Dave Smith

Comedian, commentator, libertarian.

Dave Smith was once ‘just a comedian’.

To his critics, that’s still all he is.

In reality, Dave is one of the most influential thinkers and fearless debaters in American politics today.

Dave arrived at libertarianism via the Ron Paul revolution of the 2000s - he describes the former Congressman as ‘the greatest living American’. In the decades since, Dave has only become more fervent and outspoken. In recent years, he has even publicly considered entering the game of politics; a member of the Mises Caucus of the Libertarian Party, he floated the prospect of running for the party’s presidential primary in 2024. That same year, before both men threw their support behind Trump, he was asked by Robert F. Kennedy Jr to consider the role of his vice president. Unable to reconcile his view on Israel with that of RFK's, Dave declined.

He is a regular guest on Timcast, The Tucker Carlson Show, Candace, and The Joe Rogan Experience, where he famously appeared earlier this year to debate Douglas Murray on Israel-Palestine. Dave also hosts two podcasts of his own: the libertarian commentary and current affairs show Part Of The Problem, as well as the “most offensive podcast on Earth”, Legion Of Skanks.

Why did we invite him on?

Last week, Ben Shapiro joined us to discuss, among other things, Tucker Carlson’s recent and highly divisive hosting of Nick Fuentes. The issue has divided the right, and Ben might be the most high-profile figure on the side of the opposition. Ben was full-throated in his condemnation of Tucker’s conduct, calling upon fellow conservatives and right-wingers to disavow the ugliness of extremist thinking before it takes root in the movement. If they don’t do it now, they can expect to surrender all future victories.

Dave, however, is on the other side of the aisle. He likens Ben’s response to the tactics the far-left employed at the height of wokeism: shaming, silencing, and a refusal to recognise the truth. And the truth is this: Trump’s support is fracturing, and the MAGA base is moving away from its founding father. The America First promise has been broken, and it’s not gone unnoticed. Whether you like or loathe Fuentes, his popularity expresses something meaningful about conservatism in America, especially among the mobilised young. You ignore that, and you do so at your peril.

Konstantin and Dave have conversed before, most recently on Piers Morgan Uncensored for a face-off on Trump’s foreign policy. It was a heated debate, and the two have traded barbs on X since. But Dave has been high on our guest wishlist for a while. Even if we each come at the world from a very different place, we’ve always admired Dave’s bravery and willingness to focus on the issue, not his opponent.

With everything going on, this seemed like the golden opportunity. We might differ on a great deal, but our conversation started in a place of agreement: ”[we’re] glad we’re making this happen.”

What did we talk about?

’Cancel culture’, as it’s known today, is always pinned as a left-wing pastime. Pearl-clutching witch hunts over naughty language, irreverence and, just as often, the truth. It’s the central tenent of wokeism, and much of the right’s recent rise in cultural influence is the oh-so-predictable swing-back of the pendulum. Free speech, somewhere along the way, maddeningly, became a right-wing talking point.

But that’s not always been the case. One could argue it isn’t now. In the not-so-distant past, it was the religious right levying the tools of censorship and social disgrace against ‘undesirables’. Today, we see certain factions of the right chasing down private individuals over speech, some even calling for the criminalisation of blasphemy. Libertarians can usually be depended on for adhering to principles of free speech, but even this sub-class of a sub-class finds itself divided. Big tech companies, however powerful they are, are private entities - who’s to say they shouldn’t kick off users they don’t like? What happens when two central tenets of an ideology come into conflict?

Dave condemns it in all its forms.

”I’ve always been against all types of cancel culture. Even if governments weren’t involved in cancel culture like they have been, I’d still be against it. Big tech companies kicking people off? It’s just not good, and it’s not the right path.”

To Dave, this isn’t just a legal question, or even a moral question: it’s a practical issue. Censorship has only proven one thing: you can’t destroy ideas. You can push them out of polite society, but you can’t control what people think. Eventually, they’ll come back, uglier than before. As Dave expresses, letting them out to breathe is the solution.

”The only path forward is for us to have these conversations. Are there dangerous ideas? There are dangerous ideas all around us. Fascism is a dangerous idea, socialism is a dangerous idea, wars of choice are a dangerous idea, but we have to be able to talk about them.”

All of this pertains to the recent rise of Nick Fuentes. Or rather, the widespread recognition of that rise. Fuentes has been a shadowy extremist figure on the right for close to a decade. Today, he’s a paradox: a fringe character who hosts one of the most popular political podcasts in the world - if you know where to find it.

How did this happen? Everyone has a theory. The left’s incessant finger-wagging, widespread disappointment in Trump’s second term, increasing polarisation… But among them is The Algorithm. There’s undeniably an incentive to having Nick on your show, and many major pundits have been taken in by it. Some are surely morbidly curious, but the numbers don’t lie - a Fuentes feature is a voucher for a million views.

And it’s caused an upward spiral. Nick was already popular, but his recent tour of the podcast circuit has put him in front of more moderates than ever before. The ‘basement dweller’ is a household name, and many have placed the blame on Tucker, Candace, Patrick Bet-David and their ilk for inviting him into the light.

To Dave, it’s an amoral point. You can’t blame them for Nick’s rise, or even for hosting him. It was inevitable.

”Fuentes has gotten so huge that we need to have this conversation. Hearing Mark Levin call for the cancellation and deplatforming of Tucker Carlson and Candace Owens over this… it reminds me of when [CNN pundit] Brian Stelter tried to cancel Joe Rogan during COVID. It’s like, who are you? Who do you think you are in the rankings of this thing? Popularity doesn’t make you right, but it does make you relevant.”

In Dave’s estimation, the ‘platforming’ (to use an outdated term) of Nick Fuentes is neither the easiest or the cleanest path forward. But it will lead us to the best possible place. We know where the other path goes, and it’s only when we test our principles against the most demanding conditions that we learn why we hold them.

”The best thing that could happen with the rise of Nick Fuentes is that he does a bunch more of these shows. There should be more debates, more conversations, let’s talk about what we disagree with like civilised men.”

On this subject, there’s no daylight between us and our guest. Pushing ideas underground only allows them to take root, and there’s nothing to be gained from refusing to engage. A head in the sand is an invitation to be kicked.

But it’s not that simple. We agree with Dave, but it’s not clear we have the same understanding of the terms we’re using.

What does it mean to ‘talk about’ dangerous ideas?
When we do, do we have any obligation to tread lightly?
Can we afford to be irreverent?

As Francis puts to him: if you don’t challenge someone like Fuentes, are you not implicitly condoning - even endorsing - his rhetoric?

”No, I don’t agree with that. There’s a guy called Ben Burgis - he’s a democratic socialist, and he wrote a book called Cancelling Comedians While the World Burns. He was talking about how left-wing activists were going after Louis CK when America still didn’t have universal healthcare, housing, or childcare. I thought it was a really interesting book, and an interesting take that I agreed with, so I had him on my show. I never challenged him, but you can’t infer from that that I agree with democratic socialism.”

Here, Konstantin presents a challenge. Dave’s point is convincing. The trouble is, it’s inaccurate to the situation we’re in. Fuentes isn’t a “democratic socialist”, or just ‘a little right-wing’. The extremity of his views is baked into the debate - you cannot take it out. And you don’t need to look to his critics for proof. Nick has described himself as a racist, a sexist, and, somehow, both “a fan of Josef Stalin” and on “Team Hitler.”

Dave doesn’t challenge our assessment. But the principle, in his view, remains the same; ‘not challenging’ is not the same as ‘agreeing’.

”If you have someone on your show and you talk about cars, and you agree about cars, that doesn’t mean you agree on everything. That same logic applies here.”

Going further, Dave suggests our challenge to him is itself a fallacy.

”I’m not sure being pro-socialist should be viewed as that far different from being pro-Nazi. These are the great evil ideologies of the 20th century, and they’re responsible for horror and death. It’s been conventional thinking that communism is misguided while Nazism is evil, but I don’t think that’s right.”

But what’s happening on the right isn’t just an ethical reckoning about ‘evil ideologies’. We’re not talking in the abstract. We’re not pondering about what ‘a Nazi’ might say, whether they’re worse than ‘a Communist’, or how one ‘ought to’ challenge ‘them’.

This isn’t a brain puzzle, because Nick Fuentes isn’t an idea - he’s a person. And he’s said things that are, as Francis describes, “despicable and dangerous”.

When Feutnes calls for his groypers (the affectionate term for his fans) to “kill and rape” in his name, or when he praises genocidal despots, you’re no longer just talking about ‘beliefs’: you’re talking about conduct. Maybe you can’t challenge something as abstract as what may or may not be in his heart, but his behaviour is as plain as we see it.

Does that change things? Did Tucker, with his audience of millions, not have an obligation to raise these challenges to the man sitting across his table?