Bullsh*t Ceasefires Everywhere

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Left, Right, and Center, available everywhere you get podcasts. For a limited time, you can get a Big Mac meal for just $8. That's a burger, fries, and a drink. They don't call it an extra-value meal for nothing. Get a Big Mac meal only at McDonald's. Price and participation may vary. Promotion pricing may be lower than meal pricing. Hey, it's Ryan Seacrest for Albertsons, and Tom Thumb. It's time to stock up and save now through October 27th. Get $10 off when you spend $25 or more on participating items. Just look for participating item tags to earn on eligible items from brands like Bubbler, Ghost Energy, Lindor, Halo Top, Vital Farms, Kellogg's, Campbell's, and Heinz. Clip once and save through October 27th every time you shop. Grab these hot deals before they're gone. Restrictions apply. See website for full terms and conditions. Welcome back to Pod Save the World. I'm Tommy Vitor. I'm Ben Rhodes. Ben, this morning I saw a bunch of coverage of Jeff Bezos kind of buying the Met Gala. And then I read a story about the family that owns Samsung paying an $8 billion inheritance tax bill. And I thought, we could do that. Maybe the Koreans know something we don't. It would be cool to do that. Like you can actually, you know, you can actually collect money from these people so they don't buy all your cultural institutions. Not that I, I don't know, not that the Met Gala is always my jam, but there's something kind of gross about it. Yeah, you know, it's a little late-stage capitalism, you know, whatever. It's very like collapsing Roman Empire vibes. Caligula. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Anyway, but yeah, it did make me think like, oh, yeah, remember all that ranting and raving about the death tax and how it'll hurt farmers and all this bullshit. And that's just protecting billionaires who pay. Well, you didn't get invited to any of the good movies. He didn't get invited to any of the good parties in high school. So now he has to buy the biggest party in the world for his wife. Honestly, not a bad strategy. Yeah. It's fun. Also, you buy your way to space. You can do whatever you want these days. I like, I just want to note, because there's a lot of, my algorithm has trained me for Nick's Twitter and absolutely pasted the Sixers yesterday, getting revenge for you. No, Celtics just. But there's a huge divide because Ben Stiller, Nick's superfan, went to the Met Gala. Okay. He's getting dragged pretty hard. Why? I give him a pass. He's always there. I'm not mad at Ben Stiller. I will note that Timmy Chalamet went to the game. Oh, I see. Instead of going to the game. Yeah. Did you also, I also love what Ben Stiller tweeted. Well, we got that done. Clearly about the Knicks and people thought it was about the correspondence and her assassination. So this is really fun. So I have a Knicks text thread with my best friends from high school and it's the funniest thread because it's literally like, we know we're watching the game. So we'll just be like, OG, cat, got it. No context. And Ben Stiller literally tweets, like he's on our thread. You have no idea what he's talking about. He's just like, we got it. Oh, we almost had it. And then these MAGA people are like, I can't believe you said we almost got Trump. It's like, you fucking nerds. Just calm down. Not everything is politics. Even for us. Right. Even for us. Even us, we like sports. Even these nerds agree. We got a great show today. We're going to cover all the latest from Iran from Trump's plan to guide ships through the Strait of Hormuz and why the administration is insisting that the US and Iran literally firing at each other. They sank a bunch of boats. Apparently that's not a ceasefire violation. Interesting. Then we'll talk about some newly leaked intelligence about the impact of the US and Israeli bombing campaign on Iran's nuclear infrastructure or lack thereof and whether there's any semblance of a plan or an endgame for negotiations. We'll dig into the politics back home, some polling data from The Post over the weekend, and then we'll tell you guys what we've heard from people on the ground in Iran. We'll also cover how this is impacting Trump's upcoming trip to China, the latest from Lebanon, and the truly hellish situation on the ground for people in Gaza and the lack of any reconstruction efforts that we're going to do an update on the war between Russia and Ukraine, the political situation in Russia, and then we'll have a little fun at the end at the expense of a US ambassador. Ben hasn't seen any of this yet. I don't know what this is. Michael has a sense of humor that usually lands. This will be fun. I'm trusting Michael. Trust. Trust the plan. And then you'll hear my interview with Congressman Jason Crow from Colorado, who you know well, Ben. We talk about Iran, efforts by Congress to force an authorization of the war. His grilling of Pete Hegseth last week, he took an interesting tack, focused on the fact that he focused on this one really shady staffer at the Pentagon and made some interesting news. Then we talk about Trump's plan to move troops out of Germany because the Chancellor of Germany hurt Trump's feelings. Can I just say, because we kick around Democrats as they need to be kicked around a fair amount on not just this show, but I notice, you know, everywhere, Ken Martin. Jason Crow is a great dude and like gets it and is taking on Trump on the war in the right ways, is leading the DCCC, the Congressional Campaign Committee, candidate recruitment. Anyway, every now and then we need to point out that there's some good Democrats. Yeah, there's some great Democrats out there. It's easier to be mean than nice, but you're right. Well, unfortunately, the Democratic Party gives us a lot of reasons. A lot of reasons to be mean. And by the way, Ben is actually doing today's episode topless to help us get more views on the Pod Save the World YouTube page. Thank you for your service, Ben. You're looking great. You've been working out. That's probably a joke, but you're gonna have to subscribe to find out. But please subscribe to Pod Save the World on YouTube to ensure you don't miss any pop-tops, any bonus episodes we do there about breaking news. Also, you help us displace Ben Shapiro out of the YouTube algorithm and Fox News. You may need to come up with someone other than Ben Shapiro because I noticed the Daily Wire numbers are tanking. Tanking. Tough. Tough, tough, tough. Turns out just being dyed-in-the-wool Netanyahu supporters is not a good thing. Yeah, it turns out being just pro-war neocon propaganda isn't as profitable as saying Emmanuel Macron's wife has a dick. Really, that's how you kill it in media these days. Maybe we'll get there. We've got Candace over here. That's how we get subs. We've got Pablo Torre winning a Pulitzer for sports reporting. I was just telling you that. I don't know. We land somewhere in the middle. No, Pablo's the best. Adam of Pod Save America a while back. Pulitzer Prize winner. Yeah, Pulitzer Prize winner. If you like the work Crooked Media is doing, by the way, please consider becoming a paid subscriber at crooked.com slash friends. You get ad-free episodes of this show, ad-free episodes of Pod Save America. You get great bonus content from Pod Save America. You get Dan Pfeiffer diving deep into polling, and it's really the single best thing you can do to help us grow as a progressive independent media company. Also, subscribers get early access and discounted tickets to CrookedCon and other CrookedCon perks. TBD may be more topless, Ben, at CrookedCon. Oh, possible. It's the first time you're hearing about this, but there's a movement. Me and Hasan Piker will go topless together. We'll see you as a better body. Yeah. I think it's probably not me. I think I know who it is. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Not you, Hasan. CrookedCon. You're the. Jordan and our team works out at Hasan's house in West Hollywood. Oh, really? Crushing burpees and stuff, yeah. Socialist burpees. It's pretty cool. CrookedCon happening November 5th through 7th in D.C. Go to CrookedCon.com for more info. Should we talk about Iran? I think we should. I think we should. Okay. Because somebody has to, you know, wade into the cesspool of lies that emanates from our government. Straight up bullshit. So the big news this week is this Pentagon plan to, quote-unquote, guide ships through the Strait of Hormuz. Not escort and defend. Guide. It's called Project Freedom. I guess, the freedom to get shot at. What happened to Epic Fury? It's still ongoing. It's paused. Because Trump was so happy about that name. Yeah, he did really love that name. Project Freedom. Again, Hegseth says this is a distinct mission from Epic Fury. It's not a naval escort mission. He and Trump also insist that Iran firing at U.S. Navy ships in the Strait of Hormuz, firing at targets in the UAE and Oman at a South Korean ship, the list goes on, is not a breach of the ceasefire. And CENTCOM also says that U.S. helicopters sinking six Iranian boats, also not a breach of the ceasefire. I guess that probably tells you everything you need to know. They're giving the, Iranians, I guess, the same treatment they give the Israelis, which they can bomb Gaza and Lebanon with impunity and still say there's a ceasefire. It's going to pass. It also probably tells you that Trump does not want to go back to war. Anyway, here is Hegseth talking about this new mission on Tuesday morning in a press event. This operation is separate and distinct from Operation Epic Fury. Project Freedom is defensive in nature, focused in scope, and temporary in duration. With one mission, protecting innocent commercial shipping from Iranian aggression. American forces won't need to enter Iranian waters or airspace. It's not necessary. we're not looking for a fight but iran also cannot be allowed to block innocent countries and their goods from an international waterway iran is the clear aggressor as a direct gift from the united states to the world we have established a powerful red white and blue dome over the street once again america is using its strength to lift up others iran is trying to subjugate the world to our partner partners allies and the rest of the world this is a temporary mission for us as i've said before the world needs this waterway a lot more than we do we're stabilizing the situation so commerce can flow again but we expect the world to step up at the appropriate time and soon we will hand responsibility back to you giving the world a world is it like world be free remember that basketball player he talks about the world like it's a guy like some guy named world to step up something about the way he talks just annoys the shit out of everything it's like it's his cat in the hat war crime beat poetry not it just drives me nuts so centcom says project freedom uh will involve guided missile destroyers over 100 land and sea aircraft and 15 000 service members they're also like very clearly eager to hand this mess off to other countries soon ben so i imagine they'll be cutting and running sure there are a lot of takers yeah yeah a lot of so ben like i'm genuinely confused by the end game here for for trump like there's no chance this half-assed plan to like quote-unquote guide ships is going to get traffic through the straight back to pre-war levels i guess we can hand it off to other countries like you you said but like no one has their naval capacity um so i guess you know maybe everybody just ends up paying a toll or the straight remains remains partially closed and it just crushes the global economy i don't know so like i'm trying to be charitable here i'm trying to genuinely understand the strategy for the straight before we get into the nuclear stuff do you have any like sense of what they're doing i think that the the fact that we're sitting here you know two months into this war and we a war that was started again to change the regime and the nuclear program and usher in freedom in iran has led to project freedom to be a gps service for ships that are already stuck in that quest you know it just shows you the catastrophic error again there are a number of things that jumped out to me they they are worried about the nuclear program and they're worried about the nuclear program they're worried about the absence of legal basis so the reason i think that they're going to these great lengths to call it a project freedom and say it's distinct from um epic fury is because under the war powers act which they have ignored that's the the act that says congress must uh you know authorize a war you can kind of get a 60-day period where you're allowed to um engage in military action uh before you really get in trouble you know if you're responding to an imminent threat which is a very important issue i think it's a very important issue and i think it's a very important issue and i think it's a very important issue and i think it's a very important issue and i think it's a very important Jason Crow kept uh correcting me on because there was no imminent threat because there's no imminent threat but because there he said when he was on the hill that there there it was over because of the ceasefire so they have to make this seem different it's interesting that he seems to care about that that just shows you that the he doesn't care about democrats that shows you that even republicans are feeling humiliated as they should by the absence of any congressional authorization the second thing is there i cannot possibly overstate how insulting their tone towards the rest of the world is you know um you've done a very good job week after week at detailing these massive shortages that are crippling the economies of countries around the world leading to severe shortages um making life hell for like probably untold millions of people around the world and so for him to kind of smarmily say you know like some trader who just did a line of coke in the bathroom before he wanders out to the floor you know well you guys you know we we don't need this as bad as you do and you better come in here like like what is that for like who who is that for like who is the audience for that because if it's the quote-unquote friends and allies he's talking about they have no friends anymore they lost them and and that's not going to make them want to step up you know right and then the last thing is they just fundamentally because they did such piss poor planning about this whole thing and didn't even anticipate that they closed the straightforward moves they don't they don't even understand that the problem is not that there's a lack of guidance for the ships um it's that their minds in the straightforward moves that the iranians are firing at tankers that that there's a fear factor that no amount of guidance is going to solve and similarly if the united states navy which is the strongest in the world can't reopen the strait which it has not no matter what they say they don't control the strait if they control the strait all the ships would get out um it's not like some pickup team of other countries can do it either so he like it's just this kind of weird mix of defense and offensive political messaging with no strategy attached to it yeah and there are there's 20 nearly 23 000 sailors on 1500 or more vessels that are just trapped in the gulf like trying to get out and that that is that's what's at stake right now and rubio also did a briefing at the white house today they did this full court press there was this bizarre event this morning where trump was um uh bringing back like the national fitness award remember that thing we did as kids noah cinderguard the ex-met pitcher was there it was always sad to see it's always sad when the athletes you like turn out to be mega some shredded mega guy yeah he was there but trump's like talking about like blowing up iranians in front of all these children so there was that then hegseth and uh kane did their briefing and then rubio went to the white house briefing room today and was just like a pig and shit like so happy to be there so excited about what he thinks is his future job but anyway rubio said the blockade is costing iran 500 million dollars a day and trump did this interview with um his staffer hugh hewitt on his radio show earlier this week about like oil and gas infrastructure in iran and said uh and they say that in two weeks you know when they talk about time in two weeks they're going to have a natural explosion of their oil that's going to make it impossible for them to really recover from so trump seems to think that if the blockade goes on it will permanently blow up the iranian oil and gas infrastructure and maybe that's his plan to bring them to the table but again the iranians are like they're not even willing to negotiate about nuclear issues right now their their offer is uh a ceasefire from the u.s and israel so also in lebanon they want uh sanctions relief they want other financial benefits and then they're willing to talk about the uh nuclear issues once the war is basically over and then um trump won't even specify what a uh a ceasefire violation would look like and like i don't know if you watch the kane and hegseth briefing but the reporters in that room are such a joke they were literally asking about whether iran is using like mind-carrying dolphins to attack ships or like kamikaze dolphins so that's where we're at in terms of the reporting on this yeah i i i think first of all um they have no plan and they because when you go to war not knowing why you're going to war other than the bb and now convince you to do it you don't even really know what you're trying to get in the negotiation and then they're trying to spin their way out of this but the reality is a lot of them spin it my my only observation i add to this and it's it deals with the military you know we always have to do a lot you know this is kind of throat clearing about how great the military is and it is like the people in it you know a lot of them are wonderful people dan kane has been really disappointing to me i mean i i texted you i watched that he's not as bad as hegseth so you're watching and you're like oh this guy seems better than hegseth but he's gilding the lily you know he's more factual in nature but yeah it's more factual nature there's some tether to the truth but he gives you kind of a blizzard of very tactical details that at the end of the day you're like oh this guy seems better than hegseth add up to no strategy um and and so he but by standing there next to hegseth and trying to make the military operation seem like remarkably competent um he's kind of putting you know he's putting lipstick on this pig and what worries me is that trump you know look it's always hard to play the game of what does trump actually believe because everything out of his mouth about this war is a lie or a half-truth or but i i do think that they're briefing him like the blockade's going great sir you know yeah um this blockade is never in the history of blockades has there been a blockade like this blockade and iran is losing 500 million dollars a day sir and the the oil you know things will blow up in two weeks which i think they said that two weeks ago by the way that that's what i think like quite literally and and i think that they're doing a grave disservice to the country in the world if they're doing that and and i don't know that for a fact but it seems like that because trump like just likes to be told how well everything's going and i think that's what's going on and i think that's what's going on and i think that's what's going on and i think that's what's going on and i think that's what's going on and then he goes out and he repeats it in a dumber version and he amps it up but i can kind of feel that happening here and look just because you can like position ships somewhere doesn't mean you have a good strategy doesn't mean that what you're doing is working and and good military advice is going to the president united states and saying this is not working we cannot solve this problem militarily like we and that does i worry that's not happening yeah i mean a lot of the pentagon press corps is like uh do you have suicide bomber dolphins swimming around the strait of rome which is like what are we doing here okay ben as it has become our tradition uh immediately after we wrapped the show donald trump sent a tweet that i actually i don't know the implications of this one but the war has ended like several times right after we did yeah we've had a million ceasefires everything's better so here's what he truthed on truth social uh based on the request of pakistan and other countries the tremendous military success that we've had had tremendous campaign against our country of iran and additionally the fact that great progress has been made in the United States and in the United States and in the United States and in the United States and in the United States and in the United States and in the United States and in the United we've mutually agreed that while the blockade will remain in full force and effect project freedom the movement of ships through the strait of hormuz will be paused for a short period of time to see whether or not the agreement can be finalized and signed uh from president donald j trump i have no fucking clue what that means i mean it means we won tommy i think it sort of means maybe that this whole plan wasn't working for all the reasons we just discussed and we're skeptical of and now they're going to pretend that they're close to signing some sort of real agreement to reopen the street yeah i mean uh not to be cynical yeah i'm coming from but perhaps project freedom freedom did not succeed in lowering the oil prices as he might have wanted um and so now we're trying a different tack because all he really cares about is the markets yeah but he's he's seeming to suggest that they're close to a final agreement to a final agreement but as we discussed i mean the iranian position was like yeah full ceasefire in iran and lebanon there's an agreement for him to have that involves sanctions relief iran you know getting a lot in return for little and so at some point one of these will be true right and there'll be a deal in which the irgc is still in charge of iran and they get a bunch of money from either sanctions relief for tolling the strait or unfrozen assets in return for some pretty cosmetic nuclear concessions or you know maybe some medium-sized ones like the jcpoa and and maybe this will be the time or maybe this is just another effort to try to lower gas prices but i don't know tommy um would you put project freedom up there with operation overlord the uh normandy invasion yeah it's up there it's just a remarkable success for secretary hegseth and one of the greatest folks at the department of war one of the greatest 24-hour gps uh navigation operations ever launched here's your map operation freedom okay well we wanted to hop on and just tell you guys that this true social post was sent the story of this war is trump uh just kicking the can down the road for every 24-hour news cycle and market moving events just to kind of keep the stock market on sides yeah i wonder what trades will learn took place right before yeah i'm sure don jr has a bunch of futures at bay but uh okay we're gonna go back to the regular show and we're gonna talk about the big picture issues the nuclear stuff the things that really matter but uh another truth sort of post diploma diplomacy by social media going great well i just i just i'm glad our freedom has been defended like this yeah thank you sir pod say the world is brought to you by acorns there are a million reasons why people talk themselves out of investing it can feel like they don't have enough money to do it they don't know enough information maybe they don't know how but so many it can feel complicated it can feel complicated but so many of us only focus on where our money is today acorns is the financial wellness app that cares about where your money is going tomorrow acorns is a smart way to give your money a chance to grow acorns is easy you can sign up in minutes and start automatically investing your spare money even if all you've got is spare change acorns grows with you whether you're just starting out or you're thinking about settling down acorns supports your big and small goals across every life stage the acorns potential screen shows you the power of compounding and how your money could grow over time plus you can quickly adjust how much you're investing every day week or month to make 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safe world is brought to you by aura frames aura frames a great way to mix things up from the standard mother's day playbook look flowers are nice i don't other things are nice doing something nice is great but an aura frame is a great gift it always is gonna die or last forever there you go our or our frames will never ever break i don't know if i can say that legally but it's a really great gift i got my mom one uh it was a huge hit if you got a new pet if you have a new baby if you've been on a trip you can update the pictures all the time it's just a really cool idea you get free unlimited storage you can add as many photos and videos as you want pre-load photos before it ships uh you can keep adding them from anywhere anytime you can personalize your gift with a message before it arrives there's a gift box included every frame comes packaged in a premium gift box with no price tag you can share your photos and videos effortlessly download the free app and download the free app and 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whether it does or doesn't i have to do what's right we can't let them have a nuclear war weapon we hit all new highs and i said we have to take care of business because we can't let that happen so we did a little detour and it's working out very nicely our country's booming now despite the fact that we're in a i call it a mini war i did a poll on the war with iran and they said only 32 percent of the people like it well i don't like it and i don't like war at all it's a golden age for america you know we hit an all-time high stock market today despite that we're in a little skirmish military i call it a skirmish because iran has no chance so to summarize it's a mini war or a skirmish the polls are fake uh but the stock market is up so who cares so more importantly then um there was a report from reuters on the impact of epic fury the most recent round of fighting on iran's nuclear program reuters reported that u.s intelligence believes that the time iran would need to build a nuclear weapon has not changed since last summer uh when analysts determined that the previous strikes operation midnight hammer had set them back uh it basically put them in a position where they pushed the timeline back to a year so in other words like the latest round of fighting has not set iran's nuclear timeline back any further before the war in june u.s intelligence said iran was three to six months away from having a high enough highly enriched uranium to build a nuke after the 12-day war they said it was nine to twelve months away now they're still about a year away so it's not clear that this has done anything on the nuclear front um of course we've taken out the u.s and israel have taken out a lot of conventional military capacity killed a lot of people and they're not going to be able to do anything about it so i mean ben again we're not having nuclear talks that we know of the u.s and iran but the state of positions remain very far far apart again earlier this week trump talked to uh neocon fanboy hugh hewitt uh he told him he wanted all of iran's highly enriched uranium out of the country iran refuses to do that trump has said repeatedly that iran can't do any nuclear enrichment iran repeatedly has asserted its right to enrich uh trump wants to cap their missile program he wants to end their support for proxies seems unlikely that the irgc is going to be down with that um so again i'm trying to figure out an end game a path forward some like common ground in these talks but i'm just i i'm struggling to see it i think that the the fundamental problem here is we had this debate back in uh 2015 when the iran nuclear deal went into effect and having looked at the problem for years um and having gotten the same presentation or a version of it that netanyahu gave trump uh to to bomb iran when we looked at that you know and we also looked at what was possible at the negotiating table you know what became very clear is number one you cannot destroy a nuclear program by bombing it you just can't they know how to do this they know how to do the nuclear fuel cycle they have uranium they have the capacity to build centrifuges that can enrich that uranium they have the capacity to stockpile it you can bomb buildings where that takes place and you can't destroy it you can't destroy it you can't destroy it you can't destroy it but you know they can move it around they can go underground they've got lots of different scientists you cannot bomb that out of existence you could invade the country and fully occupy it and hunt down every last scientist and you know piece of the the program but we're obviously not going to do that either so therefore you can only resolve this issue diplomatically if you resolve it diplomatically there is absolutely no way that the iranian government will ever agree that they do not have the capacity to enrich uranium that they're going to abandon and so therefore all you can do is negotiate some restrictions on their program where they're shipping the nuclear material that they produce out of the country they're operating less centrifuges and there are inspections that's the iran nuclear deal that's the jcpoa the only thing available to trump as an off-ramp to this war potentially because i don't know if the iranians are even in the mood to do it is basically the deal that obama had that he tore up right and and and agreeing to that would reveal the absolute insanity of not not just Trump, but the entire Iran and Iran war industrial complex, you know, all the Lindsey Grahams, obviously the Israelis, obviously the hack, you know, shit posters online who work at, you know, think tanks that have had no purpose for existing other than to cheerlead for a war with Iran. They they they those people cannot admit that they were wrong. And the only way out of this war is for them to, if not admit that they're wrong, tacitly admit they're wrong by essentially trying to pursue a version of what Obama's nuclear deal was. I mean, honestly, I think that's where it is. And Trump, you know, they try all these other metrics like we blew up some of their conventional military. We killed these leaders. And and everybody can see with their own eyes that the IRGC took our best punch and is still standing, that they control the Strait of Hormuz and that they actually have more enriched uranium. Pile than they had the day Trump pulled out of that nuclear deal. And what was this all not just this war, this whole last decade? What was it for? The insanity of it is just apparent. And Trump doesn't understand these things. But I think the core point here is absent something like that, this war, like literally there's accomplished precisely nothing and at unbelievable cost. Yeah. The U.S. intelligence, it's just nothing different. It's just shit. It's nothing because the ballistic missiles, they'll rebuild the ballistic missiles. They'll find a way to do it. They'll produce the ballistic missiles. Or new drone technology. So like this is completely insane that this happened. And by the way, that event with the kids, Trump talked about the power of nuclear weapons. He talked about killing Iranians. He did his whole riff about like trans athletes. And then he said to them, Barack Hussein Obama, have you heard of him? Again, to a bunch of kids. Do you think that set of remarks is going to wind up in your forthcoming book? About great speeches? I will say, having spent four years writing a book to try to tell the history of the United States through 15 consequential speeches. That's got to make it in there. Including speeches I don't agree with. You know, the vice president of the Confederacy is in there. Reagan's in there. The degree to which the bar has lowered here in Trump. I will say to people, though, book is out three weeks from today. So now we're in that sweet pre-order window. Buy that sucker. If you are planning to buy the book, buying it now helps a lot. Because if you get some pre-orders, they ship more books to the bookstores and it all works out better. Get them on our list. Where do they go? Just go to Amazon. One hit the list. But the reason that's. Wait, wait. Give them a way to buy it. I mean, you go to Amazon, you go to Bookshop. Oh, I refined my plug. Always say the battle for American identity. And actually, don't go to Amazon. Go to Bookshop because of the Met Gala. Go to Bookshop. That supports independent bookstores. And then I'm going to be hitting the road. I'll be on a book tour. I'm going to be going to like, I don't know, 15 places. So we'll make that available. I will have to say to the San Francisco World, those two in particular, though, because tickets are on sale now. I'll be at City Arts and Lectures on June 9th with Jelani Cobb. I'm excited about that event. I know we got some San Francisco listeners. Got a lot of sub listeners. Great city. Okay. So the politics of this are becoming quite clear. I mean, it's a political disaster for Trump. The Washington Post had a poll out over the weekend. Some numbers for you, Ben. You tell me if these are good. Overall approval rating for Trump is 37%. Approval of handling of Iran is 33%. 66% disapprove. Approval on inflation is 27%. Obviously, that's getting worse every day because of oil and gas prices. Cost of living, 23% approval. About 61% think going to war with Iran was a mistake. 65% aren't confident that will prevent Iran from getting a nuke. 22% think that Trump's actions against Iran are consistent with his promises in the 2024 election. So I mean, look, all these numbers suggest that they want to run I think it was the Wall Street Journal reported that Trump keeps like kind of toggling between wanting to severely punish Iran for not doing what he said, but also worrying about getting pulled deeper into the conflict. I think anyone who's gotten in one of these regime change wars over the last couple decades could have told him that military action was not going to drive political change in Iran. But here we are. Good luck getting yourself out of this one, big guy. He can't get out of it. And because you can't change prices, you can't change how people are feeling and what they're seeing. I think the other thing from all these clips that stands out to me is that there's a convergence of the extent to which he's out of touch that I think is important. And you're seeing some people on the MAGA right pick up on this, including people like Tucker Carlson, which is that, you know, he now is pivoting to the stock market. You know, well, you know, the wars, we had to do this detour. It used to be an excursion. Now it's a detour. But the stock market's at an all time high. I think actually that is the precisely, the wrong message, because people are beginning to get, you know, wise to the fact that the stock market is completely fucking juiced by an AI bubble. And so basically Trump is up there boasting about the fact that a very small number of people are making a bunch of money on an AI bubble, creating technologies that are going to come for your jobs while he's fighting a war that does nothing for you and makes your gas prices higher. And it's going to start to affect things like fertilizer and all these other things that people really depend upon in this country. And so in a way, the war itself, you know, it's pulled back the curtain that the emperor has no clothes. He has no idea what he's doing. He's broken his promises. He never probably believed them in the first place. But also, like, even his way to spin himself out of it is like compounding the error, because telling people that they shouldn't be upset about high gas prices or a war or the. Or affordability is a myth. Yeah. A hoax. Democrats. Like, what? If your only ploy is to point to the stock market, that would only make me more pissed. Oh, absolutely. Especially, yeah, you barely own stocks. I mean, most rich people own stocks. Speaking of, we've also been trying to figure out what's going on in Iran, Ben. I mean, our producers have been trying really hard to get in touch with people on the ground. Obviously, that's very hard. There's an internet blackout. There's all these threats from the regime. But just to give you a sense of what kind of conditions people are living under. So one contact we did get in touch with through an intermediary receiver, this text afterward, this is verbatim, "Dear citizen, following a review of actions carried out in cyberspace and pursuant to articles of the Islamic Penal Code, your act of approving and publishing criminal content in cyberspace is currently under investigation by the cyber police." Obviously, that person didn't want to talk further. We were finally able to connect with another civilian in Iran, a teacher. We decided not to play the audio of that message, because we just didn't want to create any risk for this person. We wanted to share some of what was said. They said their ability to teach is bad, and that's why they didn't want to create any risk for this person. They also said that they have been severely disrupted by the ongoing blackout on internet access. They said even with the expensive VPN services, internet access is limited and unstable, and that people have to spend a large part of their income just to stay connected. There's a type of government-provided internet, often referred to the national restricted internet, that gives you some basic access, but it comes with control and monitoring and all sorts of restrictions. And because of that, people don't feel comfortable using it. And overall, just getting online is no longer simple. It's expensive. It's unstable. And it comes with a bunch of trade-offs between access, quality, and privacy. And then they said, on terms of fear of the government, quote, we do not have freedom. We do not have freedom of expression. Even basic forms of dissent can lead to serious, serious consequences. People can be detained or face severe accusations. In my own experience, I've received threatening messages simply for liking a few posts on Instagram. It's not normal that a simple action like liking a post on Instagram can lead to intimidation and make you feel like your own safety could be at risk. So Trump occasionally now will mention the protesters killed. Earlier this year, he did some weird thing today where he said that 40,000 people were killed by five snipers, which doesn't make a lot of sense. But it's worth noting that he's almost exclusively made their lives worse and deepened the repression that they face from the regime. Yeah. And I talked to someone I know here, a friend of mine whose family is Iranian, and they were describing the circuitous way they have to get news. They can't really be in touch. They hear secondhand. Somebody hears from somebody, hears from somebody, they're okay. But it's just hellish. I'm just going to say something to kind of introduce a new idea here, Tommy, which is in the regime, there's nothing to do with the IRGC, the Iranian regime and how repressive they are. We have a deeply fucked up foreign policy because of how routinely we ignore the human cost of all the things that we do around the world. And this war is case in point. The girls go, we bomb them. The first day is case in point. The other thing I would say, though, is that somebody asked me recently, well, what do you regret about the Iran deal? And usually that's like, they want me to say like this sunset clauses should have been 12 years instead of 10 or something. I actually regret when I think, and if I were to make a recommendation for what Trump should do, not that he'd listen to me, let's lift the sanctions on Iran. And I know whatever intern listens to this podcast. But like maybe not everything, not the sanctions on the IRGC or whatever, but like, is this helping them? We've had, we've been sanctioning the shit out of this country for 20 years. That teacher's life is far more miserable because of it. And she's getting repressed more because of our sanctions. Our sanctions empower the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps. Do not listen any longer to these hawks who tell you that the way that you care about human rights is by sanctioning basic goods and collapsing currencies. You know what? But if you worked in Cuba, if you lifted sanctions like and, you know, try to get something, try to get the nuclear program, do bigger sanctions relief. Yeah, because I'm seriously trying to sell incremental because, you know what, that that teacher and all these people in Iran like or might still be dealing with like an intolerable amount of repression. But their lives would be better. And if we think that sanctioning this country or sanctioning this regime is somehow changing it, it is entrenched the worst people in Iran deeper in power. And so this is a bigger conversation we can have going forward. But one idea for Democrats looking for new ideas is. And by the way, because what sanctions are hurting people, they're also going to shoot us in the face because the Chinese are going around the world saying this is why you got to get out the dollars, the world's reserve currency. And so what are we doing here? We're acting against human human interest and we're acting against America's long term interests by pursuing these insane sanctions policies on Iran, on Cuba. And all these countries that the things just get worse in those countries. Yeah. So, yeah. And by the way, Trump's going to China next week on the May 14th and 15th. I think Iran's foreign minister is there this week to get ahead of that visit. Listeners probably remember that this China trip was supposed to happen in late March, early April. But Trump delayed it to deal with the Iran war. I'm sure this conversation you were just talking about, about how the Chinese can help Iran and other countries get around U.S. sanctions is front and center of that conversation. But despite the delay. I mean, Trump was like, oh, look, we have to delay this trip because then the war will be over and then we could focus on the real things like, you know, the China, the Iran war has totally overtaken the trip. Trump kind of tried to low key it today. Talk about how nice China has been to him during the war, how they haven't challenged us. But Treasury Secretary Scott Besson had a slightly different take earlier this week on I think he was on Fox News or Fox Business. Let's watch. Let's see if China, let's see them step up with some diplomacy and get the Iranians. a few steps using basic information about your industry goals and personality to generate premium quality content and personalized design recommendations. Squarespace Domains makes it easy to find the best name for your business at one fair, all-inclusive price. No hidden fees or add-ons required. Plus, Squarespace provides everything you need to bring more of your dream to life, whether that means building a website, adding a professional email service, or more. Don't wait to claim your name. Invest in your dream domain today. Head to squarespace.com for a free trial, and when you're ready to launch, go to squarespace.com slash world. Save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain at squarespace.com slash world. Speaking of Gaza, we should touch base on all things Gaza. Because, you know, last October, everybody celebrated the ceasefire deal brokered by the administration. But unfortunately, it's really been a ceasefire, a name only for people who live in Gaza, and life in Gaza is hell on earth. So, some numbers for you guys. The Palestinian Health Ministry says that since the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, 823 people have been killed, and 2,300 have been wounded. Four Israeli soldiers have been killed since the ceasefire began. Only 250 of the promised 600 trucks of aid per day are getting into Gaza. Partly, that was the result of one of the two crossings being closed for a long time due to the Iran war. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs estimates that rodents are swarming 80% of the camps for displaced people, and the World Health Organization, reports that there have been over 110,000 cases of disease or infestation due to external parasites. Ben, I was texting with Feroz Sidwa earlier this week. He was, for listeners, he was this heroic doctor who came on the show after he had volunteered in Gaza during the conflict. And he said that, like, the society and the health infrastructure in Gaza is just so thoroughly destroyed that rat attacks on infants are now a major source of morbidity. So, kids are getting sick and dying because they're getting attacked by rats. Imagine your baby getting attacked by rats. The only power comes from generators. There's no grid left. And the reconstruction cost is estimated at $70 billion. And a third of that is needed, like, up front in the first year and a half just to do basic infrastructure and essential services. So, basically, the long story short is the place is in this nightmarish limbo. Hamas is not disarmed. They refuse to disarm until Israel withdraws and Trump promises them a Palestinian state. Israel is occupying pretty much, you know, half the Gaza Strip. They're not going to be able to do anything. It refuses to let in items that are essential for reconstruction. All the people trapped by the Trump administration, this, like, group of, you know, experts and technocrats who are just sitting on their ass. Yeah, they're sitting in Egypt at a resort doing nothing. Some of them want to be doing more, but there's just no funding. There's no way to do anything. The civil police force that they kept talking about, none of them have been trained. And it's just, it was so obvious then at the time, and even clearer now, that Trump and Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff, they only gave a shit about getting the Israeli hostages out. And once that happened, they were like, you know, jobs done. They don't care about people in Gaza. And, you know, the Israelis and Hamas both seem kind of fine with the status quo because it keeps them in charge for Israel. It deals with their kind of security concerns. And the Palestinian people just suffer immensely in, you know, in the meantime. So that's the latest. I mean, just sort of couldn't really be worse. Yeah, I think, I mean, a couple of things I point out here. First of all, the ceasefire violations tend to get highlighted are the attacks, the bombing of Gaza and the killing of civilians with violence. But another piece of this is that Israel has just fundamentally refused to let in the aid that it promised to do under the terms of the ceasefire. And so the reason the conditions are so squalid, the reason that life continues to. You know, just be on just hell on earth for civilians there is at least in part, in large part that, you know, look, if Israel wanted to let assistance in, you wouldn't have infants getting attacked by rats. You wouldn't have people suffering malnutrition. You wouldn't have preventable deaths. Like this is a genocidal policy like that is continuing. And just because they're not bombing at the same pace that they were before, it doesn't mean that they're just not squeezing and squeezing and squeezing. They're just squeezing and squeezing with complete disregard to the loss of civilian life. And the second thing, like I'd say, is when you look back, there's just something ghoulish about the celebration of that agreement, you know. And we, you know, we were calibrated at the time, but this is like the worst case scenario in a lot of ways. I mean, I guess it could be worse. They could just start bombing indiscriminately at the pace that they were before, but nothing, not a finger is being lifted to help these people. Right. And there's still drone strikes regularly. Yeah, but I'm sure that if you're Palestinian, all you hear is like the buzzing of drones overhead. You know, the fear that that engenders in children is unimaginable to me. And it just shows you that Trump and Netanyahu, they wanted the hostages out and they kind of just wanted it to be downgraded on the every assignment editor's desk around the world, like the media. It's off the television screens, a little less social media attention on it, you know, like and we can all move on. Pretend we both pull together this board of peace, Gaza, the construction effort. In fact, nothing will come of that. But Jared Kushner will get to hit up the Saudis on the margins for his investment fund. Steve Witkoff can talk to the Pakistanis about buying hotels in New York and the crypto deal he made with the Trump family crypto business. Right. The president of Indonesia, as we talked about last week, can ask for Eric or Don Jr. cell phone number to figure out the golf course deal back home that he's using to grease Trump. Right. It's just like it's grift on the side. Yeah. And that's the last thing I was going to say is like the, the Jared Kushner presentation at Davos that we spent some time on with this kind of Jetsons, Dubai, data centers. Yeah. Data centers and high rises. How about tents and commercial real estate and, and it was grotesque at the time. But again, to be constructive, why, why let him make that presentation at Davos? Like stop humoring these people. Like there's a kind of, you know, deference to Jared's here. We have to sit attentively. Well, he, you know, gives us the Jetsons version of Gaza. Like it's time for people to start saying no to these people to start calling bullshit on these people to stop. I mean, if you're the Saudis or Emiratis or whomever's like invested in Jared, how you feeling about that investment now with the war in Iran, fucking up your economy. Like you don't need to pay this guy. Like, like there's not a requirement that you pay him. Like I know that, you know, you're doing it to get Trump off your back, but is it working? No, no, it's not. And it is not working. I mean, the next topic for us is, uh, Russian Ukraine, another conflict Trump said he's going to solve in 24 hours that Jared Kushner and Wyckoff are on the case. They've gotten literally nothing done. Uh, so later this week, then the Russians are going to hold their annual victory day commemoration that celebrates the defeated Nazi Germany in world war two. It usually entails this huge military parade of tanks and other weapons, but this year, Putin is not going to be displaying kind of major military hardware. It could be because, you know, drone strikes could reach that hardware and hit the parade. It could be because then I think Zelensky was speculating that the Russian military just doesn't have enough kit to show off this year. So I'm not going to try. Um, Putin proposed a ceasefire for the day of the parade itself. That's obviously a bit cynical and self-serving in response. Zelensky proposed a long-term ceasefire and like a lasting peace deal. Don't hold your breath on that getting done, but the casualty estimates are just staggering. So there's a CSIS report from January from like five months ago that estimated Russia had 1.2 million casualties from the start of the war through the end of 2025 Ukraine's casualty estimate was about half of that. But again, that was five months ago. And every week advances in drone technology make life at the front lines more deadly and hellish. So I'm sure the numbers have increased. Uh, Ukraine has been able to hit targets deeper into Russia than ever before. And there's been some really interesting reporting about dissent in Russia and security issues in Russia itself. So in mid April, there was this blogger named Victoria Banya. She posted this eight minute, 18 minute Instagram video outlining a bunch of concerns and anger at problems in Russia. And she said, I don't know, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. And she posted this video outlining a bunch of concerns and anger at problems in Russia itself. And she directed it at Putin. And it went super viral. So the Guardian said it got 26 million views in four days, which is surprising since Instagram is technically banned in Russia, as is criticism of Putin, really. But Banya, she complained about flooding, oil pollution along the Black Sea, this massive call of livestock in Siberia, which really angered people, internet restrictions, and the government was forced to respond in a real way because she was seen as actually a defender of Putin. Then there was this fascinating report in the Financial Times. Banya, she complained about flooding, oil pollution along the Black Sea, this massive call of livestock in Siberia, which really angered people, internet restrictions, and the government was forced to respond in a real way because she was seen as actually a defender of Putin. But I don't know. What do you make of these these reports? I think they're really interesting. And we should just say, I mean, for the Ukrainians, it sucks. They're just this gross. grinding uh front line and this casualty um levels is just beyond the immediate human toll like the how that country gets out of this situation and is viable in terms of rebuilding gets harder with each passing month a year on the putin piece you know he's never as weak as the wish casting uh sometimes suggests right so back in you know 2023 when i was like oh putin's gonna fall and the ukrainians are counter offensive is gonna be victory and they're gonna take back crimea like that was serious wish casting um but at the same time a lot of the issues in this war are ones that are going to get worse with time for putin so for instance like people from the front like going i mean if you look at the soviet war like the in afghanistan it took years for that war to start to eat away at like russian society because guys are coming home they're disabled their alcoholism rates are going up like it's you know there's ptsd people are you know like the literally the workforce is being hard so if you look at russia today for instance like yes they they've been able to create a war economy that can employ people and artificially you know boost growth rates and they can manipulate oil prices they benefit from the war because the price of world goes up so they get a little more revenue but at the end of the day they're spending extraordinary money on this they're losing an extraordinary amount of people the people that are coming out as we're going home are probably not you know okay um so towns small cities are starting to probably feel you know it takes two three four five years that's how long this war has been by the way the ukrainian strategy of striking these targets like deep into russia is pretty smart uh because it's bringing the war home to certain places it may actually be causing like you know demonstrable damage and they're hitting energy infrastructure yeah sources of revenue and the repression you know like we make a mistake sometimes of it's like and maybe we should know because now we live in a version of authoritarianism that like it's a spectrum so just because putin's always been repressive doesn't mean it can't get worse right and it's clearly gotten worse i mean alone has pointed out to us repeatedly that like these internet restrictions like that fucks up people's lives yeah you can't call people people want to be online people want to be in touch with their family people want to be in touch with so many russians are out of the country and they can't be in touch with their family businesses rely on the internet so i do think that they're they're you know putin is not as strong as some people project or as weak but they're these cracks are starting to show and it might take time but at a certain point the bill's going to come due for this war yeah there's been some interesting reporting about putin like trying to erase even soviet history you know the strike me as a particularly i mean it's an authoritarian move it's not the strongest move um there's also been a bunch of reporting about russian entities these like kind of fake businesses they could set up uh recruiting men from africa and telling them they can come work at some private security job and sending these kenyan men to the front lines just to be cannon fodder i mean it's horrible stuff um also though just just back on the negotiating fronts i mean i think the last trilateral talks were in february um and i saw i think i read somewhere that wickoff and jared kushner they've been to russia a bunch of times right they'll meet with putin whenever they can i don't think they've ever been to ukraine and the question is why you wouldn't go one time to meet with the people to see the place to understand the issues so uh first of all two things noticeably that meeting was before the warner on so another casualty this war is that there's just no attention on ukraine um i don't have inside information i have to do all the caveats that we don't know for sure they want to do real estate deals or mineral deals in russia that's why they're there they don't care for about the ukrainians they see a bonanza on the back end of this war being solved uh jared and wickoff i think wanted to do deals in russia i don't why might i surmise that one the guy that putin started sending to the talks is the head of the sovereign wealth fund yeah that's a big signal he's not from the foreign ministry he's from the sovereign wealth fund two and a lot he's in miami like jet skiing with them all the time yeah dick and i don't care around yeah dick and around two in alaska um putin brought all these people from like these various you know we're going to do mineral deals and all this stuff they they clearly want to skip ahead to that step the problem is that the war's going to end first and three to your point why would you not go to the country that's been invaded you know jared and wickoff's interest in this i think had nothing to do with peace and everything to do with making a buck in russia and that's disgusting yes yes it is and there's a great piece i think in the new york times magazine this week about kind of the privatization of diplomacy and the way that those two are fusing profit you know for example the pakistanis did this big crypto deal with the trump family company and now what do you know mold they're hosting the you know talks wait like you and i have laughed on this show about how trump is always shouting out like the field marshal general in pakistan is probably like a human rights violator and it's like well probably yeah we know what pretty safe bet yeah pretty safe bet and uh calling him by his honorific field marshal you know it's like some field marshal uh field marshal title eisenhower okay so final topic this one comes courtesy of uh michael and our team so uh enjoy ben it's a quiz for you pop quiz oh no this is not like a tim miller pop quiz no no no first of all who was do you know who our current ambassador to both switzerland and lichtenstein is i have no idea but if i'm gonna guess uh like is is it a is it a kushner or woodcuff relative let's roll the tape i'm holistic united states ambassador to switzerland and lichtenstein i'm delighted to celebrate national apprenticeship week as u.s ambassador to switzerland and lichtenstein i've seen firsthand the power of apprenticeships wow amazing stars i just have one comment first i know this movie uh the years or decades could go by and and calista gingrich would look exactly precisely brother that whatever they shot into that face like like we will be dead you and i and there will be a video of her in some republic administration in 2075 and we will be dead you and i and there will be a video of her and some in 2075 as ambassador to you know luxembourg or some you know fancy european place looking exactly the same yeah the sheep she face tunes with a belt sander that by the way that was calista gingrich uh former ambassador to the vatican under trump 1.0 wife of former speaker newt gingrich so calista is now representing our interest in bern uh remember she is newt's third wife so we met his first wife when he was a teenager i didn't know this when she was his high school geometry teacher candace on that case was she a roth child we'll find out uh that marriage ended in divorce after his affair with marianne who became his second wife this is newt newt then had an affair with calista for six years while he was still married uh and he asked his second wife for a divorce shortly after she was diagnosed with ms so again good guy classic calista i think is 20 years 23 years younger than newt about the same age as his daughter and again we cannot point out enough that newt was having this affair with calista gingrich because she was diagnosed with ms so again good guy fair while constantly attacking bill clinton over the lewinsky stuff uh so newt married calista in 2000 converted to her faith catholicism in 2009 so ben uh to honor her where does catholicism stand on these uh personal on this uh questions yeah on this uh yeah yeah uh a little quiz for you okay one first question like cash patel callista gingrich is a noted children's book author in her seven book series what animal quote travels through time to discover the pivotal moments that have shaped american history is it a ellis the elephant b newt the narwhal c donald the dalmatian d liberty the lynx this is this is actually just as good as cash the wizard uh what was a again uh ellis the elephant i'm gonna go with the elephant i'm gonna go with the elephant you nailed it yeah you absolutely know republican i think of all the things to choose these are these are actually republicans before they're donald i'm bummed it wasn't newt the narwhal uh so the books are apparently written in rhymes like after winning the war washington would not become a king he became our first president and that's a better thing could we please get a dramatic reading of these books by pete hegseth oh that's a good idea with a american flight it is very fitting you're right uh uh question two newt gingrich owed as much as five hundred thousand dollars to which retailer in the mid 2000s was it a vineyard vines b tiffany and co c radio shack d rolex five hundred thousand five hundred because i i would say nude has a uh a taste for the vineyard vines but i'm gonna go rolex yeah so it was b tiffany tiffany okay uh hard to spend 500 grand at very very hard that's a lot that's a lot of white a lot of salmon pants yeah oh we got a clip of this apparently i've even seen this doesn't that whole thing strike you as stupid i mean these are stores these are stores that have a wide range of things you can buy she has girlfriends with birthdays is that him defending himself in 2000. just a quick swerve here like the fact that this guy was held up as like some intellectual i know you know it's always bothered me like the bar for these republicans is so low yeah you know yeah uh this is our moral leader in our intellectual intellectual giant so this tiffany thing came up in his uh his ill-fated presidential campaign in 2012 for the nomination he also got flack for suspending his campaign to go on a greek cruise do you remember he was like the front runner yeah i mean that was a crazy feel that was like romney rick santorum had a moment there thinking back i can see why trump mopped the floor with these guys because he came in he was like i have a personality and i'm not a loser like these idiots uh last question when leaving a second wife marianne newt compared marianne to calista saying i can't handle a insert luxury consumer good right here right now all i want is a less expensive good you got the formatting here so i can't handle this luxury thing i need a less expensive thing was it i can't handle a charmin ultra soft right now all i want is a scott one ply was it b i can't handle a gray poupon right now all i want is french's was it c i can't handle espresso right now all i want is instant was it d i can't handle a jaguar all i want is a chevrolet one of those is actually true yep uh i i mean i guess i'm gonna go d because anyone else is dude you crushed this quiz d yeah chevrolet i yeah yeah i mean he wanted a chevy that's a bad thing to say to a human being i mean that you're marrying i mean newt's been in plenty of back seats over the years i mean uh like i think i got you wait like so is calista well backseat windows up this is yep uh that was a great quiz thank you michael for that that's what happens when you give this guy an hour of free time on the show day all of a sudden we're doing no that was good it was a pretty like dark angry you know run so we needed that it's important to have a little fun okay we're gonna take a quick break by the way isn't that better than the tim miller when he's like you know asking you the name of the foreign minister of licton steinstein yeah tim thinks there's people who seem to think that working in foreign policy meant you worked in geography no it's funny the reason he does it is because george bush like got asked the name of the head pack leader pakistan is mashar off and tim thought that that was like a dumb liberal gotcha thing but actually like i'm not sure that was a dumb question because pakistan ended up being like the most important country after 9-11 so yeah look i think asking i think people running for president asking them basic civics question is a good idea like i think you know if you ask donald trump like how many branches of government are they like he would just flunk a lot of these basic questions and it would have been useful along the way um but yeah tim likes to just torture us when we go on the show yeah he does uh we're gonna take a break we come back here and hear my conversation with jason crowe about iran about his grilling of about trump moving troops out of germany so stick around for that pod 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well we think it's best to have these conversations in person and hopefully it will also be more productive crooked con is right after the midterms and it is going to be the first time we come together to hash it out in person and kick off the 2028 debate we just posted a ton more info about who expects in the big event from november 5th to 7th so check it out at crooked con.com and get your tickets now cndc my guest today represents colorado's sixth congressional district and he serves on the house armed services committee the house permanent select committee on intelligence and many other august committees uh jason crowe great to see you again tommy thanks for having me back so um the the war powers resolution the the law establishes this 60-day deadline after which a president has to stop the use of armed forces in a conflict or else get congressional approval trump's war with iran hit that 60-day deadline last week last friday but the defense secretary pete hegseth he argued in a senate hearing that because of the ceasefire the clock stopped the you know 60 days is not up and they don't need congress to act uh we should all just note that the war powers act is determined on the war powers act which is determined on there being imminent threat right there has to be an imminent threat and then under an imminent threat then they have 60 days and then there's an additional 30 days to conduct the troop withdrawal beyond the 60 days but they never showed the imminent threat right so all this ado about uh much to do about the 60-day thing we never met the initial threshold right which requires there either be there's only two ways the president can can take our troops to war one is if there's an imminent threat in which case they have the 60 days which they never showed or there's an aumf by congress neither of those things are true so this whole thing from the beginning has been unlawful and without authorization but more importantly without actually the consent of the american people which is really what this is all about so you're you're right about that that context and it's important but you know i guess associated with that like wouldn't this new military operation this like uh guide mission for boats in the strait or whom it was project freedom would that also require congressional authorization yeah it would well there are so many things going on here one one is the initial uh attack on iran right which required imminent threat or a congressional aumf of some sort the second is an ongoing naval blockade i mean international law and the law of war is very very clear a naval blockade and stopping ships from coming in and out of ports is a very clear act of war right and then you add on top of it hegseth's claim that somehow a ceasefire tolls the 60 days there's zero precedent for that assertion not to mention the fact that there actually is conflict going on right now in the last 24 hours there have been numerous exchanges of fire between the united states and iranian forces or proxy forces so the whole thing is a mess it's convoluted they keep on evolving and changing uh their their definitions their legal basis for it uh which of course is uh just par for the course of this administration much like the operations going on in the caribbean which use circular legal reasoning to justify right they always say that there isn't an armed conflict it falls just short of an armed conflict level but they have to use the military because it is an international armed conflict so they want to have their cake and eat it too so what does congress do about it that's the big question here like how can you guys exert some pressure on the administration to change course to follow the law to follow the constitution whatever yeah but congress has the power that this is less the story of donald trump or any president for that matter matter and i'm always really clear that this isn't just something that donald trump has abused this has been abused by by multiple presidents democrat and republican and multiple congresses have allowed it democrat and republican this is a 20-year problem in the making and congress tomorrow could fix it we have the authority constitutional authority and we can walk in to the house floor we could take a vote and take that power back tomorrow right so that's what this is about this is about congress giving up its power and ceding its constitutional authority but more importantly its constitutional duty this is more about duty than it is about authority it's our job for god's sakes to actually take these votes and to be held accountable and to appropriate the money or not appropriate the money for all of these things because the framers knew that presidents will take all the power they're given and use all the power they're given that the accountability loop is in members of congress they have to go home to their districts every weekend every week and they have to go home and stand up in front of their constituents and be held accountable for it so that's ultimately the fix and this should be the most bipartisan thing in america right now is congress because it's been abused by both sides over the years and because americans of all stripes democrat republican independent want it over they want no part in this yeah and they want it to be ended the other sort of way you guys can get some accountability or oversight is through hearings there were some hearings last week you had this extended exchange with Pete Hegseth about a guy named Tim Parlatori, who is Pete Hegseth's private attorney. He was then appointed to a Pentagon job. You pressed Pistol Pete on Parlatori's security clearance. You asked him about his foreign clients. He's still in private law practice. Can you explain why you were so focused on this one individual and what you learned in that exchange and how we act on it? Yeah, my singular goal right now is to get Pete Hegseth fired, right? He is such an extreme danger to our service members, the men and women who I love, who I've served with, who I have a deep affection that come from my district, come from districts around this country. They're, you know, people's sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers, right? And he is putting these folks at such extreme risk because of his, not just his incompetence, but his cavalier attitude and his unwillingness. To actually do the right thing and to run the Department of Defense the way that it needs to be run. So I want this guy gone, which is why I chose a very different approach than I've ever chosen before. I was speaking largely to Donald Trump and to the White House when I was questioning. And I was pointing out that in Pete Hegseth, you have a man who publicly professes unfaltering loyalty to the president, you know, kisses his ring, kisses his ass every chance he gets. And yet behind the scenes, he's hiring people who Donald Trump despises, who Donald Trump has called a liar, a lawyer who was fired from his legal team. And, you know, basically building a fiefdom with these Hegseth loyalists. And at the same time, the corruption, just the extreme corruption of Pete Hegseth, putting all these people in place who are making money off of their positions very, very purposefully and intentionally, intentionally. So that's what I was drawing attention to. There's also been, there's been some reporting that Hegseth is increasingly isolated, that he's paranoid about getting fired, that he brings his wife to official meetings, that his closest advisors are this little circle, like Tim Parlatore, Pete Hegseth's brother, this guy, Ricky Beria, who is like a military aide under Biden, who stayed on, who's sort of, I think, risen to much higher heights. And that Hegseth is preoccupied with stuff like the Pentagon's chaplain services and not managing the massive workforce. I mean, are you hearing similar things from contacts you talk to within the Department of Defense? Yeah, absolutely. I'm hearing a variety of different things. One strand of things I'm hearing is about the culture of fear and intimidation and retribution. That if you're a senior military officer, you can't give your honest advice to the civilian leadership. You have to show a loyalty. Now, how dangerous is that, right? We're conducting military operations in dozens of places around the world. And our senior military officers don't, you know, they're saying that they don't feel empowered to say if there's something wrong or to dissent. I mean, that is so deeply dangerous. That kind of proves my earlier point. So, I'm hearing that. We're hearing rumors that, you know, this Parlatore has to be hired by senior officers to get promoted, that, you know, they have to basically pay this guy, which is, you know, part of my questioning. So, we need to drill down into that. So, if I want to go from a two-star general to a three-star, I have to hire this random lawyer to get a promotion? To do what? Yeah, that's what we're hearing and that's why I questioned Hegseth about Parlatore. I know those are the rumors that we're hearing from a lot of different places. And what's crazy is that that wouldn't actually surprise me if it were true. I mean, that's part and parcel to this administration. It's happening administration-wide in so many different ways. You know, this pay-to-play politics and it's seeped into, well, actually seeping isn't the wrong word because that's passive. It's been implemented. Yeah. Injected by Pete Hegseth and the people around him. To put it in terms, Pete might understand, he shotgunned it. So, it's down the hatch. He would understand that. Yeah, I bet he funneled it. The administration said the cost of Operation Epic Fury, the war with Iran, is $25 billion. I've seen news outlets estimate that it's much higher. I think CNN said 40 to 50, CBS said closer to 50 billion. What do you think? Did you buy that $25 billion number? Yeah, there's no way that's true. First of all, even if that's true, that's a lot of fricking money, right? We have people losing healthcare by the millions. I was just in a round table yesterday with some young folks in my district and it was all about healthcare. They're like, my healthcare has gone up. They're now paying $2,000 a month for premiums with a $6,000 deductible and a 20% copay, right? And they're like, we can't afford that, right? So, even if it's $25 billion, which it's not, right? It's a multiple of that, two times, three times, maybe four times. It's much higher than that. That is a lot of money, right? We have expended vast, vast amounts of our most exquisite high-end munitions in our stockpiles. There's been tremendous damage done to our infrastructure throughout the Middle East. Let's not forget that a lot of these drones, a lot of these missiles actually have hit infrastructure, defense infrastructure in our bases that's going to have to be rebuilt. So, it's cost a lot of money and it continues to cost a lot of money. This blockade is not cheap. I mean, it's not cheap either. So, that's kind of the biggest point here. Not only is our service members at great risk and we've lost 13 of them, over 300 have been wounded, but Americans are paying tens of billions of dollars for a war that's going to end poorly yet again without achieving a strategic goal and they're fed up with it and they should be. And like, obviously they're trying to claim that this new guiding operation through the Strait of Hormuz is actually a separate thing with a different name, but it's obviously, you know, just part and parcel of the Iran war. How would you designate the cost of that to the war effort? I mean, I think they said like a bunch of guided missile destroyers are going to stay in the region, over 100 air assets, 15,000 troops. Presumably that is an enormous cost that keeping all those individuals in theater that would continue to add up every day, right? Yeah. This is a kind of smoke and mirrors budgeting tactic that they have been using where they say it's really not costing us extra. And their rationale is, it goes something like this, that, hey, we have these ships anyhow, and hey, they have to be somewhere doing something anyway. And we're paying these service members every month anyway. So let's just take all those normal, it's called O&M funding, operations and maintenance, and we'll just move that money over into this contingency operation, this planning, and we'll call it a wash. It doesn't work that way. Actually doing this comes at some cost. Right. Right. Right. So, instead of training, instead of being back with their families, instead of that maintenance that has to be done, instead of the modernization that has to be done, instead of all the multilateral training exercises that we would normally be doing with our allies in other places in the world, we're doing this, right? There's an opportunity cost to it. And our point is, tell us what that is costing, right? And it's costing extra, because like I said earlier, if you're shooting off munitions in a stockpile, and if you're taking damage, that actually is a fixed capital cost. So I'm kind of done. And frankly, we did this under Iraq and Afghanistan too, for decades. They did the same thing, other administrations, and they take the O&M and they count it as part of the contingency. So I've been battling that for a long time now. And Americans and taxpayers deserve to know what these operations are really costing and how much more it's costing. So that's what we're trying to drill down on. Yeah, it seems like the bare minimum information they should owe us. Finally, President Trump is planning to pull 5,000 troops out of Germany. This is in response to criticism of the war in Iran from Chancellor Merz, the leader of Germany. What do you think the impact of that move is or will be? And are you concerned about it? Yeah, I am concerned about it. And I'm not presumptively against troop movements, right? A commander in chief should have flexibility to move troops around, to respond to needs, to respond to crises. That is part of the authorization that a commander in chief inherently has. When it becomes our business is when the commander in chief is doing it out of an emotional meltdown or to enact some kind of retribution or vengeance on a political opponent or a foreign leader because he's upset. Then it becomes my business, right? Because he's abusing our military and their families that need to have some sense for how to live their life. He's using taxpayer dollars to do that, right? So that is the important distinction. The reason why becomes important, because if it becomes a reason that's not acceptable and not in a normal course of being the commander in chief, then it's Congress's job to say, okay, this is a problem and we're not going to use taxpayer dollars to do it. We're not going to mess around with our military and our military family's time and money. And we also have to make sure it's in the best interest of our national security because there is the largest land war in Europe happening right now between Russia and Ukraine. And having a troop presence there is really important to make sure that we're sending the right message against Putin, that we are affirming our commitment to NATO. So that's why we're trying to invoke a legal provision that we actually put into the defense bill on a threshold level, unless you have met certain criteria to do so. And so in this case, we're talking about Trump trying to move troops from Germany because of specific comments, but he's also threatened. to punish NATO in other ways, like pull troops or even bases out of Spain because they won't participate in the war. Is he any close to actually taking those steps? Because, you know, my understanding is we don't have troops in Spain just for the hell of it. It's because, you know, that geography provides some important, you know, capability to United States military. I mean, I remember talking about basing and troops and airplanes and air assets in Spain and Italy a lot during the Benghazi attacks and the follow up from that, because that would have been, you know, sort of the closest team to get to that site on September 11th and actually try to rescue those individuals. But so just move. It's not like you can just move them around like chess pieces. You can just move a bunch of troops from Spain to like Eastern Europe and not have an impact on your ability to fight wars. But is that even being discussed with Congress or is this stuff going to happen? Yeah, well, it's not being discussed with Congress in the way that it should. I mean, this administration is violating a bunch of laws or potentially violating a bunch of laws in the case of the troop levels. Like, for example, like they haven't provided there's a there's a statutory provision in the defense bill that says they have to provide what's called an X or an execution order, which is the order that starts contingency operations. They have to legally provide every X or to the Armed Services Committee. And they haven't right for a year. Right. So they're violating that. But the troop movement thing is an important point. I had an exchange with one of the leaders of the armed services committee. And I said, well, I don't know if you're familiar with the senior deputy defense secretaries a couple of months ago where he was trying to justify the movement of troops out of Europe. And what they said was, we're going to take troops out of Europe and we're going to move them back to the United States so that we can train more. We can actually train better. And I'm like, well, let me understand this. You're going to actually take troops away from the places where we actually have training grounds, some of the best training grounds in the world. in Europe, where they actually train with our allies, because they're co-located with them, where we can conduct exercises, and we train moving troops around Europe, because movement of forces on rail lines, on highways, and learning how to do that throughout Europe is essential. You're going to take them away from there. We're going to move them back to the United States, and then to actually train them, we're going to have to temporarily ship them back there and actually do the same training that they normally do, but now we're going to have to move them back to Europe and incur that additional cost. And he's like, yeah, that's our plan. So the whole thing makes no sense. It's more expensive. It's less efficient. It's actually worse training, and all being footed by the American taxpayer, and the commonality to all of this, all because of Donald Trump wanting to send a message, and he's pissed at NATO or certain leaders. I mean, that is the reason. He's the one behind so much of what's going on. Well, that seems very stupid. Well, look, Congressman Crowe, thank you very much for joining the show today and trying to hold these goobers accountable. And if you learn more about whatever Tim Parlatore is doing or Hagsath or anybody else, please come back and fill us in, because it's a bit of a mystery over here, and we'd love to get more information. Yeah, thanks for having me back. Thanks again to Congressman Crowe for doing the show, and prepare our own quiz for Tim Miller next week. Talk to you soon. Thank you., and have a great day. You've probably seen the constant bickering about who belongs in the pro-democracy movement. Well, we think it's best to have these conversations in person, and hopefully it will also be more productive. CrookedCon is right after the midterms, and it is going to be the first time we come together to hash it out in person and kick off the 2028 debate. We just posted a ton more info about what to expect from the big event from November 5th to 7th. So check it out at crookedcon.com and get your tickets now. See you in DC. CrookedCon is right after the midterms, and it is going to be the first time we come together to hash it out in person. You're on the beach with the whole family. The sun is shining, the water is warm, and your kids are finally getting along. This is when it hits you, that Myrtle moment. It's the second everything clicks. When you realize Myrtle Beach is more than a getaway, it's right where you belong. Don't just daydream about it. Find your own Myrtle moment at CrookedCon.com. MyrtleBeach.com. apply. See website for full terms and conditions.