The Megyn Kelly Show
"Political War" Coming For Trump in 2025, and Christmas Traditions, with Steve Bannon and Doug Brunt | Ep. 971
Fri, 20 Dec 2024
Megyn Kelly is joined by Steve Bannon, host of "Bannon's War Room," to discuss how the media is having a meltdown over “President Musk,” why Speaker Johnson has to go after working with Democrats on failed CR, how this country is “addicted” to spending federal funds, how the media is trying to divide Trump and Elon Musk, how helpful Musk has been to the MAGA movement, the “political war” that's coming for Trump in 2025, why it's important that Trump needs to get things done quickly within six months, what Trump's priorities should be, whether he should push for investigations against those who wronged him, and more. Then Doug Brunt, host of "Dedicated," joins to discuss their favorite old Christmas movies, childhood holiday traditions, how her gifts for her kids’ teachers went horribly wrong, Doug gives book recommendations, and they play a Christmas-themed quiz where she sees how well she knows Doug’s favorite holiday memories.Bannon- https://linktr.ee/bannonwarroomBrunt- https://www.youtube.com/@DedicatedwithDoug & https://www.amazon.com/Mysterious-Case-Rudolf-Diesel-Deception/dp/1982169907/Birch Gold: Text MK to 989898 and get your free info kit on goldTax Network USA: https://TNUSA.com/MEGYN
Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show, live on Sirius XM Channel 111 every weekday at noon east. Hey, everyone. I'm Megyn Kelly. Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show, and happy Friday, our last live broadcast before the Christmas break.
And may I just say before we get started how grateful I am, and I know my staff feels too, toward all of you for making the show what it is and making it possible for us to do it to you every day and bring the show to you, the news to you in the way that we think is... appropriate, special, and all too rare. So couldn't do it without the support of all of you listening and watching.
Feel very grateful to you all. Feel especially hopeful this time of year, as I know a lot of you do too, as we're now, you know, what, a month away. Actually, it's a month from today that Donald Trump will be sworn in as the 47th president of the United States. And it happened despite overwhelming odds against him and despite a media that is entirely against him.
And I think it happened thanks to honest brokers like the ones who listen to this show, who are in the market for actual news, real facts, yes, opinion, but based on real facts and not misleading bullshit on one side or the other. So thank you to all of you very much. We've got two great guests today. I'm so excited about the guests we have to end out the year. The two Bs. Bannon and Brunt.
My husband, Doug Brunt, will come up in our second hour. And my team has prepared a special holiday quiz for me to take showing how well I know Doug's Christmas traditions and memories. I have not yet seen it, but I plan to ace it. So we will see how that goes in hour two. All right. And in our first guest, we have another important B, which is Steve Bannon. And here's where we're going to start.
As I said, we are now one way, one month away from the inauguration of Donald Trump 2.0. And even before that day arrives, the Democratic Party remains in crisis. They don't know what they're doing. Why are they talking about 2028 already? My God, would you just still do an honest retrospective on why you lost 2024 before you start? I mean, fine, but if I were a Democrat, I'd be a little annoyed.
They don't know what to do. Labeling Donald Trump Hitler didn't work. America's Mussolini, nah, the American public didn't buy it. So now, for now, they've come up with a new way to try to irritate Donald Trump and the to break apart a really important and potentially even holy alliance between Donald Trump and the richest man in the world, Elon Musk.
The latest line, Trump is nothing more than Elon's puppet. They got scared.
Because President Musk told them.
President Musk said, don't do it. Don't do it. Trump looked tiny yesterday. He looked like a very little man.
The shadow president, Elon Musk. But the daddy they really fear and the daddy who really leads them right now. Donald Trump looks tiny right now. He looks small compared to Elon Musk.
First, welcome to the Elon Musk presidency.
This is an unelected oligarch who appears to be running our government.
Okay, I thought Joe Biden was the president. I mean, technically, isn't he still the president? But it's obvious what they're trying to do there, and I'll talk about it in one second.
But last night, my first guest today, Steve Bannon, spoke about what the Democratic Party should expect from the incoming administration when President Trump actually takes office, when he, Bannon, appeared at Turning Point's America Fest in Phoenix. And typically for Steve, he did not hold back.
political class is infected with a malignant cancer. That cancer is bipartisanship. Was there any bipartisanship in Scott Pressler going around for the last four years and changing the makeup of the electorate in Pennsylvania or in Arizona? Was there any? No. The conversation is over. President Trump
came back from the political dead, and on the shoulders of the most powerful populist movement in the history of the world, brought in every demographic, every ethnicity, every gender in every part of the country, and won a landslide victory. All the battleground states, every demographic, and the popular vote. We have nothing else to discuss.
It's only about the execution of President Trump's plan. All we hear in the mainstream media is how they have to have quiet time. They got psychologists over at the State Department patting them on the head. They're too tired. There's no resistance because they can't take it anymore. Fuck you. We're going to go win.
Steve Bannon joins me now. He's host of War Room, which you can watch on Real America's Voice, Rumble X and all podcast platforms. He's also a former chief strategist for President Donald Trump. For those of us who have been holding our breath for the past several months, we can finally exhale in the wake of this presidential election, right?
Work can finally be done on the major issues that this country's facing, and one of the most significant is our national debt. Look, the fact is our nation's broke, and that debt is a house of cards that cannot be quickly dismantled by anyone. So the strategy remains the same when it comes to your investments. You might wanna diversify your savings. Virtually all the experts say that's a good idea.
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Thank you, Megan. Thank you for having me.
Great speech, and thank you for embodying what many of us are feeling there, especially at the end. It's like, okay, spare me on the unity. That's what Joe Biden promised us when we took office. We knew he didn't mean it. You're advocating a more honest approach. No.
Exactly. You know, it was totally phony about what they reached out to in 2021. They were trying to crush people with lawfare, bankrupt them, debank them. We just won a sweeping mandate, and it's time to execute the mandate.
I mean, one of the reasons you have this fiasco on Capitol Hill in the last 48 hours is still the reflex position or the default position of our political class on the conservative and Republican side is always to reach out and to work and really submit to the Washington cartel mentality. And President Trump, we want a mandate.
It's only about executing, and we don't have a lot of time to get ready for that. Like you said, we're 30 days away, and we got to get on it like day one. I mean, his list of to-do is just huge, and that's what the focus should be, not this phony unity. Look, to me, they...
essentially are telling you the 2020 election was stolen for the simple reasons that they're treating Trump like the president all over the world. Biden has kind of faded. Now you have articles coming out in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times. Well, he never really was president. He was infirmed from day one. They knew it. Nobody invoked the 22nd Amendment. So
This is, to me, Megan, look, I think we're partisans. We should go ultra-partisan, at least for the first six months to a year, to get the agenda done and no prisoners.
All right. Let's spend a minute on what's happening on Capitol Hill, because it's confusing, I think, to the average person who does not pay a lot of attention to continuing resolutions or these end of year budget wars that always seem to wind up the same way with them saying, just fund it, just fund it under the same terms as we've been funding it.
So in a nutshell, what's happening is we're going to run out of money to fund the government. They tried, including Speaker Johnson, spearheaded an effort to try to continue the existing funding, but with some hikes like pay hikes for Congress and ongoing funding for some very controversial organizations, but just to sort of kick the can down the road to March. And the
The Republicans, some 30 of them in the House who never vote for these, who just always say this is so irresponsible. What are we doing? We have enormous debt and deficits. We're not going to support this. Necessitated Speaker Johnson, he would say, reaching out to some Democrats to get approval for this bill. That necessitated Republicans.
all these spending extravaganzas because they won't support it unless they get some of their favorites in there. And the whole thing wound up a very ugly nightmare that was about to be shoved through. And then Vivek and Elon, who are running Department of Government Efficiency, Doge's extra-governmental watchdog on spending, stepped in to say, what are we doing? Why are we doing this?
And that there was blowback. And then Trump dropped in with another message, which I'll get to in one second. Anyway, the whole thing blew up. It all blew up. And now they might have a new deal that's like a very slimmed down version of all this. But for the people at home who are lost already with me, with this back and forth, Steve, what is the bottom line? What do they need to know?
But here's what I think is important. The fiscal year of the government runs out on September 30th. The appropriations of the budget all should have been done because of the election year, the kind of Republican establishment wanted to kick the can down the road. So they started with the CR even on October 1st.
And what we know from October and November, from the numbers that have been put out by the government, we've had the two biggest deficit months in recorded history. $674 billion of deficits in the first two months are going to be almost $800 billion to $1 trillion in the first 90 days of this fiscal year.
Right now, we're adding about a trillion dollars of new debt through deficits every 100 days. I called this a year ago, and this is what's happened. The projection, Megan, for 400 days from now, basically the one-year anniversary of President Trump's inauguration of the 20th, is $40 trillion in debt.
So in that context, this whole thing of another CR, because people would just say, let's get this thing sorted now. The CR was to kick it into past January 20th.
So President Trump would have an attempt with Russ Vought at OMB, in Vivek, in Elon at Doge, to actually come up with the House members and actually come up, because all taxes and all spending have to come from the House, according to the Constitution, that President Trump would have a thing to, so this is going to be a very simple kick it into past 20th and maybe give them a couple of months.
Let's say March. Because we hate CRs. What happened, and you saw Johnson spending all this time with Elon and he's going to UFC, he's walking into the UFC. He's at the Army-Navy game in the box. He's spending a ton of time with President Trump in Mar-a-Lago and with Vivek and Elon. And what happens is he drops this thing the other day that needs to be voted in 24 hours. It's 1,500 pages. It is.
And remember the CR itself, because when you do continue resolutions, you're just basing it upon the approved spending from the previous year. So the CR in, in, in for the 90 days in any one quarter is about a half a trillion dollars in spending or almost, you know, on top of that, he layered on new spending of about $300 billion. This is a 800, almost a trillion dollar package. So, but worse than,
80% of it was Hakeem Jeffries. And if you look at the 1,500 pages, you're a lawyer. This is a highly negotiated legal document. It's ready to be made into a law, not an executive order. This is a law. It's 1,500 pages in total giveaway to the Democrats. I mean, biolabs in Ukraine, more stuff on the pandemic, more stuff backing Fauci.
The Global Engagement Center, the thing that you and Mike Benson and others ran about all the time, that's fully funded for another year. This was 80 to 90 percent of Democratic priorities. And now we know, as we peel it back, that Schumer, McConnell, Hakeem Jeffries basically negotiated with this guy, and he didn't tell anybody.
The problem is he dropped it on people, another $800 billion in spending. Nobody planned on, never got Trump in the loop, never got Vivek and Elon in the loop. And then lied about it even on Fox. He goes on Fox and Friends in the morning, says, well, I'm going to message Shane with Vivek and Elon.
And I walked him through that we only have a couple of votes in the House and they're all fine with this. Well, they weren't fine with it at all. And the more you peel it back, it's terrible. So that got thrown out. And then you had this whole fiasco.
And President Trump, I think, feeling he wasn't being dealt with straight, started to put some demands, particularly said, I want to increase the debt ceiling. I don't want to get too technical, but there's a number of instruments called reconciliation that will take place early in President Trump's second term that the debt ceiling issue can be incorporated in there.
And I hope what they're doing, first off, if this has got to be what it is to shut the government down. Let's just shut it down and wait till Trump gets there. And they're going to try to extract as much pain on the American people. They're going to tell TSA to go home, although TSA are vital personnel. They're going to shut down the airports over Christmas.
I mean, Biden would extract a lot of pain from the American people. But I think you've got to say at some point in time, enough is enough. Now, it turns out, Megan, up there, I think what they're intended now is it looks like they're going to break it down into three groups. separate bills, a clean CR that just kicks it like they should, just 90 days with nothing.
It just says we're going to continue the spending, kick it out to March 20th, which was the original plan. Then this farm bill, because the farmers are under pressure and the banks, they're not getting paid. It'll be a separate bill, 10 or 20 billion for the farmers. And then the last will be the relief of FEMA, which normally would have to have an offset because we have tough decisions to make.
And I'm not sure the FEMA money is not there. They're just not paying it. Biden's just
putting the 110 billion 110 billion what normally we would have offsets for that that's an offset measure but because in the hurry and i said listen this is how you get 40 trillion of debt but and i'm not so sure fema doesn't have the cash right now i think that's a biden regime putting the screws to maga in western north and western north carolina and florida
But be as it may, there'll be a separate vote on that. And what I understand the latest, just when I sat down with you, is that the cuts and offsetting cuts and the deaths that will be dealt with in the first reconciliation, which will be about the border. And I would hope that that's there in the 20th. Bottom line for your audience.
have a very dysfunctional system and johnson's got to go maybe we can talk about that but it's not just individuals not just personnel we have a systemic problem and the systemic problem is we are like a heroin addict we are addicted addicted to federal spending it's the cause of inflation and it's going to destroy this country of everything trump's got to do stopping these endless wars
seal the border and deportations of the 12 to 15 million. The one that's the toughest is to the intervention to break the addiction to spending and to get our hands around, to get our arms around this out of control, you know, budget and national debt. Or when you're around the Christmas tree with your husband, look at your children and just understand that we're passing them
a catastrophe and a crisis that will make 2008 in the great depression look like garden parties.
Part of the problem is, you know, most of the spending is on entitlement spending and no, no politician, including Trump wants to touch that Medicare, Medicaid, social security.
When politicians tell you that, that is a problem. Listen, the little guy out there, he has one thing. He has a contract. Here's a contract for Social Security. It's $1,200 a month, and he's got the Medicare. It ain't a lot, but it's what he's got. And he's not going to give it up. Look at this fiasco the last 40 hours.
Why would you trust a politician and say, look, just let's get into the entitlements. We're going to sort it out. The people that say that, the politicians say that, don't want to do the hard work and discretionary spending. We have $1.5 trillion of discretionary spending, right? You have to attack that. You have to start that. Yes. You have to start there.
And look, I was a naval officer for eight years. I spent four years at Sea Under Destroyer. My daughter, as you know, is a West Point grad that served in Iraq. We're hawks, but we're not endless war hawks. You've got to start with the Defense Department. The Defense Department's budget has to be cut. It just has to. You can't have a tree. We have now an NDAA at $900 billion. We can't afford it.
The social programs have to be restructured. Once we get discretionary spending and people see that we're serious, we're serious people, and it's going to be pain. There's no doubt there's going to be pain. There is going to be pain. All the easy decisions were 10 and 20 years ago. We now have a balance sheet, 36 trillion in debt, increasing by a trillion dollars every 100 days.
So all the easy things are gone. It's now down to the heart. Inflation is not going to go away while you have this massive spending because the debt increases and you've got to refinance a third of it every year. The math here is not that complicated. It's the political will. And hopefully, President Trump, he's got Scott Besson, he's got DeRozan, he's got a great team. But
People that back President Trump and people that are coming to our movement now, particularly working class African-Americans and Hispanics, have got to understand that the country needs a reorganization economically and particularly about this federal government or We're not going to be a republic in another decade. You saw this from what the assassination on the street.
They shot a guy in the back. Some rich kid shot a guy in the back. And if you look online, 95 percent of these of these kids online, that's their living experience. I'm not saying it's proper. I'm saying that's. Where it is, we have two choices in this country.
We need to go down this MAGA revolution, this populist nationalist revolution that's peaceful, that's now getting more and more people involved in it, more and more ethnicities, more color, more races, and more economic groups, the working class, medical class. Or you're going to have a French revolution. You can see it coming. And you can see, particularly for them, a cold-blooded assassination.
So... The stakes couldn't be higher. And that's why this Christmas, I hope everybody steps back and really thinks where we're going with the direction of this country.
So interesting.
Well, Elon stepped in and objected to what Speaker Johnson was about to do, and it appears to have halted it and gotten it slimmed down to what you just said, this more three-point plan, taking care of the farmers, the hurricane relief, and just booting this whole, you know, CR thing, the continuing resolution until a couple months after Trump takes office, where they'll have to deal with it then.
But in the meantime... As I said in the intro, the left seems to smell an opportunity here of dividing Trump and Elon. They've been doing it for a while. They see that Elon's been quite a presence at Mar-a-Lago and on President Trump's initial meetings. And they know exactly that Trump has a big ego, like every president.
And they're trying to manipulate him psychologically by saying, oh, really, Elon's the president. Really, he's truly the president. He was tweeting about it himself. One second, let me find it on my phone. Elon was today and seemingly unhappy about the manipulations that we're seeing. So here's what happened first. It was...
Pramala Jayapal, a member of the squad, who tweeted out, it's not clear who's in charge. She's got a picture of Elon at the Resolute desk. And it's not President-elect Donald Trump. Shadow President Elon Musk spent all day railing against Republicans' CR, succeeded in killing the bill, and then Trump decided to follow his lead.
Then somebody retweets this and says, for awareness, note the language here. It's very intentional strategy. The goal is to weaken Trump and Elon by fomenting tensions between them, by jabbing Trump about not being the alpha. The idea is to provoke him, to sideline Elon and to fray the relationship. And Elon retweeted that saying, that is exactly the goal.
The political and legacy media puppets all got their new instructions yesterday and are now parroting the same message to drive a wedge between Donald Trump and me. They will fail. You agree that's the strategy right now?
That is the strategy. I want a different one thing. I think that also because we're a populist movement and like even when I went to prison, it's next man up. When the history of this age is written, They're not going to talk about Elon Musk or Tucker Carlson or Steve Bannon or Megyn Kelly or Roger Ailes or, you know, Sean Hannity or anybody. They're going to talk about Trump, the age of Trump.
And they're going to talk about this movement, this populist movement, this MAGA movement. It was a reaction of the people. Now, Elon was out and ahead of it. But the revolt from the folks, as soon as they understood what was going on, was enormous. And they blew up their congressmen on the phones and with the text messages, et cetera. Now, to Elon.
What he's, I think, presented and offered to the country is pretty extraordinary. We've talked about deconstructing the administrative state now for eight or 10 years in the Trump movement. Before that, Megan, you always know that all the conservatives wanted limited government, a small government. Nothing happened. The government expanded until President Trump came along.
The government was just out of control. What Elon Musk gives you in Vivek is a very sophisticated way to go about this and to bring all the best management techniques out of Silicon Valley and kind of the modern American entrepreneurial enterprise. And that is unique and extraordinary. And we've got to put that to work.
What the media is trying to do is obviously trying to separate these two guys and make them a competition. And nothing could be further from the facts. And what's happened over the last 48 hours is they broke the traditional, the 1,500-page, $350 billion giveaway to the political class and to their clients and their puppet masters. And so I thought this was extraordinary.
We just have to make sure with the new ecosystem on the right, your show, the streaming services, the new radio programs, the the social media, particularly using Twitter as a platform and other platforms. We just have to make sure we get the word out there. Our audience, like your audience, they hunger for details. They hunger for the receipts. They hunger for the facts.
They want to use this part of their agency. So it's more incumbent than ever that we really deliver more information, more facts, and make it actionable so that people can use our agency. So I feel pretty good about it. I think President Trump laughs this off, but you should see that to me that's kind of a last – if that's what the best they got to play – Bring it.
If the best you got to play is that there's two Sun Kings and only one sky, right? If that's what you got, then bring it. Because I think Elon and President Trump have a great relationship. Elon put real money to work on the ground game. He didn't come in, as you've seen him so many times, Megan, particularly when you were at Fox, all these donors come in, they want all these fancy advertisements.
He came in and put money in back of working class people going door to door. I think he understands fully what's going on. And I expect great things out of this.
I watch him with Trump at these events. And I think one thing, if Trump did not want him there, he would not be there. Trump's not shy about kicking anybody out of his orbit. And if he doesn't want to share these events or the spotlight with Elon Musk, he'll tell him to get out. Trump is not a shrinking violet.
Even though Elon's huge and really helped him out, I mean, I think he understands Elon supports the movement. It's not all about one man. It's about the movement. So he has an ally, I think, probably for life there. It's not to say there could be no personality clashes, but the media is clearly trying to drive a wedge between them. And I think it's great Elon responded on the record.
Let me follow up on something you said about Speaker Mike Johnson. So the conventional analysis is that he was doing pretty well prior to this, that he had managed to make himself into one of the critical Trump orbit people, that when we saw pictures tweeted out at the UFC events of the so-called Avengers, you know, Tulsi, Elon, Vivek, J.D., Trump. He was in there.
He was kind of like the extra, like in the back, and me too, me too. And that even the political convention now is a big change for him in 24 hours, and he's probably not going to survive as speaker. So you said he's got to go. Why?
Well, first of all, he lied to everybody. It's a bald-faced lie. Look, I took a lot of grief early. I think it was – It all blends together now. The first morning of this, when the 1500 people said, oh, you know, no, he's Trump's speaker. Trump loves this guy. He's very close to Trump. And I told people this is like about 20 people contacted me because I was coming out off the chain on this thing.
I said, I know President Trump. He's going to love him until he doesn't love him. And when he understands all the facts that he was lied to and misrepresented, and Johnson dumped this thing, 1,500 pages of a $350 billion giveaway to Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer and Mitch McConnell. Once he understands the facts, he's not going to be in love with him when the guy can't deliver.
He wants people that can deliver in the billets that they have. And Johnson is, you know, he kind of came as a compromise after after McCarthy. McCarthy. Remember, McCarthy was turfed out about the same topic spending. So, no. And I wasn't sure about taking him on because. What we have now, Megan, with this CR, these are baby steps. This was supposed to be so easy.
To bring a clean CR, the hardest core of the ultra-mega fiscal conservatives would agree, and we hate CRs, but kick it down the road clean until President Trump comes in and then vote. The entire team can work with it. We're good with that. We will hold our nose and do that this time. This is a baby step.
Compared to what has to happen starting January 20th, not just the investigations ending these wars, deporting 15 million people, the fiscal and economic issues before us are...
almost catastrophic president trump can thread the needle but you needed to be like the british call it a close-run thing you all have to be in sync you all have to have communications nobody can hide the football here's how bad they did it in this 1500 as you mentioned in your opening monologue
They included a pay raise from themselves from $173,000 to $243,000, plus they got out of paying anything for Obamacare. And they weren't upfront with it. They stuck that in the 1,500 pages. I think that was tucked into a paragraph on page 900. They tried to slip that in there without being upfront and saying, hey, we haven't had a COLA increase.
I'm not saying you give it to them, but if they came and presented it like adults, hey, we haven't had a COLA increase in 15 years. People need to do this because they can't pay for their kids to go to school. The American people said, well, no, you're not getting a pay raise, but at least you would have understood it. They tried to hide that. That's that Washington mentality of hide the football.
So, no, Johnson's got to go. The important thing for your audience, we have a deeper problem than just one guy. It's just like in taking the government apart and deconstructing. This is not about all these memes out there about you're fired. It's not about people, and it's not about research into the sex of crickets at Iowa State University. This is billets and programs.
Programmatically, departments, billets, you know, boom. This has to be big hunks of stuff that we're just not going to do anymore. It's the scale and scope of a nanny state and the scale and scope of an American empire that our founders and framers never bought into. So Johnson's a...
a symptom of the problem he's not the problem himself but he there's no doubt he's got to go in fact i would our audience today would support a short term that just kicked to january 3rd to remove him a speaker, and then get a new speaker, and then come back and try to cut these deals.
Now, Matt Boyle, as we came on your show, Matt Boyle just reported, I think there's 25 now congressmen that are saying that absolutely under no circumstances will they vote for Mike Johnson. So he's politically, he's yesterday's news. He's history.
Senator Rand Paul was suggesting a new Speaker of the House could be Elon Musk. It doesn't actually under the Constitution have to be a sitting member of Congress. Is there any world in which that happens?
It is under the Constitution, though, that you have to be a natural born citizen to be president. Remember, the Speaker of the House is doing the line of succession. Now, I asked Mike Davis about this because this came up yesterday. MTG did this and Rand Paul. And Rand Paul is a very serious guy. He could take. the billet. You don't have to be in Congress.
You don't have to be a natural born citizen to actually take the bill of Speaker of the House.
If an issue came up a succession, but the vice, you know, the something had the president, the vice president couldn't take it to come to the speaker that you would have in there that would get kicked immediately to the president pro tem of the Senate, which is the third in line of succession, and they would take it. But no, hey, I'm open to I'm open to any
I actually happen to think it's a certain elegance to that because of the because of the situation with Doge and how Doge is going to participate, this, et cetera. I think Elon said I think he's already said he he's not interested, but it's that outside the box thinking.
I kind of love right now because we have to think outside the box and we have to be able to do extraordinary things in an extraordinary time.
Yeah, Elon's pretty busy doing all the things that made him Elon to begin with, but I like it too, just as an idea, just bringing in an outsider to take a look at that organization, same way where he's looking through Doge at the government and say, this thing's all messed up. It hasn't been running well for 20 years.
I would be very comfortable with Megyn Kelly as speaker. I mean that. No, you know, you have no because you have common sense. You're tough as nails and nobody's going to be able to BS you. Right. So I'm all in for that. And I'm serious. Kelly, they put up Megyn Kelly and said, hey, we want Megyn Kelly down there. And I think it's time we had a conservative to right wing woman in charge of things.
I'd be very supportive of that. In fact, I may I may I may throw that out this afternoon on my show. Yeah. Okay, I'll run that by the mister. Trump would support it 100%, no doubt about that.
I mean, the one comfort I've had is, you know, I certainly could, I'd be the smartest person there. So that's exciting. I'm very concerned about the people getting elected to our Congress today. All right, let's keep going. What's going to happen with Trump's cabinet picks? Because they already got one scalp, Matt Gaetz. They were dangerously close to getting Pete Hegseth.
Could still happen, but they don't love RFKJ. They're saying Tulsi is a spy for Russia. So what's going to happen?
And they're not crazy about cash at FBI, which is, you know, in your legal background, how important that is. Look, to me, it's very simple. And I'm very upset that Gates was allowed to drop out or dropped out or whatever, because he did. He did provide a function. He drew fire from everybody. We wouldn't know his full name if Matt Gates was still there, which I think happened.
Listen, it is about President Trump picked a team. He wants that team. And this is why I threw in so hard for Pete last week. I mean, you know, Pete from Fox. We threw in so hard for Pete last week because they were talking about Ron DeSantis. And my point was, hey, you can't have your first two out of the box. You can't let them take out. If we do this, they're going to get to Tulsi.
They're going to get to Bobby Kennedy. They're going to get to cash. And then all of a sudden you've got, and you hear him talking on TV, what they want to do is normalize Trump. They want to take Trump away from the, he's a blunt force instrument that's giving blunt force trauma to the system. And that's what we need right now.
We need that armor-piercing shell, and he needs his people up in back of it that have a kind of an angle of attack on this thing. And so to me, you've got to lock in hard And you got to push everybody over. This is why I say flood the zone.
When the new Congress is sworn into the third, I would tell them we're going to do the confirmation hearings on the fourth and get all six or seven or eight of them up there and let's get on with it. Let's flood the zone. Let's overwhelm the system and continue on the system. I want to be on offense here. I want to be pushing the football. I want to be moving the chains.
Sometimes it gets a little too passive. And we let the media, as you know, this is an information war. When you let them get
and start leaning into it and not on their back foot they're going to crush you because they have all these massive apparatuses right we we don't have that we have a we have audiences and we have audiences of activists that will turn out and not go suck their thumb because we're going to have some you're not going to win everything the power we have is the resilience of working class and middle class people that are down for the fight this is why we should be on offense all the time and i hope
that they pick up the pace a little bit on these nominations and really force their will on the Senate to get these things done. Have your confirmation hearings, but let's get on with it. And I would love to have President Trump, at least half the cabinet, at least the national security and finance guys, all approve by the time President Trump takes the oath.
And then right after that, bang, bang, bang, you just swear in, you know, 10 to 12 people.
So talk about the more moderate, in quotes, Republican senators who are risks. You've got Collins and Murkowski. You've got McConnell, who can't stand Trump. And then you've got Ernst, who I realize her language has changed around Pete. But I have to tell you, Steve, I've got real doubts about whether she's ultimately going to vote for him. I don't think she's a yes yet.
I think all I've heard her say she's going to do is commit to seeing him through the hearing. And I don't even know if she cares about her political future in the way the average animal in D.C. does. So I don't know. What do you think?
I agree with you. I think I think there's some issues. I keep saying that no one should be just because we had a good week with Pete. And I think he's making a fine impression up there. Look, it's pretty extraordinary. Folks should know for a part for people because the Constitution, it is advice and consent that the Senate has.
is essentially built after the House of Lords when we formed the Republic, has really been the Human Resources Department. One of their big functions is judges and U.S. attorneys and obviously all the, you know, 1,000 of the 4,000 people that come in to run a new government. 1,000 of those are Senate-confirmed. That's a huge, and that's what they're supposed to do, their due diligence.
So the advice and consent they can do. I'm very worried. And people say, oh, no, these guys are going to get through now. It's pretty extraordinary to have a party when you're in charge of the Senate to actually vote against nominees. It's pretty extraordinary. It's only happened a handful of times. So I think I think but given custom and tradition, this shouldn't happen.
But I have the same fear you have that people are lying in wait. Now, number one, as you just mentioned, who's in cycle? You know, the Tillis's of the world and the Cassidy's and the Joni Ernst. There you have to put where you have to is maximum political pressure, right, on the possibility of primaries or ultimate defeats. And for the rest, I think you've got to get up close and personal.
President Trump is going to have to work this. This is one where I don't think he should have gotten involved in the House and he got sucked into it because of Johnson's incompetence and malfeasance on this one. He's going to have to – at the end, he's going to have to whip some votes.
And I think there's going to be some horse trading at the end, that some people are going to get some stuff to get these through. But listen – President Trump is an extraordinary character, unique in American political history. That cabinet is extraordinary. You've got Bobby Kennedy from Democratic Royalty.
You have Tulsi Gabbard, who I think the world of, who is a Democratic congressman and kind of a progressive, but principally, one of the leaders of the American First Movement as overall intelligence, where even the CIA reports to her.
You have Pete Hegseth, who's a combat vet, but we've never had a combat vet at that age actually run the Pentagon that's now the biggest industrial complex in the world. You have Kash Patel, who I think has a tremendous record in counterintelligence, terrorism, all that, which you need in the FBI, but has made a point that he's going to restructure the FBI.
And quite frankly, he sees that there are going to be a number of areas that we have to do serious investigations on. So these are all outside the box picks. And that means you're going to have to do some. It's a heavy lift, but you have to do it.
I think President Trump will eventually be involved here and actually whip in the votes as we get down to the end, because I share your absolute concern that this is a long way from over, folks.
I really think when it comes to Pete, the key is, yes, political pressure on some of them. But McConnell, I don't know if that would work on him and Ernst, same thing. But I do think somebody like Joni Ernst cares deeply about what the rank and file troops think and want.
I actually do think even if she's thinking I've got reservations, if she hears from enough rank and file guys and gals that they want him, they want an actual soldier, an actual warrior to take over and look out for them. she could be persuaded by that. And it's starting to happen. You're starting to see more and more do it.
Also for your audience, I do not, at the end of the day, I think you're going to have one or two Democrats, folks. Watch Fetterman. Watch Fetterman, who had many America First and MAGA leanings. He's obviously got some very progressive stuff on the social side, but his position on the takeover of U.S.
steel by the Japanese, a lot of his economic positions, this guy wrote Kahane in the House, but particularly Fetterman in the Senate. He's very pro-Israel. He supports President Trump's policies in the Middle East. Fetterman could be a guy That and I think you already said it was Pam Bond. He's already said somebody he's already met with and he's a yes.
I see him as a potential yes on a Tulsi Gabbard. Right. I see him as a potential yes on a Bobby Kennedy. So Fetterman and maybe one other Democrat may be there to give you some headroom that you not normally have and not be held up by Mitch McConnell. I mean, Mitch McConnell is is going to have a gun to her head on this thing. There's no doubt about that.
He's shown enormous courage, Fetterman, in dealing with the Israel issue. He does not care how many people protest outside of his home or his office. He runs out there with his Israeli flag. He's in your face about it in a way that I think a lot of people admire. So yeah, he could be one to watch. All right, let's talk about agenda.
You mentioned at the top, I mean, how long do you think Trump has to really get things done?
Six months outside a year. But the first 100 days, first six months, you've got to be getting all three. He's got to personally get involved in the bringing to a conclusion the Ukraine war. And I think also this Middle East situation, particularly with the Persians getting close to a nuclear weapon, as he warned about.
And I think on the border, the first reconciliation, Miller and Homan, the deportations, building the wall. and then the financial and economic crisis. He's got, I think, outside a year, I would put it as, for planning purposes, 100 days to six months, you've got to get on with it. And I mean, this is my point. You've got to be driving this thing every day.
I wouldn't even take off, if we were on the team, I wouldn't even take off Even Christmas Day now, I'd be grinding every second of every day because they're lying in wait. And remember, they're going to put a billion dollars in the back of Hakeem Jeffries to flip a handful of seats in the House on the House side in 26.
And the first thing Hakeem Jeffries is going to do because he promises it to his donors is impeach Trump. We're not out of this. We're far from being out. Even everything we accomplished. extraordinary you and everybody on the media side in this new ecosystem, inspiring people, the people coming out and do it.
This is a people's victory, but November 5th, you got to understand that's just like that gets you to the table to start the fight. And it's going to be brutal. They're going to pull out. They have, they will pull out every stop. You've already seen this and what they've tried to do, president Trump and their goal and objective is to flip the house and
In two years, and Hakeem Jeffries, the first thing he'll move is impeachment on Trump and maybe many people in the cabinet. So folks have got to understand this is a political war. And we're at the very beginning of this. Don't think the great work we did on November 5th means anything to these people. They could care less.
They're going to fight with every tool they have and legal tool, political tool, information tool, deal from the bottom of the deck, do things that are unfair. So it's – and I'm not even talking about our foreign enemies, the Chinese Communist Party, the Persians, the KGB in Moscow. This is – and, oh, by the way, you've got 10 to 15 million illegal aliens just on Biden's watch.
I'm not even considering the people here before just on his watch. So – Stakes are high, let's say six months to the outside.
How does he do it? How does he attack immigration in particular? Because what we'd love to see, of course, is an actual law, an actual law that tightens the procedures that make sure some of these Trump policies become law and the next president has to abide by them, especially if it's a Democrat. But we don't have 60 votes in the Senate. We only have 53.
which makes it tough because the Democrats could filibuster it. Maybe, maybe not, given that the temperature on immigration is so hot right now and even Democratic voters wanted to see a crackdown. But so what exactly on immigration do you want them to do?
This is what gets back to this concept called reconciliation. They have this thing, it's too technical to get into, but there are this instrumentality called a reconciliation where you don't have to get cloture in the Senate. You don't have to get the 60 votes. It's majority. They come up every so often as kind of a reconciliation of the budget.
They're technically – you've got to really thread the needle to use them. But we actually have the ability to do two reconciliations as currently interpreted, I think, by the parliamentarian in this – after Trump is – takes office. And the talk is – to use one reconciliation immediately right after his inauguration. And that is solely for the purpose of the border and immigration.
And you only need 51 votes. So you get the change that you need, right? And this is legislation. So Trump hits you with 50 executive orders, just like we did in 16, and like Biden did to reverse it. So you've got all these executive orders, unwinds, all the madness of Biden. You've also got a reconciliation bill that you jammed through with the majority.
And that's got not just some changes, but as importantly, it gives Holman and Miller some real power. You're not going to – it's nowhere in these budgets to start the deportation of these people. People are saying it's going to cost $800 billion a year. It's not.
But they at least get some powder to build the wall, to do other security in the border, to help in those areas in the southern border and actually in the cities because every – Every town's a border town now. Every state's a border state. So it's taking on the sanctuary cities. There's resources and money in a law that's done. And that's done day one, I hope, by the 20th.
That's what they should be working on or shortly thereafter. And that gives and that begins the process. I also think and we can't be fantasists here. You know, I want all 12 to 15 million gone, not just the criminals. I think you start there. I believe you have to have a sit down. And some of this is happening behind the scenes. You have to go to the frontline countries in Central America.
You have to get the Mexicans involved. And she's already said in the last 24 hours, I'm prepared to take guys back. But you have to sit down with them and work out arrangements that, you know, even economically are going to help here because we're going to be sending a lot of people back. And we're empathetic people, right? We're not cruel people.
We're just not going to do this and give them a bus ticket. It's not going to work like that. And you want to take that club out of the media's hands. I think he does some sort of summit, Mar-a-Lago, Rio Grande Valley, you pick it.
But we start a formal process of how, beyond the criminal element, you start getting these people to take back, you include, I think, a couple of South American countries, like, for instance, where the Haitians, hundreds of thousands of Haitians have been there. There's a way to do this. The guy you want in a room to do that is Donald Trump. This is a big deal.
You get reconciliation, you get money, start a formal process. Trump gets guys in the room. You start the second formal process. By the time you're six months to nine months into this by Labor Day, we've got traction. This is happening, right? The border's sealed. People are not coming across. We stopped playing the games on the migrant situation, asylum. All those games are stopped.
And you've begun a process of the criminals and the others he talks about from the insane asylums. That's in movement. Plus, countries are your partners to take these folks back and to work it out. And if they don't, Then you talk about the tariffs. You bring the tariffs. You bring economic nationals or access to the American market.
Remember, our market is the most lucrative market in the world for countries. So you have to you got to negotiate. And Trump will use he and Navarro Navarro. And he worked this out in 18 and 19 with the with the Mexican government. So but that that priority is and that's that lane. And that's got to hit. You've got to hit that hard. You got to hit it fast. You got to hit it right away.
Okay, what about investigations? Because we've seen a couple of things bubble up recently. There's been buzz around Liz Cheney, who we now have reason to believe may have behaved inappropriately with a key witness in the J6 hearings. With respect to her attorney, there have been allegations made that she interfered in an inappropriate way. Then you've got Fannie Willis,
whose disqualification was ordered by the Georgia Appellate Court yesterday. Thank God that was the right decision. And there's real questions about the behavior of some of these people who have been the main chief antagonists of Donald Trump. There's a split on whether he should go after them. He said, success is the best revenge. Not sure I'm inclined to do it, but
He's filed lawsuits, at least, against certain media personnel and Ann Seltzer, well, the Des Moines Register. So what do you see happening on the investigation or, quote, retaliation front?
So you have the three lines of work that are major. Stop the wars, get the finance and debt in shape, the economy growing again, and the border. Then you have to have, and this is not about personal revenge, because people in the Financial Times think Susie Wiles is quoted quite rightly, that the best revenge is the golden age of Trump and the sunlit uplands. I agree with that.
However, this is not about Trump. It's not about Steve Bannon went to prison or Peter Navarro or Tina Peters or anything. We have to do this for the country. This can never allow to be happen. This can never, we can't allow this to ever happen again.
The Washington Post, excuse me, the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times, Megan, as you know, over the last 72 hours has been reporting and the Daily Mail puts up a lead. Now from people in the White House, they don't know if Biden was even in charge from day one. The investigations, number one, on the vast criminal conspiracy
from the Justice Department and the FBI to New York State to Fannie Willis to all of it on the vast criminal conspiracy against President Trump with lawfare has to be with complete open sunshine exposure. That has to be investigated. It just does, whether it's at the House, at the Justice Department, and the FBI. But also, we have to get into this entire situation of the Biden White House.
Why was the 22nd Amendment called? We have to never allow these games to be played again. And by the way, on the vast criminal conspiracy, I do believe some media people are going to be brought into that.
Because I think once you start looking at text messages, once you start looking at emails, I think you're going to see that people, there were people, as you know, MSNBC and some of these publications like the New York Times and the Washington Post, that we're in on this. And so I think the investigations, we need this for the American people.
That's kind of a sidebar that's going to take its own momentum. But you see the people he's put in the Justice Department around Pam Bondi. If you see Kash Patel, we're not going to back off. We owe this to the country. This does not have anything to do with going to prison with Liz Cheney, with the illegitimate committee. But we have to get to the roots of what that was. We have to get to J6.
Sunlight. Not security. I call it a fedsurrection. The only way to do it is complete, open, Sunshine.
That's clever. Steve Bannon, what a pleasure. Merry Christmas. Happy New Year. So glad you'll be spending it with your family and not in that ridiculous prison. Great to have you.
Madam Speaker, it's got a ring to it. It's got a ring to it. I've got enough problems in my life, Steve. Irish gal and an Irish gal on top of it. It's got a ring to it.
Happy holidays, my friend. See you in the new year.
Merry Christmas. Thank you, Megan.
To you too. All right, we're on that plan by Doug Brunt, my husband, who's up next. Are you overwhelmed with back taxes or unfiled returns? Well, get ready because since COVID relief ended, the IRS hired 20,000 new enforcement agents proposing millions of pay up notices for 2025. Oh, joy. If you're worried about IRS collection tactics, you don't have to face them alone.
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Empower yourself with Tax Network USA's support and take charge of your financial future. Visit tnusa.com slash Megan today. To round out a big year, I'm joined by the person who's been by my side every step of the way. My husband, Doug Brunt. Hey, Duggar.
Hi. Happy holidays.
And to you, what do you think of a Speaker of the House?
I don't want you to do that.
But our new friend, Steve Bannon thinks I should.
I think you do an excellent job, but I prefer things up here kind of as they are.
You think it would not improve our quality of life?
No, maybe you can zoom in. If you can zoom into the house, that would be great.
It is the kind of job. No, wait, it's not. So on your podcast, which is called Dedicated with Doug Brunt, where you're a writer, you're an author, you talk about books and you talk with famous authors. You always serve a cocktail and you've brought dedicated to us today. What are we having here?
We're having eggnog. I saved the nutmeg till the very end. We can't have soggy. nutmeg with our eggnog. And I actually poured out the very last bit of our Jack Carr Warrior Proof Whiskey here. So Jack, if you're out there, it would be a real Christmas miracle if another one of these showed up.
It's delicious.
The whiskey? Yes. It's great stuff.
It's crazy. It's powerful.
He came on my show and we had that and we were flying by the end of the show. It was an hour and a half of drinking whiskey on the rock.
Yeah, a little goes a long way, but cheers. Merry Christmas, honey. Love you. Thanks for being here.
eggnog is really good warrior proof eggnog and only if you have one cup because it's not about getting drunk we've done that in the air it's about the waistline yeah remember that one year that's right so this is reduced fat eggnog i remember that year you and i were by christmas eve we were like had put on about 15 pounds we were fat yeah we were fat we'd gotten fat and we were looking at each other like something's going on a little different maybe it's the eggnog we've been having it like every
night this is years ago we didn't even have kids yet we were back in our chelsea apartment and uh yeah we realized that even the low fat yeah is has got like 400 calories a glass something ridiculous it was a pretty bloated christmas now we have like well this is a special occasion but now we have one when we like trim the tree yeah that kind of thing yeah gotta gotta save your save your moments there all right so we're getting excited tomorrow we're leaving and we're gonna go to montana which is where we spend the holidays now we've been doing that for what nine years
Yeah, gosh, yeah.
With the kids. And we always have a white Christmas there because whether it's manufactured snow or not.
There's always snow.
There's always snow.
Might not always be skiable, but there's snow.
Last year was not good snow. It was normal. It was natural snow, but it was crappy skiing. But this year we've got La Nina, so I'm feeling pretty good about it.
Yeah, but there's a ton. There was something like 30 inches the other day. So there's tons of snow. Runs will be open, and I think they're getting snow right now.
And tell the audience, have you completed all of your Christmas shopping? Yes.
I did a little today. I've got a little more coming. Yep, I did, truly.
Did you take Thatcher?
He's going later with me.
Our 11-year-old said, Mom, I really want to go down to the main drag there to do some Christmas shopping today. And he needs Doug to take him because he's got to get it done relatively early.
Today wasn't a big shop. It was like a little stocking stuffer for you. Just FYI, doing one thing.
Did you do that because of what's in the news today? There's something in the news today saying seven out of 10 women, moms, you know, and wives wake up on Christmas day to find their stocking empty or they have to do it themselves. Their husband never fills their stocking. And somehow Santa just focuses on the kids.
That was not in response to that. I just, I remember last year I wrote a letter. So this year, you know, it's, there might be something in addition to a letter.
Oh, well, you know how much I love a letter.
Yeah.
There's something in the news today also talking about how Like the vast majority of Americans want to change Christmas traditions. They're kind of over having a turkey and doing what we all do, which is like overbuy or get stressed out by money, whatever, one of those problems. And that one of the things people would prefer is... letters, like handwritten notes to gifts.
It's on the top 10 list of things that people might prefer instead of a gift. I mean, I feel like that was written for me.
Yeah, I agree with that, I think. And you were always that way. You're fine with flowers, but flowers in the absence of a card or something like that is just sort of a... Too perfunctory. And I agree that the turkey thing, that could go. I'm not that big on the turkey. Half of it's always overcooked and dry. And you're like, oh my God, to get this white meat down, you got to cover it with gravy.
Like a burger would be fine. Eat whatever you want on Christmas.
I don't know. I think it has gotten too commercialized. And then you feel all stressed out about getting the right gifts. And by the time you're done, you kind of feel the way you feel when you've overeaten. at a big holiday meal. You know, like I've supported American capitalism and ideally some small businesses. And I think people around me will be happy, but this feels excessive, right?
Like it just always, no matter how big or small you go, it feels kind of just excessive.
It's gone a little hallmarky, but I do love certain movies. Like there is something about a fire and a tree and the smell of pine needles and some of those old movies, like the really old time movies. That is awesome, especially in the run-up. You've got to start those early in December.
So we've got to talk about that. So, so far, our family started right after Thanksgiving with our holiday shows that we watched. We watched Rudolph, which led to a segment on the show talking about what a bully Santa is. And he is a bully in that movie. Santa's gone mean in the Rudolph movie. And then we watched Santa Claus is Coming to Town. You're really more of a year without a Santa Claus guy.
That's true.
Right?
Yes.
What is it about that?
It's memorable. This is foreshadowing for later in the show.
Oh, good tip.
Yeah.
We're going to do the quiz and I don't know a lot of the answers. They just gave me the questions and I was like, actually, this is going to be hard, but keep going.
I love that when it just brings back those memories of lying on the floor. Where I grew up, we had a fireplace. It was a small little family room and there wasn't enough seating for everybody. So a lot of times we just had throw pillows on the floor. We'd all lie on the floor like cats. We watched these old movies by the fireplace and the tree especially made it crowded.
You know, we're all sort of barely fitting in there. But that Heat Miser, Freeze Miser, Year Without a Santa Claus movie, I just love the song as a little kid. And it's just always stayed with me. And even though it's really for the little kids, it brings me right back to those moments of, you know, early, well, sort of mid late 70s of, you know, lying on the floor by a fire in the Christmas tree.
Well, it's funny because I did a segment with the, as you know, the guys from the Rootless program.
Love those guys.
On Best Movie, Best Christmas Movie, our favorite Christmas movie. And they said things like Christmas Story was one of them. Smug went with Godfather, which is not. And Duncan picked Four Christmases, which I had never seen. And you had never seen. You were convinced we had seen it.
Yeah. I was confusing it with another one. Fred Claus, I was confusing it with.
Or The Holiday, which you hated.
That was terrible. Yeah. Oh, my God. That was when John said. John Sharp was like, I wonder what those lucky staffs down in Guantanamo are doing. John is this Australian guy.
After we walked out of that movie together. Anyway, so we watched Four Christmases with Sissy Spacek, Vince Vaughn, and Reese Witherspoon. And it was cute. I liked it.
Yeah. And relatable in some ways. Yeah.
What do you mean?
Just going back to all the different families and all the dysfunctions, like the special dysfunctions that can happen.
I hope they're not watching this.
Well, you know, like fun, beautiful dysfunctions. Not as dysfunctional as that. It was hyperbolic.
Well, one of the people who makes a special guest star appearance in that movie is an EP of it, and it's Ralphie from A Christmas Story.
Oh, yeah, that's right.
Which was, that was, I think, Holmes' favorite movie, if I'm not mistaken. Anyway, or Ashbrook. Anyway, I love it. Yeah, and Holmes was A Christmas Vacation. So this led to a whole thing on the show about favorite Christmas movies and what gets you in the mood. And our viewers wrote in, I asked them what their favorite movies were and wrote in by droves with their various submissions.
And I mentioned how we always watch Christmas in Connecticut and I still love Christmas in Connecticut so much. Barbara Stanwyck and she liked that. Um, Stanley green street, who is, uh, he plays Alexander Yardley.
Okay. Yeah. Yeah.
Um, Anyway, and somebody wrote in, actually multiple people wrote in, if you like those old time black and white movies, and we don't love all of them, but like some of them are great.
There's something so atmospheric about it. It just takes you back and makes you feel a way.
That you should try Shop Around the Corner. So thank you to the audience who suggested that because we watched it early in the morning yesterday and today or two days this week. We woke up super early and we had it on. And it was so cute.
Yeah, that was nice. And I did not make the connection that you later told me about, about You Got Mail. It was the inspiration for that movie. But it had a great, it was a Jimmy Stewart movie that I'd never seen. And there's something so charming about Jimmy Stewart on the screen. Yes. It was awesome.
All right, we have a clip for those of you who have never seen it.
Take a look. Reading Tolstoy's Anna Karenina.
Yes, do you mind?
No, no. I just didn't expect to meet you in a cafe with Tolstoy and it's quite a surprise. I didn't know you cared for high literature.
There are many things you don't know about me, Mr. Kralik.
Uh-huh. Have you read Crime and Punishment by Dostoevsky?
No, I haven't.
I have. There are many things you don't know about me, Mr. Kralik. As a matter of fact, there might be a lot we don't know about each other. You know, people seldom go to the trouble of scratching the surface of things to find the inner truth.
Well, I really wouldn't care to scratch your surface, Mr. Crowley, because I know exactly what I'd find. Instead of a heart, a handbag. Instead of a soul, a suitcase. And instead of an intellect, a cigarette lighter. Which doesn't work.
Well, that's very nicely put.
So the whole premise is that they work together and they don't like each other. Or do they? Because each has a secret pen pal with whom they're having somewhat of a romantic blossoming. And well, if you've seen You've Got Mail, you know how it ends. But you said when we were watching it, there's something really soothing about Jimmy Stewart's voice, like about Jimmy Stewart in general.
Yeah, it's distinctive. His voice is unlike any other voice in the movies. You immediately get it. You know, some people have a fairly like Morgan Freeman's got an amazing voice. You pretty much know his as well. But Jimmy Stewart has one of those. You know exactly who it is. And it it sort of turns you into that that place immediately.
What's amazing is that movie was made in 1940. 1940, think about that. So that's 85 years ago, almost 85. That's incredible. And we were talking, so Doug, we turn it on and it's like, it is charming. So we have a little Christmas tree in our bedroom this time of year, which I love and highly recommend. And in the morning we turn on the lights and we make a coffee.
We have a little coffee maker in the room and And we sit there in our bed and we have coffee and we chat. And it's actually many days, the only time we have to really catch up before everything goes nuts. And this time of year, sometimes we'll put on like a cute movie. I remember last year we watched Serendipity.
Oh, that's right. That was a good one.
That's a great one. Notwithstanding that John Cusack is a prick, but you can suspend your disbelief. And this year, so we were watching that and, And you said to me, the setting's beautiful, we've got a little Christmas tree going, we've got our coffee, the black and white film, and you go, everyone in this movie is dead, even the babies.
Oh, my God. When it when that fact dawns and it's like our mothers were born in this era, you know, and and when that dawns and you know how old it is, you know, how long cinema has been a thing in America. You know, go back to the early days. It's all they're all dead. They're all gone.
Sweet thought, honey.
Yeah. Well, you know.
So they might, the babies might still be alive. But the thing that always strikes me is that you knew my Nana very well, who died at 101, right before Trump was elected. It was 16, October of 16. She was born in 1915, 1915. And I look at that, I'm like, Nana was 25. Someone we've known in our lifetime very, very well was alive and vibrant when this black and white 1940 film was made.
It's weird to think about.
It's totally crazy, which reminds me, the Sikorsky helicopter, people, anyone who's looked at military helicopters. I just met this guy, Igor Sikorsky Jr. He had read the Diesel book and he emailed me and he said, hey, I've got all these stories about my dad. He was a contemporary of Rudolf Diesel. And, you know, let's meet. So I went and went to the New England Air Museum.
And there's a whole Sikorsky wing there. We walked around and got this total, I mean, Igor Sikorsky Jr. walks in there and he's like a rock star. Everybody was running out to meet him. And how old is he? He's 95. And he looks at this photo and he shows me, it's of Tsar Nicholas II, a young Tsar, years before World War I even started. And Tsar Nicholas II is talking to some other man in the photo.
And my new friend, my new pal, Igor points at the man in the photo and goes, there's dad. And I'm like, oh my God, he has some personal connection to so much history going back. And he's like, you know, you really need my brother, Sergei. He's got, he's a treasure trove of information about aviation and the, you know, the interwar period and the pre-war period. I'm like, oh, that sounds great.
And he goes, he turns a hundred in a couple of weeks. He's flying in for the party. I'm like, oh my God, what are these Sikorskis eating?
Right. We need to find out. No, it's funny because you saw him and then you had a second, as we called it, a play date. I'm like, Doug's got another play date with his new best friend. But what a fascinating man.
Yeah.
And you said he was sharp as a tack.
He remembered everything. He was rattling off dates of the interwar period. You know, in 1938, this was happening. In 1928, the Bremen flew across and, you know, they met Babe Ruth at Yankee State. He just knew all this incredible information. It was at the at the ready.
See, now these are the fascinating interactions that Doug has, and he reads amazing books, and then he writes amazing books, like The Mysterious Case of Rudolph Diesel, which you should all buy for Christmas. It's still crushing it. Amazingly, it's still doing so well.
It's still selling pretty well, and events keep popping up here and there that I'll go do. It's gotten a little bit more into the diesel community. I did a trucking uh, radio show the other day. It's been big with the Marine community and yeah. So it's, it's been really fun to see that story get out there.
Yeah. So it's still available for you. It's, it's, it's, uh, available in paperwork too. So you can get paperback so you can get the cheaper version if you want though. It's, it's bargain at any, at any price, mysterious case of Rudolph diesel, by the way, may I just say, I just want the audience to see how much I've I have drunk so far. We're actually having this.
And it's like one tiny, it's like a half an inch of this glass. And I already feel a little woozy. That Jack Carr whiskey is not messing around.
By the way, these are the Al Smith dinner glasses. I don't know if you can tell all that frosting on the outside of the glass now, but.
Oh no, Debbie Murphy just reminded me I have a lot of reads after the show. Don't get drunk. I got to sip it slowly, sip it slowly. It's like we're going into the holiday period. So I got a lot going on anyway. Um, okay. So let's, let's go through a couple of things. I want to go through a story that happened before I get too intoxicated to us yesterday on Christmas gifts.
Oh yeah.
Is this my camera? You guys, I have a lost all focus. This is my camera, right? For the, for the thank you radar. Um, I'm drunk already. I've lost all control of the show. Okay. So I never get Christmas gifts for the kids' teachers. And in my defense, I won't be too much of a sexist pig about it. Doug never does either. Just because I'm the mom doesn't mean it has to be me, right?
Right.
for the record, but let's face it. It's always the moms. So, um, I had dinner with some friends here in town a couple of weeks ago and there were four of us and two were like, you never get gifts for the teachers that like around Christmas. I'm like, no, like never. I'm like, no, my friends were like, oh, okay. They weren't passing judgment. They were, but they were surprised.
And there was another mom there who was like, oh no, me neither. And she's a working mom. And she, and she was like solidarity. Right. But it's stuck in my craw. Like, oh my God, our kids are the only ones going in there. This is bad. I need to get some gifts.
Well, long story short, I decided to get like a bath bomb, you know, like one of those round, looks like chalk bombs that you throw into your bath and it makes into, into this like soothing, fun kind of bubble bath-ish thing. And I had Abby order me the one that I found online so I could try it first, make sure I'm not giving away something disgusting. And then I also saw this thing online.
It was really cute. It was like lab test tubes, you know, like what you'd see in a science lab. And they had these labels on them. Okay. Take that down for now. And, uh, so I tried that out too. And that was the winner. I'm like, that's actually really cute with the test tubes. So Abby bought like a few of them. She had them wrapped. And yesterday the kids were leaving for school.
Yardley was going with you and the boys were going with me. And, and I remembered, I'm like, oh, take your gifts. I've got, I'm on top of it this year. So you and Yardley leave with one for her teacher and the boys each have two female teachers. So they had their two and two. And Thatcher was like, what do you mean test tubes? I'm like, oh, they're, there's like, they look like lab test tubes.
And he's like, well, what's written on them? And I was like, I don't like little messages. Like one said, spirit guide, you know, it's cute. So I pulled up the website just so they could look at it while I was getting them ready and getting myself ready to leave. And I look over at them and Thatcher, who's 11, has eyes like silver dollars. And I'm like, what?
And Yates, who's 15, goes, well, I certainly hope tube number two isn't in the gift. I'm like, uh-oh. What's in tube number two? So I take a look at my own phone that they're looking at. And tube number two reads in big writing, get naked. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Which we almost had our 15-year-old.
I don't want to give her this.
Like,
Oh my God. So now I'm like, it's too late to save Yardley, but I can still save the boys. So I decide there's such nice gifts. I'm actually still excited about my gift that I take out the steak knife and I start to try to perform a surgery on it, Duggar. And I try to get in there. So like, cause I still had my own test kit up in the bathroom. And I was like, there are some innocuous tubes.
I could replace the offensive ones with the innocuous ones. So I send Yates up to get the innocuous tubes. And I was like, I can't do it. There's so many layers. It's been so beautifully wrapped, the tissue paper and then the real paper and lots of tape. And I'm like, I can't, I said, Thatcher, it's probably okay. Don't you think maybe we could just, we could just go with it as is.
Thatcher's like, I don't think it's okay, mom. Please don't make me give that to my teacher. So we replaced the boys with some candles. And Yardley's teacher got the special holiday brunt message of get naked, get drunk, and get drugged.
Yeah.
Happy New Year. I did send her a note, and she was a very, very good sport. She laughed and thought it was hysterical, but... There are some things you have to admit you're not good at, especially when you're a working mom and gift giving is on the list.
You do all the holiday shopping. Kids aren't listening to this, I'm assuming. You do all the holiday shopping around here for us.
It was a lot.
I did a little bit this year. I did some. I did a couple.
Yeah.
You're starting to get angry.
No, no, no. You've offered to help many times, but I don't like it when you help.
You've got your system. I'm happy to see your system soar.
Mm-hmm. Well, the other problem is Doug and I have a philosophical disagreement about Christmas where it's like, I'm like, I like a lot. And Doug's like, these four would make everyone really happy.
Yeah. And they'll get used. There's such a volume with you that they like, you get lost in the amount of presents. They never get used. You see like three years later, there's a closet full of stuff we never opened.
Santa brings a lot already. And I supplement.
That's right.
Because I like the look of excess. It could be something small. It could be like a little Nerf football. But I wrap it because it's just so fun to walk down and see that, you know, big thing under the tree.
Right, like the Who's at a Whoville. There's got to be volume down there.
That's kind of how I feel about it. Okay. Let's talk about, well, the drinks. We do the eggnog. We do, what else? Do we typically have a Christmas drink? Yeah.
You and I, are you talking to me or Debbie?
You.
Yeah. I mean, we have eggnog, kind of right up to it. And then, I don't know, it kind of depends what we're feeling. It doesn't have to be like a special thing. It could be a martini or Manhattan or whatever.
All right. How about special? Is this on my list? Traditions? I don't want to step up.
Are we doing the quiz right now? Let's do the quiz.
Okay.
So here is the instruction. MK, read the questions and give us your answer. Doug, the producers and Peko will confirm if you are correct. Okay. Okay. Number one, what is Doug's favorite Christmas memory? Well, I feel like you might've just told it. Is this with our family or his family or his whole life? Okay.
I guess I should tell you how I answer it. It was like, it's our family... You're never going to get this really. It's sort of.
I know, this is a tough one.
There's too many. You want me to tell you?
Yeah, I give up. I already am failing.
I'll give you a hint. One Christmas Eve. You got a buzzer. Let's see if you can get up to this hint. One Christmas Eve, there was an 11th hour, literally at 11 p.m. Christmas, the one, the only thing that matters. Oh, I know it. I know it.
I know it. Oh, it was terrible. And then it was wonderful.
Yeah.
But this involved Yates.
Yes.
Who we asked, he's our eldest. Now he's 15. But at the time he was like four and we had seen Polar Express and we had asked him like, is there any special thing, any special toy, anything?
And we asked this weeks in advance.
weeks in advance. And he was like, no, no, no. He was little, maybe five. Anyway, no, no, no, no, no. And it was literally 11 o'clock Christmas Eve. And he, he had just like woken up from his slumber and like toddled out. And he was like, I thought of what I want.
And it's the only thing I want. It's the only thing I care about.
And of course we're like the window has closed, sir. And he's like, I want the bell. I want one of silver magic bell from Santa's reindeer from polar express. He had just seen polar express. We were like, yeah, we're screwed. The one thing he wants right down the street from Dwayne Reed. Right. But Dwayne Reed was closed on Christmas Eve and didn't have the Christmas bell. So we were like,
He's not going to get it. This is so sad. Oh, well, you know, he waited too late. Maybe he'll learn in the future, but like it is sad. So then you go to set up the train. We had just bought a train for underneath the Christmas tree. Yeah. And we had purchased a Polar Express train. And lo and behold, in the box was the Christmas Santa's reindeer.
It was a Christmas miracle. Bell.
It was a true Christmas miracle.
Yeah, like the little add-on was a perfect silver bell. Exactly what he wanted. It was amazing.
It's crazy how he's like, he did that for many years.
I think the buzz was unjust. Yeah. You kind of nailed that with like a little help. It was premature. Nice. All right, good.
Okay, the next one. What is the best Christmas gift Megan ever gave Doug? I mean, we don't give gifts to each other.
This goes, all right, another hint goes back years. Think more holistically.
Is this when we first met?
Yeah.
Okay. Was this the replacement of your entire wardrobe?
The entire wardrobe gift that you gave me? Yes, this is that.
When I first met Doug. Oh, yes.
We're two for two.
He was not a good dresser. You've heard the story. yellow golf shirt and high-waisted khaki pants when we first met. This is not an appropriate outfit for anyone's first date. And so, yes, I was extremely generous on our first Christmas, even though I didn't really have much money back then.
Yeah, exactly. So it was box after box of new clothing and new clothing. By the way, so the ending of this story is full vindication for me because you're reading the Wall Street Journal one day. So you would say back then, like, you know, your ex, she was blocking you. She was just trying to make you look bad.
She was sabotaging you for other women by making you wear these terrible outfits. That's why you came to me in that condition.
So for all these years, I'm like, wow, I look so much better now that I'm dressing properly. And then you're reading a Wall Street Journal article that's talking about men's fashion and the low, there was sort of, gold sexy or silver sexy, gold sexy, platinum sexy, and it sort of described outfits at each tier.
And then it gets to black diamond sexy, which is the most sexy you can be as a guy to dress. And under black diamond sexy was literally khaki pants and yellow, it was like a hundred percent, like weirdly, you've always phrased it in this weird way. It even got the phrasing right. It's as though you wrote it. And I'm like, you're the saboteur. You've been sabotaging me for the last 20 years.
So that was, that came around.
That was the funniest thing ever. Okay. Number three, Doug's favorite Christmas song or favorite Christmas movie scene. Well, the movie, I already said that. You're Without a Santa Claus.
Hello, where's my bell? I'm waiting for the ding, ding, ding. There we go.
Favorite song? Oh, I know your favorite song. It's, don't say it. It's by Dean Martin and it's Marshmallow World.
Ding, ding, ding. Oh my God. We're three for three.
A little slow.
It's like we actually know each other. This is not the big Crosby version.
No, this isn't it at all. I just want my ding, ding, ding.
You know, they got the right song. But yeah, you're right.
It's by Dean Martin.
Dean Martin instead of the other thing.
Okay, but thank you for trying, team. Okay, number four. Doug's favorite thing to eat or drink at Christmas. Are we drinking it right now?
Yeah.
Yeah, okay. Oh, my God.
Are we five for five?
Yeah, hello, ding. Where's my ding? Is my team drunk, too? Did you all support for them? All right, five. Traditions from Doug's childhood that he's carried over to your own family. Well. Do we already cover that one or is there something else?
No, I mean, it was- Is it shopping at the last minute? No, it's just like the annual big trip that my- Yeah, no, no, I know about it.
You and your siblings would go to the mall.
Oh, no, that. Well, I meant like a vacation trip, but also that. Oh, I think I ruined the ding.
Okay, okay. Number six, traditions Doug hopes your own children will do with their kids one day. I don't know. I mean, oh, I've got one. I've got one. Is it how they all sleep in the same room the night, Christmas Eve? I mean, even if this is not what you said, I know you believe that you want this. So they sleep in the same room on Christmas Eve.
And then in the morning before they come upstairs to get us, they say a prayer together, which is, they came up with this on their own. They told us about it after a couple of years after doing it. And then they come right to our room and we walk out together.
That's awesome. Yes. That was not the one though. This was more like day to day. This is less Christmas theme. Just, just the fact that we have dinner together as a family, six plus nights a week.
Yeah. Thank you, Dr. Leonard Sacks.
Hopefully they do that.
Yeah. We're reinforcing how important that is. Okay. Um, Let's see. Okay, seven. What are Doug's hopes for the new year? And he always has the same hopes. Like everybody stays well, everybody thrives.
I feel like that counts. I said we stay on the same upward trajectory as a family.
Yeah, see, I'm nailing it. Okay, eight. If Doug could change one thing from the past year, what would it be? Well, I think we'd both like your mom to be feeling better.
Oh my God. You got it right. Yeah. This is going to bring the room down. But I said for both of our moms to be in better health. Yeah. That's amazing. You got that right away.
Yeah.
I guess it's pretty obvious, but not to diminish how amazing it is that you got that.
Well, I have another candidate.
Not good. What?
I have another candidate.
Oh God. Is this where we're going? Yeah.
Oh, my God. This is the best. I'm going to fortify myself for this one. So we went to Scandinavia in June.
A family. We went to Sweden, Norway, and Denmark. And when we got to Denmark, we went to the big amusement park there that everybody goes to. What's it called again? I don't know. We went there. Gardens.
I don't remember. It's the one.
It's the one that Disney World was based on. And... We went on this very, very mild... Already, this is fake news.
Roller coaster. It was rough.
Called the Ruchibon. It was so mild. You didn't even have the shoulder harness. It just had the lap bar where you hold. And there was a man operating it. The brakes required his foot to press the... It was a manual brake. How dangerous could it be, quite frankly? And so... You know how the roller coasters will take your picture when you're on the roller coaster?
Well, it took our picture and we went and saw it on the little screen. And I'm just going to show you the first picture that we saw. We went down to see the screen. Now, here you can see. Oh, Tivoli Gardens. That's what it was. I can see. So you can see there's yours truly. And I'm next to our son, Thatcher. And you can see I'm really enjoying myself. I love the root jabonin.
But you can see Doug is behind me and it's unclear whether Doug is enjoying it quite as much as Thatcher and I are. And they are the two kids who are behind him. And then we scrolled in the list of photos that you could purchase, which I did, by the way. And look at Doug.
You know, as you get older, like the inner ear goes a little.
The horror.
Yeah. You know, I've been developing this nice relationship and friendship with Jack Carr. He's going to see it and be like, I'm out, buddy. I can't, you know.
That's too much, dude. I'm a SEAL.
Lost all respect.
So do you remember how that went for me when I was, like, when you got off?
85.
85. We get off, and we wander over. Like, you know, it was one of the rides. Not every ride has the thing where you can go buy the photos afterward. So we wander over, and you see it on the wall. And that was the end of it. Like, there was no talking to you for like a week. You were doubled over laughing for the rest of the time we were there.
I was at a 90 degree angle.
I'm like, I just need to distract her for like 20 minutes. Because you can only buy it for a certain window of time. I'm like, let's go over that way. And you're like, no, no, no. We're going to buy that photo right now. And then for the rest of the trip, you just, any, like, anything could spark the memory. And you were gone for 20 minutes laughing, doubled over.
At which point I realized you had become my bully.
it's so funny if you guys are listening on Sirius XM or on podcast you've got to go to youtube.com go to about I don't know 90 minutes into the show and look at this picture because it's so out of character for you that's what made it so funny oh nice save thank you truly you're always so composed you're always strong you're always our defender our leader and uh there you were genuinely scared and horrified yeah
Yeah. It was just like, and then, so I, I was like, I can do better. I'm going to go back on that damn thing and I'm going to look composed and good. And I whiffed again. The second time is still like, got me going.
I'm going to send these pictures.
It took me three times to look like I was, you know, enjoying it.
I'm going to send those to the, to the team too. No, it was four times FYI.
Oh my God. Yeah.
Yeah. And, um, yeah, so he tried again and it failed and then, and then, uh, the final time you nailed it.
Nailed it. Yeah.
You look totally, totally comfortable. Um, okay. Stand by. Let's see. Um, Okay. Nine. Finish this sentence for Doug. It's not Christmas without... Hmm. Strudwick eating something he shouldn't be.
Check. Christmas this year already.
Oh, that's a tough one. I don't... Montana? A White Christmas in Montana? The fam?
I can't remember everything I said. I listed a couple of things here, like watching Wonderful Life and watching Family Man with Nicolas Cage.
Yes.
Um... Not good enough. I can't even remember what else I said. Even I failed that one.
Okay, so it's equal. Okay, 10. How early does the family start Christmas shopping? The family. How early does the family? Ladies, how early does the family start?
Thank you for including me.
The family starts maybe like two weeks before because if you wait too long, you can't get anything on Amazon.
Yeah. I think I said within December you start everything.
Yeah. There we go. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you very much. Um, I do think we should talk about it's a wonderful life and then we'll take a quick break because that is one of our family traditions and it, I love it. It's my favorite family tradition. Here is a clip from the wonderful movie. It's a wonderful life.
To my big brother, George, the richest man in town.
remember no man is a failure thanks for the wings that's a christmas present from a very dear friend of mine look daddy teacher says every time a bell rings an angel gets his wings that's right that's right that's right
It gave me a little chill just watching that.
Yeah, Jimmy Stewart at the best.
Right? And Donna Reed is so good. She's so beautiful. So we decided to make the most of this movie. I've told the audience this story before, but for those who don't know, do you want to explain what we do when we watch it as a family?
I mean, this is really you drive this. I love it. And you make sure it happens every year as you do with all this stuff. You make sure the family is doing all the all the good things. But we throw salt. You know, is it Martinelli? What's the name? Martini. Martini. Yeah. So we throw salt and we just have all the traditions and we.
There's a scene where he gets married and they're like, and Donna Reed shows up with Jimmy Stewart. And she's like, you know, bread that this house may never know hunger or salt that they never may never be bland or whatever it is.
And we ring the bells when the angels, you know, all the, all the fun little traditions throughout the movie and the whole, the kids get into it. And it's one of those things that brings us all five together. It's so fun. Really magical sort of Christmas moment.
I went to this a showing of it in Chicago years ago, like 20 years ago with some friends. And we saw them like they did this in the theater. They treated it like the Rocky Horror Picture Show. And I love, love, love. You guys totally do this with your families. So you put on the movie and every time Mr. Potter comes on, what do we do?
You boo. You hiss.
You hiss. Yeah, you hiss. And every time Clarence comes on.
It's a bell.
You ring the bell. And every time.
I love how I'm like the kindergarten. What do you do? What's in comma?
That's exactly right. It's not my inane stupidity as it is with her. It's this Jack Carr whiskey. Anywho, and then we throw salt and we throw bread at that scene where they go visit Mr. Martini and he's getting a home and she does the toast. And I don't know, it's just so fun. The whole thing is like... It's just a fun way to watch the movie and we all look forward to it.
Yeah, it is fun.
That's one of our Christmas traditions.
Jimmy Stewart.
Once again, very calming. All right, stand by, quick break. Back with more right after this. I'm Megyn Kelly, host of The Megyn Kelly Show on Sirius XM. It's your home for open, honest, and provocative conversations with the most interesting and important political, legal, and cultural figures today.
You can catch The Megyn Kelly Show on Triumph, a Sirius XM channel featuring lots of hosts you may know and probably love. Great people like Dr. Laura. I'm back. Nancy Grace, Dave Ramsey, and yours truly, Megyn Kelly. You can stream The Megyn Kelly Show on SiriusXM at home or anywhere you are. No car required. I do it all the time. I love the SiriusXM app.
It has ad-free music coverage of every major sport, comedy, talk, podcast, and more. Subscribe now. Get your first three months for free.
Go to SiriusXM.com slash MK show to subscribe and get three months free. That's SiriusXM.com slash MK show and get three months free. Offer details apply.
Why do the ads seem so funny to me when I've had something to drink?
I mean, you have a great sense of humor. I think you find humor in just about anything.
I do. It's true. OK, so speak. And that is the reason why Strudwick is allowed to remain with our family.
Oh, my God. I know you have to laugh or cry.
Yes. So today he had yet another terrible piece of behavior. Do you care to share?
He ate chocolate-covered popcorn out of a sealed bag.
Someone gave us as a gift.
Yeah, like how do you even smell it out of a sealed bag? But he finds it. He eats it. It's supposed to be life-threatening, but he's indestructible. He's fine. He's totally fine.
He's fine. So this one involves Abigail Finan, their moose munch, who received the gift from one of our friends of the show. And very nice. Thank you, Adam Carolla, by the way. And we really appreciate that.
He'll be thrilled to know Strud enjoyed it.
Well, I mean, you know, honestly, frankly, better him than me because I love that stuff would have gone right to the eggnog. Exactly. And she was like, I don't know what I was thinking. I've got to read you what she wrote because she was so mortified. She knows Strud too well. She's yelling in the other room. I said, hey, did you take a picture?
Because we always post it on the website with Meg Storm. And she wrote, no, I was so stressed out, I didn't. I literally sprinted back because I was like, WTF, Abby, you don't leave like a leftover sandwich on the counter and you left a large Harry and David gift basket there? It's really an egregious mistake. Unbelievable.
Because her sin was leaving anything on the kitchen counter because she knows exactly...
what happens almost instantly can't leave for two minutes no two seconds and yet neither of us we were like he's fine you're good yeah and sure enough hours later he's 100 totally there's nothing wrong with stradwick sugar-free gum chocolate grapes whatever he eats it all all the stuff we were told would kill him instantly he's absolutely fine like now the vet is like you're not bringing him in we're like no he's fine
We'll save the $5,000. Thanks.
Yeah. We don't recommend this plan at home. We don't know if your dog's indestructible, but our dog is unbelievable. And plus, at some point, Darwinism kicks in. It's like, I mean, we're how many thousands of dollars in the hole? I mean, you hesitate to even hazard a guess. Yeah. Now, you did bring three books with you today, sir. Why did you do that? You have some helpful hints.
These are my Christmas recommendations of great reads. It covers the gamut of reading interests, I believe. The first is our friend, Nelson DeMille, who recently passed away, a dear friend and a mentor to me and a great friend to you. He wrote a book called The Charm School, and this came out in 1988. Just after the war came down, ironically. But the Russia stuff is back in vogue.
So it's about a Russian spy training school. So it's almost like the show American, the Americans with Kerry Russell and the other guy. Matthew Rhys. Matthew Rhys, which is a terrific show. But this is even better than that. And it's just a great read. There's so many people writing thrillers now. Um, no one, and they all revere Nelson as, as just such a great inspiration to them.
And no one does it as well as Nelson has done it.
I recommended it to, um, my trainer who is a younger guy. He's married with a family, but he's younger than we are. And he couldn't put it down. Like he, he was like, what else does Doug have? I'll read anything Doug recommends.
It's great. I mean, this one, I just cannot go wrong. It's one of the best thrillers ever done. Nelson DeMille is awesome. We miss him. We love him. We truly sad when he left. He was a real inspiration to me.
It's hard to believe he's no longer with us.
Yeah. The next also by a friend. So this is different. This is a bit more of a literary work. Amor Tolles, I think, is one of the best writers working today. He's written a number of novels that people might recognize. A Gentleman in Moscow or Rules of Civility or Lincoln Highway. And a friend of yours. And a good friend. And just a terrific writer.
Oh, by the way, as you know, for writers whose work I respect, I like to get the hardcover first edition of the book. So this is the first edition of The Charm School by Nelson. It came out in 88. This is a more recent book by Amor. And it's one novella and a few short stories. It picks up on Eve, who is a character in... um, rules of civility. It's called even Hollywood and some short stories.
So it's easy to, you know, pick up and read a 30 page short story in here. And Amor's writing is really, it's just so good. He's a little more literary, uh, type, but it's just fascinating. Still page turning. And then the last one is Barbara Tuchman.
She is the OG of narrative nonfiction, narrative history, the stuff that Eric Larson and David Grant are doing so well now, what I'm trying to do with Diesel.
The mysterious case of Rudolph Diesel.
Thank you. Plug, plug. And she is just amazing. She's sort of the godmother of that whole genre in modern narrative fiction. And so this is called the Zimmerman Telegram. And it's really the biggest reason we got into World War I. People say the Lusitania and the submarines, but Lusitania happened long before we entered the war. This actually happened right before it.
And it's about the foreign secretary for Germany named Arthur Zimmerman, who sent a telegram down to Mexico saying, go invade the U.S., And distract them over in the Western Hemisphere while we fight this war over here. This is World War I. While we fight this European war. And if you do that, we're going to give you, you know, Arizona, Texas, and New Mexico back.
Wow.
And so he's trying to enlist the Mexicans to fight us in World War I. And the British intercepted and let us know about it. And, of course, that gave us all the reason to enter the war. But her writing is so it's like crackling, incredible prose, just really beautiful writing and a great, great ripping story.
So I was picking Thatcher up from school yesterday or dropping off school, and I said, guess who's coming on the program tomorrow? He said, who? And I said, Doug Brunt. He said, oh. And I said, what do you think I should ask him? And he said, you should ask him, what will it take for people to know that diesel is a proper noun that should be written with a capital D? First of all, so sweet.
Our 11-year-old thought of that. Yeah. And what do you think? You know, this guy who you've kind of brought back to life and generated a whole new conversation on with your book, The Mysterious Case of Rudolph Diesel. What do you think it'll take to make people know that?
A movie. A movie. That's what it's going to take. If the book gets adapted to the movie, then it just sort of breaks into a whole new stratosphere. But it's true. He... Everyone... Passes the word diesel multiple times a day at a filling station, on a train, on a marine outboard engine or something like that. And not an outboard, more a marine engine inboards. They tried outboards.
But, you know, you never misspell Ford with a lowercase f or Chrysler or Benz. A lot of people don't know there was a Rudolph diesel behind the diesel engine. And, you know, as people who are familiar with the book or the story know, he disappeared right before World War I. And he was a huge celebrity at the time, even though his name has really been kind of scrubbed from history.
And there were theories about what happened. He disappeared on an overnight passenger ship going from Belgium to Great Britain in the middle of the night.
the north sea and there was there were new headlines in newspapers around the world some speculating murder that it wasn't an accident or suicide that he was murdered either by john rockefeller or kaiser wilhelm ii the emperor of germany for reasons that the book gets into you could not have a u-boat or submarine without diesel power so every navy was scrambling for diesel and this was 1913 in the middle of the anglo-german arms race everyone was needed diesel's help to build a navy program
Separately on the Rockefeller side, Diesel advocated flexibility with regard to fuel. You can run the diesel engine on recycled kitchen grease, as Willie Nelson did, or on vegetable or nut oil. And he was saying, I can break the American fuel monopoly, and I don't need a law to do it. I can do it with my technology. And so he was a threat to both. There were theories of murder.
The book is sort of a biography, but it also turns into this Agatha Christie murder mystery in the last quarter of the book that solves the case.
So good. And that's why it's doing so well, because it's a fascinating story and Doug solves a mystery. All right. Final thing. The first guest today was Steve Bannon, with whom I and frankly, we have a very interesting history. The audience is well aware by this point. What did you think following Steve Bannon and how you feeling about the whole thing?
I hold a grudge a little longer than you do, perhaps.
Longer than Abigail Finan?
She's the longest. She and I are pretty aligned on this. I think, you know, particularly when it comes to attacks on you, I think you're pretty quick to shake that stuff off. I take a little longer, but I do view Steve Bannon a lot differently than I did nine years ago. And I think a lot of that came from an interview Trump did in this campaign season that you and I have talked about privately.
which I can't remember who the interviewer was, but I can paraphrase both sides of it. He was asked, why are you like this? Why do you behave like such a bastard half the time? And he answered, you don't understand. Nobody gets attacked the way I get attacked. Nobody faces as much incoming and oppositional bias that I face, and I have to fight it my way.
This is how I fight, and that's how I'm going to have to do it. And I see Bannon somewhat in that light now too. He's fighting these wars. I mean, look at the Stephanopoulos disgrace most recently. You know, he clearly knew the distinction between what was true and what was a lie. He, as the judge sees, deliberately chose the course of lying to gut Trump. And so he faces that stuff all the time.
But, you know, even seeing it in that light, you know, so I see Bannon more through a tactical lens than a personal lens. I saw it more personally back then. He did make a mistake back in 2015, 16. You know, when you had that debate question for Trump, the one that led to the Rosie O'Donnell flare up, that was a legitimate question. You know, you asked him on the woman issue.
Trump was about to get a year long hammering from the Clinton campaign on that issue. And any good journalist would have gone after it. And so it was a fair question. You hit every Republican on the stage that night. You hit all the Democrats too. And I can see how Bannon, because not only did he perceive you as an enemy at that point, he named you enemy number one and declared war.
And I can see how that went down. You know, he's he's fighting a war. He's got all these hot zones. And someone asked a tough question like that. The reaction is it's on. Now I'm coming after you. So I can see how it happened. But if he had taken a beat, he would have recognized you were not an enemy. You were a honest broker and a tough journalist doing the job.
And that at that time was a huge opportunity for him because the only places Trump could go then was either sycophants or enemies, right? You know, and neither was going to move the needle for him in a big way. You were the only down the middle fair place you could go to make the case. And he should have said, let's go make the case there.
Because the reason he correctly perceived that you are the most powerful voice in news then. And you remain that today because like if Trump does something stupid tomorrow, you'll hit him. And if he does something great, you'll praise him.
And that's why you remain, you know, it's, it's not, uh, I think he was right to, to find you the most powerful, but I don't think he was right about why it's not charisma or your oratory skills. It's your credibility.
I will say in his defense, their other strategy of making me like an enemy who they were not afraid to bash worked very well and really communicated one of the core messages of Trumpism and MAGA, which is there are no sacred cows. We'll go after anyone, which is a really valuable message. Like that is what... The MAGA Corps wanted to hear wasn't about hatred for me or Fox.
It was just like, yes, be that wrecking ball. Like we, too, have no sacred cows. The sacred cows are the ones held by an establishment that loathes or ignores us.
Look, I get it. And listen, if if Steve Bannon hears what I said. a response you could have is I just had a better 2024 than anyone could ever have imagined. You're going to second guess anything I've ever done. You got to be joking, you know, and that would be a fair point. I just, I feel like there was an opportunity there to make the case.
You know, you were the one place where they actually could have made a case where millions and millions of people, you know, Because you will call balls and strikes, people know that what you say on this show is true. And if he comes on here and makes the case, he could say, look, there's plenty of people. There are plenty of wrecking ball opportunities.
This was maybe a different kind of place where he could have made the case. There was nowhere they could have gone. Really, everyone was in one of the two camps. Everyone was either Stephanopoulos. I mean, another thing that's so crazy about the Stephanopoulos thing Only by hair was he not moderating that ABC debate. Can you imagine?
I mean, it's always David Muir and George Stephanopoulos fighting behind the scenes for who gets the big political gigs. And maybe Muir edged him out by hair because he's never worked in the Democratic machine. But Stephanopoulos gets plenty of big political gigs where he's supposed to be a straight journalist. It could have been him. And you're right. Practically, it didn't really matter.
Muir, I'm sure, feels the same way about Trump that Stephanopoulos does. And I would love to see his text messages around the debate, you know?
Same.
So that is why, you know, Bannon is fighting. And again, fair point. He's like, he may say exactly what you just said and he'd be right. I mean, how can you question a guy who just had the 2024 that he had?
Well, I know Steve Bannon actually had a rough 2024 in some ways. I mean, his show is great. He's great. But yeah, there was the whole prison sentence, which is part of the reason why he's like, F these guys. I mean, I know he's saying... It's not about personal retributions, but retribution. But you couldn't blame him if it were because what happened to him was grossly unfair.
The other thing that people are talking about a lot now is how Trump was not... He won in 16, but he wasn't set up for success as well. And what if... you were not enemy number one, but they had made a case there because by fighting you, they did alienate a lot of people and they lost some support.
Do you mean you and Abby, my team?
Among us, yeah. We're two of the most important, of course.
Very important.
But if he had made a case there... Trump banning the whole campaign.
He won. There's nothing to second guess.
That's my point, though. The first years, he was not set up as well as he could have been. I mean, there's a lot of talk about how those years were rough. What if he had articulated his case in a way that he had more support going into the administration?
How he is now.
Exactly. He's got a lot of clear air in front of him now. He did not in 16.
That's interesting. I don't know. I feel like I am... It's so funny to me, the arc of my own story with Steve, because I really couldn't stand him. I took it very personally when he was coming for me in that PBS documentary. And just with time, I really just... separated from those personal feelings. It wasn't that they went away.
It was like a separation, you know, like they were still there and I understood why I had them. I didn't conclude that I was wrong. I just no longer felt, you know, the energy around them. And that morning that we started talking about, like, should we talk to him? I asked you because Abby was like, absolutely not. Never. I'll never allow it.
And you and I had had that talk over our coffee that morning in the bed, you know, chatting. And you were like, I don't feel it either. That that animus toward him anymore. It's just we have so many common enemies and he's such an effective fighter.
Yeah. You know, and he's smart, man. He knows the landscape. He knows how all the pieces are moving together. He sees a few steps ahead. And I like you, the personal feelings. Yeah.
were on the wane and i started to appreciate him more as a tactical fighter yeah all right now i have two other points i want to get to on the subject of george stephanopoulos there was a funny and interesting exchange over on the podcast of our pals the real clear politics guys um andrew walworth uh tom bevin and carl cannon and they were talking about stephanopoulos and
And just the ridiculous—as soon as he committed this error that cost them—error is being charitable—that cost them $16 million, ABC News re-signed him at a reported—it could be $19 million, could be $20 million, could be $25 million. Those are the three numbers I've seen reported per year. I mean, it's ridiculous.
It's a total state sanction of his kind of journalism, which means ABC News likes it and wants a whole lot more of it. Well, great. You're going to get that. Yeah. Anyway, they started to get into a discussion about anchor salaries and this one in particular for Stephanopoulos and listen to this exchange. I heard it organically last night.
He's going to be making, you know, around 20 million a year, which in any other business, if you were responsible for, uh, you were negligent in your job and cost your organization, uh, $15 million via a lawsuit, um, you probably wouldn't be rewarded.
At that salary, he's sort of mid-range, I think, for anchors. Really? Yeah, for the morning shows. These anchors, they work very hard, long hours. Come on. And they have a lot of responsibility. They've got morals clauses that they have to live up to. It's... Andy, please. What would McLaughlin say?
Oh, Megyn Kelly is going to light you up. We're going to be on her show next week. He's going to back in her doghouse, isn't he?
That did not require a Nostradamus level of foresight to know that you're going to light that up.
Well, first, he got lit up the last time because he said Kamala Harris was like Winston Churchill. Oh, boy. Which Andy and I sparred over, which is crazy talk. And but... I was laughing about this and I love Andy. He's a great guy. That's a fun podcast to listen to. If you want straight politics and analysis, I really enjoy it. But, um,
I don't have a problem with Stephanopoulos' salary, obviously. I'd love to see news people paid well if they deserve it. But I do think enormous money in news can have the effect of separating the anchor from his or her audience, from people who have real struggles. And I've actually asked myself, why – A couple, okay, so a couple of things. Why didn't that happen to me?
Because I have made a lot of money in this business and I've got some thoughts on that. But secondly, to suggest what George does is hard work, I think is absurd. I love you, Andy, but that's absurd. I look around at my own family You know, my mom, lifetime nurse at the Albany VA. My stepfather, my dad who died when I was young was a professor, but my stepfather was a plumber.
My stepsister's a nurse who works overnight ICU care. My stepbrother's a cop. Like these are people, I mean, my cop stepbrother puts his life on the line every day. And now he's retired, but he was for 20 plus years. You know, my mom and like dealing in blood and guts and lives and real trauma every day, like the amount of shit that these people have to deal with.
Like these, nevermind a plumber, speaking of dealing with shit. My point is simply like news anchors like George Stephanopoulos at Network News have a red carpet rolled out for them when they show up to work. They've got tons of producers coming out of their ears who want to make their lives better. He has to wake up a little early.
Yeah.
This is nothing to be remarked on. And the morals clause, usually they're written such that you really have to commit a crime almost to really be balanced on them or be a complete asshole. That's why most people don't get balanced off of them. That's nothing to live up to. Yeah. It certainly doesn't justify the enormous salary. They do it because they give the anchor a fraction of what they earn.
On the Kelly file alone, the last year I was there, I know Fox made over $100 million in the advertising. So I made a nice salary there, nowhere near even what George Stephanopoulos was making there. But that's just because you're a moneymaker for them.
Yeah, the idea that every morning news anchor is putting in a ton of hours of prep and work is a joke. I mean, Strahan is probably working pretty hard on the NFL side of what he's doing. And the amount of time he puts in on his GMA gig is tiny, but about what every other network morning news anchor is putting in, it's not a big lift. You're handed all these cue cards of the questions to ask.
If you have an author on, they don't read the book. They're handed a couple of questions that the producer writes for them about the book. It requires almost no prep. I remember reading something Katie Couric would sort of prep the morning she got in or something like that. I don't know all the stories, but it's not a big lift.
Cable news is actually a lot harder of a lift.
So Stephanopoulos probably works harder than the average morning network anchor, you know, because I think he cares about knowing the news and knowing who the politicians are. And, you know, he's got to have some expertise and you got to stay abreast of all that. But really, once you're steeped in it, it's just incremental each day. It's not a huge lift each day to prep for that.
You sort of you've got your sort of standing start already there. Going. So that whole, and by the way, I don't believe that the salaries are, you know, it's hard to bring somebody down. Stephanopoulos is already up at those levels, thanks to having been in the game for years and years. I don't think people who are newer to it, whoever replaces Hoda is not making that money.
No. Well, that was Carl's point. He was saying you can't get an anchor for 8 million who would do a great job. Come on. And he was absolutely right about that.
I do think, especially in this failing news industry, the mainstream, the cable news industry, both of whom are hemorrhaging, hemorrhaging audience, these salaries should be rectified to, you know, bring them back down to the commensurate levels. My team did analysis for me. Actually, I have it here. It's actually really devastating what's happened to, you know, Nevermind network news.
They used to be in like 5 million, 6 million a morning. Now they're down to like two and a half million. Their audience has been cut in half in the morning news.
That's the overall, right? So the demo number is probably even uglier.
Yeah, probably even uglier. And in cable primetime, listen to this. We pulled the numbers. So primetime, we compared 2016 to 2024. At FNC, I was in the prime time in 2016. This is the key advertising demo of 25 to 54. The average for 2016 was almost 500,000, 481,000 in the key demo of 25 to 54 year olds this past year.
So it's comparison, you know, 16 to 24, those are both big election years involving Trump. So they should be comparative. So 2024, the average demo on Fox, which is the number one network, was almost 300,298. So it's almost a 200,000 difference, 183,000. They lost almost 200,000. That's 40% of their key audience in the demo. And they're number one.
Look at CNN in 2016, the demo, the average was 423,000. This past year, 151,000. That's a loss of 272,000 in their audience, which if my math is correct is 35% of their audience. Oh, wait, I just conflated a couple of numbers. Yeah, no, no, no, I have it right. And then MSNBC, 16, they averaged 270,000 in the key demo. This past year, 137. Wow. Which is a loss of 50. See, that's your math skills.
The loss of 50% of their audience, they're hemorrhaging. By the way, the Kelly file, our average in the demo when we were on air that year was 569,000, which made us number one in audience. All of cable news, which is why I get so horrified when they talk about now the average in the MSNBC is getting down towards slashies, under 50,000. My average was almost 570,000 in the key demo.
Cable news is a shocker. shadow of its former self, so is broadcast. So these numbers, like the Stephanopoulos number, are now a joke. They're just disproportionate to the work and the product.
It doesn't support those kind of salaries at all. I mean, the big three anchors of the network, so that's been a long, long decline. Cable news really had its heyday from like, oh, I don't know what you think, but I would say 05 to really 15, 16, 17, something like that. That was sort of the main period.
Put it a little later, maybe like 10, 08.
The Trump administration, the Trump show of 2016, 17, 18, really hid an underlying systemic problem.
Agreed.
People were leaving, people were cutting cords and leaving cable. You know, the Trump show sort of kept the numbers looking good for a little while there, but now we're seeing it, you know, how, how bad the problem is. Agreed.
Okay. Last but not least, I'm jumping around, but I feel like we missed something important on our Christmas traditions and it involves one big night during our trip to Montana. And we all look forward to it.
Yeah.
I think.
Sometimes the neighbors don't if they attend.
And what is it?
Costume night? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. Costume night.
We had a few people. If you come over, I mean, you got to participate. So some people are not really comfortable putting on some ridiculous costume, but we love it.
But nine times out of 10, it's just us five and Ken, your brother, who we love. He's one of the core six. And we've done so many fun things. We did Wonka one year. We did Gilligan's Island one year.
We did the Ten Commandments.
Cobra Kai. Cobra Kai. That was awesome. And so the way it's worked most years, not all, you did Gilligan's Island. That's actually in New Jersey because I love costumes year-round. That's in New Jersey where I made you wear a purple suit because we just did like a fun colors.
Did like the zoot suit riot.
Yeah, we did a fun colors party. But I love the costumes year-round. So over the Christmas season, and people could do this at home too, it happens to be yours truly because I love costumes, but I'll come up with a theme. And nobody knows what the theme is except for me. And we get to costume night. Annette. Yeah, Abby knows. She's critical. And Yezi, who helps us with the costumes.
And what we'll do is I order fun backgrounds for like the main family room. Everybody has to stay in another part of the house. And I set up the stuff and then I set out everybody's costumes on their beds. And I say, okay, it's time. And everybody goes to their bedroom and they see the costume and the big theme is revealed. They put on their costumes and then we meet in the family room.
And then we don't really do anything other than have a fun dinner and a fun night.
But we're all... The Incredibles, that was another good one. Oh, yeah. All the kids were sort of age-appropriate, too. Thatcher looked like Little Dash.
Totally.
It was perfect. Yes.
So do you have any guesses on what this year's theme is going to be?
Oh, my gosh. Can I have a hint? No. Is it connected to anything we've done recently?
No hints, no forecasts. I'm like Ruth Bader Ginsburg with the abortion confirmation hearing question.
Oh my God, is there like a rollercoaster theme?
The Richard Bonin. How did I miss that? My gosh. Well, so no guess.
No guess.
But I will reveal to the audience when we get back what we did. And it is on point for the year that we've had. And it's something that everyone will love.
Maybe we could all be political leaders, like we'll have a Speaker of the House.
I did consider that, but then I thought no one's going to want to go as Kamala Harris and Tim Walz, so I ixnayed it. Anyway, I think you're really going to enjoy it. I'm excited. I can't wait to show you, the kids, and ultimately the audience what we did. In the meantime... to our lovely audience. God bless you all. Merry Christmas. Happy Hanukkah. Happy New Year.
Looking forward to coming back to you. I'm really looking forward to two weeks off with just the fam, but as you know, I always miss the show. It's like a little, it's like this thing inside of me that needs to happen each day. And when I don't get to do it, I feel like, but we do have plenty of new content for you while I'm gone.
We are doing a true crime Christmas and then we'll be back right after the new year. So Duggar, thank you for making this possible as well.
Pleasure to be here. Merry Christmas. Love you, babe. Love you, honey.
Love all of you as well. Send us an email at megan at megankelly.com and happy holidays. Thanks for listening to The Megyn Kelly Show. No BS, no agenda, and no fear.