Last week Thomas Massie the Republican
congressman from Kentucky
became the most hated man in Washington.
He tried to force the House of Representatives to travel back to DC
to vote in person on the 2 trillion dollar stimulus bill, which was designed as a response
to the economic fallout from the Coronavirus pandemic.
President Trump called Massie a third-rate grandstander on Twitter,
which former Secretary of State in 2004
Democratic Presidential Candidate John Kerry
retweeted adding that, and I quote,
Congressman Massie has tested positive for being an asshole,
finally something the president and I can agree on.
But Massie's opposition to the two
trillion dollar spending bill,
and the suspension of a voting process laid out
in the Constitution, is no surprise to
anyone who has followed his career since
he first showed up in DC in 2012.
I'm happy to talk with him now about his
reservations about the Coronavirus Aid Relief
and Economic Security—CARES Act and how he thinks the country should be moving forward.
Congressman Massie, thanks for talking.
Hey thanks for having me Nick. Boy
there's a lot to respond to but I want
to respond to those tweets first.
Yeah, yeah please do.
Well first of the accusation that I'm a third-rate
grandstander is completely unfounded,
I'm at least second-rate okay and and to
John Kerry's tweet that I tested
positive for being an a-hole I would
just say at least I haven't been
symptomatic since birth at least at
least there was some doubt with me any
case let's clear that up and well moving
forward yeah here here is a question for
you
you know what were you hoping to
accomplish and you laid out in a we'll
have a link to it you laid out in a long
series of tweets why you were calling
for you know an actual vote on going
forward with this stimulus bill or this
spending bill rather what what were you
hoping to accomplish with that sorry
there was one there was one more insult
hurled at me that you didn't mention
that I'm most proud of Nancy Pelosi
called me a dangerous nuisance
which to me sounds it first sounds like
an oxymoron because a nuisance shouldn't
be dangerous but it's just an annoyance
right but I'm proud if Nancy Pelosi
thinks I'm a dangerous nuisance that
means I'm effective in stopping her
agenda and her agenda here was to pass a
bill with nobody in Congress I I call it
a conspiracy to subvert the Constitution
now when we're in session they
oftentimes do a unanimous consent but
the difference there is there's a quorum
people are present and you if you had an
objection you could register it and then
that would lead to a debate or vote
possibly but they were planning to do a
unanimous consent with nobody there can
you imagine if if we if I had let her
get away with that what this fourth bill
that they say is coming would look like
like if you just let her run the tables
and nobody shows up to put up a you know
any opposition or to put people on
record so that you know there's two
things here that I was trying to make a
point about number one it's a bad bill
and we can get into that we can
hopefully we will yes but first but
number two if you're going to vote for
the biggest spending bill in the history
of mankind I mean probably FDR is
blushing in his grave right now at this
if you're gonna if you're gonna pass
that somebody should register whether
they were president where they there did
they vote yay did they vote nay today
I'm sitting here Nick this bill now it
passed the Senate 96 to nothing and all
of those were registered those people
showed up to work and they're 10 years
older than us and clearly not as healthy
but if 96 out of 100 senators can show
up surely to goodness
you know 218 require congressman can
show up out of 435 actually all they
needed was 216 since we don't have quite
435 right now and just show up to vote
because the Constitution requires it
they I
literally got my little pocket
Constitution back out and reread the
section just to make sure I was you know
imagining this you have to have a quorum
and and the Constitution defines a
quorum is half of Congress present in
order to conduct business and Nancy
Pelosi and Kevin McCarthy we're telling
members of Congress stay home we got
this and the reason there's several
incentives for them to do it number one
if you're in leadership you want to get
reelected to leadership and the way you
get reelected is by being popular and
it's a popular it's popular with most
congressmen and this is unfortunate if
they hear that they can stay home and
they don't have to come to work
what's also popular is that they don't
have to go on record thereby exposing
themselves in the next election now kept
obviously Kevin McCarthy isn't trying to
protect Democrats and Nancy Pelosi isn't
trying to protect Republicans but what
they were trying to protect were their
own members of their conference in
respective conferences from primary
opponents this bill is not going to age
well okay on the left you've got some of
the Bernie bros that recognize this is
cronyism like on steroids okay and on
the right you've got people that realize
that this puts tarp to shame and the
tarp is one of the things that spawned
the Tea Party and got a lot of people
elected and a lot of them unelected so
they just didn't want to go on record
and so what I did is I went by the way
there's a false media narrative that I
delayed the bill somehow I actually
didn't delay it the the bill signing
much to my chagrin it happened on time
but it wasn't my objective to delay it
in fact I instead of surprising
everybody on Friday I went to my leaders
the Republican leadership and they said
why are you telling people that if I
demand a recorded vote it's going to
delay the bill by a day they said well
when you demand the vote we've got to
give everybody 24 hours notice to get
here I said I'm telling you I'm going to
ask for the vote and we're 24 hours
before that day is here instead of
telling people to stay home you need to
tell them to come to Washington DC now
and that's what they did so how many
people because you know they're there we
don't know exactly out of you know out
of your count how many people voted
against this bill or would have voted
against this bill we have been a
recorded vote I think there were about
five or six
can you name those names I can cite
yourself who else voted against it or
would vote against it
I'm gonna name for off the top of my
head and my apologies to these members
if they were gonna be a yes you know you
can always contest it because it wasn't
recorded and if time doesn't look kindly
on anybody's vote they can switch right
whatever suits them but I know the best
and Amash was going to be you know I
know that Ken Buck was going to be a no
kin buck also was the strongest
supporter of mine in terms of getting a
recorded vote and not doing this by
unanimous consent
Alex Mooney registered his objection to
the bill very strongly when he spoke
against the bill and I believe Andy
Biggs was wasn't no or was going to be
an oh by the way Oh see a been a vote
Alexandria okay so Cortes she voted or
she'd voiced some real criticism you
were talking about Bernie bros well - a
well literally every everybody who got
up to speak about this bill voiced some
criticism some Democrats said it was
just a down payment it didn't go far
enough
some Republicans said though there's
stuff in here I don't like everybody
expressed some criticism I think you'd
have to ask her but I think based on her
floor speech she would have been a yes
ultimately but I can't I can't speak for
and this is the unfortunate thing about
not having a vote you can't infer from
the speech they gave by the way they
they accused me of grandstanding okay if
you watched the debate I saw four hours
of Hunter at least 150 members get up
and grandstand one minute at a time and
I wished to speak on the substance of
the bail and I went and said okay to the
floor manager and they said when can I
speak like where am I here in this
lineup because I was starting to realize
that was looking pretty bleak that they
were going to allow me to speak and they
and he said well these other people
registered an interest in speaking
against they're speaking on the bill
before you did and we've run out of
slots so we'll put you at the top of the
waiting list how ridiculous is that what
everybody I mean I know somebody in
Germany they said this was on the news
in Germany that I was objecting to this
bill how ridiculous is it for somebody
to tell me on the floor of the house
that I didn't express interest in
speaking about this bill soon enough so
I would not get one minute of the four
hours and I did not get one minute of
the four hours so do you feel like you
know what what do you feel like you
accomplished you know by raising this
ruckus I mean you got a lot of coverage
you know what did you accomplish and
also you know what does it feel like to
be I mean you are you had everybody's
anger in the you know in the media and
in Washington DC
you know directed at you like a laser
what's that feel like well one of the
things I accomplished I got everybody
read article 1 section 5 the
Constitution and by the way I was right
they had they drugged a quorum
they're kicking and screaming ok because
I was right on the Constitution what did
I hope to accomplish one of this so you
know a lot of people looked at this even
my strong supporters said go don't go
down there and set yourself on fire
right because we want you to come back
to Congress so even the people that
support what I did
generally some of them wanted to know
like you just ask what was I hoping to
accomplish well they're they're already
talking about a fourth bill ok and I can
tell you it's going to be more liberal
if that's a proper term it's going to be
more of Nancy Pelosi's liking ok the
fourth one it's going to have more
spending and it's going to have probably
some more draconian and stuff in it in
terms of government overreach and manobo
objected to this bill passing with
nobody there
can you imagine a month from now we're
in the when it's harder to travel and
there are more a congressman infected
with the virus can you imagine somebody
trying to register an objection a month
from now after having let this one pass
last Friday without an objection it
would have been impossible so one of the
things that I've accomplished here next
is is I have set down a marker that
people can expect that the fourth bill
is going to require somebody to attend
and if they're not going to attend they
have to do it by remote voting and by
the way if they do it by remote voting
you got to go on the record if you're
gonna do remote voting right you can't
yell yeas and nays through a telephone
well they're not against you're not
against remote voting right I mean
you're you're a tech guy there's
obviously there's got to be a way by
which Congress can legitimately register
votes you know over the phone or
something right I'm not against it and
by the way it's different in one very
important regard from mail-in ballots in
elections with a with a mail-in ballot
that's supposed to be an anonymous
choice and in Congress you're supposed
to own your vote right so the fraud how
could the brief fraud if you've had 435
members and there's a roll call that's
printed and a member can look at it and
say yes that is how I voted like there's
a built-in you know thing that keeps
fraud from happening there I think we
should have certainly we should be
having remote hearings right now we need
to get three or four of these doctors in
a room that disagree and they need to
produce their data and their models and
let's and let's see who's got the right
model and let's you know defend it and
and the same thing with the economist
that are justifying pumping six trillion
dollars into the economy here in the
course of a few months I mean before we
talk about the the actual particulars of
the bill and the larger government
response to coronavirus you know some of
your critics said you know what what are
you doing you you mentioned that the
Senate you know there are 10 years older
than you either average age is 100 but
people were saying you know you're
bringing your
bringing sick potentially sick people
you're pulling Congress into that a
number of congressmen or representatives
tested positive for coronavirus or or
presumed to have it was that is that at
all a risk that you you know that you
should have taken into account well to
get a quorum you only need half of
Congress and I'm pretty sure there's
some congressmen who are infected that
we don't know about yet and they may
even suspect they're infected but I'm
pretty sure over half of Congress is not
infected like you could make a choice to
stay home and you could explain that
your your constituents I mean several
have self quarantined already because of
exposure Senator Rand Paul self
quarantine
now here's here's my problem with the
argument that the congressmen are making
saying they shouldn't get exposed
they shouldn't be exposed during their
travels to this virus that they're they
need to stay home they're asking the
truck drivers to go to work every day
they're asking the the farmers to go out
and spread fertilize on their field
which by the way does it involve
interacting with people do you think the
fertilized just shows up on the farm no
you have to go buy it okay they're
acting they're asking the warehouse
workers at Amazon to keep going to work
so they can buy it now and so the
congressman can buy it now they're
asking the UPS driver to go to work and
you're telling me that a congressman who
makes $174,000 a year and has a really
good health care plan paid for by the
taxpayer can't come to work when the
Constitution compels them as my
colleague Matt Gaetz
said and by the way I think he probably
would have been one of the knows I'm not
sure on this but he certainly did
support my effort to require people to
come to Congress he pointed out
congressman used to ride on horseback
and sometimes through sometimes through
hot Wars in our country to get there
right like this is this is not a valid
excuse for running over the Constitution
so they say they should have come to it
so let's let's talk about that first the
public health response of the you know
that the federal government donald trump
is pushing
different governors are doing different
things but how would you characterize
the federal government's response
particularly the role of the CDC and the
FDA have they covered themselves in
glory or is has the federal government
really kind of screwed the pooch going
you know from from day one with all this
they've screwed the pooch with the
messaging okay
I never really counted on him to be that
competent in terms of like saving us in
any scenario but their messaging should
have been better because that's the one
thing you could expect they could do
they could step up to a microphone and
give good advice let me tell you two of
the biggest lies right right after I'm
the government and I'm here to help the
second biggest lie after I'm the
government and I'm here to help is that
these face masks only confer benefits to
doctors and nurses right like look in
Japan you know I've been to Japan
several times they wear them during
allergy season or cold season or flu
season like it's a it's a cultural thing
and you know I know it's called in
ninety five because it's 95 percent
effective as topping particles right and
if you don't put it on well it's an N
eighty okay or an N fifty but it still
confers some benefit and for the health
professionals and the politicians who
are advised by ostensibly or presumably
advised by CDC to step up there and say
don't wear a mask that's harmful that's
worse than being not fully forthcoming
it's harmful I think a lot of people
could go to work and the employer in
addition to handing the safety glasses
and a hairnet if they handed them a face
mask and prop the door open okay it may
it cost a little more to heat the
building if the doors prop it now a
thousand people don't need to touch the
same door handle like there's a lot of
common-sense things we could do if the
government would quit lying so that's
that's one of the lies the other lie
that I've heard recently is that we
don't want everybody tested okay that's
that's false like what we want is like a
test that cost 10 dollars that anybody
can take at home before
they go to work that day right that's
what we want now in both of those
candies is what they're trying to do
they're assuming the American public
doesn't understand the concept of
scarcity and there's there and so it's
valid to say we want the nurses and
doctors and first responders to have the
PPE before everybody else has it that's
valid it's it's responsible to say you
know what we've only got the capacity
the test ten thousand people today and
we need to test the ten thousand that we
suspect most have it right but don't lie
to us when you're delivering that
message and that's the the CDC has
allowed the politicians to lie either
through being complacent when the
message is given by the politician with
the imprimatur of the CDC standing there
right so that's where they've been
unhelpful what what countries or what
states and localities in the US you
think have been exemplary in their
response to the corona virus I don't
know enough about the other countries I
mean just looking at the graphs I would
have to assume that Japan and Korea
South Korea are doing a good job but
looking but also you would have to infer
North Korea's doing a great job I think
if you're just going by the self
reporting that's a joke folks okay yeah
I know somebody's going to clip that out
and say and make an ad out of it and I'm
so I'm not even going to repeat it
so but I'm not quite sure I can tell you
that I don't approve of the job my own
state is doing right now how so what
what what is Kentucky doing that's so
wrong and by the way the answer in New
York may be different than the answer in
Kentucky and the answer in New York City
may be different than the answer in
upstate New York okay but what is it you
know just shutting everything down
here's here's what we're going to get to
the point of Nick we're going to have
more deaths by suicide and diabetes and
alcoholism then we are from the
coronavirus if we stay on the trajectory
that my governor chose and when you shut
something down what you owe the people
is your criteria for shutting it down so
we can understand your criteria for
opening it back up and then we can know
whether to buy one week of toilet paper
or one year of toilet paper like people
first started laughing at the folks who
are buying all this toilet paper and and
I agree there might be more important
things if you're locked up at your house
then toilet paper but was it irrational
to buy four months of toilet paper when
the government was saying oh it's just
gonna be a week and then they say now
it's gonna be two weeks and we'll be
open at Easter and now we're saying
April thirtieth my wife's got the best
analogy for it she says we're in airport
mode we're sitting in the airport and
and they come on the intercom and says
your flights been delayed 25 minutes
they give you no expectation of whether
there will be another delay and what
their criteria was for delaying it then
they come back on well we've added
another hour to your delay and pretty
soon they keep incrementally telling you
what they should have told you to begin
with which is this flight is probably
going to get cancelled right and now
you're looking for a hotel that's the
mode we're in and we we are owed the
truth if the governors are working under
certain assumptions tell us what those
assumptions are right and then we could
we can decide if it's valid the other
thing is our governor early on I don't
not sure if it was the governor or the
local county judge that ordered this but
the governor certainly took credit for
it
they sent a sheriff's deputy to
somebody's house to make sure they
didn't leave their house because they
suspected they had the virus and they
and there are different versions of this
stories they're always so are the the
wife of the man who they sought to
restrain says that the hospital never
even gave them results of the test and
still wouldn't share them with them but
I you know social distancing great idea
not shaking hands wearing the mask not
congregating a lot self-isolation if
you've got some of the light symptoms
those are all good ideas but when you
order those at the point of a gun now
you've got tyranny they go from being
good ideas to being
we are not China the stuff we saw in
China two months ago that appalled us
you know we always criticize them for
cracking down on the churches we know
you can't go to church in Kentucky and
people have accepted it as I mean
they've accepted it somewhat out of
trying to do there's sort of there's
their social obligation they're
well-meaning people and but the the fact
that the governor has ordered it and is
willing you know there was a church that
was putting together food and boxes so
that they could distribute it to people
who couldn't get out from the houses who
were told to self quarantine their local
health department came with the police
and shut it down because they said they
weren't observing the social distancing
when they were putting the boxes
together that's a problem for me what
let's talk about the economic
ramifications of this you know they've
the national economy has effectively
been shut down by all of this what do
you think your your libertarian-leaning
you are limited government when the
government mandates the you know the
closing of the economy what is the
government's role or responsibility to
make sure that people have enough food
have enough health care things like that
and you know and then how does that how
did your what you would say are the
legitimate role of government in
something like this how does that match
up with the two trillion plus spending
bill that was just passed well some of
my colleagues make a compelling argument
that this is a taking by the government
when you take somebody's livelihood by
restraining them that you owe them some
renumeration for you know for those
damages and and that's a compelling
argument to me the problem we have here
is that it's not it's the governors who
are taking and the natural feedback
mechanism to keep them from taking too
much would be that when they shut their
own economy down they deprive their
state of government of revenues and they
can't pay the state workers and so the
governor's would there's this feedback
that would incentivize them to take of
the irrational of pro
instead of just shutting everything down
what we're doing now is the federal
government is making people halt or try
they're trying to make people whole with
this bill $1200 ain't going to do it it
doesn't give you your life back the it
so this third this third coronavirus
bill the two trillion dollar bill is
basically setting up a moral hazard for
the governors the governor's who haven't
shut everything down now have an
incentive to shut more down and the
shove governor's who shut everything
down
maybe over an overreaction they're now
being told to keep it shut down and
incentivize to do that and so I think
we've broken the feedback loop the state
if the state government takes something
from you the state government should
give it back to you now it's not to say
that federal government doesn't have a
role here in fighting the virus I
believe they do what is you know in
terms of the money that is being
shoveled out now or will eventually be
shoveled out to people you know some of
it is going directly to individuals a
lot of it a majority of it is going to
business corporations other entities you
know what's the most egregious egregious
aspect for you like what sums up the the
cronyism that you're talking about
what's what's the worst part of that
well you know a lot of people have
pointed out that Chloe got 25 million
dollars for the Kennedy Center and and
that is deplorable for somebody to stick
something like that in there but to true
a trillion is a million millions okay
look you could have a million million
dollar earmarks in this bill and it
still wouldn't make up half of the bill
like and we're gonna find out eventually
what all the earmarks were but that's
that's not the most egregious a part of
this bill in my opinion let's just do a
rough top-line calculation here the
government this stimulus package is six
trillion dollars it's either gonna be
spent or bar or loaned or injected into
the economy six trillion dollars there
are a hundred million families okay
let's say the average family is 3.5
people a hundred million families in the
United States does I divide six trillion
by 100 million you get $60,000 per
household
I've spoken and and like you know what
three and a half trillion or four
trillion dollars is coming out of fed
money right
yeah Yeah right before trillion is
Treasury Treasury and fed exactly so to
from Congress forefront of the Fed that
should tell you who runs this government
right like if you know already so we
complain that we Congress really only
only like only decides how a trillion
dollars get spent every year three
trillion is entitlements now we're
talking about four trillion that's from
a totally different set here but back to
my math six trillion dollars total
divided by a hundred million families is
sixty thousand dollars per family okay
they're they're offering twelve hundred
dollar payments to each working adult if
they qualify and then like five hundred
per child or whatever a family might
expect to get $3,000 but sixty thousand
dollars is going somewhere on their
behalf mm-hmm that what's the problem
here that's like ninety five percent of
the money is going somewhere else where
is it going you know it's it's I'm and
and who's going to be responsible for
the sixty thousand the the taxpayer and
most of the taxes come from people not
from from companies not from the
corporate taxes the taxpayer is on the
on the line for sixty thousand dollars
yet they're going to receive at most
maybe three thousand dollars of benefit
from this I'm saying this is the largest
transfer of wealth in human history
it would make FDR blush and the roman
emperors would have no idea how to pull
this off this kind of why do blood would
be what would be a better you know what
if what is your actual alternative to
that okay yeah how what you know what
should we be doing in you know Thomas
Massie you are the Speaker of the House
or even better you you're that you're
the head of the Fed so you you're
actually calling the shots what should
we be that well if I was a head of the
and turn it off but let's go back to
Speaker of the House yeah or or let's
just say this bill had been debated in a
committee and amended in a committee and
I was on the committee of jurisdiction
right whoa
why do I have to imagine that I'm
somebody else to have an effect on the
government I mean three team cars men
right but you but you expose the reality
the speaker's calling all the shots and
a few lobbyists okay so let's say I had
a seat at the table like the founders
envisioned and and it was on a committee
of jurisdiction I would point out that
every American needs tested and if the
test costs $100 to perform which is a
high estimate considering how many these
tests are eventually going to happen
$100 times three hundred fifty million
people it's 35 billion that's one half
of one percent of six trillion like for
one half of 1% of what we're spending in
this bill you could test every American
okay and and and actually you could
probably test them all ten times because
we're gonna get the price of this test
down to probably ten dollars okay this
is gonna be like a pregnancy test or
something eventually and we're and we're
gonna need something like that so what
would Thomas Massie do Thomas Massie
would have a Manhattan Project okay when
we were attacked at Pearl Harbor then we
come up with a two trillion dollar
stimulus package or did we fight over do
we declare war on our enemies we
declared war on our enemies why have we
not declared war on this virus why is
our first instinct to make sure that the
rich people is keep all their riches
okay why is that our first instinct we
need to be fighting the virus so let's
do a Manhattan Project against this
virus let's do a Manhattan Project that
comes up with a 3d printed ventilator
right let's do it Manhattan Project that
figures out how to get these everybody a
week supply of masks everybody not just
to health care workers let's let's do
those kind it's work on the vaccine
let's have a Manhattan Project on the
vaccine that's where all the money
should be going because until we defeat
this virus what you're proposing is
we're going to have multiple two
trillion dollar bills
and we're not even addressing the
problem like I I I really do believe
everybody whether you're a celebrity or
a politician or a grocery store bagger
should be able to get this test and
right now that's not the case you know
there's a bill passed that said we're
going to pay for the murder that
somebody's health insurance will pay for
it nobody has to pay for the test what
the hell good is that if you can't get
the test if somebody's gonna pay for it
so we need to that's what I would do I
would declare a war on the virus not a
war on their taxpayers what uh you know
your your colleague Justin Amash tweeted
last week you know that 10 years ago the
Tea Party had you know risen up after
the the bailouts that started under
George Bush and Republicans and
continued and expanded under Obama
Barack Obama and Democratic congresses
and you know bipartisan Congress's he
said you know the tea party is over is
there any possibility of spending
restraint left or the limitation of
government you know when we can argue
over whether or not it's legitimate or
not but I mean you know where where are
we you were you were you came into
office you know throw a special election
in 2012 affiliated very heavily with the
Tea Party you know you you know it was
uh you know all of the Republicans in
the house and most of them in the in the
Senate voted in favor of this is there
any party that stands up for you know
reducing spending anytime soon
you know you saw this with tarp too
there were a lot of people that
ultimately voted for that who at the
time said they were conservative but
they were we were celebrating that they
were rushing back to vote for it right
and you know here's what here's the one
thing that you have to you have to look
in under you have to ask why was the
world so mad at me or Washington DC for
being one dissenter I didn't delay the
bill a bit right and it's a and because
there was no recorded vote do you know
that the President and Kevin McCarthy
announced at the bill signing that this
was unanimous that there was no
dissension now that's that's about as
ridiculous as saying I didn't expressed
an interest in joining the debate on the
bill right obviously there was a
dissenter I was uh you know not
everybody but a lot of people were
hating me for for 24 hours and by the
way I gave them the opportunity to hate
me because I telegraphed to the
leadership I didn't Telegraph I did
flat-out told him I'm going to ask for a
vote
I gave him notice so they could get a
quorum there so that I wouldn't be
delaying the bill so that we could do it
constitutionally but in doing that I
opened myself up to more hey now why did
they hate it why do they hate why is why
is 434 to one so much worse than 435 to
zero because the one gives the people
hope the one gives the Tea Party hope
that not everybody has sold out that
there is a chance that you could get
somebody in Washington DC that wouldn't
go along with the nonsense and so what
I've discovered Nick in in being this
one person when I first stepped out
there in front
I had longtime supporters texting me I
mean they've got my cell phone number
they've had it for 10 years
they calling me up saying don't do this
what are you doing you're crazy is this
bad idea don't stop this we need this
but within the course of 24 hours I had
some of those same people text me and
say I'm sorry I didn't realize what you
were doing and how important it was but
what I was able to do by being one
person that people could hang their
objections you know on and say you know
I do my this little thought in the back
of my head that maybe this bill ain't
the right thing to do if one congressman
I mean there wasn't even a senator that
was able to express an objection if one
congressman can do it then maybe I'm not
crazy for thinking two trillion dollars
is crazy right and and so anyways I
think the Tea Party is still alive and
I've seen it I've seen it raised up here
in the last 72 hours would you you know
can you say just as a final thought is
there anything good that's going to come
out of this I mean this is a you know an
unprecedented kind of development in
America
in history you know it's it's it's not
war you know it is not an economic
collapse like in the Great Depression or
even in 2008 or something like that but
is there anything good that's coming out
of this I mean we've shut down the
economy people are you know scared a
certain number of people are gonna die
but you know is there is there something
good that we can do you think that will
come out of this moment in history
we're probably wrestle with this virus
for a couple years okay it's gonna flare
up and come back and it's not going to
go away like Ebola or whatever you know
that was a scare I think the good thing
that will come out of it is maybe a more
practical or scientific based response
an economic based response to the next
time this happens like this is this is a
test run and we found out that a lot of
people will do some things we didn't
think they would do including our
government and well I know and depending
on who writes the history books here
hopefully they'll go back and sift
through the data and they'll find out
that some of the things that we're done
we're wrong and some of the things that
should have been done weren't done and
that'll prepare us in the future for
this I'm hopeful about that if we
haven't wrecked this country and our
economy by then but my problem is
there's so much sort of socialism and
central planning and big government I
mean you've got government deciding
what's essential and what's not but
that's the definition of central
planning you've got government telling
you when to go to work and how long to
work and what things you can buy and
what you can't buy that's central
planning on steroids I hope we have
enough data and I hope there are enough
people that can look objectively at that
data when it's over with to show that we
the aspects of this that saved us we're
free-market and innovation and
individuals and not the government maybe
when this is over with people have less
confidence in the government a realistic
view of what government's role is I can
be hopeful about that the danger is that
people get a little taste of socialism
$1200 is the cheese in the trap' here
I've been telling people and if if
people realize it was the cheese in the
trap' when it's over with and that's
good if they don't then it's bad because
they're gonna be asking for $2,400 after
that overall Nick all right well I'm
glad to hear that and hopefully we'll be
through this as quickly as possible I
want to thank of thank congressman
Thomas Massie for talking reason
congressman Massie thanks very much
thanks for having me on your show Nick
