Coffee With Scott Adams — Knowledge Archive July 10, 2026
Scott Adams Philosophy Archive
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ou. And you decide what's right and then act on it. That's all we're going to ask of you as citizens. You just decide what's right. Now I don't know how that would turn out. Maybe that wouldn't work out. But I feel like that's where we should on this. Joe Biden should be asking people like me because I'm sort of out in the bubble. I'm not old enough that I can get into the shots but I could make…

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his feels like the kind of story that's a story because Trump is no longer in office. You know something is going to fill the news cycle no matter what. You take out Trump and there's this giant empty spot that has to be filled. I don't know. This story isn't interesting to me but it's capturing the imagination.

Who do you think would be the natural leader of the populist movement if let's say if Trump does not resurrect? Who would be the natural leader? Give me some names. Now I heard Matt Gaetz. I've heard, well who do you think, who would even qualify to take that role? Yeah you know there wouldn't be a better president than me on some level but I would never want that job so it's never going to happen. The only thing that would make me a good president, I probably had more bad qualities than good so don't vote for me for president. But the one good thing I would bring is I wouldn't feel the need to lie to you. Maybe if you take the job suddenly you have all kinds of reasons to lie but I wouldn't really feel the need to because I don't think there's anything I couldn't explain in a way. I just wouldn't need to. But it would be the worst job in the world so I wouldn't want it.

All right. In the news, FBI attorney Kevin Clinesmith, you heard of him on the Russia collusion hoax business. He forged an email in Carter Page's FISA process. And he forged an email. Just think about that. A US attorney forged an email, ruined the life of this Carter Page guy for all practical purposes. His professional career just got napped. And all he received for that was 12 months probation, 400 hours of community service, and a $100 fine.

Now I don't know what is typical for what kind of a sentence you get for that kind of a crime. I suppose they probably say something along the lines of no prior crimes. Maybe they argued he thought he had a good reason. I'm not sure that should make a difference. Maybe they just said this is similar to other crimes.

Oh I'm seeing people say Tulsi Gabbard, Rand Paul for a populist leader. Maybe so. But what do you think of this? 12 months of probation, no jail time for throwing the entire country and people's specific lives into horrible situation. I feel as if this is not even close to appropriate. If you forge something in the role of a government professional, especially an FBI attorney, that's got to mean something. That's different from a regular crime, right? Can you treat a government action against a citizen the same as you could just do citizen-to-citizen crimes? I feel as if he's being sentenced as if this were just a regular white collar crime. This was not a regular white collar crime. This almost destroyed the whole freaking country and it destroyed some people's lives for sure. This should have been five to 10 years. That feels about right to me. Five to 10 years. Wouldn't you say if you were just going to compare it to other crimes that you're aware of? Five to 10 years. Completely inappropriate.

And this is the sort of thing that in t

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he context of the Trump energy or populist gaining momentum will, while Trump is sort of absent from it at the moment, this is the sort of thing that's adding energy to that. Because this seems so blatantly, I hate to say unfair but that's how people will register it. You know the world, there's no such thing as fairness, but people will register this as unfair. In other news, Black Lives Matter…

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