need to at least like, you know, adjust or reform or something. Who knows? But there's really the tempo there. Yeah, I mean, if he had won the nomination and had gone down, you know, fighting, then that would have been a whole new era of the Republican party. And what it is for that he was the one who got the nomination. And so by the way, Dave, over the years, how many times have I, you know, forgot that I already said this and repeated myself to you that like, ah, geez, just think if instead of the crash of 2008, happening in September 2008, right after Ron finally dropped out of the race, just two months before the election of 2008, what if that crash had happened in '07 or even better for our analogy? What if that crash and crash had happened in the fall of 2006? For those younger people listening who aren't familiar, Dr. Paul is a legitimate scholar of the Austrian School of Economics and had predicted for years, had explained exactly why the bubble that Bill Clinton and W Bush had built up and the Federal Reserve had built up in housing was going to lead to the giant crash. All of that was on the record. And after the crash, I said, wow, Ron Paul was so right and all that. Well, what if he, what if the crash had happened two years earlier and he had had that to run on through the entire campaign of 2007 and 2008 that yeah, he did tell you so. And everybody knows it's on the record and everybody's reading Mises and Rothbard now and you know, or at least Hayek. And, and you know what I mean? Like maybe he wouldn't have been able to beat Obama's tall, dark and handsome and whatever I get it, but it would have been, he probably could have gotten the nomination. And even if on, he wouldn't able to win the presidency on the substance, it would not have been John McCain and Mitt Romney's Republican party anymore. That would have been the difference made right there. At least there would have been much greater potential for him to, to what come out. Well, that's the situation now where we told you that is everyone on the non interventionist right and left and everywhere said, don't attack wrong because if you do, this is going to happen. And then they did. And then what happened, we lost. And it was a catastrophe. And the Republican Party just got crushed over it. America's about to get crushed by the Democrats over it because they lost because of this war. And so it's the crash of '08, but it happened in '06. Right now, happened in '26, the crash of the war parties grand plans for the Middle East. And look how it all came down. And so now, Massey and Rand and Joe Kent and Tucker Carlson have nothing but told you so to run on the whole time. Now, I'm telling you, you just wait and see, which was what Ron was running on. And I'll tell you this because I have been just saying, right, and I'm not trying to make this a big eye told you so. I'm trying to make this. I'm telling you what's next because I've been predicting on every goddamn giant show for the last year and a half that exactly this would happen, as has you and Thomas Massey and Tucker Carlson. I'm even taking credit. It was the most obvious prediction in the world. It's not like anything we should get too much credit for, but I will tell you this and I've been saying because I have this kind of two-part prediction that I've been saying. That was the first part. We're now moving into the second part here. And there is a range of possibilities of what could happen next, but I really see them all most likely going in one direction. And the range of possibilities is, you know, it's funny, Scott. We didn't even cover on the show yesterday that Donald Trump had that big tweet signaling that he might be winding down the war. Didn't even cover it on the show because that's how valuable what Donald Trump says about anything anymore about the war is. I can't even cover it every time he declares victory or declares an end because like who the hell knows, man, he said everything there is to say through this thing. If possible, he's going to walk away from the war now. If that happens, it's only going to become more and more evident over time that there was no long-term gain for the short-term pain. And by the way, we're going to keep feeling the pain of this war for another year. All economists are like agreed on this at least. So we're going to keep feeling the pain while knowing that there's no gain. Or the other possibility is that there's some more strikes, some more destruction, and then we get to that point. The other possibility is something really fantastic, a catastrophic like escalation, which hoping is not going to be the case. But in any of these possibilities, man, I see Donald Trump's approval rating next year being in the 20s. I'm telling you, man, this guy is tanking, tanking, and he's gotten into like a helicopter spiral, like a death spiral where you're going down. We're like, he can only make it worse. His closing pitch for the midterms was, yeah, gas is up, but we're making so much money. Everyone in the audience looked around and said, who? Who's making so much money? I only get the high gas prices. I don't get any of the money. Anyway, the point is here, this opening is only going to get wider and wider and wider in this thing. And like, I'm just saying, man, I really do like that is going to be the next step for all the people who predicted this. That prediction is only it's snowballing now, dude. What the disaster, it understands every bad thing the Democrats do over the next 10 years, every overstep, every woken sanity, every policy, it's all going to be so clear that it's back on you guys. It's on you guys for this war. It's just going to keep getting worse and worse. >> Yep, I mean, that's my knee during every time I see Gunther Eagleman say, oh my God, look at how horrible the Democrats are. I just was like, yeah, thanks a lot for selling us out to Israel. Like, what can you say, man, that is the reason and everybody knows it. Unlike where they rock to where, you know, I guess people finally figured out it was the Neocons, but then they didn't figure out that the Neocons is the Likud, dude. But like in this case, it's just so obvious. >> Also, I got to say, man, me and you make so much effort and almost every time me and you are on a big show, we'll make sure that we go on one monetary policy rant, even when it's totally not what the show's about. You know, I've seen like you with Anacasparia and you're like, okay, hold on, young lady, we're just going to talk about monetary policy for a minute because I insist that we do. And, you know, as much as I have tried so hard to move the needle on people understanding that it's not just what you pay with your taxes, but the other thing you have to pay for is the cost of everything. And that when the cost of everything goes up, that is you paying for the war in Iraq and Medicare Part D and you know, like the whole government, paying for the government is what causes the prices to go up. And maybe I'd love to think that like Ron Paul really did move the needle on that issue. I would love to think that maybe in a smaller way, me and you have moved the needle on that issue, but what this war has done due to the economic blockade and the dynamics in the straight of our moves is it has in a different way than any of the other wars connected directly in the American people's mind that the cost of that war is I got to pay more for stuff. And inflation and the price of things are more on people's minds than ever before. And I do got to say there's there's probably like seven major things that make the war in Iran different in kind from the other theaters in the global war on terror. But this is one of the major ones that like people have for the first time connected. I remember we used to argue in the war in Iraq days, you know, even when I was a leftist and there's I was against the war, we would argue that like, okay, we're not paying for it now, but we will pay for it down the road. The way I remember, I was driving a cab and I could fill my crown Victoria up for 20 bucks, 99 cents a gallon. And I'd sit there and watch because it was always, you know, 0.99 something something. So I would always, you know, watch the gauge to see how, how perfectly would line up the dollar price and the gallons. Well, that all came to an end with the invasion of Iraq and the price. Two seventy five three dollars a gallon. That was one of the reasons I had to quit cab driving at that time. Well, actually, yeah, maybe maybe you were older than me at the time. So maybe I just wasn't out in the workforce. You know, maybe different level. Yeah, yeah, it is a different level. And and people were like 70% in favor of that war. So it was and Bush at least tried to sell it to them with a bunch of lies for a year and a half and all of this, where no one supported this thing. And so the resentment there is like, no one wants to apologize for it really. Everybody's feeling it the same. Nobody's feeling like, you know, they were one of the ones who cheerled for it. So now they got to ignore the consequence or any of that. Everybody's just as resentful as I was then. But so now here's another crucial part of this is that taking over the libertarian party is could be in this case of virtually impossible task or at least an absolutely thankless one to wit. The Mises caucus just lost the party. I was there. I sat there through day after day after day of that clown show in there. And a lot of Mises people did show up, but you know what? A lot of Mises people didn't including a lot of leaders and former leaders of it. We're not there. And the new waivers took the party back over again. I mean, the former chair was like they say he was a kind of half and half wishy washy type, but not that bad. But now it's all gay porn producers and new wave hairdo lady and whatever run the thing. And they have no interest in doing an America first anti-war coalition type, whatever party where they bring in a bunch of right wingers who are. Evoudly not libertarians in the first place. And with the about purpose of taking it over and changing its name and inviting junk younger, the socialists to join and whatever kind of they are not going to go for that. And they're going to fight like hell for that. And on top of that, it would totally be the wrong thing. I mean, when the Mises caucus did the takeover before, it was this is the libertarian movement taking over the libertarian party because we're sick and tired of being represented this way, right? But this is not this is a valid not the literary movement taking over the libertarian party. This is some other movement taking the libertarian party away from the libertarian movement. Well, they're just not going to go for that. And there's going to be a thousand lawsuits and whatever. Also, they don't have Joe Kent. And I have that from him directly that he is definitely not doing this. They certainly do not have Tucker Carlson. They do not have, I don't even think anybody's even talking about Rand Paul. And they might be able to convince Massey, but if they did, it would be a total wreck. Also, they don't have you and they don't have me and they don't have Tom Woods. And I have that, you know, on the record from Tom Woods to me, but he also has said that publicly on a podcast, he sent me the link to here's him talking about. I'm not surprised. I have not talked to Tom about it, but I'm not surprised to hear that. So, so the three of us who helped lead the takeover, you know, well, whatever, three of, who helped lead the takeover, we're not for it. And we also don't have Nick Sarwalk, the hate figure there, who everyone was rallying against in order to thwart. And not only was it you me and Tom and everyone trying to lead this takeover, but a huge part of it at the time was the explicit and implicit understanding that we were going to run you for president. It wasn't just the Mises take over the Libertarian party. It was the Dave Smith audience and Dave Smith and Ron Paul type Libertarians taking over the Libertarian party so that we can make sure that and for the avowed stated purpose, including a badly stated by me, so that we have a friendly Libertarian party so that when we run my man for president in 24, we don't have a bunch of horrible people sniping at him, leading the LP and contradicting him during the race and all this stuff, which is what could happen, which ended up being null and void anyway, which is a huge part of why all those people went home and stop participating in the LP since then. So all of those things that were the energy around the take over then do not exist. Not the consensus to do it in the Libertarian movement, not the consensus among you me and Tom, not an enemy hate figure to rally around and not go ahead. I'm sorry, sorry, so no, you're so right about all of those points, but just also again, like I just can't stress to people enough. Look, the big question got raised in 2016, because what happened in 2016, and this is when all of us, me and you started looking at the Libertarian party, was that it had all fallen apart. You know, we were in the Ron Paul revolution in 2008 and 2012. The hope was for Ron Paul in 2016. His presidential campaign had gone down in flames, and Donald Trump had overtaken the Republican party with something else, and we were cast out. Like the Ron Paul people were kind of cast out of that, and it was like, oh, what are we going to do now? So really get this party. After 2020, it had been the year of Donald Trump embracing lockdowns and doing nothing about riots and, you know, like a million other things during the whole COVID tyranny. And by the end of it, Donald Trump was the most disgraced political figure in America, after turning on his own people after whipping up up at January 6th. So again, after 2020, you're going man, the Republican party is owned by this thing that is toxic. It's this, so we're going to this third party. Right now, the situation is that no one has the Republican party. It's up for the taking, and we have good Republicans. All the people you mentioned are Republicans. This is just not only do we have none of the things that you just mentioned, which were all the heart of this whole idea, but the facts on the ground are just completely different. Yep. All right. Now, so here's where we get into some data point stuff. And I know I have been accused of misleading people with this information, but I don't lie. And I have this on the very highest authority. So here's what it is. You can't rename the report. I mean, pardon me, the libertarian party into the American Freedom Party in almost every case. Now, the ones where you maybe could be in places where they're not on the ballot, but in almost every state where they're on the ballot, they have to run petition drives to stay on the ballot or, you know, when there's different qualifications, but well, for one thing, in every place where they have to do a petition drive, which in many cases is already over or is ongoing, you can't change the name of the party because people just signed a petition for one party. Now, you can't change it to something else or you're baiting switching the people who signed the petition and all that. And they won't allow that to happen. So they're, and remember, there are 50 different states where you'd have to get on the ballot. That's 50,000 lawsuits to prevent this from the Republicans, especially to prevent that from happening. And now, how do I know all these things is not because on the world's expert on this, but I work with Eric Harris at Ansai Word.com. And he is best friends in the world with, and first of all, he could do this by himself. But he's also best friends in the world with Richard Winger. And Richard Winger is the absolute premier expert on third party politics and laws. I mean, I don't mean internal politics in the parties. I mean, state laws regarding parties and how they operate. If it wasn't for Richard Winger, there probably wouldn't even be a national libertarian party at all. They would not be on the ballot and hardly any of the states that they're in, whatever. And I'm talking over the last decade, Steve. Okay. This is the guy who knows more about it than anyone. And all I got to do is I got to say, Hey, Eric, ask Richard and get these stats for me. And that's just because I'm a lucky guy and not the thing. So I have this information for you from the highest authority on this. So here's some of it. Okay. In 21 states, LP status in 2028 is based on the number of votes that they got in 2026. Because of that fact, you would have to start over with a new party, right? It was the LP that won those votes and therefore has status. You can't just rename it. You would have to replace it with the new thing in five of those 21 states. Technically, they might allow a name change, but they have these, what they, what happens is they say that these are archaic laws. They're old and archaic laws that might allow you to do that. But the secretary of state in every state is the one who decides. And they're going to divide that. No. Actually, that's an old archaic law. And it doesn't apply. And no, you can't change the name because I say so. And you know, you're telling me you're telling me that law is derived from force and not a document. Yeah, something like that. I mean, depending on how it's going to be tough, that's going to be tough for libertarians to wrap their heads around. But yeah, it turns out. And Dave, whether you're lawyer golf with the judge or not, and in most cases, hours don't. But that's what they're going to say. And there are examples where people try to do things like this. And where the secretaries of state have just said, nah, it's really a simple set. So therefore, quote unquote, it is effectively very unlikely. Says Richard Winger, the absolute authority that you would be able to the absolute authority comment that you'd be able to change the name. There are nine states where it's based on registration, like in California, or on some other previous qualification with the state from earlier years. So again, now this would be people going down there and officially registering as libertarians. And if enough people register as libertarians, then the libertarians are on the ballot. Well, they registered as libertarians to get the libertarians on the ballot. You can't just come and say what they really meant was they want the American freedom party on the ballot instead because we took it over and we want to change the name of it. And I think they won't let you do that because it's not just the membership of the party, it's the public who register and vote. And so then, oh, and that's a 80,000 threshold in California, by the way, there. So that's 30 out of the 50 states there. And the other 20 is still effectively illegal in three of nine. I'm sorry, my notes might be a little messier in three of the honestly, though, that's enough. But yeah, you can keep growing if you want. Yeah, let me go. You can be a new party, but you would need separate petitions to get anyone on the ballot. So though, oh, you can be the American freedom party. But for any person that you want, candidates, right? Yeah, yeah, you have a separate petition for each candidate and now have to start those petition drives all over again. In Maryland, they just finished their petition drive and they're waiting to find out if they can be on the ballot in 2028. They probably will be on it, but they won't be able to change their name then because there's no implied consent from the petition signers to change what they're doing. And then get this, you heard of this state New York. It's one of the more prominent ones. I have some familiarity. Yeah. So in New York, it's against the law to have the word America or American in the name of your political party. So that's sort of a kind of, you know, probably relevant point. Eric told me a story. They tried to run Doctor Spock, you know, from the Beastie boy, Larry. Um, no, no, that was Mr. Spock. Doctor Spock, the guy with the insane baby care book that said, let him cry or whatever, not crazy stuff. But anyway, so they tried to run him and he was like the people's party candidate or whatever, but they couldn't get the people's party. And they couldn't change the name of any party around the country. So what they did was they had whatever obscure third left wing parties all endorsed him from their own party. And the whole thing was just a giant confusing mess. And the whole thing went exactly nowhere as you would expect for to go exactly nowhere. Okay. So that's all I got to say about that part of it. And then we get back to, and this is the way I explained it to Joe Kent, because I know that Joe Kent has been, you know, people have been trying to convince him about this. But I, you know, he's a government employee. So I told him in his language that like, look, man, this is below your pay grade. These guys are stars. They get, there's no reason in the world to pull them down to our ghetto level where we're doing this LP, you know, rinky dink stuff to paraphrase Samantha power, right? Like these guys have much bigger fish to fry. Joe Kent was the director of counterterrorism. Again, Tucker Carlson is the most important man on the American right, other than the president himself right now. You know, Massey obviously has some public relations problems with the American right. But then again, he's got two years to fight about it if he wants to get in there. And he's got the most popular political figure with 40 and under people on the American right. I mean, the loved Thomas Massey. And like you said, dude, from before, they're all the people, they're all Ron Paul after the O eight crash. You know, all of them are the people who broke with the president. One resigned from like gave up his career. The other, you know, Tucker very publicly broke with him gave up his personal relationship and his access to him. And of course, Massey also gave up his career. They literally, all of them really gave things up, breaking with the president over this policy that they were proven right on. That is a hell of a thing to start a campaign with. Like even just think I heard, um, some clip the other day where like one of these packs always will Chamberlain, you know, what he was saying that, um, he's like, well, what Thomas Massey has to learn from this is that you're a junior player in our coalition. And if you want to be in our coalition, you could get some things, but you got to go along with us. It's like, dude, nice try, bro, but it's been clearly demonstrated. The coalition with us works without us gets you slammed. And here's the thing, dude, like, I don't know what else to say. No, we won't go along with wars of aggression. That's a red line for us. I'll sit here while the Democrats win. Yes, we will do that. And honestly, we believe that tanks us just as much as socialism tanks us as a nation. So it's not the split that you think it is. Hey, guess what? When you really get to the next level, you'll find out that that's socialism too, but that'll blow your fucking mind. Anyway, but yeah, we're not voting for you. If you start wars of aggression and lie us into them, sorry, you don't get us and you lose. You lose the country. But if you want to come get on board and vote for Thomas Massey, you want to get on board and come vote for Tucker Carlson, we're offering you that coalition back. So like that's kind of, you know what I mean? Like what we have to work with, our hand is going to grow stronger and stronger over the next year as theirs grows weaker and weaker, or we could remove ourselves. I'm going to be laughed at and get Democrats elected. Yeah, it's a tough choice. Yep. And look, I mean, a big part of this in my mind's eyes, just the debate stage itself. And I'd be really happy if just Joe Kent ran or any one of these guys ran, even if it was Rand Paul, I would like for him to act tougher, but whatever. But what I really want is for all four of these guys to run and maybe somebody I ain't thought of yet either because that's, you know, in the visual, that's the representation that we need up on that stage is everybody's up there at least half of them are fighting over who's the most non interventionist. And the other guys are all over 70 on our total hawks and totally discredited and everybody hates them and everybody can tell. Remember in not that this worked out well or whatever, but in the in the debates in it was in a way right where it was it was Hillary Obama and John Edwards on one side of the stage. And then it was Mike Ravel and Dennis Kucinich on the other side of the stage, right? And it was just like three devils, three Hillary Clinton's and two decent men who are trying to stop all the worst thing. And you just see it right in front of you visually, you know, portrayed that way. And that's what we want up on that debate stage is the younger generations represented by the non interventionists in relatively equal numbers to the world. Show the American people that the days where it was just wrong, Paul or whatever, that's over now. It's at least an even fight for control of the Republican party. And let me say this because I really cannot stress this enough. If we try to zoom out and focus on the fact that there's going to be two competing primaries going on, there's going to be a Democratic in a Republican primary, whether we like it or not, that's what's going to happen. And one of those parties is going to win the presidency in 2028. Everyone knows that. I want people to really think about this for a little bit. First of all, I don't know if anybody really paid attention to this election that just happened last week. Something very exciting is going to happen on the Democratic side. And we better damn well pray something very exciting is going to happen on the Republican side. Right now we're in a very weird situation. Keep in mind again that like, you know, the complete transformation on how people feel about Israel and these wars is very, very new. It started in 23, happened through 24 and 25. We haven't even really had one presidential election yet since Israel lost 50 to 70 points of approval rating. There's a race right now. There's a race between both two political parties, the major ones, about who's going to have the presidential candidate who's unapologetically anti-Israel, anti-Israel lobby, anti-war, like not playing games for the first time ever, like going to really have that candidate. There's a race to that right now. Did you see what else I had just did to the entire Israel lobby? I mean, there's, there's somebody's going to fill that void on the Democratic side. They're going to have a candidate who's saying, fuck the Israel lobby, fuck Israel, fuck these wars for them. They just committed a genocide. This is horrific. There's going to be someone unapologetically in a believable way saying that. That is going to cause a crazy spectacle because they're going to be on board with like 70 to 80% of the Democratic base while the Democratic establishment is going to hate their guts. There's going to be, and my god, if that person comes out of the Democratic side, who's willing to say that? And we have Rubio representing the Republicans. He will get John McCain. He will get absolutely blown out my points. The thing I was saying about Will Chamberlain, what's going to become clearer and clearer is that that's the only way to win this thing. That's the only way to run against it. Like, we have such an opportunity here to get in on the right. Look, who can be a credible like really anti-war anti-Israel critic, right? Critic of the lobby. Who can do that? Well, it's like the people from Tucker Carlson's camp, the people from Nick Fuentes's camp, the people from Candace Owens's camp, the people from our camp. This is it. We're all trying to get in now to see who can get a candidate first who might credibly be able to articulate these things. And if we don't, if we see, if the Democrats will, and it'll be a socialist type. Yep. All right. So now listen, I know we're over time. Let me, let me, let me, yes, I sure am. And I'll try to wrap up here. But I want to get back to something I said at the beginning here, which is that it's not true that I refuse to listen to Michael Heise. He called me for advice about this. And I called him screaming that this is the craziest, stupid thing I've ever heard of in my life. And don't eat better, not do it. But also I heard myself too. And so I said, okay, look, go ahead, dude. And I shut my mouth. And I heard him out. I absolutely heard him out. We're on the phone for like half an hour or whatever. The thing is he just couldn't convince me. And his idea, what his argument was to me, that whether we create a new third party thing or whether our best guys, you know, are the ones we favor the most run in the GOP, that they cannot win at all, their chances are, quote, negligible, not even either way. So we might as well build this new thing and hopefully be an enduring new institution into the future and it'll get some congressman elected and stuff. So my thing about that is that one, it's not true that none of these non-interventionists have no chance to be the nominee. They have a very good chance to be the nominee. All of them already are important people in the Republican party. None of them are from our ghetto. All of them are already big shots in that world to say that to just dismiss, oh, come on. Well, they can't win the GOP anyway. So we might as well do this with them is just foolish. It's just not, never. It's at all. And then secondly, no, we're not going to build some enduring new thing. I refer you back to the beginning of the interview. We have a two party system because their coalitions of factions built on keeping the other guy out. We are not going to build a thing that is going to replace the Republican party as the right wing faction in America with the $150 billion that I found under my mattress this morning. We just, it's not going to happen. The best thing that we can do is to help the non-interventionist factions inside the Republican party win their primaries and defeat the war party inside the Republican party. And this stuff about, oh, and then we'll get some congressman elected. Well, now we're just making up bullshit. Come on. No, you're not. You're going to get which congressman elected where? You have the same problem there. 51% winner take all. Why does the libertarian or whatever third party candidate always get less than 10% for the same reason they're going to get less than 10% here, dude. This is, so that was his only argument was there's no point in running any of these guys as Republicans at all. And we're going to build this new thing. And both of those things are just completely false. They're just both completely false. There is no new thing. There are no new congressman. And Michael Heist did not just inherit a fortune from, you know, the Ross Perot estate to try again to do something like this. There's just enough to build this on top of. And I'm sorry, because I got a mildly contradict you a little bit from the beginning there. Sure. I don't know anything about this guy, Brett wet wine. Sorry, sorry, sorry. So I know that you did. Yeah, yeah, no, no, no. He's no friend of mine. I don't know anything about him really other than they say that he's the less worse one of the two brothers. And not to be conspiratorial about this day, but I know a guy who this guy's brother, you know, that my friend was like saying good anti Israel stuff out in public. And this guy's brother came to him and was like, Hey, maybe you want to come to Israel and take a little trip and see for yourself that it ain't so bad. And this kind of thing, this is that Scott, Scott, let me just say since you said it, I told the story on a Jack Niel's podcast, but I didn't name him. But he's called, he's the guy who called me and said, his brother Eric one. There you go. Not Brett. I don't know. I said this. The kid Jack Niel, who had me on, he asked me if I'd ever been approached by anyone like that or something like that. And I just told the story, but I didn't tell the name. And then everyone's like, dude, why did you tell the name? And then I was like, yeah, I guess I don't know why I'm not telling the name. I mean, it's literally the only contact we've ever had is that call. I don't have to protect him. Yeah, it was really weird. It was Eric Weinstein. Well, I guess I walked out of the room during that part of the interview, because I thought I saw that. Maybe I didn't see the whole thing of it. I did see that interview, but sorry. Anyway, so yeah, man, this guy Brett Weinstein's brother, not saying you the sins of the brother, not the sins of the brother, but you know, yeah, okay. Hey, it's at least taken under advisement. I'm not saying that anyone is whispering this guy's ear to do this, but come on. And let me just put it this way. No offense to Mr. Weinstein. But what the hell does he know about American political, you know, electoral politics, third party politics and money and elections and ballot access or any other thing? I actually didn't get a chance to watch his podcast, but somebody told me that they saw his podcast where he talked about this and he said one, he thinks that the Libertarian Party is already on the ballot in all 50 states. Two, he thinks that the Mises Caucus already rules the Libertarian Party and that this will be a friendly welcome takeover. Oh, geez. Apparently, which is completely false. And so he doesn't know what he's talking about here. And I don't know why anyone would think that he knows what he's talking about. Are him and his brother famous for being billionaires and being willing to somehow spend billions of dollars. in order to somehow try to build a new party to replace the Republican party or what is the plan here or this guy is just blowing smoke in the same way Dave that every 10th grader learns that wow the Republicans and the Democrats both suck it's too bad there's not a third party but like yeah any 10th grader can think of that but can you finish the sentence can you explain how you're going to do it and what it's going to look like and who's going to pay for it and how it's supposed to work in any meaningful way whatsoever obviously not dude dude and this is Brett Weinstein into this dude I was just by the way I was just arguing with like I call him a post libertarian guy but he didn't like that term but it's an old real hardcore fan of mine who I'm arguing with now and I understand where people get this frustration we dealt with this with the guys who called themselves post libertarians we're like at a certain point that it's just kind of like this but like why don't you just win you're the problem you know the problem with you libertarians Dave as you're always just sitting here complaining that's all you do you complain about what's going on with the government all the time how about you have the balls to seize power and you go dude you just blew my mind I never thought why don't I instead of just sitting here and podcasting about this why don't I just seize control of the war department and the federal reserve and the executive branch like great great idea I'm on board so what's the plan oh you don't have one your plan is to sit and toothlessly bitch that I'm toothlessly bitching okay anyway so now back to so once you have a plan then we can grow up and we can start it's like and and I will say this about Heisman and you know Michael had approached me about like kind of a separate organization not to do with the LP like before this was the idea and I was very encouraging about it and I'll remember one I think one of the first times I don't know if you had already established it but I think one of the first times we ever met face to face must have been like 10 11 years ago or something and it was right around the time you were starting you were about to start or I just started the libertarian institute and we were talking all about that and anytime someone goes hey we're gonna build an organization that could be a thing that'll advance liberty I'm oh yeah dude awesome and man the libertarian institute is turned into such a cool thing it's published some of the most important books over the last few years to use the LP as the organization I'd almost before this if it was anything else like to take over this thing that is run democratically where you got to sit through Roberts rules of order and though and just all has all the problems that we already know about bureaucracy where of course what rises to the top are the people who love bureaucracy the most the best players are at the people who love it the most it's just it's a terrible vehicle to function as this is what's going to be you know we'll build this and in the future it will give us this I just I think more likely in the future it will be taken over by pencared weirdos again because that's who's willing to dedicate their entire as you said earlier my people were willing to come out when we were doing a big thing in the name of Ron Paul and running me and all this but we're my people gonna stick around Scott to just be career bureaucrats no no look here's another thing people and he says said this and we do we do got a wrap up so hit I'll shut up and you can hit the rest of your points yeah okay I'm almost on here so so Michael somehow we got to build this left-right coalition Jenk Younger says he's interested this Weinstein guy is interested in like what if we could get some Republicans and we'll build this kind of left-right thing the problem with that as everybody knows already the problem that is the culture war as soon as you say the word immigration or abortion or any of the things then the coalition splits again you look we did this great rage against the war machine protest which was put on by Angela McCartle and the nieces caucus of the libertarian party in alliance with a bunch of leftists and we went down to the Lincoln Memorial and the reflecting pool thing and did a big thing this is in with January February of 2023 one year into the Ukraine war is what it was about and we were able to bring left wingers and left wingers and libertarians together you know including dr. Paul and Tulsi Gabbard is you know leans a little right but she came from the democratic party whatever so but and I knew then that if we had invited any of our right wing friends the whole thing would have fallen apart now us of pretend we had to do an event similar to that with our right wing friends but we wouldn't be able to bring any of our left wing friends because I just and look I'm a libertarian I'm a austenite which means I'm from a very liberal town in a very conservative state and I've always had right wing and left wing friends and I know not to bring them around each other too much because my militia guys and my hippies even though they agree on everything they don't agree on each other or they don't agree on they agree on lots of stuff but they don't agree on each other and they don't agree on these basic cultural type things so building a third party coalition that is a badly just like with the reform party Ross pro it's a badly non ideological it's the reform party we're going to try to bring more people together and do better now it ain't going to work man you need a program and that program is going to piss off half everybody so it's just built into the thing now what you could do is if big if but is still work the fight we we get one of our guys the nomination and then work hard on bringing over swing voters and let you know sincere non interventionist liberals and Democrats cross the line and vote for the Republican just like Donald Trump got you know the right Democrats are the Trump Democrats to cross the line and vote for him we go for that in the general election we don't get on that now we know there's the last thing to actually get the seat and and a little bit even in the primary you know because like a little bit in the primary there are the people in the other primary who look over and go yeah Ron Paul is the best of the Republicans you know but yes the game the way the game works there and and this is the beautiful thing then you don't have to lie we don't have to you know I said to you on the phone the other day my big joke about that is like someone gets up on a speed on on the stage and they go you know what we got to focus on all the important issues instead of getting divided over things like abortion and guns and then someone goes hey where do you stand on abortion and guns and they go obviously I'm pro choice and for gun restriction you know it's like okay so actually let's just be honest let Tucker Carlson or Thomas Massie go I'm good on guns and spending yeah I'm for gun rights and lowering spending okay and then we can have that like we can be honest this is where we stand but then what happens is one of two things if we win the primary which is a big if but we got a shot and let's fight that fight as we said before then either an L sciad type got through the Democratic primary who stands with the base who saying fuck Israel and fuck the wars and then it's like hey we're all good on that this issue now we can have a debate over those other issues and we can hope to bring over as many people as possible and I think we could win that fight but it be a fight you know a fight worth fighting whether we're going left wing socialist against the wars or something more America you get to keep more of your money and we're against the wars you know which is a big fight that we should be in to make sure it's on that side or the other possibility is that in establishment hawk Hakeem Jeffries gets through his candidate in which case we eat their lunch and take all the left wingers and bring them all over to coalition with us on those issues and then we can offer them hey guys this is where we stand on guns and this other stuff but if you can look past that this guy's a complete chill for the war party so that's where you have real power to do that big coalition shit not in launching a third party and saying we're all we're going to pretend abortion isn't an issue or something it doesn't work that way yeah exactly right all right I mean that's it for me here I just remember the ballot of Pat Buchanan one of the greatest political minds of the 20th century one of the greatest wingers and and into this one as well um everyone check out anti-war comm slash pat if you want exposure to his absolute brilliance but that's how Roger Stone screwed him was by convincing them to do something like this it's just a fool's errand sorry to coin a phrase there but it's the wrong path for people to take right now and so I hope I've done a little bit to undermine the idea and look I and I think I can speak for Scott when I say this and I'll let you correct me if I'm wrong on that I wouldn't say that without giving you that chance but like this episode really isn't just about what we shouldn't do although we are focusing on something that we think we shouldn't do here it's also about what we should do like we should run all of these guys on the Republican Party we should have this fight we we have a huge seat at the table in the media apparatus that's something man that's way more than we ever had you know all of you we got serious men with serious credentials who were right on the most important issues and they were right because and I can tell you this from knowing all of them because they fucking believe it like I'll say that about Tucker Thomas Massey Joe Kenne these are men who sacrificed things in their lives because they believe in something not like a like Joe Kenne is a decorated combat veteran who lost his wife in a war this man knows the costs of war and was unwilling to participate in another one like he believes that and Tucker and Massey to anyway we have this opportunity we could go do something here that's a fight that we could win and if we don't win it we fall short and really affect the culture really spread a message really do all the things that look Ron Paul did in the major party better than a third party's ever done in a third party we mean Scott were LP members we we dedicated years of our lives I have nothing like years we all we did our own work but we put lots of effort into a libertarian project it's not like we're against this we're saying here the facts on the ground here's the opportunity right now please guys it makes no sense to go in this direction and it makes all the sense in the world to go in the other one also I will as I haven't mentioned here on the show but I told Michael I've made an open invite to him to have him on and he can come try to make his case as well but I am going to be frank here that I'm with Scott on this like I just think his case that he laid out here is overwhelming and I think it's important that people heard it. Now, it's also made maybe even more important that people just consume Scott's work in general. So Scott, where can people find stuff that you're doing? And of course, by the way, I know in the million things I plug of yours, I did mention up top, but I always forget a provoked with Darryl Cooper every week. It's so easy. I, I never miss an episode because it's like it's one episode every week. It's two of the best guys in the country. Make sure you catch that. But plug all your other stuff, Scott. And then I got to go, yeah, man, uh, Scott or an academy like on Dave sweatshirt. In fact, Scott word and academy.com/poTP and you get 20% off on a lifetime subscription, 10% off on an annual one. And that's just the deepest dives. It's everything that I know on, on all the Middle East stuff and all the Cold War with Russia and all that. Scott word and academy.com. Otherwise, yeah, my books, I'm about to put out a very final, all the way corrected version of provoked as well as a fool's air. And I'm actually, I changed the subtitle full Zaren is now a real history of the war of America's war in Afghanistan. And that'll be coming out in a couple of weeks here. Um, but so yeah, otherwise, um, at Scott Horton show everywhere. And you check out my show and, uh, yeah, the Britonist suit.org. All right. Scott, thank you so much for your time as always. And thank you so much for breaking this down. I think a lot of people are going to benefit from it. Catch guys next time. See you in New Orleans. It's Gankfest this weekend. Peace.