Producers' Pick | Raymond Arroyo: Biden is too diminished to win in 2024

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We're just getting started. Criminal Minds Evolution. Stream new episodes now. Now exclusively on Paramount Plus. Barney and company wants to do a simulcaster with us. They want to see what I look like in person on television. Raymond Arroyo knows what I look like. He's in studio.

He's the author of The Wise Men Who Found Christmas. Raymond, welcome back. You look far better in person than you do on TV. Really? Oh, absolutely. 10 years younger.

How do I feel about this? In other words, do you need a new TV? Do I need a new makeup artist? Well, I still have rabbit ears and it's a black and white, you know, a file co in the corner. The way I used to watch wrestling as a child. That's exactly right.

Yeah, the whole family gathers around me every now and then the static breaks up. Is this is this big three sponsored, Eric, or is it? Okay, so let me just tell you, I'm going to be talking about US and Iran, John Kirby at the White House of giving oil and gas a pass when it comes to Venezuela, and then the China's Insane COVID lockdown.

But first things first, Raymond, when it comes to you, out of those three, what story resonates with you the most? The China story. Because it's because this is so I have great hope here. Great hope for the protesters.

Oh, and to rattle them at the core in the foundation. Brian, I have friends there. You as well. You know, Jimmy Lai is a friend of mine, Cardinal Joseph Zen, who's- Jimmy Lai is under arrest, right? Right, and in prison, and he could have easily escaped. He stayed. He kept funding.

Oh, the newspaper self self-made. Yeah, he was Rupert Murdoch of Hong Kong, and he stayed. His family got out, but Jimmy stayed to defend and stand with his people. He thought Hong Kong was worth it. My friend, Cardinal Zen, a 90 year old heroic Catholic Cardinal, stood up for not only his faith and his people, but democracy.

He was a leader in the movement. They've arrested him under this national security law. You can't keep suppressing people, particularly once they've tasted freedom their whole lives, and suddenly impose this regime on them. Eventually, Xi and his regime will be overthrown.

How long that takes, who knows? Right, but people want to point to how America has got in trouble. America's got challenges. Yeah, got challenges, but if you look at what's going on in that country, that economy, they've gotten rid of all the free market principles that somewhat fuel their success. In the past, they can't employ people. 18 to 28 year olds are almost all unemployed.

They have no ambition to go get a job. They've killed off all their girls with the one child policy for so long. Beginning to reverse it. Yeah, and they have an aging population, so they've got real challenges in China that are systemic to their economic, as well as their cultural well-being.

I don't think it lasts long, but we'll see, we'll see. All right, so with this uprising that's taking place, they couldn't predict it, but do you see the video of them walking through subways and trains, grabbing people's phones, trying to see where they're located, what apps they have on their phones, if they have Telegram or anything else, they'll go to jail immediately? It's a total surveillance state. I mean, we have to be, we also have to be very careful of the things, TikTok and these other apps that we're allowing our children in the United States to not only frequent, but pour their personal information into.

These are basically Chinese surveillance apps, and there are more than one of them, and they have infiltrated the American market. That should be stopped. You remember Mike Pompeo and Donald Trump tried to stop Huawei, tried to stop TikTok. Biden reversed some of that. He shouldn't have. It was a big mistake.

Now he's reappraising it, but maybe too late. And you realize, of course, that Brazil, if Lula stays in power, despite these protests, that is going to be a sycophant state to China, gives them a foothold, again, in our hemisphere. And guess what? China's got huge influence in Venezuela as well.

You bet. No, well, increasingly, you saw that this week, where they're forgiving debt, they're rearranging the debt for these countries. That is within our sphere of influence in our hemisphere. Again, the Biden administration should have stepped in very early on and solidified, particularly when you're trying to do oil. Now you're buying oil from Venezuela, from this dictatorship. If you're going to go that far, make sure you make real inroads there, and you're protecting that part of our world from Chinese influence.

It will breed dangerous ground in days to come. So they are considering right now, with all the stuff that you do every night on Laura Ingraham, just pointing out things that we're seeing present probably on a regular basis, it looks like all engines are a go for a re-election at the age of 82. He's going to do it again. They say they're going to stop him. He's not going to have to go out and campaign. He's going to stay above it all, like a statesman. He's going to let all his surrogates go out and run against whoever the Republicans put forward.

Brian, I said this last time, I was wrong last time, I think I'm right this time. You can't run a campaign from weakness and in hiding. He did that one time because of COVID. He had all the stars aligned for Joe Biden, where you have a decrepit guy. Look, I covered Joe Biden. He was a senator. He was a source of mine on Capitol Hill.

I knew Joe Biden. I saw him regularly. He was snappy. He was garrulous.

Yeah, he was full of blarney, but he was on it. That is not the man we have today. He's angry today. Most of the time he's angry. And greatly diminished.

You just have to say cognitively diminished. He clearly is not keeping up. But this circle around him, Ron Klain and the others who are enabling this and holding this up, I just don't think they're going to be able to do that for another four years, six years. So you don't think he's running?

I do think he's running, but I don't think he can be victorious. You can't have a proxy campaign. This is not 1802 where you can sit on your porch and wave at people. That's not going to go in a media age.

And if America allows that to happen, they deserve whatever leadership or lack thereof they get. I also think it's one of the main reasons Elon Musk can really benefit the country if he just allows Twitter to be a place of least balance, you know, and rather than it being a place where Facebook and all the other social media apps are out there tearing people apart. Controlled communication. It's a bad thing. We need free speech, not harmful speech, not hateful speech, not racist speech, but free speech. And at times it's going to be things you and I and others are going to disagree with.

That's the nature of free speech. I don't know if you've seen the study, but they did a study on everything I said, and most of it's right. Have you seen that study? No, I haven't. Yeah, I'm going to get it to you.

Is it all right? Can you get him this stuff before the segments? What's the ratio breakdown? I'd like to see that. I mean, just off the top of your head, do you remember, like from the pie chart I handed you?

The Kilmeade family were the only people who took part. That is not true. How dare you diminish the problem? No, no, I'm just asking. I was just wondering.

What is the breakdown? I mean, Brian's always right, Raymond. Always right. Okay, well, that makes it easy. Right. So listen.

Thank you, Mrs. Gallup. You can't argue with numbers. Okay.

And what were those numbers again? I'm not sure. I can't get into it now. So, Raymond, you wrote the book The Wise Man Who Found Christmas. You thought you'd write a tale that would inspire people during Christmas, but you stumbled into this thing called facts and myth.

Yeah. Tell me the story. Well, I was looking. Years ago, I wrote a book called The Spider Who Saved Christmas. It's a very sweet story. It's the reason we decorate trees with tinsel. Who knows where tinsel came from? It came from this old legend from the first century. And I retold it.

It was a huge hit, seven weeks on The New York Times bestseller list. So my publisher said, hey, you got any other legends at Christmas? I said, well, I don't. So I started looking. I thought, well, The Wise Man, we don't know a lot about The Wise Man. I'll bet there's legends there. What I discovered is that everything we thought we knew about The Wise Man, it's all legendary, Brian. You know the song, we three kings of orient are.

No, you're not. They were not three. They were not from the Far East and they were not kings.

So once I, and how did I figure that out? First century sources, historians, Clement of Rome, you're a historian. Clement of Rome, Justin Martyr writing during the time of Jesus. All of them say, the wise men came from Arabia. Arabia was right on the other side of the Dead Sea from Jerusalem.

It's a 300 mile journey. The headquarters of Arabia was a place called the Kingdom of Nabatae, current day Petra. Well, when I saw Kingdom of Nabatae, I thought, my gosh, for a writer, this is like a story already telling itself. I've got to figure out what is this place? Where did these guys come from? Why were they there? As you pull back the story, you realize Magi were consultants to kings. They were the interpreters of dreams, stargazers, theologians, mathematicians, and magicians. These men particularly were very likely, not only stargazers, but they were focused on the Jewish prophecies of a Messiah.

Why? That only, that starts to narrow the options. They were either Persian priests, Zoroastrian priests, who in their belief, these are the Iranians, in the old Iranian belief, they do believe in a Messiah who vanquishes evil.

So there was that. But the more likely prospect here is that these men were descendants of the first temple Jewish priesthood, expelled hundreds of years before Jesus, living in exile in Arabia, serving the King of Nabatae. Once you see it in this historical lens, I said, my gosh, I've got to get families to rethink and just reimagine the historical reality, because the story is more action-packed, more dangerous. Is still in Bethlehem? Still going to Bethlehem, still wise men. There were more, look, the Syrian church says there were 12 wise men, Armenians say 12, the Coptic church says there were 60 wise men, 6-0. So you got a big wide range there, but there certainly weren't three.

The Gospel only talks about three gifts, Brian. It says nothing about the number of wise men, just as wise men from the east. Well, the east was the immediate east, not the far east.

We think Asia, Africa, that's nonsense. There's no way those kings or people from there could have gotten through the political barriers and the Roman blockades to get to Bethlehem. It's impossible. Well, how did the drummer boy get through? Well, the drummer boy knew one of the wise men.

He did. He was on part of the caravan. You bring that drum, you can get in. You got to bring something to the table. Look, everybody with talent gets into Bethlehem. That's part of the deal.

Dizzy Gillespie was there too. But it is a, when I started digging in and I realized, look at the historic reality. These were two kingdoms. There was tension between them. Herod's mother was a princess, a Nabataean princess. So there's blood between Herod and this kingdom of Nabatae. There's also tension. So when the king of Nabatae hears from his wise men, there's a new Messiah to be born in Judea. He thinks Herod's got a new kid.

So let's go, go bring him some gifts for me to keep the peace. That's why they go. It's a royal diplomatic mission. But aren't these two no names? Joseph and Mary are no names. They're not royalty.

Nobody knows who they are. All they knew is there was a star and there was a Messiah to be born. So did you go back astronomically and if that is a word? Yes, astrologically. That too. I do either way. Well, you're always right.

So of course, 90% accurate. You're right. Yeah. I mean, that's true.

The study has to be right. Right. It was really Gallup. It was the sister of Gallup. Oh, Gallup. Yeah. I know. That's what the White House spokeswoman would have called it. Did you hear yesterday?

She called the Nobel Prize, the Nobel Prize. Yeah. So I guess the Gallup and Gulop. That's fine. It's no problem. Just remind me, when I become president, I'm going to ask her to stay. Oh, that would be great. That would be good because then you could be your own spokesman. Absolutely.

I disclaimer. Does she ever met the president? I mean, she just comes out there and wings it. She has no idea what's happening. She's just reading.

It's like papers. Here you go. Read this. Have a good time.

Yeah. I don't know quite what she's doing. None of it makes sense to me.

But you're right. Mary Joseph, there were no names. Nobody knew who they were.

Nobody knew who this child was. But was the star there? Yes, they do believe. I mean, the Gospels tell us.

How else would people be attracted to that spot? Well, remember, it was a... They were reading the... They were steeped in these Jewish prophecies and the prophecy says, his scepter shall rise from Israel. Now, this is poetic language, but in their minds, the scepter is the star that rises in Israel.

There it is. So they've been looking for the confirmation of the prophecy for hundreds of years. They see this bright light. Now, what was it? Was it a conjugation of planets coming together? Was it a comet?

We don't know, right? I talked to these astronomers. We even went down to a planetarium and they recreated it in the ceiling for us for the Fox Nation special. You'll see it. Who knows what they saw? The fact is, they saw something that made them go, wait a minute, the prophecy is coming to pass. But the fact is, and this is the lesson for us, all of us listening, watching, they got on their horses and they ran after the truth. They pursued Christmas.

They went out to find it. We all take it for granted and wait for Christmas to come to us. No, we've gotta be like these wise men. Keep your gaze set high on the things of God, not on the things of earth and the duties of the moment and all the crap surrounding us.

Focus on the light and you'll find something interesting. Who's the book focused on for? It's for families. It's really for everybody, four to 104. And I've got families reading it together. The adults are crying.

The kids are having a great adventure. And there's an author's note in the back with a lot of my research to lead people. By the way, Kissinger's a hundred, so he should get this book. Kissinger was one of the wise men.

How interesting that you brought that up. German? Yeah. A German wise man. Well, yeah, there's lots of them.

The Gentiles came into it. We're in between fact and fiction. That's where he spent most of my life anyway. No, he was not one of the wise men, but he was a wise man. But he is eligible to get the book. Absolutely.

That's my point. He would gain something from reading the wise men who found Christmas. And there's huge gaps in Kissinger's knowledge, so this could fill that gap.

We've been over that. From the Fox News Podcasts Network, subscribe and listen to the Trey Gowdy Podcast. Former federal prosecutor and four-term US Congressman from South Carolina brings you a one-of-a-kind podcast. Subscribe and listen now by going to foxnewspodcasts.com.