hat's wrong with you? Would you want anybody who wouldn't bend the rule in that case? I wouldn't want to be around somebody who wouldn't bend the rules in that case.

But here's the problem. The fake news is what's our main problem, and we're being distracted. I'm going to go to the whiteboard and I'm going to tie it all together. You ready for this? Tying it all together. Here's how I see the world. I see the fake news creates extremism, and then the FBI encourages the extremists. And then, not in every case but in some notable cases such as Russia collusion and there may be something with the Hunter Biden laptop. So basically every time we see the people in charge who should be protecting us doing sketchy stuff, it makes the extremism worse, does it not?

So between the fake news and the fact that we don't trust the people who are supposed to be protecting us, this creates a feedback loop that creates more fake news, more money, etc. So this is the answer to the question why don't they ask the would-you-kill-Hitler question. The question that the media won't ask, because they make money by not asking it, is if you believe the fake news, if you believe what the news is saying, why wouldn't you murder Republicans? If you believe the news, right? So the news can't ask the question because they're the problem.

So everybody who thinks that the extremists on the left are the problem have been duped by the fake news. Everyone who believes that the extremists on the right are the problem have been duped by the fake news. So General Hayden and we'll talk about Sam Harris later, both duped by the fake news. Now I don't think that either of them seem to quite grok how strong the news is, its persuasive ability. In other words, its ability to make you believe something that absolutely couldn't be true. The news is good at that. I believe yesterday alone I believed two hoaxes until I got corrected. That's just yesterday. I fell for two yesterday. That's just one day, and I fell for two hoaxes. Now they were on social media. They weren't in the regular news. But it's so easy to fall for a hoax, right?

If you ever see me mocking somebody for falling for a hoax, you should correct me. Because you shouldn't mock the person for falling for a hoax. You should be mad at the hoaxer. Because the reason that hoaxes are a thing is that they work, right? It's not always the fault of the person who believed it. We can get better at not believing stuff, but it's not really the fault of the person who believed it. It's more the person who created the hoax.

So we have this system in which the people who are causing the problem are telling us that it's other people, and we're believing them. And the tell for that is that they won't ask the only question that matters. The only question that matters: Hey Democrat, if you believe what you're saying about Republicans, would you break all the rules, including an election rule, to stop them from power? And let me say clearly that I would. I would, if I believed the fake news about Trump, I would break a law to stop him. Wouldn't you, if you believed it?

Now the difference between me and General Hayden and Sam Harris, we'll talk about in a moment, is that I don't believe what they believe. But if I did, I wouldn't act the way they act. I would act pretty aggressively. So they have this weird dichotomy where their actions and their words are not aligned. Or at least they're not willing to admit it. Although I think Sam Harris came pretty close. We'll talk about that in a minute.

All right, I had something on the other side of this. Let's tie it all together. So let's talk about Sam Harris, and then I'll give you my test for cognitive dissonance. We'll work up to it. So here's a Jeff Giesea tweet. He asked me on Twitter this question: How would you rank the following forces based on their impact on today's political discord? All right, so which of these things do you think is causing the most political division? Media distrust, social media algorithms, foreign intel operations, perverse political incentives, specific corrupt political actors, politicization of the federal bureaucracy, and economic shifts.

Now all of those have an impact, but the main one is left off the list. The one that's left off the list is not media mistrust. Our problem is not media mistrust. Our problem is the media. It's not that I don't trust them. It's that they're not trustable. It's not my fault. Did I do something wrong by not trusting people who lie to me? How's that my fault? I feel like I'm doing it right by not trusting people who have a track record of lying to you. Feels like that's right. That's right in the sweet spot right there.

So it's interesting how blind we can be to what's happening. And I don't mean to make fun of Jeff, because he's a smart observer. In fact, you should follow him. He's a good follow on Twitter. It's just that no matter who you are, it's so easy to lose sight that the media is actually just manipulating and hypnotizing us for their own benefit, not yours. And it's just so easy to lose sight of it somehow. It's the public. We're extremists and we're not following the news and we're not doing our own research. It is not our problem. It might be our problem to fix, but it's not. We didn't cause it. We're just being people.

All right, so in my opinion the fake news is what makes us fight. And if you fix the fake news, extremism would disappear. It would disappear. Have you seen lately what the left thinks about me personally? Have you seen any of my social traffic lately? Think about the things that people have said about me. Almost or maybe 100 percent of it is based on incorrect information. So there are really bad feelings about me, but I think zero of them actually know my opinion. They've heard it from somebody else or from somebody else. So basically we're all suffering under insanely bad information, and it's causing us to hate each other.

Where does this bad information come from? Well, in my case a lot of it is on social media. But do you think the people on social media would be coming after me every day if they did not believe fake news? Let me explain. If they knew what my actual opinions were, they wouldn't have much problem with them. Or at least they'd disagree with an assumption, but they wouldn't think I was Hitler myself. And I think that that's largely true of all of us. I believe that if you put me in a room with the leftist lefty and the rightist righty, extremists on both sides, that I could find out what information we differed on and probably bring them together. The leftist left and the rightist right. I believe if nobody else were in the room and I was allowed to give them accurate information, I actually think I could get them on the same page, no matter how left and no matter how right.

Now the exception would be if they're just being crazy, right? If they have an interest and they're not in deep cognitive dissonance, if they have an interest, I could do it. Now what happens if somebody's in cognitive dissonance? How do they know and how do you know? Well, I'm going to give you an example. So Sam Harris was on the Triggernometry podcast, which is a big, very good podcast. And he said directly that Trump was such a menace, and especially that Trump University was such an example of something that was far worse than anything Biden is accused of. Not only worse than what Biden may have done for sure, but even worse than what Biden is accused of. You know, accused of maybe some bad dealings with Ukraine, for example. And in Sam Harris's view, the media suppressing the Hunter laptop story to get Biden elected was legitimate. And he agrees that the news faking the news to keep Trump out of office, literally faking the news, it was justified because Trump is such a risk.

What do you think of that? Here's the problem. Did you just say to yourself, damn that Sam Harris, that freaking Sam Harris, that guy's, there's something wrong with that guy? Right? Okay, I'm gonna disagree with all of you. Do you know what's wrong with Sam Harris? Nothing. Nothing. He's a victim of the news. He's a victim of the news. He actually believes the news. Or he believes some subset of the news that got him to this point. So if you think the problem is with Sam Harris, again you're being diverted. The problem is the news. If the news told him the truth, I'm pretty sure his opinion would be different.

All right, so I give him an A-plus for intellectual honesty. And he's saying basically I'm okay with breaking the rules if you're stopping a mortal threat. I totally agree with that. I would break a rule all day long to stop somebody from getting killed right now. Of course you know you got this slippery slope. If everybody's breaking the rules, blah blah blah. But I don't think that counts if you're talking about killing Hitler. Nobody thinks that killing Hitler is a slippery slope, do they? Well, if you can kill Hitler, next thing you know you're going to be murdering toddlers. No, no. Special case. I think we can handle special cases without worrying about the slippery slope every single time.

So the real problem is, is Sam Harris experiencing cognitive dissonance or am I? And in this case I'll be a proxy for many of you in the audience. Am I and you experiencing cognitive dissonance about Trump? And you see maybe like the Hitler that some are afraid of. Or is Sam Harris and people who would agree with him suffering? Here's your test to find out. All right, here's your test. Can you argue the other side? That's it. Can you argue the other side? If you can take the other person's perspective and argue it in a full-throated, balanced way, then you probably do not have cognitive disso