November 3, 2020 • 55 mins
Robert is joined by Cody Johnston for a special election day reading of Ben Shapiro's awful novel.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hmm, what's distracting us from the election. Yeah, there we go.
Welcome America to Behind the Bastards, the podcast about terrible people. Normally,
this week is not going to be anybody's favorite week ever.
Probably that might be. It's possible, but unlikely because of
the election, which it is right now. So we're we're
(00:22):
gonna try and ease a little bit of that stress
and pain by reading another few chapters from Benethan Shapiro's terrible,
terrible book True Allegiance, our favorite book, our our Bible. Yeah,
Cody and Eyes what I would describe as I don't know.
I was going to make a joke, but then I
(00:43):
realized I don't know enough about religion to make a
good religion joke. So I don't have a joke. It's
just good. It's a good book. Yeah, we go to
it for wisdom. Like when I wake up and I
don't know what I'm gonna do with my day or
how to feel. I flipped through it and it inspires me.
If I am trying to sleep late at night and
I'm like stressed out, I read a few pages and
get relaxed. I get you some few nuggets star football
(01:04):
players have no name exactly. And then and then then
I feel at peace. I feel it at one you know,
um and uh, and then I do it all again
the next day. Yeah. So we're gonna be dropping this
on election day so you can listen to it while
you're standing in line and or getting into gunfights with
(01:24):
fascist paramilitaries, whatever winds up being our reality. Yeah, whichever
you want. Yeah. So that's that's good. That's great. We're
all very happy, Cody. We should also the elephant in
the room, Katie is not here. Her dog is sick unfortunately,
so our thoughts are with both her and her dog
in equal measure as she is at the dog hospital. Yes,
(01:46):
heart goes out to um Katie and Benny. We love you,
Benny and Katie. The good Benny Good as opposed to
the author of this book, Ben Shapiro. Yeah, the bad,
the bad Benny who wrote the good book, this book,
the good book, the book book. So when we last
left off, we we had that fun chapter with with
(02:09):
Solo Dad and her militia who uh she seemed to
be the plot seemed to be piloting rather than her
because as a woman in Ben's book, she's not allowed
to actually make decisions. Yeah, would it's not a it's
not a fantasy novel, Robert, Come on, so our next chapter.
We're back in Detroit, Michigan for Levin. With Levin, or
(02:31):
at least we'll be with him for a few paragraphs.
Just do another character. How many tenses do you think
we'll get? Levin couldn't believe what he was hearing. Reverend
Jim Crawford sat there in the conference room of the
MGM Grand. The room had already been scanned for bugs
and been found clean. In his expense, Wow, that is
(02:52):
a sentence right now. Crawford sat there, Comma in the
conference room of the MGM Grand. And then there's an
md ash. The room had already been scanned for bugs
and been found clean. Second m Dash in his expensive suit,
Comma explaining why he thought he should get his people
off the street. One sentence, that's so many claus that's
(03:13):
so yeah, Ben, use the fucking period, or like you
don't even like, oh, okay, it's okay to have sentences.
Sentences can be short. All you need, you know, you
need the subject, you know, you need a verb, maybe
like an object in there. But like even that first
(03:33):
one where you were saying, He's what was it? He's
sitting there, Comma in the conference room. He was just
sitting there in the conference room. Can't read that, Comma. Yeah,
but you're about to have a long m dash clause
that is itself an entire sentence. Oh and here's the
best part. After in his expensive suit, Comma explaining why
he thought Lee should get his people off the street.
(03:54):
The next sentence is just the word Now. Oh my god,
the difference, Ben, Oh my god, Oh, so many extremes,
Like you couldn't write worse if you tried. It's it's
really something else. Like presumably an editor looked at this,
(04:16):
but I have like, I don't know. I think he's
like Glint and Greenwald. He does not like to be edited. Yeah,
if they like, I'm sure they offered to edit it.
But Ben was like, no, you're censoring me. You don't
edit poetry. I'll publish this myself because I'm an artist. Allegedly, Okay,
lev On had seen Big Jim's press conference with the
mayor the previous week period. That's a sentence, Comma still
(04:40):
sporting a bandage over his gashed forehead. Comma had thanked
Big Jim profusely for stopping the violence, Comma for cutting
short the possibility of a riot. Okay, okay, okay, it's uneven.
That's like my one note. Like sometimes you nail it
in that you write a sentence. At other times it
seems maybe you need to add word. See, this is
(05:03):
the other thing that I read his book for. It
gets out the toxins. He made me spit out coffee.
That was fun to watch. Yes, sorry, don't good for
everybody listening to this in line to vote or getting
into a gunfight with fascist paramilitary again. Either way, it
(05:24):
could be both. It could be both. Yeah, yeah, multitask
you know there's a lot going on in so Yeah.
They talk about problems of inequality, problems of racial justice.
They're talking to the mayor. They're doing a a conversation
with the mayor about racial justice. After this big riot,
Mayor Burns nodded along, common knowing that he had no
choice dash he could use the photo off with the
(05:47):
civil rights icon in his reelection campaign. Newsweek put Big
Jim on its cover the headline the Peacemaker. The photo
framed his head with a halo. In the piece, Big
Jim in Detroit said that Detroit would have to pursue
a complete makeover of its obviously racist police apartment. That
meant community policing in the truest sense, drawing police officers
from the community itself. That didn't mean hiring officers from
(06:10):
the outside the way they'd hired Ricky O. Sullivan. It
didn't even mean hiring black cops from outside the city
and forced him to live in the city to get
to know the people they protected. And meant hiring longtime
residents of the city, even people with backgrounds America said,
said Big Jim, Yeah, exactly. It's like this is a
horrible idea. Like what Bin's actually saying here, Like he's
trying to frame this as like this evil black terrorists
(06:32):
has a plan to make all of the cops be
gangsters by community policing, But what he's actually saying is
community policing like having neighborhoods policed by people who live
in those neighborhoods is a bad idea because blacks are
criminals actually people with just like the phrase people with backgrounds,
like say what you mean, buddy, what are the backgrounds?
(06:56):
But like it's as you were reading that, I was
like surely, surely this is actually going to be framed
as though it's a bad thing. And he did not
disappoint No, no, no, no, it absolutely did not. He
wants like to force people from out of the city
to like move there to police the area. They were
(07:16):
all of the stuff, like, there's actually a lot of
problems with community policing as it's generally introduced. But but
all of the stuff big Jim, who is again the
devil basically in a bed is saying here is perfectly reasonable.
You want to know why our community doesn't trust the police.
They don't trust the police because to them, the police
are strangers and the other way around. And it takes
more than a few than living in the community a
(07:36):
few months to earn trust. I'll tell you what he
told the newsweek reporter. It takes more than even being
a good policeman. It means having been through what these
folks have been through. It means knowing that just because
somebody got sent up to prison for some stupid drug
crime that wouldn't have gotten a white boy six months
in the can, that doesn't mean their life should be over.
It means understanding with theres a legacy of racism again,
these people are engaged in a plot to overthrow the government.
(07:59):
It is. It is so frustrating hearing this young man
right this book like yeah, because it just it makes
it clear that he knows, ye, like he's making he's
he knows, and he's making the argument like that is
correct and good. So he knows, he knows, he knows
what the argument is, but whenever he talks about it,
(08:20):
he pretends like he doesn't. I shouldn't have gotten mad
at my favorite book. Sorry, Ben, It's okay. You only
you only you know, we only hurt the books we love,
which you know is why, for example, every night I
get into a fist fight with a copy of slaughter
House five. Um, you know, it's just it's just what
(08:43):
happens when you're drinking, you assault the books that you love. Yeah, okay,
so uh yeah. The interview had caused an uproar. They
even Robert, I believe we left off at the m dash.
There's there's so many nash in this book, which I
(09:03):
get it right, Like we all use them, especially like
when I'm and stuff that's not for publication, I'll throw
them in a lot because it's a helpful way for
me to like remember how I plan to read it. Like,
Like people ask, like why I don't push them up,
It's because, like they're messy as hell. They're not like there,
I write them their essays, but they're they're written and
exactly and I would not publish them that way because
they wouldn't read well if someone else we're reading them right, been,
(09:28):
like it is the thing that new writers do. It's fine,
like if you're using a lot of M dashes, but
your goal should be you know, sentences like Yeah, Also,
he's not a new writer at this point. He's not
a new writer. He's been doing it. It's the only
thing he's ever done in his entire life for money. Yeah, yes,
the only thing he's ever done. Yeah. It's literally his
(09:50):
one job and he's killing it. He's nailing it. Yeah.
The interview had caused an uproar. They even quoted Leaf
on it and asking him what do you thought of
Big Jim's leadership? Leave and told them that without Big Jim,
the whole street would have got up in flames. Big Jim,
he told them standing up for us. So long as
he does, as long as we get justice, we can
make this city whole again now. However, Levin regretted he'd
(10:10):
ever laid eyes on Big Jim. He'd been foolish to
have trusted the man. He'd figured he could always outplay him.
Everybody thought Big Jim was past his prime, that he'd
run his course after a youth of rabble rousing and
race baiting. He'd entered the main stream. He had had,
he had, he'd appeared in liquor stores. Blah blah blah
blah blah. He's just making the same point. So he's Yeah,
Big Jim's talking to him about how they've done a
(10:30):
lot of good and they're okay, Uh that they they
they've achieved some things, and Levan's gonna get what he
wants and uh he should, uh he should be satisfied
with what they've gotten so far and play the cards
they've got. Yeah, okay, so that's what Big Jim saying. Um,
this is next paragraph in Afghani. Stand there like no, no, no.
(10:51):
It was already packed when he pulled up, and the
shops set as he So he leaves the meeting with
Big Jim angry because Big Jim is happy with the
games they've made. He's already packed when he pulled up
and the shop set A slightly overweight black woman, Regina Malone,
clutched a handkerchief to her face. Her every makeup was
streaked with tears. She looked like she hadn't stopped crying
since she found out about her son, Kendrick. And the
truth was she hadn't. Kendrick had been her youngest boy,
(11:12):
a good boy, she told the media, shot to death
because of police racism. The President had called her offer
his condolences and told her he'd stop at nothing to
get to the bottom of the case. That's what a
president would say. I'm gonna get to the bottom of
the case. The president. Yeah, I also like that his
left wing rag. And this is Newsweek, the magazine that
Andy No writes columns for. But yeah, the Wayne County
(11:36):
prosecutor hadn't been his forthcoming. She'd been elected for a fluke.
The entire government in Wayne County sprang from the Democratic Party.
But Kim Donahue had looked into her job show she
it is a fluke that a competent conservative had become
the prosecutor here. Um yeah, she'd been appointed to no opposition. Yeah,
yea had to Um so he's just describing this person
who is his, his ideal human being because she's going
(12:00):
into not going to prosecute cops for shooting a black boy. Yeah, okay,
that's good talking about how great this this prosecutor is. Okay.
Regina alone, standing next to Big Jim had called a
press conference and which he asked Donna Hue to refuse
herself given her ties to the police department. Donna he
would refuse, stating that she would insure justice was served
and implied that if anyone implied her sin skin color
(12:20):
meant that she couldn't be objective, they were racist. But
light made national headlines turning and turned Kim Donahue into
one of those polarizing political figures in America. Levon got
out of his car and Regina, what I mentioned the
skin color. I thought it was because of a relationship
with the police. Yeah, I know, Yeah that no one did.
It doesn't seem like, okay, just making all right. She
(12:41):
she's doing the thing that Ben says you shouldn't do.
But he she's likes cops, so Ben's fine with it,
because yeah, it does sound like she's the one who
brought race into it. Then on the television stood Kim
Dominic Donahue, the cheers. So we we go through a
little bit of this, like Levan's talking with the mother
this dead boy, and then the news announces that the
d A is not going to charge the police officer
who shot the kid. As as happens repeatedly, Um, yeah,
(13:07):
so that's that's cool. She says that she's not doing
the agenda of the mob. The evidence of the support manslaughter,
doesn't support murder. Levan gets angry at this, as you
as you might one might one might get angry at that. Yeah.
The mayor asks everybody to remain calm, so I think
we're gonna have yeah, and Big Jim tells people not
to riot, So I think that's that's that's that's what
(13:28):
we're gonna have here, very very subtle foreshadowing then, Yeah.
And also the officers getting released from prison the day
that they choose not to do charges, which is not
how it works. They like charge them and then they
generally get out on on bail, which is like what's
happened every time one of these guys shot somebody and
actually been charged. But whatever, Okay, leave paid administrative leave.
(13:53):
Uh so leave on is surrounded by cameras and like media.
After this announcement that they're not charging, the cop comes
in and he realizes that he's standing next to the
mother of the kid who's just been killed, and he
has a great opportunity to be a rabble rouser. So
the camera zoomed in on leave On. He forced himself
to cry comma, just to tear semi colon. He looked
up at the throat. He's doing Obama. He's doing Obama.
(14:17):
He's doing Obama cry. Oh yeah, it's Obama cry. And
he cried the one tier at the same Oh yeah, yeah.
The right hates that he cried that one tier. Yeah,
he's he's doing You're probably right, yeah, okay, yep, definitely.
Then he exhaled slowly and looked directly into the camera.
Enough dead children, it stops today. Yeah he did, he
(14:37):
did it. Oh my god, so bad, Oh my god.
Every now and then we'll get to like a chunk
like we just went through, where it's kind of dull,
and then you get Ben Shapiro, like making the terrorist
leader do the exact same thing Obama did when he
was sad that twenty something children got shot to death
at school. Oh my god, oh so good slash bad.
(15:00):
It's it's amazing. Like one of the things that's frustrating
is like I don't like Obama or Biden, but they
keep getting attacked by the right for things that like
aren't bad. Like I don't think Obama was faking his
tears at twenty something children getting shot to death because
he's a person. It makes you sad. It's like it's
so it's I mean, it's a lot of that stuff
(15:21):
to speaks to like their worldview and who they are, right,
like they don't cry or like feel those things, didn't
give a shit about those kids, So yeah, exactly, like, oh,
surely he has to be faking it because nobody would
ever cry at this. Yeah, it can't be that. Like, no,
he can both like have a callous disregard for the
lives of people in Yemen and also like see a
(15:42):
bunch of small children shot to pieces with a rifle
and be fucked up by it because he's a dad.
Like yeah, like those really don't conflict with each other
as much as maybe they should. But like, yeah, god,
and it's it's the same thing with like the paid
protesters stuff. Yeah you think that because you would need
to get paid to protest something in order to care
(16:04):
about people getting harmed. Who weren't you? You would need
money because you're a bad person. Unbelievable. I cannot believe
he just did that. I can't believe it. I mean, okay,
and yeah, he's he's okay. So he just says that
to the news and then he silently leads a crowd
that I guess is formed at this point away from
the barbershop towards the criminal Justice Center. So he's he's
(16:27):
marching with a big protest that I'm sure is going
to burn the city down. Um, that's the thing that's
going to happen next. So now we're back to Brett Hawthorne. Yes, yeah, yeah,
fucking precious. Get that bear of a man in here. Yeah.
(16:47):
Brett surveyed the damage from the top of a nearby
parking lot. It's stretched before him like a diorama, unreal
in miniature, too dramatic for life. Since the attacks, all
commercial air travel had been shut down thanks to warnings
from the Department of Homely in Security. The terror chatter
had actually elevated after the attack. DHS thought the airlines
could be targeted again. Given the focus on the destruction
of the bridge, Brett's homecoming hadn't been much of one.
(17:10):
By the time he landed his rescue, if you could
call it, that had been blown off the front pages
by the terror attack. His flight back to Texas had
been canceled, and he'd been stashed at a local hotel
with oh my God the sentences. Fight back to Texas
had been canceled, Comma, and he'd been stashed at a
local hotel Comma with guards on him at nearly all times.
M Dash, the President, was obviously worried. He'd talked to
the media without hand loose nearby. Period did not need
(17:36):
to be there. You could just have written a couple
of sentences there, buddy. It's okay to use a period
bit like every period. And it's also okay to just
like not use commas and just like keep writing. I
kind of want yeah, yeah, you're in the middle of
a sentence. Just keep going. You're almost done with the sentence.
I kind of want to get you know, they have
(17:56):
those books. I assume they have these books for little
girls about like the first periods. I want to like
photoshop one of those, to be forbid, and about like
using periods and sentences. It's actually okay, it's okay, it's okay.
Everyone periods, Everyone does it. It's totally natural, very funny. Well,
you know he's not. He's pretty afraid of words. Yeah
(18:17):
he is. Uh. Ellen had hinted via phone that some
big move was imminent in Texas from the governor, but
he hadn't had time to focus on that. He'd been
more focused on helping out Bill Callier. Call Your's wife,
Jennifer had been on the bridge. They still hadn't dredged
up her body. The day after his arrival, Bill had
met Brett at his hotel. He dismissed a security For
(18:38):
a few minutes. Brett could see that his friend had
aged a century in a day. His face looked craggy,
his eyes sunken. Bill had been married to Jennifer for
a long time. He had also lost his daughter in
the attack, an eight year old. He'd called his little trooper.
We don't we don't get her name? Why why why
would he give her a name? I do love that.
That's like this, This guy losing his eight year old
(19:00):
daughter is an afterthought. Yeah, his young child also diet,
Like yeah, uh, very fun by the way, his small
daughter is dead too. Um YadA, YadA, yaday. They talk
about this man who has lost his wife and young child.
(19:22):
Talks with Brett about the fact that he's afraid the
president is going to use the terrorist attack to call
for a massive spending package on infrastructure and urge for
their cuts to the military. Yeah, the worst nightmare is
an infrastructure bill. Yeah, he's he doesn't know where his
his eight year old corpses, but he's concerned about an
(19:44):
infrastructure bill. Good. Uh, like a human would you know?
Ye that it's all that I have on my mind. Yeah, well,
you know on my mind. And Robert products and services.
Perhaps it is the only thing that can balmb the
loss of an eight year old. That's true. So if
(20:06):
your wife and daughter have died in a terrorist attack
on a bridge, please console yourself with these products and
services we have back are m. We're a single tear
for the problems, and we're shedding a tear for products
(20:29):
and services. So this general guy uh has ordered Brett
orders bretton newr Okay, so like we're doing the thing
you know been started us in media arrests. And then
he's going back in time to explain how Brett arrived
in New York City. Yeah, Earliever, I love it. Yeah,
and there it's amazing that like they're having this, this
(20:50):
conversation about sending Bret somewhere to thwart the president's plans
for an infrastructure bill. Well, this this man is grieving
of all the reasons God just and ignoring like I
love Yeah, in the middle of the action, we're gonna
like it's starting. But like earlier, let's see like how
(21:11):
we got here, Let's do all the boring stuff real quick.
Instead of instead of summing up the boring stuff in
a sentence, you know, Bill had, you know, through a
haze of tears, ordered you know, uh, Brett to to
New York in order to do this and this like bam,
you got it in a sentence. Let's get continue the action.
We're going back and rather than you know, trying to
establish any emotional pathos by by lingering on the fact
(21:32):
that this man has lost his wife and child, he's
just talking at like normal about how they need Brett
here and how bad it is that the president wants
to build up infrastruct Uh, it's fun, your daughter, We
gotta stop the roads. Yeah. Oh, Wow. Yeah, So Brett
says the President won't like that, and Bill says, to
(21:53):
my patience for bullshit goes out the window after I
watched them search on television for my daughter's body, said
the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of sta F. I'll
make whatever excuses I have to make. I want to
know who's responsible for this, and right now you're my
best lead, You're the only. Yeah. So that Ben really
understands how humans deal with grief. Yeah, No, no, he doesn't.
You could have just stopped that Ben doesn't really understand
(22:16):
how humans. Yeah. He, And he does also understands tense.
Because you would not say, like where I saying to you,
Cody that my patients for bullshit goes out the window
after I watched them search on television for my daughter's body.
That's not what I would say. I would take my
patients for bullshit went out the window when I watched
them search on television for my daughter's body. Or my
patients goes out the window when I see them doing
(22:39):
X or why. Yes, every way basically, but the way
Big wrote it, it would be grammatically appropriate. Yeah, okay,
so I'll need your weird that you'll stay away from
the media. That's the only thing Prescott cares about. Amazing,
like that what you carry about infrastructure and your daughter? Guy, Like,
(23:00):
come on, dude, okay, um Breton, not a I'm sorry
about your family, bill, call your grimaced Yeah me too,
he said, me too. No, go get the pieces of
ship who did this so I can bomb them back
into the sixth century, which had He's just like writing
Independence Day like bad and worse. Yes, the thing that
(23:22):
a man would say after being comforted by a friend
for the loss of his wife and daughter, like I'm
sorry about your family. Yeah, me too, me too. Yeah.
Hey you know what, same same bro. It's like they're
talking about a car that got totaled, right, Like that's
what's like, Oh hey man, I'm sorry about your car.
I know you really like that car. It's like, yeah,
(23:42):
me too. Right, let's this is your wife and daughter. Dude. Yeah,
Like I said, it's a bomber. Yeah it's lame as hell, bro,
that's very clear out bom diam Okay. So uh. Now,
looking at the damage, Brett punished himself for not having
(24:04):
been able to warn intelligence sooner. If only he'd used
Morst code to tell them something was coming from a
CHAMMI if only he'd blinked the name Mohammed, Yes, if
only he'd blinked the most common name in the world,
that would a really key to men. If only I
let him know, John did it. Ok Yeah, it's so
(24:27):
good in his name, in his heart. He knew it
wouldn't have helped. Yes, I agree. America had blinded itself
in the name of peace. Okay, okay, And Brett knew
that hope wouldn't buy peace anyway. He turned his back
on the Hudson, where the sunken bridge still lay, slumbering
under acres of water, the comb of the surface masking
the graves of thousands of Americans. The American public had
(24:47):
called the Iraq War two bloody comma, the Afghanistan War
two costly semi colon combined, America had lost fewer than
seven thousand people period. Now Comma, on one day, they'd
lost far more than that. It' funny because Bill ben
is trying to justify the war on terror, and the
only way he could do it is by inventing a
fake terrorist. It's amazing. It's see in my book, they
(25:11):
killed more people than we lost in the Wars that
we lost. It's like Slip Slippery Slope the novel. It's
so good. Oh I love it. But what if? What if?
And then I'm right? Okay, good point. Yeah I guess,
I guess. Then you're right, man, yeah, yeah, then yes, yes,
(25:31):
bit well no, you still wouldn't have been right because again,
this terrorist attack was launched by Iran, one of the
yeah like okay, which none of like the actual interplay
with the terrorist makes a whole lot of sense in
this either, but still be right, I mean wrong. And
then you're it was one of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. Okay, yeah, yeah,
(25:53):
they Yeah, that's why the yeah is justified because in
this book they are right. So it's okay. Saddam's revenge unbelievable,
which is normally a term for diarrhea. Um, yeah, I
mean it was. Yeah. So the airport felt like a mausoleum.
He gets sent to the airport, by the way, uh,
(26:16):
completely empty, completely deserted. The planes set at their terminals
like sleeping grasshoppers. That's a weird. Why that's maybe taking
other paths that what you are comparing plates to grasshoppers.
I mean they have wings, but so do things look
more like plane, right? Okay, Ben, I mean like it's
(26:39):
in the name they like they hop dragon flies. I
don't know. You also like just like, don't do the metaphors,
just don't do it. I guess that was assimilate, but like,
come on, man. So Ben is with port authority in
security in the closed down airport looking to see like
(27:00):
all the people who have entered the country and all
the flight manifests to see if this terrorist had come
into the country. Uh, he tells one of the officials,
I would access to the customs files if you don't
mind me asking, Sir murmured the official, is there somebody
we're looking for? Particularly, Brett said, yes, an Arabic looking
young man. Oh uh, which is clearly like he's trying
(27:23):
to justify racial profiling, but also like the least useful, Yes,
that will narrow it down to thousands. That's and like
that's that's the point, like that's why exactly, that's why
it's bad, why it's bad. But it's there's too me.
It's to me like a slightly better hack writer would
(27:45):
have had him like accurately described the man and then
had like some histrionic you know, official will be like
that's racial profiling, and being it's not racial profiling, just
to point out that he has you know, that he's
an Arab man and he has these features, and like
that's again, would still be a bad book, but that
would be like a competent, shitty writer. Yeah, a better
(28:06):
smarter person. Yeah, a better right wing grifter author. I've
done it that way. But Ben is again a complete
failure of it's it's it rules. Honestly the best thing
about him. Yeah. Yeah. The official complaints that that's racial profiling,
which it is because the only detail Brett gave is
(28:28):
that he's Arabic looking looking looking. That's oh my god,
oh god, you're not doing the profiling. I am. Well
now I'm a party to it. Brett stared into his face.
I don't care. Just do it, sir. It's against regulations though.
Look Brett burst out, losing his patients. I don't give
a rat's ass at this point whether it's racial profiling
or not. Maybe you right, Maybe Mohammed is a light
(28:51):
skinned Norwegian woman or a Cherokee elder. Maybe he's a
Persian or Arabic, or maybe he's a I feel like
i'm listening to him talk right now, I know it's it,
it's good. Or maybe he's a Persian or Arabic looking
son of a bitch who hangs out with other Persian
or Arabic looking sons of bitches who look like Abraham
is Shami, which is you know, Ben, they're different ethnic groups.
(29:14):
Persians and Arabs don't care for this. Yeah, it's like
being like, yeah, he's a Mexican or an African person,
you know, like like like that, like it's that level
of racist, Like it's he's a person from one of
two massive land masses, you know, again making the case
(29:35):
for why racial profiling is bad. Like he's doing all
of the work for us. It's just incredible. Yeah, I
mean it is. It is like it it's that racist.
It's his racist as being like he's an African looking person.
It's like, well, but that's a giant land mass that
includes a wide variety of different ethnic groups. Like yeah,
I know he's Persian or Arabic. Thank you, Ben. That
(29:55):
narrows it down. You got it, You got it. You
definitely understood what we said, yeah, and responded accordingly. Yeah,
it's great because this is supposed to be like how
him explaining like how racial profiling is really necessary to
stop terrorism, but all it actually is is like showing
that all Been wants is racial profiling. He's not saying
(30:16):
like this isn't It's usually pointed as like, well, look,
you know, if if if we get a solid tip
that like a terrorist is a man of you know,
Afghan descent, you know we can't. You're saying we can't
like look for people who are of Afghan descent who
are in the area, and like that's wrong, and like
that's again, is a wrong line of argument. But there's
at least more it's at least more of an argument
than Ben who is saying, like, let's profile all of
(30:39):
the Persian or Arabic looking sons of bitches. He's not
He's not actually saying anything. There's no argument here. He's
just saying I want it, so I'm gonna have my
character yell about it and be proven right by the
circumstances that I write in the book and also been
again the lack of research here. One of the things
(30:59):
that Brett notes is that there would be hundreds, maybe
thousands of possible leads men who had flown from the
Middle East through some point in the days that would
be ten. The Middle East is large, been there's so
many people who come to the US and leave the
US towards like heading there. It's every big, it's very big.
(31:20):
Is the Middle East a country? To him? Is that?
Like what? He like? Yeah, I think it is. I
think the Middle East to him is like like it's
a single place as opposed to a massive Again, it's
like somebody is saying he looks Africans, like, well, okay,
does he look like he's from Morocco or look like
like like there's all all white light of countries and
there's thousands of ethnic groups. Like it's a massive area,
(31:44):
like very big continents. Yeah, it's it's I mean of
which you know the Yeah, it's it's it's great, it's
it's very it's everything in this book is so good,
and okay, here's the best part. Uh. He realizes that
there's too many names to search through, point making the
(32:05):
point that everything he's done at this so far is useless.
So he calls a contact of his name to Hassan
Abduel to find a cafe to go meet a contact
who presumably is going to know about this guy, which
is kind of been maybe making the point, uh that
that racial profiling doesn't work, but didn't work because he
(32:26):
needed to go contact because there be too many people
that instead, you reached out to an individual who had
pertinent information maybe about an individual who you were looking for,
as opposed to again looking for Persian or Arabic sons
of bitches. So the whole point of that section was
just for him to be racist, right and then not
realize that he's making the case against it. Yeah, well
(32:51):
he did it. You did. You got to do the
racism scene. I guess, I mean one of the many.
The whole book is a racism seen. Um. Yeah, so
he sits down from this guy. Oh, I guess that's
his friend from high school. Um, his his his black
friend who I think converted to Islam, the one who
taught him how to be funny to the bully with
no name. Yeah, the Jersey list football player. Yeah just
(33:17):
call just call your friend first instead of saying look
for an Arab looking guy. Oh cool, So Ben's friend.
The one positive Muslim person that we've met so far
was was buddies with Anwar al al Laki, who is
like one of the uh who's like a fucking very
(33:38):
hardcore Islamic preacher um who uh is seen as having
an influence on you know, terrorists. Uh so, And then
he's he's he's now helping Brett out because on September eleven,
he'd seen the uh yeah, okay cool, so so so
Ben's Ben's one uh positive Muslim like character was also
(34:02):
friends with a with a with an extremist still terrorist,
still terrorist, Jason Yeah. After September eleven, Hassan spoke to
Brett and Brett set up a covert meeting with the
Federal Bureau of Investigation. Hassan Abdul became a mole. His
jobs changed over the years, as did his location. His
responsibility into the Bush administration had been to provide leads
(34:22):
on possible terror suspects attending mosques in prominent urban areas.
For the past few years, he'd been stationed in New
York City at the mosque he posted as a borderline radical.
He spoke regularly about the injustices of the wars in
Iraq and Afghanistan. But during okay, so yeah, he's he's
he's been a he's been working with the FBI. Hadda YadA, YadA,
um because he found out that all Muslims are terrorists.
(34:43):
And then we've been points out that under the election
of Mark Prescott, who is white Obama, the FBI no
longer monitored mosques um and that that is clearly a
bad thing. Yep. Cool. Wait Wait, I figured what years
was written seen is when it was published. I guess
he probably wrote or during a weekend in give him
(35:06):
the care he gave to editing this. Yeah. Yeah, So
he gives the information about this terrorist he's looking to
to his contact. I says, it's not a lot to
go on. How do you know he's coming to New
York as opposed to some other city. Had you know
he wasn't involved in the original attack. Is the government
even locked down the bastards who planted the bombs? I
don't know, Hassan. All I know is there's something more
to this, and I know that he is religious the
(35:27):
way a Shami spoke to him. If he's here, the
only way to find him will be through the mosques. Ah.
That's good. Uh. They talk some more. He's got to
convince his friend, who's angry because the FBI isn't profiling
Muslims anymore. Somehow, somehow darker. Yeah it is. I'm gonna
read the last bit of this because it's very strange writing.
You don't want to need to convince me, white boy.
(35:47):
I just need to know why I'm doing this. And
it isn't for your president, believe me not. At Brett
neither am I. Hassan nodded a lot of nodding. Here,
I'll be in touch when I've got something for you.
He turned towards the door, then turned back. There's good
and bad and everyone, he crooned, a smile, suddenly creasing
his lips. We learned to live, We learned to give.
Brett left each other what we need to survive together alive.
I think they're singing a song here, yes, yep, okay,
(36:13):
I'm guessing that's a song. Yeah, like a thing that
they did together, like it's in it's like a friend
thing that they do. Yeah, yeah, that's that's fine. I
guess like like they're like they're little yeah spoken handshake,
I guess yep, yep, yeah, okay. You know Sophie, you
know who won't surveile Muslims pointlessly? Uh and because of racism,
(36:40):
that's not ship these products and we're back. Oh, yeah,
oh yeah, yep, all right, you know I do you know,
(37:03):
you know, Cody, all right, we're back to New York City.
I mean that could have that could have just been
like you reading the book, you know, Comma, you know Dash,
you know, so New York City President Prescott iconic moments.
These were the moments that Mark Prescott had always wanted.
FDR standing before Congress declaring war on Japan, John F.
Kennedy in Berlin, Reagan at the Berlin Wall, George W.
(37:26):
Bush and the wreckage of the World Trade Center. And
now Prescott standing on the precipice of the Hudson Oh
my god, what a sentence. And now Comma Prescott Comma
standing on the precipice of the Hudson River. Comma with
the Coastguards still dredging the waters, Comma with the wreckage
of one of America's greatest public works projects mangled behind him. Period.
We got there, we got through it. Oh my good,
(37:46):
damn it. Wow, Ben, what a sentence. There are a
lot of Oh you could have yeah, just generally, just generally,
like if you like, go just go through an open
and you're listening because you're a huge fan um and
you appreciate feedback. Just go through and remove half the
commas and your sentences will be better. Um. I also
(38:09):
find it very very funny that uh, Ben seems really
really hyper focused on this idea of Obama only wanting
these like moments, these publicity moments. He's like, I want
to look like FDR, I want to look at this
um and has Uh I don't. I don't know if
you know anything about the current president, Robert, I don't.
Who do we have? We have a president? We do?
(38:31):
We do? Um? He one could argue, um is like
the worst uh at this exact thing, the most obvious
about this exact thing that Ben cannot get out of
his mind about President Barack Obama. Sorry, I'm sorry, President
Barack's saying Obama Barry Sato. Do you remember that? Do
you remember when that was the thing on the right
(38:53):
wait no, oh boy, oh man, yeah it was. It
used to be ah like yeah. They were convinced that
that that was his should be his real name for
reasons that I don't know. I don't even remember. I
used to know why, like yeah, used, yeah, it's stopped
once everything got so much like worse once Trump became president.
But like that used to be like a whole if
(39:14):
you'd go to like Free Republic where all of like
the really old like worst fascist Republicans were back before
that was the norm in the party. They would all
call him Barry Satara. It was very silly. Um, yes,
and I suspect been abolutely. I'm that's a that's a
tab I'm opening for later. Yeah, yeah, can take a
(39:35):
look into that. So the president is obvious, is very
excited because a bunch of people are dead, so he
gets to give a speech. He's wearing a windbreaker instead
of the suit like George Bush did, which is like yeah,
as if it's like a ploy as opposed to like, yeah,
you're head and do a disaster area, you wouldn't wear
a nice suit to like an active disaster Like it's
it's one of those things like you don't even like
(39:56):
I'm not even gonna like give Bush it for that,
Like he wasn't doing it for a look. He was
doing it because he was headed to a disaster area
and you're gonna wear not a fine suit for that,
you know, if you did wear a fine suit, he
would be called like a coastal elite fancy man. He's
wearing a suit to a thing. You shouldn't have won
a suit too. Nonsense utter nonsense. Also been capitalized his windbreaker,
(40:19):
which is weird to me. It doesn't seem like a
like a proper noun. But okay. That is also super
concerned about his editor, like I don't think there is
I really don't think he had one. There's like, there's
no way, there's no way he had one. Like it's
(40:39):
like that that that would be I would be I
would be surprised if we would. We would have to
hunt his editor down. Um with extremes. Be fired. I mean,
Ben should be fired. That person should be Comma fired,
Comma right, Comma away, Colma period, m DA. But also
(41:00):
windbreaker windbreaker is not capitalized like never never ever unless
it's like the name of a boat, right right, yeah,
or like like the brand of of of the windbreaker. Yeah,
if it's a windbreaker. Yeah, yes, I don't know why,
(41:20):
but that's my favorite part of this book. Yeah, very cool. Um, Yeah,
I'm upset that the president didn't wear a suit. I
guess at the thing, um and really wants that photo ops,
the photo op. President Barack Obama always came about photo ops. No,
presidents after him, caring more about he's the only president
who like who like got his picture taken. Ever, it
(41:44):
never happened again. That was the single time that it occurred.
And they would never again like create events just to
just to have these sort of photo opportunities. Yeah, never uh. Yeah,
he would never like have people tear gased in order
to take a picture with the Bible, right, Like that
would be bad. That's that's ridiculous, Robert, that's like you
should be you should that's an Obama thing. Yeah, classic. Yeah.
(42:11):
The President gives a speech. All right, I'm gonna read
a speech my fellow Americans. He said, We've experienced the
greatest single attack on American soil in our history. Two
days ago. We lost thousands of American lives, women, women, children.
But let our enemies here this. We remain strong. We
remained unbowed, We remained unbroken, unwavering, unshaken. We stand together,
and our unity is our power. Today, our enemies rejoice
in our tragedy. Tomorrow they will see us rebuilding from
(42:32):
these ashes, restore what was once what once was, rebuild
our America better, stronger than it was before. They hope
that their destruction would cause us to question ourselves, question
our course. They hope that we would surrender our philosophy,
our way of life. They were wrought. Yeah, yeah, there's
a a boring president, doesn't seem very's yeah, yeah, like
why even right all this out if it's also okay,
(42:53):
So it's not even saying anything about him president or
like anything. It's just like the yeah, the basic president
ship like okay, okay. So he's he's giving his speech
and he's about to hit the big moment that he's
been excited for, and then someone in the crowd screams,
you did this. Prescott was momentarily startled. Then he began
in times of grief, we do not walk alone yet. Yeah,
(43:13):
He's continues. Then someone interrupts again and yells, you did this,
Mr President? Uh? And suddenly yeah, he sees a loan protester.
It was a woman overweight, wearing fair faded jeans and
a T shirt with holes in it. Her hair hair
crop short. You did this, Mr President. My husband is
at the bottom of this river because of you, Mr President.
So yeah, he gets uh, he gets distracted from this.
(43:34):
He tries to continue his speech. She says she owes
him all answers. Doesn't really not really clear why it
would be the president's fault. I guess because he he
pulled out of Afghanistan. Um. Yeah, I've been wondering what
they're yeah saying about what he did other than just
like be the president while this happened. Yeah, um, or
(43:58):
like is it just like it seems to also just
be another like that that uh you shout a liar
during the State of the Union at Obama, right, Yeah,
that's what he's doing. Yeah. Uh. So he lets the
woman speak, being the monster that he is, and she's
she's very grief stricken, and she talks about her husband,
who of course served in Vietnam and then was a
(44:18):
bus driver. I guess, uh, And oh god, he's doing
the Obama thing again. Okay, So she asked him, how
could you keep us safe? She stared at him, eyes glowing,
and then he suddenly saw a way forward. He leaned forward,
let a tear roll down his cheek, and hugged her.
She tried to pull away. Initially, he held her tighter.
Finally he felt her sob against his chest, the tension
(44:39):
to go out of her body. The cameras flashed around him.
The moment time stood still. This was the image he'd
been seeking ever since his election. Compassionate, caring, straight. Yeah,
he does it a second time. And you already because
all of all of the villains in this are Barack Obama.
Is that been wrote a book with multip bad guys
(45:00):
and all of them are Obama Obama, Oh my god.
And like the worst thing about they're all Obama. And
the bad thing about them is that they cry. Yeah. Yeah,
they let out a single tear. Um. I cannot believe
he did that again with a different person so close
to the other time. It has not been that long,
(45:22):
Like at least spread them out. You know, wait a
couple of chapters, don't I would have forgoten, wouldn't We
would have forgotten about it. Yeah, because there's so much
terrible ship going on. Just like spread it out, man. Yeah.
And then this president, who is again a monster, admits
that he and the government made mistakes week week. Yeah. Yeah,
(45:44):
it's it's great. Um. He says that, like also some
of the mistakes were that we struck out in aggression
in the Middle East, which like inspired more anger against
us and maybe helped make the attack. We go to
war to protect ourselves, but we end up weakening ourselves.
And an objectively true statement, what uh can you keep making? Amazing?
(46:08):
Even the guy you've said you're going to vote for
President Donald J. Trump says that we weakened ourselves by
invading Iraq in Afghanistan part of why he got elected.
That's it's it's such simple, ship, It's it's amazing. Really, like,
I love everything that happens in the world. Um, it's
(46:30):
so good, Ben, keep it. Yeah, he's gonna he's gonna
where America is going to rebuild. We're gonna raise this
bridge again, gonna be handered by the past. Our swords
will be beaten into plow plowshares. He motioned over to
the thousands of American troops now working along the shoreline.
Our bravest and finest men will be put to work rebuilding.
(46:52):
No more nation building abroad. Thousands upon thousands of those
men and women are coming home, to coming to New
York to rebuild, to revitalize. It's time to build ourselves
up here at home. What a horrible thing I am.
This is It's just this is beautiful art. I can't
even Yeah, yes, Ben, good idea, good idea, bring them.
(47:12):
The worst thing we could do is stop fucking around
in other countries with our army and instead use them
to I don't know, fix the bridges that are falling
things and create stuff for for each other. Like what
what I what is the problem he just wants for
It's this weird revenge ship he wants to like, h
it's weird revenge ship. It's also like weirdly, I also
(47:34):
think he's making attacks at FDR here for like the
works project progress as the Nazi stuff, which from one
of the best things that the government ever did was
be like what if we what if we took all
these starving people and gave them jobs to make parks
and roads and ship No, yes, thank you, make parks
(47:56):
and stuff that people still camp in every single day
called yeah it's amazing. Um. Yeah. Safety does not come
through the fear of a gun or the height of
our walls. Safety comes from love, yes, love for each other. Again,
this is the bad guy, um because when like I'm waiting,
like I really I know it's not going to happen,
(48:21):
because of course it's not because I I know who
wrote this, but like I'm waiting for like the actual
evil thing, right, like what's the thing that he does
where And we're a normal person would read this and go, oh,
that's a villain because like you did, like that's like
a thing you would do in like a good thing
(48:42):
is have this? Characters like oh, they seem like pretty
good actually uh and then like oh they turned. They
were revealed that he's going to like embezzle all of
this money or something from his his program and whatnot,
like something he wants to build bridget he wants to
use you S troops to like improve infrastructure at home
and not waste money in foreign wars, thus making him
(49:05):
the devil. It really, it really doesn't seem like it
was gonna be a turn. It seems like this is
what we get, Like what chapter is this? I think
there's going to be a very sudden turn that makes
no sense. But we are like two thirds of the
way through the book at this point. Oh okay, so
the the end of the book there will be like
I'm I actually want to do the jenocides. Yeah, I'm
here to kill all white people or something. Yeah yeah great,
(49:30):
so yeah the president. The next scene is the president
relaxing in his hotel room watching TV. Uh. The coverage
was nearly universally a static. The one guest commentator on
Fox News had the goal to ask whether the president
and he leads on the perpetrators? Again, no one, no
one would have a problem with that question after a
massive terrorist attack, like it would be the thing we'd
be talking about. Yeah. Ben famously hates presidents that spend
(49:54):
all their time watching Fox News. Yeah my god, all right, yeah, alright, alright,
So the President's concerned, or the President's aid is concerned
that bread Hawthorne is in New York. Uh, YadA, YadA, YadA. President,
what should I care? Uh? And the AID says, well,
he's digging around flight manifest and he's asking to see
(50:15):
pictures of Arabs. First Jesus Christ. The president says racial
profiling right after the love speech, and they say the
media will probably figure it out pretty soon. I mean,
these things have a way of leaking. Yeah, okay. Also, like,
kudos to Ben for writing that line, which I think
is actually like racial profiling after the love speech. It's
(50:39):
such a it's so childish, What a childish way to
frame anything. I love it. Yeah, yeah, it ends on
the president watching his speech and like the last line
from his speech, vengeance is God's we know. Our job
is to build again a monster, the literal devil, a
guy who wants to rebuild bridges team us. He must
(51:00):
be stopped. Pretty if he were allowed to continue on
his path of evil, eventually we would choke to death
on all of the bridges. There he that's his evil planning.
He wants to make too many bridges. He wants to
drown us in bridges. Yeah, he wants to murder us
in bridges. He wants to choke us in an endless
(51:21):
river of infrastructure that allows us to safely drive without
our bridges collapsing like the devil would do at the
devil in a single tier for all the all the
bridges that caused that. I can't even Yeah, well, Cody,
we're three more chapters in. That was three chapters. Like,
(51:43):
decide if that was too long or too short. For
three chapters, I feel like I've lived a thousand years. Oh,
this is an attorney. We're never gonna leave. We're stuck here. No,
this is we're We're stuck in true Allegiance forever. We
will never escape True Allegiance. It is. It is the
Alpha and the Omega the beginning and the end, and
(52:05):
like Ben sentences, it never never conclude. It never actually
never comma. M Dash concludes like a sentence should do
second to m Dash, but because Ben doesn't like to
use comma, periods comma, which which would conclude that meanwhile,
(52:27):
I can't wait until um the president either turns comically
way too evil to be believable or continues down this
this path of just like basic good stuff. You know
what I love, Cody? What's that the written word? I know?
I know that about you? Yeah. So have your feelings
(52:47):
on Ben's novel changed? We're now sixty of the way through.
I it's changed in that I get more of it.
Can I say more of more of it? Yeah, my thoughts,
but more yeahs and flows. It's really it's really, uh,
it's really something to behold. I because you think you
think it doesn't end, you think it doesn't stop. You
think like, oh, surely he can't like show his ass anymore.
(53:10):
Surely the mask couldn't possibly slip anymore. Surely he couldn't
write another just awful, awful sentence. It's amazing. I like
I want to collect and frame all of the bad
sentences in this and then send them to Ben Shapiro
via a registered career and like, here, here are the
sentences you wrote that are not They're not sentences, Ben,
(53:30):
but I want to do immortalize them. Here are some
not sentences for you to check out. Fire your editor
or hire an editor, whichever one you didn't do. Yeah, higher,
and fire a series of editors until you get someone
who's willing to tell you to use a fucking period.
Been It's okay. That's my message at the end of this.
I don't hate Ben Shapiro. I don't want ill to
befall him. I want him to know that it's okay. Ben,
(53:53):
It's okay to conclude a sentence. You can do it.
You can do it. We believe in you and of
sentence Cody. You got any pluggable stepluck, Sure, why not?
I got a YouTube channel called some More News. We
got a Patreon dot com slash Some More News, and
(54:14):
a podcast called even more News. But also cos the
podcast with Robert Evans, it's called Worst You're Ever Um,
we have Some More News actually has a movie that
we released a couple of days before. You listen to
this and check that out. It's fun and about a
lot of stuff, and I don't know Dr MSR Cody
on Twitter all that all that jazz, you know. I
do want to make one note before we roll out.
(54:36):
There is some evidence that Ben Shapiro has improved in
the second half of his novel, that he's learning as
he's writing. Um, which is that we went through three
whole chapters and he never randomly switched from a perspective
character to a completely different character in a wild, last
jarring transition. That is true. He is growing. That's why
he such a skilled writer, because he does it for
(54:56):
the first third of the book. So then you expected
to keep but you're like, Okay, when's this gonna happen?
And then he doesn't do it. That's surprising. It's a
twist exactly. I thought you were even worse as a
writer than you are, but you've gotten slightly better. Oh,
it's good times for everybody, all right, Well, the episodes over.
(55:17):
Please continue voting and or engaging in gunfights with Baptist paramilitaries.
Have a have a good election day, and remember a
tourniquet should be placed above the bleeding wound and then
tightened until the bleeding stops. America strong
Hmm, what's distracting us from the election. Yeah, there we go.
Welcome America to Behind the Bastards, the podcast about terrible people. Normally,
this week is not going to be anybody's favorite week ever.
Probably that might be. It's possible, but unlikely because of
the election, which it is right now. So we're we're
(00:22):
gonna try and ease a little bit of that stress
and pain by reading another few chapters from Benethan Shapiro's terrible,
terrible book True Allegiance, our favorite book, our our Bible. Yeah,
Cody and Eyes what I would describe as I don't know.
I was going to make a joke, but then I
(00:43):
realized I don't know enough about religion to make a
good religion joke. So I don't have a joke. It's
just good. It's a good book. Yeah, we go to
it for wisdom. Like when I wake up and I
don't know what I'm gonna do with my day or
how to feel. I flipped through it and it inspires me.
If I am trying to sleep late at night and
I'm like stressed out, I read a few pages and
get relaxed. I get you some few nuggets star football
(01:04):
players have no name exactly. And then and then then
I feel at peace. I feel it at one you know,
um and uh, and then I do it all again
the next day. Yeah. So we're gonna be dropping this
on election day so you can listen to it while
you're standing in line and or getting into gunfights with
(01:24):
fascist paramilitaries, whatever winds up being our reality. Yeah, whichever
you want. Yeah. So that's that's good. That's great. We're
all very happy, Cody. We should also the elephant in
the room, Katie is not here. Her dog is sick unfortunately,
so our thoughts are with both her and her dog
in equal measure as she is at the dog hospital. Yes,
(01:46):
heart goes out to um Katie and Benny. We love you,
Benny and Katie. The good Benny Good as opposed to
the author of this book, Ben Shapiro. Yeah, the bad,
the bad Benny who wrote the good book, this book,
the good book, the book book. So when we last
left off, we we had that fun chapter with with
(02:09):
Solo Dad and her militia who uh she seemed to
be the plot seemed to be piloting rather than her
because as a woman in Ben's book, she's not allowed
to actually make decisions. Yeah, would it's not a it's
not a fantasy novel, Robert, Come on, so our next chapter.
We're back in Detroit, Michigan for Levin. With Levin, or
(02:31):
at least we'll be with him for a few paragraphs.
Just do another character. How many tenses do you think
we'll get? Levin couldn't believe what he was hearing. Reverend
Jim Crawford sat there in the conference room of the
MGM Grand. The room had already been scanned for bugs
and been found clean. In his expense, Wow, that is
(02:52):
a sentence right now. Crawford sat there, Comma in the
conference room of the MGM Grand. And then there's an
md ash. The room had already been scanned for bugs
and been found clean. Second m Dash in his expensive suit,
Comma explaining why he thought he should get his people
off the street. One sentence, that's so many claus that's
(03:13):
so yeah, Ben, use the fucking period, or like you
don't even like, oh, okay, it's okay to have sentences.
Sentences can be short. All you need, you know, you
need the subject, you know, you need a verb, maybe
like an object in there. But like even that first
(03:33):
one where you were saying, He's what was it? He's
sitting there, Comma in the conference room. He was just
sitting there in the conference room. Can't read that, Comma. Yeah,
but you're about to have a long m dash clause
that is itself an entire sentence. Oh and here's the
best part. After in his expensive suit, Comma explaining why
he thought Lee should get his people off the street.
(03:54):
The next sentence is just the word Now. Oh my god,
the difference, Ben, Oh my god, Oh, so many extremes,
Like you couldn't write worse if you tried. It's it's
really something else. Like presumably an editor looked at this,
(04:16):
but I have like, I don't know. I think he's
like Glint and Greenwald. He does not like to be edited. Yeah,
if they like, I'm sure they offered to edit it.
But Ben was like, no, you're censoring me. You don't
edit poetry. I'll publish this myself because I'm an artist. Allegedly, Okay,
lev On had seen Big Jim's press conference with the
mayor the previous week period. That's a sentence, Comma still
(04:40):
sporting a bandage over his gashed forehead. Comma had thanked
Big Jim profusely for stopping the violence, Comma for cutting
short the possibility of a riot. Okay, okay, okay, it's uneven.
That's like my one note. Like sometimes you nail it
in that you write a sentence. At other times it
seems maybe you need to add word. See, this is
(05:03):
the other thing that I read his book for. It
gets out the toxins. He made me spit out coffee.
That was fun to watch. Yes, sorry, don't good for
everybody listening to this in line to vote or getting
into a gunfight with fascist paramilitary again. Either way, it
(05:24):
could be both. It could be both. Yeah, yeah, multitask
you know there's a lot going on in so Yeah.
They talk about problems of inequality, problems of racial justice.
They're talking to the mayor. They're doing a a conversation
with the mayor about racial justice. After this big riot,
Mayor Burns nodded along, common knowing that he had no
choice dash he could use the photo off with the
(05:47):
civil rights icon in his reelection campaign. Newsweek put Big
Jim on its cover the headline the Peacemaker. The photo
framed his head with a halo. In the piece, Big
Jim in Detroit said that Detroit would have to pursue
a complete makeover of its obviously racist police apartment. That
meant community policing in the truest sense, drawing police officers
from the community itself. That didn't mean hiring officers from
(06:10):
the outside the way they'd hired Ricky O. Sullivan. It
didn't even mean hiring black cops from outside the city
and forced him to live in the city to get
to know the people they protected. And meant hiring longtime
residents of the city, even people with backgrounds America said,
said Big Jim, Yeah, exactly. It's like this is a
horrible idea. Like what Bin's actually saying here, Like he's
trying to frame this as like this evil black terrorists
(06:32):
has a plan to make all of the cops be
gangsters by community policing, But what he's actually saying is
community policing like having neighborhoods policed by people who live
in those neighborhoods is a bad idea because blacks are
criminals actually people with just like the phrase people with backgrounds,
like say what you mean, buddy, what are the backgrounds?
(06:56):
But like it's as you were reading that, I was
like surely, surely this is actually going to be framed
as though it's a bad thing. And he did not
disappoint No, no, no, no, it absolutely did not. He
wants like to force people from out of the city
to like move there to police the area. They were
(07:16):
all of the stuff, like, there's actually a lot of
problems with community policing as it's generally introduced. But but
all of the stuff big Jim, who is again the
devil basically in a bed is saying here is perfectly reasonable.
You want to know why our community doesn't trust the police.
They don't trust the police because to them, the police
are strangers and the other way around. And it takes
more than a few than living in the community a
(07:36):
few months to earn trust. I'll tell you what he
told the newsweek reporter. It takes more than even being
a good policeman. It means having been through what these
folks have been through. It means knowing that just because
somebody got sent up to prison for some stupid drug
crime that wouldn't have gotten a white boy six months
in the can, that doesn't mean their life should be over.
It means understanding with theres a legacy of racism again,
these people are engaged in a plot to overthrow the government.
(07:59):
It is. It is so frustrating hearing this young man
right this book like yeah, because it just it makes
it clear that he knows, ye, like he's making he's
he knows, and he's making the argument like that is
correct and good. So he knows, he knows, he knows
what the argument is, but whenever he talks about it,
(08:20):
he pretends like he doesn't. I shouldn't have gotten mad
at my favorite book. Sorry, Ben, It's okay. You only
you only you know, we only hurt the books we love,
which you know is why, for example, every night I
get into a fist fight with a copy of slaughter
House five. Um, you know, it's just it's just what
(08:43):
happens when you're drinking, you assault the books that you love. Yeah, okay,
so uh yeah. The interview had caused an uproar. They
even Robert, I believe we left off at the m dash.
There's there's so many nash in this book, which I
(09:03):
get it right, Like we all use them, especially like
when I'm and stuff that's not for publication, I'll throw
them in a lot because it's a helpful way for
me to like remember how I plan to read it. Like,
Like people ask, like why I don't push them up,
It's because, like they're messy as hell. They're not like there,
I write them their essays, but they're they're written and
exactly and I would not publish them that way because
they wouldn't read well if someone else we're reading them right, been,
(09:28):
like it is the thing that new writers do. It's fine,
like if you're using a lot of M dashes, but
your goal should be you know, sentences like Yeah, Also,
he's not a new writer at this point. He's not
a new writer. He's been doing it. It's the only
thing he's ever done in his entire life for money. Yeah, yes,
the only thing he's ever done. Yeah. It's literally his
(09:50):
one job and he's killing it. He's nailing it. Yeah.
The interview had caused an uproar. They even quoted Leaf
on it and asking him what do you thought of
Big Jim's leadership? Leave and told them that without Big Jim,
the whole street would have got up in flames. Big Jim,
he told them standing up for us. So long as
he does, as long as we get justice, we can
make this city whole again now. However, Levin regretted he'd
(10:10):
ever laid eyes on Big Jim. He'd been foolish to
have trusted the man. He'd figured he could always outplay him.
Everybody thought Big Jim was past his prime, that he'd
run his course after a youth of rabble rousing and
race baiting. He'd entered the main stream. He had had,
he had, he'd appeared in liquor stores. Blah blah blah
blah blah. He's just making the same point. So he's Yeah,
Big Jim's talking to him about how they've done a
(10:30):
lot of good and they're okay, Uh that they they
they've achieved some things, and Levan's gonna get what he
wants and uh he should, uh he should be satisfied
with what they've gotten so far and play the cards
they've got. Yeah, okay, so that's what Big Jim saying. Um,
this is next paragraph in Afghani. Stand there like no, no, no.
(10:51):
It was already packed when he pulled up, and the
shops set as he So he leaves the meeting with
Big Jim angry because Big Jim is happy with the
games they've made. He's already packed when he pulled up
and the shop set A slightly overweight black woman, Regina Malone,
clutched a handkerchief to her face. Her every makeup was
streaked with tears. She looked like she hadn't stopped crying
since she found out about her son, Kendrick. And the
truth was she hadn't. Kendrick had been her youngest boy,
(11:12):
a good boy, she told the media, shot to death
because of police racism. The President had called her offer
his condolences and told her he'd stop at nothing to
get to the bottom of the case. That's what a
president would say. I'm gonna get to the bottom of
the case. The president. Yeah, I also like that his
left wing rag. And this is Newsweek, the magazine that
Andy No writes columns for. But yeah, the Wayne County
(11:36):
prosecutor hadn't been his forthcoming. She'd been elected for a fluke.
The entire government in Wayne County sprang from the Democratic Party.
But Kim Donahue had looked into her job show she
it is a fluke that a competent conservative had become
the prosecutor here. Um yeah, she'd been appointed to no opposition. Yeah,
yea had to Um so he's just describing this person
who is his, his ideal human being because she's going
(12:00):
into not going to prosecute cops for shooting a black boy. Yeah, okay,
that's good talking about how great this this prosecutor is. Okay.
Regina alone, standing next to Big Jim had called a
press conference and which he asked Donna Hue to refuse
herself given her ties to the police department. Donna he
would refuse, stating that she would insure justice was served
and implied that if anyone implied her sin skin color
(12:20):
meant that she couldn't be objective, they were racist. But
light made national headlines turning and turned Kim Donahue into
one of those polarizing political figures in America. Levon got
out of his car and Regina, what I mentioned the
skin color. I thought it was because of a relationship
with the police. Yeah, I know, Yeah that no one did.
It doesn't seem like, okay, just making all right. She
(12:41):
she's doing the thing that Ben says you shouldn't do.
But he she's likes cops, so Ben's fine with it,
because yeah, it does sound like she's the one who
brought race into it. Then on the television stood Kim
Dominic Donahue, the cheers. So we we go through a
little bit of this, like Levan's talking with the mother
this dead boy, and then the news announces that the
d A is not going to charge the police officer
who shot the kid. As as happens repeatedly, Um, yeah,
(13:07):
so that's that's cool. She says that she's not doing
the agenda of the mob. The evidence of the support manslaughter,
doesn't support murder. Levan gets angry at this, as you
as you might one might one might get angry at that. Yeah.
The mayor asks everybody to remain calm, so I think
we're gonna have yeah, and Big Jim tells people not
to riot, So I think that's that's that's that's what
(13:28):
we're gonna have here, very very subtle foreshadowing then, Yeah.
And also the officers getting released from prison the day
that they choose not to do charges, which is not
how it works. They like charge them and then they
generally get out on on bail, which is like what's
happened every time one of these guys shot somebody and
actually been charged. But whatever, Okay, leave paid administrative leave.
(13:53):
Uh so leave on is surrounded by cameras and like media.
After this announcement that they're not charging, the cop comes
in and he realizes that he's standing next to the
mother of the kid who's just been killed, and he
has a great opportunity to be a rabble rouser. So
the camera zoomed in on leave On. He forced himself
to cry comma, just to tear semi colon. He looked
up at the throat. He's doing Obama. He's doing Obama.
(14:17):
He's doing Obama cry. Oh yeah, it's Obama cry. And
he cried the one tier at the same Oh yeah, yeah.
The right hates that he cried that one tier. Yeah,
he's he's doing You're probably right, yeah, okay, yep, definitely.
Then he exhaled slowly and looked directly into the camera.
Enough dead children, it stops today. Yeah he did, he
(14:37):
did it. Oh my god, so bad, Oh my god.
Every now and then we'll get to like a chunk
like we just went through, where it's kind of dull,
and then you get Ben Shapiro, like making the terrorist
leader do the exact same thing Obama did when he
was sad that twenty something children got shot to death
at school. Oh my god, oh so good slash bad.
(15:00):
It's it's amazing. Like one of the things that's frustrating
is like I don't like Obama or Biden, but they
keep getting attacked by the right for things that like
aren't bad. Like I don't think Obama was faking his
tears at twenty something children getting shot to death because
he's a person. It makes you sad. It's like it's
so it's I mean, it's a lot of that stuff
(15:21):
to speaks to like their worldview and who they are, right,
like they don't cry or like feel those things, didn't
give a shit about those kids, So yeah, exactly, like, oh,
surely he has to be faking it because nobody would
ever cry at this. Yeah, it can't be that. Like, no,
he can both like have a callous disregard for the
lives of people in Yemen and also like see a
(15:42):
bunch of small children shot to pieces with a rifle
and be fucked up by it because he's a dad.
Like yeah, like those really don't conflict with each other
as much as maybe they should. But like, yeah, god,
and it's it's the same thing with like the paid
protesters stuff. Yeah you think that because you would need
to get paid to protest something in order to care
(16:04):
about people getting harmed. Who weren't you? You would need
money because you're a bad person. Unbelievable. I cannot believe
he just did that. I can't believe it. I mean, okay,
and yeah, he's he's okay. So he just says that
to the news and then he silently leads a crowd
that I guess is formed at this point away from
the barbershop towards the criminal Justice Center. So he's he's
(16:27):
marching with a big protest that I'm sure is going
to burn the city down. Um, that's the thing that's
going to happen next. So now we're back to Brett Hawthorne. Yes, yeah, yeah,
fucking precious. Get that bear of a man in here. Yeah.
(16:47):
Brett surveyed the damage from the top of a nearby
parking lot. It's stretched before him like a diorama, unreal
in miniature, too dramatic for life. Since the attacks, all
commercial air travel had been shut down thanks to warnings
from the Department of Homely in Security. The terror chatter
had actually elevated after the attack. DHS thought the airlines
could be targeted again. Given the focus on the destruction
of the bridge, Brett's homecoming hadn't been much of one.
(17:10):
By the time he landed his rescue, if you could
call it, that had been blown off the front pages
by the terror attack. His flight back to Texas had
been canceled, and he'd been stashed at a local hotel
with oh my God the sentences. Fight back to Texas
had been canceled, Comma, and he'd been stashed at a
local hotel Comma with guards on him at nearly all times.
M Dash, the President, was obviously worried. He'd talked to
the media without hand loose nearby. Period did not need
(17:36):
to be there. You could just have written a couple
of sentences there, buddy. It's okay to use a period
bit like every period. And it's also okay to just
like not use commas and just like keep writing. I
kind of want yeah, yeah, you're in the middle of
a sentence. Just keep going. You're almost done with the sentence.
I kind of want to get you know, they have
(17:56):
those books. I assume they have these books for little
girls about like the first periods. I want to like
photoshop one of those, to be forbid, and about like
using periods and sentences. It's actually okay, it's okay, it's okay.
Everyone periods, Everyone does it. It's totally natural, very funny. Well,
you know he's not. He's pretty afraid of words. Yeah
(18:17):
he is. Uh. Ellen had hinted via phone that some
big move was imminent in Texas from the governor, but
he hadn't had time to focus on that. He'd been
more focused on helping out Bill Callier. Call Your's wife,
Jennifer had been on the bridge. They still hadn't dredged
up her body. The day after his arrival, Bill had
met Brett at his hotel. He dismissed a security For
(18:38):
a few minutes. Brett could see that his friend had
aged a century in a day. His face looked craggy,
his eyes sunken. Bill had been married to Jennifer for
a long time. He had also lost his daughter in
the attack, an eight year old. He'd called his little trooper.
We don't we don't get her name? Why why why
would he give her a name? I do love that.
That's like this, This guy losing his eight year old
(19:00):
daughter is an afterthought. Yeah, his young child also diet,
Like yeah, uh, very fun by the way, his small
daughter is dead too. Um YadA, YadA, yaday. They talk
about this man who has lost his wife and young child.
(19:22):
Talks with Brett about the fact that he's afraid the
president is going to use the terrorist attack to call
for a massive spending package on infrastructure and urge for
their cuts to the military. Yeah, the worst nightmare is
an infrastructure bill. Yeah, he's he doesn't know where his
his eight year old corpses, but he's concerned about an
(19:44):
infrastructure bill. Good. Uh, like a human would you know?
Ye that it's all that I have on my mind. Yeah, well,
you know on my mind. And Robert products and services.
Perhaps it is the only thing that can balmb the
loss of an eight year old. That's true. So if
(20:06):
your wife and daughter have died in a terrorist attack
on a bridge, please console yourself with these products and
services we have back are m. We're a single tear
for the problems, and we're shedding a tear for products
(20:29):
and services. So this general guy uh has ordered Brett
orders bretton newr Okay, so like we're doing the thing
you know been started us in media arrests. And then
he's going back in time to explain how Brett arrived
in New York City. Yeah, Earliever, I love it. Yeah,
and there it's amazing that like they're having this, this
(20:50):
conversation about sending Bret somewhere to thwart the president's plans
for an infrastructure bill. Well, this this man is grieving
of all the reasons God just and ignoring like I
love Yeah, in the middle of the action, we're gonna
like it's starting. But like earlier, let's see like how
(21:11):
we got here, Let's do all the boring stuff real quick.
Instead of instead of summing up the boring stuff in
a sentence, you know, Bill had, you know, through a
haze of tears, ordered you know, uh, Brett to to
New York in order to do this and this like bam,
you got it in a sentence. Let's get continue the action.
We're going back and rather than you know, trying to
establish any emotional pathos by by lingering on the fact
(21:32):
that this man has lost his wife and child, he's
just talking at like normal about how they need Brett
here and how bad it is that the president wants
to build up infrastruct Uh, it's fun, your daughter, We
gotta stop the roads. Yeah. Oh, Wow. Yeah, So Brett
says the President won't like that, and Bill says, to
(21:53):
my patience for bullshit goes out the window after I
watched them search on television for my daughter's body, said
the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of sta F. I'll
make whatever excuses I have to make. I want to
know who's responsible for this, and right now you're my
best lead, You're the only. Yeah. So that Ben really
understands how humans deal with grief. Yeah, No, no, he doesn't.
You could have just stopped that Ben doesn't really understand
(22:16):
how humans. Yeah. He, And he does also understands tense.
Because you would not say, like where I saying to you,
Cody that my patients for bullshit goes out the window
after I watched them search on television for my daughter's body.
That's not what I would say. I would take my
patients for bullshit went out the window when I watched
them search on television for my daughter's body. Or my
patients goes out the window when I see them doing
(22:39):
X or why. Yes, every way basically, but the way
Big wrote it, it would be grammatically appropriate. Yeah, okay,
so I'll need your weird that you'll stay away from
the media. That's the only thing Prescott cares about. Amazing,
like that what you carry about infrastructure and your daughter? Guy, Like,
(23:00):
come on, dude, okay, um Breton, not a I'm sorry
about your family, bill, call your grimaced Yeah me too,
he said, me too. No, go get the pieces of
ship who did this so I can bomb them back
into the sixth century, which had He's just like writing
Independence Day like bad and worse. Yes, the thing that
(23:22):
a man would say after being comforted by a friend
for the loss of his wife and daughter, like I'm
sorry about your family. Yeah, me too, me too. Yeah.
Hey you know what, same same bro. It's like they're
talking about a car that got totaled, right, Like that's
what's like, Oh hey man, I'm sorry about your car.
I know you really like that car. It's like, yeah,
(23:42):
me too. Right, let's this is your wife and daughter. Dude. Yeah,
Like I said, it's a bomber. Yeah it's lame as hell, bro,
that's very clear out bom diam Okay. So uh. Now,
looking at the damage, Brett punished himself for not having
(24:04):
been able to warn intelligence sooner. If only he'd used
Morst code to tell them something was coming from a
CHAMMI if only he'd blinked the name Mohammed, Yes, if
only he'd blinked the most common name in the world,
that would a really key to men. If only I
let him know, John did it. Ok Yeah, it's so
(24:27):
good in his name, in his heart. He knew it
wouldn't have helped. Yes, I agree. America had blinded itself
in the name of peace. Okay, okay, And Brett knew
that hope wouldn't buy peace anyway. He turned his back
on the Hudson, where the sunken bridge still lay, slumbering
under acres of water, the comb of the surface masking
the graves of thousands of Americans. The American public had
(24:47):
called the Iraq War two bloody comma, the Afghanistan War
two costly semi colon combined, America had lost fewer than
seven thousand people period. Now Comma, on one day, they'd
lost far more than that. It' funny because Bill ben
is trying to justify the war on terror, and the
only way he could do it is by inventing a
fake terrorist. It's amazing. It's see in my book, they
(25:11):
killed more people than we lost in the Wars that
we lost. It's like Slip Slippery Slope the novel. It's
so good. Oh I love it. But what if? What if?
And then I'm right? Okay, good point. Yeah I guess,
I guess. Then you're right, man, yeah, yeah, then yes, yes,
(25:31):
bit well no, you still wouldn't have been right because again,
this terrorist attack was launched by Iran, one of the
yeah like okay, which none of like the actual interplay
with the terrorist makes a whole lot of sense in
this either, but still be right, I mean wrong. And
then you're it was one of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. Okay, yeah, yeah,
(25:53):
they Yeah, that's why the yeah is justified because in
this book they are right. So it's okay. Saddam's revenge unbelievable,
which is normally a term for diarrhea. Um, yeah, I
mean it was. Yeah. So the airport felt like a mausoleum.
He gets sent to the airport, by the way, uh,
(26:16):
completely empty, completely deserted. The planes set at their terminals
like sleeping grasshoppers. That's a weird. Why that's maybe taking
other paths that what you are comparing plates to grasshoppers.
I mean they have wings, but so do things look
more like plane, right? Okay, Ben, I mean like it's
(26:39):
in the name they like they hop dragon flies. I
don't know. You also like just like, don't do the metaphors,
just don't do it. I guess that was assimilate, but like,
come on, man. So Ben is with port authority in
security in the closed down airport looking to see like
(27:00):
all the people who have entered the country and all
the flight manifests to see if this terrorist had come
into the country. Uh, he tells one of the officials,
I would access to the customs files if you don't
mind me asking, Sir murmured the official, is there somebody
we're looking for? Particularly, Brett said, yes, an Arabic looking
young man. Oh uh, which is clearly like he's trying
(27:23):
to justify racial profiling, but also like the least useful, Yes,
that will narrow it down to thousands. That's and like
that's that's the point, like that's why exactly, that's why
it's bad, why it's bad. But it's there's too me.
It's to me like a slightly better hack writer would
(27:45):
have had him like accurately described the man and then
had like some histrionic you know, official will be like
that's racial profiling, and being it's not racial profiling, just
to point out that he has you know, that he's
an Arab man and he has these features, and like
that's again, would still be a bad book, but that
would be like a competent, shitty writer. Yeah, a better
(28:06):
smarter person. Yeah, a better right wing grifter author. I've
done it that way. But Ben is again a complete
failure of it's it's it rules. Honestly the best thing
about him. Yeah. Yeah. The official complaints that that's racial profiling,
which it is because the only detail Brett gave is
(28:28):
that he's Arabic looking looking looking. That's oh my god,
oh god, you're not doing the profiling. I am. Well
now I'm a party to it. Brett stared into his face.
I don't care. Just do it, sir. It's against regulations though.
Look Brett burst out, losing his patients. I don't give
a rat's ass at this point whether it's racial profiling
or not. Maybe you right, Maybe Mohammed is a light
(28:51):
skinned Norwegian woman or a Cherokee elder. Maybe he's a
Persian or Arabic, or maybe he's a I feel like
i'm listening to him talk right now, I know it's it,
it's good. Or maybe he's a Persian or Arabic looking
son of a bitch who hangs out with other Persian
or Arabic looking sons of bitches who look like Abraham
is Shami, which is you know, Ben, they're different ethnic groups.
(29:14):
Persians and Arabs don't care for this. Yeah, it's like
being like, yeah, he's a Mexican or an African person,
you know, like like like that, like it's that level
of racist, Like it's he's a person from one of
two massive land masses, you know, again making the case
(29:35):
for why racial profiling is bad. Like he's doing all
of the work for us. It's just incredible. Yeah, I
mean it is. It is like it it's that racist.
It's his racist as being like he's an African looking person.
It's like, well, but that's a giant land mass that
includes a wide variety of different ethnic groups. Like yeah,
I know he's Persian or Arabic. Thank you, Ben. That
(29:55):
narrows it down. You got it, You got it. You
definitely understood what we said, yeah, and responded accordingly. Yeah,
it's great because this is supposed to be like how
him explaining like how racial profiling is really necessary to
stop terrorism, but all it actually is is like showing
that all Been wants is racial profiling. He's not saying
(30:16):
like this isn't It's usually pointed as like, well, look,
you know, if if if we get a solid tip
that like a terrorist is a man of you know,
Afghan descent, you know we can't. You're saying we can't
like look for people who are of Afghan descent who
are in the area, and like that's wrong, and like
that's again, is a wrong line of argument. But there's
at least more it's at least more of an argument
than Ben who is saying, like, let's profile all of
(30:39):
the Persian or Arabic looking sons of bitches. He's not
He's not actually saying anything. There's no argument here. He's
just saying I want it, so I'm gonna have my
character yell about it and be proven right by the
circumstances that I write in the book and also been
again the lack of research here. One of the things
(30:59):
that Brett notes is that there would be hundreds, maybe
thousands of possible leads men who had flown from the
Middle East through some point in the days that would
be ten. The Middle East is large, been there's so
many people who come to the US and leave the
US towards like heading there. It's every big, it's very big.
(31:20):
Is the Middle East a country? To him? Is that?
Like what? He like? Yeah, I think it is. I
think the Middle East to him is like like it's
a single place as opposed to a massive Again, it's
like somebody is saying he looks Africans, like, well, okay,
does he look like he's from Morocco or look like
like like there's all all white light of countries and
there's thousands of ethnic groups. Like it's a massive area,
(31:44):
like very big continents. Yeah, it's it's I mean of
which you know the Yeah, it's it's it's great, it's
it's very it's everything in this book is so good,
and okay, here's the best part. Uh. He realizes that
there's too many names to search through, point making the
(32:05):
point that everything he's done at this so far is useless.
So he calls a contact of his name to Hassan
Abduel to find a cafe to go meet a contact
who presumably is going to know about this guy, which
is kind of been maybe making the point, uh that
that racial profiling doesn't work, but didn't work because he
(32:26):
needed to go contact because there be too many people
that instead, you reached out to an individual who had
pertinent information maybe about an individual who you were looking for,
as opposed to again looking for Persian or Arabic sons
of bitches. So the whole point of that section was
just for him to be racist, right and then not
realize that he's making the case against it. Yeah, well
(32:51):
he did it. You did. You got to do the
racism scene. I guess, I mean one of the many.
The whole book is a racism seen. Um. Yeah, so
he sits down from this guy. Oh, I guess that's
his friend from high school. Um, his his his black
friend who I think converted to Islam, the one who
taught him how to be funny to the bully with
no name. Yeah, the Jersey list football player. Yeah just
(33:17):
call just call your friend first instead of saying look
for an Arab looking guy. Oh cool, So Ben's friend.
The one positive Muslim person that we've met so far
was was buddies with Anwar al al Laki, who is
like one of the uh who's like a fucking very
(33:38):
hardcore Islamic preacher um who uh is seen as having
an influence on you know, terrorists. Uh so, And then
he's he's he's now helping Brett out because on September eleven,
he'd seen the uh yeah, okay cool, so so so
Ben's Ben's one uh positive Muslim like character was also
(34:02):
friends with a with a with an extremist still terrorist,
still terrorist, Jason Yeah. After September eleven, Hassan spoke to
Brett and Brett set up a covert meeting with the
Federal Bureau of Investigation. Hassan Abdul became a mole. His
jobs changed over the years, as did his location. His
responsibility into the Bush administration had been to provide leads
(34:22):
on possible terror suspects attending mosques in prominent urban areas.
For the past few years, he'd been stationed in New
York City at the mosque he posted as a borderline radical.
He spoke regularly about the injustices of the wars in
Iraq and Afghanistan. But during okay, so yeah, he's he's
he's been a he's been working with the FBI. Hadda YadA, YadA,
um because he found out that all Muslims are terrorists.
(34:43):
And then we've been points out that under the election
of Mark Prescott, who is white Obama, the FBI no
longer monitored mosques um and that that is clearly a
bad thing. Yep. Cool. Wait Wait, I figured what years
was written seen is when it was published. I guess
he probably wrote or during a weekend in give him
(35:06):
the care he gave to editing this. Yeah. Yeah, So
he gives the information about this terrorist he's looking to
to his contact. I says, it's not a lot to
go on. How do you know he's coming to New
York as opposed to some other city. Had you know
he wasn't involved in the original attack. Is the government
even locked down the bastards who planted the bombs? I
don't know, Hassan. All I know is there's something more
to this, and I know that he is religious the
(35:27):
way a Shami spoke to him. If he's here, the
only way to find him will be through the mosques. Ah.
That's good. Uh. They talk some more. He's got to
convince his friend, who's angry because the FBI isn't profiling
Muslims anymore. Somehow, somehow darker. Yeah it is. I'm gonna
read the last bit of this because it's very strange writing.
You don't want to need to convince me, white boy.
(35:47):
I just need to know why I'm doing this. And
it isn't for your president, believe me not. At Brett
neither am I. Hassan nodded a lot of nodding. Here,
I'll be in touch when I've got something for you.
He turned towards the door, then turned back. There's good
and bad and everyone, he crooned, a smile, suddenly creasing
his lips. We learned to live, We learned to give.
Brett left each other what we need to survive together alive.
I think they're singing a song here, yes, yep, okay,
(36:13):
I'm guessing that's a song. Yeah, like a thing that
they did together, like it's in it's like a friend
thing that they do. Yeah, yeah, that's that's fine. I
guess like like they're like they're little yeah spoken handshake,
I guess yep, yep, yeah, okay. You know Sophie, you
know who won't surveile Muslims pointlessly? Uh and because of racism,
(36:40):
that's not ship these products and we're back. Oh, yeah,
oh yeah, yep, all right, you know I do you know,
(37:03):
you know, Cody, all right, we're back to New York City.
I mean that could have that could have just been
like you reading the book, you know, Comma, you know Dash,
you know, so New York City President Prescott iconic moments.
These were the moments that Mark Prescott had always wanted.
FDR standing before Congress declaring war on Japan, John F.
Kennedy in Berlin, Reagan at the Berlin Wall, George W.
(37:26):
Bush and the wreckage of the World Trade Center. And
now Prescott standing on the precipice of the Hudson Oh
my god, what a sentence. And now Comma Prescott Comma
standing on the precipice of the Hudson River. Comma with
the Coastguards still dredging the waters, Comma with the wreckage
of one of America's greatest public works projects mangled behind him. Period.
We got there, we got through it. Oh my good,
(37:46):
damn it. Wow, Ben, what a sentence. There are a
lot of Oh you could have yeah, just generally, just generally,
like if you like, go just go through an open
and you're listening because you're a huge fan um and
you appreciate feedback. Just go through and remove half the
commas and your sentences will be better. Um. I also
(38:09):
find it very very funny that uh, Ben seems really
really hyper focused on this idea of Obama only wanting
these like moments, these publicity moments. He's like, I want
to look like FDR, I want to look at this
um and has Uh I don't. I don't know if
you know anything about the current president, Robert, I don't.
Who do we have? We have a president? We do?
(38:31):
We do? Um? He one could argue, um is like
the worst uh at this exact thing, the most obvious
about this exact thing that Ben cannot get out of
his mind about President Barack Obama. Sorry, I'm sorry, President
Barack's saying Obama Barry Sato. Do you remember that? Do
you remember when that was the thing on the right
(38:53):
wait no, oh boy, oh man, yeah it was. It
used to be ah like yeah. They were convinced that
that that was his should be his real name for
reasons that I don't know. I don't even remember. I
used to know why, like yeah, used, yeah, it's stopped
once everything got so much like worse once Trump became president.
But like that used to be like a whole if
(39:14):
you'd go to like Free Republic where all of like
the really old like worst fascist Republicans were back before
that was the norm in the party. They would all
call him Barry Satara. It was very silly. Um, yes,
and I suspect been abolutely. I'm that's a that's a
tab I'm opening for later. Yeah, yeah, can take a
(39:35):
look into that. So the president is obvious, is very
excited because a bunch of people are dead, so he
gets to give a speech. He's wearing a windbreaker instead
of the suit like George Bush did, which is like yeah,
as if it's like a ploy as opposed to like, yeah,
you're head and do a disaster area, you wouldn't wear
a nice suit to like an active disaster Like it's
it's one of those things like you don't even like
(39:56):
I'm not even gonna like give Bush it for that,
Like he wasn't doing it for a look. He was
doing it because he was headed to a disaster area
and you're gonna wear not a fine suit for that,
you know, if you did wear a fine suit, he
would be called like a coastal elite fancy man. He's
wearing a suit to a thing. You shouldn't have won
a suit too. Nonsense utter nonsense. Also been capitalized his windbreaker,
(40:19):
which is weird to me. It doesn't seem like a
like a proper noun. But okay. That is also super
concerned about his editor, like I don't think there is
I really don't think he had one. There's like, there's
no way, there's no way he had one. Like it's
(40:39):
like that that that would be I would be I
would be surprised if we would. We would have to
hunt his editor down. Um with extremes. Be fired. I mean,
Ben should be fired. That person should be Comma fired,
Comma right, Comma away, Colma period, m DA. But also
(41:00):
windbreaker windbreaker is not capitalized like never never ever unless
it's like the name of a boat, right right, yeah,
or like like the brand of of of the windbreaker. Yeah,
if it's a windbreaker. Yeah, yes, I don't know why,
(41:20):
but that's my favorite part of this book. Yeah, very cool. Um, Yeah,
I'm upset that the president didn't wear a suit. I
guess at the thing, um and really wants that photo ops,
the photo op. President Barack Obama always came about photo ops. No,
presidents after him, caring more about he's the only president
who like who like got his picture taken. Ever, it
(41:44):
never happened again. That was the single time that it occurred.
And they would never again like create events just to
just to have these sort of photo opportunities. Yeah, never uh. Yeah,
he would never like have people tear gased in order
to take a picture with the Bible, right, Like that
would be bad. That's that's ridiculous, Robert, that's like you
should be you should that's an Obama thing. Yeah, classic. Yeah.
(42:11):
The President gives a speech. All right, I'm gonna read
a speech my fellow Americans. He said, We've experienced the
greatest single attack on American soil in our history. Two
days ago. We lost thousands of American lives, women, women, children.
But let our enemies here this. We remain strong. We
remained unbowed, We remained unbroken, unwavering, unshaken. We stand together,
and our unity is our power. Today, our enemies rejoice
in our tragedy. Tomorrow they will see us rebuilding from
(42:32):
these ashes, restore what was once what once was, rebuild
our America better, stronger than it was before. They hope
that their destruction would cause us to question ourselves, question
our course. They hope that we would surrender our philosophy,
our way of life. They were wrought. Yeah, yeah, there's
a a boring president, doesn't seem very's yeah, yeah, like
why even right all this out if it's also okay,
(42:53):
So it's not even saying anything about him president or
like anything. It's just like the yeah, the basic president
ship like okay, okay. So he's he's giving his speech
and he's about to hit the big moment that he's
been excited for, and then someone in the crowd screams,
you did this. Prescott was momentarily startled. Then he began
in times of grief, we do not walk alone yet. Yeah,
(43:13):
He's continues. Then someone interrupts again and yells, you did this,
Mr President? Uh? And suddenly yeah, he sees a loan protester.
It was a woman overweight, wearing fair faded jeans and
a T shirt with holes in it. Her hair hair
crop short. You did this, Mr President. My husband is
at the bottom of this river because of you, Mr President.
So yeah, he gets uh, he gets distracted from this.
(43:34):
He tries to continue his speech. She says she owes
him all answers. Doesn't really not really clear why it
would be the president's fault. I guess because he he
pulled out of Afghanistan. Um. Yeah, I've been wondering what
they're yeah saying about what he did other than just
like be the president while this happened. Yeah, um, or
(43:58):
like is it just like it seems to also just
be another like that that uh you shout a liar
during the State of the Union at Obama, right, Yeah,
that's what he's doing. Yeah. Uh. So he lets the
woman speak, being the monster that he is, and she's
she's very grief stricken, and she talks about her husband,
who of course served in Vietnam and then was a
(44:18):
bus driver. I guess, uh, And oh god, he's doing
the Obama thing again. Okay, So she asked him, how
could you keep us safe? She stared at him, eyes glowing,
and then he suddenly saw a way forward. He leaned forward,
let a tear roll down his cheek, and hugged her.
She tried to pull away. Initially, he held her tighter.
Finally he felt her sob against his chest, the tension
(44:39):
to go out of her body. The cameras flashed around him.
The moment time stood still. This was the image he'd
been seeking ever since his election. Compassionate, caring, straight. Yeah,
he does it a second time. And you already because
all of all of the villains in this are Barack Obama.
Is that been wrote a book with multip bad guys
(45:00):
and all of them are Obama Obama, Oh my god.
And like the worst thing about they're all Obama. And
the bad thing about them is that they cry. Yeah. Yeah,
they let out a single tear. Um. I cannot believe
he did that again with a different person so close
to the other time. It has not been that long,
(45:22):
Like at least spread them out. You know, wait a
couple of chapters, don't I would have forgoten, wouldn't We
would have forgotten about it. Yeah, because there's so much
terrible ship going on. Just like spread it out, man. Yeah.
And then this president, who is again a monster, admits
that he and the government made mistakes week week. Yeah. Yeah,
(45:44):
it's it's great. Um. He says that, like also some
of the mistakes were that we struck out in aggression
in the Middle East, which like inspired more anger against
us and maybe helped make the attack. We go to
war to protect ourselves, but we end up weakening ourselves.
And an objectively true statement, what uh can you keep making? Amazing?
(46:08):
Even the guy you've said you're going to vote for
President Donald J. Trump says that we weakened ourselves by
invading Iraq in Afghanistan part of why he got elected.
That's it's it's such simple, ship, It's it's amazing. Really, like,
I love everything that happens in the world. Um, it's
(46:30):
so good, Ben, keep it. Yeah, he's gonna he's gonna
where America is going to rebuild. We're gonna raise this
bridge again, gonna be handered by the past. Our swords
will be beaten into plow plowshares. He motioned over to
the thousands of American troops now working along the shoreline.
Our bravest and finest men will be put to work rebuilding.
(46:52):
No more nation building abroad. Thousands upon thousands of those
men and women are coming home, to coming to New
York to rebuild, to revitalize. It's time to build ourselves
up here at home. What a horrible thing I am.
This is It's just this is beautiful art. I can't
even Yeah, yes, Ben, good idea, good idea, bring them.
(47:12):
The worst thing we could do is stop fucking around
in other countries with our army and instead use them
to I don't know, fix the bridges that are falling
things and create stuff for for each other. Like what
what I what is the problem he just wants for
It's this weird revenge ship he wants to like, h
it's weird revenge ship. It's also like weirdly, I also
(47:34):
think he's making attacks at FDR here for like the
works project progress as the Nazi stuff, which from one
of the best things that the government ever did was
be like what if we what if we took all
these starving people and gave them jobs to make parks
and roads and ship No, yes, thank you, make parks
(47:56):
and stuff that people still camp in every single day
called yeah it's amazing. Um. Yeah. Safety does not come
through the fear of a gun or the height of
our walls. Safety comes from love, yes, love for each other. Again,
this is the bad guy, um because when like I'm waiting,
like I really I know it's not going to happen,
(48:21):
because of course it's not because I I know who
wrote this, but like I'm waiting for like the actual
evil thing, right, like what's the thing that he does
where And we're a normal person would read this and go, oh,
that's a villain because like you did, like that's like
a thing you would do in like a good thing
(48:42):
is have this? Characters like oh, they seem like pretty
good actually uh and then like oh they turned. They
were revealed that he's going to like embezzle all of
this money or something from his his program and whatnot,
like something he wants to build bridget he wants to
use you S troops to like improve infrastructure at home
and not waste money in foreign wars, thus making him
(49:05):
the devil. It really, it really doesn't seem like it
was gonna be a turn. It seems like this is
what we get, Like what chapter is this? I think
there's going to be a very sudden turn that makes
no sense. But we are like two thirds of the
way through the book at this point. Oh okay, so
the the end of the book there will be like
I'm I actually want to do the jenocides. Yeah, I'm
here to kill all white people or something. Yeah yeah great,
(49:30):
so yeah the president. The next scene is the president
relaxing in his hotel room watching TV. Uh. The coverage
was nearly universally a static. The one guest commentator on
Fox News had the goal to ask whether the president
and he leads on the perpetrators? Again, no one, no
one would have a problem with that question after a
massive terrorist attack, like it would be the thing we'd
be talking about. Yeah. Ben famously hates presidents that spend
(49:54):
all their time watching Fox News. Yeah my god, all right, yeah, alright, alright,
So the President's concerned, or the President's aid is concerned
that bread Hawthorne is in New York. Uh, YadA, YadA, YadA. President,
what should I care? Uh? And the AID says, well,
he's digging around flight manifest and he's asking to see
(50:15):
pictures of Arabs. First Jesus Christ. The president says racial
profiling right after the love speech, and they say the
media will probably figure it out pretty soon. I mean,
these things have a way of leaking. Yeah, okay. Also, like,
kudos to Ben for writing that line, which I think
is actually like racial profiling after the love speech. It's
(50:39):
such a it's so childish, What a childish way to
frame anything. I love it. Yeah, yeah, it ends on
the president watching his speech and like the last line
from his speech, vengeance is God's we know. Our job
is to build again a monster, the literal devil, a
guy who wants to rebuild bridges team us. He must
(51:00):
be stopped. Pretty if he were allowed to continue on
his path of evil, eventually we would choke to death
on all of the bridges. There he that's his evil planning.
He wants to make too many bridges. He wants to
drown us in bridges. Yeah, he wants to murder us
in bridges. He wants to choke us in an endless
(51:21):
river of infrastructure that allows us to safely drive without
our bridges collapsing like the devil would do at the
devil in a single tier for all the all the
bridges that caused that. I can't even Yeah, well, Cody,
we're three more chapters in. That was three chapters. Like,
(51:43):
decide if that was too long or too short. For
three chapters, I feel like I've lived a thousand years. Oh,
this is an attorney. We're never gonna leave. We're stuck here. No,
this is we're We're stuck in true Allegiance forever. We
will never escape True Allegiance. It is. It is the
Alpha and the Omega the beginning and the end, and
(52:05):
like Ben sentences, it never never conclude. It never actually
never comma. M Dash concludes like a sentence should do
second to m Dash, but because Ben doesn't like to
use comma, periods comma, which which would conclude that meanwhile,
(52:27):
I can't wait until um the president either turns comically
way too evil to be believable or continues down this
this path of just like basic good stuff. You know
what I love, Cody? What's that the written word? I know?
I know that about you? Yeah. So have your feelings
(52:47):
on Ben's novel changed? We're now sixty of the way through.
I it's changed in that I get more of it.
Can I say more of more of it? Yeah, my thoughts,
but more yeahs and flows. It's really it's really, uh,
it's really something to behold. I because you think you
think it doesn't end, you think it doesn't stop. You
think like, oh, surely he can't like show his ass anymore.
(53:10):
Surely the mask couldn't possibly slip anymore. Surely he couldn't
write another just awful, awful sentence. It's amazing. I like
I want to collect and frame all of the bad
sentences in this and then send them to Ben Shapiro
via a registered career and like, here, here are the
sentences you wrote that are not They're not sentences, Ben,
(53:30):
but I want to do immortalize them. Here are some
not sentences for you to check out. Fire your editor
or hire an editor, whichever one you didn't do. Yeah, higher,
and fire a series of editors until you get someone
who's willing to tell you to use a fucking period.
Been It's okay. That's my message at the end of this.
I don't hate Ben Shapiro. I don't want ill to
befall him. I want him to know that it's okay. Ben,
(53:53):
It's okay to conclude a sentence. You can do it.
You can do it. We believe in you and of
sentence Cody. You got any pluggable stepluck, Sure, why not?
I got a YouTube channel called some More News. We
got a Patreon dot com slash Some More News, and
(54:14):
a podcast called even more News. But also cos the
podcast with Robert Evans, it's called Worst You're Ever Um,
we have Some More News actually has a movie that
we released a couple of days before. You listen to
this and check that out. It's fun and about a
lot of stuff, and I don't know Dr MSR Cody
on Twitter all that all that jazz, you know. I
do want to make one note before we roll out.
(54:36):
There is some evidence that Ben Shapiro has improved in
the second half of his novel, that he's learning as
he's writing. Um, which is that we went through three
whole chapters and he never randomly switched from a perspective
character to a completely different character in a wild, last
jarring transition. That is true. He is growing. That's why
he such a skilled writer, because he does it for
(54:56):
the first third of the book. So then you expected
to keep but you're like, Okay, when's this gonna happen?
And then he doesn't do it. That's surprising. It's a
twist exactly. I thought you were even worse as a
writer than you are, but you've gotten slightly better. Oh,
it's good times for everybody, all right, Well, the episodes over.
(55:17):
Please continue voting and or engaging in gunfights with Baptist paramilitaries.
Have a have a good election day, and remember a
tourniquet should be placed above the bleeding wound and then
tightened until the bleeding stops. America strong
Behind the Bastards News
Host
Robert Evans
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