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. Welcome Back America. Hugh hewittt in the
Speaker 1: Relief Factors studio Beltwigh, joined by an lsc Rothman, you
Speaker 1: can follow on Exit nosc Rothman, senior writer for a
Speaker 1: National Review, participant often in the Editors podcast. No. I
Speaker 1: asked you to stick around extra today because I listened
Speaker 1: to the editors this week and I love Rich, Love Michael,
Speaker 1: Brendan Doherty, love Charles C. W. Cook. They've all been
Speaker 1: guessing here frequently. But I don't think they I don't
Speaker 1: think they dealt fairly with you and the last editors.
Speaker 1: Did you get enough time to stake the case in
Speaker 1: your opinion?
Speaker 2: Well, I think I got plenty of time.
Speaker 3: My colleagues are more skeptical of the campaign than I am,
Speaker 3: and for reasons that are perfectly well reasoned and legitimate
Speaker 3: and prudent. I wouldn't question any of their motives. I
Speaker 3: think they're sound and the.
Speaker 2: Sacticism is justified.
Speaker 1: Question they're wrong.
Speaker 2: I argue that as well.
Speaker 4: I want to give you a lot.
Speaker 1: Of run Unspy. How you see the war.
Speaker 3: Well, listen, and as I said on the show, if
Speaker 3: you were to gauge it, I gauge it in two
Speaker 3: different ways, tactically and strategically. Tactically, this is one of
Speaker 3: the most impressive military campaigns in the history of the
Speaker 3: human race. Which is not an exaggeration the degree to
Speaker 3: which we're taking out a top twenty military power on
Speaker 3: the planet Earth. This is state interstate conflict. This is
Speaker 3: not the sort of war that we're used to in
Speaker 3: the post nine to eleven world. We're fighting as state power,
Speaker 3: and we are doing so with incredible success. Everything is
Speaker 3: relative and in relative terms. We've been gaming out this
Speaker 3: war with a Ran for twenty five years longer, and
Speaker 3: those wargames produced catastrophic results in the world. Before October seventh,
Speaker 3: twenty twenty three, Iran was capable of shutting down the
Speaker 3: Straight within the first week and shutting down the Straight
Speaker 3: to its own traffic as well mining the Straight, as
Speaker 3: it did in the nineteen eighties, threatening shipping with really
Speaker 3: scary anti ship missiles, drones, ballistic missiles, etc. The prospects
Speaker 3: were for a major campaign, a ground war with up
Speaker 3: to a million troops men at arms occupying the entire country,
Speaker 3: Iranian cities, leveled, huge refugee crisis across the region, instability
Speaker 3: throughout the region, up to a million dead on both
Speaker 3: sides of the conflict. You can go check this out.
Speaker 3: To say nothing of oil prices which were expected to
Speaker 3: skyrocket two hundred three hundred dollars a barrow within the
Speaker 3: first week. As recently as twenty nineteen, everything changed after
Speaker 3: October seventh. Has Reel spent the last three years methodically
Speaker 3: dismantling Iran's proxy terrorist network, which were to pose a
Speaker 3: real threat in an existential war. We were expecting that
Speaker 3: Iranian terrorist cells active and passive, would be activated in
Speaker 3: North America, in Latin America, in Europe and would target
Speaker 3: soft targets, and that threat has not entirely abated to
Speaker 3: my knowledge. I wouldn't say that the threat is completely gone,
Speaker 3: but it was much more grave a menace to Israel,
Speaker 3: to American troops in the regions and Syria and Iraq, etc.
Speaker 2: And what we're experiencing instead is total.
Speaker 3: Air superiority, verging on air supremacy, the destruction of the
Speaker 3: Iranian navy, the entire navy, the elimination almost of Iran's
Speaker 3: capacity to fire long range ballistic missiles, short range ballistic missiles.
Speaker 2: We're attenuating its drone capacity.
Speaker 3: We're striking really hard now at these depots and factories
Speaker 3: that allow Iran to manufacture the munitions that would have
Speaker 3: shielded its nuclear program and possibly denied US area access
Speaker 3: to the entire Middle East in the event of if
Speaker 3: we didn't act.
Speaker 2: And we have experienced.
Speaker 3: Three US soldiers killed by enemy fire, six rather just
Speaker 3: killed by enemy fire, each of which is a tragedy,
Speaker 3: each of which is an atrocity. You could argue, I
Speaker 3: would argue, and definitely something to warn. But again, if
Speaker 3: we are going to look at this campaign and say
Speaker 3: we've sustained three fatalities due to enemy fire and that's unacceptable,
Speaker 3: I just don't understand where you're coming from. What metrics
Speaker 3: are you using to evaluate that, What historical benchmarks are
Speaker 3: you grading this against. I just feel like it's an
Speaker 3: impossible standard to hold the United States too, that the
Speaker 3: enemy can't be allowed to fire a successful shot. That's
Speaker 3: just an unrealistic standard to hold any country engaged in
Speaker 3: a real war, and this is a real war.
Speaker 1: Some numbers. Ten Israelis have been killed, thirteen American serviceman
Speaker 1: sixtion combat seven is a result of an air catastrophe
Speaker 1: that was not caused by the enemy or by friendly fire.
Speaker 1: We've lost a couple of jets to friendly fire in Kuwait.
Speaker 1: A number of our United Arab Emirates in Qatari and
Speaker 1: Saudi Arabian facilities have been hit today. A reported just
Speaker 1: minutes ago. The state of Gutter expresses its strong and
Speaker 1: unequivocal condemnation of the brutal Iranian attack on the industrial
Speaker 1: city of ross Laffen, which caused fire sufficient damage significant
Speaker 1: damage to the facility. Gutter views this attack as a
Speaker 1: dangerous escalation, the blatant violation of its sovereignty, as well
Speaker 1: as a direct threat to its national security and the
Speaker 1: stability of the region. Meanwhile, Israel in the United States
Speaker 1: took out the largest facility seaborne facility for the production
Speaker 1: of domestic use natural gas in Iran. So the war
Speaker 1: is widening to the Iranian infrastructure and overnight Israel took
Speaker 1: out like number three and number five on the list
Speaker 1: of the top ten people in Iran. Every morning I
Speaker 1: opened up the Times of Israel, Noah, and they've gotten
Speaker 1: two or three more of the batties. I don't know
Speaker 1: anyone could describe this as other than an overwhelming success
Speaker 1: with the tragic costs of life. That's how it is
Speaker 1: to be described. I haven't.
Speaker 3: When I say this stuff like I'm accused of being
Speaker 3: pollyannish about this campaign, because there are downsides and I
Speaker 3: don't want to minimize those. But again, the Iranian campaign
Speaker 3: to extend the pain of this war to Gulf states
Speaker 3: is part of the playbook, and the playbook suggested that
Speaker 3: Iran would execute something like the twenty nineteen a Ramco attack.
Speaker 3: Remember that the attack on the Saudi petroleum processing facility,
Speaker 3: the largest on the planet Earth.
Speaker 2: That was a strategic assault.
Speaker 3: It was involved multiple drones hitting very specific targets designed
Speaker 3: to affect international oil prices. We're not seeing anything nearly
Speaker 3: that coordinated. And the reason we're not seeing anything nearly
Speaker 3: that coordinated is because our technological and intelligence capacities shared
Speaker 3: with Israel have evolved to the point where strikes on
Speaker 3: leadership targets, pinpoint strikes on individuals, the sort of thing
Speaker 3: that we could only fantasize about in two thousand and
Speaker 3: three when we attempted to open that war with a
Speaker 3: decapitation strike and failed.
Speaker 2: That's usually what happens. Very hard to forget that instead.
Speaker 1: Quit early one thousand and three because we thought we
Speaker 1: knew where Sudam was and we didn't get Sadamn for months.
Speaker 1: For months he hit out, and of course the dec
Speaker 1: of cards, we never fully decapitated the regime. There's a
Speaker 1: different kind of war, but.
Speaker 3: No I will one contrast, we've eliminated forty nine of
Speaker 3: Kamane's top associates, including the head of his intelligence services,
Speaker 3: his security chiefs, the.
Speaker 2: Guy who was running the war.
Speaker 3: And we're pealing back the layers of this regime, which
Speaker 3: is contributing a to instability in the regime. The command
Speaker 3: and control structure is gone. We're seeing people individual IRGC
Speaker 3: commanders act autonomously, which minimizes the amount of damage they
Speaker 3: can do. And second you peel back these layers, you
Speaker 3: finally you get to people who are maybe less loyal
Speaker 3: to the regime, who maybe prioritize their own survival and
Speaker 3: their family survival, who maybe want to talk to us.
Speaker 2: These are all stratiefic objectives.
Speaker 1: Have you seen the reports of members of the besiege
Speaker 1: and a few IRGC refusing to report for work or deserting.
Speaker 3: I have not, but Hugh and I said this on
Speaker 3: the commentary podcast today. It was really curious to me
Speaker 3: to hear Benjamin Nya who say, yesterday, Iranian people go
Speaker 3: out and celebrate in the rules. Yep, we got your back.
Speaker 3: We're in the sky, we're watching you. Go celebrate, enjoy
Speaker 3: your lives. I didn't expect that to happen for.
Speaker 2: A couple of weeks.
Speaker 3: He's not said go engage in insert violence, but he
Speaker 3: is saying go outside.
Speaker 1: He is, and I was taken him back by that
Speaker 1: as well. We may play that for you don't go
Speaker 1: anywhere America because Noah Rothman is probably occasionally I like
Speaker 1: to talk to pundons who agree with me. Noah and
Speaker 1: I might be the most Impacotico views of the war.
Speaker 1: I think the world is so much better off. We
Speaker 1: got to talk about the strategicy involved as well. China
Speaker 1: cannot be liking any of this, and we got to
Speaker 1: talk about American public opinion. Don't go anywhere. I'm you
Speaker 1: you itt no A. Rothman will be right back. Welcome
Speaker 1: back in America. I'm Hugh Hewittt with Noah C. Rothman,
Speaker 1: senior writer for a National Review. Noah, I have described
Speaker 1: this as a battle within Cold War two. Cold War
Speaker 1: two of course with the United States and China, but
Speaker 1: the battle here has three parts Venezuela, Cuba, and of
Speaker 1: course Iran. If you're China, how do you view the
Speaker 1: developments of the last fifteen months of Donald Trump's presidency.
Speaker 3: Well, it haven't been great if you've predicated your geopolitical
Speaker 3: strategy on developing and leaning on as many of the
Speaker 3: anti American powers as you could. And again, as of
Speaker 3: January I'm sorry October sixth, twenty twenty three, they consisted
Speaker 3: roughly of Russia, China and North Korea, Iran, Cuba, Venezuela
Speaker 3: and you could say Nicaragua perhaps, but on the edges
Speaker 3: of that.
Speaker 2: Sort of thing.
Speaker 3: And we've seen a significant attenuation of the anti American
Speaker 3: access over the course of I would say that the
Speaker 3: end of Joe Biden's presidency all the know thanks to him,
Speaker 3: in part because Israel took its destiny into its own hands,
Speaker 3: but the Trump administration has pretty much taken Venezuela off
Speaker 3: the board for now. I don't love that the regime
Speaker 3: is still in place, and it still has the very
Speaker 3: same character of the regime that Hugo chav has established
Speaker 3: in nineteen ninety nine. But they're playing ball, and the
Speaker 3: oil exports that were gifted to Cuba have been cut off.
Speaker 3: China can no longer rely on them either. That's strategically valuable,
Speaker 3: and Irana is China's gas pump. China's insulated itself from
Speaker 3: fuel shocks.
Speaker 2: To my understanding, They've.
Speaker 3: Electrified a lot of their civilian automotive fleet, and they
Speaker 3: have significant stockpiles in anticipation.
Speaker 2: Of this very scenario.
Speaker 3: But it's going to hurt, and they're going to rely
Speaker 3: ever more on Russia now strategically. The thinking, as I
Speaker 3: understand it, among those who do this kind of thinking,
Speaker 3: is that it is in our interests to do something
Speaker 3: like the opposite of the Sino Soviets split, like a
Speaker 3: reverse Kissingerian approach to the dynamics between China and Russia.
Speaker 3: Rather than split them, we want to bind them together.
Speaker 3: We want their fates intertwined, because Russia is a declining power.
Speaker 3: It is a power embroiled in a war it cannot win.
Speaker 3: It is a gas station that has a nuclear weapons
Speaker 3: facility attached to it, as I believe Lindsay Graham used
Speaker 3: to say, and China is a rising power, but it's
Speaker 3: got plenty of internal problems on its own, and it
Speaker 3: is confronting now something that it hasn't seen in a
Speaker 3: long time, which is a demonstration of American state power.
Speaker 3: We're seeing a lot of commentary about how exquisite ordinance
Speaker 3: is being depleted, and that's a problem because we can't
Speaker 3: replace it as fast as we're using it, specifically missile interceptors,
Speaker 3: but also a variety of other high end missiles, you know,
Speaker 3: long range weapons, standoff munitions. But that's got to be
Speaker 3: mitigated by the fact that we have demonstrated the will
Speaker 3: to use them in a sustained way, in a strategic way,
Speaker 3: and in a very impressive way. That's the sort of
Speaker 3: thing that puts the fear of God into you. There's
Speaker 3: something that people who observe foreign policy just kind of dismiss,
Speaker 3: and that is elementary human psychology, Like I don't begrudge
Speaker 3: this is something.
Speaker 2: This is where we're going to disagree with you.
Speaker 3: I don't begrudge European powers that have been treated like
Speaker 3: garbage by this administration for months and saying well, now
Speaker 3: you need us, and look where it's going to get you.
Speaker 3: That's elementary human psychology. So too is the human psychology
Speaker 3: of seeing the United States decimate a rogue but not
Speaker 3: in substantial military power in Iran with the quickness, with
Speaker 3: relative ease, and demonstrate the will to continue that fight,
Speaker 3: to fruition to an endgame that is shaping the thinking
Speaker 3: in Beijing. That is changing their considerations. It may not
Speaker 3: change the considerations for the better by the way they
Speaker 3: may proceed in the windows we do disagree, that's closing fasts.
Speaker 1: I expect European leaders to act in their national interest.
Speaker 1: Palmerston said that we have no permanent friends or enemy to,
Speaker 1: only permanent interests. So I expect them to look past insults,
Speaker 1: behavior that they don't consider to be reciproc all of
Speaker 1: that to the fact that they wanted one thing from
Speaker 1: America arms for Ukraine, which we sold them. We didn't
Speaker 1: give it to them. They haven't spent five percent, much
Speaker 1: less two percent for decades. They have been a free
Speaker 1: writer and I've been okay with that. I'm like Lindsay Graham,
Speaker 1: we need Europe. But this is not the time to
Speaker 1: exercise your peak. This is the time to do something
Speaker 1: symbolic because they have you know, the British Navy's down
Speaker 1: to twenty seven ships. I think that they're not really
Speaker 1: a superpower. They've got some nukes. France is crippled by
Speaker 1: internal divisions that make our look like paper mache. The
Speaker 1: people we can rely on are the Polls, the Ukraines,
Speaker 1: the Thins, the Swedes, and they can't really give us
Speaker 1: they're involved in a war, so the people are a loser.
Speaker 1: Here is great Britain in France. You get a minute
Speaker 1: to the break. Then we'll come back and have America. Yeah.
Speaker 3: Sure, listen, there's nothing I disagree with there, and it
Speaker 3: would be very valuable for us to have these ships
Speaker 3: to help escort missions when it's time to do those
Speaker 3: escort missions, which is now. Now is the time to
Speaker 3: sequentially degrade RAN's capacity to project power in the Persian golf,
Speaker 3: and then we demonstrate that the Persian golf is clear.
Speaker 3: Everything's going to happen in a sequential order. But we're
Speaker 3: going to have to agree to disagree. Yes, I understand.
Speaker 3: I believe it's cutting off your nose to spite your face,
Speaker 3: to react as they have reacted. Do I blame them?
Speaker 3: Do I think that they don't have any motive or
Speaker 3: impetus for acting that way?
Speaker 1: No, I guess it's fine. And then we don't disagree.
Speaker 1: We just think they had to be I think they
Speaker 1: had to be more mature. So do you. But you're
Speaker 1: more understanding of them, I say, huh. Great nations don't
Speaker 1: need psychologists. I'll be right back with Noah Rothman to
Speaker 1: talk about American public opinion after this Welcome Back America,
Speaker 1: hew it in the Relief Actors Studio inside the Beltway,
Speaker 1: Join by Noah C. Rothman, Senior writer for National Review.
Speaker 1: You can hear Noah on the Editor's podcast. He's a
Speaker 1: guest host on the Commentary podcast Today, which I will
Speaker 1: listen to after the show. You can follow him on
Speaker 1: Exit no c Rothman. No, I want you to listen
Speaker 1: to Harry Anton on CNN last night talk about the
Speaker 1: state of American public opinion, beginning with Republicans and Trump.
Speaker 1: Then we'll come back and get your thoughts on how
Speaker 1: this might feed into November. Here is Harry Anton, and
Speaker 1: this is one.
Speaker 5: Of those because just take a look here, MAGA GOP
Speaker 5: a view of Trump approve one hundred percent, one hundred percent.
Speaker 5: If you are a member of MEGA and the GOP
Speaker 5: you approve of Donald John Trump zero percent say that
Speaker 5: they disapprove. You don't have to be a mathematical genius
Speaker 5: to know you can't go higher than one hundred percent.
Speaker 5: He is the nineteen hundred and seventy two Miami Dolphins. Now,
Speaker 5: there are some Republicans who disapprove of Donald John Trump,
Speaker 5: but they are not members of the Make America Great
Speaker 5: Again movement. The bottom line is this, if you are
Speaker 5: a member of MEGA, you approve of Donald Trump.
Speaker 6: It's interesting, though, because there have been a couple prominent
Speaker 6: people who have sort of come out online and they're
Speaker 6: very mad about this war with Iran because he promised
Speaker 6: no new wars. Is there anything that people might be
Speaker 6: leaving MAGA relative to twenty twenty four?
Speaker 5: Yeah, okay, so you know I've said it before, and
Speaker 5: you know the theme of this segment is Tucker Carlson
Speaker 5: b darn and when we look at the numbers, I
Speaker 5: mean I've heard some people say, oh, you know what,
Speaker 5: when you look at those MAGA numbers, it doesn't account
Speaker 5: for those who might have left MAGA. But take a
Speaker 5: look here Americans who identify as MAGA. In November of
Speaker 5: twenty twenty four, it was twenty eight percent of Americans.
Speaker 5: Now it's basically the same of anything, it's slightly higher
Speaker 5: at thirty percent. The bottom line is this, the magabase
Speaker 5: within the.
Speaker 2: GOP is not shrinking.
Speaker 1: It's the same size.
Speaker 5: If anything, it is slightly larger than it was back
Speaker 5: in twenty twenty four, when, of course, Donald Trump won
Speaker 5: a second term. So that one hundred percent that Donald
Speaker 5: Trump has approval among MAGA GOP that is not an
Speaker 5: artifact of MAGA shrinking.
Speaker 1: It's just an indication of how.
Speaker 5: Strong Donald Trump's grip is on that MAGA base.
Speaker 6: And so I guess it begs the questions what's happening
Speaker 6: with inside the GOP and if there are any splits there,
Speaker 6: because with that those kind of numbers, they're going to
Speaker 6: want to retain that right so they can retain their seed.
Speaker 5: Yes, yes, and you know what we're talking about.
Speaker 2: You know, we've mentioned Iran in the intro.
Speaker 5: Of this segment GOP on US military action in Iran.
Speaker 5: Look at this in Magga, it's ninety percent approval. It's
Speaker 5: ninety percent approval, just five percent disapprove. If you disapprove
Speaker 5: of the job that Donald Trump is doing, or excuse me,
Speaker 5: the US military action in Iran, and you're a member
Speaker 5: of the GOP, look at this, it's your non maggot,
Speaker 5: You're not Magga. It's thirty six percent there, fifty four
Speaker 5: percent approval. But the majority of Republicans approve of the
Speaker 5: job that the US military action is in Iran, and
Speaker 5: the majority of MAGA, which is the majority of the
Speaker 5: GOP very much proof ninety percent, very little.
Speaker 1: You No, you are not MAGA. I am not MAGA.
Speaker 1: I'm a Reagan Conservative. I don't know how you describe yourself?
Speaker 1: What do you make of I think Harry is a
Speaker 1: pretty good pull, sure, and I think it's an honestly presented,
Speaker 1: presented set of numbers. What do you make of them?
Speaker 3: It comports with what I've been seeing in the polling.
Speaker 3: And it's important to distinguish self described MAGA voters versus
Speaker 3: self described Republican voters, because self describe MEGA voters to
Speaker 3: expressed a higher approval rating of the president overall. To
Speaker 3: say nothing of the Iran war specific whereas Republican voters
Speaker 3: take a more nuanced view, and I've seen numbers that
Speaker 3: are higher than sixty four percent among Republicans who support
Speaker 3: this war. Depends on the poll you go to. I've
Speaker 3: seen mid seventies, I've seen low eighties.
Speaker 2: You have to.
Speaker 3: Remember that it's not like Donald Trump came out of
Speaker 3: nowhere and said we should be hostile and confrontational with Iran.
Speaker 3: This has been baked into the Republican DNA, Republican voters
Speaker 3: DNA since the inception of the Islamic Republic forty seven
Speaker 3: years ago, including Donald Trump himself, who was one of
Speaker 3: the most outspoken expostulators of a view that we should
Speaker 3: be much more aggressive towards Iran as early as nineteen
Speaker 3: eighty and has been consistent in that view throughout his
Speaker 3: career in public life. So this is not something that
Speaker 3: the President really has to sell to Republicans. It's a
Speaker 3: different story when you're talking about the rest of the
Speaker 3: the electorate, and we can get really deep and granular
Speaker 3: with this thing, like for example, YouGov has a survey
Speaker 3: of today which indicates that while seventeen percent of self
Speaker 3: described Republicans I'm maga. Just Republicans express dissatisfaction with Trump's
Speaker 3: job approval, A full third thirty three percent are disapproving
Speaker 3: of the president when it comes to gas prices, and
Speaker 3: gas prices are ineluctibly linked with the instability in the
Speaker 3: Persian Gulf and therefore an expression of disapproval in the war.
Speaker 3: You could really go granular with this thing if you
Speaker 3: wanted to, But I think that does kind of miss
Speaker 3: the mark because while these voters are expressing dissatisfaction with
Speaker 3: their own personal finances, and that satisfaction will could and
Speaker 3: probably will result in less enthusiasm to go to the
Speaker 3: polls in November, especially if these conditions persist. I doubt
Speaker 3: they will, but if we were in stasis between now
Speaker 3: and November, that would mute enthusiasm to vote for Republican
Speaker 3: candidates at the polls. But I think it just misses
Speaker 3: the point because we're not talking about November's elections, talking
Speaker 3: about the price of gas between now and July. We're
Speaker 3: talking about an apocl confrontation with an immortal American enemy,
Speaker 3: And on the other side of this thing could be
Speaker 3: a lot of benefits that Americans will perceive and don't
Speaker 3: even understand their paying Now. Nobody has any idea how
Speaker 3: much resources we devote, how much time it takes, how
Speaker 3: many US service personnel and civilians, public servants alike, devote
Speaker 3: to containing the threat from Iran. These people work day
Speaker 3: and night to kill our servicemen, to kill our public servants,
Speaker 3: to frustrate our interests in the world.
Speaker 2: We've just gotten really good at interdicting it. But they
Speaker 2: never stop. They do not sleep. This is what they do.
Speaker 3: And if on the other side of a world without
Speaker 3: the Islamic Republic, where we finally get to engineer the
Speaker 3: pivot to Asia that we've always wanted to engineer, we
Speaker 3: can contain Russia in Europe. We know how to do that.
Speaker 3: NATO allies are very good at doing that. What we
Speaker 3: can't do is extricate ourselves from the Middle East as
Speaker 3: long as the Islamic Republic exists. And if we could,
Speaker 3: that would be an epochal strategic shift for the United
Speaker 3: States and very bad news for our enemies.
Speaker 1: And that is my view, is that every Republican running
Speaker 1: for reelection ought to learn the speech that Noah just
Speaker 1: gave off the cuff and say it again and again
Speaker 1: and again, because I think it's a winning issue if
Speaker 1: the war is won last minute too. Noah, if you're
Speaker 1: a Republican candidate, what do you say right now about
Speaker 1: the war? Right now?
Speaker 2: Well, listen, I would say that.
Speaker 3: I would say that if you're talking about politics right
Speaker 3: as a credidate an appeal to.
Speaker 2: Voters, yeah, I would say that. Listen.
Speaker 3: My political career is important to me, and I think
Speaker 3: that I'm valuable to you as your constituents. You matter
Speaker 3: to me, and I want to serve you best, and
Speaker 3: I'm trying to do that now. And what I'm going
Speaker 3: to do is put my political interests aside in favor
Speaker 3: of the American national interest. These people are enemies. They
Speaker 3: want to kill us, they have killed us. It is
Speaker 3: far more important to me to be of service to
Speaker 3: you and of service to the history of this country
Speaker 3: then it is for us to argue about who should
Speaker 3: control the next budgeting process in Congress, who should control
Speaker 3: committee chairs. That doesn't matter to me nearly as much
Speaker 3: as the safety of you and your children, And that's
Speaker 3: what I'm here to protect.
Speaker 1: Bingo. Noah Rothman campaign consultant extraordinaire, except he's not. He's
Speaker 1: a senior writer at NRO follow him on exit. Noah
Speaker 1: S c. Rothman, thank you for the extra time today, Noah,
Speaker 1: I'll be right back. America Station. You inside the Beltway.
Speaker 1: And if you've been watching c SPAN for the last
Speaker 1: day and today, you've seen Republicans standing up demanding voter
Speaker 1: ID and citizenship before they vote in federal elections, and
Speaker 1: they're pummeling the Democrats because of the way the Majority
Speaker 1: Leader John Thune set this up. The leader joint me now,
Speaker 1: Leader Dune, welcome, Well played, mister Bond. This is if
Speaker 1: this was a fight, they'd stop it. The Democrats could.
Speaker 1: Are they going to.
Speaker 7: We'll find out here soon enough. You know, I think
Speaker 7: the one thing that this is a Save America Act
Speaker 7: is a package of just common sense policies that should
Speaker 7: get an automatic yes literally from every member of the Senate.
Speaker 7: And the core of it, as you know, is a
Speaker 7: requirement for Americans to demonstrate that they're eligible to vote
Speaker 7: and that they are who they say they are when
Speaker 7: they go to do so. And requiring a photo ID
Speaker 7: for a whole lot of things in this country is
Speaker 7: something that you know, Americans expect, You would think that
Speaker 7: they'd be able to produce one to vote in our elections,
Speaker 7: so I think it's on the substance where it's a winner.
Speaker 7: We just have to do everything we can to make
Speaker 7: sure that we're pounding them over the course the next
Speaker 7: week or two, and then we'll see where the votes are.
Speaker 1: Well. I enjoy tuning in when I can, and whenever
Speaker 1: I want to break from using my voice. I just
Speaker 1: turned on c SPAN because we're winning so well played,
Speaker 1: well played. Is there any idea of how long they'll
Speaker 1: put up with this?
Speaker 4: Is?
Speaker 1: Is there any way they can stop it? Democrats?
Speaker 7: I mean not really. I mean what we did. We
Speaker 7: called up the House passed version and typically to get
Speaker 7: a up on the floor, and the Senate takes procedurally
Speaker 7: what we call culture on the motion to proceed, which
Speaker 7: is a sixty vote threshold in the Senate. Because this
Speaker 7: came over in the form of a message in the House,
Speaker 7: it was at fifty one, so we were able to.
Speaker 2: Get on it.
Speaker 7: And then I filled the amendment tree, which prevents the
Speaker 7: Democrats from getting some of the amendment votes on some
Speaker 7: of the crazy ideas they have, so it keeps it more,
Speaker 7: gives us more control, I guess, I would say, of
Speaker 7: the floor, and we ultimately we end up voting on
Speaker 7: but again, we'll see how long it goes. I think
Speaker 7: that we need to have a sufficient amount of time
Speaker 7: obviously to make the case and get this issue in
Speaker 7: front of the American people and hold the Democrats accountable.
Speaker 1: So later down, if Chuck Schumer had a brainstorm, which
Speaker 1: would be rare, but it doesn't not impossible and decided
Speaker 1: I'll offer to reopen DHS, We'll vote on the appropriation
Speaker 1: bill if they'll stop pummeling us. Would you take that deal?
Speaker 7: You know, I will say that would be That's a
Speaker 7: good question. I think that'd be a might be. It
Speaker 7: might be an off ran for the Democrats, honestly, And
Speaker 7: we've got to get d DHS opened up. And you know,
Speaker 7: we've got one hundred and twenty thousand people at DHS
Speaker 7: who started missing paychecks and many of those, of course
Speaker 7: work with TSA or other agencies that are crucial, crucial
Speaker 7: for national security. And so yeah, if they were willing
Speaker 7: to make a deal on that, we might we might be,
Speaker 7: we might be willing to negotiate, but.
Speaker 1: They take that TKO Senator, yesterday, one of your colleagues
Speaker 1: I talked to was about to go through to a
Speaker 1: TSA line, and this Senator had been padded down on
Speaker 1: their way home. I'll bet you a lot of Senators
Speaker 1: are getting padded down unnecessarily right now because they can't
Speaker 1: be very happy. But I think about the Coast Guard
Speaker 1: and the counter terrorism people. This is nuts. This is
Speaker 1: really nuts. In the middle of a war.
Speaker 7: It is and you know, what's the second time they've
Speaker 7: done this to you. And this is especially troubling because
Speaker 7: we are in the middle. It's a dangerous world. We've
Speaker 7: got cyber threats and the Cyber Office is located within
Speaker 7: the Department of Homeland Security, so that's also affected by
Speaker 7: this appropriation bill. And it just it makes you wonder
Speaker 7: what is on their minds. I mean, I think they
Speaker 7: have become so obsessed with I'm told there's another No
Speaker 7: King's rally out here in the next week or two.
Speaker 7: The Democrats are you know that happened last fall and
Speaker 7: slowed down negotiations on ending that government shutdown. They are
Speaker 7: held so hostage by the far left in the country
Speaker 7: right now and are so infected with Trump derangement syndrome
Speaker 7: and blind hatred of the president that they don't want
Speaker 7: to do anything obviously that that gives him a victory
Speaker 7: and this isn't The White House has been very willing
Speaker 7: to negotiate. I mean, I don't know if, of course
Speaker 7: you've been following the back and forth on this, but
Speaker 7: they really are on ICE and DHS or I should
Speaker 7: say customs of border patrol, the two things. Right now
Speaker 7: the Democrats have held hostage.
Speaker 1: That to me is a.
Speaker 7: You know, it's a.
Speaker 2: Defund the police, defund law.
Speaker 7: Enforcement position that they've taken in spite of the fact
Speaker 7: that the administration has made numerous efforts to engage with
Speaker 7: the Democrats on some of the issues they care about
Speaker 7: in ways that I think the Democrats ought to be
Speaker 7: willing to accept them. I'm just this is about politics,
Speaker 7: nothing more, nothing less for them, you know, a.
Speaker 1: Leader I did not know we had another No King
Speaker 1: spectacle coming. I have heard the President called an authoritarian
Speaker 1: by Ben Rhodes and because of Venezuela and Cuba and
Speaker 1: Iran and the fascist talking is out there. You know
Speaker 1: what I say to them, Supreme Court ruled against the
Speaker 1: thing that matters most to him, the tariffs, and they
Speaker 1: said you can't do it, and he didn't arrest him.
Speaker 1: You know, it's the like least authoritarian thing in the
Speaker 1: world is to abide by the ruling of the people
Speaker 1: who rule against the thing you want the most. And
Speaker 1: so they're just silly. Let's turn to the war. Five
Speaker 1: minutes ago and Na da Viol, a very good reporter
Speaker 1: out of Israel, posted the IDF confirmed it has struck
Speaker 1: the Iranian naval fleet in the Caspian Sea. The fleet
Speaker 1: had been used during the war in Ukraine to transfer
Speaker 1: equipment from Iran to Russia. I think the Iranians are
Speaker 1: getting pummeled and they don't know how to surrender.
Speaker 7: Yeah, it seems like it, I mean, and I think
Speaker 7: the President clearly understands the importance of reopening the strait,
Speaker 7: whether it's done the easy way or the hard way.
Speaker 7: But you know, operations have been going on now for
Speaker 7: less than three weeks, and thousands of stories have taken
Speaker 7: place against their missile launchers, their ballistic missiles all the
Speaker 7: I just think they're you know, the the administration, our
Speaker 7: military leadership, our war planners have done a great job
Speaker 7: of just taking completely away from the Iranians their ability
Speaker 7: to threaten the region. And I think that's what this
Speaker 7: was all about. And so I mean, we need to
Speaker 7: finish the job. Hopefully that'll be done soon. But I
Speaker 7: think every day we start, you know, we achieve more
Speaker 7: of our objectives in defanging the Iranians regime.
Speaker 1: I'm very glad that Senator Collins and our colleagues got
Speaker 1: the defense appropriations built through. Is a supplemental necessary and
Speaker 1: if so, can reconciliation be used to move.
Speaker 7: It could be option obviously that we'll keep available to
Speaker 7: us and honestly, in both defense and homeland security, if
Speaker 7: they continue, I think we have to. We got to
Speaker 7: do what we can and make sure we're doing everything
Speaker 7: we can to defend the country and the homeland and
Speaker 7: the Democrats seem very unwilling to do that. But so
Speaker 7: if a supplemental is necessary, we'll obviously entertain that the
Speaker 7: White House sends it up. We did, as you know,
Speaker 7: put a significant amount of funding last summer in the
Speaker 7: Working Family's Tax Cuts bill for defense. But you know,
Speaker 7: obviously this costs money, and we need to make sure
Speaker 7: that we keep sure keep our munitions built up so
Speaker 7: that the deterrence is always the best thing that we
Speaker 7: can do as a country. And you want to desur
Speaker 7: bad behavior around the world. You know, it's not as
Speaker 7: it's always been said that it's not our strength tempts
Speaker 7: our adversaries, it's our weakness. And I think that's why
Speaker 7: we've got to make sure that we're sufficiently funding our
Speaker 7: readiness in a way that deters bad behavior later.
Speaker 1: I'm old enough to remember Grenada, and I'm old enough
Speaker 1: to remember Panama and nineteen ninety one, and then of
Speaker 1: course two thousand and one Afghanistan in two thousand and
Speaker 1: three March to Bagdad. Every time our troops do something big,
Speaker 1: I'm always amazed at the iterations. I mean, triple generation
Speaker 1: jumps and weaponry accuracy lethality. Do you sit around the
Speaker 1: Senate conference room and look at each other? How do
Speaker 1: they do this?
Speaker 7: You kind of do? I mean you look at the
Speaker 7: operations that have been conducted just in this past you know,
Speaker 7: the time frame here is starting with the B two
Speaker 7: bombing run in Iran earlier this year, of Venezuela, this operation.
Speaker 7: It is remarkable how good these people are, and it
Speaker 7: makes you grateful as a nation that there are young
Speaker 7: men and women who want to serve their country and
Speaker 7: have the skill, the expertise, the experience and the determination
Speaker 7: to keep the country safe. And I think we've seen
Speaker 7: that in so many ways just in the last few months.
Speaker 1: All Right, last question. Everyone always assumes the Republicans get along.
Speaker 1: They've never been to a conference meeting, and now they've
Speaker 1: seen Senator Paul and Senator Mullen kind of comeing to
Speaker 1: verbal blows today. Does Senator Mullin have the votes to
Speaker 1: get confirmed because we need him confirmed quickly.
Speaker 7: We do, and they'll I'm hoping he'll be voted out
Speaker 7: of the committee tomorrow. I think that'll be the case,
Speaker 7: and then we'll get him up on the floor early
Speaker 7: next week. We got to fill that position, and he's
Speaker 7: the right person for it. And yes, there are some
Speaker 7: it got a little spicy, and there's some personal history
Speaker 7: that those two have, but at the end of the day,
Speaker 7: it's about the job, and you know, it's an important job,
Speaker 7: and I think Senator Mollin is the right person to
Speaker 7: fill it.
Speaker 1: I always say, a little sparky is fun lights up
Speaker 1: the night. Sah Majority of Leader of Thune. Thank you
Speaker 1: for joining me. As always a pleasure talking to your leader.
Speaker 1: Welcome back in America. I'm Hugh Hewett. Josh crosh Hour
Speaker 1: is editor in chief of Jewish Insider, a daily newsletter.
Speaker 1: Josh Before I go to any specifics, how do you
Speaker 1: think the war is going?
Speaker 8: I mean, militarily, If you look at the objectives that
Speaker 8: both the US and Israel set out at the beginning
Speaker 8: of the war, you really couldn't have asked for a
Speaker 8: whole lot more. The first twenty four hours saw the
Speaker 8: killing of the Ayatola and some of the top Iranian
Speaker 8: military officials know Israel I know certainly has had certain targets,
Speaker 8: the besiege headquarters, some of the checkpoints, some of the
Speaker 8: IRGC offices and leaders. So there's been a lot of
Speaker 8: military successes. I think the one thing that has been unclear,
Speaker 8: and we talked about this last week, Q is you
Speaker 8: know there's been a mixed messaging for the US and Israel.
Speaker 8: I think a little bit on whether regime changes the
Speaker 8: goal and whether that's a reasonable expectation as a result
Speaker 8: of the military operation.
Speaker 4: Has also been you know, a lack I.
Speaker 8: Think of communication a little more of the US side
Speaker 8: in terms of what the goals are. And I think
Speaker 8: President Trump lately, as we're talking about the war, its
Speaker 8: aims and the threat that it posed with its nuclear
Speaker 8: ambitions very clearly the last few days. But that's been
Speaker 8: an issue, But in terms of the military successes, I
Speaker 8: think Israel's been very transparent about the accomplishments. The US
Speaker 8: has been briefing on a daily basis, and I think
Speaker 8: militarily they've taken out a lot of the Iranian infrastructure,
Speaker 8: a lot of the top leadership, and it has been
Speaker 8: fairly significant to date.
Speaker 1: Great breaking reports have the IDF sinking at least five
Speaker 1: Iranian Navy ships in the Caspian Sea used for reef
Speaker 1: supply of Russia. One of the Israeli journalists I followed
Speaker 1: closely is Nada viol I think he sort of center left.
Speaker 1: He writes in a piece called Lara Jeani was the system.
Speaker 1: Now he's gone this paragraph. One senior figure told me
Speaker 1: Nada vel imagine Israel waking up after weeks of war
Speaker 1: to find no military industry, no Raphael, no Israel aerospace industries,
Speaker 1: no R and D technological backbone for the regime left.
Speaker 1: That's the scale of damage we're inflicting. That's the campaign
Speaker 1: billions that they are losing each day, and that's Israel's
Speaker 1: insurance policy for the day after. What do you think
Speaker 1: of that?
Speaker 8: Yeah, I mean, that's consistent with what we've been hearing,
Speaker 8: certainly on the Israeli side, Hugh. We have a story
Speaker 8: on Jewish Insider about the lieutenant colonel who has been
Speaker 8: briefing the Israeli public who said that Iran is now
Speaker 8: as of as of right now, they're no longer able
Speaker 8: to produce ballistic missiles, which is one of the big
Speaker 8: goals in terms of both the goals of the war
Speaker 8: and getting getting rid of its bablistic missile UH stockpile,
Speaker 8: and also the nuclear inrichment. And on the ballistic missile front,
Speaker 8: apparently they've declared UH success at least on the Israeli side.
Speaker 4: They're the you mentioned UH.
Speaker 8: You know, there's been a lot of notable officials in
Speaker 8: recent days that have been taken out. The latest is
Speaker 8: the Iranian Intelligence Minister sm A L Katib, who the
Speaker 8: Israeli military said today that it had killed in an
Speaker 8: overnight airstrike. So, like again militarily, there are a lot
Speaker 8: of checks on the boxes of what the US and
Speaker 8: Israel have been doing. I think the one big remaining
Speaker 8: question is is regime what is the timetable and is
Speaker 8: regime change going to be the outcome of these of
Speaker 8: this pretty very very deliberate military even.
Speaker 1: From the beginning, it's been my estimate that this would
Speaker 1: go until June, but not longer than June. And that's
Speaker 1: for a variety of reasons. But I would I would
Speaker 1: think June, given how long carriers can deploy. We have
Speaker 1: the Ford is leaving today and the h the hw
Speaker 1: Bush is on its way there. The Lincoln's been there
Speaker 1: a long time. There is a durability factor there are
Speaker 1: our Air Force has a long range strike. I don't
Speaker 1: think there'll be any targets. Laugh Josh. That's the now
Speaker 1: whether or not this horror moods reopens. Let me play
Speaker 1: for you the Secretary of General of NATO RUTA today.
Speaker 1: If you can find that clip Harley and play it
Speaker 1: for job of ba blistic missiles.
Speaker 9: Of the nuclear capability is severely degraded. But it comes
Speaker 9: to the straitor for Moose. I've been in contact with
Speaker 9: as many allies. We all agree, of course, that straight
Speaker 9: has to open up again. And what I know is
Speaker 9: that allies are working together discussing how to do that,
Speaker 9: What is the best way to do it. They're working
Speaker 9: on that collectively to find your way forward.
Speaker 1: All right. Now, that's not saying yes, but it's not
Speaker 1: a no, Lindsey Graham, Mister NATO blew up yesterday at
Speaker 1: NATO's reluctance to help the United States clear the strait
Speaker 1: and keep them open. And I'm kind of there too,
Speaker 1: and I've always been a big supporter of NATO. What
Speaker 1: do you think is the blowback at Britain and France
Speaker 1: as a result of their being afraid to be a
Speaker 1: part of this.
Speaker 8: Well, look, it's the Trump has expressed as yesterday was
Speaker 8: letting some steam off when he was with the Irish
Speaker 8: leader about about the British Prime Minister Starmer and his
Speaker 8: sort of hesitance to be engaged.
Speaker 4: Look, I think there's also, you know, a challenge on
Speaker 4: the US front.
Speaker 8: We didn't we talked about the public wasn't quite as mobilized,
Speaker 8: and in terms of preparing for war as we've seen
Speaker 8: in other past interventions, there wasn't a whole lot of
Speaker 8: mobilization on the international front. Now, I remember all too well,
Speaker 8: Hugh that, even going back to the Iraq War and
Speaker 8: other international engagements, that the Europeans always seemed to kind
Speaker 8: of carve from the sidelines.
Speaker 4: That's not entirely new, but there was sort of.
Speaker 8: A lack of building that Coalition of the willing, and
Speaker 8: I think it's been done a little bit on the
Speaker 8: fly as we speak, So I'm not sure it's a
Speaker 8: lack of wanting to engage as much as it is,
Speaker 8: you know, about preparing their publics in their own countries
Speaker 8: about what what the goals.
Speaker 1: Are and the coalition that w was nineteen ninety one,
Speaker 1: we had the bridge in two thousand and three for
Speaker 1: Iraq Afghanistan. Article five triggered everyone kind of pretended to play.
Speaker 1: The UA had more real soldiers in real combat than
Speaker 1: Germany did in Afghanistan, but everyone pretended to play We
Speaker 1: carry the load with the bridge. Now, however, Ukraine is
Speaker 1: in its fourth year. We're supplying Ukraine everything except manpower.
Speaker 1: And we did it before NATO started spending it. And
Speaker 1: now NATO isn't setting a mind sweeper. A mind sweepers
Speaker 1: you get the last minute.
Speaker 8: Yeah, look, I would hope, I would hope that it
Speaker 8: would be as simple as, you know, some communication at
Speaker 8: better diplomacy, that we could kind of coordinate more effectively,
Speaker 8: and that they are not trying to resist helping out
Speaker 8: and dealing with the threat that Iran poses.
Speaker 4: Very much to their own countries.
Speaker 8: In fact, terrorism is an even more pronounced threat, and
Speaker 8: Iranian terrorism or Indian sponsored terrorism is very very real
Speaker 8: on the European homefront.
Speaker 4: So they understand, they should understand these.
Speaker 8: Countries the threat that Iran has posed and does pose,
Speaker 8: and I would hope that it would be more of
Speaker 8: an issue of diplomacy rather than an issue of their
Speaker 8: reading of the security threat.
Speaker 1: We can only hope. Josh Crushauer, thank you. Don't go anywhere, America.
Speaker 1: I'm do Hewett. Stay tuned to the Salem News Channel.
Speaker 1: I'll be right back. Welcome back to America. I'm Hugh Hewitt.
Speaker 1: Joined by Charles CW. Cook of National Review. He is
Speaker 1: a contributor to the Editor's Podcast. He also has his
Speaker 1: own podcast, the Charles C. W. Cook Podcast. Charles, I
Speaker 1: had Noah on earlier. I gave him extra time because
Speaker 1: I thought you guys all ganged up on him in
Speaker 1: the Editors this week, although you were the most gentle
Speaker 1: of the three. How do you just not in that context,
Speaker 1: but just you, Charles C. W. Cuck, how do you
Speaker 1: assess the war whine?
Speaker 10: It's quite difficult, and it's been a remarkable military success
Speaker 10: at the outset, and I'm deeply impressed by the performance
Speaker 10: of the Department of Defense, and as I said on
Speaker 10: the editors, I hope our adversaries are watching. I'm sure
Speaker 10: they are. Where I'm a little stymied here is I'm
Speaker 10: not quite sure what we're doing. It's not that I
Speaker 10: don't think there are all manner of good reasons to
Speaker 10: be there.
Speaker 4: There are.
Speaker 10: It's not that I am per se against this action.
Speaker 10: I'm certainly not. But the President has been all over
Speaker 10: the place when describing what their aims are here, and
Speaker 10: because there wasn't a debate, I'm just not quite sure
Speaker 10: how to judge it. I'm not sure how long he's
Speaker 10: going to stay. I'm not sure whether we're going to
Speaker 10: commit the resources we would need, for example, to reopen
Speaker 10: the straits of horror moods.
Speaker 1: So I find it quite difficult to judge.
Speaker 10: Not because I think, you know, I've seen some people
Speaker 10: who have derangement syndrome saying the US is losing that's
Speaker 10: absolute nonsense.
Speaker 1: I'm just not.
Speaker 10: Sure how long we're going to stay in what we're doing,
Speaker 10: so I find it difficult to know.
Speaker 1: I'm a bit like I'm going to borrow from in
Speaker 1: Antigony and Butcher Misophocles. You cannot tell how good the
Speaker 1: day has been until the evening comes. We won't know
Speaker 1: till it's over. But it sure looks pretty impressive to me.
Speaker 1: And I'm not worried about the Strait of Hormuz, even
Speaker 1: though the price of gas is up Politically. I know
Speaker 1: that's a problem for Republican if it remains upcome the midterms,
Speaker 1: But this is much bigger than the midterms in my view?
Speaker 1: What do you make? And I think this is actually
Speaker 1: the untold story. This might break NATO. When Lindsey Graham
Speaker 1: and Hugh Hewitt and a bunch of old Reagan conservatives
Speaker 1: are saying what in the world they won't even send
Speaker 1: mind sweepers. What is the purpose of NATO? Is it
Speaker 1: just to protect NATO? What's your reaction to that, Charles,
Speaker 1: that people are turning on NATO who have always been
Speaker 1: pro NATO.
Speaker 10: Yeah, I'm pro NATO, but I'm also of the view
Speaker 10: that NATO is in effect American power, and so I
Speaker 10: don't get too hung up on the formal structure. I
Speaker 10: think that the United States is in effect playing the
Speaker 10: role that the British Empire played before nineteen forty five.
Speaker 10: Back to about the Battle of Waterloo, and that is
Speaker 10: as the global hedgemon with naval supremacy on which others rely.
Speaker 10: So I'm not sure it can break NATO in the
Speaker 10: sense that it's not going to break American hegemony. And Europe,
Speaker 10: whether it likes to admit it or not, is completely reliant,
Speaker 10: more reliant now than it has been for a while
Speaker 10: on that supremacy. So I think it's more a matter
Speaker 10: for us. You know, are we getting tired of being taken.
Speaker 1: For a ride?
Speaker 10: And I suppose in some sense the answer is yes.
Speaker 10: But on the other hand, Donald Trump has made this
Speaker 10: a big feature of both of his presidencies, to tell
Speaker 10: Europe to pay more and to put pressure on them.
Speaker 10: So I very much see this within the context of
Speaker 10: that existing tension.
Speaker 1: Now, Charles, one of the memorable moments of my life,
Speaker 1: and it's long. It's seventy years old, when after nine
Speaker 1: to eleven, w addresses Congress and he looks up and
Speaker 1: Prime Minister Blair is there. He thanks him for being there,
Speaker 1: to thank you, friend, and that spoke volumes about the
Speaker 1: special relationship. Kiir Starmer has trashed that in two weeks.
Speaker 1: Do you think the British public is in favor of that.
Speaker 10: Well, here's what I think you and I take no
Speaker 10: pleasure in saying this as somebody who was formerly British
Speaker 10: and whose family lives there. But the British, irrespective of
Speaker 10: Kirs Starmer and the most recent examples, have rendered themselves,
Speaker 10: through their own choices, somewhat irrelevant. I mean, if you
Speaker 10: think back, even just over a decade ago to when
Speaker 10: Barack Obama was considering going into Syria after the Libya adventure,
Speaker 10: the British Parliament voted against helping.
Speaker 1: And this was a big deal.
Speaker 10: This was reported in the United States as being a
Speaker 10: big deal. It had some impact, not definitive impact, but
Speaker 10: it had some impact on Barack Obama's decision not to
Speaker 10: go in. That wouldn't happen now. If the British Parliament
Speaker 10: had taken a vote ahead of this and said we're
Speaker 10: not going to help in Iran, it would not really
Speaker 10: have factored in very much to America's calculations. So, although
Speaker 10: I am very sad about that, and although I am
Speaker 10: sad about the decline of the special relationship which has
Speaker 10: accompanied it, I think it's a lot less important than.
Speaker 2: It used to be.
Speaker 10: Look at the British inability, the British of all people,
Speaker 10: inability to send a naval power around the world within
Speaker 10: what two weeks they said they would need two weeks.
Speaker 10: When the Falklands were invaded in the early nineteen eighties,
Speaker 10: Missus Thatcher sent hundreds of ships to the Falkland islands
Speaker 10: within forty eight hours. So the British have done this
Speaker 10: to themselves. I don't think that is a case for
Speaker 10: going into Iran or for this or that president, but
Speaker 10: the British have rendered themselves irrelevance such that it doesn't matter.
Speaker 1: Unfortunately, well, now there is New NATO, there is poland
Speaker 1: there is Finland. There is Ukraine, which is a sort
Speaker 1: of deep fact on member of New NATO, and they
Speaker 1: are holding the line against one of the maligned powers
Speaker 1: in the Alliance of Tyrants. I'm just curious if you
Speaker 1: think Britain can recover its mojo, and whether or not
Speaker 1: France might recover with new political leadership. They've only had
Speaker 1: twenty seven ships right now, They've got seven submarines, one
Speaker 1: of which is at sea right now. They've got two
Speaker 1: aircraft carriers. I don't know how you send aircraft carriers
Speaker 1: out without an escort fleet that they haven't got. Can
Speaker 1: they get it back? Do they want it back?
Speaker 10: Well, it's a huge question because they're going to have
Speaker 10: to if they're going to get it back, acknowledge that
Speaker 10: there is more to life than welfare spending. And I'm
Speaker 10: really not being a moaning conservative when I say this.
Speaker 10: I am very much a physical conservative. But the British
Speaker 10: have now for ten fifteen years, really since the end
Speaker 10: of the Blair years, ramped up welfare spending, raised taxes
Speaker 10: to pay for it, and let everything else go by
Speaker 10: the wayside. There is no dynamism in the British economy.
Speaker 10: There is no interest in the creation of wealth. There
Speaker 10: is no interest in the generation of great companies or
Speaker 10: great ideas or frankly great men in the way that
Speaker 10: there once was. And the same is true of defense.
Speaker 10: That the British have given up on defense. They have
Speaker 10: allowed their defense capability to atrophy. So it won't just
Speaker 10: be one good prime minister or one new political party
Speaker 10: or one favorable election. Culturally, in their souls, the British
Speaker 10: are going to have to acknowledge that there is more
Speaker 10: to government than handing out money. And at the moment
Speaker 10: they're just incapable of doing it again. I hate saying this.
Speaker 2: I hate this.
Speaker 10: I take no pleasure in it just because I move country,
Speaker 10: you know, I haven't left all those sentiments behind. I
Speaker 10: wish the British and their island well, but I don't
Speaker 10: see anything at the moment that suggests that there is
Speaker 10: an uprising against the status.
Speaker 1: Quo one minute, Charles, not the rise of Parage and
Speaker 1: a party to his right. Is that not the stirring
Speaker 1: of the embers.
Speaker 10: It's the stirring of the embers. But you need a
Speaker 10: lot more than embers, you know, a very very.
Speaker 4: Large fire here.
Speaker 10: And Nigel Farage, although admirable in some ways, is still
Speaker 10: operating within the existing political structure, and he is, for example,
Speaker 10: quite bad on housing development because he understands that the
Speaker 10: people he need have all of their wealth tied up
Speaker 10: in their homes. The real shift in British history in
Speaker 10: the recent years was Margaret Thatcher, who operated outside of
Speaker 10: all of that, and the results spoke for themselves. So
Speaker 10: I hope that it can happen again. But I'm not optimistic, Charles,
Speaker 10: But you.
Speaker 1: Are honest, and I appreciate that. Candor Charles C. W. Cook,
Speaker 1: listen to him on the editors read him in National View.
Speaker 1: We listen to his podcast, Charles B. W. Cook and
Speaker 1: come right back, Sharon Bedford from The Illness Welcome Back
Speaker 1: in America. I'm Hugh Heugh at Sarah C. Bedford is
Speaker 1: a senior investigations editor at The Washington Examiner, and she
Speaker 1: covers the Hill like few people. Sarah, what do you
Speaker 1: think the endgame is going to be for the Save
Speaker 1: Act and the DHS shut down?
Speaker 2: Well, it'd be great.
Speaker 11: If those two things could sort of get done together, right,
Speaker 11: and you finally have enough pressure on Senate leadership to
Speaker 11: bring the Save Act to the floor have a.
Speaker 2: Real debate about it. And you know what.
Speaker 11: People like Senator Mike Lee and other big supporters of
Speaker 11: the Save Act wanted all along was to have to
Speaker 11: force Democrats to defend their opposition to the Save Act,
Speaker 11: which is like full of eighty twenty proposals, right, voter ID,
Speaker 11: proof of citizenship to register to vote. Those are things
Speaker 11: that most Americans support, and so Senatorly and others who
Speaker 11: wanted to force, you know, a talking filibuster, and we've
Speaker 11: talked about before how that's maybe not.
Speaker 2: The most realistic way to try to.
Speaker 11: Overcome the sixty vote threshold. But the real thirty thousand
Speaker 11: foot view of the goal of all of that was
Speaker 11: to try to force Democrats to say why they're against
Speaker 11: proposals that are so popular. And finally it looks like
Speaker 11: Republicans are going to get that chance with soon bringing
Speaker 11: the builds to the floor, even if it doesn't end
Speaker 11: up having the votes to pass.
Speaker 1: Spartacus is up right now Corey Booker, and he's saying
Speaker 1: crazy stuff. Patty Murray has said, oh, you can't use
Speaker 1: your student idea anymore. I don't even know if that's true,
Speaker 1: but it's not really consequential to me. We've had Amy
Speaker 1: Klobuchar saying that Elon Musk is setting up a data
Speaker 1: center at DHS to take They're saying crazy things. Do
Speaker 1: you think those crazy things will hurt them in the fall?
Speaker 11: Well, it depends on how much Republicans are willing to
Speaker 11: push on the Save Act. I mean, so far, it
Speaker 11: seems like not that much. It's only in the past
Speaker 11: few weeks that you've seen momentum really builds behind the
Speaker 11: Save Act.
Speaker 2: But if you go point by point through.
Speaker 11: Most of the Democrats objections to the Save America Act
Speaker 11: and we've done that at the Washington Examiner.
Speaker 2: Most of them don't stand up to scrutiny.
Speaker 11: You know, this idea that married women, for example, won't
Speaker 11: be able to register to vote if they've had their
Speaker 11: name changed.
Speaker 2: Legally, that's just not the case.
Speaker 11: And so, you know, Democrats don't really have a cohesive
Speaker 11: argument against the Save Act. And that's what Republicans were
Speaker 11: sort of thinking on why they wanted these open conversations
Speaker 11: on the floor of the US Congress, because it's so
Speaker 11: difficult for Democrats.
Speaker 2: To hold the line against something that's so popular.
Speaker 1: Democrats want to cheat. And it comes down to that
Speaker 1: they want to cheat in a few places where it
Speaker 1: makes a big difference in a few hundred votes mean
Speaker 1: an election that some elections do not feature cheating does
Speaker 1: not mean that cheating does not occur in some elections.
Speaker 1: Let me switch topics to the war. I've been covering
Speaker 1: it top to bottom. I believe it's going very very well,
Speaker 1: about as well as any war could go. In which
Speaker 1: you've suffered fourteen casualties, thirteen casualties and among Americans ten
Speaker 1: Israelis now six team with six Palestinians killed this afternoon
Speaker 1: in the city of Hebron. Our allies and the Gulf
Speaker 1: nations are taking it as well. But Iran is getting pummeled.
Speaker 1: What's your take on the war.
Speaker 11: Of Sarah Bedford, Iran is and I you know, it
Speaker 11: was interesting today you had d and I Pulci Gabbard,
Speaker 11: you had CAA director John Ratcliffe, FBI director Cash Hotel
Speaker 11: on the Hill, and they faced a lot of questions
Speaker 11: about the threats from Iran. And what was really interesting
Speaker 11: to me is that the extent that Democrats were able
Speaker 11: to I don't know if land some successful blows is
Speaker 11: the right way to put it, but were able to
Speaker 11: sort of really press Ratcliffe and Gabbard in particular. It
Speaker 11: was really all about messaging related to the war, right,
Speaker 11: because it's hard for Democrats at the stage to argue
Speaker 11: that the war has been unsuccessful in achieving its goals
Speaker 11: or that it's a bad idea to make sure that
Speaker 11: Iran doesn't get a nuclear weapons. So you really all
Speaker 11: Democrats had to go off of we're messaging critiques. You
Speaker 11: know you said this at one point, now you're saying this.
Speaker 11: Your opening remarks had a paragraph that you didn't end
Speaker 11: up reading out loud. In the case of gabbered, But again,
Speaker 11: those were just all sort of rhetorical critiques about the
Speaker 11: way that the Trump administration is talking about the war,
Speaker 11: and not really critiques of what the Trump administration is
Speaker 11: actually doing.
Speaker 1: Sarah, I think the American media is overwhelmingly anti war
Speaker 1: because they're anti Trump overwhelmingly, and they cannot bring themselves
Speaker 1: a report. This is going as well as any military
Speaker 1: operation in my life, and I've seen a lot of wars,
Speaker 1: beginning with Grenada in nineteen eighty three. I remember vaguely
Speaker 1: the end of Vietnam, but not really that well, and
Speaker 1: that was a disaster. But doesn't anyone on the left
Speaker 1: recognize the incredible, awesome ability of the American military.
Speaker 11: Well, I think that's why you do see Democrats treading
Speaker 11: rather carefully, not necessarily going after the Trump administration directly
Speaker 11: saying this is really bad.
Speaker 2: We don't want the Iranian people to be free.
Speaker 11: We definitely want one of our biggest adversaries in the
Speaker 11: Middle East to have nuclear weapons. They are sort of
Speaker 11: that's why don't have a coherent message from Democrats. They're
Speaker 11: going after messaging and things like that, because again, like
Speaker 11: you said, it has so far been a successful mission.
Speaker 1: I hope it remains that way. Sarah C. Bedford follow
Speaker 1: her on x at Sarah C. Bedford. Thank you, Sarah.
Speaker 1: You've heard me talk a lot about Consumer Cellular how
Speaker 1: you can switch your carrier save money without the sacrifice.
Speaker 1: That's because Consumer Cellular uses the same towers as major carriers.
Speaker 1: Make the switch today and get twenty five dollars off
Speaker 1: at Consumer Cellular dot Com slash shoe. If you're over fifty,
Speaker 1: get one line of unlimited talk, text and data for
Speaker 1: thirty five dollars plus an additional five dollars per month
Speaker 1: off for the first five months. When you visit Consumer
Speaker 1: Cellular dot Com slash shoe, use the promo code Q
Speaker 1: twenty five. Consumer Cellular ranks number one for network coverage
Speaker 1: and consumer satisfaction. According to ACSL, You'll be working with
Speaker 1: an actual human being when you switch base right here
Speaker 1: in the US, so get one line of unlimited talk,
Speaker 1: text and data for only thirty five dollars per month,
Speaker 1: plus an additional five dollars off per month for the
Speaker 1: first five months. Think of all the money you will save.
Speaker 1: Go to Consumer Seular dot Com slash shoe. Promo QUE
Speaker 1: twenty five are called one eight hundred and four to
Speaker 1: one one forty four fifty four consumer cellular dot com
Speaker 1: slash shoe. Clean water is not complicated, but it is essential.
Speaker 1: Without it, public health suffer, education declines, economic stability well
Speaker 1: it weakens if it doesn't collapse. Across Latin America and
Speaker 1: the Caribbean, families are facing that reality of unclean water.
Speaker 1: Every day. Mothers walk miles for clean water. Children are
Speaker 1: exposed to preventable diseases because they haven't got it. Communities
Speaker 1: are held back by the absence of basic clean water access.
Speaker 1: But strategic compassion changes outcomes through food for the poor.
Speaker 1: Your gift provides safe and living water, improving how strengthening communities,
Speaker 1: and supporting gospel centered transformation through trusted local partnerships. This
Speaker 1: is a measurable impact with lasting result. Your gift to
Speaker 1: fifty dollars and sure two people have safe and living
Speaker 1: water or four one hundred dollars a family of four
Speaker 1: will be transformed for a year. I hope you act.
Speaker 12: Text Hewitt Hgwitt, that's Hewitt hg Witt to five one
Speaker 12: five fifty five that's Hewett to fifty one five five five,
Speaker 12: or visit Hughewitt dot com right now and click on
Speaker 12: the blue giving living Water banner at the top to
Speaker 12: provide living water today and thank you.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to Maerica. I'm Hugh Hewett. Mary Katherine Ham
Speaker 1: joins me, host of the Getting Hammered podcast and Fox
Speaker 1: News contributor, Mary Katherine, you really hit Paul Eric hard today.
Speaker 1: He was a villain. You said we should talk about
Speaker 1: Norman Borlog, but let's just pause to dance on the
Speaker 1: on the grave a little bit. That guy was wrong
Speaker 1: about everything.
Speaker 13: Forever well wrong about everything, and hurt people being wrong
Speaker 13: about it, and was never once sorry about how wrong
Speaker 13: he was. And I just think with people like Paul Aarl, like,
Speaker 13: I'm usually pretty nice unless you're an actual terrorist when
Speaker 13: you die, But like a lot of people made decisions
Speaker 13: based on this person's worldview that did not allow for
Speaker 13: the idea of human innovation at all, and a lot
Speaker 13: of people are sad because they made decisions based on
Speaker 13: that worldview. And that worldview was also used to bully
Speaker 13: a bunch of people with government policy and environmental wacko
Speaker 13: stuff to make all of our lives worse. And so
Speaker 13: I just I don't want to let that kind of
Speaker 13: person with that kind of scholarship so easily into elite
Speaker 13: conventional wisdom.
Speaker 2: Anymore, can we learn some lessons? Pleased?
Speaker 1: I appreciate it, Paul Air, like for the Steelers fans
Speaker 1: believe malth Is, like that the world was overpopulated and
Speaker 1: what's going to run out of resources? Wrong? Wrong? Wrong?
Speaker 1: Then you and Vic spent a lot of time on
Speaker 1: the oscars. They only reach seventy point nine million people.
Speaker 1: That's less than a presidential debate, because people would rather
Speaker 1: get their politics when people are really in politics as
Speaker 1: opposed to the movies. And the only movie I saw
Speaker 1: was Marty Supreme. I think they're dead. I think the
Speaker 1: oscars are dad. Mary Catherine, you may be the person
Speaker 1: who watched them.
Speaker 13: Well, I didn't even watch them. I was just reporting
Speaker 13: what I saw the next day.
Speaker 1: Okay. I got the impression that you had watched them.
Speaker 1: In my gosh, I did not think. Let's talk about
Speaker 1: something important. Let's talk about the Iranian women soccer team.
Speaker 1: They're being forced back because the terrorists are taken their
Speaker 1: families hostage. No one accept you and Vic had paid
Speaker 1: attention to this.
Speaker 13: I know, and I wish people would. I was saying
Speaker 13: at the Oscars perhaps someone could wear a pin for them.
Speaker 13: That's an ongoing crisis with specific women involved that we
Speaker 13: I'm sure in Hollywood alleged that they care deeply about
Speaker 13: women under oppression, while they pretend that we are all
Speaker 13: oppressed here in America under Donald Trump. It's shameful that
Speaker 13: no one talks about it, and it is a situation
Speaker 13: where I think some people don't understand. When you live
Speaker 13: under a totalitarian regime like in Iran, if you are
Speaker 13: able to get out, your family is subject to torture,
Speaker 13: to kidnapping, to awful punishments, to disappearing. They are under
Speaker 13: tremenous familial pressure and filial pressure to go back.
Speaker 2: Home to spare them that.
Speaker 13: But by the way, they'll be in trouble as soon
Speaker 13: as they get back home. It's a really awful situation,
Speaker 13: and I'm praying for them and praying that the Iranian
Speaker 13: people will soon be in a different position.
Speaker 1: Well. The one thing I think our government could do,
Speaker 1: and I hope Secretary of State Ribio does, is mark
Speaker 1: the names of the women who defected and then are
Speaker 1: coming back and say very clearly the Iranian regime when
Speaker 1: you fall, the people who are in charge of these girls,
Speaker 1: these women and their families will be marked and will
Speaker 1: be found, and if you mistreat them, you will be
Speaker 1: prosecuted and hung by the neck until dead, just like Nurremberg.
Speaker 1: That's all we can do, right, We could do that.
Speaker 2: We could do that.
Speaker 13: And the nice thing about the threat credibility of Donald
Speaker 13: Trump is that people might actually believe it.
Speaker 1: So yes, now, Mary Catherine, I began the show talking
Speaker 1: I Noah. I want to end it by asking you,
Speaker 1: I think we're winning. I think we're winning big. I
Speaker 1: don't say that point of view reflect that anywhere in
Speaker 1: the media, And I mean, really, we're really winning big, big, big.
Speaker 2: What do you think now?
Speaker 13: I think that the media has trouble covering military conflict.
Speaker 13: They don't like American might and military being used for
Speaker 13: basically any ends, so they don't want to cover tactical
Speaker 13: and operational victories as victories. Instead, they just focus on, well,
Speaker 13: there's risk, Well we don't know all that is true,
Speaker 13: there are always risks in conflict of this kind. But
Speaker 13: they're not dealing with or contextualizing any of this for
Speaker 13: people who'd actually like to understand it and how things
Speaker 13: are going on the ground or in the air, which
Speaker 13: is a pretty astounding victory on many fronts, including the
Speaker 13: continuing amazing intel from Israel that allows the striking of
Speaker 13: specific targets, which by the way, minimizes civilian targets or
Speaker 13: civilian casualties, and we end up taking out large parts
Speaker 13: of their higher ups, which is what can inspire people
Speaker 13: to actually come out of their house. You have Baby
Speaker 13: Yahoo telling the Iranian people we're watching from the skies
Speaker 13: for you.
Speaker 2: I mean, that's something else.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what I would love to see. You know, my daughter,
Speaker 1: you know, her husband is a flyboy who now sales ships.
Speaker 1: He's been in out of the war. He's not in
Speaker 1: the war right now, he's in the far side of
Speaker 1: the world. But I wish that we would celebrate these
Speaker 1: men and women in the fight. They're such extraordinary professionals.
Speaker 1: And I think you're the one who said, please make
Speaker 1: a friend in the was that you please make a
Speaker 1: friend in the military. Yes, please make a friend. We
Speaker 1: have no idea what they're doing. It's extraordinary.
Speaker 13: No, it's it's shameful that the press is so bad
Speaker 13: at this. The Surf and Turf was another great example
Speaker 13: of like, y'all don't know anyone you can call who's
Speaker 13: been in the military, who could tell you about this.
Speaker 13: I wish they did. I wish that more civilians knew
Speaker 13: more military folks. It is the beauty we have this
Speaker 13: beautiful volunteer force full of these amazing families who put
Speaker 13: so much on the line, and getting to know them
Speaker 13: will help you understand their lives and what they sacrifice
Speaker 13: for us. And the press is foremost in needing to
Speaker 13: do that. By the way, That's why I work with
Speaker 13: Travis Manning Foundation, because we make a lot of connections
Speaker 13: between civilian life and military.
Speaker 1: Life, and right now the civilians ought to be thinking
Speaker 1: about the military family next door and asking, especially if
Speaker 1: their wife or husband is deployed, can we give you
Speaker 1: a ride to school? Can we give you a meal?
Speaker 1: Let me close by doubling back to what you began
Speaker 1: with Saint Patrick's Day. Mary Catherine am if not Irish,
Speaker 1: this is a shock to everyone. She's English and she's
Speaker 1: completely Protestant. But your dad made a shamrock for you,
Speaker 1: and I want every dad to know that. Tell that story.
Speaker 13: So I was between five and seven, probably, and I
Speaker 13: remember being a little panicked in the morning of Saint
Speaker 13: Patrick's Day because I realized I didn't have anything green
Speaker 13: on and couldn't find anything, and my dad found somewhere
Speaker 13: a piece of felt the house and handcut this beautiful
Speaker 13: little shamrock and we pinned it on my shirt and
Speaker 13: I saved it for years. I probably could still find
Speaker 13: it somewhere around here, but it's just this little creative
Speaker 13: knickknack from when I was a child where my dad
Speaker 13: quickly solved a problem at six years old. I was like, Wow,
Speaker 13: how amazing is that? And I still think it's amazing
Speaker 13: and I appreciate it.
Speaker 1: It's been thirty five years and you're remembering what your
Speaker 1: dad did on Saint Patrick's Day. Is a message to
Speaker 1: dad's that everything they do every day matters. That's actually
Speaker 1: what I took away from that, Mary katherineham every day,
Speaker 1: what a dad does.
Speaker 2: Matters, it does.
Speaker 13: And there's nothing like having a good dad, and I
Speaker 13: have one.
Speaker 2: So I'm very thankful.
Speaker 1: Well said and a well produced episode The new Getting
Speaker 1: Hammered dropped. I will talk about corn, beef and cabbage
Speaker 1: in the Filipinos tomorrow with Vic Mattis.
Speaker 2: That was weird, but that's good.
Speaker 1: We'll do that tomorrow. Mary Katherine aam follow on Exit
Speaker 1: mk Hammer. Get getting hammered on, your like and subscribe.
Speaker 1: Playlist it's back. It's weekly, great fun, Stay tuned America.
Speaker 1: I'm dugious