CLAY: This is probably not gonna surprise you, by the way. I’m about to pop out a video. I’m just watching it, rolling my eyes. San Francisco’s mayor, Buck.
They have a mask requirement indoors, of course, in San Francisco. San Francisco’s mayor was out partying with a BLM group. No mask. Indoors. It’s all so flagrantly hypocritical.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
CLAY: I’m down in the free state of Florida, an oasis of freedom, as Florida governor Ron DeSantis has described it. Buck is up in New York City locked down. I’m surprised he can even do the radio show without wearing four masks right now, based on the way Bill de Blasio continues to restrict everything there.
BUCK: I’m gonna put goggles on.
CLAY: (laughing) You might need a full hazmat suit to do the show pretty soon. But I’ll bet Bill de Blasio is not actually wearing a mask anytime that he is aware that there aren’t cameras present. And this level of hypocrisy… We had Gavin Newsom at French Laundry. We had Gretchen Whitmer traveling to Florida, her husband trying to get the boat out when nobody else was allowed to get their boat out.
Muriel Bowser, the mayor of Washington, D.C., was at a wedding. All of these different Democratic mayors, governors, people in positions of power continuing to flout the rules of covid that they are attempting to put in place for others. And we’ve got the latest Democratic Party hypocrite underway. I tweeted out the video. Buck, you have seen it.
It is echoing throughout social media. First of all, the day after Gavin Newsom wins the recall vote, L.A. County comes out and basically mandates vaccines everywhere. The timing on this is crazy. But within a day or two of Gavin Newsom winning, London Breed, who is the mayor of San Francisco, is caught on camera out with one of the cofounders of Black Lives Matter celebrating indoors, karaoke-ing, playing along with a band.
The amount of hypocrisy as it pertains to masking and covid requirements that have existed from Democratic politicians — and, Buck, you asked a question. I think it’s a good one. I think what we’re seeing here is all these Democrat leaders see the data, but they understand that their base is so terrified of covid that they’re not willing to stand up and actually talk about the data. The choices they make in their own lives — remember, Gavin Newsom’s kids were going to private school — shows you what they really think as opposed to what they say publicly.
BUCK: Clay, how do you come down off the ledge, in a sense, here, right? If you’ve convinced people… You know I like my shark attack analogy.
CLAY: Right.
BUCK: But if you’ve convinced people that the first time you put your foot in the water at the beach, you’re probably gonna have Jaws come along and rip it off — and they actually think that — and you make them think it for a long time, it’s never gonna be a good moment when you have to say to them, “Yeah, turns out that’s not how it goes.
“It turns out you probably didn’t have to be terrified of going in the ocean this whole time.” So because they’ve created what I would say is a mass hysteria… For me now, in New York City, Clay — and you were just talking to one of our producers here about this. People are walking around in pretty considerable numbers. It would be anecdotal for me to say, but I can tell you walking from where I live to the studio, not a long distance, I will see at least a few dozen people outside with masks on.
CLAY: What percentage would it be that you see on the sidewalks wearing a mask in New York now, roughly?
BUCK: I want to say 15 to 20%, something like that.
CLAY: Okay, so it’s still a minority, but a substantial number of people?
BUCK: But Clay at this point if you’re wearing a mask outside, first of all, you are definitely vaccinated, and second of all you probably know about the CDC saying it doesn’t really spread outside. Wearing a mask outdoors in America today for covid is just a sign of an anxiety disorder.
CLAY: I agree.
BUCK: It’s like agoraphobia, somebody who’s afraid to go out in public spaces or something. It has become a mental disorder that’s on full display for everybody. And to your point about London Breed and the others, I think that a lot of these prominent Democrat politicians, they know this.
CLAY: Yes.
BUCK: But they don’t want to ever turn around, face their constituents, and say, “You know how we’ve demonized all the anti-mask people and demonized those who ask questions and all that? They may have a point.” They’ll never want to do that, because it will be a slap in the face. It’ll be offensive. If you’ve been double masking this whole time — remember when there were people bragging about how, “I haven’t left my house in 18 months”?
CLAY: As if it were a sign of strength as opposed to incredible weakness.
BUCK: Yeah, and then you ask, “How old are you?” “I’m 25 years old,” and you’re like, “Why won’t you leave your house because of covid at 25? Unless you’re born without an immune system, that feels like a pretty weird move.” London Breed, by the way, hypocrisy. Do you think this will cost her? She’s unmasking singing and dancing with a totally unmasked crowd in direct violation of San Francisco order. Nobody in San Francisco… It’s not only, Clay that we’ll make fun of this, as we should, the people of San Francisco will convince themselves, okay. Well, nobody’s perfect. At least she’s on —
BUCK: It’s not just that. “She’s on the right side of the issue by making all the peasants mask up so we’ll excuse it.”
CLAY: Well, remember the CNN… I still love that. When Obama threw his party and had a massive crowd and then ended up uninviting a few people, Dr. Fauci… Nobody came out and said, “This is a really bad idea to be doing if you’re gonna be following the CDC guidelines.” And the London Breed situation, remember, Obama was defended by that CNN commentator who said, “Well, it’s an educated, sophisticated crowd,” right?
As if, oh, the virus, it was gonna impact them and then it was like, “Oh, wait. These people, they still remember some of the lines from Hamlet. They’re gonna be fine. They’re fantastic,” and so the hypocrisy… To me, the essence of whether you can trust someone or not — and there’s obviously a lot of different versions of this — is, do they live the same life privately that they claim to live publicly?
Look, I’m gonna be on the road, Buck, for the Alabama-Florida game. I can’t wait. I’m going to be out in crowded bars. There are gonna be pictures of me with our listeners with college football fans all over social media. Nobody’s gonna be able to say, “Oh, my God. Look at Clay Travis! He doesn’t have a mask on,” because I’m telling all of you exactly what I believe, which is I’m not at risk.
I’m gonna live my life normally. To me that’s the ultimate test, right? Are you living the same life privately that you claim to live publicly? And what we’re seeing exposed very often on the Democratic side of the equation, particularly with covid, is how many people are claiming to be on one side of an issue and then in their own lives, with their own lives at stake, with their own life choices, whether it’s their kids in school… How many Democratic politicians put their kids in private schools when they didn’t let the average person out there’s kids go to school. It’s unbelievable.
BUCK: This has been true for the entirety of the pandemic. By the way, it’s true of a lot of Democrat policy positions. Climate change is another one, which I believe is a religion replacement for leftists. I think actually Fauci-ism has become at some level a religion replacement, the kind of existential identity tribalism for people now. “In Fauci we trust” is what a lot of Democrats think about this entire pandemic and that’s their motto.
But they want things, whether it’s higher taxes, climate change, any number of things. Even in some cases gun control, you’ll have prominent celebrities who are anti-gun and you’ll find out — this was a big thing in New York City — well, they got a concealed carry permit because they were scared for their safety.
CLAY: Or their security staff does.
London Breed is the same. Muriel Bowser, Gavin Newsom, you go down the list. All these Democrats, very fraudulent on this issue. But the vax passport situation, there’s some cause for… I don’t know. I can’t say it makes me happy, but at least there are places, Clay — and there’s some numbers on this we’re starting to see — that are refusing in New York City to do this.
CLAY: Oh, yeah. I saw that. I think that’s fantastic.
BUCK: We should get into where they’re refusing and where they’re not and how this is going, because my belief… First of all, the top of the list for me would be if we could just get airline attendants to stop acting like Stalinist prison guards on airplanes about masks. Nobody cares if the mask falls below my nose. No normal human.
Anyone who has a problem with that is a moron, okay? Nobody cares. But the airline attendant will come by, “Excuse me, sir! Excuse me! Excuse me! Put the mask up! Put the mask up!”
CLAY: (chuckling)
BUCK: They’re crazy. And I’m sorry. I do not buy this thing it’s ’cause other people will complain. It’s dark! I’m taking a nap! Nobody can even see me. We can pretend that I’m eating my peanuts really slowly.
CLAY: You’re also taking it off while you’re eating and drinking. It’s nonsensical.
BUCK: Idiotic. And I’ll tell you, it’s worse on planes than it is anywhere else, and I think it’s just ’cause everyone’s all so used to being beat up down by the general discomfort and lack of customer service, you get from airlines.
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