September 18, 2025 • 37 mins
In this episode, Ryan breaks down how political violence statistics are framed by groups like the ADL and what that means for public perception. He answers listener questions in his "Ask Me Anything" segment—including top food spots in New York City—before diving into key political and cultural issues. Topics include how census data impacts congressional power, the “Roe effect” on crime rates, red state vs. blue state crime dynamics, and the Biden administration’s handling of illegal immigration. Girdusky also explores the Democratic Party’s challenges ahead of the midterms, the long-term consequences of America’s declining birth rate, and what’s next for Ron DeSantis. It's a Numbers Game is part of the Clay Travis & Buck Sexton Podcast Network - new episodes debut every Monday & Thursday.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome back to a Numbers Game with Ryan Grodowski. Happy Thursday, everybody.
I hope that you all enjoyed. I honestly enjoyed, but
found the episode on Monday intriguing and informative on political violence.
I have to tell you that I approached that episode
thinking that I was going to break down like all
the data on political violence over the last twenty years,
(00:23):
and I got way over my skis and I ended up,
I think, presenting you guys with a lot of information,
but I wanted to show you everything and it was
just way too much. But I think one thing that
I would like to touch on one more time before
I go into ask me anything for the episode was
(00:44):
really how these nonprofits are manipulating information in order to
make you have the opinion that right wing violence is
larger than what it is. So I went through the ADL,
the Anti Defamation League's data, and the University of Cincinnati's
information to see examples that they had of right wing violence.
(01:08):
Right So, the ADL, which was only looking at homicides,
did not include Luigi Mangioni as a case of left
wing violence, which is pretty insane considering it is the
one of the largest. They also did include the transgender
cold Zizian. As I mentioned, they included any case where
(01:28):
somebody who had formerly belonged to some kind of neo
Nazi or white nationalist prison gang committing any sort of
homicidal act post their release as a case of right
wing violence. So a New Hampshire man who shot his
younger half brother after the half brother had informed the
(01:48):
police that he had shot a random house where no
one was injured and nobody was killed, he killed that
half brother who informed the police. The ADL lists that
as a case of right wing extremism. A sex offender
with a lengthy criminal record in Texas a murdered an
eleven year old He at the time of his arrest,
had a Nazi swastika tattoo. Once again, did not murder
(02:11):
her because of the intentions of promoting some kind of
bast right wing conspiracy or some far right agenda. He
murdered her because he was a criminal with a who
chose to murder a child. But there wasn't a political
opinion behind that. Nonetheless, that is considered a case of
right wing extremism, according to the ADL. ADL infused any
(02:36):
case where a person from the Arian Brotherhood, a neo
Nazi white supremacist group, committed any kind of murder, even
among other members of their organization that had no political bias.
There were fights where somebody was accused of being part
of a neo Nazi group who got into a fight
with a neighbor and killed the neighbor with a baseball bat,
where that was included. Once again, no political bias involved whatsoever,
(02:59):
no loitical opinion being about whatsoever. Black gangs whose leaders
espouse black nationalism were not included. We're not thrown into
the same thing. And the idea once again was looking
specifically at homicides. The other organization I mentioned University Cincinnati's
prosecution project by Michael Lodenthal. They were looking at any crime.
(03:20):
And what he put together, which was cited by the economists,
is truly laughable. What he called violent right wing extremism.
A woman named Linda Mueller and two friends were arrested
for peacefully protesting an abortion clinic in Westchester, PA. He
called that violent right wing extremism. Four men in Dover,
(03:41):
New York were arrested for targeting Mexicans and robbing them.
The four men were all black, Another woman was named
Tiffany Harris, who had long history of mental health issues
and petty crimes. She went into a majority Jewish neighborhood
and spit at several Jews. She was also a black woman.
If I didn't mention that that was considered right wing extremism.
(04:02):
They manipulate all of this data. They lie if you can,
if you're old enough where you can think back to
twenty fifteen, think back to twenty sixteen when Trump was
running and Trump supporters being pelted with eggs. That one
woman I can remember her face being pelt with eggs,
or the speech in Chicago where right wingers were attacked.
None of these cases exist. Let alone BLM, let alone,
(04:24):
anti file, let alone, the chest. None of it counts.
It is all manipulated data in order to promote to
the media, promote to Democrats, and promote to liberal hacks
in the media that this is a right wing only
a problem. It is used to manipulate you and you
should not believe it. Okay, now for a full ask
(04:44):
Me Anything episode. I had to get out on my
chest because the more research I did, the more I
was just completely down the rabbit hole, and I had
to talk about it. Hey, we'll be right back after this.
All right. First question, probably my favorite question I have
ever been asked and asked me anything. It comes from Frank.
(05:05):
He says, do you have a favorite NYC restaurant or
some good recommendations? Listen, Frank, I am a foodie. I
love food. I wish I could lose weight while eating it.
I could go on for a days. I'm going to
give you some good New York City places to visit
if you're in the neighborhood. If you're in the city
and you want some things, these are my favorite things.
(05:25):
I'm not endorsed by these people. I wish i was.
They want to give me some free food, I will
take it. First and foremost. If you want a Republican hangout,
go to Beach Cafe on Second Avenue in seventeenth Street.
The food isn't like outstanding, but it's fine. They have
a copsle that's pretty good. Bartender's great. Love visiting them.
I went there before and after being canceled on CNN
that day. Second, if you want a good deal for food,
(05:48):
there is a place called Patrizia's. I would go to
the Williamsburg Patrizias on thirty fifth and Broadway in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.
There's a seventy five dollars pre fixed menus, five courses,
bottomless beer, bottom almost wine. Highly recommend. You won't find
a better deal in the city, and it's good quality
for what you're getting. I would also if you want
(06:09):
a higher priced dinner, there's a place called Piccolo Cucina Uptown.
It's on East sixteenth Street. It's where my friends from
Italy choose to eat Italian food in the city. There
Kashia de Peppe is very authentic to Italy. Love it.
Manetta's in Long Island City, great homemade pasta. Very highly
recommend that place. If you want pizza, which is a
(06:31):
New York Specicity specialty. Everyone wants to know where's the
best pizza. My favorite is if you go down to
Coney Island and go to Spamoni Gardens. Absolutely fantastic. My
mouth is actually watering while thinking of these things. Spamoni
Gardens downtown in Coney Island. It's on down here, but
it's in Coney Island and they only serve pies and
half pies, really really really good. If you're deep into Queens,
(06:55):
there's a place called Rockaways on the Rock best chicken
palm I've ever had in my life. It was spicy
chicken palm with sweet Penney Baka, absolutely incredible. I'm going
to give three more quick ones because I know it's
not a food podcast, but I was very enthralled with
this question. Bok's on the Upper east Side. It's a
French restaurant, great steak, Free Tis excellent bar. There's a
(07:18):
Puerto Rican fish place in Brooklyn called Portsal Plaza on
Arlington Avenue, sell big containers of food. That's said more
if you live in New York City and you want something,
because it's not really a place you said and eat,
it's place you take to go. And then lastly, downtown
there's best called Oscar Wilds on twenty seventh Street. Usually
places that try to be too cute sees on the
inside and try to be too theme oriented, the food
(07:40):
kind of sucks. This is a case where the food's
excellent and the vibe is very very cool. Okay, enough
of the food questions, but I had to really I
was very excited to be asked that question, so I'm
excited to answer it because it's always politics. So that's
that was a great question. Thank you for that. Second
question comes from Carl. You sent me a lot of
(08:03):
questions somewhere north of twenty five. So I'm only going
to answer too, because that would be the whole show
would be just asked answer Carl's questions. Not that I
don't appreciate. I love the questions, but there's a lot.
So Carl hit on the question of the census, and
I have to say, of all the topics that are
constantly sent to me, the census is probably number one.
(08:25):
People are always asking about why did the census go wrong?
How can we fix the census data from the twenty
twenty census? He says. Basically, Carl says, how would the
seats be changed? The number of House seats in the
US Congress be changed in their allocation of each state,
especially if it was done correctly and if the illegal
(08:48):
aliens weren't counted. I think that's the best way to
sum up your question, Carl. So the first question is
a little difficult, right because I'm going to give you
two separate answers. If the number of seats that were
counted back in twenty twenty were done differently, it would
look like this. So the census undercounted voters in six
(09:12):
states Arkansas, Florida, Illinois, Mississippi, Tennessee, and Texas, and it
over counted voters in Delaware, Hawaii, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New York, Ohio,
Rhode Island, and Utah. Have those states been counted correctly
the first time. Texas would have gained three House seats
instead of two, Florida would have gained three instead of two,
(09:34):
Colorado would have not gained any, Rhode Island would have
lost one of their two seats, and Minnesota would have
also lost one seat. Now we don't know how things
are going to shake up ahead of the twenty thirty census.
You know, something could happen that drastically changes the population
of a given state, Like if there's a massive hurricane
Katrina style hurricane that makes its way to someplace like
(09:56):
South Florida, that could change so many people live there.
If California had as the big earthquake and San Francisco
falls into the San Andreas Fault or North Dakota and
it's like the next big business and everyone's making a
million dollars there, you never know, like things could change
drastically in the next five years. As of now, Forecaster's
estimate of California is slated to lose three congressional seats,
(10:17):
which makes their redistricting that Newsom's doing right now an
actual nightmare because it means in five years, Democrats will
have six incumbents either having to choose to retire or
run against each other. New York is slated to lose two.
My best guess is one in Long Island and one
in Upstate, and maybe they're going to merge a Long
Island in Queen's seat. Who knows. Oregon, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, Illinois, Wisconsin,
(10:40):
and Rhode Island are all slated to lose one. Texas
and Florida will each gain four, Idaho, Utah, and Arizona
will each gain one. This is going to be very consequential,
not only in the House representatives, by the way, but
this will be consequential for the next for the presidential
elections of the twenty thirties, because it means a Republican
can win without winning a single blue Wall Midwestern state. Right,
(11:04):
You'll need Georgia, North Carolina, Nevada, Arizona. You will not
need Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, or Michigan, which will change our politics
a lot. I'm able to do a whole episode in
that in the future. Now, what would have happened in
the twenty twenty census if illegals were not counted, which
is part of your question. According to Pew Research, both
Florida and Texas they would have gained one less seat,
(11:27):
So Texas would have gained two and Florida have gained one.
They would have getting in total of three instead of five.
California would have lost two seats instead of only losing one. Alabama, Minnesota,
and Ohio would have all gained a seat. So illegal
aliens being counted for the House of Representatives not only
gibs Democrats more seats. It really does take away from
(11:49):
these red states in the Midwest, these red states in
more like you know, deep southern places. I have to
tell you that I'm asked constantly like can they fix
the senses? Can we redo the senses? I think if
they could have, they would have. I don't think it's
possible anyway. Thank you for your many, many, many questions, Carl.
(12:12):
I hope I answered a few of them, and maybe
I'll get to another one and different ask me anything.
Next question comes from Bennett. He writes, quote, last week,
you mentioned that crime rates went down after spiking in
the seventies, yet you made no mention of the row effect.
Many sociologists point towards the impact of legalized abortion for
lowering violent crime during the period, especially inner city crime.
(12:36):
So what Bennett is referring to is this idea that
many sociologists have that abortion, especially with the legalization of
Roe v. Wade nationwide abortion legalization resulted in many poor,
specifically black women, aborting their babies. Considering black men are
have a higher share of the violent crime than their
(12:57):
overall percentage of the population, this is what they're pointing to,
because black men are about six percent of the population
and something like I don't know forty percent, I don't
know the exact number on the top my head, but
like something forty percent of all violent crime, especially homicide.
That is what they are pointing to as the answer
to that. The study was published by John Donahue and
(13:21):
Stephen Levitt. That's the people the first two criminologists who
sat there and said that this was the reasoning. They wrote, quote,
we offer evidence that legalized abortion has contributed significantly to
the crime reduction. Crime began to fall roughly eighteen years
after abortion was legalized. The five states that allow abortion
in nineteen seventy experienced declients earlier than the rest of
(13:43):
the country, which legalized in nineteen seventy three. With Roe v. Wade.
States with high abortion rates in the nineteen seventies and
eighties experienced a greater crime reduction in the nineties. In
higher abortion states, only arrest of those born after abortion
legalization fall relative to low abortion states. Legalized abortion appears
(14:03):
to account for as much as fifty percent of the
recent crime drop. The argument that they have holds some merit,
specifically with the black population. I've done this research before.
If the black population of America and the white population
were two separate countries, the black population would have a
crime rate in the top fifteen or top ten most
(14:27):
violent nations in America, and the white crime rate would
be somewhere around Canada's. However, I think that what is
missing from there, and what is undercounted from their data,
is the fact of an aging population, significantly the aging
of the baby boomers. Right. There were a lot of
(14:47):
things happening in the early nineties together, not just eighteen
years since Roe v. Wade was legalized. That was part
of it, for sure, That wasn't the entire thing. I
don't think it makes sense that while abortion increased in
the nineteen seventies, abortion really peaked nineteen eighty three. That's
(15:07):
one about a third of pregnancies resulted in abortion. Abortion
actually hit their highest raw number nineteen ninety. Crimes started
really coming down, not just in the early nineties under Giuliani,
which New York City, by the way, had legalized abortion
way before row. Crime starts coming down in the I mean,
(15:28):
and then it starges back up, but it doesn't. The
drop begins actually much closer to the to the legalization
to row being enacted in nineteen seventy three than people think. Right. Remember,
murder is specifically a young man's game. It is incredibly
rare for an older person to become a serial killer,
(15:48):
you know, after spending decades with no history of violence.
That's what makes the Las Vegas shooting so odd. Abortion
hit about one point five million in the late seventies,
one point five million abortions per year, which means that
those children would have only been teenagers in the nineties.
When the murder rates starts collapsing, they're not kind of
(16:09):
old enough to be responsible for what would have been
higher crime rates. I read a book that I highly
recommend on this topic called The Rise and Fall of
Violent Crime in America by Barry Lasser, and what he
points to is really just an aging of the population.
Basically that as baby Boomers came of age in the
nineteen sixties and seventies, there was this dramatic rise in crime,
(16:30):
and then it began to fall in the late eighties.
Then the crack epidemic and the increased gang violence happens,
and there's a lot of activist judges starting to release
criminals during that time period, especially in big blue states
and big blue cities. But Latser says that a mixture
of hard on crime laws placed in places like New
York City and Los Angeles under their Republican mayors, on
(16:52):
top of just an aging population of baby boomers aging
and the gen x being significantly smaller than baby boomers,
really was responsible for the massive decline in crime. I'm
not going to say that abortion played no part, but
as abortion rates began substantially declining throughout the nineteen nineties,
it did not result in a spike of crime in
(17:13):
twenty tens. Right, So just because people had less abortions
doesn't mean that there was an increase in crime. That's
what I believe. I believe abortion a part of it,
but it was I think it was the aging population
was a bigger part of it. I highly recommend though,
The Rise and Fall of Island Crime by Barry Latser
if you're interested in this subject. Okay, let's do a
next question on crime, but this time from Kyle. Kyle writes, quote,
(17:37):
Kathy Hogle and Gavin Newsom have a point when they
say that crime is worse than some major cities in
red states and then in blue states. That is so true.
Places like New Orleans, Saint Louis, Cincinnati, Indianapolis, Kansas City,
and Jackson. Republican governors don't need to wait to Trump
for Trump to send in the National Guard. Are red
steak governors so inept that they can't get control of
their cities. Thank you Kyle for this and to your point, Yeah, look,
(18:01):
crime has fallen even in some of the worst areas
of our country over the last few decades. So something
is happening that is positive. But I'll say this because
those cities you mentioned, but Saint Louis Jackson, these sitn
New Orleans. These cities have either a majority black population
or a significant black population. They do not vote for Republicans.
(18:26):
They vote for very, very comically corrupt Democratic mayors who
are utterly inept in what they do. And I think
there is this feeling of being complacent, that the problem
is too difficult, and that why bother these people are
(18:47):
never going to support us, Why are we to a
point going to support them? These cities are hellholes? And
no one has ever told me this. This is the
feeling I've gotten being in some big Red cities with
some big Republican politicians about their cities. They kind of
just are like, can't doing about that place? That place
as a hellhole. And the truth is that Red states
(19:09):
have some of these beautiful cities. New Orleans is amazing city,
Memphis is an incredible city, but they are allowed to
become you know, unfathomably dangerous, especially for you know, young
families and people who are looking for housing. How much
more housing would you have available if some of these
(19:32):
cities like Memphis and New Orleans were livable, like we're
all parts were livable, you'd have so much more housing.
But I just think that people sit there and say,
you can't fix it, don't even try. I agree with
you one hundred percent. They should try Kansas Cities, New
Kansas City, New Orleans, Memphis. I've been to all those places.
They're beautiful, They've got such life to them. The crime
(19:53):
is unimaginable, and Republican governors should be taking a more
proactive stance, even against the well wishes of their Democratic mayors,
and even by against the well wishes by the way
of some of the population. They're the governor, they're responsible.
They should crack down on crime. Okay. Next question comes
from David Scott from New Hampshire. He writes that he
(20:16):
had an argument with his liberal sister about how many
illegal aliens Biden has led into the country during the
four years he was in the White House. He said
that he David says that he said there was ten million,
and his sister said there was two point three million.
Can you explain, okay, First, your sister cited PolitiFact. Never
listen to PolitiFact. They are a bias misleading organization. Secondly,
(20:39):
you're both kind of correct, though you're more right than
she is. During Biden's presidency, there were an estimated ten
point eight to eleven million encounters at the border, with
about two million known godaways on top of that. Those
are illegal aliens that don't encounter border patrol, but it
are still believed to have made it within the interior
(21:00):
of the United States. That doesn't mean, by the way, though,
that that ten to ten point eight to eleven million
plus two million got aways is the number that was released.
The numbers released are much lower. There were about two
point five million illegal aliens released into the country during
Biden's presidency that we are well aware of, right if
(21:23):
you have to remember, Biden understood at the end of
his presidency that the immigration problem was becoming a stain
on his presidency, that it was really dragging his numbers down.
So he started cracking down on immigration pretty substantially. And
one thing that he did was offer parole programs two
illegal aliens to be flown into the country so they
(21:44):
were no longer coming across our southern border. That's why
there's this huge dip in the number of southern border encounters.
And they were given this CHNV parole program. That was
about one point seven million of them plus about five
one hundred thousand unaccompanied miners. When you add all of
(22:05):
them together, the one point seven million, which by these
like PolitiFact would never include because it was a quote
unquote parole program, So they were technically legally here, although
they had no rights to be here, aside from the
fact that Biden waved his magic wand and Trump unwaived it,
and now they are not legally allowed in the country anymore.
When you add those five hundred thousand miners, one to
(22:26):
two million known gataways, the one point seven million Parolis,
and the about two point five to three million illegal aliens,
it's overall, it's estimated, according to Goldman Sachs, by about
to about five million illegal aliens made it into the
interior of the country and stayed here. That was also
repeated by The New York Times the Goldman Sacks numbers,
(22:48):
The Center for Immigration Study says it was about five
point four million, and Migration Policy Center says it was
about five point eight million. So five to six million
people came under Biden illegally in state, including HNB, including Parolis,
including on accompanied minors. You both have bits and pieces
of the data. You're more right than she is, but
that's the full story. I hope you guys can solve
(23:09):
this dispute peacefully. I imagine what a game of monopoly
with your family is like. Anyway, we'll be right back
with more. Ask me anything. Next question comes from Brian.
He says he's a big fan of the show and
shares with everybody. Brian, seriously, thank you, thank you to
everyone who listens. I really want to grow the show
(23:30):
large enough to do live events one day, and I
need my numbers to keep growing. And it really means
a lot to me. He asks. If there was a
do over in the twenty twenty four election and Harris
was to take over the presidency for Biden instead of
just running in his place, would have had a different result.
He asked. Is there any historical precedent for a vice
(23:50):
president completing another president's term barring death or scandal, and
then the successful running on their own. Okay, the only
time he vite president has taken over for a president
when there wasn't a death involved was Gerald Ford for
Richard Nixon in nineteen seventy four, and Richard Nixon believed
or not took over the role of presidency but never
(24:15):
the title. Several times during Dwight Eisenhower's presidency. Eisenhower was
a very unhealthy president towards the end of his second term.
He had a heart attack in nineteen fifty five, he
had a major surgery in nineteen fifty six, and he
had a stroke in nineteen fifty seven, and Richard Nixon
took over the responsibility in the role of presidency for
several lengthy periods of time. However, in both cases, neither
(24:39):
men went on to win the presidency in the following election.
Ford lost to Carter in seventy six and Nixon to
Kennedy in nineteen sixty. I don't think that there's a
scenario where Harris would have taken over for Biden and
then won like forward thinking, and he mentions in the
email forward thinking, like there's no there's no answer, like
(25:01):
JD were to take over for Trump, would it result
in him having a better chance at winning. Probably not,
because then you're just viewed as the accidental president and
you still inherit all the positives and negatives from your successor.
I don't think there's really a scenario where Harris would
have won the presidency given everything else that happened that year.
(25:23):
From the arrests, the assassination attempt, the you know, the economy,
the border, everything. I just don't think that there's a
solution that would have made that possible. Though if she
did take over the presidency, the one thing that would
have been slightly un versus that Trump would have had
to redo all of his merchandise from forty seventh president
(25:43):
to forty eighth. Anyway, and Brian also asked if poll
taxes are viewed as illegal impediments to voting rights, then
should in congestion pricing tolling be as impediment to New
York City. Shouldn't that be illegal as given the rights
or the peace people to exercise, to exercise free assembly. No,
not really, And I hate the toll the congestion pricing,
(26:06):
so I'm not a fan of it. But no, that's
not it because the scenario doesn't hold up, Brian, because
congestion pricing doesn't block anyone from voting, given that if
you live in the outer boroughs, you vote in the
borough you live in. So no one from Queen's travels
to Manhattan to go vote. Same thing with Staten Island
or the Bronx or Brooklyn. You don't travel to Manhattan
(26:27):
to go vote, so you wouldn't be poll to go vote.
And I believe there's a waiver for people who live
like right on the line from having to pay it,
so they wouldn't have to pay it either. There's no
one really who would be forbidden from voting in order
to do that, and there's other ways of getting to
that area. So I don't like it, but I don't
think that argument holds up. But thank you for the question. Okay,
(26:48):
let's go to John Atkins, who is a big fan
of the podcast. He says, congrats on all your success
so far. He says, quote, I'm a little confused by
this because we've all heard since Trump's inacuration is how
Dems are imploting, hemorrhaging voters, embarrassing themselves left and right
and on the wrong side of every eighty twenty issue.
Are in total chaos internally and generally can't do anything right,
(27:08):
thank God. So how is it that at the same
time they petitive going into the midterms and even have
a decent chance at derailing Trump's agenda by taking the House.
How can all this be true at the same time?
Are the Democrats dead? Are the Democrats dead? No. First,
we live in a two party system, so unlike Europe,
unlike Canada, you only have two choices. So if you're
(27:31):
fed up with one party, you only have another party
to go to, or you could sit out, but you can't.
There's no real alternative third party that has a serious
chance of winning in any major race in this country
outside of Bernie Sanders and Angus King in two states,
and they've caused the Democrats. You can only pick Democrat
or Republican. Secondly, when it comes to the House, the
(27:54):
number of swing states we are singing swing seats rather
that we are talking about is very, very small. In
twenty twenty four election, only thirty seven House seats were
decided by less than five percentage points. There's eight point
five percent of all House seats. So when we're talking
about such few seats being really competitive and the margin
(28:15):
in the House as far as who runs the majority
being so tight, it can easily swing between both parties,
especially if people are disenfranchised. Over the economy. I've been
saying this last few episodes. The economy is not in
great shape. Energy prices are through the roof, Grocery prices
are climbing. This is causing concern among voters, especially voters
(28:36):
like Latinos, like independence, like young people who swung heavily
towards the president and his party. I think that the
economy is the major question, and if the media has
done a very good job of blaming Trump's tariffs for stuff,
I don't think that that's the full answer. I think
a lot of these energy costs are coming from these
data centers. I did a whole episode about this, but
(28:57):
I think that this is really affecting the ways and
other impressionable people are voting. And also Democrats, by the way,
once again are the party of high propensity frequent voters,
so not only do they have that working for them,
they have the higher likelihood of people who vote in
(29:19):
every election showing up in this one. Now, maybe things
are changing, maybe especially the death of Charlie Kirk. Maybe
that is it brought people who are less engaged to
become more engaged. Maybe they want to be more active.
There's a lot of people who are putting applications to
start turning point chapters. And maybe we'll see something happen
in twenty twenty six because of that, and maybe Charlie's
(29:42):
last act will be to inspire a million people to
be just like him. Who knows right. But as of
right now, Democrats do have that advantage. I am old
enough to remember the two thousand and eight the cover
of Time magazine where it said endangered species and it was
a picture of the republic elephant, and they said it
was going to be a regional that was going to
lose seats. Things swing back and forth, right, nothing is permanent.
(30:04):
Democrats have taken a lot of bad policy positions on
a number of things, and for every Mundani that they
have nominated in places like New York, they've also backed
a lot of moderates so far, I think that they
are trying to really navigate issues like the transports issue.
They keep saying we don't want to talk about it
(30:26):
because they don't want to alienate their base, But this
is them also saying we're not going to, you know,
embrace it the way that Kamala did. Republicans are kind
of the same evolution around gay marriage and in the
twenty ten Time where they were like, how do we
navigate this knowing how the polls are going. Democrats have
loads of problems still from the twenty twenty four election,
but If the question is can they win the House,
(30:46):
the answer is undeniably yes. It's not that many seats
that they need to win. Voters are word about the
economy and don't undercount the ability of Republicans to both
step on their own feet because they will absolutely, you know,
if they can, they will, And secondly, they can also
become victims of their own success. The border, for example,
(31:10):
is not going to be a major issue in the
next election. Why could Trump solve the problem? Same reason
I Crime is not as big of an issue in
New York today as it is in nineteen ninety three
when Giliani won because to a large degree, you solved
the problem. We don't have three thousand murders in New
York City anymore. Okay, last question for the episode. This
one comes from Patrick from Tampa Bay, Florida, a city
(31:32):
that I have never been to, but I would like
to visit. Patrick Wrights, you and Ann Coulter are two
of my favorite commentators, and you seem to align on
most issues, but I've noticed you different on falling birth rates.
You seem to think it's a serious problem. Well, she
thinks it's a bit overblown. I lean towards Anne I
believe that a lower birth rate may not be problematic
and actually could be beneficial, provided that births occur within stable,
(31:55):
self supporting, nuclear families that up hold Western values. My
primary concern is declining birth rates, and it's in balanced
age demographics with two hye proportion of retired elderly relative
to working age population. Are there strategies to mitigate the
demographic challenges while maintaining a low birth rate. I would
enjoy hearing you and discussed Hey, Patrick, so let me
(32:18):
answer your first question first in that yes, and I
completely disagree on this issue. I do believe the falling
birth rates in around the globe are problem. In this country,
it is not as catastrophic as it is internationally. We
are not in the worst case scenario you mentioned wanting
Western values and families with Western values to have kids.
(32:38):
If you look at some countries like Italy, there are
many parts of Italy that have not had a single
birth recorded in three years. Italy has lost more than
one million people since twenty eighteen, and that's with record
high immigration levels. China, which is not a Western country,
but as a major country, China, when I was growing up,
the largest country in the world is losing two million
people per year. Japan, Ukraine, Poland, Germany, Belarus, places like
(33:04):
the eastern East Asia all losing people every year, and
they are in the midst of a societal collapse. You know,
you look at Japan, there are more people over seventy
than under five. That country does not have a future, right,
It's that raises major concerns for their national security, major
concerns for their economy and their welfare state. And you know,
(33:24):
Anne thinks that the welfare state and especially social security
is a Ponzi scheme that we're never going to inherit
and you know that's her opinion. But there is no
evidence that intact Western families are going to come out prevailing,
even as nations with higher levels of religiosity like Poland.
For example, Poland has a high church attendance relative to Europe,
(33:47):
high belief in God, immensely low birth rates, incredibly low
birth rates. Even Muslim majority nations have slipped below replacement levels.
Even parts of Africa have slipped below replace levels. But
over the next decade you're going to see places have
extreme societal collapse throughout Europe, throughout East Asia, and then
(34:08):
have declining populations throughout Latin America. Africa is going to
hold on the longest, but they're going to see declines
as well. And a big question is what happens to
our own workforce when China is a net importer of workers,
when India is a net importer of workers, when all
of Europe is a net importer of workers. It's not
just people to pay taxes for the welfare, it's who
(34:31):
cleans the restaurants, who powers the machines, who invents the
cure for cancer. You know, maybe maybe generative AI is
going to sit there and do all those things, but
I don't. I don't. I would always bet on humanity,
And especially when you look at the concentration of where
most of the geniuses of the world who created most
of the inventions came from, it's a very small geographical
(34:54):
area of them and their descendants, crazy low birth rates.
It's not a big bet for humanity. And that's all
I could say about that. Having children is probably the
most important thing that people could do in this time
period to fight the greatest existential threat facing our country.
And if you're an intact nuclear family with Western values,
that makes even better. You also asked And this is
(35:16):
the last question about the post Desanta's political struggle in Florida.
Is Desanta's is run in twenty twenty four creating a
retaliation from the Trump campaign. I'm going to say, I
know there's still some bad blood between parts of the
Trump camp and parts of the Santa's camp. I don't
know how serious it is between the two men specifically.
(35:38):
I'm not privy to that information. I've never asked. I
do know that Desantas is looking at what his future
will be post governorship, and there's a lot of energy
right now from the Trump camp to support Byron Donald's.
And I will say one thing. I do know for
a fact that there's a lot of santa supporters who
don't want Byron to be governor. But as is the
(35:59):
case know Hi with a vek Ramaswami, there's a lot
of people who don't want a victory governor. Time is ticking.
The hour is later than people like to imagine the
availability to find a nominee who could raise the money,
who could generate the attention, who could be an alternative
to either Byron or Revec. In this case, Byron, it's
(36:20):
very late. It's very, very very late, so I don't
know if Desanta's has a successor in mind that is
not Byron Donald's. I don't know if he's put that
much energy or thought into it. But if there is
supposedly an anti buyering candidate and they have yet to emerge,
they've yet to show their face and the hour is
very very late for them to show up. So anyway,
(36:43):
thank you for listening to this all Ask Me Anything
episode of this podcast. I love getting your questions. Please
submit them to me Ryan at Numbers gamepodcast dot com.
That's Ryan at Numbers gamepodcast dot com. If you like
this podcast, please subscribe on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
wherever you get your podcasts, and I will see you
guys on Monday
Welcome back to a Numbers Game with Ryan Grodowski. Happy Thursday, everybody.
I hope that you all enjoyed. I honestly enjoyed, but
found the episode on Monday intriguing and informative on political violence.
I have to tell you that I approached that episode
thinking that I was going to break down like all
the data on political violence over the last twenty years,
(00:23):
and I got way over my skis and I ended up,
I think, presenting you guys with a lot of information,
but I wanted to show you everything and it was
just way too much. But I think one thing that
I would like to touch on one more time before
I go into ask me anything for the episode was
(00:44):
really how these nonprofits are manipulating information in order to
make you have the opinion that right wing violence is
larger than what it is. So I went through the ADL,
the Anti Defamation League's data, and the University of Cincinnati's
information to see examples that they had of right wing violence.
(01:08):
Right So, the ADL, which was only looking at homicides,
did not include Luigi Mangioni as a case of left
wing violence, which is pretty insane considering it is the
one of the largest. They also did include the transgender
cold Zizian. As I mentioned, they included any case where
(01:28):
somebody who had formerly belonged to some kind of neo
Nazi or white nationalist prison gang committing any sort of
homicidal act post their release as a case of right
wing violence. So a New Hampshire man who shot his
younger half brother after the half brother had informed the
(01:48):
police that he had shot a random house where no
one was injured and nobody was killed, he killed that
half brother who informed the police. The ADL lists that
as a case of right wing extremism. A sex offender
with a lengthy criminal record in Texas a murdered an
eleven year old He at the time of his arrest,
had a Nazi swastika tattoo. Once again, did not murder
(02:11):
her because of the intentions of promoting some kind of
bast right wing conspiracy or some far right agenda. He
murdered her because he was a criminal with a who
chose to murder a child. But there wasn't a political
opinion behind that. Nonetheless, that is considered a case of
right wing extremism, according to the ADL. ADL infused any
(02:36):
case where a person from the Arian Brotherhood, a neo
Nazi white supremacist group, committed any kind of murder, even
among other members of their organization that had no political bias.
There were fights where somebody was accused of being part
of a neo Nazi group who got into a fight
with a neighbor and killed the neighbor with a baseball bat,
where that was included. Once again, no political bias involved whatsoever,
(02:59):
no loitical opinion being about whatsoever. Black gangs whose leaders
espouse black nationalism were not included. We're not thrown into
the same thing. And the idea once again was looking
specifically at homicides. The other organization I mentioned University Cincinnati's
prosecution project by Michael Lodenthal. They were looking at any crime.
(03:20):
And what he put together, which was cited by the economists,
is truly laughable. What he called violent right wing extremism.
A woman named Linda Mueller and two friends were arrested
for peacefully protesting an abortion clinic in Westchester, PA. He
called that violent right wing extremism. Four men in Dover,
(03:41):
New York were arrested for targeting Mexicans and robbing them.
The four men were all black, Another woman was named
Tiffany Harris, who had long history of mental health issues
and petty crimes. She went into a majority Jewish neighborhood
and spit at several Jews. She was also a black woman.
If I didn't mention that that was considered right wing extremism.
(04:02):
They manipulate all of this data. They lie if you can,
if you're old enough where you can think back to
twenty fifteen, think back to twenty sixteen when Trump was
running and Trump supporters being pelted with eggs. That one
woman I can remember her face being pelt with eggs,
or the speech in Chicago where right wingers were attacked.
None of these cases exist. Let alone BLM, let alone,
(04:24):
anti file, let alone, the chest. None of it counts.
It is all manipulated data in order to promote to
the media, promote to Democrats, and promote to liberal hacks
in the media that this is a right wing only
a problem. It is used to manipulate you and you
should not believe it. Okay, now for a full ask
(04:44):
Me Anything episode. I had to get out on my
chest because the more research I did, the more I
was just completely down the rabbit hole, and I had
to talk about it. Hey, we'll be right back after this.
All right. First question, probably my favorite question I have
ever been asked and asked me anything. It comes from Frank.
(05:05):
He says, do you have a favorite NYC restaurant or
some good recommendations? Listen, Frank, I am a foodie. I
love food. I wish I could lose weight while eating it.
I could go on for a days. I'm going to
give you some good New York City places to visit
if you're in the neighborhood. If you're in the city
and you want some things, these are my favorite things.
(05:25):
I'm not endorsed by these people. I wish i was.
They want to give me some free food, I will
take it. First and foremost. If you want a Republican hangout,
go to Beach Cafe on Second Avenue in seventeenth Street.
The food isn't like outstanding, but it's fine. They have
a copsle that's pretty good. Bartender's great. Love visiting them.
I went there before and after being canceled on CNN
that day. Second, if you want a good deal for food,
(05:48):
there is a place called Patrizia's. I would go to
the Williamsburg Patrizias on thirty fifth and Broadway in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.
There's a seventy five dollars pre fixed menus, five courses,
bottomless beer, bottom almost wine. Highly recommend. You won't find
a better deal in the city, and it's good quality
for what you're getting. I would also if you want
(06:09):
a higher priced dinner, there's a place called Piccolo Cucina Uptown.
It's on East sixteenth Street. It's where my friends from
Italy choose to eat Italian food in the city. There
Kashia de Peppe is very authentic to Italy. Love it.
Manetta's in Long Island City, great homemade pasta. Very highly
recommend that place. If you want pizza, which is a
(06:31):
New York Specicity specialty. Everyone wants to know where's the
best pizza. My favorite is if you go down to
Coney Island and go to Spamoni Gardens. Absolutely fantastic. My
mouth is actually watering while thinking of these things. Spamoni
Gardens downtown in Coney Island. It's on down here, but
it's in Coney Island and they only serve pies and
half pies, really really really good. If you're deep into Queens,
(06:55):
there's a place called Rockaways on the Rock best chicken
palm I've ever had in my life. It was spicy
chicken palm with sweet Penney Baka, absolutely incredible. I'm going
to give three more quick ones because I know it's
not a food podcast, but I was very enthralled with
this question. Bok's on the Upper east Side. It's a
French restaurant, great steak, Free Tis excellent bar. There's a
(07:18):
Puerto Rican fish place in Brooklyn called Portsal Plaza on
Arlington Avenue, sell big containers of food. That's said more
if you live in New York City and you want something,
because it's not really a place you said and eat,
it's place you take to go. And then lastly, downtown
there's best called Oscar Wilds on twenty seventh Street. Usually
places that try to be too cute sees on the
inside and try to be too theme oriented, the food
(07:40):
kind of sucks. This is a case where the food's
excellent and the vibe is very very cool. Okay, enough
of the food questions, but I had to really I
was very excited to be asked that question, so I'm
excited to answer it because it's always politics. So that's
that was a great question. Thank you for that. Second
question comes from Carl. You sent me a lot of
(08:03):
questions somewhere north of twenty five. So I'm only going
to answer too, because that would be the whole show
would be just asked answer Carl's questions. Not that I
don't appreciate. I love the questions, but there's a lot.
So Carl hit on the question of the census, and
I have to say, of all the topics that are
constantly sent to me, the census is probably number one.
(08:25):
People are always asking about why did the census go wrong?
How can we fix the census data from the twenty
twenty census? He says. Basically, Carl says, how would the
seats be changed? The number of House seats in the
US Congress be changed in their allocation of each state,
especially if it was done correctly and if the illegal
(08:48):
aliens weren't counted. I think that's the best way to
sum up your question, Carl. So the first question is
a little difficult, right because I'm going to give you
two separate answers. If the number of seats that were
counted back in twenty twenty were done differently, it would
look like this. So the census undercounted voters in six
(09:12):
states Arkansas, Florida, Illinois, Mississippi, Tennessee, and Texas, and it
over counted voters in Delaware, Hawaii, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New York, Ohio,
Rhode Island, and Utah. Have those states been counted correctly
the first time. Texas would have gained three House seats
instead of two, Florida would have gained three instead of two,
(09:34):
Colorado would have not gained any, Rhode Island would have
lost one of their two seats, and Minnesota would have
also lost one seat. Now we don't know how things
are going to shake up ahead of the twenty thirty census.
You know, something could happen that drastically changes the population
of a given state, Like if there's a massive hurricane
Katrina style hurricane that makes its way to someplace like
(09:56):
South Florida, that could change so many people live there.
If California had as the big earthquake and San Francisco
falls into the San Andreas Fault or North Dakota and
it's like the next big business and everyone's making a
million dollars there, you never know, like things could change
drastically in the next five years. As of now, Forecaster's
estimate of California is slated to lose three congressional seats,
(10:17):
which makes their redistricting that Newsom's doing right now an
actual nightmare because it means in five years, Democrats will
have six incumbents either having to choose to retire or
run against each other. New York is slated to lose two.
My best guess is one in Long Island and one
in Upstate, and maybe they're going to merge a Long
Island in Queen's seat. Who knows. Oregon, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, Illinois, Wisconsin,
(10:40):
and Rhode Island are all slated to lose one. Texas
and Florida will each gain four, Idaho, Utah, and Arizona
will each gain one. This is going to be very consequential,
not only in the House representatives, by the way, but
this will be consequential for the next for the presidential
elections of the twenty thirties, because it means a Republican
can win without winning a single blue Wall Midwestern state. Right,
(11:04):
You'll need Georgia, North Carolina, Nevada, Arizona. You will not
need Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, or Michigan, which will change our politics
a lot. I'm able to do a whole episode in
that in the future. Now, what would have happened in
the twenty twenty census if illegals were not counted, which
is part of your question. According to Pew Research, both
Florida and Texas they would have gained one less seat,
(11:27):
So Texas would have gained two and Florida have gained one.
They would have getting in total of three instead of five.
California would have lost two seats instead of only losing one. Alabama, Minnesota,
and Ohio would have all gained a seat. So illegal
aliens being counted for the House of Representatives not only
gibs Democrats more seats. It really does take away from
(11:49):
these red states in the Midwest, these red states in
more like you know, deep southern places. I have to
tell you that I'm asked constantly like can they fix
the senses? Can we redo the senses? I think if
they could have, they would have. I don't think it's
possible anyway. Thank you for your many, many, many questions, Carl.
(12:12):
I hope I answered a few of them, and maybe
I'll get to another one and different ask me anything.
Next question comes from Bennett. He writes, quote, last week,
you mentioned that crime rates went down after spiking in
the seventies, yet you made no mention of the row effect.
Many sociologists point towards the impact of legalized abortion for
lowering violent crime during the period, especially inner city crime.
(12:36):
So what Bennett is referring to is this idea that
many sociologists have that abortion, especially with the legalization of
Roe v. Wade nationwide abortion legalization resulted in many poor,
specifically black women, aborting their babies. Considering black men are
have a higher share of the violent crime than their
(12:57):
overall percentage of the population, this is what they're pointing to,
because black men are about six percent of the population
and something like I don't know forty percent, I don't
know the exact number on the top my head, but
like something forty percent of all violent crime, especially homicide.
That is what they are pointing to as the answer
to that. The study was published by John Donahue and
(13:21):
Stephen Levitt. That's the people the first two criminologists who
sat there and said that this was the reasoning. They wrote, quote,
we offer evidence that legalized abortion has contributed significantly to
the crime reduction. Crime began to fall roughly eighteen years
after abortion was legalized. The five states that allow abortion
in nineteen seventy experienced declients earlier than the rest of
(13:43):
the country, which legalized in nineteen seventy three. With Roe v. Wade.
States with high abortion rates in the nineteen seventies and
eighties experienced a greater crime reduction in the nineties. In
higher abortion states, only arrest of those born after abortion
legalization fall relative to low abortion states. Legalized abortion appears
(14:03):
to account for as much as fifty percent of the
recent crime drop. The argument that they have holds some merit,
specifically with the black population. I've done this research before.
If the black population of America and the white population
were two separate countries, the black population would have a
crime rate in the top fifteen or top ten most
(14:27):
violent nations in America, and the white crime rate would
be somewhere around Canada's. However, I think that what is
missing from there, and what is undercounted from their data,
is the fact of an aging population, significantly the aging
of the baby boomers. Right. There were a lot of
(14:47):
things happening in the early nineties together, not just eighteen
years since Roe v. Wade was legalized. That was part
of it, for sure, That wasn't the entire thing. I
don't think it makes sense that while abortion increased in
the nineteen seventies, abortion really peaked nineteen eighty three. That's
(15:07):
one about a third of pregnancies resulted in abortion. Abortion
actually hit their highest raw number nineteen ninety. Crimes started
really coming down, not just in the early nineties under Giuliani,
which New York City, by the way, had legalized abortion
way before row. Crime starts coming down in the I mean,
(15:28):
and then it starges back up, but it doesn't. The
drop begins actually much closer to the to the legalization
to row being enacted in nineteen seventy three than people think. Right. Remember,
murder is specifically a young man's game. It is incredibly
rare for an older person to become a serial killer,
(15:48):
you know, after spending decades with no history of violence.
That's what makes the Las Vegas shooting so odd. Abortion
hit about one point five million in the late seventies,
one point five million abortions per year, which means that
those children would have only been teenagers in the nineties.
When the murder rates starts collapsing, they're not kind of
(16:09):
old enough to be responsible for what would have been
higher crime rates. I read a book that I highly
recommend on this topic called The Rise and Fall of
Violent Crime in America by Barry Lasser, and what he
points to is really just an aging of the population.
Basically that as baby Boomers came of age in the
nineteen sixties and seventies, there was this dramatic rise in crime,
(16:30):
and then it began to fall in the late eighties.
Then the crack epidemic and the increased gang violence happens,
and there's a lot of activist judges starting to release
criminals during that time period, especially in big blue states
and big blue cities. But Latser says that a mixture
of hard on crime laws placed in places like New
York City and Los Angeles under their Republican mayors, on
(16:52):
top of just an aging population of baby boomers aging
and the gen x being significantly smaller than baby boomers,
really was responsible for the massive decline in crime. I'm
not going to say that abortion played no part, but
as abortion rates began substantially declining throughout the nineteen nineties,
it did not result in a spike of crime in
(17:13):
twenty tens. Right, So just because people had less abortions
doesn't mean that there was an increase in crime. That's
what I believe. I believe abortion a part of it,
but it was I think it was the aging population
was a bigger part of it. I highly recommend though,
The Rise and Fall of Island Crime by Barry Latser
if you're interested in this subject. Okay, let's do a
next question on crime, but this time from Kyle. Kyle writes, quote,
(17:37):
Kathy Hogle and Gavin Newsom have a point when they
say that crime is worse than some major cities in
red states and then in blue states. That is so true.
Places like New Orleans, Saint Louis, Cincinnati, Indianapolis, Kansas City,
and Jackson. Republican governors don't need to wait to Trump
for Trump to send in the National Guard. Are red
steak governors so inept that they can't get control of
their cities. Thank you Kyle for this and to your point, Yeah, look,
(18:01):
crime has fallen even in some of the worst areas
of our country over the last few decades. So something
is happening that is positive. But I'll say this because
those cities you mentioned, but Saint Louis Jackson, these sitn
New Orleans. These cities have either a majority black population
or a significant black population. They do not vote for Republicans.
(18:26):
They vote for very, very comically corrupt Democratic mayors who
are utterly inept in what they do. And I think
there is this feeling of being complacent, that the problem
is too difficult, and that why bother these people are
(18:47):
never going to support us, Why are we to a
point going to support them? These cities are hellholes? And
no one has ever told me this. This is the
feeling I've gotten being in some big Red cities with
some big Republican politicians about their cities. They kind of
just are like, can't doing about that place? That place
as a hellhole. And the truth is that Red states
(19:09):
have some of these beautiful cities. New Orleans is amazing city,
Memphis is an incredible city, but they are allowed to
become you know, unfathomably dangerous, especially for you know, young
families and people who are looking for housing. How much
more housing would you have available if some of these
(19:32):
cities like Memphis and New Orleans were livable, like we're
all parts were livable, you'd have so much more housing.
But I just think that people sit there and say,
you can't fix it, don't even try. I agree with
you one hundred percent. They should try Kansas Cities, New
Kansas City, New Orleans, Memphis. I've been to all those places.
They're beautiful, They've got such life to them. The crime
(19:53):
is unimaginable, and Republican governors should be taking a more
proactive stance, even against the well wishes of their Democratic mayors,
and even by against the well wishes by the way
of some of the population. They're the governor, they're responsible.
They should crack down on crime. Okay. Next question comes
from David Scott from New Hampshire. He writes that he
(20:16):
had an argument with his liberal sister about how many
illegal aliens Biden has led into the country during the
four years he was in the White House. He said
that he David says that he said there was ten million,
and his sister said there was two point three million.
Can you explain, okay, First, your sister cited PolitiFact. Never
listen to PolitiFact. They are a bias misleading organization. Secondly,
(20:39):
you're both kind of correct, though you're more right than
she is. During Biden's presidency, there were an estimated ten
point eight to eleven million encounters at the border, with
about two million known godaways on top of that. Those
are illegal aliens that don't encounter border patrol, but it
are still believed to have made it within the interior
(21:00):
of the United States. That doesn't mean, by the way, though,
that that ten to ten point eight to eleven million
plus two million got aways is the number that was released.
The numbers released are much lower. There were about two
point five million illegal aliens released into the country during
Biden's presidency that we are well aware of, right if
(21:23):
you have to remember, Biden understood at the end of
his presidency that the immigration problem was becoming a stain
on his presidency, that it was really dragging his numbers down.
So he started cracking down on immigration pretty substantially. And
one thing that he did was offer parole programs two
illegal aliens to be flown into the country so they
(21:44):
were no longer coming across our southern border. That's why
there's this huge dip in the number of southern border encounters.
And they were given this CHNV parole program. That was
about one point seven million of them plus about five
one hundred thousand unaccompanied miners. When you add all of
(22:05):
them together, the one point seven million, which by these
like PolitiFact would never include because it was a quote
unquote parole program, So they were technically legally here, although
they had no rights to be here, aside from the
fact that Biden waved his magic wand and Trump unwaived it,
and now they are not legally allowed in the country anymore.
When you add those five hundred thousand miners, one to
(22:26):
two million known gataways, the one point seven million Parolis,
and the about two point five to three million illegal aliens,
it's overall, it's estimated, according to Goldman Sachs, by about
to about five million illegal aliens made it into the
interior of the country and stayed here. That was also
repeated by The New York Times the Goldman Sacks numbers,
(22:48):
The Center for Immigration Study says it was about five
point four million, and Migration Policy Center says it was
about five point eight million. So five to six million
people came under Biden illegally in state, including HNB, including Parolis,
including on accompanied minors. You both have bits and pieces
of the data. You're more right than she is, but
that's the full story. I hope you guys can solve
(23:09):
this dispute peacefully. I imagine what a game of monopoly
with your family is like. Anyway, we'll be right back
with more. Ask me anything. Next question comes from Brian.
He says he's a big fan of the show and
shares with everybody. Brian, seriously, thank you, thank you to
everyone who listens. I really want to grow the show
(23:30):
large enough to do live events one day, and I
need my numbers to keep growing. And it really means
a lot to me. He asks. If there was a
do over in the twenty twenty four election and Harris
was to take over the presidency for Biden instead of
just running in his place, would have had a different result.
He asked. Is there any historical precedent for a vice
(23:50):
president completing another president's term barring death or scandal, and
then the successful running on their own. Okay, the only
time he vite president has taken over for a president
when there wasn't a death involved was Gerald Ford for
Richard Nixon in nineteen seventy four, and Richard Nixon believed
or not took over the role of presidency but never
(24:15):
the title. Several times during Dwight Eisenhower's presidency. Eisenhower was
a very unhealthy president towards the end of his second term.
He had a heart attack in nineteen fifty five, he
had a major surgery in nineteen fifty six, and he
had a stroke in nineteen fifty seven, and Richard Nixon
took over the responsibility in the role of presidency for
several lengthy periods of time. However, in both cases, neither
(24:39):
men went on to win the presidency in the following election.
Ford lost to Carter in seventy six and Nixon to
Kennedy in nineteen sixty. I don't think that there's a
scenario where Harris would have taken over for Biden and
then won like forward thinking, and he mentions in the
email forward thinking, like there's no there's no answer, like
(25:01):
JD were to take over for Trump, would it result
in him having a better chance at winning. Probably not,
because then you're just viewed as the accidental president and
you still inherit all the positives and negatives from your successor.
I don't think there's really a scenario where Harris would
have won the presidency given everything else that happened that year.
(25:23):
From the arrests, the assassination attempt, the you know, the economy,
the border, everything. I just don't think that there's a
solution that would have made that possible. Though if she
did take over the presidency, the one thing that would
have been slightly un versus that Trump would have had
to redo all of his merchandise from forty seventh president
(25:43):
to forty eighth. Anyway, and Brian also asked if poll
taxes are viewed as illegal impediments to voting rights, then
should in congestion pricing tolling be as impediment to New
York City. Shouldn't that be illegal as given the rights
or the peace people to exercise, to exercise free assembly. No,
not really, And I hate the toll the congestion pricing,
(26:06):
so I'm not a fan of it. But no, that's
not it because the scenario doesn't hold up, Brian, because
congestion pricing doesn't block anyone from voting, given that if
you live in the outer boroughs, you vote in the
borough you live in. So no one from Queen's travels
to Manhattan to go vote. Same thing with Staten Island
or the Bronx or Brooklyn. You don't travel to Manhattan
(26:27):
to go vote, so you wouldn't be poll to go vote.
And I believe there's a waiver for people who live
like right on the line from having to pay it,
so they wouldn't have to pay it either. There's no
one really who would be forbidden from voting in order
to do that, and there's other ways of getting to
that area. So I don't like it, but I don't
think that argument holds up. But thank you for the question. Okay,
(26:48):
let's go to John Atkins, who is a big fan
of the podcast. He says, congrats on all your success
so far. He says, quote, I'm a little confused by
this because we've all heard since Trump's inacuration is how
Dems are imploting, hemorrhaging voters, embarrassing themselves left and right
and on the wrong side of every eighty twenty issue.
Are in total chaos internally and generally can't do anything right,
(27:08):
thank God. So how is it that at the same
time they petitive going into the midterms and even have
a decent chance at derailing Trump's agenda by taking the House.
How can all this be true at the same time?
Are the Democrats dead? Are the Democrats dead? No. First,
we live in a two party system, so unlike Europe,
unlike Canada, you only have two choices. So if you're
(27:31):
fed up with one party, you only have another party
to go to, or you could sit out, but you can't.
There's no real alternative third party that has a serious
chance of winning in any major race in this country
outside of Bernie Sanders and Angus King in two states,
and they've caused the Democrats. You can only pick Democrat
or Republican. Secondly, when it comes to the House, the
(27:54):
number of swing states we are singing swing seats rather
that we are talking about is very, very small. In
twenty twenty four election, only thirty seven House seats were
decided by less than five percentage points. There's eight point
five percent of all House seats. So when we're talking
about such few seats being really competitive and the margin
(28:15):
in the House as far as who runs the majority
being so tight, it can easily swing between both parties,
especially if people are disenfranchised. Over the economy. I've been
saying this last few episodes. The economy is not in
great shape. Energy prices are through the roof, Grocery prices
are climbing. This is causing concern among voters, especially voters
(28:36):
like Latinos, like independence, like young people who swung heavily
towards the president and his party. I think that the
economy is the major question, and if the media has
done a very good job of blaming Trump's tariffs for stuff,
I don't think that that's the full answer. I think
a lot of these energy costs are coming from these
data centers. I did a whole episode about this, but
(28:57):
I think that this is really affecting the ways and
other impressionable people are voting. And also Democrats, by the way,
once again are the party of high propensity frequent voters,
so not only do they have that working for them,
they have the higher likelihood of people who vote in
(29:19):
every election showing up in this one. Now, maybe things
are changing, maybe especially the death of Charlie Kirk. Maybe
that is it brought people who are less engaged to
become more engaged. Maybe they want to be more active.
There's a lot of people who are putting applications to
start turning point chapters. And maybe we'll see something happen
in twenty twenty six because of that, and maybe Charlie's
(29:42):
last act will be to inspire a million people to
be just like him. Who knows right. But as of
right now, Democrats do have that advantage. I am old
enough to remember the two thousand and eight the cover
of Time magazine where it said endangered species and it was
a picture of the republic elephant, and they said it
was going to be a regional that was going to
lose seats. Things swing back and forth, right, nothing is permanent.
(30:04):
Democrats have taken a lot of bad policy positions on
a number of things, and for every Mundani that they
have nominated in places like New York, they've also backed
a lot of moderates so far, I think that they
are trying to really navigate issues like the transports issue.
They keep saying we don't want to talk about it
(30:26):
because they don't want to alienate their base, But this
is them also saying we're not going to, you know,
embrace it the way that Kamala did. Republicans are kind
of the same evolution around gay marriage and in the
twenty ten Time where they were like, how do we
navigate this knowing how the polls are going. Democrats have
loads of problems still from the twenty twenty four election,
but If the question is can they win the House,
(30:46):
the answer is undeniably yes. It's not that many seats
that they need to win. Voters are word about the
economy and don't undercount the ability of Republicans to both
step on their own feet because they will absolutely, you know,
if they can, they will, And secondly, they can also
become victims of their own success. The border, for example,
(31:10):
is not going to be a major issue in the
next election. Why could Trump solve the problem? Same reason
I Crime is not as big of an issue in
New York today as it is in nineteen ninety three
when Giliani won because to a large degree, you solved
the problem. We don't have three thousand murders in New
York City anymore. Okay, last question for the episode. This
one comes from Patrick from Tampa Bay, Florida, a city
(31:32):
that I have never been to, but I would like
to visit. Patrick Wrights, you and Ann Coulter are two
of my favorite commentators, and you seem to align on
most issues, but I've noticed you different on falling birth rates.
You seem to think it's a serious problem. Well, she
thinks it's a bit overblown. I lean towards Anne I
believe that a lower birth rate may not be problematic
and actually could be beneficial, provided that births occur within stable,
(31:55):
self supporting, nuclear families that up hold Western values. My
primary concern is declining birth rates, and it's in balanced
age demographics with two hye proportion of retired elderly relative
to working age population. Are there strategies to mitigate the
demographic challenges while maintaining a low birth rate. I would
enjoy hearing you and discussed Hey, Patrick, so let me
(32:18):
answer your first question first in that yes, and I
completely disagree on this issue. I do believe the falling
birth rates in around the globe are problem. In this country,
it is not as catastrophic as it is internationally. We
are not in the worst case scenario you mentioned wanting
Western values and families with Western values to have kids.
(32:38):
If you look at some countries like Italy, there are
many parts of Italy that have not had a single
birth recorded in three years. Italy has lost more than
one million people since twenty eighteen, and that's with record
high immigration levels. China, which is not a Western country,
but as a major country, China, when I was growing up,
the largest country in the world is losing two million
people per year. Japan, Ukraine, Poland, Germany, Belarus, places like
(33:04):
the eastern East Asia all losing people every year, and
they are in the midst of a societal collapse. You know,
you look at Japan, there are more people over seventy
than under five. That country does not have a future, right,
It's that raises major concerns for their national security, major
concerns for their economy and their welfare state. And you know,
(33:24):
Anne thinks that the welfare state and especially social security
is a Ponzi scheme that we're never going to inherit
and you know that's her opinion. But there is no
evidence that intact Western families are going to come out prevailing,
even as nations with higher levels of religiosity like Poland.
For example, Poland has a high church attendance relative to Europe,
(33:47):
high belief in God, immensely low birth rates, incredibly low
birth rates. Even Muslim majority nations have slipped below replacement levels.
Even parts of Africa have slipped below replace levels. But
over the next decade you're going to see places have
extreme societal collapse throughout Europe, throughout East Asia, and then
(34:08):
have declining populations throughout Latin America. Africa is going to
hold on the longest, but they're going to see declines
as well. And a big question is what happens to
our own workforce when China is a net importer of workers,
when India is a net importer of workers, when all
of Europe is a net importer of workers. It's not
just people to pay taxes for the welfare, it's who
(34:31):
cleans the restaurants, who powers the machines, who invents the
cure for cancer. You know, maybe maybe generative AI is
going to sit there and do all those things, but
I don't. I don't. I would always bet on humanity,
And especially when you look at the concentration of where
most of the geniuses of the world who created most
of the inventions came from, it's a very small geographical
(34:54):
area of them and their descendants, crazy low birth rates.
It's not a big bet for humanity. And that's all
I could say about that. Having children is probably the
most important thing that people could do in this time
period to fight the greatest existential threat facing our country.
And if you're an intact nuclear family with Western values,
that makes even better. You also asked And this is
(35:16):
the last question about the post Desanta's political struggle in Florida.
Is Desanta's is run in twenty twenty four creating a
retaliation from the Trump campaign. I'm going to say, I
know there's still some bad blood between parts of the
Trump camp and parts of the Santa's camp. I don't
know how serious it is between the two men specifically.
(35:38):
I'm not privy to that information. I've never asked. I
do know that Desantas is looking at what his future
will be post governorship, and there's a lot of energy
right now from the Trump camp to support Byron Donald's.
And I will say one thing. I do know for
a fact that there's a lot of santa supporters who
don't want Byron to be governor. But as is the
(35:59):
case know Hi with a vek Ramaswami, there's a lot
of people who don't want a victory governor. Time is ticking.
The hour is later than people like to imagine the
availability to find a nominee who could raise the money,
who could generate the attention, who could be an alternative
to either Byron or Revec. In this case, Byron, it's
(36:20):
very late. It's very, very very late, so I don't
know if Desanta's has a successor in mind that is
not Byron Donald's. I don't know if he's put that
much energy or thought into it. But if there is
supposedly an anti buyering candidate and they have yet to emerge,
they've yet to show their face and the hour is
very very late for them to show up. So anyway,
(36:43):
thank you for listening to this all Ask Me Anything
episode of this podcast. I love getting your questions. Please
submit them to me Ryan at Numbers gamepodcast dot com.
That's Ryan at Numbers gamepodcast dot com. If you like
this podcast, please subscribe on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
wherever you get your podcasts, and I will see you
guys on Monday
Host
Gill Alexander
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