The Bill Walton Show

This show comes at time that this episode's guest, Dr. Peter Vincent Pry, calls our "hinge of fate."

Our topic is his riveting paper "Surprise Attack: ICBMs and the Real Nuclear Threat" where he lays bare the world's current and future nuclear warfare realities.

It's an issue that many simply do not want to think about.

As Peter puts it, "when it comes to nuclear weapons, U.S. and Western strategic culture mostly thinks and acts in a state of denial and unreality. Nuclear weapons of mass destruction are antithetical to our ethos."

But as Leon Trotsky warned, "You may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you."

By contrast, totalitarian states - China, Russia and North Korea - love, celebrate, and parade nuclear missiles as symbols of their omnipotence and their potential "final solution" to the vexing existence of free peoples, like the United States.

The U.S. "Triad" comprises decades old bombers, ICBMs and missile submarines, requiring years to modernize, while Russia, China, and North Korea have mostly new systems and are developing new delivery vehicles that have no counterparts in the U.S. deterrent, including ASBMs, nuclear-powered cruise missiles, autonomous submarines like Russia's Poseidon, and hypersonic strategic warheads.

They believe they could win a nuclear war.

The "unthinkable" is becoming increasingly "thinkable" and someday soon may become irresistible to them.

Yet space-based strategic defenses can turn the technological tide, if the U.S. awakens and acts— before it is too late.

Dr. Peter Vincent Pry has vast experience in national security, where he's served as Executive Director of the EMP Task Force on National and Homeland Security, Director of the United States Nuclear Strategy Forum, Chief advisor to the Vice Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee and the Vice Chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, and to the Chairman of the Terrorism Panel. Dr. Pry was an Intelligence Officer with the Central Intelligence Agency responsible for analyzing Soviet and Russian nuclear strategy.

Give this a 50 minute listen to learn what's at stake for America.

If you think a show about financial regulation is likely to be boring, I ask you to think again.

Financial regulations are really about money.

And in particular, ordinary Americans' money.

Consumer credit and credit cards

Student loans

Credit reporting

Mortgage finance

Fintech

Crypto currencies

How small businesses get financed

And financial regulations have become yet another primary battlefield on which the Left hopes to fundamentally transform America through the prisms of race and social justice.

Joining me to explain this at-first-glance arcane but critically important topic is Todd Zywicki professor of law at George Mason's Antonin Scalia law school and Brian Johnson who was deputy director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

They make this come alive. To learn what's at stake, listen in.

The most politically important election in America takes place this November - the race to become the next governor of Virginia.

This race will not be just about Virginia. It will be the first statewide election since Joe Biden took office, and will also be a referendum: How do voters feel about where Joe Biden and Kamala Harris are taking the country.

Glenn Youngkin is the Republican candidate and he joins me in this episode to talk about what he wants to do as Virginia's governor.

Glenn's joining the political fray after a career with the Carlisle Group where he rose to become co-chief executive officer of a firm with over $230 billion of assets under management.

As you'll learn from this conversation, he not only brings a strong economics and leadership background, he also has a sound grasp of the on-the-ground social and pocketbook issues that concern Virginians.

Among them: opening up communities and schools, the culture wars being waged in schools, keeping communities safe, qualified immunity for police officers, property taxes and the like.

He comes across as passionate, thoughtful, a strong leader and strategic thinker who can connect with people from all walks of life.

He could win.

Listen in to decide for yourself.

"I used to struggle with imposter syndrome, but at age thirty six I refuse to internalize misguided patriarchal ideas of what a woman can or should be. I am tired of feeling like I'm supposed to apologize for the space I occupied rather than intoxicate people with my effort, my brilliance. I am proud of me, full stop."

Is this a quote from a self-help workshop in a "safe space" on a university campus?

No, it's taken from a recent CIA recruitment ad.

What's going on here? What kind of people does the CIA want to recruit?

American national security agencies are charged with protecting the United States and its citizens from foreign threats to our safety and liberties. But it seems that "national security" is no longer just about threats to our freedom from external enemies.

Our national security agencies have been drifting leftward for decades and have become increasingly "woke" and hostile to political adversaries.

Recently former CIA Chief John Brennan declared that political libertarians in America should now be considered domestic terror threats.

How did this happen?

Where do we go from here?

For some answers and to explore these troubling trends are my guests, Fred Fleitz, the President and CEO of the Center for Security Policy, and Dr. Michael Waller, the Senior Analyst for Strategy at the Center for Security Policy.

Social Justice recruiting must not be the mission of the CIA. As Fred puts it, "the CIA does serious work. CIA officers handle extremely classified information, and if used well lives can be saved. If it is misused, people die."

External enemies still abound and it's clear that they now include China. I asked Mike whether we should also worry about the Chinese penetrating our Agencies?

His answer:

"Absolutely."

To learn how this could be happening, join me in this wide ranging and disturbing examination of America's national security establishment.

My friend Paul Teller keeps a running (and depressing) list of the destructive actions taken by Joe Biden's Administration. Joe Biden has been in office for just a few months and already the list is a mile long. Paul, who was a top aide to VP Mike Pence and is now his chief of staff, calls his list "The Horribles" The TBWS Team agrees that the name is apt. In yet another free association roundtable, we kick off with how grateful we are for lunch bucket Joe's letter - in an IRS envelope - reminding us to thank him personally for our pandemic relief checks. Then we move on to wokeness, equity and Biden's sowing more racial divisions, cancel culture, Biden's proposed "Section 8" tax plan, the assault on religious liberty, whether a Federal government promoting "wokeness" violates the Establishment Clause, the attempted Federal takeover of elections with the "John Lewis Voting Rights Act", and the HR5 "Equality Act" which would do anything but bring about equality. "It's a Five Alarm Fire," says Brian McNicol. Who is really driving the Biden agenda? Greg Corombos puts it, "Joe Biden is getting shoved to the front of the parade and has no idea where it's going." But whoever's in command, "what they're doing is really damaging," says Brian. "They really think that they can control the weather, our ability to get and distribute energy, that they can just control it. They can just say, It won't be that anymore. It'll now be this. And it will magically happen." "They are operating on some very dangerous assumptions and we need to watch. It's a very dangerous time in the world." True, yet I think you'll find this show an interesting take on the madness.

The Bill Walton Show Roundtable worries about what the future of law enforcement could look like in this country.

In many cities, seasoned officers are rushing to retire - causing a major deficit as those positions are becoming harder to fill.

Increasingly, resisting arrest is becoming a badge of protest. And rather than punishing law breakers, police officers are being demonized for doing their jobs.

Why happens if big city Mayors actually do "defund the police?" What will cities look like a decade from now? Who will be keeping the peace? Who will want to live there?

Much to ponder, and unless we change course, the future of cities look dystopian.

For years, major American corporations have been drifting to the political Left.

Now that drift seems more like a tidal wave. Companies like Coca Cola, Delta Airlines … and even Major League Baseball have, for example, condemned Georgia's legislature's effort to protect free and fair elections.

And increasingly the very top echelons of many big corporations - the C Suites and the boards of directors - are filled with people on the left promoting a "woke" agenda.

Household names like Levi, Nike, Air BnB, Blackrock, Ford, the NBA and Bank of America are now aligned with the Democrat Party.

This corporatist move to the left has emerged as the latest front in the war to "fundamentally change America."

How this happened is a complicated and disturbing story. Joining me to tell it is Justin Danhof director of the Free Enterprise Project at the National Center for Public Policy Research, who has waged a long battle against creeping leftism in corporate America.

And Matt Schlapp, Chairman ACU, which sponsors CPAC, and the founder of Cove Strategies, an advisor to many major corporations.

Effective ways remain for conservatives to push back against this trend.

Justin, Matt and I provide an insider's view about what's going on in corporate America and how to deal with its lurch to the left.

When you think of all the things in your house that are "made in China", one thing you may not realize is how many medicines are. That bottle of aspirin? Made in China. Penicillin? Made in China. Even something as simple as Vitamin C is produced in China. And if that's not shocking enough, there's also a good chance your doctor doesn't even know where these medicines are being manufactured! Joining me is Rosemary Gibson, author of the book "China Rx", which chronicles how this began and how the Chinese developed it in stealth. Rosemary, a recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine, is a thoughtful and careful chronicler of this very alarming reality. How did the US let this happen? What about Chinese quality control? How has the pandemic played a role in all of this? Before you take that next pill, you'll want to hear this conversation.

This past year has been filled with adversity, but with tough times can come great blessings.

In my case, my wife Sarah and I have found a wonderful blessing in our friendship with Mercy and Matt Schlapp and their five daughters. We all found ourselves locked down in our places in Madison and Rappahannock County, Virginia during the pandemic. So what did we do? We formed a "quarantine club" and got together on weekends to talk deeply and at length about what's going on in America, and what we can do to keep it a free country.

This show first appeared on CPAC Now last night and we thought you might enjoy hearing from Matt and Mercy in a wide ranging conversation that's very much like our informal get togethers.

Of course, Mercy was director of communications strategy for the Trump-Pence reelection campaign, and Matt is Chairman and CEO of the American Conservative Union, sponsor of CPAC.

Things have changed so much in society in recent years. As Matt points out, "What's interesting is we're all used to having conversations about public policy. Now, we're just trying to make sure that our family is safe. It's a really scary time. I think there's been so much change in society so fast that these esoteric policy conversations are really not a part of what we talk about now."

"We talk about how will you raise kids? How do you talk to them about gender and sex? What are they hearing in school, our schools? There's complete chaos going on in society. So, for me personally it's a hard time because people say, "You don't seem as happy as you usually are." It's like you're not happy when you're seeing society being ripped apart."

"I think that part of it is that our faith is very important to us," says Mercy. "It's central to our lives. It's the way we deal with the pressure, the abuse, the things changing in your life. If we did not have God in the center of it and faith, we know God will not abandon us because we have to do what God has asked us to do."

"It is our vocation. Our vocation is to ensure that we keep up this fight for America."

Please join me for this powerful and personal conversation with Mercy and Matt Schlapp.

In this episode, Bill talks with Jay Richards and John Tamny about the Covid-19 pandemic and the trade-offs between freedom and government mandated "safety."

Should governments have simply provided people with information about risks and precautionary measures, or were the microscopic instructions, lockdowns and mask mandates necessary?

At this point the answer seems pretty clear.

"We're a full year into this and we've got a lot of empirical data," Jay explains. "We have Florida and New York to compare, as well as other states, so it's not as if we're in a position where we don't really understand whether lockdowns worked. The most modest and moderate way of saying it is that the lockdowns seem to make no difference one way or the other."

Moreover, we're now seeing the lockdown's enormous human and social costs with most vulnerable groups in the US devastated by unscientific and ineffective policies.

But even with the evidence before us, we're now seeing the goal lines to end mandates continually moved outward to some distant time when we will all be "safe."

When do we get to the point when we can declare that - like all other viruses - we just have to learn to deal with its risks?

Dr. Jay Richards is a professor at Catholic University, a senior fellow at Discovery Institute, the executive editor of The Stream and the author The Price of Panic.

John Tamny is the economic guru for FreedomWorks, editor of RealClearMarkets and the author of When Politicians Panicked.

Both John and Jay have penetrating observations about the ordeal we've all been through and what we can learn from it about balancing the risks in life.