Tucker: A lot of COVID regulations weren't really about science

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A lot of COVID regulations weren't really about science

Fox News host reflects on the COVID-19 pandemic two years later, China's new lockdowns and a cartel firefight on 'Tucker Carlson Tonight.'

This is a rush transcript of "Tucker Carlson Tonight" on March 15, 2022. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

TUCKER CARLSON, FOX NEWS CHANNEL HOST: Good evening and welcome to TUCKER CARLSON TONIGHT.

We keep a detailed daily calendar. We checked this morning and believe it or not, this week is the two-year anniversary of the coronavirus lockdowns. Those are the first mass quarantines in American history.

And if you look back, you'll be struck by how much has changed since those lockdowns began. Think back to the American you grew up in. There are three things you knew about that country. It was a free country. It was a middle class country, it was defined by small business and it was a constitutional country.

Our politicians were limited by the guardrails in our founding documents. They couldn't go past that. So, it was a happy place.

Unfortunately, none of those three things is still true about the United States and lockdowns are not entirely to blame for that, no single cause ever is. But there is no question that the coronavirus lockdowns accelerated the transformation of the United States. Just think of masks.

So we knew early on that paper masks were not going to spread the stop of COVID. A couple of studies including a big study from Vietnam showed pretty clearly that they were not effective. And then we watched the behavior of our public officials. It turns out they didn't like masks any more than anyone else liked masks despite the fact they had ordered you to wear masks.

When they thought no one was watching, they often went bare faced. So you saw that and you had to wonder if masks are so darn effective and life- saving, why aren't our leaders wearing them? And we made that point. We've had many points like it. We made them dozens of times on the show and needless to say, it had no effect at all. The mask mandates stayed, and in some places they still remain.

So as this unfolded, we started to realize that masks, in fact, a lot of this was not really about science or public health. So what was it about?

Well, recently, we learned the answer because we watched it. Masks were a training exercise. Mandatory masking was a shock collar designed to teach Americans unquestioning obedience. And of course, it worked because shock collars do work.

In a single day last month, we watched for example, our entire professional class dutifully change their Twitter avatars from mask up to the now mandatory Ukrainian flag. There was no debate about doing this. No reflection. It was not even a real conversation. They just did it.

Millions of people simply assumed reflexively, a partisan position in a highly complicated foreign crisis, the next crisis, and as they did, they moved in perfect lockstep. They were guided by their masters at the social media companies who were themselves taking direction from the White House.

The whole thing was like watching synchronized swimming in Pyongyang, it was an amazing performance. Most amazing of all was seeing Republican leaders join the herd.

After two years of COVID training, they couldn't help themselves. The result was the largest political flash mob in American history. Republicans, Democrats, business titans and the media all on one side. So of course, dissent of any kind was banned instantly, and the few who persisted in asking questions about all of this found themselves censored and those who persisted in asking questions because they were lucky enough to have a rare protected platform found themselves threatened was something worse, maybe indictment, maybe arrest.

Here is former Senator Claire McCaskill of Missouri threatening this show just last night.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CLAIRE MCCASKILL, MSNBC POLITICAL ANALYST Tucker Carlson and others are really, really close to treason in terms of what they are saying and parroting what is Putin's dream.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Oh, so defending our country from your recklessness and unwise decision making is treason; declare your loyalty to Ukraine or you've committed a crime. Right?

Claire McCaskill, whatever you think of it was not talking like that two years ago, no one in public was talking that way two years ago before COVID. In a free country, you're allowed to say what you think is true. You can defend your country if you want, even if politicians disagree with you. That was the whole point of living in the United States, but not anymore.

Now, if enough powerful people, that would be former Senators, "New York Times" columnist, retired Intel chiefs working as contributors at MSNBC, if enough of these people call for you to be indicted, you probably will be indicted. If not for the core crime, then for another crime, they'll find something. That's how our justice system now works. Those are the rules.

This is a big change over what we had before for about 250 years. So how did we get this new system? Simple. We eliminate the guardrails. We got rid of the principles that set limits to our leaders' power. Those principles in short personal autonomy and the sanctity of the citizen's conscience and we surrendered both of those during COVID. They no longer exist we let them go.

Once we allowed political leaders to force Americans to take drugs they didn't want, the old arrangement where the citizen had as much or more power as the leaders was over. Our politicians now have effectively limitless power. And they know that, they know it perfectly well that's why they did it, and if you doubt that they know it, watch the way they communicate with the American population.

They're giving a propaganda, they always have. What's changed is that their propaganda is no longer sophisticated or persuasive, because it doesn't have to be. Instead, their propaganda is blunt and vulgar. They summon TikTok performers to the White House so that some 18-year-old who has never had a job can tell you that inflation and historically high gas prices are actually Vladimir Putin's fault. They just did that in fact. Here's the result.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ELLIE ZEILER, TIKTOK CONTENT CREATOR: I had the opportunity to ask the White House why gas down the street is $7.00 and here is what they said.

Russia is one of the top three producers of oil and it is actually their number one revenue source. Now, with Putin starting this horrific fight between Ukraine and Russia, nobody wants to work with him and do international trade.

So with people being scared of war, and limited resources, prices are bound to go up as well.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Okay, so nothing against the teenage energy expert in light gray, you just saw, but that is not the way you communicate with a population in a democracy. That's not the way you talk to free people. That is the way that you command your serfs.

You assume that they're stupid, and so you serve them up stupid propaganda. You patronize them. Like you're speaking to a housekeeper at a hotel in Cabo. We call this oil, it costs very much now, Vladimir Putin very bad man. That's what they're saying and they're saying it for a reason.

Because when you no longer respect your own citizens, you can't be bothered to speak in complex sentences. You have TikTok influencers deliver your lies.

All around us, this is happening, even on former news channels, this is exactly what they're doing. That's their power, but it's not their main power. Their main power, the one they deploy most often is the power to change the subject, the power to force you to ignore what actually matters to you and your family and your country and focus instead on what matters to them. They call that democracy.

Congress at the moment, for example, is totally absorbed in the question of how to arm Ukraine. How many MiGs should we be sending to Zelenskyy? And how do we get them there?

Now, that's not an issue that directly or even indirectly is related to the many, many of the growing number of pressing problems the United States is facing domestically. But even on its own terms, even if you think that is the most important thing that we could be talking about, they're not really talking about it in any complete sense.

And if you doubt that, ask yourself how you would handle it. You're the Congress, and you're moved by the suffering in Ukraine. Every American is. Americans are kind people, they want to help. Civilians in Ukraine are being crushed by Vladimir Putin. That's true.

How can we help? Well, why don't we send more weapons to Ukraine in the middle of a war? It doesn't sound like a bad idea. But if you're going to make that decision, you probably feel some kind of moral obligation to consider the ramifications, like, what effect will this actually have? Is it possible that doing this, as well-intentioned as it is, and it is, is it possible doing this will be counterproductive?

Will it hurt the people I'm hoping to help? Will it for example, prolong the fighting in Ukraine at the expense of the vulnerable civilian population in Ukraine?

If I do this, could I inadvertently be doing to Ukraine what the West inadvertently did to let's say, Iraq and Syria and Libya and Afghanistan? You wouldn't want that you'd hate to do something like that again, because that would be cruel.

So you'd want to make sure you weren't doing that, but not a single person in Washington, at least in public, appears to be asking that question. No one is allowed to ask that question.

What are you? A Putin defender?

And in fact, as well-meaning is most Americans are and most of our lawmakers are well-meaning, you get the sense that the core figures in our foreign policy establishment don't really care, and in fact, never have cared about the effects of their policy. We can give you a million examples. Here is one.

Here is former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright way back in 1996, shrugging off the documented deaths of half a million Iraqi children, not a small number, half a million, because imposing sanctions on Saddam Hussein was quote, "worth it."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LESLEY STAHL, JOURNALIST: We have heard that a half a million children have died. I mean, that's more children died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?

MADELEINE ALBRIGHT, FORMER U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: I think this is a very hard choice, that the price -- we think the price is worth it. It is a moral question, but the moral question is even a larger one. Don't we owe to the American people and to the American military and to the other countries in the region that this man not be a threat?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: So keep in mind that debate, that conversation was about sanctions which were certainly going to hurt Saddam Hussein. They didn't. They ended up invading seven years later because sanctions didn't work. When have sanctions worked exactly to achieve their desired outcome? Let us know when you find out.

But in the meantime, a half a million children died, but it was worth it because -- because why? Well, in retrospect, sadly, and it burdens the conscience of every decent person, it is hard to see why it was worth it.

But you should know that these are exactly the same people who are now giving you moral lectures right now, in fact, at this very moment on every other channel on television 24 hours a day, about how we have a moral obligation to wade blindly into a war in Eastern Europe against a country that has not attacked us and if we don't do that, you're a traitor.

What's going on here? High levels of aggression, that's for sure. But deflection, too. Our leaders are a master of deflection. They yell so you won't notice what else is happening. What else is happening?

Well, it turns out one of the biggest stories of the decade dropped this morning, you may not even be aware of it. "The Wall Street Journal" reported that Saudi Arabia is considering accepting Chinese currency rather than U.S. dollars for its oil sales to China. Now, why is that a big deal? It seems like some little financial story.

Well, because it would spell the end of the petro dollar. The petro dollar is one of the keys to the United States' wealth. Saudi Arabia has traded oil exclusively in U.S. dollars for nearly half a century and that is one of the key reasons the United States has the highest living standard of any big country in the world despite the fact that our manufacturing sector long ago collapsed.

You may have wondered, how'd that work? Why are we still so rich? Well, this is how.

Petro dollars allow our government in short to spend money that we don't have and that money pays for an awful lot of what we have. Healthcare, retirements, military, we could go on -- everything essentially. As economist Gal Luft put it in an interview with "The Wall Street Journal" today, quote: "The oil market and by extension, the entire global commodities market is the insurance policy of the status of the dollar as the reserve currency. If that block is taken out of the wall, the wall will begin to collapse."

What's the wall? Well, it is the U.S. economy. Not a small story, maybe even a bigger story than the invasion of Ukraine. I wonder why we are not talking about it.

Meanwhile, at the exact same moment that happened, there is this. The Chinese government has decided to wound our already teetering economy once again by using the pretext of COVID. So the Chinese have ordered lockdowns in factory towns, towns that make Toyotas, Volkswagens, circuit boards, air conditioning units, batteries, televisions, and yes, iPhones.

Now, why are they doing this? Well, you're supposed to believe it's all about the coronavirus, which has mysteriously resurged in China in the middle of a war in which China is siding with the country that we are against, Russia.

Can that really be true? Hard to believe?

Is it really just the virus that's causing this behavior? Yes, say the propagandist at "The Washington Post." It definitely is. It's definitely not a trade war brought on by the Biden administration's incompetence in international affairs. We're not suffering for the fact that they don't know what they're doing. No, it's just a virus.

A pundit called Catherine Rampell, for example, told us with a straight face that quote: "Daily COVID cases in China have reached numbers not publicly reported since 2020. Thanks partly to low vaccination rates for the elderly in China, plus the relative effectiveness of Chinese made coronavirus vaccines, the Chinese government has responded to outbreaks with an iron fist."

They should have gotten with Pfizer, like we did.

Now none of that, of course explains why cases are higher in China now that they were in the beginning of the pandemic. But "The Washington Post" doesn't want you to think about that. They want you to think about vaccines. It was all about vaccines.

It turns out the Chinese have a pandemic of the unvaccinated, too, and don't they deserve it?

And speaking of news you may not be hearing about, oh, a Hot War is in progress 50 yards from Texas, which is an American state. No one seems to notice that either because we're focused on Ukraine.

You're seeing the aftermath of a cartel firefight in the border town of Nuevo Laredo, Mexico. I mean, right across the border, right there. According to one report, a Mexican cartel engaged local authorities in a shootout for more than three hours. You may notice the burning trucks with no one responding to them. That's a war.

The U.S. Consulate has just warned Americans to avoid the area or secure shelter. That's our Southern border over which two million people flowed this year with no restraints whatsoever.

Meanwhile, in our country, a convoy of American citizens dared to peacefully protest their own government as they assume the Constitution guaranteed them the right to do and yet, they have been blocked unconstitutionally from entering their own capital city, Washington, D.C.

And such as truckers who are banned from entering Washington, D.C., it's everyone. D.C. Police somehow were allowed to block off many exits yesterday to drivers for more than two hours.

It is the same city that rewarded violent Black Lives Matter protesters with a mural. So maybe you're for that, maybe you're not, but in normal times that would be a big story because our constitutional rights are wrapped up and then we should be debating what the limits of those rights are.

How much power our politicians have? How much politician power do we want them to have? But we're not, because Ukraine, because you changed your Twitter name to a Ukrainian flag.

It's the new crisis, you're not supposed to pay attention to any of the other crises, particularly here at home.

Chris Bedford is paying attention to these crises and he has thought a lot about how COVID has affected our response. He's got a new piece out in "The Federalist," marking the two-year anniversary of corona law. He joins us tonight.

Chris Bedford, thanks so much for coming on.

CHRIS BEDFORD, SENIOR EDITOR, "THE FEDERALIST": Thanks for having me.

CARLSON: So I don't -- you know, I don't want to start off too depressing, but I think the answer to all of this just for people to know what's going on and to exert, as they're allowed to as Americans, their constitutional rights. How have those rights eroded, do you think over the past two years?

BEDFORD: They have been massively eroded and like you said, it's been absconded to being like a virus and I first really got a good eye on this when just a few months, maybe a month and a half into the lockdown, I flew from Washington, D.C., which was locked down to California, which was locked down, I stopped in Philadelphia, or Chicago, where the airport bars were open, but the city was locked down.

And then I drove cross country talking to businesses, I saw different states, different towns, were living in their own realities, where people didn't even realize that just a hundred miles from them, people were free, maybe 50 miles away, people were free.

And as folks' businesses were being destroyed, their churches shuttered, their lives ruined, their children separated from them, they're dying parents kept from them, their babies kept men when they're having them in the maternity ward. They were just blaming this virus.

But in reality, it was all human action from the very beginning and it is tempting for us to think that: Hey, now that masks started to come off, now that Hawaii and D.C. are the last places in the union that still really force mask mandates on children, that is all going to go away.

But it wasn't the virus, which is not going to go away. It was the human action, the things we've surrendered. And all across the entire Western world, our relationships with our own teachers, our relationships with our politicians, with our media, with our police, with our priests, even with our children, and our parents had been fundamentally altered in a way that was largely chosen by our elites forced upon us in a completely hypocritical fashion, like you pointed out.

We can't just walk away and say this chapter is over. It plays over and over again, just like you were talking about with the calls to investigate or imprison you. Where did those come from?

We got so casually used to saying that people should be investigated for COVID disinformation, that it was for the good of us all, that now it just slips off the tongue, it is practically mundane. That's a massive shift in the Western world and the beginning of a new era.

CARLSON: I think it is. And you know, you look around and you think, well, things are so screwed up, they could never get better. But you know, I think the majority, no matter who they vote for, still believes in the Constitution and in personal autonomy and civil rights.

So maybe if the majority peacefully and calmly reasonably exerted their constitutional rights, things would get better a lot faster.

BEDFORD: There is certainly an opportunity for that, but we entered the strange place where parents are now used to not being allowed into their children's schools or not having control over what their children are taught. But the good news about COVID in some aspect, that's a bright light is it has re-politicized people.

I was just talking to someone who said that no one in Dallas knew the name of the County Judges and the politicians, the local folks at city council until the last two years, and now they do. Now, they are involved in those elections.

People weren't really paying attention in Washington, D.C. or in San Francisco, or in Loudoun County to the School Boards. Well, now they are and this is going to be fought in the local level, because you can get an 80-point Republican sweep, but just as you showed with the Ukraine stuff, Republicans in D.C. aren't going to save you, our focus on national politics has removed the local and that's where this fight is going to be won.

CARLSON: That's totally right. Good people are the majority in this country. They really are. But you're right, the Republican Party is not going to save you. Thank you for saying that.

BEDFORD: Nope.

CARLSON: Chris Bedford, great to see you. Thank you.

BEDFORD: Thank you.

CARLSON: We have very sad news to report tonight. Two of our colleagues here at FOX News appear to have been killed in Ukraine.

Cameraman Pierre Zakrzewski and freelance journalist, Oleksandra "Sasha" Kuvshynova died outside Kyiv when their vehicle was struck by incoming fire. Pierre was 55 years old, Sasha was 24.

FOX News' Trey Yingst just tweeted a photograph of himself with the two of them. It read, quote, "Sasha was killed alongside Pierre. She was talented, well-sourced and witty. She liked photography, poetry, and music." It's crushing.

Sasha served as a consultant in Ukraine. She helped FOX News journalists navigate that country.

Zakrzewski covered war zones for FOX all over the world -- Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, and Ukraine. Here he is back in 2004, shooting a package in the Republic of Congo with Steve Harrigan.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEVE HARRIGAN, FOX NEWS CHANNEL CORRESPONDENT: the peacekeeping mission got off to a rough start when the commander of French forces struck a journalist.

PIERRE ZAKRZEWSKI, FOX NEWS CHANNEL PHOTOJOURNALIST: We didn't really know what to expect. We were going to Ituri Province. There had just been some pretty horrific massacres there.

HARRIGAN: We have you on tape striking a journalist. How can you just have this behavior?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Other question please?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Cameraman Pierre Zakrzewski has shared many experiences with Harrigan.

HARRIGAN: As you can see, people are now on the run. The gunmen are coming closer. Pierre, let's go. Grab the sticks.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: It is such a dangerous job and you forget that and we're grateful to the people who perform it.

Our friend, Benjamin Hall of FOX was also injured in Ukraine. And of course, we are praying for him and we'll bring you updates.

There is heavy shelling tonight in the capital city of Ukraine. City officials are imposing a 35-hour curfew there. We've got a live report from the scene, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: This is a FOX News Alert. Ukraine's capital city has just imposed a 35-hour curfew. Buildings in the city are under heavy shelling at the moment. FOX's Greg Palkot is in Ukraine for us tonight.

We're grateful that he is. Greg, what do you see?

GREG PALKOT, FOX NEWS CHANNEL SENIOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Tucker. Yes, we are over here in Lviv, pretty quiet. They have a curfew in place here, too. We heard a little bit of scattered gunshots earlier. We've been hearing a pretty steady drone overhead, but I would say, eerily quiet is the way to describe Lviv.

I would say brutal is the way to describe Kyiv, the capital of this country.

Russians stepped up their indiscriminate bombardment by artillery of much of the city. Dozens of civilians have been killed with their main forces still outside of the center of the city. The shelling is becoming even more systematic there.

There is now, yes, an around the clock curfew there. There is mayhem all the time. The buildings left for burning wrecks.

Meanwhile, down south, a little bit of relief for the people of that port City of Mariupol, 20,000 people fled via cars along the humanitarian route yesterday and today, but some 400,000 remain there and with barely any vital services, 2,300 are feared dead.

Talks today between Ukrainian officials and Russian officials described as difficult and the Russians must feel that Ukraine is stealing their PR thunder, posting a video claiming to show Ukrainian military vehicles being blown up.

The pace and the agility of Ukrainian forces using anti-tank and other offensive weapons is nothing short of remarkable.

Tucker, we spoke with the mayor of Lviv today, he said, just give us more weapons, and they could even defeat the Russians. That's a tall order.

And I want to thank you too, for that, moving tribute to our last colleagues. Pierre and I worked together for over 20 years. He will be sorely, sorely missed.

Back to you.

CARLSON: It's just unbelievable, and unbelievably sad. Greg Palkot for us. Thank you so much.

So his whole thing is sad. Those pictures are awful. The fact that two FOX News employees were just killed there is awful. Many civilians have been killed there. Soldiers, some conscripted had been killed there and that is sad, too.

So it's understandable that the West is outraged by what the Russians have done and that led by the United States, they have imposed sanctions on the Russian population.

These are without precedent you should know. Russia is about to default on its debts, the value of Russia's currency has plummeted dramatically. The question is, could there be long term consequences for the United States from doing this?

No one in Washington seems to be thinking of that at all. Today, Joe Biden's publicist celebrated the economic collapse of Russia. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JEN PSAKI, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: The President has rallied the global community to put in place a greater set of financial sanctions package than has ever been done for any economy in the world. It wouldn't have happened without his action.

I just outlined for you at the top, which I think it's important to note the crippling impact this has had on the economy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Okay, the crippling impact it's had on the economy. Sure. Will it dislodge Putin from power? Will it force the Russians to withdraw from Ukraine? That would be a victory? I don't know. Did it force Saddam Hussein out of power? Did it force Fidel Castro out of power our sanctions? Or did it just hurt the population?

But the question from the American perspective is, will these sanctions, will our effort to destroy the Russian economy hurt this country in the long and short term?

Jonas Max Ferris is an investment advisor. He is the co-founder of Max Funds. He joins us tonight.

Jonas, thanks so much for coming on.

So I think, you know, Washington is having a moral debate: Is what Russia did wrong or right? Of course, it's wrong. I mean, that's sort of beyond debate at this point. The question is, what's the effect on the United States of destroying the Russian economy? And what is the effect do you think?

JONAS MAX FERRIS, FOX NEWS CHANNEL CONTRIBUTOR: Well, I think the effect is we are running a real risk of creating basically a new Soviet Union and a new Iron Curtain through sanctions that, in my opinion, are targeted more towards the people of Russia, the ordinary citizens that I mean, no one seems to care about the Russian people at this point and I understand the sentiment seeing all these horrible -- these images.

But we need these people to like the West and not to put them in darkness and remove all commerce with these people because what Putin did, and more importantly, I don't think they will work because it ignores how the economics of Russia, how it finances wars whenever Putin has been aggressive doing his sphere of influence stuff, it is during high periods of energy prices and that goes from the 2008 with going into Georgia, high energy prices back then if you recall, 2014 annexation of Crimea it goes back to the Soviet invasion in '79 of Afghanistan, which also ended in '89 when oil prices fell back down.

That's where the money comes from. It's not from flights on Aeroflot to the U.K., it is not from these oligarchs' yachts. It comes from the energy and commodity business. When those prices are high, they have money to afford these kind of military adventures.

If the West was serious, then they would attack that area, sanction that area, drive those prices down even potentially cause a recession here, that is what is called to fight the supposed next Hitler, not just to punish citizens where you can't transfer a few hundred dollars to family or friends you have in Russia, or Coke has to leave even though they've been in there since it was the Soviet Union, I think that was very sad for everybody.

Our Western influence, our movies, we saw Disney come out. These are things that helped bring down the Soviet Union by showing the success and amazement of a capitalist society. To remove all that and just have them live in a dark bubble again, if anything, it is what Putin in some ways, wants. He wanted, maybe less Western influence, both social media, which kind of grew under his power, and doesn't -- you know, now he is getting what he wants basically.

He could also buy back stakes in these companies at very low prices because we don't want to own them anymore. We don't want to do business there. We want to cut them off.

And it's nice that we have this economic clout and power, but these Western companies probably wouldn't do this if something like this happened in China. They can do it because the Russian economy is not a big deal for them. And so it's a little bit off. Again, I want to -- it is good to take economic action, but we have to target where the money is going, not just what feels good.

CARLSON: Right. Well, our policy seems to have driven up oil prices globally, which makes Biden -- I mean, which makes Putin richer. So I mean, I know I'm a little confused by this, but I appreciate your clarity on it because we should care what the consequences are.

Jonas Max Ferris, thank you.

So Joe Biden's Assistant Secretary for Health, who is a man, just one Woman of the Year from "U.S.A. Today." How does that work, and if you're a woman, might you be a little insulted by this?

What about you? You're a woman.

Candace Owens is a woman and we're going to get her take after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: So it wasn't that long ago when a physician called Anthony Fauci who was once a public figure in this country, told us that if everyone got vaccinated against COVID, we wouldn't have to worry about the virus again. But then he changed his views.

First, he told you that you need a booster. And if you didn't get a booster, the vaccine wouldn't work. But it turns out that two shots plus a booster still isn't enough. We know that from the CEO of Pfizer, who has just informed us you're going to need a booster shot every single year. In other words, you're going to need to keep buying his product from now until forever, sorry.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARGARET BRENNAN: You think that we will, every fall, have to prepare ourselves for a booster shot with COVID just like we get a flu shot?

DR. ALBERT BOURLA, CEO, PFIZER: I think so. We know that the duration of the protection doesn't last very long. So, what we are trying to do and we are working very diligently right now, it is to make not only a vaccine that will protect against all variants, including omicron, but also something that can protect for at least a year.

It is necessary for a boost right now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Why don't other companies try this? Why doesn't the CEO of McDonald's go on "Face the Nation" on CBS News and say, I'm sorry, you're going to have to eat more Big Macs. I'm sorry, you just are. Doctors require it. But if you get sick from one, you can't sue, unfortunately, but you must eat more Big Macs.

So you're going to have to get your fourth booster right away, says the guy selling boosters and whatever you do, do not ask questions.

As Barack Obama just informed us this weekend, the vaccines are effective quote: "I just tested positive for COVID." Obama wrote, "It's a reminder to get vaccinated, if you haven't already even as cases go down."

I've been vaccinated, I have COVID, which means you need to get vaccinated -- again and again and again into perpetuity. Shut up and do it. Amazing.

Well, "U.S.A. Today" America's newspaper just announced its Women of the Year. According to the newspaper that award is a quote, "Recognition of women across the country who have made a significant impact." Okay, but here's the irony. In this Women of the Year competition, we saw a major win for the patriarchy.

A biological man called Rachel Levine is at the very top of the list. Now, Levine is a former health official in the State of Pennsylvania who forced nursing homes to take COVID positive patients, even as Levine snuck Levine's mother into a private facility.

Now, Levine is a fake Admiral, and we're told a woman.

Candace Owens is a woman, so we thought she could assess. She is the host of "Candace," and we're happy to have her join us tonight.

Candace Owens, "Woman of the Year," Rachel Levine. Do you feel honored to have this new addition to the sisterhood or do you have other feelings?

CANDACE OWENS, POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: What's a woman, Tucker? I'm confused. I don't know what a woman is anymore. Look, this is -- it's funny and it is also pointedly ridiculous and it kind of gets back to what I always say, which is that with progressives, they are always so progressive that they are actually just regressive. Right?

We saw this in terms of race. We were once the country worth aspiring towards, not being able to judge each other by the color of our skin. Now we basically say, no, no, we have to only judge each other exclusively by the color of our skin.

Same thing in the category of feminism, right? Early feminism, we were trying to create a space for women that was separate from men. We wanted women's sports. We wanted women to be able to compete differently.

We have women that train from the time that they are kids all the way up through college, trying to compete at the level to say against other women. Well, now you can just throw on a wig and say: Actually, I'm a woman, too and you can crush all of their records because it's so progressive, it is actually regressive. We're actually erasing women.

And sadly, it was the feminists that got behind this early on. I didn't have the courage to say no, actually, that's a man that we're looking at and feminists should be fighting this tooth and nail.

By the way, where is Hillary Clinton? I don't want her perspective on Russia and Ukraine. I want to hear her perspective on this category. I want to hear her perspective on the person who ran on, oh, my gosh, women are so oppressed, and I'm a woman and vote for me because I'm a woman, she seems suspiciously quiet on this topic, doesn't want to really touch this topic about men taking the spots of women.

I mean, that is actually representing an existential crisis for these young women who I said earlier, are competing in these categories. So it's ridiculous.

Bigger question, Tucker, why are they doing this? You always have to ask with the left because it's always something Machiavellian and it gets back to Marxist ideology over and over again. It's always about disrupting the family unit.

The government gains more power when people are confused, right? If you don't know whether you're a woman or a man, you're not going to have a functional nuclear family unit, right? Instead, you're going to be dysfunctional and dysfunctional people tend to rely upon the government. That's what's happening right now. That's what you're seeing this push for.

CARLSON: I mean, just -- I've asked this so many times, but I still don't know the answer. If Rachel Levine can declare I'm a woman then why can't I declare I'm Samoan and demand that you respect me because I don't have the human rights campaign backing me up? Like what's the honest answer?

If we can be whatever we want to be because we wished it, why can't I be whatever I want to be?

OWENS: Well, I think we need to turn around and Rachel Dolezal is owed an apology. Who cares if she was born white? Who cares if she was changing her skin color? She felt on the inside that she was a Black woman. And I feel it's absolutely ridiculous to state that a woman can be a man, a man can be a woman?

Well, why aren't you Black, Tucker? And why aren't I White? Why can't we just pick our races as well? It's that ridiculous. And that, by the way, is a question that trans-people never want to answer.

Can you just pick your race? They go: Oh, of course, you can't pick your race. Of course, you can't pick your race. And of course, you can't pick your gender. You're born the way that you are. But what we're talking about, Tucker, of course, is reality and the left doesn't work in reality.

CARLSON: I mean, of course. I mean, and by the way, racism much shallower category than gender. I mean, the sex differences are much deeper than racial differences. So like if you can change your sex -- whatever, it's too crazy, and thank you for not playing along. I appreciate it.

So in a story that has not gotten enough attention, I want to say it again, Saudi Arabia has announced it may begin to sell oil to China using the Chinese currency instead of the U.S. dollar. End of the petro dollar. You should at least know what's coming and we will tell you straight ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: if you've left home recently, you know the gas prices are now at their highest level well in history. So Americans, not surprisingly are getting desperate. Why wouldn't they be? FOX's Bill Melugin is here to explain what that means exactly.

Hey, Bill.

BILL MELUGIN, FOX NEWS CHANNEL NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Tucker.

So some Americans have apparently decided that fuel is just too expensive to purchase right now. So they're just stealing it instead.

Take a look. Surveillance video at a gas station in the Houston area shows thieves pulling up in a green van. They evidently had some sort of a trap door at the bottom of the vehicle waiting for that video to load in a moment, but what they did is they broke a lock. They shove a hose down in the gas tanks then they start siphoning all of that fuel out.

The owner of the gas station says it happened several days in a row and the thief stole hundreds of gallons of diesel fuel each and every time. Now surveillance video shows the owner of that gas station actually running out and trying to chase the thieves down once he realized what was happening.

He says the thieves got away with over 1,000 gallons of fuel in total that ended up costing his family about $5,000.00.

Then out here in LA County, in Long Beach thieves using a truck disguised as a construction vehicle stole thousands of gallons of fuel using these large tanks you see in the back of that truck there. The thieves had access to tanks with a master key and at least one person was arrested.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This other car? They have everything.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This cell video shows the gas thieves in action, their truck disguised as a construction truck, but a closer look inside shows a huge tank used to steal thousands of gallons of fuel.

Look at this, would you?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You see they have the tank in the back.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No license for police out there.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They are stealing around 2,000 gallons is almost $10,000.00.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MELUGIN: And Tucker, these thieves are targeting diesel fuel rather than just regular gasoline. And the reason they're doing that is because diesel fuel is less flammable, it's a lot easier to transport and it is it's also worth a lot more on the black market.

We'll send it back to you.

CARLSON: Unbelievable. Bill Melugin for us. Thanks so much.

Let's send billions more to Ukraine. People are literally stealing gas in the States of America. How thoroughly has the Biden administration mismanaged American leadership around the world? Well, here's one very significant indicator.

The Saudi Kingdom, Saudi Arabia reportedly considering accepting Chinese currency instead of U.S. dollars for its oil sales to China. This should be a huge change.

For almost 50 years, Saudi Arabia has traded oil exclusively in U.S. dollars and that has been a massive boom to the United States. According to "The Wall Street Journal," which broke the story, the Chinese government is quote, "Offering everything you could possibly imagine to the Saudis."

What would this mean for the United States? Elbridge Colby is a former Pentagon official, he's also a principal at the Marathon Initiative. We're happy to have him join us tonight.

Elbridge, thanks so much for coming on.

So we didn't want the story pass. I think it's being ignored by a lot of people. It seemed like a major story to us, is it?

ELBRIDGE COLBY, FORMER PENTAGON OFFICIAL: Yes, I think so Tucker, and I think you're right to point to the dollars role is central to our wellbeing in a very practical level, and I think what we're seeing is early indications of a movement towards probably two blocks, one led by us and one led by China, and that's going to have massive implications, especially if we're poorly organized.

And I think the point that you're making, Tucker, which you're absolutely right is we need to be jealously and carefully thinking about this kind of crown jewel of the role of the dollar, and just being very careful in how we use it.

And I mean, the Saudis are a great example of poor foresight and strategic planning. The administration was very tough on the Saudis. And yes, the murder of Jamal Khashoggi was an abomination. But on the other hand, if you're going to end up meeting them, and asking them for help, maybe you should think about how you approach them in the first place.

And this is not the only example of that where we need to take strategic account of the consequences, and not be solely focused on sort of moral posturing, if you will. And that's a classic example.

And because, otherwise, we're not going to be thinking about what's in the long term interest of the American people.

CARLSON: I mean, it feels like they are their college sophomores, like all they're capable of is a moral lecture. And I'm not against moralizing. We do it all the time. There are moral questions to solve. But if you're leading a country, shouldn't you put its interest at the top of your concerns? They don't seem to be.

COLBY: Absolutely, I think you do. And I mean, I think you take proper account of the ways in which you're going to pursue sort of high minded goals, and then you stick to them. But if you're going to make a huge moral issue, and then back off it when you need it. Well, that's going to result in a situation in which the Saudis and the Emiratis don't return your phone call and that's not a good situation. That's not serving anybody's interests, not serving a moral interest. And it's not serving Americans' interests.

CARLSON: That's exactly right. We are a force for good in the world because we're rich, okay, because we can afford to be. Burundi is not, not because they are not good people, because they're not rich like we are.

So if we jeopardize our affluence, we jeopardize our ability to make the world better, obviously.

Elbridge Colby, I wish you were running the State Department. Thank you.

COLBY: Thanks, Tucker.

CARLSON: So Nancy Pelosi has been in Congress like since the beginning of time, what we didn't know was it in her free time, she is a strategic war strategist. She is now making battle plans in Ukraine. We have the tape, you're going to want to get the popcorn. We'll show it to you after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: Every decent American is horrified by the atrocities underway in Ukraine. Of course, that's not the question. The question is how do you respond? Because keep in mind, Russia, however bad its leaders may be has thousands of nuclear weapons aimed at the United States, and you wouldn't want those to go off and kill everyone here, of course.

So you need steady wise leaders to make certain that doesn't happen. But instead we have Nancy Pelosi. Have you seen Nancy Pelosi speak recently? You probably haven't. Well, here she is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA): Myself, when I see that, that -- those tanks that 40 miles of tanks, I'd like to take out those tanks. I mean, I think that them having more planes might be useful, but I'm not a military strategist. We hope that we will be able to get to a place, I hope, you asked me how -- I hope that we can get to a place where the MiGs which are the kinds of planes they've been flying, can go to Ukraine. The F-16s, especially if we have an excess of them can backfill for Poland.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: She would like to take out some tanks. Let's elect some competent people, shall we?

That's it for us tonight. Wish we could stay. We will see you tomorrow.

Have the best night with the ones you love.


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