The 90 minutes or so I spent listening to Tucker Carlson’s Friday interview with Russell Brand was time well spent. Tucker was open and relaxed, and Brand was a generous host, making sure that Tucker had all the time he needed to make his points. I’ve transcribed a few of the key takeaways below, but I urge you to listen to the interview yourself, if for no other reason than the pleasure of hearing Tucker’s voice again.

Tucker, who always seems like a happy person, disavows anger at being fired:

You know, it’s not the first time I’ve been fired. And I think in our business, when you work for a big company in media, and you know you say what you think, there’s an expectation that you could get fired. So I’ve always had that, and I’ve always tried to take the long view, not just on media, but on life. All graves go unvisited in the end. [snip] And I don’t know why I was fired. I really don’t. I’m not angry about it. You can believe me or not, but I think you can feel that I’m not. And you know, I wish Fox well.

As a counter to the left’s relentless charge that Tucker is a racist, he speaks of how his upbringing and faith mean he cannot be a racist, at least not as the term was once understood:

So, my views about race begin with my religious faith, which is not very sophisticated but is sincere. And that begins with the belief, the knowledge, the certainty that God created people, that they’re not objects, they’re not machines. They’re not widgets in a bin waiting to be assembled by some company.

They are distinct individuals with distinct souls, and they have equal value in the eyes of God. [It] doesn’t mean they have equal ability, doesn’t mean they all look the same? But it means they have equal inherent value.

And my politics flow from that belief. And so the idea that you would reduce people to their race and say, you know, we’re going to treat this person better or worse because of his skin color is repugnant to me. And it’s something that I’ve argued against every day that I was at Fox News. I think all of my life.

You can’t punish or reward people based on their immutable characteristics. Because they didn’t choose those characteristics, so it’s inherently unfair. It’s inherently immoral. I’m totally opposed to it.

The issue for Tucker is, as it should be for all of us, values.

Interestingly, Tucker disclaims being political, noting that his political predictions are usually wrong:

I’m not a very astute political analyst. I’m not interested in politics. I never have been interested in politics. I’m interested in ideas. I’m interested in people and so there’s a primary going on in the United States between Trump and a bunch of other people, primarily Ron DeSantis, the Governor, Ford. Others Vivek Ramaswamy, for example and. I haven’t said word one about it. Don’t plan to.

That’s an important point because people are only engines of the ideas they espouse, whether those ideas are good or bad. When people act, it’s important to name and, if necessary, shame them rather than let them hide behind institutions. However, unless voters first understand the ideas that animate people, they exist at the whim of demagogues.

Tucker goes on to say that Trump is transformative:

I, you know, I think looking back on this 10 years from now, assuming we’re still around, I think we’re going to see Trump’s emergence as as the most significant thing to happen in American politics in 100 years because he reoriented the Republican Party against the wishes of Republican leaders.

I disagree. Trump transformed the voters, not the party. The Republican Party deliberately destroyed both his presidency and his reelection chances. Moreover, given the GOP’s disinterest in stopping fraud, you can see that the party is more afraid of conservatives than of leftists.

Tucker believes, though, that when it comes to foreign policy, Trump is the only one getting it right (one of the reasons, I think, the party hates him):

I’m struck by his foreign policy views. You know, Trump is the only person with stature in the Republican Party, really who’s saying, “Wait a second. You know, why are we supporting an endless war in Ukraine?”

And that, you know—leaving aside whether Trump’s gonna get the nomination or get elected president, or would be a good president; you know, I can’t even assess that—all I can say at this point is I’m so grateful that he has that position. He’s right. And everyone in Washington’s wrong everyone.

And, of course, there are things we’ve heard before: Tucker is a fan of RFK, Jr., another populist: “I think he’s a wonderful person. I’ll just say that, as a man, I admire him.” To which I’ll add, he’s a libertarian on some things and a leftist on others. I focus on the fact that if he takes your guns (which he wants to), he can become a totalitarian, and there’s nothing you can do to stop him.

Tucker also notes that there have been four populists in American presidential history: Teddy Roosevelt, Ross Perot, Trump, and (now) RFK, Jr. (I would add Jackson to that list.) All of them have something in common:

The effective populists are the ones who critique from the inside and say I grew up in this world. … So these are people who know how the system works, cause they’ve benefited from the system and so their critique is much more meaningful and much more effective.

There’s much more, and I’ve just scraped the surface. It really is a fascinating interview because, as Tucker says, it’s not about politics. He’s not doing the kind of mindless horse-race analysis that we usually endure. Instead, he and Brand talk about the ideas that drive the West and that, at the levels where the most power and wealth exist, are changing far more rapidly than we can grasp.

Image: Rumble screen grab.