Just hours after we finished taping this podcast, new evidence surfaced of just how wild and crazy things could get in the last days of Donald Trump's presidency.

The White House announced that the president had issued a new round of pardons that included Paul Manafort, his former campaign chairman, and Roger Stone, his longtime political adviser, both of whom had been convicted of crimes going out of Robert Mueller's Russia investigation.

And as if that wasn't enough, Trump also pardon Charles Kushner, the father of his son-in-law Jared Kushner, who had been convicted of illegal campaign contributions, tax evasion, and witness tampering.

That's a lonely if he'd taken one more step, I would have bitch slapped the guy. I would have bitch slapped at a recent point, I was preparing a bitch slap if he did one more inch of aggressiveness.

You needed to be bitch slapped.

I think Biden is going to break our sovereignty. I think I know what his plan is and involves the UN. And American should arm if Biden comes in, you should arm.

And the day that he does anything like invites the UN, and you is the day we start revolution.

That was Patrick Byrne, Gadfly American entrepreneur, talking on a pro-Trump podcast about how he almost smacked the White House Council in the Oval Office last week, during an hours long meeting in which he pressed the president to take dramatic measures to reverse the results of last month's election.

Byrne's views might seem more than a bit outlandish, but his comments about taking up arms once Biden becomes president is no joke.

As Americans prepare to celebrate Christmas, law enforcement officials are increasingly worried about the prospects for disruptive protests and even violence in Georgia during the January 5th Senate run-offs, and the next day in Washington when Congress is slated to officially accept the Electoral College tally, making Biden the next president.

We'll discuss the strange final days of the Trump presidency and what they could bring with Ben Wittis of the Brookings Institution, and then we'll let our intefatigable producer Mark Seaman put climate and me on the hot seat with questions from our listeners on this hour end of the year special edition of Skull Duggery.

Because people have got to know whether or not they're president of the crook, well I'm not a crook.

I told the American people I did not trade arms for hostage. My heart and my best intentions still tell me that's true, but the facts and the evidence tell me it is not.

I did not have sexual relations with that woman.

There will be no lies. We will honor the American people with the truth and nothing else.

I'm Michael Isgov, Chief Investigator correspondent for Yahoo News, and I'm Dan Clyde, Minister and Chief of Yahoo News.

And we are joined for this discussion with the aforementioned Ben Wittis, Ben welcome back to Skull Duggery.

Good to be here. So I want to talk a little bit about this guy, Patrick Byrne. I actually became aware of him and got in touch with him about a year and a half ago.

When it was revealed that he was having a hot, torrid affair with one Maria Bhutina, the later convicted Russian agent who was sucking up to all sorts of American power figures and political leaders.

And that seemed to be quite fascinating. And Byrne seemed to have a strange story to tell that would shed light on what Maria Bhutina was up to.

And then he resurfaces just in the last couple of weeks as one of those who's been egging Trump on about trying to reverse the results of the election.

And there was this now notorious meeting in the Oval Office last Friday. I was texting with Byrne about it. He said it lasted four hours.

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