April 22, 2025 • 36 mins
Hour 3 of the Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show features an engaging interview with investigative journalist David Zweig, who discusses his new book, "An Abundance of Caution: American Schools, the Virus, and a Story of Bad Decisions." Zweig shares insights into the failures of American public policy during the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly focusing on the detrimental impact of prolonged school closures. He highlights the lack of scientific evidence supporting these closures and the political pressures that influenced decisions, including the role of teachers' unions.
The hosts and Zweig delve into the revisionist history surrounding the pandemic response, emphasizing the importance of demanding evidence-based policies. Zweig recounts his experiences with silent dissent among medical professionals and the challenges he faced in reporting the truth. He hopes his book will serve as a corrective to the narrative and arm readers with the knowledge to recognize and challenge misinformation in future crises.
Clay and Buck also discuss the broader implications of the pandemic on public trust in institutions, with Zweig expressing his disillusionment with the legacy media and the left establishment. He shares how his worldview has been fundamentally altered by the events of the pandemic and the dishonesty he encountered.
Additionally, the hour covers the legal dispute between Harvard University and the Trump administration over the withholding of billions in taxpayer dollars. The hosts critique the extensive federal funding of universities and question the necessity of such subsidies, especially given the ideological biases and discriminatory practices at institutions like Harvard.
The discussion includes the ethical concerns surrounding NPR's government funding and its role as a competitor in the media landscape. Clay and Buck argue for the elimination of taxpayer subsidies to NPR, highlighting the unfair advantage it provides in the marketplace.
The hour concludes with listener interactions, including VIP emails and talkbacks, where the hosts address various topics and engage with their audience. They emphasize the importance of accountability and transparency in both education and media funding.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome back in Clay Travis Buck Sexton Show. Appreciate all
of you hanging out with us. Rolling through the Tuesday
edition of the program, and we are joined now by
David Zwig, investigative journalist and author. He's got a brand
new book. I think you guys are going to love it.
I've already started to check it out. We got it
at the home. Buck is holding it up right now.
An Abundance of caution, American schools, the virus, and a
(00:23):
story of bad decisions. David, thanks for joining us in
our New York City studio. I know we've had you
on before, and I think it's fair to say that
a lot of your reporting was not necessarily well received
by people on the left, and that you are not
some far right wing conspiracist conspiracy theorist.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
You just did something wild.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
You looked at the data and you were willing to
write about what the data showed, and you were as
Buck and I have both been profoundly angered and still
angry over the failures of American public policy as it
pertains to COVID. What pushed you to write this book
and what do you hope that people take from.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
It's it's a very good assessment. Yeah, in the beginning,
very early on, it seemed reasonable to me. I wasn't
knowledgeable about what was happening. I live right outside New
York City. Okay, the schools are closed, everything shut down.
But very quickly after that, I watched my kids just
(01:26):
wilting away in the kind of the gray light of
their chromebooks, sitting alone in their bedrooms, and I was like,
this isn't going to work for a long period of
time like this, How can this be? And and from
there I just started kind of researching and digging in.
I was in the middle of writing a book and
a totally different topic at the time, but this was
(01:47):
just so crazy what was happening. I wanted to learn
more about what was going on, and very quickly I
started to speak with experts in Europe and elsewhere, because
you couldn't speak to them in the United States. And
it was very obvious that there was no reason for
the schools to remain closed. And that kind of set
(02:08):
me off on this path. And as you noted this
very much was you know, what was termed a contrarian
view against the establishment, and it was certainly a challenging
position for me writing for mainstream publications to get my
reporting in there. But I pulled it off, and I
(02:30):
think people kind of perceived me. I think it's true
as basically the only guy who's really able to do that,
to write a number of pieces. They were all backed
by evidence showing why the establishment view was so wrong.
Speaker 4 (02:43):
David, you said something I want to return to if
I can. You said that there was no reason for
the schools to be closed.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
There was no.
Speaker 4 (02:54):
Medical reason for the schools to be closed. But I
am sure in the course of your research fund a
whole slew of non medical reasons or rationales or horse
trading that led to the continuation of public school closures.
While you know, I grew up in New York City,
so I know that system pretty well. Went to you know,
(03:15):
went to Catholic school there. There's private schools, parochial schools,
public schools. Parochial and private were open for business in
that in that fall after the initial pandemic, and yet
public schools were remote.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
Why.
Speaker 3 (03:29):
Yeah, I mean one of the things that's so remarkable,
and it's it's almost astonishing that this actually happened in
real time, and it's kind of one of the mean
reasons of why I wrote this book was to make
sure that what happened isn't just memory hold and the idea.
As you noted, kids were in school, in private schools,
(03:49):
They were in school in red districts and and in
you know, red states, while at the same time, a
kid could be down the block in public school and
he was kept home while his best friend you know,
in a different area or went to private school, was
in school every day. So the irony to me is
that on the left, which traditionally perceives itself as being
(04:12):
that the heroes of the underprivileged in our society, they
championed the rules and the guidelines and the policies that
actually harmed underprivileged kids the most. And it's like one
of the most tragic ironies of the pandemic to me
that this was the result that you had people vigorously.
(04:32):
It wasn't just advocating, but as you know, anyone who
disagreed was immediately vilified. You were some right wing crank.
You are a piece of garbage if you disagreed with them.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
Well, I mean, I am a right wing crank. I
can imagine what would be like for you being Yeah,
I was a turncoat.
Speaker 3 (04:47):
Yeah, I was ben a mc darnald. Here I was.
I was, you know, immediately cast aside. I was called
a murderer. You know, how could you do this? One
of the things that's so important that that that and
this is kind of like the original sin that I
taught talk about in the book. At the end of April,
in the beginning of May, in twenty twenty, schools began
to open in Europe. And it's not just like some
(05:09):
little school in Tibet somewhere with twelve kids. We're talking
about millions of kids. We're back in school. And the
European Union, the Education ministers met in May and at
that meeting they said, we have observed no negative consequences
of opening our schools. They met a second time in June,
(05:31):
they had the same determination. No one reported this. I
ultimately reported it myself in June. But this is kind
of an astonishing thing. This wasn't, you know, a random blog,
This wasn't an obscure medical journal. This is the European
Union and their official announcement regarding opening schools where millions
(05:53):
of kids were in There was there was no negative consequence.
And as far as I am aware. No one in
the US media reported on this meeting that sort of
set things on the course, you know, where we were
just kind of never to come back from that.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Okay, So I want that's an important point.
Speaker 1 (06:11):
I want you to expound upon something that happened that
a lot of people have forgotten in June of twenty twenty.
And I may get the official name wrong, but it
was like the American Association of Pediatricians or something like
that said schools needed to open back up and we
could do it safely.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
That was a big story in June.
Speaker 1 (06:31):
And then Randy Winegarten and the American Federation of Teachers
somehow kind of got into their universe and they ended
up you probably, I'm sure it's in the book. It is.
They ended up reversing their guidance. What do you think
now when you see Randy Wingarden going around on show saying, oh,
I never said that I wanted schools to be shut down.
Speaker 2 (06:54):
What does the evidence show us?
Speaker 1 (06:56):
And how important was it from a science perspective for
those pediatricians? And I remember their argument being David correct
me if I'm wrong that while the virus wasn't going
to go away, kids had far more to gain by
being in school than they did to fear from the virus.
That was June of twenty twenty, and then they completely
reversed themselves under political pressure.
Speaker 3 (07:15):
So what happened was the American Academy of Pediatrics put
out a guidance that was unambiguous. It said, we've got
to get kids in school. Don't even worry about six
feet of distancing. If you can do it, great, but
if you can't, don't worry. Just three feet is fine, whatever,
just get the kids in the building. Shortly thereafter, Donald
Trump tweeted we must open schools in the fall, all
(07:37):
caps with a bunch of exclamation points. Within days, the
American Academy of Pediatrics put out a new statement. Gone
was any mention of don't worry about distancing. Gone was
the idea of get kids in school no matter what.
And instead they mentioned money. It's really important for a
lot of money to flow to schools. And then the
second important thing about that revised statement was who all?
(08:00):
And it wasn't just the American Academy of Pediatrics. It
was co authored with the two largest teachers unions in
the country. It was so stark. What happened that even
NPR reported on this. But I got to tell you
this is part of a larger thing. And I talk
about this a lot in the book, where I show
this behind the scenes thing that was going on. So
as I started writing these articles challenging the sort of
(08:21):
dogma and the establishment view, people started reaching out to
me from around the country, parents, regular people, but also
a lot of doctors. And these are doctors, not just
some suburban pediatrician, but people who are at elite institutions,
are top university hospitals in the country. And they were saying, hey,
thank you so much for writing this. I just want
you to know I think it's terrible what's happening with kids.
(08:45):
I think these policies for keeping schools closed and these
mask mandates, there isn't good evidence behind this. Schools are
open in Europe, all these things. And they said, but
all this has to be off the record because they
were afraid to be cast out by their peers, or
in many instants, they were explicitly told and I have
examples of this in the book. They were explicitly told
(09:05):
by their superiors, by the administrators at their hospitals, do
not say anything about this. So I had this bizarre
experience where I'm observing this narrative that's going on in
the culture, this sort of manufactured consensus that wasn't real,
And I had this very lonely, strange experience where I'm
getting all these text messages and emails and I'm talking
(09:26):
with all these doctors who are disagreeing with this, but
the dissent was silent. I wasn't allowed to talk about it,
and they were too afraid or weren't allowed to speak
about it themselves. So my book gives what I hope
is this deep, behind the scenes account of what actually
happened during the pandemic, not the narrative that we were
all fed. And I'm hoping that when people finish reading
(09:49):
this that they're going to be armed with enough information
so they can actually understand and see how the gears
turn within the legacy media and how they turned where
they were working in conjunction with different institutions of power.
So it's not just for a pandemic, but for when
any other crisis happens that your listeners and they're like, oh,
I read about that in Swig's book. I see exactly
(10:12):
what's happening.
Speaker 4 (10:12):
Now we're speaking to David's wig, the book is an
abundance of caution. I have my copy in my hands here.
American Schools, the virus, and a story of bad decisions.
One of the reason we want to have you on, David
is we like to reward people who were right when
it mattered and did good work when it mattered on
this issue. So congrats on the book, and we hope
people will will pick up a copy because I think
that it's very important. Right it's a lot easier for
(10:34):
people to jump on the bandwagon now, but we know
that you were early on this and you got heat
to that end. Just one that mean, Clay might have
a question for you in closing. I don't know if
you're a sports fan, you like the SEC or anything,
but that's always a possibility here at the end too.
But if you were to walk around right now, you know,
sort of tell us what it's like on the other
side of it, because they'll still talk to you. They
(10:56):
won't talk to us that much. Some of them listen
to the show because it is so entertaining. But generally speaking,
we have a center to write audience. If you walked
around park Slope or you walked around I don't know,
you know, Santa Monica and just talk to people who
watch I don't know CNN, read the New York Times
at the LA Times and said, hey, guys, the next
(11:17):
time around, we're we're all clear that we don't shut
down the schools for this, right? Are they clear on that?
Speaker 3 (11:24):
I think there's been a softening. So I think that's
the good news. The bad news is is that there
is this revisionist history. There's this narrative that they've been pushing,
which is in the beginning, it was we have to
close schools, we have to do all this stuff. Eventually,
when it was so obvious that that wasn't beneficial, it
was so obvious this was only causing harm, then they shifted.
Then the narrative was, well, this is regrettable, but it
(11:47):
was an understandable thing. This was a fog of war decision.
It was chaos. We did the best we could. And
what I show in the book over and over is
that information was known in real time, and that example
about the European Union and is just one of many.
They knew what was happening. It was ignored or it
was dismissed. So when you asked me that question. My
(12:08):
fear is that when the next crisis happens and it doesn't
have to be a pandemic, that once again there's this
excuse of we're building the plane as we fly it.
We don't know. Sorry, we're doing the best we can.
Don't accept it. It's not true. Demand evidence, And that's
what my book is about at its core, is you
can't say stuff without providing evidence and over and over,
(12:29):
and I cite these long examples in the New York
Times and all these other media outlets. They kept quoting
all these experts saying things, but they didn't provide any evidence.
They never challenged them. Journalists shirked their core duty, which
was to actually question the statements by those in power.
So I'm hoping my book will act as a counter
as a corrective, as this is an actual, real history
(12:51):
of what happened, and it works as its own guidebook
to help arm people to understand how the gears turned
behind the scenes, so we can try to prevent something
like that from happening again.
Speaker 1 (13:01):
Last question, you came from the left, and Buck's right.
I'm just curious from your perspective, we hope that the
historic record twenty forty years, sixty years from now is
going to be a worthy lesson how much less faith
do you personally have in the so called legacy media
than you did before COVID happened. So David Zuwig twenty
(13:24):
nineteen compared to David Zwig twenty twenty five, how are
you different?
Speaker 3 (13:29):
I would say, if I may not just the legacy media,
but the entire left establishment, if you will, my experience
during the pandemic and what I observed and what I
experienced as a journalist actually chasing down the evidence and
the facts has completely shattered my entire worldview that I had.
(13:50):
I was a smug liberal. I've always been an independent
I was not like a staunch democrat, So I was
an independent minded person, but I tended to believe in
these institutions, and what I observed and experienced was the
absolute failure and these people who were the good guys.
I've recount some stuff in the book about I had
evidence from Arizona, the state itself, which differed from a
(14:12):
study that the CDC put out, and when I contacted
the CDC, I said, hey, I have evidence that I
have data that's differing from what you have in your study,
and I knew what they had was wrong because I
had the official data, and their response to me was,
we look through it, there are no errors. When you
can't come back from something like that, and like I
(14:32):
remember just like kind of hunched over with like a
migraine that night talking to my wife. So to answer
your question, I'm I just feel entirely differently about how
the world works, and you just can't recover from something
like that when you know, you would think something like
the NSA or Defense Department might pull some type of
(14:52):
BS on that this is a health department and the
CDC they were lying through their teeth right to me
in email, saying there were no errors when I knew
they knew that I knew, and I knew that they
knew that I knew that this was complete BS and
they didn't care. You can't recover from something like that.
So my book is filled with kind of that type
(15:14):
of stuff where this was this was almost like a
cathartic endeavor where I had to set the record straight
so people, and hopefully not just your audience, though I
know they're going to be receptive, I think, but I'm
hoping that I can persuade some independent minded people as well.
That's my real goal. It is like to help people
see what's really going on.
Speaker 4 (15:35):
David's wag everybody in abundance of caution, David, thank you
so much.
Speaker 2 (15:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (15:39):
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Speaker 4 (16:49):
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Speaker 2 (17:12):
Now, and we've noticed this.
Speaker 4 (17:13):
So if you heard that before and she's I'm now
playing fetch with the dog while doing radio, we call
that multitasking. But please send us your talkbacks and and
call in eight hundred and two A two two eight
A two. You know that number, also our vip emails.
Let's give that a go. So all of that we
want to hear from you, and we're going to dive
(17:35):
into some more news here momentarily I did think it's
interesting that David's why came home with us there. The
fact that they shut down schools is just unforgivable because
they knew. It's a little bit like the Biden dementia thing.
Speaker 2 (17:50):
They knew.
Speaker 4 (17:51):
They didn't know necessarily about masks, as it was a
religious belief for them, but they knew that the school
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Speaker 1 (18:57):
Welcome back in Clay Travis Sexton Show. There is now
another legal dispute that is underway. Harvard is reportedly going
to sue Trump and the Trump administration.
Speaker 2 (19:12):
Over the withholding of billions.
Speaker 1 (19:14):
Of dollars in taxpayer dollars that have otherwise been going
to the university.
Speaker 2 (19:23):
Harvard, but also a lot of other universities.
Speaker 1 (19:26):
And I grabbed this stat and credit New York Times
where it was, and I shared it on social media
the other day. I don't know if you have seen
this yet, Buck, but we are going to spend, or
we did spend in twenty twenty three, sixty billion dollars
in taxpayer money more to colleges and universities, sixty billion dollars.
(19:52):
Harvard is getting billions of that, but the money is
being spent many different universities across the country. And this
this was thirty times what they spent in nineteen fifty three.
If you account for inflation. So there's a graphic, and
I shared the graphic and the New York Times had
(20:14):
it up, and you look at it, and what we
are spending on universities blew my mind. Here's a question
for you, because I would put this in the same category. Now,
the defense of this is going to be saying, okay, well,
they're doing research, and we want them doing research, development,
(20:34):
all these different things. If it's such a great idea,
why aren't the universities funding their own research and development?
Why is it the responsibility of you and me and
so many of you out there listening to us right
now to not only potentially be paying tuition and room
and board that is exorbitant for many of these colleges
(20:54):
and universities nationwide, but for us also to be funding
with our dollars huge amounts of the bureaucracy that exist
at these universities. I actually give Trump credit. I never
really thought about it before. I didn't know the dollars
were this extensive. Did you know that we were given
sixty billion dollars to colleges and universities?
Speaker 4 (21:15):
And why should we be doing this? Well, you know
one thing that you've heard a lot about is this
is for research for R and D? Okay, like what, yeah,
I want to know that if we're hearing this, because
there's a lot that you can say is research. I mean,
is this the kind of research where we're spending money
to find out the mating habits of you know, TC
(21:37):
flies or something like what exactly is this money being
spent on at these schools? Or even worse, is it
looking at is it just a lot of people being
hired to do sociology research to for the progress of
DEI initiatives? I mean, we have no idea, right, So
your first point, Clay, did I know or do I
think the general public had any idea how much money
(22:00):
was going to the university? I knew the answer was
that there was money, and it was considerable. I didn't
know what sixty billion dollars that's hot. And the second
part of it is, well, this is where you get
more into the Doge piece. What exactly is this money
being spent on? And then you can add to that
We'll hold on a second, why are we to fund
these universities? We've already decided that the government's going to
(22:23):
backstop the loans, so now everyone can get a loan
to go. I'll just be honest to a worthless four
year college degree at a play or whatever, at a
place that does not have any incentive really to make
sure that it's graduates are getting jobs that can help
them pay back the loans, because it doesn't matter to them.
It's not their problem, right. The colleges and universities have
(22:45):
no incentive to address what the job market actually looks
like them. I'm saying they don't do any of this,
but from the macro view, it's just there's no skin
in the game for the colleges and universities. And this
is why the tuition keeps going up because why not
because it's not their problem. The government is backstopping this stuff,
(23:06):
and anybody can get these loans. So that's part one
of it, or rather that's part three of it. And
I just think that then you add to this the
ideological realization that we all have had for a long time,
but just what factories of insanity these places are? And
I think that the campus pro Hamas stuff was just
the latest iteration of this. But I mean, I had
friends who were in law school Clay during the George
(23:28):
Floyd stuff and what was law school and what was
being sent around in law schools was nuts. Yeah, you
know you want to talk about do you do you
think any of them thought that Derek Chauvin should get
due process?
Speaker 2 (23:40):
This is law schools. Yeah, of course, of course not.
Speaker 1 (23:43):
I also think this ties in and I'm going to
start hammering this really aggressively. In PR said that Trump
was going to fire Pete Hegseth. You can go read
INPR dot org or INPR dot com or whatever the
heck their website is. It is full on left wing
propaganda daily. We compete with them. Why should regardless of
(24:07):
what your politics are, why should in PR be getting
millions and millions of dollars in government funding? We don't
get millions and millions of dollars in government funding. We
don't get favorable treatment when it comes to AD dollars
being allocated basically from the federal government. If we're directly
(24:27):
competing WITHINPR, which we are. Now, you know, you guys
have brains, so you probably don't listen to MPR that often.
But in many of the five hundred and fifty some
odd stations that we are on on a daily basis,
there are a lot of stations out there that will
be top competing options with us will be MPR. There
(24:48):
are lots of places out there where you might live
or you might not get this show, and you get MPR.
Why is that not one of the first things that
they would cut to your point on dogebuck and if
NPR as well, we're not getting that much money, and
they make the argument that said, Okay, why are you
getting any at all? And you are because it's coming
through local advertisements and everything else. I don't think a
(25:10):
single red scent of taxpayer money should go to subsidize
NPR's coverage in any way of their media outlet. In
the same way that I don't think we should be
spending millions of dollars on Politico subscriptions or anything else.
We shouldn't be giving them a penny.
Speaker 4 (25:27):
Yeah, well, why, I mean, sure, the government, the government
in general, you don't really want in the business of business.
You want to let the American people do that. Would
we want the government to create a really bad smartphone company. No,
I think that there's plenty of people already in that space.
There are plenty of people in the media space. We
don't need incumbents who are little piggies at the trough
(25:53):
of government funding to continue to do what they've been doing.
So I completely completely agree with that. And on that
colleges and you know, diversity side of things, it's very clear.
I mean, Harvard is just the most prominent example. Understand this, everyone,
Harvard has been violating the Constitution for years with its
omissions policies. Now you could say at the time Harvard
thought they were operating within Okay, fine, I'm not saying
(26:15):
that we can hold them responsible after the fact in
a legal sense, but I do think it's worth noting
that Harvard has engaged in a long practice of discrimination.
And when it comes to discrimination, just look at Section
five of the Voting Rights Act, places end up being
punished or being watched very closely for historical discrimination, in
(26:35):
some cases for.
Speaker 2 (26:37):
Decades or more.
Speaker 4 (26:39):
Right, I mean, this is the reality of discrimination law,
is that once you find a place that has discriminated
under the law, they are under a dark cloud of
suspicion for a very long time.
Speaker 2 (26:50):
Legally speaking.
Speaker 4 (26:51):
Mind you look at Section five of the Voting Rights
Act a perfect example of what I'm talking about. Although
I think now that Supreme Court's even looked at that
and changed the formula, but put that aside.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
You know what I mean?
Speaker 4 (27:01):
In general, I think Clay on this issue, Harvard has
shown everybody that the plan is to continue to get
the money, but to not have to abide by federal
guidelines or so why should you have your cake in
either to Harvard play amen, it's effectively a hedge fund
that also has classes.
Speaker 2 (27:19):
At this point, it's kind an you know what is it?
An eighty billion, sixty billion.
Speaker 1 (27:22):
Fifty three billion dollar endowment as most recently we don't
know what it's been for like the last year in change.
But to your point, when you take federal dollars, you
agree to be bound in some way by federal guidelines,
and the most basic of federal guidelines is don't discriminate
on the basis of race, and make sure that everybody
(27:44):
has an equal opportunity to be educated and they're not
going to be discriminated against based on ethnicity, religion, anything else.
They failed during the protests surrounding the October seventh related incidents,
and many other universities failed as well. I told our
team to get Larry arn There was a great article
interviewing him in the Wall Street Journal weekend edition. He
(28:06):
is the president of Hillsdale College. Hillsdale made the decision
we want our educational mission to be completely independent of
the United States government, and so we are not going
to take any of their dollars. Hillsdale has way less
money than Harvard does, and they have managed to run
their university independently without needing federal dollars. Why wouldn't that
(28:29):
be the standard for Harvard unless buck they were feeding
at the trough of special interest dollars. They've got a
fifty three billion dollar endowment. They can't afford to run
their university without taxpayer subsidies.
Speaker 4 (28:45):
You would think you would think, you know, Harvard. At
one point, the reporting was that they were planning to
just batten down the hatches and do without the federal funds.
But I think they've realized, well, hold on it. It
would be for a number of years.
Speaker 2 (28:58):
Here.
Speaker 4 (28:58):
You start to do that math, and those hundreds of
millions of dollars feel like it's it actually adds up,
even for Harvard. So this is this is a moment
that we've been waiting for on the RITE for a
long time, which is just more accountability. These universities have
been given tremendous preferential treatment from them. This preferential treatment, right,
I mean, whether it's about the tax tax policy supporting
(29:22):
the student loans with government backstopping, which I think is
a bad idea. Now even the discussion although you know
Trump is going to start Trump's Department of Education, not
a Department of educator, who's behind the loans?
Speaker 1 (29:32):
Who does the loans student laws? They're going to start Underwright. Yeah,
it's a good question. I'm wondering who does the collection
or that.
Speaker 2 (29:38):
I don't know.
Speaker 4 (29:39):
But anyway, they're going to start collecting money again because
it was like Doe, that would actually mean they do
something that they're supposed to do.
Speaker 2 (29:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (29:47):
So I think that you're going to see more people
paying attention to this issue than they have in a
while because of that. And I also think that the
universities have betrayed the the man that they've implicitly been
given by the American people, which is to educate future
leadership and make our people as smart and competitive in
a global marketplace as possible. Instead, they're educating a ton
(30:10):
of foreigners. Okay, start with that. Because the foreigners pay
full freight, no help with the tuition, whatever. You go
to a lot of the elite universities and everybody's from
Beijing in Dubai.
Speaker 2 (30:20):
This is just the truth.
Speaker 4 (30:21):
Not everybody, but huge percentages of these classes, and they've
become left wing and doctrination factories that are churning out
kids who don't know anything that's not good, so they're
getting slapped down.
Speaker 3 (30:32):
I like it.
Speaker 1 (30:34):
I also would point out I think there are massive
lawsuits to be filed here. Some of these education loans
are indefensible. For instance, you shouldn't be able to take
out a loan of two hundred thousand dollars to get
a social work degree. You can never pay it back
when your job. And look, I appreciate the people who
(30:54):
take jobs that don't pay that well, but the fact
that these universities would loan somebody fuck two hundred grand
to get a job where you're going to make forty
grand a year, it doesn't ever add up that you
can ever pay these things off.
Speaker 2 (31:07):
To me. They're predatory.
Speaker 1 (31:09):
Also, I think this is a function of Hey, we
should be teaching actual basic math and investment and understanding
in schools because the people who agree to these loans,
I don't think they have any concept of how impossible
it is to ever pay them back. Right, if you're
a lawyer or doctor, someone getting a master's degree in
business or something like that.
Speaker 2 (31:28):
You would I wouldn't. I wouldn't even tell people to
get it.
Speaker 4 (31:31):
Look, I looked at getting an MBA and from fancy
places and I didn't do it. Now I'm sitting here
with Clay because I wanted to media instead. I think
the advance, I think advanced degrees. People need far more
honesty in this discussion. Most advanced degrees are not worth
very much, and a lot of advanced degrees are truly worthless.
(31:51):
In fact, they put you deep in the hole. I'll
perfect example, you journalism. Don't ever get a master's in journalism.
It is a waste. I don't even know how journalism
schools still exist. Like that's a whole. It is a
waste of your time. And a lot of master's degrees
in the humanities unless you are convinced you're going to
get a teaching job. That is the only thing that
(32:12):
they are worthwhile to do, and those are very hard
to come by, right, Clay, I mean, you look at
this stuff. Mostly degrees do the waste.
Speaker 1 (32:21):
I don't think people do the math, and I think, unfortunately,
we have a lot of people who don't understand how
loans work, and a lot of people who don't understand
how interest rates work. And you don't even sit back
and think how you're going to bankrupt yourself basically getting
a degree that never pays you.
Speaker 4 (32:34):
Actually, I qualified for master's credit from Georgetown School Foreign
Service as an undergrad. So I got master's credit as
an undergrad.
Speaker 2 (32:43):
You know what.
Speaker 4 (32:44):
The master's credit was for a class just like the
classes I was taking an undergrad.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
And I remember thinking, so.
Speaker 4 (32:50):
I would just go to school for two more years
to do two more years of reading books that I
could read on my own.
Speaker 2 (32:55):
I don't think so.
Speaker 1 (32:57):
Lessons in Life from Clay and Buck. As hard as
the Israelis have tried to return to a normal life,
difficult to do. Nearly every day there's talk of another
missile attack on one of multiple fronts. You never know
which direction it might be coming. I was over there
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(33:19):
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That's eight eight eight four eight eight four three two
five online at SUPPORTIFCJ dot org to give that websit again.
Speaker 2 (34:00):
Support IFCJ dot org.
Speaker 5 (34:04):
Cheap up with the biggest political comeback in world history
on the Team forty seven podcast. Play and Buck highlight
Trump free plays from the week.
Speaker 2 (34:13):
Sunday's at noon Eastern.
Speaker 5 (34:15):
Find it on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get
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Speaker 4 (34:19):
All right, we're closing enough shop today On Clay and Buck,
that's a great time to remind you to please subscribe
to the Play Travis and Buck Sexton Show podcast network.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
Why is it a network? Not just this show?
Speaker 4 (34:30):
Other great hosts put their shows in that feed, Carol Markowitz,
Tutor Dixon, Dave Rutherford, former Navy seal. His podcast has
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He's doing a great job and many many others show
go check that out when you get a chance. Get
some of your VIP emails and also some talkbacks.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
Here.
Speaker 4 (34:51):
Let's start with VIP email. I'm gonna jump to this one, Clay, Sandy,
Sandy knows how to get on the show. She starts
with Buck is absolutely right. Why Jill was part of
the cover up of Biden's cognitive decline to make sure
Biden could cover up the crime of the Biden family.
She was protecting Joe from staff pushing removal by the
(35:12):
twenty fifth Amendment at any time. I do think, Clay,
I mean, I know, you know, we're a little bit
we don't see this exactly the same way. But Jill
was having to do a delicate, delicate dance to keep
Joe in the in the cockpit, so to speak.
Speaker 1 (35:27):
It is funny remember the first Trump term, how often
they talked about the twenty things with him.
Speaker 2 (35:33):
All the time.
Speaker 1 (35:34):
Yeah, never was mentioned about Biden at all, even though
it probably was far more legitimate to mention it there.
Now there's all sorts of constitutional issues associated with it.
It's a challenge in general, but I think Biden was
so decrepit mentally and physically that even Democrats are not
willing to bring up the twenty fifth Amendment on Trump
(35:55):
so far this term.
Speaker 4 (35:56):
That's a perfect transition to Kevin another VIP. The first
time I heard Claim make this point, it really opened
my eyes, and I share the point with all my friends.
We see Biden maybe five percent of the time, imagine
what he is like the other ninety five percent of
the time behind closed doors. That point really struck with me,
opened eyes to how decrepit Biden really was. To see
(36:16):
Clay Indeed.
Speaker 1 (36:18):
I mean it is whatever you think of a public figure,
understand that they typically are putting foot forth, their best
foot forward when they are in a public venue. The
Biden that we saw on June twenty seventh, and the
Biden that we saw at all those public events was
the best version of him they could put out. And
(36:38):
it was still awful, and we still are only getting
I think, probably a smidge a small pinprick of the
awfulness that he was embodying behind closed doors. We'll be
back with you tomorrow. Never behind closed doors. Three hours
of fun, Clay and Buck come hang with us.
Welcome back in Clay Travis Buck Sexton Show. Appreciate all
of you hanging out with us. Rolling through the Tuesday
edition of the program, and we are joined now by
David Zwig, investigative journalist and author. He's got a brand
new book. I think you guys are going to love it.
I've already started to check it out. We got it
at the home. Buck is holding it up right now.
An Abundance of caution, American schools, the virus, and a
(00:23):
story of bad decisions. David, thanks for joining us in
our New York City studio. I know we've had you
on before, and I think it's fair to say that
a lot of your reporting was not necessarily well received
by people on the left, and that you are not
some far right wing conspiracist conspiracy theorist.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
You just did something wild.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
You looked at the data and you were willing to
write about what the data showed, and you were as
Buck and I have both been profoundly angered and still
angry over the failures of American public policy as it
pertains to COVID. What pushed you to write this book
and what do you hope that people take from.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
It's it's a very good assessment. Yeah, in the beginning,
very early on, it seemed reasonable to me. I wasn't
knowledgeable about what was happening. I live right outside New
York City. Okay, the schools are closed, everything shut down.
But very quickly after that, I watched my kids just
(01:26):
wilting away in the kind of the gray light of
their chromebooks, sitting alone in their bedrooms, and I was like,
this isn't going to work for a long period of
time like this, How can this be? And and from
there I just started kind of researching and digging in.
I was in the middle of writing a book and
a totally different topic at the time, but this was
(01:47):
just so crazy what was happening. I wanted to learn
more about what was going on, and very quickly I
started to speak with experts in Europe and elsewhere, because
you couldn't speak to them in the United States. And
it was very obvious that there was no reason for
the schools to remain closed. And that kind of set
(02:08):
me off on this path. And as you noted this
very much was you know, what was termed a contrarian
view against the establishment, and it was certainly a challenging
position for me writing for mainstream publications to get my
reporting in there. But I pulled it off, and I
(02:30):
think people kind of perceived me. I think it's true
as basically the only guy who's really able to do that,
to write a number of pieces. They were all backed
by evidence showing why the establishment view was so wrong.
Speaker 4 (02:43):
David, you said something I want to return to if
I can. You said that there was no reason for
the schools to be closed.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
There was no.
Speaker 4 (02:54):
Medical reason for the schools to be closed. But I
am sure in the course of your research fund a
whole slew of non medical reasons or rationales or horse
trading that led to the continuation of public school closures.
While you know, I grew up in New York City,
so I know that system pretty well. Went to you know,
(03:15):
went to Catholic school there. There's private schools, parochial schools,
public schools. Parochial and private were open for business in
that in that fall after the initial pandemic, and yet
public schools were remote.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
Why.
Speaker 3 (03:29):
Yeah, I mean one of the things that's so remarkable,
and it's it's almost astonishing that this actually happened in
real time, and it's kind of one of the mean
reasons of why I wrote this book was to make
sure that what happened isn't just memory hold and the idea.
As you noted, kids were in school, in private schools,
(03:49):
They were in school in red districts and and in
you know, red states, while at the same time, a
kid could be down the block in public school and
he was kept home while his best friend you know,
in a different area or went to private school, was
in school every day. So the irony to me is
that on the left, which traditionally perceives itself as being
(04:12):
that the heroes of the underprivileged in our society, they
championed the rules and the guidelines and the policies that
actually harmed underprivileged kids the most. And it's like one
of the most tragic ironies of the pandemic to me
that this was the result that you had people vigorously.
(04:32):
It wasn't just advocating, but as you know, anyone who
disagreed was immediately vilified. You were some right wing crank.
You are a piece of garbage if you disagreed with them.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
Well, I mean, I am a right wing crank. I
can imagine what would be like for you being Yeah,
I was a turncoat.
Speaker 3 (04:47):
Yeah, I was ben a mc darnald. Here I was.
I was, you know, immediately cast aside. I was called
a murderer. You know, how could you do this? One
of the things that's so important that that that and
this is kind of like the original sin that I
taught talk about in the book. At the end of April,
in the beginning of May, in twenty twenty, schools began
to open in Europe. And it's not just like some
(05:09):
little school in Tibet somewhere with twelve kids. We're talking
about millions of kids. We're back in school. And the
European Union, the Education ministers met in May and at
that meeting they said, we have observed no negative consequences
of opening our schools. They met a second time in June,
(05:31):
they had the same determination. No one reported this. I
ultimately reported it myself in June. But this is kind
of an astonishing thing. This wasn't, you know, a random blog,
This wasn't an obscure medical journal. This is the European
Union and their official announcement regarding opening schools where millions
(05:53):
of kids were in There was there was no negative consequence.
And as far as I am aware. No one in
the US media reported on this meeting that sort of
set things on the course, you know, where we were
just kind of never to come back from that.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Okay, So I want that's an important point.
Speaker 1 (06:11):
I want you to expound upon something that happened that
a lot of people have forgotten in June of twenty twenty.
And I may get the official name wrong, but it
was like the American Association of Pediatricians or something like
that said schools needed to open back up and we
could do it safely.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
That was a big story in June.
Speaker 1 (06:31):
And then Randy Winegarten and the American Federation of Teachers
somehow kind of got into their universe and they ended
up you probably, I'm sure it's in the book. It is.
They ended up reversing their guidance. What do you think
now when you see Randy Wingarden going around on show saying, oh,
I never said that I wanted schools to be shut down.
Speaker 2 (06:54):
What does the evidence show us?
Speaker 1 (06:56):
And how important was it from a science perspective for
those pediatricians? And I remember their argument being David correct
me if I'm wrong that while the virus wasn't going
to go away, kids had far more to gain by
being in school than they did to fear from the virus.
That was June of twenty twenty, and then they completely
reversed themselves under political pressure.
Speaker 3 (07:15):
So what happened was the American Academy of Pediatrics put
out a guidance that was unambiguous. It said, we've got
to get kids in school. Don't even worry about six
feet of distancing. If you can do it, great, but
if you can't, don't worry. Just three feet is fine, whatever,
just get the kids in the building. Shortly thereafter, Donald
Trump tweeted we must open schools in the fall, all
(07:37):
caps with a bunch of exclamation points. Within days, the
American Academy of Pediatrics put out a new statement. Gone
was any mention of don't worry about distancing. Gone was
the idea of get kids in school no matter what.
And instead they mentioned money. It's really important for a
lot of money to flow to schools. And then the
second important thing about that revised statement was who all?
(08:00):
And it wasn't just the American Academy of Pediatrics. It
was co authored with the two largest teachers unions in
the country. It was so stark. What happened that even
NPR reported on this. But I got to tell you
this is part of a larger thing. And I talk
about this a lot in the book, where I show
this behind the scenes thing that was going on. So
as I started writing these articles challenging the sort of
(08:21):
dogma and the establishment view, people started reaching out to
me from around the country, parents, regular people, but also
a lot of doctors. And these are doctors, not just
some suburban pediatrician, but people who are at elite institutions,
are top university hospitals in the country. And they were saying, hey,
thank you so much for writing this. I just want
you to know I think it's terrible what's happening with kids.
(08:45):
I think these policies for keeping schools closed and these
mask mandates, there isn't good evidence behind this. Schools are
open in Europe, all these things. And they said, but
all this has to be off the record because they
were afraid to be cast out by their peers, or
in many instants, they were explicitly told and I have
examples of this in the book. They were explicitly told
(09:05):
by their superiors, by the administrators at their hospitals, do
not say anything about this. So I had this bizarre
experience where I'm observing this narrative that's going on in
the culture, this sort of manufactured consensus that wasn't real,
And I had this very lonely, strange experience where I'm
getting all these text messages and emails and I'm talking
(09:26):
with all these doctors who are disagreeing with this, but
the dissent was silent. I wasn't allowed to talk about it,
and they were too afraid or weren't allowed to speak
about it themselves. So my book gives what I hope
is this deep, behind the scenes account of what actually
happened during the pandemic, not the narrative that we were
all fed. And I'm hoping that when people finish reading
(09:49):
this that they're going to be armed with enough information
so they can actually understand and see how the gears
turn within the legacy media and how they turned where
they were working in conjunction with different institutions of power.
So it's not just for a pandemic, but for when
any other crisis happens that your listeners and they're like, oh,
I read about that in Swig's book. I see exactly
(10:12):
what's happening.
Speaker 4 (10:12):
Now we're speaking to David's wig, the book is an
abundance of caution. I have my copy in my hands here.
American Schools, the virus, and a story of bad decisions.
One of the reason we want to have you on, David
is we like to reward people who were right when
it mattered and did good work when it mattered on
this issue. So congrats on the book, and we hope
people will will pick up a copy because I think
that it's very important. Right it's a lot easier for
(10:34):
people to jump on the bandwagon now, but we know
that you were early on this and you got heat
to that end. Just one that mean, Clay might have
a question for you in closing. I don't know if
you're a sports fan, you like the SEC or anything,
but that's always a possibility here at the end too.
But if you were to walk around right now, you know,
sort of tell us what it's like on the other
side of it, because they'll still talk to you. They
(10:56):
won't talk to us that much. Some of them listen
to the show because it is so entertaining. But generally speaking,
we have a center to write audience. If you walked
around park Slope or you walked around I don't know,
you know, Santa Monica and just talk to people who
watch I don't know CNN, read the New York Times
at the LA Times and said, hey, guys, the next
(11:17):
time around, we're we're all clear that we don't shut
down the schools for this, right? Are they clear on that?
Speaker 3 (11:24):
I think there's been a softening. So I think that's
the good news. The bad news is is that there
is this revisionist history. There's this narrative that they've been pushing,
which is in the beginning, it was we have to
close schools, we have to do all this stuff. Eventually,
when it was so obvious that that wasn't beneficial, it
was so obvious this was only causing harm, then they shifted.
Then the narrative was, well, this is regrettable, but it
(11:47):
was an understandable thing. This was a fog of war decision.
It was chaos. We did the best we could. And
what I show in the book over and over is
that information was known in real time, and that example
about the European Union and is just one of many.
They knew what was happening. It was ignored or it
was dismissed. So when you asked me that question. My
(12:08):
fear is that when the next crisis happens and it doesn't
have to be a pandemic, that once again there's this
excuse of we're building the plane as we fly it.
We don't know. Sorry, we're doing the best we can.
Don't accept it. It's not true. Demand evidence, And that's
what my book is about at its core, is you
can't say stuff without providing evidence and over and over,
(12:29):
and I cite these long examples in the New York
Times and all these other media outlets. They kept quoting
all these experts saying things, but they didn't provide any evidence.
They never challenged them. Journalists shirked their core duty, which
was to actually question the statements by those in power.
So I'm hoping my book will act as a counter
as a corrective, as this is an actual, real history
(12:51):
of what happened, and it works as its own guidebook
to help arm people to understand how the gears turned
behind the scenes, so we can try to prevent something
like that from happening again.
Speaker 1 (13:01):
Last question, you came from the left, and Buck's right.
I'm just curious from your perspective, we hope that the
historic record twenty forty years, sixty years from now is
going to be a worthy lesson how much less faith
do you personally have in the so called legacy media
than you did before COVID happened. So David Zuwig twenty
(13:24):
nineteen compared to David Zwig twenty twenty five, how are
you different?
Speaker 3 (13:29):
I would say, if I may not just the legacy media,
but the entire left establishment, if you will, my experience
during the pandemic and what I observed and what I
experienced as a journalist actually chasing down the evidence and
the facts has completely shattered my entire worldview that I had.
(13:50):
I was a smug liberal. I've always been an independent
I was not like a staunch democrat, So I was
an independent minded person, but I tended to believe in
these institutions, and what I observed and experienced was the
absolute failure and these people who were the good guys.
I've recount some stuff in the book about I had
evidence from Arizona, the state itself, which differed from a
(14:12):
study that the CDC put out, and when I contacted
the CDC, I said, hey, I have evidence that I
have data that's differing from what you have in your study,
and I knew what they had was wrong because I
had the official data, and their response to me was,
we look through it, there are no errors. When you
can't come back from something like that, and like I
(14:32):
remember just like kind of hunched over with like a
migraine that night talking to my wife. So to answer
your question, I'm I just feel entirely differently about how
the world works, and you just can't recover from something
like that when you know, you would think something like
the NSA or Defense Department might pull some type of
(14:52):
BS on that this is a health department and the
CDC they were lying through their teeth right to me
in email, saying there were no errors when I knew
they knew that I knew, and I knew that they
knew that I knew that this was complete BS and
they didn't care. You can't recover from something like that.
So my book is filled with kind of that type
(15:14):
of stuff where this was this was almost like a
cathartic endeavor where I had to set the record straight
so people, and hopefully not just your audience, though I
know they're going to be receptive, I think, but I'm
hoping that I can persuade some independent minded people as well.
That's my real goal. It is like to help people
see what's really going on.
Speaker 4 (15:35):
David's wag everybody in abundance of caution, David, thank you
so much.
Speaker 2 (15:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (15:39):
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Speaker 4 (16:49):
All right, we got a quick turn around here, so
just want to invite you all the Please, first of all,
ignore Ginger barking in the background. She's so sweet, but
when her mommy leaves and mommy's taking the baby out
for a walk and doesn't bring Ginger, Ginger gets play
very jelly, very jealous, very quickly. So she gets it's amazing.
She's very sweet to the baby, but she expects to
(17:11):
go wherever the baby goes.
Speaker 2 (17:12):
Now, and we've noticed this.
Speaker 4 (17:13):
So if you heard that before and she's I'm now
playing fetch with the dog while doing radio, we call
that multitasking. But please send us your talkbacks and and
call in eight hundred and two A two two eight
A two. You know that number, also our vip emails.
Let's give that a go. So all of that we
want to hear from you, and we're going to dive
(17:35):
into some more news here momentarily I did think it's
interesting that David's why came home with us there. The
fact that they shut down schools is just unforgivable because
they knew. It's a little bit like the Biden dementia thing.
Speaker 2 (17:50):
They knew.
Speaker 4 (17:51):
They didn't know necessarily about masks, as it was a
religious belief for them, but they knew that the school
shut down thing, but it was just for the teachers' unions,
it was just for the Democrats to keep their base happy. Look,
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Speaker 1 (18:57):
Welcome back in Clay Travis Sexton Show. There is now
another legal dispute that is underway. Harvard is reportedly going
to sue Trump and the Trump administration.
Speaker 2 (19:12):
Over the withholding of billions.
Speaker 1 (19:14):
Of dollars in taxpayer dollars that have otherwise been going
to the university.
Speaker 2 (19:23):
Harvard, but also a lot of other universities.
Speaker 1 (19:26):
And I grabbed this stat and credit New York Times
where it was, and I shared it on social media
the other day. I don't know if you have seen
this yet, Buck, but we are going to spend, or
we did spend in twenty twenty three, sixty billion dollars
in taxpayer money more to colleges and universities, sixty billion dollars.
(19:52):
Harvard is getting billions of that, but the money is
being spent many different universities across the country. And this
this was thirty times what they spent in nineteen fifty three.
If you account for inflation. So there's a graphic, and
I shared the graphic and the New York Times had
(20:14):
it up, and you look at it, and what we
are spending on universities blew my mind. Here's a question
for you, because I would put this in the same category. Now,
the defense of this is going to be saying, okay, well,
they're doing research, and we want them doing research, development,
(20:34):
all these different things. If it's such a great idea,
why aren't the universities funding their own research and development?
Why is it the responsibility of you and me and
so many of you out there listening to us right
now to not only potentially be paying tuition and room
and board that is exorbitant for many of these colleges
(20:54):
and universities nationwide, but for us also to be funding
with our dollars huge amounts of the bureaucracy that exist
at these universities. I actually give Trump credit. I never
really thought about it before. I didn't know the dollars
were this extensive. Did you know that we were given
sixty billion dollars to colleges and universities?
Speaker 4 (21:15):
And why should we be doing this? Well, you know
one thing that you've heard a lot about is this
is for research for R and D? Okay, like what, yeah,
I want to know that if we're hearing this, because
there's a lot that you can say is research. I mean,
is this the kind of research where we're spending money
to find out the mating habits of you know, TC
(21:37):
flies or something like what exactly is this money being
spent on at these schools? Or even worse, is it
looking at is it just a lot of people being
hired to do sociology research to for the progress of
DEI initiatives? I mean, we have no idea, right, So
your first point, Clay, did I know or do I
think the general public had any idea how much money
(22:00):
was going to the university? I knew the answer was
that there was money, and it was considerable. I didn't
know what sixty billion dollars that's hot. And the second
part of it is, well, this is where you get
more into the Doge piece. What exactly is this money
being spent on? And then you can add to that
We'll hold on a second, why are we to fund
these universities? We've already decided that the government's going to
(22:23):
backstop the loans, so now everyone can get a loan
to go. I'll just be honest to a worthless four
year college degree at a play or whatever, at a
place that does not have any incentive really to make
sure that it's graduates are getting jobs that can help
them pay back the loans, because it doesn't matter to them.
It's not their problem, right. The colleges and universities have
(22:45):
no incentive to address what the job market actually looks
like them. I'm saying they don't do any of this,
but from the macro view, it's just there's no skin
in the game for the colleges and universities. And this
is why the tuition keeps going up because why not
because it's not their problem. The government is backstopping this stuff,
(23:06):
and anybody can get these loans. So that's part one
of it, or rather that's part three of it. And
I just think that then you add to this the
ideological realization that we all have had for a long time,
but just what factories of insanity these places are? And
I think that the campus pro Hamas stuff was just
the latest iteration of this. But I mean, I had
friends who were in law school Clay during the George
(23:28):
Floyd stuff and what was law school and what was
being sent around in law schools was nuts. Yeah, you
know you want to talk about do you do you
think any of them thought that Derek Chauvin should get
due process?
Speaker 2 (23:40):
This is law schools. Yeah, of course, of course not.
Speaker 1 (23:43):
I also think this ties in and I'm going to
start hammering this really aggressively. In PR said that Trump
was going to fire Pete Hegseth. You can go read
INPR dot org or INPR dot com or whatever the
heck their website is. It is full on left wing
propaganda daily. We compete with them. Why should regardless of
(24:07):
what your politics are, why should in PR be getting
millions and millions of dollars in government funding? We don't
get millions and millions of dollars in government funding. We
don't get favorable treatment when it comes to AD dollars
being allocated basically from the federal government. If we're directly
(24:27):
competing WITHINPR, which we are. Now, you know, you guys
have brains, so you probably don't listen to MPR that often.
But in many of the five hundred and fifty some
odd stations that we are on on a daily basis,
there are a lot of stations out there that will
be top competing options with us will be MPR. There
(24:48):
are lots of places out there where you might live
or you might not get this show, and you get MPR.
Why is that not one of the first things that
they would cut to your point on dogebuck and if
NPR as well, we're not getting that much money, and
they make the argument that said, Okay, why are you
getting any at all? And you are because it's coming
through local advertisements and everything else. I don't think a
(25:10):
single red scent of taxpayer money should go to subsidize
NPR's coverage in any way of their media outlet. In
the same way that I don't think we should be
spending millions of dollars on Politico subscriptions or anything else.
We shouldn't be giving them a penny.
Speaker 4 (25:27):
Yeah, well, why, I mean, sure, the government, the government
in general, you don't really want in the business of business.
You want to let the American people do that. Would
we want the government to create a really bad smartphone company. No,
I think that there's plenty of people already in that space.
There are plenty of people in the media space. We
don't need incumbents who are little piggies at the trough
(25:53):
of government funding to continue to do what they've been doing.
So I completely completely agree with that. And on that
colleges and you know, diversity side of things, it's very clear.
I mean, Harvard is just the most prominent example. Understand this, everyone,
Harvard has been violating the Constitution for years with its
omissions policies. Now you could say at the time Harvard
thought they were operating within Okay, fine, I'm not saying
(26:15):
that we can hold them responsible after the fact in
a legal sense, but I do think it's worth noting
that Harvard has engaged in a long practice of discrimination.
And when it comes to discrimination, just look at Section
five of the Voting Rights Act, places end up being
punished or being watched very closely for historical discrimination, in
(26:35):
some cases for.
Speaker 2 (26:37):
Decades or more.
Speaker 4 (26:39):
Right, I mean, this is the reality of discrimination law,
is that once you find a place that has discriminated
under the law, they are under a dark cloud of
suspicion for a very long time.
Speaker 2 (26:50):
Legally speaking.
Speaker 4 (26:51):
Mind you look at Section five of the Voting Rights
Act a perfect example of what I'm talking about. Although
I think now that Supreme Court's even looked at that
and changed the formula, but put that aside.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
You know what I mean?
Speaker 4 (27:01):
In general, I think Clay on this issue, Harvard has
shown everybody that the plan is to continue to get
the money, but to not have to abide by federal
guidelines or so why should you have your cake in
either to Harvard play amen, it's effectively a hedge fund
that also has classes.
Speaker 2 (27:19):
At this point, it's kind an you know what is it?
An eighty billion, sixty billion.
Speaker 1 (27:22):
Fifty three billion dollar endowment as most recently we don't
know what it's been for like the last year in change.
But to your point, when you take federal dollars, you
agree to be bound in some way by federal guidelines,
and the most basic of federal guidelines is don't discriminate
on the basis of race, and make sure that everybody
(27:44):
has an equal opportunity to be educated and they're not
going to be discriminated against based on ethnicity, religion, anything else.
They failed during the protests surrounding the October seventh related incidents,
and many other universities failed as well. I told our
team to get Larry arn There was a great article
interviewing him in the Wall Street Journal weekend edition. He
(28:06):
is the president of Hillsdale College. Hillsdale made the decision
we want our educational mission to be completely independent of
the United States government, and so we are not going
to take any of their dollars. Hillsdale has way less
money than Harvard does, and they have managed to run
their university independently without needing federal dollars. Why wouldn't that
(28:29):
be the standard for Harvard unless buck they were feeding
at the trough of special interest dollars. They've got a
fifty three billion dollar endowment. They can't afford to run
their university without taxpayer subsidies.
Speaker 4 (28:45):
You would think you would think, you know, Harvard. At
one point, the reporting was that they were planning to
just batten down the hatches and do without the federal funds.
But I think they've realized, well, hold on it. It
would be for a number of years.
Speaker 2 (28:58):
Here.
Speaker 4 (28:58):
You start to do that math, and those hundreds of
millions of dollars feel like it's it actually adds up,
even for Harvard. So this is this is a moment
that we've been waiting for on the RITE for a
long time, which is just more accountability. These universities have
been given tremendous preferential treatment from them. This preferential treatment, right,
I mean, whether it's about the tax tax policy supporting
(29:22):
the student loans with government backstopping, which I think is
a bad idea. Now even the discussion although you know
Trump is going to start Trump's Department of Education, not
a Department of educator, who's behind the loans?
Speaker 1 (29:32):
Who does the loans student laws? They're going to start Underwright. Yeah,
it's a good question. I'm wondering who does the collection
or that.
Speaker 2 (29:38):
I don't know.
Speaker 4 (29:39):
But anyway, they're going to start collecting money again because
it was like Doe, that would actually mean they do
something that they're supposed to do.
Speaker 2 (29:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (29:47):
So I think that you're going to see more people
paying attention to this issue than they have in a
while because of that. And I also think that the
universities have betrayed the the man that they've implicitly been
given by the American people, which is to educate future
leadership and make our people as smart and competitive in
a global marketplace as possible. Instead, they're educating a ton
(30:10):
of foreigners. Okay, start with that. Because the foreigners pay
full freight, no help with the tuition, whatever. You go
to a lot of the elite universities and everybody's from
Beijing in Dubai.
Speaker 2 (30:20):
This is just the truth.
Speaker 4 (30:21):
Not everybody, but huge percentages of these classes, and they've
become left wing and doctrination factories that are churning out
kids who don't know anything that's not good, so they're
getting slapped down.
Speaker 3 (30:32):
I like it.
Speaker 1 (30:34):
I also would point out I think there are massive
lawsuits to be filed here. Some of these education loans
are indefensible. For instance, you shouldn't be able to take
out a loan of two hundred thousand dollars to get
a social work degree. You can never pay it back
when your job. And look, I appreciate the people who
(30:54):
take jobs that don't pay that well, but the fact
that these universities would loan somebody fuck two hundred grand
to get a job where you're going to make forty
grand a year, it doesn't ever add up that you
can ever pay these things off.
Speaker 2 (31:07):
To me. They're predatory.
Speaker 1 (31:09):
Also, I think this is a function of Hey, we
should be teaching actual basic math and investment and understanding
in schools because the people who agree to these loans,
I don't think they have any concept of how impossible
it is to ever pay them back. Right, if you're
a lawyer or doctor, someone getting a master's degree in
business or something like that.
Speaker 2 (31:28):
You would I wouldn't. I wouldn't even tell people to
get it.
Speaker 4 (31:31):
Look, I looked at getting an MBA and from fancy
places and I didn't do it. Now I'm sitting here
with Clay because I wanted to media instead. I think
the advance, I think advanced degrees. People need far more
honesty in this discussion. Most advanced degrees are not worth
very much, and a lot of advanced degrees are truly worthless.
(31:51):
In fact, they put you deep in the hole. I'll
perfect example, you journalism. Don't ever get a master's in journalism.
It is a waste. I don't even know how journalism
schools still exist. Like that's a whole. It is a
waste of your time. And a lot of master's degrees
in the humanities unless you are convinced you're going to
get a teaching job. That is the only thing that
(32:12):
they are worthwhile to do, and those are very hard
to come by, right, Clay, I mean, you look at
this stuff. Mostly degrees do the waste.
Speaker 1 (32:21):
I don't think people do the math, and I think, unfortunately,
we have a lot of people who don't understand how
loans work, and a lot of people who don't understand
how interest rates work. And you don't even sit back
and think how you're going to bankrupt yourself basically getting
a degree that never pays you.
Speaker 4 (32:34):
Actually, I qualified for master's credit from Georgetown School Foreign
Service as an undergrad. So I got master's credit as
an undergrad.
Speaker 2 (32:43):
You know what.
Speaker 4 (32:44):
The master's credit was for a class just like the
classes I was taking an undergrad.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
And I remember thinking, so.
Speaker 4 (32:50):
I would just go to school for two more years
to do two more years of reading books that I
could read on my own.
Speaker 2 (32:55):
I don't think so.
Speaker 1 (32:57):
Lessons in Life from Clay and Buck. As hard as
the Israelis have tried to return to a normal life,
difficult to do. Nearly every day there's talk of another
missile attack on one of multiple fronts. You never know
which direction it might be coming. I was over there
in December and I saw for myself how dangerous it
can be. That's why we're partnering with the International Fellowship
(33:19):
of Christians and Jews to help provide life saving aid
and security essentials. Your urgently needed gift today will help
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Your gift will also help first responders by providing armored
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(33:42):
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That's eight eight eight four eight eight four three two
five online at SUPPORTIFCJ dot org to give that websit again.
Speaker 2 (34:00):
Support IFCJ dot org.
Speaker 5 (34:04):
Cheap up with the biggest political comeback in world history
on the Team forty seven podcast. Play and Buck highlight
Trump free plays from the week.
Speaker 2 (34:13):
Sunday's at noon Eastern.
Speaker 5 (34:15):
Find it on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get
your podcasts.
Speaker 4 (34:19):
All right, we're closing enough shop today On Clay and Buck,
that's a great time to remind you to please subscribe
to the Play Travis and Buck Sexton Show podcast network.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
Why is it a network? Not just this show?
Speaker 4 (34:30):
Other great hosts put their shows in that feed, Carol Markowitz,
Tutor Dixon, Dave Rutherford, former Navy seal. His podcast has
been blown up lately, so many of you listening in.
He's doing a great job and many many others show
go check that out when you get a chance. Get
some of your VIP emails and also some talkbacks.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
Here.
Speaker 4 (34:51):
Let's start with VIP email. I'm gonna jump to this one, Clay, Sandy,
Sandy knows how to get on the show. She starts
with Buck is absolutely right. Why Jill was part of
the cover up of Biden's cognitive decline to make sure
Biden could cover up the crime of the Biden family.
She was protecting Joe from staff pushing removal by the
(35:12):
twenty fifth Amendment at any time. I do think, Clay,
I mean, I know, you know, we're a little bit
we don't see this exactly the same way. But Jill
was having to do a delicate, delicate dance to keep
Joe in the in the cockpit, so to speak.
Speaker 1 (35:27):
It is funny remember the first Trump term, how often
they talked about the twenty things with him.
Speaker 2 (35:33):
All the time.
Speaker 1 (35:34):
Yeah, never was mentioned about Biden at all, even though
it probably was far more legitimate to mention it there.
Now there's all sorts of constitutional issues associated with it.
It's a challenge in general, but I think Biden was
so decrepit mentally and physically that even Democrats are not
willing to bring up the twenty fifth Amendment on Trump
(35:55):
so far this term.
Speaker 4 (35:56):
That's a perfect transition to Kevin another VIP. The first
time I heard Claim make this point, it really opened
my eyes, and I share the point with all my friends.
We see Biden maybe five percent of the time, imagine
what he is like the other ninety five percent of
the time behind closed doors. That point really struck with me,
opened eyes to how decrepit Biden really was. To see
(36:16):
Clay Indeed.
Speaker 1 (36:18):
I mean it is whatever you think of a public figure,
understand that they typically are putting foot forth, their best
foot forward when they are in a public venue. The
Biden that we saw on June twenty seventh, and the
Biden that we saw at all those public events was
the best version of him they could put out. And
(36:38):
it was still awful, and we still are only getting
I think, probably a smidge a small pinprick of the
awfulness that he was embodying behind closed doors. We'll be
back with you tomorrow. Never behind closed doors. Three hours
of fun, Clay and Buck come hang with us.
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