198. Trump's War On Europe: No Way Back?

(upbeat music) - Hello, and welcome to the Restors Politics US with me, Katty Kaye, and not Anthony Scaramucci, who is at the literary festival, somewhere in the South England. But I'm very lucky to be joined by Joe Scarborough, co-host of Morning Joe on MSNOW, former representative from Florida. You've got a lot of formers, Joe, you've got former Republican, former congressman, former Floridian, you stack 'em up. So, American of you. - I just keep moving. I'm quite happy with where I am right now, exactly. You know, you'd say so, American of you. We were passing by a car yesterday, and there was a Washington and Lee sticker on there. And you understand W&L, like being from Virginia. - Yeah. - But me and I were talking, and I said, you know, I actually was going to school at W&L, but I decided, law school decided to wait a year and ended up at Florida. And I said I'm so glad I did, because now I can mock and ridicule people in the Trump administration and say, hey, I just went to Southern state schools. And even I understand, dot, dot, dot. But it is funny how America has changed from this sort of wasp thing to where, somehow being from Southern state schools, you know. - Has become a cache. - More of a thing, yeah. Because the home aristocracy thinks. - And we could have a whole conversation about the fact that there is now more social mobility in the UK than there is in the United States on the 250th anniversary of the founding of your country. But we'll save that for another time. Okay, today we are going to talk about big movements in Europe. Donald Trump attacking various European leaders, one of whom has just left office. He's berated leaders from at least five different countries. Recently piling it on Britain's Kirstama as the prime minister says he is stepping down. Georgia Maloney, his most devoted European ally has turned against him, which has won her massive plaudits back in Italy. And Pete Hakeseth, meanwhile, accusing NATO countries of free riding and calling them shameful. We're going to get into all of that. And in the second half of the program, we'll look at Iran, quite a bit chaos over the weekend in Switzerland as Trump threatened to take over Iran if the straight of all moves was not reopened immediately. But as Vance left the peace talks this morning, he says that great progress has been made, make of that what you will. You and I were on Morning Joe this morning, so we're just carrying on our conversation of six o'clock this morning because why not? And you said something I thought was really interesting and I wanted to get your take on it for a kind of American. Somebody who watches British politics very closely, but from an American perspective and for our listeners both in the UK and in the US. And you made the point that between 1979 and 2007, so basically three decades, there were three British prime ministers. And then since 2016, there have been six. So since Brexit 2016, there have been six British prime ministers. Why, what was the point you were wanting to make? Why were you drawing that link? Well, because of the stability. I mean, you look at that from '79 to I guess '90 and John Major and then Tony Blair, you have remarkable stability. There's so much so that I went through high school, college, coached high school football, wrote musicals, went to law school, went to Congress, came out of Congress, did Scarborough Country, did Morning Joe have been, you know, I did all of that in the span of Britain having three prime ministers, three prime ministers. And now you might be able to get through breakfast in this, maybe exactly, and so, and then since 2022, there have been four. And so as an angle of file, you know, it's deeply concerning to me as I know it is to you as well. And for us, you know, looking over for people looking at Britain, the question is, if you're having this much chaos and you understood that Brexit was such a colossal mistake, why can't you just go back on and everybody talked to you, says you just can't do it? There was a former cabinet member of Atchiff Kierstarm, as you said recently, that social democracy has to be as much about a successful market economy as it is about an active state. I mean, that could be a discussion with people like Mamdani, that we could perhaps find ourselves having in the States, I think, coming up fairly soon, this balance between market forces and growth and also state interventions. I think that's a question. But Katty, can I just say, somebody taught me a valuable lesson in 2009. And it was you, when Barack Obama got elected president, Newsweek had a headline that said, we're all socialists now. I said, are we becoming socialists? And Katty K said, you Americans make terrible socialists, you focus on work, you're obsessive, you will never be socialists. You don't remember saying that, but you are, you are so right. You just walk down like six avenue in New York and you then walk down to Wall Street. You just, yeah, terrible socialists. I think that is still true, that America basically doesn't have a socialist bone in its body. But I am looking at leaders like Mamdani and Platner and wondering if there is something more of the social democracy or democratic socialist model that is creeping into Gen Z in the United States. And they would do well, perhaps, to look at the fortunes of European leaders who have got to focus like heck on growth because you can't have one without the other. You can't deliver the services if you don't have the growth. Okay, if you were advising Joe Scarborough, I'm gonna put you in the position of flying up to Manchester, England, I know your team is Liverpool, but anyway, you're gonna go to Manchester and you're gonna sit down with Andy Burnham and you're gonna play strategist and advise him on how to deal with his friends across the Atlantic Ocean. And I think there's two parts to this question because there's dealing with Donald Trump and let's deal with that first. And then there is also dealing with the United States and wherever the United States is going. But how would you advise the next Prime Minister of Britain? 'Cause I think Keir Starmo came in, we felt he gave a kind of masterclass when he sat down and produced that letter that he gave to Donald Trump and said, okay, there's gonna be a second unprecedented state visit for you. And we all thought maybe he's playing it right. And now after the events of the weekend and we can get into the Maloney stuff as well, I'm not sure that is the strategy and you said something about interesting about that on Morning Joe this morning. But what would you say to Andy Burnham on how to deal with Donald Trump? Assuming he's the next Prime Minister. - Right, but any sign of weakness is death. I remember trying to talk to Paul Ryan when he became speaker. I had known Paul since he was 22, 23 years old. He actually worked for me and a couple other people and the Republican House Caucus. And I said to him, he said, "Hey, I've known Donald for 20 years. He hates weakness. You can't be seen as weak. He may push back hard on you, but if you're tough, he will respect you. And if you just keep your head down while he's insulting you, he will come back your way and he will tell people privately, "Hey, that Paul Ryan, he's a pretty tough guy." Paul, of course, said, "Well, I'm just interested in policy." And I just, I love Paul, but I just shook my head going, "Well, Donald Trump's not interested in policy." I would say it's a real balancing act. You can flatter him if you want. I've never done that. I've found flattery doesn't work with Donald Trump being straightforward without being hateful. It does, it times help. And when he insults you, just let it roll off your back. But be tough. I think actually though, the most important thing, and this can be very tricky for labor. I think it's interesting, it's sort of a mirror of what Republicans face, the challenges they face in the midterms and what Andy Burnham's going to face. Republicans are going to have to prove they actually care about working Americans. And they've done absolutely nothing to prove that. So they're going to have to get out of their comfort zone at one point and put more money into Medicaid, put more money into healthcare, put more money into the sort of things that Americans are struggling with so far right now, then Andy Burnham, it's just the opposite. I mean, great Britain's future depends. Basically, on what Alan Greenspan, God rest his soul, told Bill Clinton in 1993, and that is he was hostage to bond traders. Andy Burnham, his premiership is going to be hostage to whether people want to invest in Britain, whether they will keep investing in Britain, whether they will continue helping pay off that debt. And so he may have to be more pro business, more pro entrepreneurship than most of labor is going to be comfortable with him doing. But if he does that, it helps investment. I think it also helps him the short run with Donald Trump. Not to me, you can't buy Donald Trump. You can only rent him. And sometimes you can only rent him for 15 minutes. So, but I will say if Trump goes after him, the correct response is seeing what Maloney has done. Because I guarantee you the fighting's going on on. Donald Trump wants to see if she's going to back down the fact that she's pray so much means she's not going to back down, he respects that. And he will be far more likely to come back and have a good working relationship with Maloney with her acting this way rather than bowing down, cow-towing, and apologizing to him. Yeah, I was interested to see what you tweeted out and it's been just kind of fun to watch the even the right wing press in Italy with this big banner headline. I think we can say this because it's a podcast, Trump is an asshole. When you've got your far right that's been causing you problems back on side with you. Undoubtedly, it's helped kind of Maloney's popular fortunes. And I think she then has realized that sucking up to Trump was never the smart play and there have been Europeans all along. And I think this gets to how Europe and the UK handles the relationship more broadly because there's one thing in what you say and tonally how you present yourself. But I think you also have to be able to do a little bit what China did and show strength that is real strength that is not just words, right? They had a card and they were prepared to play it and that card was rare earth minerals. Europe has cards too and we are a huge market for American products, American pharmaceutical products in particular. NATO is a value to the United States security, but we've somehow European leaders, and I think I would include Kier Starrmer in this, have just been somehow terrified of showing strength to Donald Trump and threatening to play Donald Trump at his own game. And it's not just the words, it's it's a sense of robustness. And okay, we're prepared to launch the nuclear trade cards if we need to. And I don't know that that's the right strategy. I think they should have looked at Beijing and seen what Beijing did. Another great example, if they want to look to a democratic leader, would be to see what Mark Carney has done in Canada. Donald Trump and Mark Carney aren't close friends and Trump is still holding up a bridge and he still wants to make Canada the 51st state. But Mark Carney has been tough without being gratuitously insulting. And again, people will be watching going, well, Trump insults him, but yeah, of course he does. He's a child. He's a five year old. That's what you have to understand about his taunts or the same taunts as a five year old. The best way to handle that is the way that Mark Carney handles it, head down, move forward and and use that as an opportunity to say, like Maloney did, I'm not going to bow down to Donald Trump. And Italy is never going to bow down to Donald Trump, strengthens her at home. The same thing's going to happen, of course. And the same thing is happening with Carney who came in on the barest of margins. But now, you know, a year in, people are talking about what a forceful leader he's become. And I will say, if you look at Donald Trump's relationship with Mom Donnie, he loves success. He loves winners. Mom Donnie's a winner. Mom Donnie was asked if he still believed Donald Trump was a fascist in the Oval Office next to Donald Trump. And he started to answer and said, you don't have to answer that. I'm fine. We're good. So the idea that you have to be weak and cow-tow to Donald Trump, it doesn't work. It doesn't work for Republican congressmen or senators. It doesn't work for foreign leaders. So I would recommend that he be respectful, but also be tough. One other thing too, that I just don't understand why I don't hear this more coming from European leaders. Don't understand why there isn't the realization that you're right. Europe does hold cards. I mean, you look at the GDP of the United States, $26.27 trillion. You look at the GDP of Europe, the EU, add the UK. It's about $26.27 trillion. The economies are equal. China's is beneath that. Russia's is $1.4 trillion. So the fact, the fact that Donald Trump continues to hedge his bets for some reason with Russia, with its $1.4, $1.5 trillion GDP, a GDP smaller than the size of taxes. And basically, continue to tell Europe. The F off is just it's beyond me. And I think it's time for Europe to push back and say, what's wrong with you? We have the opportunity, standing shoulder to shoulder, to dominate the world. You can't do it alone. And we're here ready to be your partners, but you're going to have to treat us as partners or else we'll look elsewhere. Joe Scarborough's advice to Andy Burnham, call Georgia Maloney. Perhaps. Yes. Maybe so. Give her a ring. I thought the other point of Georgia Maloney. And I listened to the video. And I thought the thing, and everybody's made a big thing about how she says, I'll never beg, and Italy never begs. But she made, I thought, the even more important point, which is what you've just said is that Donald Trump treats his allies in this terrible way. The same time that he seems to accommodate his adversaries. And it was clear she was talking about Putin in that respect. And I think that is the question that Europeans always have about Donald Trump. And they feel it's so much more existentially than Americans do, because it's that much closer. And Maloney, who we were all worried when she was elected, was not going to be a supporter of Ukraine. Has been a huge supporter of Ukraine. Actually, you tweeted out that pick, you know, the thanks to her, her support that she's given Ukraine. But let me play Devils advocate for a bit, which is that this is something Rory Stewart was saying on their live stream that they put out after Starmer resigned is that the problem Europe faces. You mentioned about if Europe stands shoulder to shoulder. The problem is twofold. Europe doesn't stand shoulder to shoulder. That's its inherent weakness. It is 27. The European Union is 27 different countries. But the other is that it's just it is dependent still on the United States. We've spoken a lot on Morning Joe about the dependence on NATO. But it's also the UK's building an economy on American tech. Europe is building an economy on American artificial intelligence at the moment. We're increasing our dependence. You could argue on America right now right at the time that America looks like a less reliable ally. So what do European leaders need to do, Joe? We know what they need to do on defense spending. They've got it then. They're starting to do it. They've got to do a hell of a lot more coordination and that's going to be harder. But I think they also have to reckon with the idea how do we we've got to be able to stand up to America. It's got to be more than just words. How are we going to do that? And they seem to be moving. Europe seems to be moving in the right direction on defense issues. It's something that Merkel said in Donald Trump's first term. We have to look east. We can't depend on the United States anymore. They have to use leverage. And I will say that while it's horrifying to even suggest this, the UAE is very open about the fact that they're going to deal with China. When it's in their best interest, they'll deal with Russia. When it's in their best interest, they'll deal with America when it's in their best interest. And unfortunately, I think Europe's going to have to move more in that direction until they have another president. They can rely on because right now you do have in Donald Trump, a president is remarkable as it seemed that is drawn to dictators, that's drawn to autocrats. He loves she's very impressed by she. He, of course, we all know how fond he is of Vladimir Putin. He loved Orban when Orban was in power. And there's this incredible quote Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan's new book of Donald Trump in 1990 asked about Tiananmen Square. And Trump compared Gorbachev unfavorably to the Communist Chinese said Gorbachev was weak. And that's why he's in trouble. But said the Chinese, they were strong, they were tough. They handled the student demonstrators the way you're supposed to handle those people strength always wins. And he was openly brazing the communist Chinese leadership for cracking down on pro-democracy demonstrations in Tiananmen Square. That is who Donald Trump was in 1990. That's who that's who Donald Trump is today. And it seems to me that Europe's going to have to figure out how to respond to that. And the first thing they do, they do have to figure out how to become more united militarily, economically in every other way. And they've got to figure out, again, the thing that Trump respects the most is money, got to figure out how to make partnerships with AI firms and do whatever it takes to get some of those businesses, some of those entrepreneurs in Europe in the UK. God, it's such a different time, Joe, from when you were in Congress as a Republican in Congress in the mid-90s, which was kind of peak transatlantic corporation. Right. And it's also just a radically different time than it was even in Trump's first term. In Trump's first term, he was focused on getting coal mines back open, steel mills back open. Now he's all in on AI, he's all in on Bitcoin, he's all in on the tech sector. And that's that's what drives him the most right now. And so that is the real challenge. And it's a real challenge at the UK and Europe not get left further and further behind in those areas especially. With Trump turning on his European allies and seemingly losing friends by the day, it's worth asking, is Donald Trump the loneliest president? in American history. Well, fortunately, this is the subject of this week's newsletter, where historian Adam Smith dives into how Trump, by purging his administration of all of those dissenting pesky voices, has isolated himself in a way we haven't seen in American history. To read this, sign up at therestispoliticsus.com and it'll be in your inbox on Wednesday. Okay, we're going to take a quick break and come back and talk about Iran and the latest out of Switzerland and what we make of these negotiations. We are getting the statement from the 10th of that flight with 350 passengers on board. The great gay strategic struggle between Britain and Russia. We assess Prime Minister with high confidence it was Russian. Holden Derrussian's accountable is world war story. They took down a British passenger jet containing 350 people. Man in the Kremlin is playing, Alex. Got to ask yourself, you want to play or not? You're the Prime Minister. If done, nothing! We would need to understand the policy context. All the relevant context will be structured as a framework today and disseminated into an operation order or Frago. And Frago that says to kill the president of Russia. Yes. New from Goldhanger. Who is going to be able to pull this off? You're my soldier, are you Sergeant Trump and Duffy? An audio drama journey like no other. Men like Duffy, they are our most valuable weapons. Devised as a technically rigorous geopolitical action forever, we're Britain plays its strongest act against its strongest foe. Don't do it Duffy! Bear hunt. Available now, wherever you get your podcasts. Hi everybody, it's Dominic Sandbrook here from The Restless History and we are here to tell you about a thrilling new series on the blood-soaked climax of the French Revolution. The reign of terror. So the French Revolution is one of the most significant episodes in the whole of world history. It essentially lays the foundations for contemporary politics as we know it. But it is also unbelievably dramatic. We'll be discussing the murder of the firebrand Jean-Paul Marat in his bathtub. We will be going to the guillotine with the Marianne Toinette and in our final episode, we will be telling the story of the extraordinary and grotesque downfall of one of the chief architects of the terror, one of the most evil men in history, some would say, Maximilian Crabberspierre. So if you want to hear this epic series, search for The Restless History, wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome back to The Restless Politics US. Anthony is off today, but I'm back here with Joe Scarborough, host of Morning Joe. My favorite television show as it happens. Well, good. That's good to know. Every morning. You know, I would even get up at four in the morning to come on your show. That is unbelievable that you do that. You have to be, again, in the words of Kedi K, criminally insane to do that regularly. Well, you have to be, I do it twice a week. You do it five times a week. That is what makes you certifiable. Yeah, yeah. Oh, no doubt about it. I've been doing it now. We're coming up on our 20th year. The scar tissue accumulates. It's so funny. I'll be lying around in the afternoon going, "Oh, I'm so old. How did I get so old?" And they go, "Oh, wait a second. I woke up at 4.30 this morning. Tap dance for three or four hours on TV. Did all these things after?" And I've been doing it for 20 years. 20 years. Yeah, can you believe that? That's crazy. And it's not like there's nothing to talk about. So let's look at what's happening in Iran. What do you make of what's coming out of Iran? Both in terms of, look, do we ever get beyond an MOU? Because what I'm hearing from people that follow Iran far more closely than I do is this is what we're going to get. It's a page and a half. We're going to have this kind of bumpy ceasefire going forwards. There will never really be substantive negotiations. There is not a team that pays attention to technical detail and has much in the way of follow through historically when it comes to big strategy. So this is probably all that we're going to get is a ceasefire that holds more or less well at various points. I think that's the best case scenario right now from what I say maybe this MOU can keep a ceasefire stitched together between Iran and the United States and keep the straight open. But moving forward to any nuclear deal. That's just never going to happen. And what I think, a lot of people are concerned about in the region. Certainly what I'm concerned about, what I would guess a lot of Republicans in some Democrats in Washington are worried about is a fact that Donald Trump will unfreeze about $100 billion in fines that I doubt will ever get to the $300 billion in reparations, which actually is more than Germany agreed to pay for it for side. I don't think we'll ever get that for, but there's no doubt Iran will be strengthened a great deal by this war. We'll have control over the straight. We'll have be able to sell their oil without sanctions. We'll be able to rebuild their war machine. They're not going to go in and rebuild infrastructure quickly to help the people of Iran. They don't care about the people of Iran. And this idea that was floated out there that, well, if the Iranians will deal with us so nuclear, then we'll invest in their country and their country can become an economic success story. The Moules don't care about that. The revolutionary guard doesn't care about that. They care about what Putin cares about staying in power. So I think you're right. I'd go one step further. They actually actively don't want that. Right. That capital investment and those foreigners coming into their country to build shiny new condos or whatever it was in North Korea. I think it was beach hotels. They offered them. That's a threat to the regime. That's Karim Sahjapur, the great Iran expert who was saying over the weekend, that's a Trojan horse. We lose control of our population if our population is suddenly free and prosperous and open to Western ideas and money. So that's kind of the last thing that they would want. Yeah, exactly. So I really don't know where this goes. I think we're stuck in the same place. We were a week, two, three weeks ago. You've got Iran who is drawing a red line on enrichment. You've got the United States and Donald Trump is that they fought this war. So Iran would never have a nuclear weapon. And as much as Donald Trump wants to make it go away, Israel is not going to allow it to go away as long as Iran is still enriching. And Republicans in the United States send it in the House. I don't think we're going to let it go away either. So I'm not really exactly sure where we go from now. Other than to a place that you just described and that is where there's this sort of uneasy ceasefire with some ships being able to go through the strait. Can I ask you about why JD Vance? Because I think this is interesting. JD Vance, who has just released a book on his conversion to Catholicism. You are a better Christian than I am Joe, not a Catholic, but you know, you actually do go to church, I don't. Oh, oh, oh, Teddy. Oh, no, I am not a reader Bible, but yeah. You read the Bible. Okay. So here is JD releasing this book in the same week that he is talking about the Iranian regime suddenly having become more like, I don't know, pick an innocuous European country. I think your favorite is Luxembourg. There you go. Luxembourg. Iran is becoming normal. Donald Trump has said that the regime is not radicalized. This is now a very different group of people. We've got in there, they're far more normal. We can have a good, you know, gentleman's agreement with them. Effectively is what the administration says. This is the regime that has just given 74 lashes to a 29 year old singer who performed without a hijab. It has escalated persecution of some of the minorities. Right. And it's putting political prisoners on a fast track to the gallows. I mean, literally, this is the same regime. This is JD Vance, who is releasing a book on his deep Christian faith. Somehow suggesting that the leadership of Iran, because of the war that Donald Trump implemented, is now a more reasonable, normal, pro-Western, acceptable regime. How is JD squaring those two things? He doesn't have to swear, he's just been so hypocritical. This guy who attacks the Catholic Pope, a recent convert to Catholicism, lecturing the Pope on theology in such a way that even a right-wing Catholics in America were offended. And it's the same JD Vance that compared Donald Trump to Hitler, called Donald Trump cultural heroine. And the same JD Vance, whose conversion to Trumpism, Deny? not come during the 2020 campaign. It actually came, think about this. This is all you need to know about JD Vance. His conversion to Trumpism came in the weeks following January the 6th, because he decided he wanted to run for Senator in 2022. So after the loss, after January 6th, after the insurrection, after all the lies, after trying to undermine democracy, when JD Vance went from calling Trump cultural heroine and America's Hitler to decide he wanted to be his ally, the same things happening here, where you have JD Vance again, embracing the Iranians because that's the mission Donald Trump has put him on. And right now he's in a competition with Marco Rubio for who's going to be Donald Trump's successor. And by all indications, right now it seems that Donald Trump is leaning towards Marco Rubio. It's funny, and regime change. There's a moment when somebody looks at all the gold that Donald Trump has put all over the White House and how garrisoned it become. Liberacci kind of on steroids. Exactly. Exactly. Liberacci on steroids. And advisor says, aren't you concerned that the next president is going to tear all this down on the first day? And Trump goes, nah, Cubans love gold. And Q Marco. Yeah, yeah. Q Marco, in time and time in the book, JD just seems to be just so politically clumsy. Time and time again, whether you talk about the war, you know, he was on the side with Tucker Carlson saying, you can't go into Iran. You know, Donald Trump turns his back on and basically says, leave me alone. You just go down the list that Epstein files. It seems JD's always on the wrong side of things. And there is no doubt. And Trump said as much, we've put JD out there. So if it fails, it's JD's fault and not mine. Well, JD's been given a losing hand. He's been set up to fail. I think that's exactly what's going to happen. I wonder, I heard from a European diplomat recently whose wife is in a group that is Usha Vance is kind of part of says they're having a pretty miserable time that they're not actually liking this. They're not liking the scrutiny of my god. If they're not liking the scrutiny on the family now, try running for president, try being president of the United States. And I'm, I thought the book launch was his 2028 bid. I don't think he handled it particularly well because his conversion on the view to being soft and cuddly and self deprecating Anthony and I spoke about this last week wasn't particularly compelling. I think JD Vance is the JD Vance, the Munich Security Council conference. And I think it's he is the JD Vance we saw with Vladimir Zelensky in the Oval Office. And when he tries and does soft and cuddly, it's, it just comes across as weird. Yeah, it doesn't work. And it doesn't work because you look at a lot of people that it worked for Trump. And sometimes you're like, Oh God, stop playing that role. You're embarrassing yourself. You're trying to be tough. You're trying to be overly, you know, aggressive and rude with JD Vance. Based on the Republican fund racers, I know who have dealt with him and dealt with him in the normal one situation. Say, I never seen this side of him. So I don't know, but they say behind closed doors. He's a pretty miserable person. He's a pretty mean person. He's a pretty unlikable person. So your insights on held soft and cuddly, JD doesn't sell. Well, it makes sense. I think he is the JD Vance of the Munich Security Conference. I think if Marco is the one who's thinking he benefits from all of that, that picture of him looking like he's in a hostage video behind the president at the G7 summit in France may not be the easiest thing for me. I just think it's striking that somehow over the last four months, Iran has got poorer and cooler and somehow more popular in Washington all at the same time. That seems to be quite a feat that they've pulled off. Well, Donald Trump had figured out, you know, all the lies about completely destroying Iran's military machine, all the lies about destroying their nuclear capabilities, quote, obliterating the nuclear capabilities. Donald Trump yelling at JD Vance because he's doesn't use the word obliterate enough when he talks about their attack on the nuclear facilities. All of that has been swept away because Donald Trump realizes what everybody's been warning up for 20, 25 years. You can't invade Iran. You can't go into Iran or as Dr. Brzezinski said in 2012, they will shut off the straight. They'll never beat you in war, but you will be setting the world's economy on fire. And that's what Donald Trump has finally figured out. He's figured out there's no good way out in there. So he's helping people blame JD for capitulating to the Iranians. Do you think, Joe, just before we stop, this is something I'm wondering if Democrats are getting wrong because they're looking at the details of this and saying, well, point six is, you know, just the same as the Obama plan and point 13 is worse than the Obama plan. Actually, what the White House is looking at is gas prices are going to start coming down in the United States. And so how many people who are voting in swing districts around the country are actually going to be looking at the finer points of the memorandum of our understanding, or actually caring in two months time. How much are we going to be talking about Iran and the straightforward moves, assuming the oil is flowing reasonably fluidly enough? Do you think the White House has a point that they can just sell this as a win because people will not follow through on the details and we'll forget. And actually this won't be as much of a political cost to Republicans as we might be thinking it is sitting here right in the middle of this short term. This is the best political move for all the reasons that you just said. I mean, first of all, you try to get a run off the front pages. There's complication of that. It's called the Edstein Files, and you'll remember the Friday before Trump launch the attacks is when the stories of the 14-year-old, the 15-year-old started to really get reported out. And that story was about to blow up. So who knows, maybe Trump trades the Epstein Files for the Iran War and finds himself back dealing with the Epstein Files. But in the short run, Republicans will, I think, will benefit with gas prices going down. The markets will probably stabilize a bit more. I said probably because it's chaos. In the long run, though, for Donald Trump's legacy, for the Republicans' legacy, it's a complete disaster. Bob Kagan wrote this, this will go down. If this is where we end, the MOU, this will go down as one of the greatest military defeats in U.S. history. And it won't be enough for Trump and Higgs to say, well, we beat them militarily. Well, we beat Vietnam militarily in every battle. We beat the Iraqis. We beat Afghanistan. And yeah, we beat the Iranians, and we lost all four wars. So long run, it's going to be devastating on Trump's legacy. And that's what he cares about the most right now. In the short run, though, maybe Republicans pick up some political gains for it. Yeah, in the long, long run, I think we end up with a world that is potentially less safe because you got a whole bunch of countries saying what I need is a nuclear weapon. Right. And then this won't happen to me. If you would like hear more from Joe Scarborough, he's going to join us for our bonus episode for our founding members, where we're going to be discussing Bill Pulti's dramatic start, dramatic, to his tenure as Acting Director of National Intelligence. Who's actually going to be funding that $300 billion pledge to Iran and why American intelligence tends to not quite get it right when it comes to understanding other countries. Priorities, if you're not a member and would like to listen, do make sure to sign up at the rest of politics us.com to become a founding member. Joe Scarborough, thank you very much. I've been wanting to get you on the show for ages. We just had to get a really advantage for a week and then find a slot in your schedule. Exactly. Get rid of him. I love him. Thank you so much for having me. Thank you. (upbeat music)