You Have To Lead Me Up To Heaven By My Nipples?!

Summary

Armstrong & Getty On Demand – Episode Summary Episode: "You Have To Lead Me Up To Heaven By My Nipples?!"
Date: March 3, 2026
Hosts: Jack Armstrong & Joe Getty
Producer/Technical Director: Michael
Newswoman: Katie Rayner
Podcast Network: iHeart Podcasts

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Episode Overview

This episode centers on the dramatic power vacuum in Iran following a massive bombing that eliminated the country's Supreme Leader and much of its leadership. Jack and Joe delve into the geopolitical, ethical, and practical aftermath of this event, touching on American and global reactions, media portrayal of Iran's leadership, and the U.S. Congress's handling of war powers. As always, their commentary is laced with humor, skepticism toward mainstream media, and sharp asides about American governance.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Iran’s Brutal Leadership Vacuum

• Opening Segment ([00:16]–[01:38]): Joe and Jack recap that Iran’s Supreme Leader and the council responsible for choosing his successor have been wiped out in a bombing, leaving a massive power vacuum.

  • Joe Getty: "So they are all dead. As I saw someone on Twitter say, when they're choosing a pope, you look for white smoke. In this case, you see black smoke. There ain't going to be no supreme leader."
  • Jokes about who might be left to take charge—down to 'dog catchers' and 'assistant superintendents of parks.'

• Discussion on Trump’s Response ([01:57]–[05:25]): Audio clips of President Trump discussing the military actions taken against Iran, Germany’s support, and concerns about "the day after" for Iran.

  • Michael (Trump quote): "They have no navy, it's been knocked out. They have no air force, that's been knocked out... just about everything's been knocked out." ([01:57])
  • Talk of uncertainty about who could take charge in Iran after so many officials are dead.

• Risk of Replacement and Anarchy ([03:30]–[04:26]):

  • Michael (as Trump): "Most of the people we had in mind are dead... now we have another group, they may be dead also... pretty soon we're not going to know anybody." ([03:38])
  • Jack and Joe lampoon the possibility of completely unknown local officials or even librarians rising to power.

2. Post-Regime Collapse Lessons: Iraq & Nation-Building

• Chaos After Regime Change ([05:25]–[08:12]):
  • Joe draws parallels to post-invasion Iraq: no one to maintain basic order, leading to looting and chaos.
  • Joe Getty: "Garbage piling up in the streets... people just broke into the banks and stole all the money. It just was a complete anarchy."
• Jack Armstrong: "In chaos, in a vacuum, what is rewarded most richly is viciousness... which sounds to me like a fundamentalist Islamic sect."
• Discussion about the challenges of arming the secular Iranian populace to resist extremists.

3. The U.S. Dilemma: If You Break It, You Bought It?

• Responsibilities After Regime Toppling ([08:20]–[09:50]):
  • Talk on the "Pottery Barn rule"—if you break a country, are you now ethically responsible for fixing it?
  • Joe Getty: "We broke the government, so now we're done. We took them all out. Good luck."
  • Jack notes the need for some figure (e.g., the son of the Shah) to serve as a figurehead, but questions who would actually enforce order.
• They revisit the U.S. experience after invading Iraq—Al Qaeda, ISIS, and ongoing instability.

4. Debating Congressional War Powers & Accountability

• War of Choice vs. Imminent Threat? ([10:53]–[15:54]):
  • Jack and Joe question if the bombing and removal of Iran’s leadership constitutes a "war of choice," referencing the “imminent threat” doctrine cited by the administration.
  • Katie Rayner (on Congress): "The United States Congress is like male nipples... Why do you exist? What do you do? Nothing. You just sit there waiting for angels to grab you when we die." ([11:17])
  • Rubio clip: argues the U.S. acted preemptively to save American lives, not as a war of choice.
  • Debate over whether waiting for Congress to weigh in is practical, or just a way to avoid accountability.

5. Critique of U.S. Media and Western Coverage of Khamenei’s Death

• Western Media’s Obituaries ([17:14]–[21:55]):

  • Reading and critiquing media obituaries that paint Khamenei in a nuanced, even sympathetic, light.
  • Jack Armstrong: "Calling Khamenei a hardline cleric is akin to calling Hitler a hardline nationalist." ([19:10])
  • Details from NYT/Guardian/Washington Post focus on Khamenei’s poetry interests, with disgust from hosts at such whitewashing.
  • Joe Getty: "You shouldn't be complimenting evil people." ([19:26])

• Celebration Among Iranians Worldwide ([22:24]–[23:53]):

  • Discussing how Iranians at home and in diaspora celebrated Khamenei’s death while Western media softened his image.
  • Quoting Congresswoman Yasemin Ansari (first Iranian-American elected to Congress): "'Khamenei was the epitome of evil. For decades, he oversaw the torture, imprisonment and murder of countless Iranians who dared to demand freedom.'" ([23:41])

6. Skepticism Toward Legacy Media & News Reporting

• Failure of Bigfoot (Mainstream) Media ([25:09]–[26:58]):
  • Jack and Joe argue that younger generations have no trust in “legacy” media.
  • Accuse media of parroting propaganda, e.g., reporting claims of U.S. bombing schools from Iranian government sources.
  • Jack Armstrong: "We need to take a vow of just completely disregarding all of the traditional Bigfoot media." ([30:40])

7. Iran’s History of Proxy Violence and Atrocities

• Recap of Iranian Regime's Violence ([25:41]–[27:39]):
  • Listing Iran’s history of attacking U.S. and allies through proxies: Buenos Aires bombing, Khobar Towers, Beirut barracks, USS Cole, recent drone strikes.
• Discussion of the regime’s routine oppression, executions, and human rights abuses—contrasted with Western media “nuance.”

8. War Powers, Leadership, and Broken System

• Lord Acton's Dilemma ([28:16]–[29:46]):
  • Contemplation on whether war decisions should be solely the president’s domain or require more congressional oversight.
  • Joe Getty: "I don't know how you make that work, but the idea of one guy... probably shouldn’t be in one guy’s hands." ([28:50])
  • Cynicism about whether Congress is up to the job (“only sure bets”), or is primarily about fundraising.

9. Media Narratives & Propaganda

• Birthrate Story Skepticism ([30:17]–[30:51]):
  • Hosts mock ABC News for blaming declining U.S. birth rates solely on housing costs and inaccurate timelines.
  • Criticism of repeating enemy (Iranian) claims as news, particularly regarding alleged U.S. bombing of schools.
• Iranian Tactics with Human Shields ([33:34]–[33:55]):
  • Citing Iranian journalist: the regime evacuates military facilities and occupies schools/hospitals to provoke civilian casualties for propaganda.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Iran’s Leadership Vacuum
  "They're down to, like, dog catchers and the assistant superintendent of parks. I would imagine somebody at this point has got to raise their hand, say, I make a motion to vote by mail. I second it." – Jack Armstrong ([01:20])

• On Congress’ Role
  "The United States Congress is like male nipples. Why do you exist? What do you do? Nothing. You just sit there waiting for angels to grab you when we die." – Katie Rayner ([11:17])

• On Mainstream Media & Dictators
  "Calling Khamenei a hardline cleric is akin to calling Hitler a hardline nationalist." – Jack Armstrong ([19:10])
  "You shouldn't be complimenting evil people." – Joe Getty ([19:26])

• On U.S. Action in Iran
  "If you break it, you bought it." – Joe Getty ([08:37])

• On Media Reporting Iranian Claims
  "So you took the Iranian government's word for this and put it on the news like it's fact, even though they denied killing 30,000 people a month or so ago..." – Joe Getty ([31:17])

• Congresswoman Yasemin Ansari on Khamenei
  "'Khamenei was the epitome of evil. For decades, he oversaw the torture, imprisonment and murder of countless Iranians who dared to demand freedom.'" – cited by Jack Armstrong ([23:41], [33:55])

• Humor & Running Gags
  "You gotta lift me up to heaven by my nipples." – Jack Armstrong ([12:08])

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Important Timestamps

• [00:16] Iran’s leadership is wiped out; “no Supreme Leader” after the bombing
• [01:57] Trump on the state of Iran's military and leadership
• [03:38] "Most of the people we had in mind are dead..." – Discussion of who’s left to run Iran
• [05:25] Comparison to Iraq post-invasion, chaos and anarchy
• [08:37] “Pottery Barn rule” - ethical responsibility after regime change
• [11:17] Katie Rayner's “male nipples” analogy about Congress
• [14:34] Marco Rubio on “imminent threat” justification for U.S. action
• [17:14] Critique of Western media coverage of Khamenei’s death
• [23:41] Quoting Rep. Yasemin Ansari about Khamenei’s evil
• [25:41] List of Iran's history of terrorism and attacks on US interests
• [30:40] Jack's call to disregard legacy media
• [33:34] Iranian regime tactic of using schools and hospitals as shields

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Tone and Style

• Conversational, humorous, and irreverent
• Deep skepticism toward both U.S. government institutions (especially Congress) and mainstream media outlets
• Occasional dark humor and banter to punctuate serious geopolitical analysis

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Summary for the Uninitiated

If you missed this episode, you’ll find a mix of sharp criticism, historical context, policy analysis, and gallows humor. Armstrong and Getty digest the stunning elimination of Iran’s regime, the thorny ethical quandaries facing US policymakers, and the failures of both Congress and legacy media to provide honest leadership or coverage. Expect sharp asides, offbeat analogies, and a strong bias toward skepticism of both power and media.

Bottom Line: This is a masterclass in snarky but substantive geopolitics with little patience for official narratives and political inertia.

Transcript

[Jack Armstrong]

This is an iHeart podcast, guaranteed human broadcasting.

[Joe Getty]

Live from the Abraham Lincoln radio studio

[Jack Armstrong]

at the George Washington Broadcast Center, Jack Armstrong and Joe Getty. Armstrong and Getty.

[Joe Getty]

And now here's Armstrong and Getty. So some countries have a president, some have a prime minister, some have a king, some have a dictator. Iran had a supreme leader or Ayatollah since 1979. They had two of them. The one died in, what, 80 something. And then this guy that got obliterated Saturday had been in charge for Dang near 40 years. He was very old. And so Iran currently does not have a supreme leader. Well, they got together today to vote, tried to vote in secret. 88 members of whatever council they have got together to pick a new supreme leader. Apparently our CIA or Israel knew where they were. And, and we hit that building with so many bombs, there's nothing there but tiny rocks. So they are all dead. As, as I saw somebody on Twitter say when they're choosing a pope, you look for white smoke. They've chosen a pope. In this case, you see black smoke. There ain't going to be no supreme leader. They have not chosen the supreme leader because of the black smoke.

[Jack Armstrong]

As David Berg put it on X, the vote is deadlocked at zero. They're down to, like, dog catchers and the assistant superintendent of parks. I would imagine somebody at this point

[Joe Getty]

has got to raise their hand, say, I, I make a motion to vote by mail. I second it.

[Jack Armstrong]

Can we text each other? No, no, we've got to get together at the civic center. I ain't coming. Meanwhile, speaking of leadership, President Donald J. Trump is getting set to meet with Friedrich Mertz of Germany to discuss the whole situation here. We'll start with 65. Michael.

[Michael (Technical Director)]

We'll obviously be talking a little bit about Iran today, and he's been helping us out doing. We've been very nice, actually, and that is coming along, as you see, very well. They have no navy, it's been knocked out. They have no air force that's been knocked out. They have no air detection that's been knocked out. Their radar has been knocked out. And just about everything's been knocked out.

[Jack Armstrong]

But what of the German leader? What does he have to say?

[Joe Getty]

We are on the same page in terms of getting this terrible regime in Tehran away. And we will talk about the day after, what will happen then if they are out.

[Jack Armstrong]

Speaking of which, the assembled press was able to ask some questions of the president. And I don't think the reporter is included in this clip, but he asks, you know, we've talked about the best case. What's the worst case?

[Michael (Technical Director)]

I guess the worst case would be we do this and then somebody takes over who's as bad as the previous person.

[Marco Rubio]

Right.

[Michael (Technical Director)]

That could happen. We don't want that to happen. It would probably be the worst. You go through this and then in five years you realize you put somebody in who is no better. So we'd like to see somebody in there that's going to bring it back for the people and we'll see what happens with the people. You know, they have their chance and we've said don't do it yet. If you're going to go out and protest, don't do it yet. It's very dangerous out there. A lot of bombs are being dropped.

[Jack Armstrong]

And then the follow up to the question of who's going to take over.

[Joe Getty]

Do you have someone in mind right now?

[Jack Armstrong]

Because you said all the people you did have in mind have been taken out.

[Michael (Technical Director)]

Well, most of the people we had in mind are dead. So, you know, we had some in mind from that group that is is dead. And now we have another group, they may be dead also based on reports. So I guess you have a third wave coming in. Pretty soon we're not going to know anybody.

[Joe Getty]

Yeah, I gotta think that's already true. If you've got that first 40 and now this near 90, you gotta be down to people you don't have any info on.

[Jack Armstrong]

Well, there might be like a police chief of a medium sized suburb of Tehran who's now the highest ranked living official. Is he gonna announce? You know what, I'm looking around, there's nobody else. I, Chief Jones, am now the president of Iran.

[Joe Getty]

The librarian in Tehran Heights. Yeah. You're supreme leader now.

[Jack Armstrong]

I'm what? Great. You know. One more clip from Trump. This is pretty good. 69, Michael. Brand new, brand spanking. You got it.

[Joe Getty]

I'm excited about this.

[Jack Armstrong]

I'm looking and I don't see it.

[Michael (Technical Director)]

If I didn't do this, guys like Schumer who are losers, the Democrats, losers, That's why they're not here. Got guys like Schumer would say, well, you should have done this. In other words, if I did it, it's no good. If I didn't do it, they would have said the opposite, that you should have done this. But most people feel, I'll tell you what, I have never had more compliments on something I did. People felt it's something that had to be done. So if we have a little high oil prices for a little while but as soon as this ends, those prices are going to drop, I believe lower than even before.

[Joe Getty]

When Menachem Begin decided as prime Minister of Israel to hit the nuclear facility in Iraq, it was condemned by the world, including by the United States. Then years later, when things calmed down, we gave him the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah.

[Joe Getty]

For doing that. I think. I think this will go that direction. At what point, though? So the problem that. The thing that happened in Iraq was with deep bathification, where we just, We.

[Jack Armstrong]

We

[Joe Getty]

there. There was nobody in charge of anything yet. Garbage piling up in the streets. There was nobody to keep the electricity on. Nobody was watching the banks. People just broke into the banks and stole all the money. I mean, it just was a complete anarchy and chaos. So who's running Iran right now?

[Jack Armstrong]

Who's.

[Joe Getty]

Who's keeping even just a little bit of law and order and the. The lights on and the. The banks locked and all that sort of stuff?

[Jack Armstrong]

Well, that's a good question. This. It's like de Ba', athification, but it's not an administrative move. It's a. Bombs falling from the sky move. And, you know, in chaos, in a vacuum, what is rewarded most richly is viciousness.

[Joe Getty]

Oh, yeah.

[Jack Armstrong]

Cohesion and viciousness, which sounds to me like a fundamentalist Islamic sect. Unless the, The. The people of Iran, just the normal, you know, I just want to make a living and raise a family. Secular people of Iran can somehow get enough arms to fend them off and win the day, because they have much, much, much greater numbers. But that's not the question. In chaos.

[Joe Getty]

Yeah. And they don't have guns, as far as I know.

[Jack Armstrong]

Right. They gotta get some.

[Joe Getty]

They can't take on the Revolutionary Guard or whatever Muslim extremist group that tries to take over, because they don't all have guns like we have in the United States.

[Jack Armstrong]

Mm. And somebody says, hey, all right, the weapons depot is unguarded. Let's go get a bunch of weapons. I'm thinking, how about you go onto a military base right now and get those weapons? I'm staying here in my apartment. Yeah. Where this ends, nobody knows. And as Trump said, it could end up worse. We don't want that. But doing nothing was no longer tenable. He would tell you, and I think he was probably right, Man.

[Joe Getty]

If you've ever read the stuff about Baghdad in those early days, within. Within a couple of days, I mean, people had broken into the power plant and stolen all the copper wire out of it and everything like that, so you couldn't keep the lights On. I mean. And things fell apart really, really fast.

[Jack Armstrong]

Museums and people just grabbing unbelievable, priceless antiquities. Oh, look at that. It's the earliest ever known. What's it. So I'm taking this home, put it on my mantle. Unbelievable.

[Joe Getty]

So I. I don't quite understand how that's not happening in Tehran right now. What's keeping everything. What's keeping order? Is there any order? I. I don't actually know that.

[Jack Armstrong]

Here's a philosophical question for you. What would be an acceptable timeline for a reasonable, cooperative regime to take form? Realistically, if you told me 10 years, that would be a realistic goal.

[Joe Getty]

Okay, so what about the, you know, the. The colon. Powell. The Pottery Barn rules. The. If you break it, you bought it.

[Jack Armstrong]

Why?

[Joe Getty]

I've never quite understood that. So, I mean, I can under. I can make an ethical or moral argument, I guess, but we broke the government, so now we're just. We're done. We took them all out. Good luck. And then they just fight it out, I guess, right? Or hopefully don't fight it out. You don't have to fight it out. You could have somebody say, I'll be president until we have an election. Everybody thinks Jim's a good guy. And you let him be president until you have an election and you keep things running. You keep the schools open and the water flowing and everything.

[Jack Armstrong]

Old man Pavlovi, the son of the shah. I mean, he is an obvious figurehead, but he's gonna have to have goons. And who are those goons? Is it an international, quote, unquote, peacekeeping force? Is it the United States Marine Corps? Is it the vestiges of the Iranian army? But if they decide, you know what, I don't like the guy so much. You got, you know, I don't know, 3,000 guys with guns, and you decide, no, I don't like Pavlovi at all. What happens then? It's going to be violent and terrible, probably.

[Joe Getty]

Well, Iraq fell apart. Ask.

[Jack Armstrong]

Ask the residents of Tehran how violent and terrible it was under the old guys. Pretty effing is the answer.

[Joe Getty]

Iraq fell apart, and you ended up with Al Qaeda in Iraq and then ISIS and that. So that. That was an actual threat to the United States, especially as close to 911 as it was, we felt like. So we had to do something. Do we need to be in charge of Iran, or can we just let them all figure it out? Even with tremendous bloodshed? Is that our fault? They've had tremendous bloodshed. 30,000 innocent civilians got murdered on the street just a month ago.

[Jack Armstrong]

Right, Right. No easy answers.

[Joe Getty]

No. And not doing anything is not an easy answer.

[Jack Armstrong]

No. That's the lazy answer.

[Joe Getty]

That's the. It's really easy to keep you from having to deal with actual problems answer.

[Jack Armstrong]

Right. If you never do anything, you never answer for having done something. I get that. That's kind of the. It's Congresses. Somebody needs to translate that into Latin and make it the motto of Congress.

[Joe Getty]

So one of the.

[Jack Armstrong]

Do nothing and be condemned for nothing.

[Joe Getty]

So, yeah, no kidding. One of the conversations of the day is, was this an imminent threat? Marco Rubio's got his stance on it. Maybe we could play that for you, among other things. Coming up. Stay tuned.

[Jack Armstrong]

Armstrong and Getty. The House is set to vote on the War Powers Resolution on Thursday,

[Katie Rayner]

this coming Thursday. Thursday. Monday. Thursday. You're gonna vote Thursday. The war already started. I swear to God. The United States Congress is like male nipples.

[Joe Getty]

Why?

[Katie Rayner]

Why do you exist? What do you do? Nothing. You do nothing. You just sit there waiting for angels to grab you when we die.

[Joe Getty]

So.

[Jack Armstrong]

Wow, that's an interesting view of the afterlife. Ow, ow, ow. You know, you have an escalator on here or something? You gotta lift me up to heaven by my nipples.

[Joe Getty]

Well, so it's a Republican controlled Congress. Is that's why they're putting it off, so they don't have to deal with it?

[Jack Armstrong]

I have no idea. Or is that why they're rushing it to the floor, to rush the president? Or

[Joe Getty]

so Daily show last night, which was pretty funny, but he kept referring to it as a war of choice. So people that are criticizing this are calling it a war of choice. Our military analyst Jeff McCausland this morning earlier called it a war of choice on our show and denying that there is an imminent threat, which is what the administration is saying is that there is an imminent threat. So it's not a war of choice. The whole war of choice thing is, you know, kind of complicated.

[Jack Armstrong]

It is very eye of the beholder.

[Joe Getty]

It really is, as I was reading this morning, Abraham Lincoln. It was a war of choice to fight the South. Horace Greeley, famous newspaper publisher at the time. Go west, young man. That guy, Horace Greeley, I know more about him than most people do because I live near Greeley county, which is named after him, in the town of Horace, which is the county seat. So we all learn about Horace. But anyway, Horace Greeley was making the argument that there's a famous quote about letting the two ridiculous states go and, you know, make God, you know, enjoy. Maybe they enjoy God's. Wrath or something like that. Just let the two, two first two states that seceded, the secede don't go to war. So it was a war of choice to decide, no, I'm going to hold the union together. That was, that was the argument there and a number of situations over the years. So I don't, I don't know. I understand that if, like, you get bombed, it's obviously not a war of choice. You're at war now. It's. But the argument is Iran has been declared war on us 50 years ago, has killed more of our soldiers than anybody else in that amount of time, has chanted death to America over and over again. They have claimed that if they get a nuclear weapon, they'd wipe Israel off the map and attack the United States. And they're trying to get a nuclear weapon and won't stop.

[Jack Armstrong]

Right.

[Joe Getty]

So I don't know what point becomes not a war choice there. And then the whole imminent thing, how imminent was it? Marco Rubio, the secretary of State, spoke to that today.

[Marco Rubio]

There absolutely was an imminent threat. And the imminent threat was that we knew that if Iran was attacked, and we believe they would be attacked, that they would immediately come after us. And we were not going to sit there and absorb a blow before we responded because the Department of War assessed that if we did that, if we waited for them to hit us first after they were attacked by someone else, Israel attacked them, they hit us first, and we waited for them to hit us, we would suffer more casualties and more deaths. We went proactively in a defensive way to prevent them from inflicting higher damage. Had we not done so, there would have been hearings on Capitol Hill about how we knew that this was going to happen and we didn't act preemptively to prevent more casualties and more loss of life.

[Joe Getty]

That gets to the whole after nine, 11, you know, really going back, how did you miss this information and allow this to happen, that sort of thing?

[Jack Armstrong]

Speaking of Jeff McCausland, he characterized that reasoning as the tail wagging the dog because Israel was forcing our hand. I don't think that's accurate. I think we, the United States have wanted to get rid of the Iranian regime for a long time. Trump was serious about it and we agreed with and encouraged Israel. Now is a good time. So go ahead. It's half a, you know, it's not a dishonest argument exactly. Rubio's making, I would call it incomplete. I happen to agree with him. And what happened?

[Joe Getty]

Well, I'm further away from it. Than that even I don't think you need that to make the argument that, well, all the stuff I just said, they've been an enemy in the United States forever. They've killed lots of our people. They continue to try to kill our people, and they want to get a nuclear weapon.

[Jack Armstrong]

It's weird. In a really strange way, it reminds me of copyright laws in which if you don't defend your copyright this time, this time, this time, and this time when you defend it, the next time the judge is going to say, no, you haven't been defending it. It's not really a copyright. Well, it's as if we gave up the right to whack them hard when they kill our people over and over and over again. So now the left and some people on the right are saying, no, it's. They're not an imminent threat. We don't have a right to attack them because they attacked us, because we've let it go so many times, the

[Joe Getty]

weakest they'll ever be. It's the best chance we ever have to take out one of our biggest enemies on Earth. I'm fine with that calculation. I guess Congress will get involved on Thursday. Gonna give it a good four or five days to sink in before the vote on it or discuss it. And then maybe somewhat, at some point, does the Supreme Court have to weigh in on this, I wonder. The War Powers act and whether or not it was legal or illegal.

[Jack Armstrong]

They don't want any part of it.

[Joe Getty]

I'm sure

[Jack Armstrong]

Armstrong and Getty there.

[Katie Rayner]

He was martyred at 86. Man, are the virgins gonna be disappointed. I'm sorry, am I going too hard on Khamenei? Murderous dictator, like, who? Don't make fun of his erectile dysfunction. That's a bridge too far, Stuart. Guy mowed down his own people, but, you know, Viagra's a serious drug.

[Joe Getty]

He made another joke number of jokes on a daily show last night about the eye. I told him the crown has, like, grown a little bit. Like, oh, you're making fun of the

[Jack Armstrong]

austere cleric, the victim of Trump,

[Joe Getty]

as

[Jack Armstrong]

the free press puts it. I should give. Oh, Maya Sulkin, who I absolutely love that, you know, they crooked the ayatollah

[Joe Getty]

and they croaked him.

[Jack Armstrong]

I'm summarizing the first few sentences. For many Iranians, both in their country in the diaspora, it was a day of celebration. This man, a symbol of oppression for millions and a leader with blood of. The blood of tens of thousands of his own people on his hands, was gone.

[Joe Getty]

It's got to be hundreds of thousands through the years.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah, yeah, almost certainly. But some Western media outlets saw differently. In obituaries written about Khomeini Khamenei, excuses were made. His legacy was whitewashed, and nuance was introduced where none was necessary. And I'm tempted to steal the thunder of some of these headlines. No, I won't. I'll be disciplined. A New York Times headline described Khamenei as a hardline cleric who made Iran a regional power. As author Tim Urban put it on X, calling Khamenei a hardline cleric is akin to calling Hitler a hardline nationalist. And if building a network of terrorist proxies across the region, Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, and other minor groups can be described as statecraft, well, then, yes, Khamenei surely built Iran into a regional power.

[Joe Getty]

The problem is, you word it that way and it is a compliment. You shouldn't be complimenting evil people.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah, okay. I've lost my discipline. What's amazing here is they have this need to say we need to be balanced. We can't be pro American and anti the foreign dictator. We've got to be balanced. I've got a question for the editors of the New York Times. If Khamenei had been a Christian fundamentalist running some sect, right, whether in the United States or maybe they left the U.S. maybe they're in Guyana, where he would regularly have women tortured, raped, beaten, disfigured for running afoul of his.

[Joe Getty]

About murdering fundamentalists and trans people.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Slaughtering them in the name of his religion over and over again, would you say? On the other hand, the cafeteria was kept very clean and we're told the food was of high quality.

[Joe Getty]

No.

[Jack Armstrong]

You would gush out venom into gallons. God dang it, these people make me insane.

[Joe Getty]

I know, as I said to somebody over the weekend, they can't help themselves. When I was reading from the Washington Post version where they talked about how he loved poetry and Les Mis.

[Jack Armstrong]

Oh, yeah, we're getting to that one. The Times went on to describe, his leadership style is characterized by his avuncular and magnanimous aloofness above the jousting of daily politics. Which is a strange way to describe a man who personally oversaw the massacres of many thousands, thousands of his countrymen. After critics blasted the obituary, the Times PR team went into a defensive crouch, taking to X to accuse detractors of trying to quote dishonestly score points. The Washington Post wasn't much better, assuring its readers that under Khamenei Iran did not seek to destroy the Jewish state militarily. He merely sought its dissolution through popular referendum. How they reached this conclusion when the Ayatollah's X feed dished out post after post repeatedly describing Israel as cancerous tumor in the Middle east and assuring his followers that Zionism was always close to implosion. How they came to that conclusion is a mystery. Across the pond, the Guardian took us on a literary tour of the man's inner life. His love of Victor Hugo's Les Miserables, his fondness for Persian poetry, and his mother's affection for the poet. Hafez Khamenei, we learned, was an average reader of Western literature, including Uncle Tom's Cabin and the Graves of Wrath. It read more like the obituary of a bookish scholar rather than a man who ordered the imprisonment, torture and execution of his own people.

[Joe Getty]

That is disgusting.

[Jack Armstrong]

It is not only disgusting, it's all you need to diagnose a mental illness among these so called journalists.

[Joe Getty]

So a buddy of mine sent me the Washington Post version and said, and they wonder why nobody reads them anymore. And they lost so much money they had to, you know, fire the entire sports department and bring in their international correspondence. This sort of crap, right? They haven't.

[Jack Armstrong]

The brainwashing is so amazing and complete. For instance, Maya points out, while these gentle obituaries were being drafted in newsrooms across New York, Washington and London, something else was happening. Iranians poured into the streets not to mourn, but to celebrate. For 47 years, they'd lived under a regime that imprisoned women for showing their hair, hanged gay men from cranes in public squares, executed political prisoners by the thousands, tortured dissidents in Evan Prison, the notorious the Tehran facility, where rape and psychological torture were standard practice. And they treated the most basic human rights to speak, to dress, to practice religion freely as crimes punishable by death. In la, home to the largest Iranian community outside of Iran, a community built by people who fled the Khamenei regime, crowds gathered outside the Wilshire Federal Building waving Iranian, American and Israeli flags. They chanted, freedom for Iran and do more or no more. Ayatollah Arizona Congresswoman Yasemin Ansari, the first Iranian American elected to Congress, said simply, quote, khamenei was the epitome of evil. For decades, he oversaw the torture, imprisonment and murder of countless Iranians who dared to demand freedom. It's sickening how twisted these editors are.

[Joe Getty]

I hadn't heard that quote. I didn't know we had an Iran American in Congress. I wonder how she gets along With Rashida Tlaib who over the weekend said, remember I read that thing yesterday where she said Israel and the United States just blah, blah, blah. This is who they are. With the response to a lot of people being they. You refer to the United States as they and obviously this is a bad thing. So the Iranian American cheers it. The Muslim of a different stripe, Palestinian I believe. Oh, that's right, yeah. Who hates America and hates Israel. But they don't get along like in a different kind of level of, you know, I think we need higher taxes. I mean, don't get along like they each wish the other one was dead

[Jack Armstrong]

and might do something about it given the chance. Yeah, I would agree with. It's, it's both good and bad that the Bigfoot media have completely lost their sway over American Life. And in 20 years what's that going to look like? Well, they're either going to wake up, get sane and get smart or they will go away.

[Joe Getty]

I don't think there's any coming back. You got to be practically our age to have any respect for words like Washington Post and New York Times and CBS Evening News. If you're much younger than 45, 50, you never grew up with it having any power. It doesn't mean anything to my kids at all. Those, those phrases I just said. So there's no bringing it back. You'd have to create it out of whole cloth and earn it 100% because you don't have any of the legacy name for the younger crowd.

[Jack Armstrong]

I want to squeeze this in now and then. I want to do it again early in the show tomorrow. Somebody remind me because I'll forget. But just very briefly, the Khomeini, then Khamenei regime. In November of 79 there was the taking of the American hostages held for 444 days. Famously 1994, bomb laden van driven into a Jewish community in Buenos aires, Argentina. Killed 85, injured over 300. Deadliest terrorist attack in Argentine history. Worst attack against Jews since the Holocaust. It was Iran and Hezbollah. Two years later, the bombing of the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia killed 19 US service members linked to another Iranian back group. Then there was the attack on the USS Cole, blah blah blah and, and

[Joe Getty]

at times root bombing somehow with all the dead Marines. 300, yeah, where the hell is that? That was in the 80s.

[Jack Armstrong]

That's funny. In 1983, right? 82 or 83, yeah. Oh, I'm sorry. Well anyway, blah, blah, blah blah blah. The attack on the USS Cole, Al Qaeda seizing of a Navy ship humiliating American sailors in 2016, forcing them to kneel, crying before Iranian forces. You remember that one?

[Joe Getty]

Yeah.

[Jack Armstrong]

Five days later, President Obama sent $400 million to Iran, by the way, to try to buy their friendship. Under Khamenee's watch, roughly 180 attacks on Western forces took place in the region after October 7, 2023. 180, including a drone strike on a base in Jordan that killed three Americans. All part of Iran's plan to spread terror and violence throughout the Middle East. And then they go into some of the details of Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, the rest of it. Then the delightful history of beating, torturing, and raping women for running afoul of their. Their. Their awful, plain clothes religious police.

[Joe Getty]

We had a guest on earlier today. I won't belabor it by bringing up his name, but he said, well, there are lots of bad countries out there, not that are attacking us on a regular basis. North Korea is a bad country. Give me an example of when North Korea's killed multiple Americans over and over and over again.

[Jack Armstrong]

Right, right. It was a bad argument and a weak one. Yeah. Just a vicious, brutal, horrifying regime that exported their ugliness and horror and killed our guys over and over and over again.

[Joe Getty]

So I am a believer that it's odd that one guy gets to make the decision whether we do something about that or not. And we need to figure that out, a better system for that. I don't know exactly what it is. I don't know how realistic it would be to take it to Congress, get a vote, go through all that and then strike. I don't know. I really don't know. And I don't think Congress would ever vote for anything because nobody wants their. Nobody has the guts to have their name attached to a vote to do anything.

[Jack Armstrong]

Right. Only sure bets. I don't know.

[Joe Getty]

I don't know how you make that work, but the idea of one guy Trump could have, well, like Barack Obama did, you know, red line with Syria, international laws, you can't use chemical weapons. We draw a red line, Syria uses chemical weapons, and Barack Obama goes for a walk in the garden and decides, nah, we'll let it slide. Which led to, I think, Ukraine and all kinds of other things. But, yeah, I don't know. It probably shouldn't be in one guy's hands, but that's up to Congress. You know, get together, vote, have a discussion. Legislative.

[Jack Armstrong]

That is a hell of a hard question.

[Joe Getty]

And I'd say, which is, I guess, what we'll be Discussing on Thursday when Congress finally does get together and discusses the War Powers Act. God, will that be anything close to the way government's supposed to look? Or will it just be the usual for TV partisan nonsense?

[Jack Armstrong]

Fundraising.

[Joe Getty]

Fundraising. I'm not optimistic. Anywho, we'll finish strong next, Armstrong and Gettysburg. The latest statistics show the average American woman having 1.6 children over the course of her lifetime, well below the so called replacement rate of 2.1 needed to keep the population stable. The Decline began in 2007 with the Great Recession. Now as then, a lack of affordable housing has some women stepping back from childbearing, at least for now.

[Jack Armstrong]

Oh my God.

[Joe Getty]

What? That's ABC News. One claiming the declining birth rate just started in 2008. That's bull. And second, that it's because of expensive housing.

[Katie Rayner]

Oh my God.

[Joe Getty]

What's the point of even watching or reading news?

[Jack Armstrong]

I said this the other day, we need to take a vow of just completely disregarding all of the traditional Bigfoot media. From here on out, never watch them, never mention them. I mean, that's laughable.

[Joe Getty]

Well, that's.

[Jack Armstrong]

Every word of that was dishonest or inaccurate. There's. It's. Give us a report on talking turtles next. Or you know your buddy who has magical powers.

[Joe Getty]

ABC News, which was the leader over the weekend on reporting that the United states had killed 60 schoolchildren by bombing a school in Iran. Where did that story go? I haven't heard about it hardly since.

[Jack Armstrong]

That's odd.

[Joe Getty]

Lots of people were reporting at the time. I thought it was horrific. And then they said according to the Iranian Defense Department. So you took the Iranian government's word for this and put it on the news like it's fact, even though they denied killing 30,000 people a month or so ago, even though the whole world knows they did so. The same people that lied about that, you take their word for it here. Well, I just came across this from an Iranian journalist. I can't believe I didn't think about this. My. Does this tactic sound familiar? Hamas, Hezbollah, where do you think they learned this from the Iranians? His Iranian journalist saying, for years we've been shouting that Hamas takes its orders for Khomeini and that their playbook has always been to hold their meetings or fire rockets from schools or hospitals so that they can make these claims. Well, of course they're turning schools into barracks, using children as human shields to protect themselves. It's the. They invented this playbook.

[Jack Armstrong]

Don't fall for it.

[Joe Getty]

Of course. Nice job, ABC boy.

[Jack Armstrong]

In the Difficult to penetrate veil of. Instead of calling Hezbollah the, you know, Iranian army, we call them Hezbollah or Hamas when they're like three miles down the road or the Houthis or whatever. All of our guys on our bases all over the world are American soldiers and we acknowledge that. But yeah, they're all the same.

[Joe Getty]

Check your clock.

[Jack Armstrong]

It's time to stop Jack and Joe.

[Michael (Technical Director)]

They've gotta go.

[Jack Armstrong]

And if they don't, you can. They'll be back tomorrow.

[Joe Getty]

Here's your host for final thoughts, Joe Getty.

[Jack Armstrong]

Let's get a final thought from everybody on the crew to wrap things up for the day. There he is, our technical director, Michelangelo, pressing the buttons. Michael, what's your final thought? Yeah, if you're ambitious and you're willing to move, there's a lot of government jobs opening up in Iran. So I'm just. Just saying, yeah, yeah, good benefits, but a little explodey. Katie Rayner, esteemed newswoman, has a final thought. Katie, I believe it was you, Joe, who paints such pictures with words. And now I will forever picture men being dragged to heaven by their nipples. Yeah, I'm converting to whatever religion doesn't have that. Jack, a final thought for us.

[Joe Getty]

Just to follow up with this Iranian journalist in case you hear another story that could happen this afternoon of us bombing a hospital or a school. Multiple reports indicate that many military and security centers across Iranian cities have been evacuated with forces and equipment relocated into schools and hospitals. They are turning these places into barracks and using children and patients as human shields.

[Jack Armstrong]

Of course they are. My final thought, I will cede to Congresswoman Yasmine Ansari of Arizona, first Iranian American elected to Congress. Khamenei was the epitome of evil. For decades, he oversaw the torture, imprisonment and murder of countless Iranians who dared to demand freedom. There's your hero. New York Times. Yay.

[Joe Getty]

Armstrong and Getty wrapping up another grueling four hour workday.

[Jack Armstrong]

So many people to thank, so little time. Go to armstrongandgetty.com for the many pleasures that await you there. The hot links. Katie's Corner. Drop us a note, download the podcast, pick up some ang swag. I, Joe Getty, co host and currently wearing the Ruin the entire country newsome 2028 t shirt. You can own one too. Armstrongandgetty.com the Ang store.

[Joe Getty]

It's a pretty funny notion. Who knows what's gonna happen in the next 24 hours? It'll be crazy. And you'll join us, won't you? See you then. God bless America. Armstrong and Getty.

[Jack Armstrong]

There's a fantastic podcast that you gotta listen to every day. It's got Jack and Joe, Katie and Michelangelo. It's called Armstrong and Getty on Demand. Subscribe now wherever you download your podcast. Armstrong and Getty on Demand. Armstrong and Getty.

[Joe Getty]

This is an I heart podcast, guaranteed human.