Should The Right Be Purity Testing?

I'm not so just to clarify, I'm not saying these people all agree with you know the nefarious actors or in line with Tucker and they're clearly like optics all the optics can demonstrate they're willing to stand in front of in an Israel in Israel in front of an Israeli audience and engage in these conversations. So I give credit for that but I'm saying there needs to be I mean or does there need to be like an ideological boundary drawn about people who are actually the ones dividing a potentially very fruitful coalition. Like it's not just well I I I don't agree with him but the question is he's actually doing harm to the coalition and you're attributing the harm and the divisiveness to people calling that divisive figure out. So there's a gaslighting quality like are we crazy like and it's not just the self-interested Jewish preservation thing. I mean this is bad for conservatism. It's bad for the West. It's bad for the United States and it hands the left victories on a silver platter because all they have to do is you know for years and years they manufactured Nazis on the right. Look they're everywhere. Trump derangement syndrome tiki torches Nazis everywhere and for years I'm like that's Trump derangement. What are you talking about? I said to liberal Jewish friends of mine the same thing but now what AOC has to point to a few episodes of whatever it is and I'm not trying to say guilt by association but [clears throat] you have to admit like there has to be there shouldn't be really any disagreement on this. Um that we all can agree on on the damage these people are doing and that they being properly called out. I don't want to I know people don't like the term struggle session or being compelled to say something but it's disturbing that they wouldn't be alarmed by that as any leftist ideas that are on the ascent. It's the same thing to me you know. >> I mean I think at least I you know I can I I think as a general principle you are correct right? Like I think that as in general the I I think that in general Jews aren't to blame for anti-Semitism right? And you mean and we can talk about all the variety of nefarious things that like the the global left Tucker and Candace the Qatar whoever is doing to foment anti-Semitism in the United States and weaken the appearance of Israel. >> And they certainly bear, you know, a far more the vast majority of the blame even for what is happening in terms of Israel's public relations problem. >> Right. >> I think that it's it's merely that in the context of this panel being given to Israel, you know, a speech to Israeli rightists. Again, that strikes me as the kind of like that's like to me that's almost table stakes. Like yes, we we know all that stuff, right? But we, you know, maybe we should, you know, acknowledge it more they maybe they should have acknowledged more aggressively. I don't know. You can that's a reasonable argument to make. Um >> Well, I think I feel like that's always the elephant in the room, right? When whenever if when J.D. Vance is saying, "Look, he's asked about Tucker." and he goes, "Yeah, obviously Fuentes and Rogan are not the same person." We're like, "What about Tucker?" "Well, obviously Fuentes and Rogan are not the same person." [laughter] "Well, what about Tucker AND CANDACE?" "WELL, OBVIOUSLY FUENTES and Rogan are not the same person." I'm like, "I'm sorry, man. Like and I you you're putting us in this corner where we have to be like, you know, you know, not just for us, for the sake of what you're trying to build. Like the divisive figures are here and that to me is almost central. It's not some marginal thing that we can just presume everybody's on the same page about this, people. That's where I'm That's where I I have to push back. It doesn't feel like it's clear, you >> I hear that and and I, you know, I mean, for all the criticism that we're like the Vance pack or something in NACON, like, okay, not all of us agree on that, right? Like and I like J.D. I think he'll be an excellent president, but if you think of me as like somebody who's like really invested in the fight between Vance and Rubio, you have you have me very mistaken. I'm not. I think Rubio would be a fabulous president. Um and moreover, one one thing that I think people haven't really in general, it feels like there is this huge fight over like who should be the successor between Vance and Rubio on the right and at least among like ex especially like pro-Israel ex people. And I would say that this fight is not worth your time because Donald Trump will pick a successor. Like Donald Trump will endorse. And when Donald Trump endorses, that will be the nominee. And I guess maybe maybe you're trying to have influence on Donald Trump's decision through like various channels. Maybe I don't know. But I don't From my perspective, I look at it like I mean the Vance [clears throat] will be a question is I will let Donald Trump resolve that. However, I I want to get back to your your you had a good point though, which is I think I know Vance has made these claims about well, I don't want to be disloyal to a friend and and blah blah blah. Like I don't want politics to invade our friendships and I'm like I hear that, but I also, you know, if I if I were in Vance's shoes and I've actually told some of these people this like I I think that you are are too skittish when it comes to criticizing somebody because Tucker is being you're being a much better friend to Tucker than Tucker is being to you. >> Right. >> Uh and and there's no reason to think he's going to could get more loyal over time or get more reasonable on these questions and decide to give you fewer problems in terms of your attempts to maintain the coalition. So I I I would have been more aggressive on their on their behalf distancing myself from Tucker, but you know, I'm not going to I'm not going to sit here and whine about the vice president's decisions on on this front. >> Right. To to to me I liken it to like I kind of made up this term, but it's like intellectual isolationism, right? For people who [laughter] are like let's [snorts] just put our heads in the sand. We just got to mind our own business and focus on our conservative policies and all these people who are actually really causing all this harm, they'll just go away. They don't have political aspirations or ambitions. There's nothing to fear like it's I don't agree with all I don't agree with the Iranian regime, but whatever. Yeah, they're calling death to America. Obviously, I'm not supporting them. I don't agree with them, but they're going to do us harm if we don't do something about it. And maybe respectful people can disagree on how to tackle that, but you know, I just think it I liken it to like to me the parallel is like on the left, right? Abdul al-Sayed [clears throat] is complaining. Why do people keep bringing this up? You know, whatever. It's because you can't answer the basic moral questions and pass the litmus test over what you actually stand for. You brought it up. You campaigned with As'ad AbuKhalil. So now it's being brought to you and it's not the people complaining about it that take issue with it that are the problem. It's your inability to actually draw a clear moral boundary. The The question would go away. We could move on to the other things you claim to want to focus on on the far left, you know, affordability and all these things. Um, if you just answered the question and didn't dodge it, right? So, I guess it's a larger question of what happens to a movement and how does it deal with its extremities? Um, because the left collapsed in 2024 because it didn't properly, you know, draw those clear boundaries over when the left [clears throat] Jordan Peterson used to say, "When you know, when does the right go too far? You know, we have to ask those questions, you know? And when the left goes too far?" You know, he used to say that. And he said the right, he said this in like 2015. I think it's clear the right goes too far when we we get into identitarianism and supremacist racial ideas that start to infiltrate, [clears throat] right? The blood and soil kind of ideas. And he called it then. He's like, "If you If you On the left, we don't have any of those uh limiting principles and now we're seeing the results of that." They didn't call it out. We had Kamala Harris, she hers. They tried to play the game and they're coming in to infiltrate. I fear the same thing could happen to the right if they don't properly not just, you know, not agree with those things, but properly draw those boundaries because they're afraid of being canceled culture vultures or seeming lefty. It's like, you know, you know. >> I agree I agree with that entirely. Like I mean, honestly, I remember having these debates gosh, back in 2017 with people and I would be on the side of, you know, when when the alt-right was ascendant and they they pushed this meme and I think it still exists to some degree. No enemies to the right. >> Uh-huh. >> Um, and don't punch right. That's another one. And I don't agree with that at all. I actually think punching right is good and virtuous when it's appropriate. And also, uh, you know, usually what happens is they're saying don't punch right while they're just punching you non-stop endlessly, uh, you know, beating you into a pulp and then you you throw a jab and they're like, "How dare you? Are you conservative or not?" Um, so, that's I I agree with that. I think NatCons actually done a decent amount of that, oddly enough. Like it just may it it sets the line in a different place than I think the people who are just who are critics would set it. Right? I think that's the way to understand where the dispute is. Not Not whether or not there should be a line, but where it should be set. >> [music] [music]