Speaker 1: Welcome to today's podcast sponsored by Hillsdale College, All Things
Speaker 1: hillsdalet Hillsdale dot ed or I encourage you to take
Speaker 1: advantage of the many free online courses there, and of
Speaker 1: course I'll listen to the Hillsdale dialogues, all of them
Speaker 1: at Hugh for Hillsdale dot com or just Google, Apple
Speaker 1: iTunes and Hillsdale Morning Glory and even Grace America. And
Speaker 1: here's the Big Weekend pod. I'm Hugh Hewett. Thank you
Speaker 1: for listening. Big line up today, John ellis of course
Speaker 1: with the news items of great import that you may
Speaker 1: have missed this week. Be following it up with Eli Lake.
Speaker 1: We'll be talking about Iron, as I will be with
Speaker 1: Matt Continei and Ben Dominicic as well. Look at a possible,
Speaker 1: as I said on America Reports yesterday John Roberts, possible
Speaker 1: that Iron will capitulate and simply say, hey, we're going
Speaker 1: to open up the kimono, Come get our missiles, come
Speaker 1: get our uranium. It's what Kadafi did in two thousand
Speaker 1: and three December two thousand and three through the spring
Speaker 1: of two thousand and four, after the invasion of Rock
Speaker 1: had marched up to Bagdad Kadafi saw what the United
Speaker 1: States military could do, and he said, okay, out come
Speaker 1: get all my bad stuff, and we did go and
Speaker 1: get all of his bad stuff. Could the Iranians make
Speaker 1: that deal.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: I don't think actually a regime is capable of doing that.
Speaker 1: But could a new regime put a bullet in the
Speaker 1: back of Himene's head and decide, no, we're not going
Speaker 1: to go down with this ship.
Speaker 2: These people are crazy. Yeah, that's possible, but it.
Speaker 1: Would be a new regime, Like there's a new regime
Speaker 1: in Venezuela that is cooperating with President Trump and the
Speaker 1: rest of the administration in the transition to something new
Speaker 1: and something that doesn't threaten the United States or the
Speaker 1: people of Venezuela. That transition undeterminate yet how long it
Speaker 1: will go. But I'll talk with all my guests about
Speaker 1: that today. Plus Japan takes a Chinese shipping boat. We'll
Speaker 1: start there with John Ellis on this big weekend pod.
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening, Glory and even Graves in America.
Speaker 1: I hope your Valentine's Day weekend is off to a
Speaker 1: good start. I'm starting the program today with John Allis,
Speaker 1: founder and editor in chief of News Items, your morning
Speaker 1: newsletter on everything that's important in the world. Get rid
Speaker 1: of everything else. You can stick with news items and
Speaker 1: be well read. John, I had no idea until you
Speaker 1: sent me the note that we got a little crisis
Speaker 1: brewing in the South China Sea. I didn't know that
Speaker 1: Prime Minister Takaichi had won a thumping, big victory last Sunday,
Speaker 1: did not know that Japan had seized a Chinese fishing
Speaker 1: vessel within their exclusive economic zone and China is not happy.
Speaker 1: How goes that situation, Well.
Speaker 3: It's interesting.
Speaker 4: I think it's the most important story of the day,
Speaker 4: and it may, you know, become more important as the
Speaker 4: day's passed. But if you go back to November, Takeishi
Speaker 4: was newly installed as the Prime minister. She was asked
Speaker 4: what would happen if China invaded Taiwan, and she said,
Speaker 4: Japan could become involved if that were to occur. The
Speaker 4: Chinese completely flipped out about that. They said, mind your
Speaker 4: own business, you know, you have no right to even
Speaker 4: think that, and they and they put down, you know,
Speaker 4: some market, you know, tourists from.
Speaker 3: China could go to Japan. Whatever.
Speaker 4: She then last weekend was elected her party got a
Speaker 4: two thirds majority in the Diet, which is the Japanese Congress,
Speaker 4: and you know, she won a landslide victory. And here
Speaker 4: we are five days later and a Chinese fishing boat
Speaker 4: is in Japanese water. The Japanese seized the fishing boat
Speaker 4: and they arrest the captain. And so that's where we're
Speaker 4: at right now. But the one thing that President g
Speaker 4: has simply can't allow is for him to appear week
Speaker 4: and at the moment he appears weak because the Chinese
Speaker 4: haven't done anything yet.
Speaker 3: So we'll see what.
Speaker 1: I would also add to what into her newly elected status.
Speaker 4: It's a fairly bold move and one I think that well.
Speaker 4: I surprised it wasn't on the front page of every
Speaker 4: major news website.
Speaker 1: Now you brought to my attention and I immediately went
Speaker 1: to see what have we got there? The Lincoln was
Speaker 1: on patrol in the South China Sea. That George Washington
Speaker 1: is back in Yakuska in the homeport. We do have
Speaker 1: a big deck Tripoli US Marine Corps carrying ship out there,
Speaker 1: and it's a big deck. But we really don't need
Speaker 1: another crisis in the world right now. With two carriers
Speaker 1: on their way to off the coast of Iran. So
Speaker 1: good heads up on that. Let's go to the good
Speaker 1: news in your briefing that you sent me Alzheimer's A
Speaker 1: I'm covered on coffee. I'm not sure I'm covered on
Speaker 1: language unless high school Latin counts. Let people know about
Speaker 1: how to ward off Alzheimer's and dementia.
Speaker 3: So there are two stories today.
Speaker 4: One is that caffeine reduces your risk of Alzheimer's, and
Speaker 4: it's a huge study conducted over forty three years. Two
Speaker 4: or three cups of coffee a day, two or three
Speaker 4: cups of tea a day reduces your risk of inflation of.
Speaker 3: It reduces it reduces your risk.
Speaker 1: Hope that might be why the number came in today.
Speaker 4: Sorry about that reduces your risk of dementia and you know,
Speaker 4: as I said, it's a huge study. So that was
Speaker 4: encouraging news, particularly for me because I get up very
Speaker 4: early in the morning.
Speaker 3: And drink a fair amount of coffee.
Speaker 4: The second is that if you if you keep engaged intellectually,
Speaker 4: if you read, if you write, if you do puzzles,
Speaker 4: you know, if you stay active, if you learn the language,
Speaker 4: it reduces your risk of dementia by forty percent. So
Speaker 4: the advice is to start reading, start writing, and start
Speaker 4: doing puzzles.
Speaker 1: And well, I work with Dwayne every day, so I'm
Speaker 1: covered on the puzzles too. But yeah, one thing they
Speaker 1: never tell you in these studies on caffeine is I
Speaker 1: don't know anyone who drinks three cups of coffee. He
Speaker 1: doesn't drink five cups of coffee. So I'm the five
Speaker 1: cup of copy a guy day. Does it decline? Did
Speaker 1: you get to the small print?
Speaker 3: I didn't get to the small print.
Speaker 4: I was so excited about the first paragraph that I
Speaker 4: didn't read it anymore.
Speaker 1: Now you have to explain to me the AI story
Speaker 1: you sent me, because the numbers are mind boggling on
Speaker 1: the speed with which AI can compute or likely to
Speaker 1: compute in the next twenty years.
Speaker 4: Yeah, there's a research group called METR and they built
Speaker 4: a simple model for forecasting when AI will automate AI development. Okay,
Speaker 4: so essentially the AI will wrote write the code, and
Speaker 4: at current rate I'm going to quote from the research article,
Speaker 4: at current rates of compute growth and algorithmic progress, this
Speaker 4: model's median prediction is ninety nine percent automation of AI
Speaker 4: R and D in late twenty thirty two, So six
Speaker 4: years from today, all code, all AI code, will be
Speaker 4: written by AI.
Speaker 3: And that is.
Speaker 4: That it has enormously positive implications because if genetics is
Speaker 4: code as well, there are four letters and three billion
Speaker 4: base pairs, So if your AI is able to write
Speaker 4: that code, then we'll have a much better understanding of
Speaker 4: every disease. It will be astonishing. On the other hand,
Speaker 4: there are no guardrails to code writing code. There's no structure,
Speaker 4: there's no salt talk if you will, that that nations
Speaker 4: all agree on and how it should develop. So it
Speaker 4: could be that the machines win.
Speaker 1: In the absence of an agreement, everyone goes fast as
Speaker 1: you can, which may lead to why people are so gloomy.
Speaker 1: The poll that you brought from Pew about the percentage
Speaker 1: of US adults who anticipate living high quality lives in
Speaker 1: five years down to under sixty percent. I find that astonishing.
Speaker 4: John ellis, Yeah, it was actually a gallup pole. But
Speaker 4: they've been, you know, they've been tracking this forever, and
Speaker 4: it is truly discouraging because people in the US are
Speaker 4: you know, discouraged, and the younger they are, the more
Speaker 4: discouraged they are. So it's something that needs to be
Speaker 4: turned around or else we're in a lot more trouble
Speaker 4: than we.
Speaker 3: Think we are.
Speaker 1: Is exuberance always been lower among the younger than it
Speaker 1: has been among the middle aged because they are uncertainty?
Speaker 1: Or is it something that is precipitously declining with gen alpha.
Speaker 4: It's declining. It's not that it's precipitously declining. It's that
Speaker 4: the steady decline has full en off a couple of
Speaker 4: stairs instead.
Speaker 1: Of one stair at a time I got my books.
Speaker 1: Discouraging the Pew Pole does not surprise me. That's the
Speaker 1: low confidence in journalism to act in the best interest
Speaker 1: in public Fifty seven percent express low confidence in journalism
Speaker 1: when it comes to acting in the public interest.
Speaker 2: I kind of actually surprised it's that high.
Speaker 4: John Well, I think you know this is not this
Speaker 4: is not news, right, I mean, we've been watching this
Speaker 4: trend for a long time, uh, and you know that
Speaker 4: it's I think the reason that it's not higher is
Speaker 4: it because people have found their own news sources, which
Speaker 4: they quite like, right. I mean people who listen to
Speaker 4: Hugh hewittt like the Hugh Hewitt Show. So from from
Speaker 4: their point of view, you know, the news media isn't
Speaker 4: a bad thing. But I think big news media organizations,
Speaker 4: the major broadcast networks, the major cable organizations measure what
Speaker 4: we used to call newspapers, are suffering a crisis of confidence.
Speaker 3: But that's you know, that's not news.
Speaker 1: That's yeah, you've got tens of thousands, You've got tens
Speaker 1: of thousands of subscribers to news items.
Speaker 2: I am among them.
Speaker 1: Do they ever do you ever get feedback from them
Speaker 1: why they have confidence and news items? Because I think
Speaker 1: it's because you cover the waterfront quickly, but I'm not sure.
Speaker 3: I think, I mean, I think the.
Speaker 4: Key to our success, such as it is, is that
Speaker 4: in eight minutes, you get a lot of information that
Speaker 4: is you know, vetted, and that brings to your attention
Speaker 4: stuff that you might not otherwise see. I mean, the
Speaker 4: basic premises, We read it all so you don't have to,
Speaker 4: and then we make the decisions as to what is
Speaker 4: most important.
Speaker 3: And people like.
Speaker 4: That because it's you know, they can get a pretty
Speaker 4: broad picture in eight minutes and.
Speaker 3: Then they can get on with their day.
Speaker 1: All right, last story you sent me, Switzerland is joining
Speaker 1: the anti immigrant maybe joining the anti immigrant wave. They're
Speaker 1: going to hold a referendum. I'm not sure when it's
Speaker 1: going to be on whether or not to admit more people.
Speaker 4: Details, yeah, details are that the current population is nine million.
Speaker 4: There's a strong conservative movement in Switzerland that has gathered
Speaker 4: the signatures to put a petition, put a referendum essentially
Speaker 4: on the ballot to say, look, we're going to cap
Speaker 4: the population of Switzerland at ten millions so that we're
Speaker 4: not overrun by immigration. And it's an important vote. Switzerland
Speaker 4: is not part of the EU, but it is indicative
Speaker 4: I think of a very strong reaction to immigration across Europe.
Speaker 4: And as the climate gets worse in the upper part
Speaker 4: of Africa and stuff, and as the political climate deteriorates
Speaker 4: in the Middle East, more and more people are going
Speaker 4: to want you moved to Europe. And so Switzerland has
Speaker 4: said nope, quartering to go ten millions the number and
Speaker 4: that's it.
Speaker 1: And Italy deployed its navy today saying stop introduce all
Speaker 1: shipping from Africa. So it is not just the Swist's everywhere.
Speaker 1: John Ellis from news Items, Thank you. If you want
Speaker 1: news items, just go to Google news items. Sean Ellis
Speaker 1: substack and you'll find it. Thank you, John, I'll be right.
Speaker 2: Welcome back to America.
Speaker 1: I'm Hugh Hewett, joined now by Eli Lake of the
Speaker 1: Free Press, where he was writing about the Kurds inside
Speaker 1: of Iran today. Eli, good to see you. Follow Eli
Speaker 1: at x on exit Eli Lake. Yesterday, the President said
Speaker 1: if negotiations don't work, there will be severe trauma for Iran,
Speaker 1: and that they have about a month or zo to
Speaker 1: make them work. I note before we start that Kadaffi
Speaker 1: in fact capitulated in late two thousand and three, early
Speaker 1: two thousand or opened up as Kaimano. Take my nuclear stuff,
Speaker 1: take my chemical take my skates. That's really the only
Speaker 1: choice that I think the Iranians have other than getting
Speaker 1: hammered again.
Speaker 5: What do you think, Well, I agree with you.
Speaker 6: I think it's slightly different than what happened with Kadaffi.
Speaker 6: Kadaffi was responding to the invasion of Iraq and the
Speaker 6: coalition that George W. Bush had put together, and this
Speaker 6: was pursued discreetly. There was no announcement of it until
Speaker 6: there was a deal. It was done first through intelligence,
Speaker 6: and it was done very quietly. This time it's a
Speaker 6: little different. We we know that we had Midnight Hammer
Speaker 6: last June and the Iranian people, which were we began
Speaker 6: the year with that front and center. I think, you
Speaker 6: know are we're We're in the beginning stages. My hope
Speaker 6: is that we are in the beginning stages of a
Speaker 6: revolution that will finally topple the Islamic Republic. In this respect,
Speaker 6: Trump is basically offering a kind of lifeline, albeit a
Speaker 6: godfather offer, sort of light fline. If you disarm and
Speaker 6: you do all these things which are definitely in the
Speaker 6: US national interest, we will let you survive. But the
Speaker 6: problem is he began twenty twenty six by promising to
Speaker 6: come to the aid of the Iranian people who've already
Speaker 6: died in the tens of thousands at the hands of
Speaker 6: this vicious regime. So I have mixed feelings about them.
Speaker 6: Where we are at this moment, I have very.
Speaker 1: Clear feeling eli, which is, if the President follows through,
Speaker 1: he will have done what he promised to do, meaning
Speaker 1: if he attacks Iran, or if they totally capitulate and
Speaker 1: Hamani is gone and his son is gone and there's
Speaker 1: a general in charge, it's.
Speaker 2: Possible, it is not likely.
Speaker 1: And then I think it is very likely that he's
Speaker 1: going to hammer Iran, but that as Admiral Montgomery explained
Speaker 1: on this program on Monday, he's going to do it
Speaker 1: after making sure we're it's defended as we can be
Speaker 1: wherever we are vulnerable. And I don't I don't know
Speaker 1: if they'll be Serbia like or Libya like in terms
Speaker 1: of our pounding of him, but it's going to be big,
Speaker 1: and I think it's going to be within a month
Speaker 1: to two months.
Speaker 6: Well, this is again I want to What I want
Speaker 6: to say though, is that what bought. What concerns me
Speaker 6: is that he has it seems that he has dropped
Speaker 6: the condition that you can't kill the Iranians who are
Speaker 6: protesting the regime.
Speaker 2: That's the problem.
Speaker 6: They did kill in the tens of thousands, lots of
Speaker 6: they defied his redline. And if there is a final deal,
Speaker 6: I have not heard any I mean, it could be
Speaker 6: that that's in the deal, but we haven't heard.
Speaker 5: When Trump talks.
Speaker 6: About the deal, he talks about nuclear he talks about missiles.
Speaker 6: He meets with net and Yahoo, but we don't hear.
Speaker 6: And we talked about the terror proxies, but what about
Speaker 6: the executions, what about you know, the Iranian people and Ultimately,
Speaker 6: I think the end goal has to be the end
Speaker 6: of the regime.
Speaker 2: Well, I give you that.
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna I agree, but el I've heard a
Speaker 1: lot of people talking about this. We won't know how
Speaker 1: well Trump has pulled this off until it's over.
Speaker 2: It's like Sophocle.
Speaker 1: He will not know how good the day has been
Speaker 1: until the sun is set, and we want the sun
Speaker 1: doesn't set on this drama for a while. So I'm
Speaker 1: I don't think he can bring those people back to life.
Speaker 1: I don't blame them that the regime killed them and
Speaker 1: they've been killing people for forty seven years. But I
Speaker 1: do think we got to give him a chance to
Speaker 1: do what he said he would do, and by by
Speaker 1: upping the any with terror, with the missiles on the table,
Speaker 1: they're not going to give up their missiles, are they?
Speaker 5: Well?
Speaker 6: Agree that now you're getting into something else, which is
Speaker 6: that can they accept the offer? Are they motivated by
Speaker 6: a kind of regime death wish? I believe they are.
Speaker 6: I think they're apocalyptic. And then the second thing is
Speaker 6: is that it's absolutely prudent to want to make sure that.
Speaker 2: You have the innerset.
Speaker 6: Actors in place and the military positioning in place to
Speaker 6: absorb any kind of barrages that the Iranians will launch
Speaker 6: after an attack. All of that's true, and I hope
Speaker 6: and that there's a lot of coordination I assume there
Speaker 6: is between the Mosad and our military and the CIA
Speaker 6: to find out exactly where them as the launchers are
Speaker 6: and to make sure maybe we get them before they
Speaker 6: can fire them off. All that's great, but I just
Speaker 6: want to stress it's not a judgment, because I think
Speaker 6: you're right, we have to judge this until we can't
Speaker 6: judge until it's over. I'm throwing one red flag, though,
Speaker 6: is that the regime was cratering. They had lost popular legitimacy.
Speaker 6: Even the Chancellor of Germany said they're in their final
Speaker 6: months or days.
Speaker 2: At this point.
Speaker 6: Even the act of negotiations is reflected back to the
Speaker 6: Iranian people, see America will abandon you. And that's the
Speaker 6: part of it that doesn't sit well with me. I
Speaker 6: understand that he's trying to do it without war. That's
Speaker 6: always admirable, but then why make a promise that you
Speaker 6: didn't deliver on When they did that, now you know
Speaker 6: again it could be one of these things where he
Speaker 6: said that that was where his heart was. And then
Speaker 6: he's briefed, listen, we don't have the interceptors in place.
Speaker 6: We've got to move these assets into the Persian golf.
Speaker 6: That's going to take some time. I understand that. And
Speaker 6: in the end history will judge him by the final result,
Speaker 6: not by what maybe happens in the interim. But just
Speaker 6: right now, where is that original demand, stop killing your
Speaker 6: own people?
Speaker 5: Moas we hold all the cards, they have zero leverage.
Speaker 1: They can't deliver that now. I mean, I think he
Speaker 1: was actually trying to protect those people. I think he
Speaker 1: was trying to tell their regime not to do that.
Speaker 1: And the regime did it, and they did something I
Speaker 1: didn't think possible. They out Chinese the tannem and square thing.
Speaker 1: They went three times and square, and I didn't think
Speaker 1: we'd ever see that done in the daylight or at
Speaker 1: nighttime or without the internet. So they have done the
Speaker 1: worst that they could possibly And now it's made it
Speaker 1: harder because the IRGC can't really lay down its arms,
Speaker 1: can they are the people will? I asked the Crown
Speaker 1: Prince that this on Monday, how do you stop the
Speaker 1: reprisals if the regime falls? And he says, they think
Speaker 1: they can. I don't think he can.
Speaker 7: Do you.
Speaker 2: I hope he can.
Speaker 6: I think there was I think in I think reprisals
Speaker 6: in the situation, and it's been building I'd say since
Speaker 6: seventy nine, are inevitable. I mean, there reprisals. As we
Speaker 6: know in Romania, it's very rare that you don't get
Speaker 6: reprisals when you have a regime this violent, repressive finally topple.
Speaker 5: But they do have to go.
Speaker 6: And I'm just worried that even if we got a
Speaker 6: great deal on all the things we wanted, the survival
Speaker 6: of the regime is still in my view of failure.
Speaker 1: Well, I agree, but I don't think. I don't think
Speaker 1: that's possible.
Speaker 5: Eli.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because if that is, then trumps gerald in a
Speaker 1: way it would be as it would be a historic failure.
Speaker 1: It would haunt his presidency if he collapses.
Speaker 2: Yep.
Speaker 6: Yes, And I think the good The difference between Trump
Speaker 6: and Obama, there's been a lot of these comparisons, is
Speaker 6: that Trump understands that you can never go into a
Speaker 6: negotiation wanting the deal more than the other side. So
Speaker 6: he's shown before he is willing to say to walk
Speaker 6: away and say I'm not going to play games anymore.
Speaker 6: That was something that was Obama's big weakness. He at
Speaker 6: the end of it, he just wanted any deal and
Speaker 6: he got a very bad one. So I don't think
Speaker 6: Trump will agree to a bad deal in terms of
Speaker 6: our US interest. I just want him to understand that
Speaker 6: even if what he thinks is a good dealer, the
Speaker 6: AD either says a good deal, it can't be a
Speaker 6: good deal until we see a new regime in Iran.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I agree. And if you ever played Jackson Open,
Speaker 1: trust the Wynn poker. H the Iranians doing Jackson Open.
Speaker 1: They can't open. Yeah, I mean they can't write and
Speaker 1: so yeah, So I hope we're there. I never seen
Speaker 1: Well keep talking about it every week because Eli and
Speaker 1: I have gotten there's no other story that's important in
Speaker 1: the world. Maybe the Chinese fishing boat, the Japanese cities
Speaker 1: this morning, but all other story is this close. Stay
Speaker 1: tuned in America. Thank you, Eli Lake, follow him at
Speaker 1: Eli Lake, and read them in the Free Press.
Speaker 2: Stay tune. Welcome back to America.
Speaker 1: I'm Hugh Hewett, joined now by Wall Street Journal columnist
Speaker 1: Matt Continetti. Matt also has domestic policy studies at the
Speaker 1: American Enterprise Institute, and in his column this week for
Speaker 1: the Journal, he was talking domestic policy. He said, the
Speaker 1: Republicans need three things before November. Sustained economic growth. I
Speaker 1: think I'm going to give a check to that. Given
Speaker 1: the inflation number and job number this week, they need
Speaker 1: to have a put the Democrats on their feet with
Speaker 1: a pivotal moment towards the end. Don't know if that's
Speaker 1: going to happen, and they need presidential barnstorming, which I
Speaker 1: think is going to happen. Matt Continetti, do you agree
Speaker 1: with me first on the fact that sustained economic growth
Speaker 1: appears to be in the in the offering for as
Speaker 1: long as we can.
Speaker 5: See, Absolutely, Hugh. I mean, this administration has a great
Speaker 5: story to tell on the economy. The very simply, jobs
Speaker 5: are above expectations and inflation is below expectations, and slowly
Speaker 5: but surely, the American economy and the American worker is
Speaker 5: gaining back the ground that we lost during the Biden era.
Speaker 5: I think Biden doug about a three thousand dollars hole
Speaker 5: in living standards, and with the latest data, I think
Speaker 5: the administration is saying we're up to about fifteen hundred
Speaker 5: dollars back into the filling it back up, so that
Speaker 5: means we're halfway there to where we're starting to really
Speaker 5: feel that we're making progress again on the economy. And
Speaker 5: so it's very important for the administration to highlight all
Speaker 5: of this good economic news. I think President Trump has
Speaker 5: been trying to do that in recent weeks, trying to
Speaker 5: get the story back onto the economy. You notice that
Speaker 5: he's not holding as many press conferences with foreign leaders,
Speaker 5: for example, and the travel he's done in recent weeks
Speaker 5: has emphasized affordability. He needs to keep that up through
Speaker 5: the election.
Speaker 1: He has also made the Secretary of the Treasury a
Speaker 1: regular fixture on the Evening and News and the Sunday shows.
Speaker 1: And I think Scott Besson deserves headline billing because he's
Speaker 1: very good at this better than you know. I mean,
Speaker 1: Williami Simon was pretty good, James Baker was very calm
Speaker 1: and poised. I'm sure Hamilton was witty. But he is
Speaker 1: our new Secretary of the Treasury, is a very funny man,
Speaker 1: and he's got good news to tell. I think they
Speaker 1: can't keep them out there enough.
Speaker 5: Yeah, this Secretary Beson's a great ambassador for the administration,
Speaker 5: and he made the rounds today with the latest inflation numbers.
Speaker 5: You know, this has been the story of the Trump
Speaker 5: presidency so far, is that the tariffs aren't showing up
Speaker 5: in the overall inflation data, and so the economic cost
Speaker 5: of the tariffs and the tariffs are attacks, so there's
Speaker 5: always a cost is showing itself in other ways. And
Speaker 5: so Secretary of Besting can say, look, inflation is lower
Speaker 5: than expected, and meanwhile GDP growth is above expectations, quite
Speaker 5: considerable growth coming out of the last quarter. And the
Speaker 5: job a situation, the job picture in January was really
Speaker 5: out of left field in terms of the jobs created.
Speaker 5: And so that's a great story any administration wants to have.
Speaker 5: Now it's not enough, i think for the midterms, because
Speaker 5: if you recall, the economy was going gangbusters in twenty
Speaker 5: eighteen as well, and in fact, at that time, the
Speaker 5: economy was President Trump's best issue. He had high ratings
Speaker 5: on the economy, which he does not enjoy today. But
Speaker 5: in twenty eighteen, you had a growing economy, you had
Speaker 5: Trump being rated very highly on the economy. The Democrats
Speaker 5: still won the House of Representatives, so that's where that
Speaker 5: second item in my list comes in a dramatic event.
Speaker 5: Something that puts the Democrats on their heels and allows
Speaker 5: Trump and the rep Republicans to display leadership and vision
Speaker 5: late in the election is critical, I think for Republican
Speaker 5: performance in the campaign.
Speaker 1: Matt Contney, this will carry over into the break, So
Speaker 1: I encourage everyone to go and listen to the Big
Speaker 1: Weekend pod as well to hear the second part of this,
Speaker 1: and then Matt will be buck on the other side.
Speaker 2: Would you think that either one.
Speaker 1: Or two retirements on the Supreme Court this June or
Speaker 1: early July would or even announced earlier, would set the
Speaker 1: Republicans up for an enthusiasm burst. You can't get a
Speaker 1: higher one hundred percent turnout and the Democrats are there.
Speaker 1: So what do you think a Supreme Court vacancy or
Speaker 1: two would do for the GOP?
Speaker 5: Well, I do think of vacancy and a fight over
Speaker 5: the Supreme Court would be something that could mobilize Republican
Speaker 5: voters in the fall and add to their enthusiasm. And
Speaker 5: we have historical president for this. Again, I'll go back
Speaker 5: to the twenty eighteen example, Hugh, the Kavanaugh hearings and
Speaker 5: the way in which now Justice Kavanaugh was treated by
Speaker 5: the mainstream media and buy the Democrats on the Senate
Speaker 5: Judiciary Committee infuriated Republicans and to I think, really defend
Speaker 5: Trump and go out and support Republican Senate candidates in
Speaker 5: twenty eighteen, I think the Kavanar hearings are a reason
Speaker 5: that Republicans held on to the Senate despite losing the
Speaker 5: House in twenty eighteen. And so fight over the Constitution,
Speaker 5: a fight over jurisprudence about what type of direction we
Speaker 5: want the country to go in, that is something that
Speaker 5: would galvanize Republican views. And it's a consideration I think politically, though,
Speaker 5: I think the Justices make their decisions on different considerations.
Speaker 1: Oh they do, and yeah, we don't know. And I'm
Speaker 1: not saying they should go. It's up to two justices
Speaker 1: and their spouses. But I'll be back with Matt Continentty
Speaker 1: to talk about some sacred saws that can be added
Speaker 1: to that during the burk. I'm back with Matt Continety
Speaker 1: in the bridge segment between our two over the year segments. Matt,
Speaker 1: I've been peddling the idea that if you really want
Speaker 1: to make Democrats stand up and go crazy, President Trump
Speaker 1: would nominate either for a retirement by Justice Thomas or
Speaker 1: win by Justice Alito.
Speaker 2: Eileen Cannon, the.
Speaker 1: Astute judge from South Florida who ruled correctly that Jack
Speaker 1: Smith had no constitutional warrant for the position he was in.
Speaker 1: How do you think Democrats would respond to Judge Cannon's nomination?
Speaker 5: Well, they go gaga. There's no question about that. I mean,
Speaker 5: let's not forget the Democrats will pose any Supreme Court
Speaker 5: nominee that President Trump throws up. And that's why people
Speaker 5: should be wondering about the prospect of potential retirement among
Speaker 5: a Republican appointed justice at the end of this term.
Speaker 5: Because say that the election does go overwhelmingly in the Democrats'
Speaker 5: direction and they win not just the House but also
Speaker 5: the Senate. I happen to think Democratic victory in the
Speaker 5: Senate is unlikely at the moment, but let's just say
Speaker 5: it happens. Well, that means that President Trump will get
Speaker 5: no Supreme Court appointments for the rest.
Speaker 2: No judicial appointments, Matt, I don't.
Speaker 5: Probably no cabinet appointments either, right right, it will stop.
Speaker 5: So so that's a you know, that's a consideration. And
Speaker 5: again I'm not sure that justice is thinking those terms,
Speaker 5: and so as a Canon nomination I think would galvanize Republicans,
Speaker 5: it would galvanize Democrats. Let's remember, you know, Judge Cannon
Speaker 5: was also I think involved in striking down the Biden
Speaker 5: vaccine mandate which was unconstitutional as well and the mask
Speaker 5: the mask mandate on planes. So she has I think
Speaker 5: of you, of freedom, individual liberty that many Conservatives would
Speaker 5: support if she were nominated to the High Court.
Speaker 1: And there are lots about Judge Strauss up there in
Speaker 1: minnesot Cold Land. There's Mulsa Bar in Kentucky. There's David Hoe,
Speaker 1: Judge Hoe down in Texas. There are a lot of
Speaker 1: great first term Trump judges who have added six years
Speaker 1: to their resumes on the Appeals Court bench. I'm just
Speaker 1: toying with the Eileen Cannon, but any of them would
Speaker 1: ignite the Republicans, I think because Democrats could I guess
Speaker 1: there's a question, and I don't want to give you
Speaker 1: an answer in the form of a question. Could the
Speaker 1: Democrats resist the bait Matt and not trash a nominee.
Speaker 5: No, no, you is the Democrats can't resist any bait
Speaker 5: right now. I mean, look at what they're shutting down
Speaker 5: the government again this weekend, even though ICE is already funded.
Speaker 5: So we're having a second government shutdown, partial affected the
Speaker 5: Department of Homeland Security, which just happens to include besides ICE, FEMA,
Speaker 5: the Coast Guard, and the TEMP Transportation Security Authority TSA.
Speaker 5: And the Democrats are doing it why because of their
Speaker 5: left wing base. It's demanding resistance to Trump at all costs,
Speaker 5: and that means taking grabbing any date that they see
Speaker 5: before it.
Speaker 1: We'd have code pink twenty four to seven throughout a
Speaker 1: nomination process. And that's a promise, not a prediction. I'll
Speaker 1: be right back when Matt Connetty stay tuned. Clargan back
Speaker 1: in America. I'm huit joined by Matt Connetti. He had
Speaker 1: AEI in the Wall Street Journal. Matt, time to turn
Speaker 1: to Iran. I was talking with Eli Lake before you
Speaker 1: joined us about how long the president has to settle debts,
Speaker 1: and I think he is indebted to the people of Iran.
Speaker 2: I think he made promises.
Speaker 1: The Crown Prince of Iran was on this program Monday
Speaker 1: and said President Trump promised help is on the way.
Speaker 1: So unless they capitulate like Kaddafi did in two thousand
Speaker 1: and three and four, and that would probably mean the
Speaker 1: general's removing Hamini and someone something like that, which I
Speaker 1: can't imagine. Trump has to hit them very, very hard,
Speaker 1: or it's a shadow over his entire presidency. Do you
Speaker 1: agree with that assessment?
Speaker 5: Well, I do agree that if Trump fails to enforce
Speaker 5: the red line that he drew, it will affect the
Speaker 5: rest of his presidency, not just in the way that
Speaker 5: we think about his presidential performance, but it will affect
Speaker 5: the way that America's adversaries see President Trump see our
Speaker 5: position in the world. You know, the deterrent is a
Speaker 5: capability plus the will to use it. And if President
Speaker 5: Trump ends up not having the will to use our
Speaker 5: capabilities to enforce the lines he drew, that is, don't
Speaker 5: kill your own people, stop enriching uranium, and limit your
Speaker 5: ballistic missiles, and no longer support these terrorist proxies, then
Speaker 5: it won't just be the Mullahs that take notice. It
Speaker 5: will also be Vladimir Putin. It will also be Shi
Speaker 5: Jimping in the People's Republic of China, Kim Jong Lunan
Speaker 5: in North Korea. They'll all see an opportunity and they'll
Speaker 5: begin to probe America's defenses. I think it's very important
Speaker 5: that President Trump enforced the Redline, and I think what
Speaker 5: we're seeing now, Hugh, is America moving our assets into position.
Speaker 5: Kind of Remember, it's capability plus will. So if the
Speaker 5: will is there, that means we have to have the capability,
Speaker 5: not just the capability to strike Iran, but also the
Speaker 5: capability to defend against a raring and retaliation. That takes time.
Speaker 5: And we were having the second aircraft carrier now moving
Speaker 5: to the Persian Gulf to the Arabian Sea. That will
Speaker 5: take time. And in the meantime, of course, we're replenishing
Speaker 5: our air defenses and putting other offensive platforms into the
Speaker 5: region as well. So I think this will play out
Speaker 5: over the coming weeks. President Trump this week said that,
Speaker 5: you know, a month or so, that probably just around
Speaker 5: the amount of time it takes for that second carrier,
Speaker 5: which I believe is the Ford Carrier Group, the largest
Speaker 5: carrier in the world, to get in place, and for
Speaker 5: everyone there on board and in the affiliate vessels to
Speaker 5: have operational readiness.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 1: Admiral Montgomery brought me up as a civilian this week.
Speaker 1: He said, takes the two weeks after a carrier arrives
Speaker 1: on station to get operationally ready to do what they
Speaker 1: really want to do if they can, if they have
Speaker 1: the time to take. They want to take the time
Speaker 1: to get ready.
Speaker 2: So he said a month or.
Speaker 1: So yesterday on Thursday, and I take that strategic confusion again.
Speaker 1: He said everything, but he's also last question on I run.
Speaker 1: I want to go to Japan and China. I think
Speaker 1: what he's created are the conditions for what Admiral Montgomery
Speaker 1: called strategic confusion, not ambiguity, but confusion. And we really
Speaker 1: can't we really can't judge what he's done here until
Speaker 1: it's over. And I'm going to stick to that point.
Speaker 1: We don't really know if he's erased the redline or not,
Speaker 1: or he's gone Obama or not until those ships are withdrawn.
Speaker 2: I agree.
Speaker 5: I agree that Trump always leaves his options open. Trump
Speaker 5: would prefer a deal. He's asking things that this Iranian government,
Speaker 5: this deacratic dictatorship that has waged war against the United
Speaker 5: States since it came to power in nineteen seventy nine,
Speaker 5: they're not going to agree to it. And so the
Speaker 5: moment of decision will come, but it might not come
Speaker 5: for a few more weeks.
Speaker 1: Did you play poker as a young man? Now, have
Speaker 1: you ever played jack? So open trips to win.
Speaker 5: I've played a few hands of poker, but I'm not
Speaker 5: going to Blackjack is more my game.
Speaker 2: Hugh, Well, Jackson opened, even though the odds.
Speaker 5: Are against him blackjack, blackjack, I still prefer it poker
Speaker 5: for whatever reason.
Speaker 1: Well so do I, and that's the only thing I
Speaker 1: know how to play, So that's why I prefer it.
Speaker 1: I'd lose at blackjack, but Jack's to open. The Iranians
Speaker 1: don't have jacks. They don't have anything they can give
Speaker 1: or their regime will collapse. And so either the generals,
Speaker 1: I think it's really the generals do it, or we
Speaker 1: do it now. Matt earlier today, John Ellis brought me
Speaker 1: up to be on this. Japan sees a Chinese fishing
Speaker 1: but within their exclusive economic zone. We do not have
Speaker 1: a carrier in the South China Sea. We do have
Speaker 1: a big deck. The Tripoli is there that George Washington
Speaker 1: is in Yokuska. They're homeport in Japan, but they're not
Speaker 1: patrolling right now. They were patrolling until December. Do you think,
Speaker 1: I mean, what do you think is the worst case
Speaker 1: scenario for China Japan right now.
Speaker 5: Well, the worst case is always a conflict between these
Speaker 5: two powers that would drag in the United States, obviously,
Speaker 5: because of our very important alliance with Japan. You know,
Speaker 5: the Chinese so called fishing fleets have been harassing our
Speaker 5: allies for over a decade. What's interesting here is, you know,
Speaker 5: the Japanese Prime Minister Hue Prime Minister Takeichi just had
Speaker 5: a tremendous victory in the Japanese Parliament and has done
Speaker 5: one of the largest majorities ever enjoyed by her party,
Speaker 5: the ld which has been the ruling party of Japan
Speaker 5: since the Second World War. And of course Takeichi is
Speaker 5: disliked intensely by Beijing because she is a Japanese nationalist,
Speaker 5: because she is a strong supporter of the Democratic governor
Speaker 5: government in Taiwan, and because she believes that Japan needs
Speaker 5: to re arm and expand its defenses. It already has defenses,
Speaker 5: and we help with them. And so I wonder whether
Speaker 5: this probing by the Chinese fishing vessel was a part
Speaker 5: of a test of Takeiichi to kind of remind her. Interesting,
Speaker 5: even though she has this tremendous political victory, that she
Speaker 5: still has to watch out for the CCP.
Speaker 1: I don't think she I think I'm not sure I
Speaker 1: can call her Asia's Thatcher yet. But she is a
Speaker 1: China Hawk, and I can't imagine that she's going to
Speaker 1: go wildly do you imagine? I just don't see it happening.
Speaker 5: No, she's not you know Thatcher as an Iron Lady.
Speaker 5: Takiichi is the Iron Maiden because she used to play
Speaker 5: drums in a metal band. Oh, she's a fascinating Yes,
Speaker 5: she's a fascinating figure. She spent time in the United States,
Speaker 5: and you know she was a protege of Shinzo Abbe,
Speaker 5: who is very much in Shinzo Abbe's mold, someone who
Speaker 5: believes in Japan's power, strength, wants to re energize the
Speaker 5: Japanese economy. And of course Abe had a tremendously important
Speaker 5: relationship with Trump, and I think Takeiichi and Trump are
Speaker 5: on the way to re establishing that type of personal
Speaker 5: friendship that strengthens the alliance.
Speaker 1: In the second watch that space. Wait the Iron Maiden
Speaker 1: would be terrific. Wait the Iron Lady and the Iron Maiden.
Speaker 1: That's a good one. Matt Conteney, thank you. As always
Speaker 1: follow Matt Tad continenty on Accent in the Wall Street
Speaker 1: Journal and over at AEI and come right back here on.
Speaker 2: The Huge Show. Hiight you, Hewett. You've heard me talk
Speaker 2: a lot.
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Speaker 5: Is you.
Speaker 2: Morning loraining engrace in America? I'm to hear it?
Speaker 1: Joined by Ben dominic Is, the host of the Big
Speaker 1: Ben Pod. And you ought to be listening to Big
Speaker 1: Ben Pod this week you would have heard is America?
Speaker 1: Is Trump Losing America? And a long conversation about a
Speaker 1: novel with a novelist, which I found very interesting, though
Speaker 1: I don't read novels very often. Ben Dominicic, welcome. I
Speaker 1: have a completely unexpected turn. Nobody expects the Spanish inquisition.
Speaker 1: But Ben, when you show up, nobody but I know
Speaker 1: that I can ask you about sports?
Speaker 2: Right? Are you an NBA fan?
Speaker 7: I am, but I paid more attention to basically once
Speaker 7: the playoffs start, especially at this particular moment. I mean,
Speaker 7: I'll wait for your question, but especially at this time
Speaker 7: of year when you see so many teams tanking well
Speaker 7: this time of.
Speaker 2: Year is also when you see teams going all in.
Speaker 1: And the Cavaliers, my club has been since they got
Speaker 1: started in the seventies, they've only won once twenty sixteen,
Speaker 1: been ten years, and they went all in, trading Darius
Speaker 1: Garland for the Beard James Harden, and Cleveland is on fire.
Speaker 2: Ben.
Speaker 1: He made his home debut against the Wizards, the hapless
Speaker 1: Wizards who are thanking, and he's lit up the first
Speaker 1: three games. And I just want to know what you
Speaker 1: think of the Beard because Cleveland and I am now
Speaker 1: in love with the guy and I've kind of all
Speaker 1: he's been a West guy mostly. He was with Philadelphia
Speaker 1: and Brooklyn for a while, but mostly it was thunder
Speaker 1: and rockets and stuff like that. Now the Clippers, what
Speaker 1: do you think of the Beard?
Speaker 7: Well, first of all, I have to say it's a
Speaker 7: bold statement to say Cleveland is on fire. I'm giving
Speaker 7: it some context. No, you went on fire. And the
Speaker 7: truth is I am actually a longtime fan of James Harden.
Speaker 7: Oh who is who I has gotten to see multiple times,
Speaker 7: you know, in person, and look, the truth is that
Speaker 7: his limitation has always been a physical one and not
Speaker 7: a mental one. He's a very smart player, and when
Speaker 7: he wants to get going, he can get going. And
Speaker 7: the real question is just whether you know he's able
Speaker 7: to hold up once you get to the playoffs, because
Speaker 7: I think that this is you know, look, this is
Speaker 7: a moment where there's a lot of action in the
Speaker 7: East and there's a lot of things that I think
Speaker 7: that the you know, people frankly are disappointed in how
Speaker 7: Orlando has turned out. They're disappointed, and you know a
Speaker 7: number of different clubs that they thought would be doing better.
Speaker 7: And I think that, you know, this could be a
Speaker 7: year where you have a team surprise and breakthrough. And
Speaker 7: as for the Wizards, yes, they are definitely tanking, though
Speaker 7: the Anthony Davis and Trey Young acquisitions are ones that
Speaker 7: make me hopeful if they are able to stay healthy,
Speaker 7: and that is an incredible heavy.
Speaker 1: If so that's when they when Darius Garland got traded,
Speaker 1: everyone was saying, oh lucky, he's ten years younger than
Speaker 1: hard and maybe the young man doesn't play, he's hurt
Speaker 1: all the time because he's small.
Speaker 7: You can't yeah, no, he's not. And you can't evaluate
Speaker 7: a player on hope. You know, I'm sure only had
Speaker 7: plenty of them come through in Washington who you evaluate
Speaker 7: that way, and you just have to at a certain
Speaker 7: point you have to say, are we serious about this
Speaker 7: or not? And so I like the hard and move
Speaker 7: and I think that there is an opportunity here, perhaps
Speaker 7: in the East to really, you know, make make some
Speaker 7: noise in the year when certain places have underperformed expectation.
Speaker 1: So let me that's my first step on the diving
Speaker 1: board is step number two about sports. Cleveland is very
Speaker 1: excited about this. The Guardians have got said, you know,
Speaker 1: we have the Browns, and the Browns are disaster, but
Speaker 1: they got a new coach. But they're very excited. And
Speaker 1: it brings me back to the Washington Post's decision to
Speaker 1: close their sports page. Now, if they really want to
Speaker 1: reinvigorate the paper, they have to reverse that decision, don't they.
Speaker 1: I mean, I pay to Cleveland dot Com a ridiculous
Speaker 1: am I remember about this for Fox News this week.
Speaker 2: I subscribe to them.
Speaker 1: I get their verticals on the calves of the Browns,
Speaker 1: Ohio State and the Guardians. The only way the Post
Speaker 1: can actually turn it around is to go heavy into
Speaker 1: Washington DC sports.
Speaker 2: There. They even have the University of Maryland in the
Speaker 2: Big Ten.
Speaker 1: Now they've got George, they got hoops, they got UVA
Speaker 1: planning for maybe getting in James Madison looks like it's interesting.
Speaker 1: What do you think then do they change their mind?
Speaker 7: I think that there's I think there are two things
Speaker 7: that have to happen. One is I actually think they
Speaker 7: need to expand you mentioned James Madison. The Washington Post
Speaker 7: is for years essentially treated anything that's outside of Northern
Speaker 7: Virginia as if it's a foreign country. You know, they
Speaker 7: didn't they didn't cover Virginia Tech as as much as
Speaker 7: they should have.
Speaker 5: They don't.
Speaker 7: They'll cover what goes on with you know, when UVA
Speaker 7: was something that was a little bit of an exception
Speaker 7: because it's a basketball tem But the truth is that,
Speaker 7: you know, when the jam you run was happening, they
Speaker 7: did almost nothing in terms of their coverage of it
Speaker 7: because they're more they were more addicted to these stories.
Speaker 7: And and Andrew Styles over at the Free Beacon did
Speaker 7: a fantastic roundup of like of like twelve of them
Speaker 7: that over the past couple of years that are just
Speaker 7: ridiculous injections of politics into sports. So I think you
Speaker 7: have to step one is you have to expand you
Speaker 7: have to cover these different teams that are outside of
Speaker 7: the of the Beltway area. But you also, I think,
Speaker 7: have to be serious about we are in the business
Speaker 7: of sporting news. We are talking about the games, we
Speaker 7: were talking about the trades, we were talking about what's
Speaker 7: going on. We are not using sports as a lens
Speaker 7: to look into the American psyche as it relates to
Speaker 7: gender and sex and raise.
Speaker 2: They're doing fan service. They need to do fan service.
Speaker 7: That's and not the kind of fans who don't care
Speaker 7: about sports, but they've basically been catering to for the
Speaker 7: last several years. And it's why this decision was easy,
Speaker 7: because essentially you're killing in an opinion section which is
Speaker 7: expensive to run, and that's something that I think that
Speaker 7: they need to understand in order to move forward and look,
Speaker 7: I think that that would be an enormous benefit to
Speaker 7: the Posts and to having the paper set on a
Speaker 7: good role going forward. They need to appreciate how important
Speaker 7: this is. And I will say one more thing, and
Speaker 7: I say this with all due respect our British friends,
Speaker 7: there's been you know, a real importation from the UK,
Speaker 7: including in the in the Post, you know, in terms
Speaker 7: of their in terms of their leading folks and across
Speaker 7: media generally, a lot of folks have come over in
Speaker 7: the last couple of years. One thing that they don't
Speaker 7: get American sports. And that's something that I think that
Speaker 7: they don't quite rock as much as they ought to
Speaker 7: as something that was a centerpiece of American discourse. But
Speaker 7: they have to change the approach that has been used
Speaker 7: by these lefties who just wanted to I mean, I
Speaker 7: don't know if you've seen this today, even Sarah Spain,
Speaker 7: you know, going after jd Vance for you know, seeing him,
Speaker 7: just seeing him carrying his kid at the Olympics, and she's, oh, no,
Speaker 7: I didn't.
Speaker 2: I'm not reading the paper. I don't I don't subscribe
Speaker 2: to that.
Speaker 7: Well that's that's she's doing it on X. But the
Speaker 7: but the point is just that like those are the
Speaker 7: kind of people you've had covering sports. That doesn't make
Speaker 7: sense anymore. You can't get away with that anymore. We're
Speaker 7: not interested in it. The market has spoken, and you can't,
Speaker 7: you know, let them write a notpbed occasionally in the
Speaker 7: New York Times, which also is a lot of people
Speaker 7: who don't really care about sports reading it and and
Speaker 7: leave that leave the sports sections alone. When it comes
Speaker 7: to Indian injecting this type of politics into literally every
Speaker 7: story you can.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't want them to go hire David Campbell,
Speaker 1: who's the Cleveland dot com sports editor and the genius.
Speaker 1: But there are there got to be people around who
Speaker 1: know how to do sports journalism and do it well,
Speaker 1: because everybody I know in my world love sports, even
Speaker 1: if they're left.
Speaker 7: You Lucas Tomlinson and my colleague and I text about
Speaker 7: sports on a daily basis, and when it comes to
Speaker 7: the Washington decisions and everything related all to the leagues,
Speaker 7: and you know, he's absolutely as die hard into this
Speaker 7: as I am. And I'm sure that we would love
Speaker 7: to have an actual local section that was paying attention
Speaker 7: to things that mattered in terms of the franchisees as
Speaker 7: opposed to, you know, again, injecting politics into every piece
Speaker 7: of coverage that you possibly can. Leave them leave that
Speaker 7: worldwide leader.
Speaker 2: By the way, my triple.
Speaker 1: Jump off of the board now is to the Olympics
Speaker 1: and it will take us into the break and we'll.
Speaker 2: Talk about Iran afterwards. I have watched very.
Speaker 1: Little Olympics because of one reason. There's too much Olympics
Speaker 1: I mean, they're everywhere broken into eight minute segments, and
Speaker 1: there's not NBC News primetime at seven pm you can
Speaker 1: catch the most important events with.
Speaker 2: All the glitz. Do you think they killed the Olympics.
Speaker 1: I don't know what their viewership is like, but it's
Speaker 1: it's like a buffet course that is never ending.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I think that there's there's a bit. It's just
Speaker 7: oversaturation and it's hard to cover all this, you know,
Speaker 7: to pay attention to all the storyline. I'll confess that
Speaker 7: because of the kid, the love of the little now
Speaker 7: almost six week old, you know, I've paid less attention
Speaker 7: to this Olympics than I normally do. Because I like
Speaker 7: the Olympics. I think it's great to see America go
Speaker 7: up into the Olympics and kick ass. But the thing
Speaker 7: that is the thing that I think is really you know, difficult,
Speaker 7: is you never really know what you're watching. It bounces
Speaker 7: around quite a lot, and I really wish that they
Speaker 7: would give it to us in a bit more of
Speaker 7: a package where we would have, you know, something more
Speaker 7: that we can that we can see and follow. I
Speaker 7: will say though, that the primary complaint against the Olympics
Speaker 7: was lodged by the five year old in the house
Speaker 7: who wanted to watch a movie or something, and my
Speaker 7: wife informed her that, know, in this house, we root
Speaker 7: for the United States of America. And so that's what
Speaker 7: happened for Mecca.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a shared experience.
Speaker 1: It's a shared experience that most Americans like, but it's
Speaker 1: not a shared experience anymore when it's fragmented. So the
Speaker 1: shared experience of watching an ice skater fall or America
Speaker 1: win beat the Russians in nineteen eighty, that's not there.
Speaker 7: So I think just they made a huge program and
Speaker 7: if you have not seen it, you should watch this
Speaker 7: Netflix documentary on the on the nineteen eighty USA team
Speaker 7: because and this I think that they did a poor
Speaker 7: job of advertising it, because it has a ton of
Speaker 7: new footage, of footage that has never been seen before
Speaker 7: of the game. And it's really just something that I
Speaker 7: think is is, you know, I recommend to everybody that
Speaker 7: I know to watch, even even just as a historical
Speaker 7: document and you know, you get different shots of Herb Brooks,
Speaker 7: you get different shots of you know, key plays that
Speaker 7: we're in it, and you look at that was obviously
Speaker 7: an incredibly shared experience in America, as you as you had,
Speaker 7: you know, people able you know who did not know
Speaker 7: that it had happened learning about it, and so I
Speaker 7: think this is also just one of these uh, this
Speaker 7: is one of these eras where we have such an
Speaker 7: oversaturation of some of these things, often motivated by just
Speaker 7: being able to do ad sales during them, as NBC
Speaker 7: has done quite successfully, and and that I think leads
Speaker 7: to some of that fragmentation that you're talking about.
Speaker 1: I'll be right back during the break with Ben Dominics.
Speaker 1: We're going to talk about the Big Ben podcast. The
Speaker 1: lead story, has Trump lost in America? I don't think
Speaker 1: some that will have been talked about that. We'll be
Speaker 1: back on the other side and talk Aaron, So don't
Speaker 1: go anywhere they tuned to.
Speaker 2: The k Huge Shots. I'm back with Ben Dominic s.
Speaker 1: Ben, I thought you were opening at the Big Ben podcast,
Speaker 1: which was very provocative this week, where you asked as
Speaker 1: president and Trump lost the country and then I watched
Speaker 1: him go down to Fort Bragg and get the enormous
Speaker 1: reception that the commanders in chief got. I think he's
Speaker 1: lost belue America, but I don't think he's lost right.
Speaker 1: America is just a question he turns up in November.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 7: I think that the big question though Hugh is whether
Speaker 7: he is losing, and this is something where he got
Speaker 7: in good news today obviously on the inflation figures, whether
Speaker 7: he has lost the key portion of his coalition, which,
Speaker 7: as you know, is difficult to get to the polls
Speaker 7: when it comes to mid terms of working class Americans.
Speaker 7: I know that you probably saw if you have, If
Speaker 7: you haven't, who you will the AOC clip from Munich
Speaker 7: where she's talking about so today, you know, she went
Speaker 7: to Munich, which is interesting.
Speaker 2: So she's running for president. She's running.
Speaker 7: It's another sign as I think she's running for president.
Speaker 7: She's not running for Senate. She's running for president, and
Speaker 7: that I think is But one of the things that
Speaker 7: she started leading with was about having a coalition that
Speaker 7: they basically it sounds like half Hillary Clinton on one
Speaker 7: hand when it comes to the Globe and then half
Speaker 7: at home mom Donnie and basically you know, affordability. We
Speaker 7: need to be this working class coalition, warrying warrying about
Speaker 7: oligarchs by the way to Munich, which is pretty funny,
Speaker 7: and and then and saying that we needed She was
Speaker 7: asked by one of the people there about whether we
Speaker 7: ought to have a wealth tax, and she said that
Speaker 7: needs to be a priority. That kind of language is
Speaker 7: actually what upper crust sort of lefties think is an
Speaker 7: affordability message. It's not an actual affordability message. And if
Speaker 7: you look consistently the kind of reports that were coming
Speaker 7: out after November of last year from from the you know,
Speaker 7: the different Democrat super packs, they all indicated that basically,
Speaker 7: what people want to hear within that demo, which again
Speaker 7: went for Donald Trump and went in mass and delivered
Speaker 7: a big victory for him, what they want to hear
Speaker 7: about is affordability. They feel like things should have gotten
Speaker 7: cheaper since he got back into office, and they and
Speaker 7: they care about those things as a priority. They don't
Speaker 7: really care about hearing about the you know how insulting
Speaker 7: it is. She she went after the Trump administration, for instance,
Speaker 7: for forgetting Maduro, describing it as kidnapping a head of state,
Speaker 7: which I mean, actually quite the stretch. But I think
Speaker 7: that this is the situation where again she's running for president.
Speaker 7: Put that in your calci bet now.
Speaker 1: But I think let me ask you that have you
Speaker 1: ever heard her give a serious interview on national security?
Speaker 7: I have never heard once, of course not and and
Speaker 7: she's treated by kid gloves, you know, she in terms
Speaker 7: of the way that the media acts towards her, and
Speaker 7: I think we have to expect that that will continue.
Speaker 7: And so look, you are going to end up with
Speaker 7: the situation here where the President could lose a significant
Speaker 7: portion of his coalition that the Republican Party needs to
Speaker 7: show up in order to have a competitive November. Otherwise
Speaker 7: they get swamped. The Democrats take at least the House
Speaker 7: and they just turn the next two years into a
Speaker 7: complete craft show of investigations and impeachments.
Speaker 1: Well, that's going to happen. I think we're gonna lose
Speaker 1: the House. But I'll come back on the other side
Speaker 1: with Ben, and we're going to talk about how did
Speaker 1: the Republicans chiefs turn out?
Speaker 2: Standby Welcome Back in America.
Speaker 1: I'm Hugh Hewitt, and I'm temporarily stunned because during the break,
Speaker 1: Ben Dominic's told me that AOC went to the Munich
Speaker 1: Security Conference, which is with the Reagan Defense Conference and
Speaker 1: the Halifax Conference, the big three national security conferences around
Speaker 1: the country. The Nixon Foundation does one as well in DC,
Speaker 1: but the one up in Halifax out west in Munich.
Speaker 1: They're the Big three and I can't imagine AOC at
Speaker 1: a security conference. Ben just explain to our Steelers fans
Speaker 1: what that means, because I agree.
Speaker 3: With you what it means.
Speaker 7: What it means is that AOC wants the attention of
Speaker 7: the world. And the way that she framed herself by
Speaker 7: the way to this global audience was essentially as someone
Speaker 7: not who didn't want to tear down the system, but
Speaker 7: kind of restore an older system of of you know,
Speaker 7: using using all the normal catchphrases of global order and
Speaker 7: the like. She basically depicted the Trump administration as agents
Speaker 7: of chaos when it came to the global affairs, particularly
Speaker 7: in our own hemisphere, you know, citing the Greenland example,
Speaker 7: citing the Venezuela example, you know, citing you know, some
Speaker 7: of this other you know, saber rattling and the like.
Speaker 7: What what she really means, of course, when she says
Speaker 7: something like that is she wants to China run global
Speaker 7: order in my opinion, but that's just my opinion. The
Speaker 7: thing is, I think that when she goes on to
Speaker 7: a stage like that, she knows she's going to be
Speaker 7: treated with kids loves, by the by the international folks,
Speaker 7: they're not going to be judging her right off the bat,
Speaker 7: and she can basically give this message as one where
Speaker 7: you know, again she is depending on which polling numbers
Speaker 7: you look at, she's third currently in terms of the
Speaker 7: ranking of the Democratic potential presidential candidate. You can debate
Speaker 7: about where she is, but she's definitely third, with Newsom
Speaker 7: and of course Kamala Harris hanging around as one and two,
Speaker 7: depending on the ployee that you're looking at. I think
Speaker 7: she is fully intend to run for president.
Speaker 5: I think she wants to.
Speaker 7: Depict herself as being this future is female candidate, but
Speaker 7: from a younger generation. And I think that she wants
Speaker 7: to basically become someone who could go up against the vance.
Speaker 7: I mean Rubio was there as well this year, of course,
Speaker 7: go up against you know, potentially a Rubo and depict
Speaker 7: them as being chaotic figures, where she's a return to
Speaker 7: normalcy on the international level. And that's a savvy political move.
Speaker 7: I think it's the kind of.
Speaker 1: There's no downside to her running for president, there's none.
Speaker 1: She doesn't she didn't get stuck in the Senate where
Speaker 1: she's one hundred out of one hundred. She gets either
Speaker 1: she gets it the brass ring, or she makes a
Speaker 1: gazillion dollars and she becomes her own thing. So there's
Speaker 1: no downside to it. It's almost inevitable that she runs.
Speaker 1: And I think she's going to win because she got
Speaker 1: chops on stage and the President has said to me
Speaker 1: on the show, Oh, she's got a lot of sparkle.
Speaker 1: But we'll have to see how she does in an interview.
Speaker 1: She does not do interviews, Ben, and I don't know
Speaker 1: whether or not she can do the comments.
Speaker 7: I don't think require her to do it. I think
Speaker 7: she's going to skate. And this is the thing that's
Speaker 7: you know, happens so frequently with her. Again, she represents
Speaker 7: herself as being this candidate who appeals to the working class,
Speaker 7: and you can't think of a less working class friendly
Speaker 7: policy than something like the Green New Deal. I mean,
Speaker 7: that's just it's a complete opposite. And yet she never
Speaker 7: gets asked about that. The idea that she is going
Speaker 7: is going to skate into this role is something that
Speaker 7: I certainly believe, and I would be scared if I
Speaker 7: was Gavin Newsome that she could have the kind of
Speaker 7: of inspiring appeal that he is, This kind of slick California,
Speaker 7: you know, Silicon Valley back, you know Reid Hoffman backed
Speaker 7: candidate or something like that. You know, is going to
Speaker 7: seem like She's going to make him seem like the corporatist,
Speaker 7: you know, billionaire friend much older, Yeah, much older. And
Speaker 7: I think that that's something that has real resonance in
Speaker 7: in America, where you know, no offense view that the
Speaker 7: millennials are in charge right now, you know we are.
Speaker 1: You know, we're going to skip right past these Actually
Speaker 1: you cannot offend me because I'm seventy. I know what happens,
Speaker 1: and I'm looking at Gavin, and Gavin's on my side
Speaker 1: of the divide.
Speaker 2: He's not on your side of the divide.
Speaker 7: Well, but again, I maintain the most gen x thing
Speaker 7: that ever happened is to not have a president like
Speaker 7: we looked around and we decided, nah, I will not
Speaker 7: do that. So it's the thing that I think is
Speaker 7: going to be very interesting going forward. Look at the
Speaker 7: way that she is covered versus the way that JD
Speaker 7: dances covered, because they are essentially I think that they
Speaker 7: are headed on a collision course.
Speaker 1: And I think, now I've been talking about I got
Speaker 1: to get this in because I've been talking about Iran
Speaker 1: with Matt Contenenny and Eli Lake.
Speaker 2: I don't have to cover it with you, but I
Speaker 2: do want to cover with you.
Speaker 1: Takaichi the new prime minister who just went overwhelmingly a
Speaker 1: week ago huge majority in the DAT in Japan, and
Speaker 1: today her security forces went out and nabbed the Chinese
Speaker 1: fishing vessel inside their exclusive economic zone. It's a Conney
Speaker 1: says we should call her the Iron Maiden. I said,
Speaker 1: maybe she'll be Asia's Asia's Thatcher, and Kantene said, no,
Speaker 1: she's the Iron Maiden, not the Iron Lady, because I
Speaker 1: didn't know she was in a heavy metal band. What
Speaker 1: do you think of her and what do you think
Speaker 1: of this this crisis in the South China Sea.
Speaker 7: I think that this is going to be a real
Speaker 7: test for us in terms of the alliances that we
Speaker 7: have in the region, and it could be something that
Speaker 7: could spawn I mean, it's very rare that something like
Speaker 7: this happens without after action, after effect Domino's falling. I'll
Speaker 7: be curious to see how she handles it. I do
Speaker 7: think that you know, she's someone to watch, but you know,
Speaker 7: in an era when we have seen so much praise
Speaker 7: directed at UH directed at North Korea of all places,
Speaker 7: for having a female air name. That was a big
Speaker 7: trend among a lefty twitter. Why can't we have a
Speaker 7: female air named You know, here in the United States,
Speaker 7: don't people look to you know, women politicians who are
Speaker 7: actually good at what they're doing. You know, why don't
Speaker 7: Why don't she serious?
Speaker 1: And we just talked about AOC not doing any national
Speaker 1: security interviews. Ever, she that's what she made her bones on.
Speaker 1: She's a China Hawk.
Speaker 7: Yes, yeah, And I think that this is I mean,
Speaker 7: this is obviously a test case. But the truth is
Speaker 7: that we we should be applauding this in the West
Speaker 7: in terms of having someone in that job who understands
Speaker 7: the real threat that China represents and is not too
Speaker 7: scared to confront it. But look, you know, these these
Speaker 7: are the kind of questions I would like to see
Speaker 7: AOC asking, as opposed to should we have a wealth tax?
Speaker 1: You know, we asked AOC if we asked her what
Speaker 1: the Hunan Island incident was, would she have a clue?
Speaker 2: Do you think she'd have a clue?
Speaker 7: You know, I don't. I'm not a big fan of,
Speaker 7: like of basic tests in order to run for office
Speaker 7: or to get that job. But I kind of wish
Speaker 7: that we made all of the all of the you know,
Speaker 7: folks who did this do some form of political jeopardy
Speaker 7: just for the sake of just, oh, you know, where
Speaker 7: do you you know? What part of the world do
Speaker 7: you think? You know? Afghanistan is in? How about that?
Speaker 7: To start with?
Speaker 1: I don't I don't believe in gotcha's, but I do
Speaker 1: believe that before you become president. And you know, famously,
Speaker 1: Donald Trump told me he know more about terrorists on
Speaker 1: day one when he became president, and I didn't. Sure enough,
Speaker 1: he took it out more. He's taken out more terrorists
Speaker 1: than any other president on one on one basis.
Speaker 2: He doesn't.
Speaker 1: But I I just wonder if she doesn't really have
Speaker 1: any kind of evidence, any kind of grasp of the
Speaker 1: complexity of what she aspires to speak on it.
Speaker 2: You know, there's some humility in its a real problem.
Speaker 7: I think it's a real problem. But I think that
Speaker 7: the other problem that we need to understand is she
Speaker 7: has a political career that is built on vibes and
Speaker 7: social media that works in this era. It's going to
Speaker 7: raise a ton of money for She's going to have
Speaker 7: a ton of energy, and I think that Republicans should
Speaker 7: not underestimate her. And that's you know, something that we've
Speaker 7: seen happened four where they thought that certain people could
Speaker 7: come up. I mean, I remember the talk about Barack Obama.
Speaker 7: How are they gonna k oh, yeah.
Speaker 2: I'm guilty, guilty, guilty, guilty, and well well but.
Speaker 7: See, I think at the time you can defend yourself
Speaker 7: because that seemed like a very unlikely scenario. But sometimes
Speaker 7: the nation is a couple of rungs ahead I guess,
Speaker 7: or a couple of months behind where you think they are,
Speaker 7: and they are very vulnerable in an era like think
Speaker 7: about it this way, in an era in which education
Speaker 7: scores have plummeted. Not everybody's Mississippi, Hugh, And I say,
Speaker 7: that's a proud a child with Mississippi.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I agree.
Speaker 1: I was in the Qweight Center when Obama gave his
Speaker 1: speech in two thousand and four, and I was impressed,
Speaker 1: but I wasn't thinking he could be president. So that
Speaker 1: just tells you what four years can do. But he
Speaker 1: also is a Harvard log guy, and she has not
Speaker 1: well Ben dominant. She's given us a lot to think about.
Speaker 1: Follow Ben a be dominant on X Listen to the
Speaker 1: Big Ben podcast you hear most Fridays when we are lucky.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Ben,