September 18, 2025 • 36 mins
Hour 1 of A&G features...
- Kimmel out at ABC & the FCC
- Katie Green's Headlines!
- Greg Lukianoff talks to Jack Armstrong!
- Prunes!!
Stupid Should Hurt: https://www.armstrongandgetty.com/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio, the George
Washington Broadcast Center, Jack Armstrong and Joe Katty.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Armstrong and Techy and no He.
Speaker 3 (00:24):
Arms He live from Studio C, a dimly lit room
deeput them the bowels of.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
The Armstrong and Getty Communications compound, which is surrounded by
razor wire and barking dogs. Actually, I am happy. We
got a security guard outside sitting there, and there's a
little car with the splashing lights. Let you know, there's
somebody with somebody carrying heat. Looks like he's carrying heat.
I think that's a gun. Welcome, How you doing, Glad
you're here? Oh, all right, today we're under the tutelage
(00:58):
of our general manager. I'll go with Jimmy Kimmel, just
because I think that's a danged interesting conversation. Jimmy Kimmel's
show being taken off the air indefinitely. Nobody seems to
know if that means. Usually in the world of broadcasting,
indefinite is forever, almost always in my experience, but this
one could be just temporarily hard to say. I found
(01:20):
Jimmy Kimmel over the last many years to be an
insufferably pompous. Well, I came across the word last night.
Popped in my head. I thought that was the perfect
word for him. I don't remember what it was, but
pompous is close enough. Just just the whole our side
is wonderful and everyone else is stupid. Just that whole.
(01:42):
It's just so annoying. But I also don't want the government,
you know, policing speech. So we'll get into both sides
of that comment with as as the same with Colbert
when he got taken off the air. Being left out.
A lot is these people's ratings are really low compared
to what these shows cost, really low, and they've gone down, down,
(02:06):
down over the years, partially because they decided to say
f you to half the country. If you say f
you to half of the country, it's hard to have
very high ratings. With all that said, I still don't
want the government policing speech, so we'll handle all that. Yes, Michael,
you already wanted to join in. I like that Michael
year jumping at the bet.
Speaker 4 (02:24):
His contract is up in May, and I just wonder
if you know the network just said here's an excuse.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Or it's not going to do so that much. Du
may of next year. Yeah, but yeah, I don't know.
I mean there's a there's another deal going through and
people don't want trouble whatever. But have you heard what
he said regarding the Charlie Cook assassination. He said it
on Monday night, took till Thursday for it to land
in such a way that he got taken off the air,
(02:51):
And definitely will play that for you and talk about
all the ins and outs of all that sort of stuff.
Got a lot of great guests lined up today on
a bunch of different topics, everything from what do the
interest rates going down a quarter point mean for you
if anything at all? And doesn't mean a whole lot
for you yet, just directionally it's good, but it doesn't
mean a lot for you yet. And talk a little
(03:13):
bit about Trump's trip to England. Did you see that
meal that they had last night. That table was more
than half a football field long. That's hard to even
imagine sitting at table, eating dinner at a table more
than half a football field long. The people down at
the other end, you would hardly be able to see them,
let alone have a conversation with them. Wouldn't even though
(03:35):
they were there. You wouldn't even know they were there. No, no, no, no.
You could meet them years from now and say, oh,
we had dinner together, and you'd say we did. Eh, yeah,
we were fifty yards away. Yeah, at that sixty yard
long table. I was at the other end. You were
at the other end. We had so I tell people
we had dinner together. That is a giant table. Only
in England, where they have castles, would even have room
(03:55):
for a table that large. It was a little excessive.
H Well, that's what they do. That's what the royal
family does, is excessive. Because it was all about King
Charles and the windsor castle, whatever the hell that is
trumps special guests. You get to bring anybody you want
to a state dinner. His special guests were the guy
who runs video video, Sam Altman from open Ai that's
(04:18):
the chat GPT guy, and then one other, Tim Cook
from Apple. So he had really high level tech guy
specifically around AI is his special guest. I don't know
exactly what the message was there, which leads me to
my headline. I don't understand of the day at least
so far that I saw breaking news from the Wall
Street Journal. Video said it would buy five billion dollars
(04:43):
worth of Intel a sign of how AI is reshaping
the tech industry. I have no idea what that means,
buying five million dollars of your competitor Intel, But it's
all about the super high speed AI chips, and this
bed is either going to pan out or it's not.
But a lot of people with a lot of money,
who we are very very smart, certainly smarter than me,
seem to think it's the wave of the future one
(05:04):
way or to'ther. It's funny. I was talking to a
person yesterday who said they air kid was into coding
as a senior in high school and has specifically decided
to learn to weld because of AI. The idea that
AI is going to do all the coding in the future,
but AI will never be able to weld. I wonder
(05:26):
which is true. I think maybe someday robots will be
able to weld. It'll be a while though, It'll be
a long time before robots can successfully do a good
job of welding. I wonder how many young people are
going to be making those decisions in the very near future,
going back to maybe more your traditional work with your
hands sort of the jobs anyway, that's a separate topic.
There is a horrifying attack on police in Pennsylvania, worst
(05:49):
one they've had in the state of Pennsylvania in a
one hundred years. What a bunch of police officers being shot.
I think it's just a random, one off, horrible story.
It has no greater significance for America, I think. But
if any more details come out, we'll hit you with that.
There is some new stuff around the Charlie Kirk assassination.
Knowing a little more about the the shooter and the
(06:13):
process for getting this guy convicted and hopefully the death penalty,
and hopefully he gets shot himself. That's the result I'm
looking for. Some of my favorite conservative commentators are pretty
uncomfortable with Jimmy Kimmel being driven off the air, if
(06:34):
that's what happened by the FCC. The FCC Commissioner has
said some fairly strong things in the last forty eight
hours about what Kimmel said and about people not getting
to keep their network licenses FCC the FCC Commissioner about
not being able to keep their network licenses, the broadcasting
(06:56):
licenses if they aren't towing the line politically or whatever.
And like I said, some of my favorite conservative commentators
are pretty uncomfortable with that for one reason, Like Joe
and I always talking about whatever you do, the next
administration is going to do two, and I don't know
that I want an FCC commissioner saying, you know, talk
radio is completely out of hand. Yeah, and that would
(07:20):
be unfortunate. Yes, and they get to say whatever the
hell they want, which we do, and we don't think
that's good for the country. So we're gonna start yanking
people broadcast license or threaten the Yank broadcast license if
you don't get people like Armstrong and giddy off there.
For instance, Randy Weingarten, Lady, I've been running the teachers
Union for a long time and all through COVID. She's
(07:41):
a witch, she is the devil. I believe she's actually
actually works for the devil. I think she actually hates children. Now,
that's a pretty strong thing to say. A democratic administration,
their FCC commissioner might say, you know, Jack Armstrong just
said the most important leader teachers in our country is
the devil. We can't have that. That's not good, that's devisive.
(08:04):
And I don't want a democratic administration and be able
to do that anymore than I want a Republican administration
to be able to drive Jimmy Kimmel off there, even
though he said a really awful stupid thing. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (08:13):
I don't know that I have like a great argument
for this, but something in me, this Charlie Kirk situation
is so different.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
Right because it is possible. Well, let's start to show officially.
We're going to play a little bit of Kimmel the
Frock with the FCC watch out. Yeah, yeah, exactly got
to start the show officially. The FCC gets on this.
I'm Jack Armstrong, he's Joe Getty on this. It is
how did it get to be? Thursday, September eighteenth to
year twenty twenty five Armstrong and Geedy and we approve
of this program. Will begin the show at Hey, I'm
doing it on time, mister chairman Mark.
Speaker 5 (08:43):
We hit some new lows over the weekend with the
Magga Gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered
Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and
do everything they can to score political points from it
in between the fingerpots.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
That's good. There was play the rest later, but that
that's the line that got people all been out of shape.
That was a crazy thing to say. That's just a
nut job thing to say. To go on the air
Monday Jimmy Kimmel and say stating as fact in his
mind that the shooter is a maga person. Well, I
(09:19):
don't even know where did that come from, although I
saw I heard David French of the New York Times
talking about a Yugo poll that came out over the weekend.
Seventy percent of Democrats believe that that killer scumbag is maga.
So somehow that story got started online or the rumor
spread will be Wow, what are you base on that? On?
Speaker 4 (09:39):
Yeah, there was some I saw in an interview watching
Megan Kelly. She played a clip of another woman who
was like, well, his dad was.
Speaker 6 (09:47):
In law enforcement, he was into guns. He's a white boy,
and so clearly he's on their team.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
And it's like, what are you talking about. You don't
know any conservative families across the country who's young The
boys or girls went off to college and their politics
became completely different than their parents. So because the parents
are Republicans, the kid obviously is, oh.
Speaker 6 (10:08):
His dad's in law enforcement, so clearly they're maga.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
Yeah, so i'd that whole The fact that seventy percent
of Democrats think the shooter was maga is weird. That's
its own conversation. And then Jimmy Kimmel saying that it's
just a weird, dumb thing to say. But okay, this
was gonna be my point. I don't know if you remember.
After nine to eleven, Bill Maher had a show on
ABC at that time, very popular show called Politically Incorrect.
(10:33):
You might be too young for this, No, I remember this.
He had a show and he went on like days
later after the buildings came down in New York City,
he said, because George Bush or somebody had called the
hijackers cowards, and he said, one thing you can't say
is that they're cowards. They're obviously not cowards. They're obviously
brave to fly planes into a building, which is sort
(10:53):
of factually correct. But in that moment, days after the
buildings came down, and the most show fucking thing, and
it happened to America in seventy years, there was an
outcry and ABC took his show off the air. That
wasn't the FCC coming down or the government stifling free speech.
That was just crossing a line for most Americans. Yeah,
(11:18):
And I don't know if Jimmy Kimmel reached that level,
but he is close is close to the because a
whole bunch of various smaller groups that have ABC stations
in the middle of the country that aren't you know,
New York and LA centric the middle and you know,
I was about to say middle of Ore. I'm from
(11:39):
the middle of Nore and probably so, but middle of
the nowhere stations where you got lots of people who
would hate to see that sort of thing on their television.
It's not crazy that they would decide, all right, that's it,
We're not gonna air Jimmy Kimmel here in Provo, Utah.
That's a bad choice. Shootings were in Utah, here in Omaha, Nebraska,
or you know, place in Texas or whatever. It's not
(12:01):
shocking that they would make that decision that Jimmy Kimmel
crossed the line in the same way that Bill Maher
crossed the line. Now, the FCC Commissioner has had said
specific things that I find very very troubling in the
last two days about policing speech that just I mean,
I think fly directly in the face of the First Amendment.
But Jimmy Kimmel and Stephen Colbert, like I said, made
(12:26):
a decision to say you not just hey, we're gonna
rib you. I hope you can take the jokes just
to with contempt for half or more of the country. Well,
and those weren't jokes, all right, those aren't jokes. But
if you do that, it really narrows your support and
makes it a lot more likely that you can get
fired like this. So I don't feel sorry for him
(12:48):
in that way. It's like the lady at the end
of our show, bye bye, all right, But I don't
want a NFCC commissioner under President Gavin Newsom deciding that
talk radio is out of control and something needs to
be done. And I don't see a whole lot of
difference between that and policing. Jimmy Kimmel, if I'm wrong,
text me for what what I forgot?
Speaker 4 (13:07):
The text line we have one five KFTC.
Speaker 2 (13:12):
I'm glad you know it X line she said, four
one k FTC. Joe and I have been uh nearly
run out of this job a couple of different times
in the history of the show, like really close, and
(13:33):
so I'm fairly sensitive the idea of losing your job
over like going too far with a joke or a comment.
But we'll talk more about that later.
Speaker 1 (13:43):
That.
Speaker 2 (13:44):
Regarding the whole Jimmy Kimmel being booted off the air,
I really.
Speaker 4 (13:48):
I really want for them to replace Jimmy Kimmel Live
with old episodes of The Man Show, just so his
audience can see where he originated.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
Right right when it was him and all.
Speaker 4 (14:00):
And chicks jumping on trampolines, right, yeah, right while.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
They drank beer. Yeah, let's find out what all the
headlines are with Katie all right.
Speaker 4 (14:08):
Starting with Fox News, sheriff says Charlie Kirk, assassin negotiated
a gentle surrender and was afraid of being shot.
Speaker 2 (14:17):
Yeah, I heard that, and I think that was handled well.
I'm kind of surprised that you do that because the
guy that the shooter had shown himself to be incredibly violent,
but they allowed him to, like calmly be brought into
the sheriff's office.
Speaker 4 (14:33):
And because it's everywhere from NBC Disney's, ABC pulls Jimmy
Kimmel Live after FCC share criticizes the host's Charlie Kirk comments.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
Yeah, we will get into that quite a bit later.
And Jack, I know you're a fan of these guys.
Speaker 4 (14:46):
From the Free Beacon embarrassment for MSNBC and CNN as upstart,
News Nation wins out on primetime ratings.
Speaker 2 (14:55):
I didn't know that. I watch News Nation every single day.
They're pretty good. They are pretty good. They're not I
haven't found a bias with them, So I like that.
Speaker 4 (15:05):
From ABC, the IDF is expanding it's Gaza City Operation.
Speaker 2 (15:11):
Yeah, we might talk to one of our military analysts
about that later. How that's going to unfold, what that
will look like.
Speaker 4 (15:18):
From The Washington Examiner, Christy Nomes houts one hundred and
fifty thousand new ICE applications after recruitment push.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
Oh wow cool. Yeah. From the Washington Post, Fed cuts.
Speaker 4 (15:32):
Interest rates by a quarter point and signals more could
be coming.
Speaker 2 (15:36):
Yeah. Well, like I said, it's headed in the right direction,
but it's not going to have much of an effect
on your car Loan credit card or buying a house yet.
Speaker 4 (15:47):
From the Verge, Business Insider reportedly gives journalists the green
light to write stories with AI and doesn't tell.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
Its readers that's inevitable. Well, and one of the.
Speaker 4 (16:01):
Things they're using is chat GPT, which we've talked about
being incorrect.
Speaker 2 (16:05):
Yeah, many a time making stuff up. Of course journalists
are incorrect a lot.
Speaker 4 (16:09):
So yeah, good point, New York Post Wild chimpanzees consume
two cocktails worth of alcohol a day by feasting on
boozy fruit. Really, this is in Uganda, and these chimps
are finding fermented fruit and they're just getting wasted.
Speaker 2 (16:26):
And if they've always done that, is that like, because
that would be interesting to know if there's a beast
out there that we share ninety nine percent of the
genetic material that just likes getting hammered every day. Yeah,
I get it. Wow, sometimes you just want to check
out from study fines.
Speaker 6 (16:44):
Fatty foods can scramble your memory.
Speaker 2 (16:47):
Just days later. Oh that's my problem. Mm hmm, that's
why you forgot the text line.
Speaker 4 (16:54):
Also, just a side note, it's National Cheeseburger Day, so
I'll let everybody know. And finally from the Babylon Bee,
Trump deports Phillies Karen to L Salvador prison.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
Good. Do you know who Greg Lukianoff is. We quote
him all the time, We've had him on the show
multiple times over the years. He has been writing a
lot about the political climate, where it's headed, what we
might be able to do about it. We're going to
talk to him coming up next. This will be good conversation, guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
Stick around Armstrong and getty Man.
Speaker 2 (17:28):
Did we get lucky with the timing of this our
next guest we could talk to or I could talk
to for the next three hours easily, because he's one
of the leading thinkers and a couple of the hottest
topics going right now. So Greg lukian Off New York
Times best selling author The President of Fire, which is
a foundation for individual rights and expression, all about free speech.
(17:50):
That's with Jimmy Kimmel loosing's job. Does that fit into
that whole topic? Is the author of Unlearning Liberty, Campus censorship,
and the end of American debate, canceling of the American mind,
Canceled culture, all about cancel culture, which is hot right now,
of course, and then part of this free press series
on repairing America after the murder of Charlie Kirk and
(18:14):
this particular piece that I've gotten front of me from
Greg Lukianoff Berry. The whole words are violence cliche, which
I would agree with anyway. Welcome back, to the Armstrong
and Getty Show, Greg lukian Off. Greg, thanks for joining
us today.
Speaker 1 (18:29):
Great to be back.
Speaker 2 (18:30):
Man, you obviously are the man of the moment for
a whole bunch of these topics. Let's start with what
you just wrote the Barry The words are violence, cliche
around the whole, Charlie Kirk thing, what are you talking about?
Speaker 1 (18:42):
Yeah, you know, I've been defending free speech at Fire
for twenty four years now, and I'd say when I
first started my job, the sort of activist argument that
words can be just like bullets was something that people
kind of rolled their eyes at because it was obviously
a sort of self serving rhetorical right. But I'd say,
(19:04):
like ten years ago, or maybe even as long as
fifteen years ago, this really started to become a common
argument that I would hear on campus. And then you
started having people who should have known better actually saying, well,
words can cause stress, so therefore that is a lot
like violence. And you know, me and John Hight, who
I wrote probably in the American mind with we wrote
a piece in the Atlantic saying, no, this is crazy words.
(19:27):
We have a societal agreement essentially, and you're supposed to
have it in a democratic society, that there's a bright
line distinction between physical violence and expression of opinion. And
I've been screaming to high Heaven to saying like, no,
this is an incredibly foolish idea. It's not progressive. It
gets you back to the thirteenth century A d or BC.
(19:49):
It doesn't matter.
Speaker 2 (19:51):
Yeah, I mean, just as a side on that, I
remember at one point when The New York Times a
couple of years ago actually said intent doesn't matter. So
not only had words become violence, but sometimes the way
they took your words, even if you didn't intend it
that way. So man, you're really into pre enlightenment then,
but go ahead, yeah.
Speaker 1 (20:12):
No, no exactly. And the thing is, of course, this
kind of you know, foolish self serving rhetoric actually turns
into a situation that justifies violence for speech. And this
is oftimes coming from people who think that they're anti totalitarian.
It's like, there's nothing more totalitarian than saying that I
get tourst onto your words with violence or, in the
(20:34):
case the horrifying case last week, murder.
Speaker 2 (20:39):
Right, So you want to do away with that because
you think it's leading to violence, the saying words or
violence because that can justify this particular maniac job as
feeling like he's meeting violence with violence.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
Yes, yes, but also I think it's bad for people's
mental health to have this kind of like catastrophizing way
of thinking about that. And here's the most horrifying thing.
We just released a massive study for our campus free
speech ranking. About one third of the students we surveyed
in about out of like seventy thousand said that at
least in rare cases, violence can be acceptable in response
(21:16):
to speech. Some schools that answer with over fifty percent
of them, we have done something terribly wrong. If educated
people are being educated in almost half of them think
that violence and response to words. And the funny thing is,
oftentimes it's not that they think it's just acceptable. They
think in some cases it's noble to respond to speakers
with usually the lighter forms of violence like shoutdowns or
(21:41):
blocking people's access. But here we see it, and it's
most chilling and horrifying.
Speaker 2 (21:45):
All right, Since you make this list every year of
where what campuses have the least free speech, there's this
contest going on right now. You know who's worse, which
side is worse, which side commits more violence, which side
does more cancel culture, that sort of thing. But when
it comes to college campuses, it's pretty one sided, isn't it.
(22:07):
That liberals can say whatever they want and conservatives can't.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
It's a little more complicated than that, but you know,
the fire has been a second to no one and
taking on sort of like what might be called woke censorship.
But generally the rule is if the censorship comes from
on campus, it comes from the left. If a censorship,
because it does not that many conservatives on campus in
the first place, but if it comes from off campus,
it tends to come from the right. And what we're
(22:33):
seeing right now is a big surge of cancelations of
censorship actually being pressured from the right as well.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
So would the hope be that because I think you're right,
I think this puts us in a bad headspace. If
we buy into the idea that words are violence. You've
been taught that you should react as if somebody's threatening
to punch you or shoot you when you hear something
you don't like, and that gets everybody's emotions running really,
(23:04):
really high. And then if we could get away with that,
maybe we wouldn't have things like Riley Gaines having to
fight her way out of Berkeley, or Charlie Kirk being.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
Shot at exactly, it's a foolish idea. I think people,
you know, people who are actually thinking people know that
it's just kind of a rhetorical first, But I believe
some of these younger people really do feel like they're
in a simplistic battle of good versus evil, and evil
must be stopped. And by the way, that's an anti
intellectual way of thinking about that's not an intellectual way
(23:33):
of thinking about the world.
Speaker 2 (23:35):
No doubt. Before I move on to the Jimmy Kimmel
thing and how it fits into everything, how optimistic are
you for us, like really learning a lesson from this
horrible assassination and turning some sort of corner.
Speaker 1 (23:54):
I would like to say I'm optimistic, but I think
that we're probably in the beginning of a intensifying sort
of free speech crisis, and it's happening not just in
the US, it's happening globally right So unfortunately, business is
booming in free speech Land. So I'm not going to
get a lot of sleep, nor will the good people
at fire.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
Yeah, what's going on in England is just horrifying.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
Horrifying, and my mom is British, so it's very personal
to me and they will continue to I did a
piece on my sub sect, the eternally radical idea, where
just pointing out the sheer number of people that they're arresting.
It has no parallel. I don't think it has any
parallel in British history. It certainly doesn't have a parallel
in American history in terms of the scale.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
So you've written a lot about cancel culture over the years,
and we've got an example in the last twenty four
hours and since Charlie Kirk's death. So you've got people
being canceled from their jobs for saying sometimes really awful,
awful things. But should they lose their jobs over it?
Should the government be getting involved in put pressure on
(25:01):
broadcast licenses to get rid of someone like Jimmy Kimmel
because they don't like what they say. Where are you
on this whole thing?
Speaker 1 (25:07):
Oh yeah, So you know, it really is the case
by case thing and canceling of the American mind. You know,
we give a definition of cancel culture, which is the
uptick of campaigns to get people fired or otherwise punished,
starting around twenty fourteen for speech that would be protected
for say a public employee. So we choose a lot
of like nuanced and common sense to it. But to
(25:29):
be clear, some of the people who are getting punished,
you know, we're saying things relatively tame things that we're seeing,
at least some of the stuff we're seeing on campus.
It's not all that guy had it coming. It's a
little bit like I really disagree with that guy on
a lot of things, which is, of course, you know,
completely within bounds. But the Jimmy Kimmel stuff, I mean, like, yeah,
he Jimmy Kimmel was kind of a typical kind of
(25:50):
Hollywood guy, Like he just he was desperate that this
guy be right wing. And I saw this like in
the media as well. It's kind of embarrassed for a
lot of mainstream to be kind of like, well, look,
his parents are Republicans. Must be like in what universe, right,
the case that your parents are bubbled.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
Because no conservative family sends their kids off to college
and they come back, you know, with completely different politics.
Speaker 1 (26:14):
Well, I was just thinking about family ties. Say, comey
watched as a kid, like, right, yes, that's what That's
more the way it goes it's a technical termce skinsmogenesis,
but the so so, you know, it's kind of typical
that he was kind of implying that this guy's got
to be maga in some of his UH in his
(26:35):
comedy routine on Monday. But then you know, the campaign
and it was really clearly a campaign to get Jimmy fired.
Taking this opportunity really got going, you know, with Brendan
Carr being really clear about it. And and another thing
that's really important to point out is that, you know,
months ago they were saying Jimmy Kimmel's next, you know,
(26:56):
so this was this was a you know, I think,
a target about opportunity to get this guy fired. And
I've never been to be clear, I've never seen something
quite like this. And people will always do what about ism,
like what about what about like Rose Ambar or some
of these other cases. It's like, I just haven't seen
this level of pressure on mainstream networks to silence to
(27:20):
silence a comedian.
Speaker 2 (27:22):
Right well, because of my politics, I'm highly annoyed by
the UH treating anybody to the right side of the
aisle as a moron the way Colbert and Kimmel did.
But The problem with the government putting pressure on networks
to get rid of them, or broadcast licenses or whatever
is there's gonna be a democratic president someday, and I
(27:45):
don't want President Gavin Newsom telling his FCC hey, right
wing talk radio is out of control and we need
to do something about this.
Speaker 1 (27:54):
Yeah, it is interesting, but the way the Trump administration
has been running things, it seems like they don't care
about the fact that someone else could have used this
power in the future, with kind of like an idea
that they're always going to be the ones who are
making these calls, which I think is foolish. But it's also,
by the way, rightfully banned it in a lot of
these cases by the First Amendment. And fire's job in
(28:17):
this situation like this is the call balls and strikes,
and I will get people sometimes saying, oh, the political
situation is so intense right now you have to pick
a side that your quite little First Amendment thing that
you know doesn't really apply it in this kind of battle.
And I'm always like, no, right now, the rules of
the road matter more than ever, and it's our job
(28:39):
to defend them.
Speaker 2 (28:41):
Specifically, Charlie Kirk, while he was out there doing his thing,
going to college campuses. Did you think that was a
productive thing for free speech in America?
Speaker 1 (28:51):
I did. Actually, you know, my disagreement with Charlie Kirk
is mostly due to their scholar their scholar database, the
scholar Watch, which I was not a big fan of,
because it resulted in a lot of people, a lot
of tends to get people fired, a lot of you know,
a lot of cancer culture. We made a big distinction
between just calling out professors, which you totally can do,
(29:12):
but you know when you put like this is their
supervisor and like all this kind of stuff to try
to get them fired, I got an issue with that. However,
you know, Charlie's murder has led me to, you know,
go back and look at some of his discussions with students,
and I think this is having this effect all over
the country. By the way, yeah, definitely, So political violence
tends to backfire, and I'm like, wow, Like he dealt
(29:34):
with some frustrating questions and he dealt with them usually
like that was the one that I saw with pretty civilly.
So I've left with an impression that it was a
productive dialogue.
Speaker 2 (29:49):
Right. I don't know if you've seen the it's on YouTube.
Charlie Kirk with Bill Maher. They had like a two
hour conversation in Bill Maher's basement a couple of months ago,
pretty recently, and it was it was as between two
guys that agree on nothing is you could possibly imagine
and if we can't do that, we're doomed. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (30:07):
And I'm actually speaking at Sun Valley at Sun Valley,
at Utah Valley on October thirtieth, and what's crazy. I'm
just gonna admit it. You know, am I a little spooked?
You know? Of course I am. But you can't ever
let the you know, assassin veto win. You have to
actually show up. You have to you know, pick up
(30:28):
the mantle. You have to actually you know, have that discussion.
And I'm hoping to go there with a message of
you know, essentially free speech belongs to us all or
belongs to nobody, because I think the younger people are
being taught that freedom of speech is the weapon of
the bully, the big and the robber baron. And as
I say all the time, that is just that history.
(30:49):
You are being miseducated on this topic. So hopefully I
can I'm going to try and Fire is always trying
to contribute to a deeper, more philosophical understanding of the
frankly beautiful role of free speech in human history.
Speaker 2 (31:04):
Well, we talk about your books all the time. The
Coddling of the American Mind is my partner. Joe's one
of his favorite books of all time. We mentioned stuff
that you write all the time. What particularly would you
like us to point people to right now before I
let you go?
Speaker 1 (31:18):
Sure? I mean, you know, the most important thing is
that Fire is currently overwhelmed, so we could really use
support from people, and we need the people who care
about free speech for their own side, but also for
everyone else. We need those principal people are out there
to come and help because right now, to use a pun,
it's a free speech just kind of have a house
(31:38):
on fire.
Speaker 2 (31:38):
Yeah, Greg Lukiana, thanks for your time.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
Yeah, I take care.
Speaker 5 (31:42):
Yea.
Speaker 2 (31:43):
He is really good and he's absolutely right. Like I
can't stand Jimmy Kimmel. I mean, he makes my skin crawl.
He's so smug. That's the word I was looking for.
He is so freaking smug. But if the FCC can
pressure him off the air, he can pressure Joe and
I off. They can pressure joean eye off the air
and a different administration absolutely, so that bothers me. I
(32:06):
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estate plan documents by visiting Trust and Will dot com
slash armstrong. That's Trust Andwill dot com slash armstrong. I
know a lot of you are going to be angry
and feel like I'm standing up for Jimmy Kimmel because
I'm not just really rolling around in glee that he
got fired. But uh, once you allow that weapon of
(33:09):
canceling people from the FCC to be wielded against your enemies,
it's going to come back. I just know it is.
We've got a lot more time to talk about this
and other stuff. I hope you can stick around.
Speaker 7 (33:22):
Former MNA fighter Conor McGregor announced this week vide has
withdrawn from the Irish presidential race after quote careful reflection,
or as it's known in Ireland, sobering up.
Speaker 2 (33:34):
They now, okay, we're getting a number of texts from
people saying the FCC had nothing to do with Jimmy
Kimmel being fired. These various groups of stations decided they
want to drop him. Okay, we'll play some quotes from
the FCC commissioner. I'll read you some things that he
said in recent days. He was absolutely pressuring people on
(33:57):
their broadcast license. And I can tell you trust me,
I'm in business. We have the radio stations have the
same deal with broadcast licenses TV do as TV does.
Owners get really nervous, really fast if there's even a
whiff of trouble with their license, they just do. It's
been that way my whole career. Just the most subtle
hint of your on the wrong side of things makes
(34:19):
people a pucker, if you'll pardon the expression. So we'll
get into that next hour. The FCC did have something
to do with this. I didn't mention this letter the
other day. So I've been talking about prunes a lot.
I will not explain exactly why. You could probably guess. Oh,
I wonder why. It's just a treat I enjoy. Yeah,
(34:40):
just a nice little snack, the humble prune. Some of
you like oranges, some of you like a candy bar.
I enjoy it. Prune now and then, or at least
I have for the last week or so. I had
never had a prune in my life until my doctor
recommended it for a perticigator situation. We don't need to
get into hydration anyway. So the orders from the doctor
was start with run one prune to day, and then
(35:02):
if that doesn't work, go to two prunes. And I've
found the sweet spot seems to be between four and
five prunes today, maybe more than you wanted to do.
Whatever works for you, Jack. Anyway, because we talked about
prune so much, to California prune association or network or
company or whatever they are had heard this and sent
us a gift box the other day with all kinds
(35:23):
of different kind of prune related treats and a prune
hat and that my son is going to wear to
school and it's good. But anyway, I didn't read from
the letter. Dear Jack. I'm an avid listener and caught
your recent segments about prunes and couldn't be happier to
share our passion for this dried fruit. Now that you
know what prunes are, we thought we'd level up your
prune game. Yeah. I didn't know what a prune was.
(35:45):
I'd heard about it my whole life. When I was
a kid. They would always joke about him on sitcoms.
Old people would joke about prunes. So I knew it
had something to do with your you know, regulating your system,
But I didn't really know what they were. I can't
believe he didn't know what a prune was. Good grief.
I'm that kind of person.
Speaker 4 (36:02):
I know.
Speaker 2 (36:02):
I know what they are. Now. They're a part of
my life. They're best friends. Me and prudes are best friends.
That's funny that the Prune people sent me so much
swag I have more prude swag than the who knew
the Prune people even had hats. I wouldn't be mad
at a prune hat. No, no, it's pretty awesome. Okay,
we got a lot more news to get to, things
(36:22):
that are going on in the world. Trump's in Great Britain,
Jimmy Kimble got fired, this and that. If you miss
a segment an hour, get the podcast Armstrong and Geddy
on demand and uh, we'll get to all this other
stuff coming up. Some great guests too, and a whole
bunch of different topics, so please stay here, Armstrong and
Getty
Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio, the George
Washington Broadcast Center, Jack Armstrong and Joe Katty.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Armstrong and Techy and no He.
Speaker 3 (00:24):
Arms He live from Studio C, a dimly lit room
deeput them the bowels of.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
The Armstrong and Getty Communications compound, which is surrounded by
razor wire and barking dogs. Actually, I am happy. We
got a security guard outside sitting there, and there's a
little car with the splashing lights. Let you know, there's
somebody with somebody carrying heat. Looks like he's carrying heat.
I think that's a gun. Welcome, How you doing, Glad
you're here? Oh, all right, today we're under the tutelage
(00:58):
of our general manager. I'll go with Jimmy Kimmel, just
because I think that's a danged interesting conversation. Jimmy Kimmel's
show being taken off the air indefinitely. Nobody seems to
know if that means. Usually in the world of broadcasting,
indefinite is forever, almost always in my experience, but this
one could be just temporarily hard to say. I found
(01:20):
Jimmy Kimmel over the last many years to be an
insufferably pompous. Well, I came across the word last night.
Popped in my head. I thought that was the perfect
word for him. I don't remember what it was, but
pompous is close enough. Just just the whole our side
is wonderful and everyone else is stupid. Just that whole.
(01:42):
It's just so annoying. But I also don't want the government,
you know, policing speech. So we'll get into both sides
of that comment with as as the same with Colbert
when he got taken off the air. Being left out.
A lot is these people's ratings are really low compared
to what these shows cost, really low, and they've gone down, down,
(02:06):
down over the years, partially because they decided to say
f you to half the country. If you say f
you to half of the country, it's hard to have
very high ratings. With all that said, I still don't
want the government policing speech, so we'll handle all that. Yes, Michael,
you already wanted to join in. I like that Michael
year jumping at the bet.
Speaker 4 (02:24):
His contract is up in May, and I just wonder
if you know the network just said here's an excuse.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Or it's not going to do so that much. Du
may of next year. Yeah, but yeah, I don't know.
I mean there's a there's another deal going through and
people don't want trouble whatever. But have you heard what
he said regarding the Charlie Cook assassination. He said it
on Monday night, took till Thursday for it to land
in such a way that he got taken off the air,
(02:51):
And definitely will play that for you and talk about
all the ins and outs of all that sort of stuff.
Got a lot of great guests lined up today on
a bunch of different topics, everything from what do the
interest rates going down a quarter point mean for you
if anything at all? And doesn't mean a whole lot
for you yet, just directionally it's good, but it doesn't
mean a lot for you yet. And talk a little
(03:13):
bit about Trump's trip to England. Did you see that
meal that they had last night. That table was more
than half a football field long. That's hard to even
imagine sitting at table, eating dinner at a table more
than half a football field long. The people down at
the other end, you would hardly be able to see them,
let alone have a conversation with them. Wouldn't even though
(03:35):
they were there. You wouldn't even know they were there. No, no, no, no.
You could meet them years from now and say, oh,
we had dinner together, and you'd say we did. Eh, yeah,
we were fifty yards away. Yeah, at that sixty yard
long table. I was at the other end. You were
at the other end. We had so I tell people
we had dinner together. That is a giant table. Only
in England, where they have castles, would even have room
(03:55):
for a table that large. It was a little excessive.
H Well, that's what they do. That's what the royal
family does, is excessive. Because it was all about King
Charles and the windsor castle, whatever the hell that is
trumps special guests. You get to bring anybody you want
to a state dinner. His special guests were the guy
who runs video video, Sam Altman from open Ai that's
(04:18):
the chat GPT guy, and then one other, Tim Cook
from Apple. So he had really high level tech guy
specifically around AI is his special guest. I don't know
exactly what the message was there, which leads me to
my headline. I don't understand of the day at least
so far that I saw breaking news from the Wall
Street Journal. Video said it would buy five billion dollars
(04:43):
worth of Intel a sign of how AI is reshaping
the tech industry. I have no idea what that means,
buying five million dollars of your competitor Intel, But it's
all about the super high speed AI chips, and this
bed is either going to pan out or it's not.
But a lot of people with a lot of money,
who we are very very smart, certainly smarter than me,
seem to think it's the wave of the future one
(05:04):
way or to'ther. It's funny. I was talking to a
person yesterday who said they air kid was into coding
as a senior in high school and has specifically decided
to learn to weld because of AI. The idea that
AI is going to do all the coding in the future,
but AI will never be able to weld. I wonder
(05:26):
which is true. I think maybe someday robots will be
able to weld. It'll be a while though, It'll be
a long time before robots can successfully do a good
job of welding. I wonder how many young people are
going to be making those decisions in the very near future,
going back to maybe more your traditional work with your
hands sort of the jobs anyway, that's a separate topic.
There is a horrifying attack on police in Pennsylvania, worst
(05:49):
one they've had in the state of Pennsylvania in a
one hundred years. What a bunch of police officers being shot.
I think it's just a random, one off, horrible story.
It has no greater significance for America, I think. But
if any more details come out, we'll hit you with that.
There is some new stuff around the Charlie Kirk assassination.
Knowing a little more about the the shooter and the
(06:13):
process for getting this guy convicted and hopefully the death penalty,
and hopefully he gets shot himself. That's the result I'm
looking for. Some of my favorite conservative commentators are pretty
uncomfortable with Jimmy Kimmel being driven off the air, if
(06:34):
that's what happened by the FCC. The FCC Commissioner has
said some fairly strong things in the last forty eight
hours about what Kimmel said and about people not getting
to keep their network licenses FCC the FCC Commissioner about
not being able to keep their network licenses, the broadcasting
(06:56):
licenses if they aren't towing the line politically or whatever.
And like I said, some of my favorite conservative commentators
are pretty uncomfortable with that for one reason, Like Joe
and I always talking about whatever you do, the next
administration is going to do two, and I don't know
that I want an FCC commissioner saying, you know, talk
radio is completely out of hand. Yeah, and that would
(07:20):
be unfortunate. Yes, and they get to say whatever the
hell they want, which we do, and we don't think
that's good for the country. So we're gonna start yanking
people broadcast license or threaten the Yank broadcast license if
you don't get people like Armstrong and giddy off there.
For instance, Randy Weingarten, Lady, I've been running the teachers
Union for a long time and all through COVID. She's
(07:41):
a witch, she is the devil. I believe she's actually
actually works for the devil. I think she actually hates children. Now,
that's a pretty strong thing to say. A democratic administration,
their FCC commissioner might say, you know, Jack Armstrong just
said the most important leader teachers in our country is
the devil. We can't have that. That's not good, that's devisive.
(08:04):
And I don't want a democratic administration and be able
to do that anymore than I want a Republican administration
to be able to drive Jimmy Kimmel off there, even
though he said a really awful stupid thing. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (08:13):
I don't know that I have like a great argument
for this, but something in me, this Charlie Kirk situation
is so different.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
Right because it is possible. Well, let's start to show officially.
We're going to play a little bit of Kimmel the
Frock with the FCC watch out. Yeah, yeah, exactly got
to start the show officially. The FCC gets on this.
I'm Jack Armstrong, he's Joe Getty on this. It is
how did it get to be? Thursday, September eighteenth to
year twenty twenty five Armstrong and Geedy and we approve
of this program. Will begin the show at Hey, I'm
doing it on time, mister chairman Mark.
Speaker 5 (08:43):
We hit some new lows over the weekend with the
Magga Gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered
Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and
do everything they can to score political points from it
in between the fingerpots.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
That's good. There was play the rest later, but that
that's the line that got people all been out of shape.
That was a crazy thing to say. That's just a
nut job thing to say. To go on the air
Monday Jimmy Kimmel and say stating as fact in his
mind that the shooter is a maga person. Well, I
(09:19):
don't even know where did that come from, although I
saw I heard David French of the New York Times
talking about a Yugo poll that came out over the weekend.
Seventy percent of Democrats believe that that killer scumbag is maga.
So somehow that story got started online or the rumor
spread will be Wow, what are you base on that? On?
Speaker 4 (09:39):
Yeah, there was some I saw in an interview watching
Megan Kelly. She played a clip of another woman who
was like, well, his dad was.
Speaker 6 (09:47):
In law enforcement, he was into guns. He's a white boy,
and so clearly he's on their team.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
And it's like, what are you talking about. You don't
know any conservative families across the country who's young The
boys or girls went off to college and their politics
became completely different than their parents. So because the parents
are Republicans, the kid obviously is, oh.
Speaker 6 (10:08):
His dad's in law enforcement, so clearly they're maga.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
Yeah, so i'd that whole The fact that seventy percent
of Democrats think the shooter was maga is weird. That's
its own conversation. And then Jimmy Kimmel saying that it's
just a weird, dumb thing to say. But okay, this
was gonna be my point. I don't know if you remember.
After nine to eleven, Bill Maher had a show on
ABC at that time, very popular show called Politically Incorrect.
(10:33):
You might be too young for this, No, I remember this.
He had a show and he went on like days
later after the buildings came down in New York City,
he said, because George Bush or somebody had called the
hijackers cowards, and he said, one thing you can't say
is that they're cowards. They're obviously not cowards. They're obviously
brave to fly planes into a building, which is sort
(10:53):
of factually correct. But in that moment, days after the
buildings came down, and the most show fucking thing, and
it happened to America in seventy years, there was an
outcry and ABC took his show off the air. That
wasn't the FCC coming down or the government stifling free speech.
That was just crossing a line for most Americans. Yeah,
(11:18):
And I don't know if Jimmy Kimmel reached that level,
but he is close is close to the because a
whole bunch of various smaller groups that have ABC stations
in the middle of the country that aren't you know,
New York and LA centric the middle and you know,
I was about to say middle of Ore. I'm from
(11:39):
the middle of Nore and probably so, but middle of
the nowhere stations where you got lots of people who
would hate to see that sort of thing on their television.
It's not crazy that they would decide, all right, that's it,
We're not gonna air Jimmy Kimmel here in Provo, Utah.
That's a bad choice. Shootings were in Utah, here in Omaha, Nebraska,
or you know, place in Texas or whatever. It's not
(12:01):
shocking that they would make that decision that Jimmy Kimmel
crossed the line in the same way that Bill Maher
crossed the line. Now, the FCC Commissioner has had said
specific things that I find very very troubling in the
last two days about policing speech that just I mean,
I think fly directly in the face of the First Amendment.
But Jimmy Kimmel and Stephen Colbert, like I said, made
(12:26):
a decision to say you not just hey, we're gonna
rib you. I hope you can take the jokes just
to with contempt for half or more of the country. Well,
and those weren't jokes, all right, those aren't jokes. But
if you do that, it really narrows your support and
makes it a lot more likely that you can get
fired like this. So I don't feel sorry for him
(12:48):
in that way. It's like the lady at the end
of our show, bye bye, all right, But I don't
want a NFCC commissioner under President Gavin Newsom deciding that
talk radio is out of control and something needs to
be done. And I don't see a whole lot of
difference between that and policing. Jimmy Kimmel, if I'm wrong,
text me for what what I forgot?
Speaker 4 (13:07):
The text line we have one five KFTC.
Speaker 2 (13:12):
I'm glad you know it X line she said, four
one k FTC. Joe and I have been uh nearly
run out of this job a couple of different times
in the history of the show, like really close, and
(13:33):
so I'm fairly sensitive the idea of losing your job
over like going too far with a joke or a comment.
But we'll talk more about that later.
Speaker 1 (13:43):
That.
Speaker 2 (13:44):
Regarding the whole Jimmy Kimmel being booted off the air,
I really.
Speaker 4 (13:48):
I really want for them to replace Jimmy Kimmel Live
with old episodes of The Man Show, just so his
audience can see where he originated.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
Right right when it was him and all.
Speaker 4 (14:00):
And chicks jumping on trampolines, right, yeah, right while.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
They drank beer. Yeah, let's find out what all the
headlines are with Katie all right.
Speaker 4 (14:08):
Starting with Fox News, sheriff says Charlie Kirk, assassin negotiated
a gentle surrender and was afraid of being shot.
Speaker 2 (14:17):
Yeah, I heard that, and I think that was handled well.
I'm kind of surprised that you do that because the
guy that the shooter had shown himself to be incredibly violent,
but they allowed him to, like calmly be brought into
the sheriff's office.
Speaker 4 (14:33):
And because it's everywhere from NBC Disney's, ABC pulls Jimmy
Kimmel Live after FCC share criticizes the host's Charlie Kirk comments.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
Yeah, we will get into that quite a bit later.
And Jack, I know you're a fan of these guys.
Speaker 4 (14:46):
From the Free Beacon embarrassment for MSNBC and CNN as upstart,
News Nation wins out on primetime ratings.
Speaker 2 (14:55):
I didn't know that. I watch News Nation every single day.
They're pretty good. They are pretty good. They're not I
haven't found a bias with them, So I like that.
Speaker 4 (15:05):
From ABC, the IDF is expanding it's Gaza City Operation.
Speaker 2 (15:11):
Yeah, we might talk to one of our military analysts
about that later. How that's going to unfold, what that
will look like.
Speaker 4 (15:18):
From The Washington Examiner, Christy Nomes houts one hundred and
fifty thousand new ICE applications after recruitment push.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
Oh wow cool. Yeah. From the Washington Post, Fed cuts.
Speaker 4 (15:32):
Interest rates by a quarter point and signals more could
be coming.
Speaker 2 (15:36):
Yeah. Well, like I said, it's headed in the right direction,
but it's not going to have much of an effect
on your car Loan credit card or buying a house yet.
Speaker 4 (15:47):
From the Verge, Business Insider reportedly gives journalists the green
light to write stories with AI and doesn't tell.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
Its readers that's inevitable. Well, and one of the.
Speaker 4 (16:01):
Things they're using is chat GPT, which we've talked about
being incorrect.
Speaker 2 (16:05):
Yeah, many a time making stuff up. Of course journalists
are incorrect a lot.
Speaker 4 (16:09):
So yeah, good point, New York Post Wild chimpanzees consume
two cocktails worth of alcohol a day by feasting on
boozy fruit. Really, this is in Uganda, and these chimps
are finding fermented fruit and they're just getting wasted.
Speaker 2 (16:26):
And if they've always done that, is that like, because
that would be interesting to know if there's a beast
out there that we share ninety nine percent of the
genetic material that just likes getting hammered every day. Yeah,
I get it. Wow, sometimes you just want to check
out from study fines.
Speaker 6 (16:44):
Fatty foods can scramble your memory.
Speaker 2 (16:47):
Just days later. Oh that's my problem. Mm hmm, that's
why you forgot the text line.
Speaker 4 (16:54):
Also, just a side note, it's National Cheeseburger Day, so
I'll let everybody know. And finally from the Babylon Bee,
Trump deports Phillies Karen to L Salvador prison.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
Good. Do you know who Greg Lukianoff is. We quote
him all the time, We've had him on the show
multiple times over the years. He has been writing a
lot about the political climate, where it's headed, what we
might be able to do about it. We're going to
talk to him coming up next. This will be good conversation, guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
Stick around Armstrong and getty Man.
Speaker 2 (17:28):
Did we get lucky with the timing of this our
next guest we could talk to or I could talk
to for the next three hours easily, because he's one
of the leading thinkers and a couple of the hottest
topics going right now. So Greg lukian Off New York
Times best selling author The President of Fire, which is
a foundation for individual rights and expression, all about free speech.
(17:50):
That's with Jimmy Kimmel loosing's job. Does that fit into
that whole topic? Is the author of Unlearning Liberty, Campus censorship,
and the end of American debate, canceling of the American mind,
Canceled culture, all about cancel culture, which is hot right now,
of course, and then part of this free press series
on repairing America after the murder of Charlie Kirk and
(18:14):
this particular piece that I've gotten front of me from
Greg Lukianoff Berry. The whole words are violence cliche, which
I would agree with anyway. Welcome back, to the Armstrong
and Getty Show, Greg lukian Off. Greg, thanks for joining
us today.
Speaker 1 (18:29):
Great to be back.
Speaker 2 (18:30):
Man, you obviously are the man of the moment for
a whole bunch of these topics. Let's start with what
you just wrote the Barry The words are violence, cliche
around the whole, Charlie Kirk thing, what are you talking about?
Speaker 1 (18:42):
Yeah, you know, I've been defending free speech at Fire
for twenty four years now, and I'd say when I
first started my job, the sort of activist argument that
words can be just like bullets was something that people
kind of rolled their eyes at because it was obviously
a sort of self serving rhetorical right. But I'd say,
(19:04):
like ten years ago, or maybe even as long as
fifteen years ago, this really started to become a common
argument that I would hear on campus. And then you
started having people who should have known better actually saying, well,
words can cause stress, so therefore that is a lot
like violence. And you know, me and John Hight, who
I wrote probably in the American mind with we wrote
a piece in the Atlantic saying, no, this is crazy words.
(19:27):
We have a societal agreement essentially, and you're supposed to
have it in a democratic society, that there's a bright
line distinction between physical violence and expression of opinion. And
I've been screaming to high Heaven to saying like, no,
this is an incredibly foolish idea. It's not progressive. It
gets you back to the thirteenth century A d or BC.
(19:49):
It doesn't matter.
Speaker 2 (19:51):
Yeah, I mean, just as a side on that, I
remember at one point when The New York Times a
couple of years ago actually said intent doesn't matter. So
not only had words become violence, but sometimes the way
they took your words, even if you didn't intend it
that way. So man, you're really into pre enlightenment then,
but go ahead, yeah.
Speaker 1 (20:12):
No, no exactly. And the thing is, of course, this
kind of you know, foolish self serving rhetoric actually turns
into a situation that justifies violence for speech. And this
is oftimes coming from people who think that they're anti totalitarian.
It's like, there's nothing more totalitarian than saying that I
get tourst onto your words with violence or, in the
(20:34):
case the horrifying case last week, murder.
Speaker 2 (20:39):
Right, So you want to do away with that because
you think it's leading to violence, the saying words or
violence because that can justify this particular maniac job as
feeling like he's meeting violence with violence.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
Yes, yes, but also I think it's bad for people's
mental health to have this kind of like catastrophizing way
of thinking about that. And here's the most horrifying thing.
We just released a massive study for our campus free
speech ranking. About one third of the students we surveyed
in about out of like seventy thousand said that at
least in rare cases, violence can be acceptable in response
(21:16):
to speech. Some schools that answer with over fifty percent
of them, we have done something terribly wrong. If educated
people are being educated in almost half of them think
that violence and response to words. And the funny thing is,
oftentimes it's not that they think it's just acceptable. They
think in some cases it's noble to respond to speakers
with usually the lighter forms of violence like shoutdowns or
(21:41):
blocking people's access. But here we see it, and it's
most chilling and horrifying.
Speaker 2 (21:45):
All right, Since you make this list every year of
where what campuses have the least free speech, there's this
contest going on right now. You know who's worse, which
side is worse, which side commits more violence, which side
does more cancel culture, that sort of thing. But when
it comes to college campuses, it's pretty one sided, isn't it.
(22:07):
That liberals can say whatever they want and conservatives can't.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
It's a little more complicated than that, but you know,
the fire has been a second to no one and
taking on sort of like what might be called woke censorship.
But generally the rule is if the censorship comes from
on campus, it comes from the left. If a censorship,
because it does not that many conservatives on campus in
the first place, but if it comes from off campus,
it tends to come from the right. And what we're
(22:33):
seeing right now is a big surge of cancelations of
censorship actually being pressured from the right as well.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
So would the hope be that because I think you're right,
I think this puts us in a bad headspace. If
we buy into the idea that words are violence. You've
been taught that you should react as if somebody's threatening
to punch you or shoot you when you hear something
you don't like, and that gets everybody's emotions running really,
(23:04):
really high. And then if we could get away with that,
maybe we wouldn't have things like Riley Gaines having to
fight her way out of Berkeley, or Charlie Kirk being.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
Shot at exactly, it's a foolish idea. I think people,
you know, people who are actually thinking people know that
it's just kind of a rhetorical first, But I believe
some of these younger people really do feel like they're
in a simplistic battle of good versus evil, and evil
must be stopped. And by the way, that's an anti
intellectual way of thinking about that's not an intellectual way
(23:33):
of thinking about the world.
Speaker 2 (23:35):
No doubt. Before I move on to the Jimmy Kimmel
thing and how it fits into everything, how optimistic are
you for us, like really learning a lesson from this
horrible assassination and turning some sort of corner.
Speaker 1 (23:54):
I would like to say I'm optimistic, but I think
that we're probably in the beginning of a intensifying sort
of free speech crisis, and it's happening not just in
the US, it's happening globally right So unfortunately, business is
booming in free speech Land. So I'm not going to
get a lot of sleep, nor will the good people
at fire.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
Yeah, what's going on in England is just horrifying.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
Horrifying, and my mom is British, so it's very personal
to me and they will continue to I did a
piece on my sub sect, the eternally radical idea, where
just pointing out the sheer number of people that they're arresting.
It has no parallel. I don't think it has any
parallel in British history. It certainly doesn't have a parallel
in American history in terms of the scale.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
So you've written a lot about cancel culture over the years,
and we've got an example in the last twenty four
hours and since Charlie Kirk's death. So you've got people
being canceled from their jobs for saying sometimes really awful,
awful things. But should they lose their jobs over it?
Should the government be getting involved in put pressure on
(25:01):
broadcast licenses to get rid of someone like Jimmy Kimmel
because they don't like what they say. Where are you
on this whole thing?
Speaker 1 (25:07):
Oh yeah, So you know, it really is the case
by case thing and canceling of the American mind. You know,
we give a definition of cancel culture, which is the
uptick of campaigns to get people fired or otherwise punished,
starting around twenty fourteen for speech that would be protected
for say a public employee. So we choose a lot
of like nuanced and common sense to it. But to
(25:29):
be clear, some of the people who are getting punished,
you know, we're saying things relatively tame things that we're seeing,
at least some of the stuff we're seeing on campus.
It's not all that guy had it coming. It's a
little bit like I really disagree with that guy on
a lot of things, which is, of course, you know,
completely within bounds. But the Jimmy Kimmel stuff, I mean, like, yeah,
he Jimmy Kimmel was kind of a typical kind of
(25:50):
Hollywood guy, Like he just he was desperate that this
guy be right wing. And I saw this like in
the media as well. It's kind of embarrassed for a
lot of mainstream to be kind of like, well, look,
his parents are Republicans. Must be like in what universe, right,
the case that your parents are bubbled.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
Because no conservative family sends their kids off to college
and they come back, you know, with completely different politics.
Speaker 1 (26:14):
Well, I was just thinking about family ties. Say, comey
watched as a kid, like, right, yes, that's what That's
more the way it goes it's a technical termce skinsmogenesis,
but the so so, you know, it's kind of typical
that he was kind of implying that this guy's got
to be maga in some of his UH in his
(26:35):
comedy routine on Monday. But then you know, the campaign
and it was really clearly a campaign to get Jimmy fired.
Taking this opportunity really got going, you know, with Brendan
Carr being really clear about it. And and another thing
that's really important to point out is that, you know,
months ago they were saying Jimmy Kimmel's next, you know,
(26:56):
so this was this was a you know, I think,
a target about opportunity to get this guy fired. And
I've never been to be clear, I've never seen something
quite like this. And people will always do what about ism,
like what about what about like Rose Ambar or some
of these other cases. It's like, I just haven't seen
this level of pressure on mainstream networks to silence to
(27:20):
silence a comedian.
Speaker 2 (27:22):
Right well, because of my politics, I'm highly annoyed by
the UH treating anybody to the right side of the
aisle as a moron the way Colbert and Kimmel did.
But The problem with the government putting pressure on networks
to get rid of them, or broadcast licenses or whatever
is there's gonna be a democratic president someday, and I
(27:45):
don't want President Gavin Newsom telling his FCC hey, right
wing talk radio is out of control and we need
to do something about this.
Speaker 1 (27:54):
Yeah, it is interesting, but the way the Trump administration
has been running things, it seems like they don't care
about the fact that someone else could have used this
power in the future, with kind of like an idea
that they're always going to be the ones who are
making these calls, which I think is foolish. But it's also,
by the way, rightfully banned it in a lot of
these cases by the First Amendment. And fire's job in
(28:17):
this situation like this is the call balls and strikes,
and I will get people sometimes saying, oh, the political
situation is so intense right now you have to pick
a side that your quite little First Amendment thing that
you know doesn't really apply it in this kind of battle.
And I'm always like, no, right now, the rules of
the road matter more than ever, and it's our job
(28:39):
to defend them.
Speaker 2 (28:41):
Specifically, Charlie Kirk, while he was out there doing his thing,
going to college campuses. Did you think that was a
productive thing for free speech in America?
Speaker 1 (28:51):
I did. Actually, you know, my disagreement with Charlie Kirk
is mostly due to their scholar their scholar database, the
scholar Watch, which I was not a big fan of,
because it resulted in a lot of people, a lot
of tends to get people fired, a lot of you know,
a lot of cancer culture. We made a big distinction
between just calling out professors, which you totally can do,
(29:12):
but you know when you put like this is their
supervisor and like all this kind of stuff to try
to get them fired, I got an issue with that. However,
you know, Charlie's murder has led me to, you know,
go back and look at some of his discussions with students,
and I think this is having this effect all over
the country. By the way, yeah, definitely, So political violence
tends to backfire, and I'm like, wow, Like he dealt
(29:34):
with some frustrating questions and he dealt with them usually
like that was the one that I saw with pretty civilly.
So I've left with an impression that it was a
productive dialogue.
Speaker 2 (29:49):
Right. I don't know if you've seen the it's on YouTube.
Charlie Kirk with Bill Maher. They had like a two
hour conversation in Bill Maher's basement a couple of months ago,
pretty recently, and it was it was as between two
guys that agree on nothing is you could possibly imagine
and if we can't do that, we're doomed. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (30:07):
And I'm actually speaking at Sun Valley at Sun Valley,
at Utah Valley on October thirtieth, and what's crazy. I'm
just gonna admit it. You know, am I a little spooked?
You know? Of course I am. But you can't ever
let the you know, assassin veto win. You have to
actually show up. You have to you know, pick up
(30:28):
the mantle. You have to actually you know, have that discussion.
And I'm hoping to go there with a message of
you know, essentially free speech belongs to us all or
belongs to nobody, because I think the younger people are
being taught that freedom of speech is the weapon of
the bully, the big and the robber baron. And as
I say all the time, that is just that history.
(30:49):
You are being miseducated on this topic. So hopefully I
can I'm going to try and Fire is always trying
to contribute to a deeper, more philosophical understanding of the
frankly beautiful role of free speech in human history.
Speaker 2 (31:04):
Well, we talk about your books all the time. The
Coddling of the American Mind is my partner. Joe's one
of his favorite books of all time. We mentioned stuff
that you write all the time. What particularly would you
like us to point people to right now before I
let you go?
Speaker 1 (31:18):
Sure? I mean, you know, the most important thing is
that Fire is currently overwhelmed, so we could really use
support from people, and we need the people who care
about free speech for their own side, but also for
everyone else. We need those principal people are out there
to come and help because right now, to use a pun,
it's a free speech just kind of have a house
(31:38):
on fire.
Speaker 2 (31:38):
Yeah, Greg Lukiana, thanks for your time.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
Yeah, I take care.
Speaker 5 (31:42):
Yea.
Speaker 2 (31:43):
He is really good and he's absolutely right. Like I
can't stand Jimmy Kimmel. I mean, he makes my skin crawl.
He's so smug. That's the word I was looking for.
He is so freaking smug. But if the FCC can
pressure him off the air, he can pressure Joe and
I off. They can pressure joean eye off the air
and a different administration absolutely, so that bothers me. I
(32:06):
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(32:48):
estate plan documents by visiting Trust and Will dot com
slash armstrong. That's Trust Andwill dot com slash armstrong. I
know a lot of you are going to be angry
and feel like I'm standing up for Jimmy Kimmel because
I'm not just really rolling around in glee that he
got fired. But uh, once you allow that weapon of
(33:09):
canceling people from the FCC to be wielded against your enemies,
it's going to come back. I just know it is.
We've got a lot more time to talk about this
and other stuff. I hope you can stick around.
Speaker 7 (33:22):
Former MNA fighter Conor McGregor announced this week vide has
withdrawn from the Irish presidential race after quote careful reflection,
or as it's known in Ireland, sobering up.
Speaker 2 (33:34):
They now, okay, we're getting a number of texts from
people saying the FCC had nothing to do with Jimmy
Kimmel being fired. These various groups of stations decided they
want to drop him. Okay, we'll play some quotes from
the FCC commissioner. I'll read you some things that he
said in recent days. He was absolutely pressuring people on
(33:57):
their broadcast license. And I can tell you trust me,
I'm in business. We have the radio stations have the
same deal with broadcast licenses TV do as TV does.
Owners get really nervous, really fast if there's even a
whiff of trouble with their license, they just do. It's
been that way my whole career. Just the most subtle
hint of your on the wrong side of things makes
(34:19):
people a pucker, if you'll pardon the expression. So we'll
get into that next hour. The FCC did have something
to do with this. I didn't mention this letter the
other day. So I've been talking about prunes a lot.
I will not explain exactly why. You could probably guess. Oh,
I wonder why. It's just a treat I enjoy. Yeah,
(34:40):
just a nice little snack, the humble prune. Some of
you like oranges, some of you like a candy bar.
I enjoy it. Prune now and then, or at least
I have for the last week or so. I had
never had a prune in my life until my doctor
recommended it for a perticigator situation. We don't need to
get into hydration anyway. So the orders from the doctor
was start with run one prune to day, and then
(35:02):
if that doesn't work, go to two prunes. And I've
found the sweet spot seems to be between four and
five prunes today, maybe more than you wanted to do.
Whatever works for you, Jack. Anyway, because we talked about
prune so much, to California prune association or network or
company or whatever they are had heard this and sent
us a gift box the other day with all kinds
(35:23):
of different kind of prune related treats and a prune
hat and that my son is going to wear to
school and it's good. But anyway, I didn't read from
the letter. Dear Jack. I'm an avid listener and caught
your recent segments about prunes and couldn't be happier to
share our passion for this dried fruit. Now that you
know what prunes are, we thought we'd level up your
prune game. Yeah. I didn't know what a prune was.
(35:45):
I'd heard about it my whole life. When I was
a kid. They would always joke about him on sitcoms.
Old people would joke about prunes. So I knew it
had something to do with your you know, regulating your system,
But I didn't really know what they were. I can't
believe he didn't know what a prune was. Good grief.
I'm that kind of person.
Speaker 4 (36:02):
I know.
Speaker 2 (36:02):
I know what they are. Now. They're a part of
my life. They're best friends. Me and prudes are best friends.
That's funny that the Prune people sent me so much
swag I have more prude swag than the who knew
the Prune people even had hats. I wouldn't be mad
at a prune hat. No, no, it's pretty awesome. Okay,
we got a lot more news to get to, things
(36:22):
that are going on in the world. Trump's in Great Britain,
Jimmy Kimble got fired, this and that. If you miss
a segment an hour, get the podcast Armstrong and Geddy
on demand and uh, we'll get to all this other
stuff coming up. Some great guests too, and a whole
bunch of different topics, so please stay here, Armstrong and
Getty
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Jack Armstrong
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