The Absurd GOP

[Angrboda]

I watched the Candace Owens and Andrew Wilson debate about who killed Charlie Kirk so that you don’t have to.

On one side, you had Andrew Wilson, a conservative commentator and expert on firearms, who believes the totality of the evidence is very persuasive that Tyler Robinson, the suspect who is being prosecuted for killing Kirk, actually was Kirk’s killer. And, spoilers: He is completely right.

On the other side, you have Candace Owens, who thinks it just doesn’t add up and there were other people involved: Robinson is, in her view, a patsy. He’s been set up by the U.S. government or Israel or Turning Point USA, or some other third-party group. Sigh.

In my humble opinion, the verdict wasn’t close: Wilson destroyed and humiliated Owens, who proved she has no idea what she’s talking about. She had no evidence whatsoever to support her theories, no logical basis to make her claims, and no ability to explain her absurd conclusion that there’s zero chance Robinson killed Kirk. Zero chance, that’s her position.

It’s insane. Take a look.

The debate was four hours long, hosted by Patrick Bet-David. Wilson allegedly put up $300,000 of his own money to secure Owens’s participation, because he thought he was doing a public service by challenging her unsupported claims. There’s an argument to be made that his strategy backfired, however — online audiences seemed to think Owens won the debate. I think that shows the limits of what you can even accomplish in the persuasion industry, unfortunately.

Now, I say that as someone who personally agrees with Wilson, that the evidence of Robinson’s guilt is overwhelming and that Owens often fails to provide basic evidence for her claims. But even by the low bar to which I hold Owens, I was disappointed that she came at Wilson with nothing, not a single shred of evidence, that would help establish that Robinson was a patsy — let alone that there’s “zero” chance he killed Kirk.

Candace Owens destroyed by Andrew Wilson in Charlie Kirk debate