Trump vs. Mark Kelly... War Crimes, Venezuela and Blowback (G&R 443)

Summary

Podcast Summary

Green & Red: Podcasts for Scrappy Radicals

Episode 443: Trump vs. Mark Kelly... War Crimes, Venezuela and Blowback
Hosts: Bob Buzzanco and Scott Parkin
Date: December 2, 2025

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Overview

In this incisive episode, Bob Buzzanco and Scott Parkin delve into the interwoven crises and scandals enveloping the Trump administration’s military policy, recent alleged war crimes, and the political and human blowback stemming from decades of U.S. foreign interventions. The discussion pivots around three major current events: the war crime allegations in the Caribbean, the sharp conflict between Trump (and his Secretary of War Pete Hegseth) and elements of the U.S. military, and a tragic shooting in D.C. by an Afghan former CIA-backed operative. The hosts critically assess the implications for U.S. politics, military ethics, and the fraught history of American imperial ventures.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Trump, Hegseth, and Military Tensions

• Military Purge and Discontent:

  • Bob explains that over two dozen high-ranking military officials, particularly those associated with former Joint Chiefs Chair Mark Milley, have been fired since Trump and Hegseth took charge.
  • “It's very clear that Hegseth is... reviled within most quarters of the Pentagon since Trump and Hegseth have taken over...” (02:11)

• Department of War & Internal Military Resistance:

  • Recent renaming spectacles and public chiding of the military by the administration are causing “cracks” and profound unease within military circles.

• Firing of Admiral Alvin Halsey:

  • Halsey, head of Southern Command, likely removed due to misgivings about U.S. operations around Venezuela, alleged “drug war” justifications, and unauthorized violence in the Caribbean (03:10–04:10).
  • “None from—there’s no record of any fentanyl coming in from Venezuela... this is about oil and trying to get rid of Maduro.” (04:10)

• Dismissal of Naval Academy Commandant:

  • Early termination of Captain Gilbert Clark, possibly to disrupt ethical and legal military training norms.

2. The Double Tap War Crime Allegation

• Incident Details:

  • On September 2, a U.S. military boat attacked a vessel near Trinidad, and then allegedly returned to kill survivors on Hegseth’s order (“double tap”) (04:40–06:00).
  • Trump administration's tone is proudly unapologetic: “They doubled down. ‘Yeah, I did it. So what?’” (03:34).

• Context & Coverup:

  • The killings are defended instead of denied, with the administration justifying them as anti-narcotics operations—a claim both hosts ridicule as false.

• Rules of War and Accountability:

  • The show details the basic premise that soldiers must refuse illegal orders, a point underscored by a viral video from Senators Mark Kelly, Elise Slotkin, and others urging military personnel to uphold their oaths (06:52–09:26).

3. The Kelly/Slotkin Video and Trump’s Threats

• Video Contents:

  • Democratic officials issue a direct message to military personnel: “You must refuse illegal orders. No one has to carry out orders that violate the law or our Constitution.” (08:56)
  • Trump’s reaction: calls for public execution, labeling their statement as “seditious conspiracy” (07:55).

• Political Fallout:

  • Threats to reactivate Mark Kelly for court martial, though hosts see this as “zero percent chance”—more political theater than imminent risk (11:30).

• Kelly’s Profile Rises:

  • Being targeted by Trump boosts Kelly’s political fortunes and fundraising, with speculation about a 2028 presidential run (12:08–12:49).
  • “Getting attacked by Trump is actually good for your political career. Right.” (12:50)

4. Congressional and Political Realignments

• Bipartisan Reactions:

  • Figures like Roger Wicker (R), Mike Turner (R), Mike Rogers (R), Jack Reed (D), Rand Paul (R), and even Marjorie Taylor Greene (R) break with Trump over the Venezuela operation and military conduct.
  • “Rand Paul, more than anybody—even more than Bernie Sanders—has been very outspoken on Trump and Venezuela and Hegseth.” (14:50)

• Republican Coalition Fraying:

  • Hosts note increasing public dissent within the GOP, especially regarding war crimes and overseas adventures (15:50–16:30).

5. Legal and Historical Rules of War

• Universal Code of Military Justice (UCMJ):

  • Discussion of how the law (and military culture) codifies refusal of illegal orders and prohibits targeting civilians or surrendering combatants (16:20).

• Historical Examples:

  • Reminders of infamous incidents from Vietnam (My Lai, Tiger Battalion, Phoenix Program), Iraq, Afghanistan, and WWII.

• Modern Realities:

  • Hosts argue the “rules of war” mean little as state actors circumvent or brush them aside, referencing recent Israeli actions and U.S. behavior (16:20–17:36).

6. Blowback and the D.C. Shooting

• Details of the Shooting:

  • Recent killing of a National Guard member in D.C. by an Afghan ex-Zero Unit squad member, once a CIA-backed child soldier now tormented by trauma and substance abuse (20:35–22:48).
  • “I can’t think of a more obvious example of blowback in recent days than what has happened with this shooting.” (21:57)

• Blowback as a Recurring Theme:

  • CIA “Zero units” in Afghanistan, U.S. legacy of creating and importing traumatized, dangerous operatives.
  • Hosts cite other recent instances of ex-U.S.-backed Afghans involved in violence in America, part of a broader pattern (24:53).

• Domestic Political Exploitation:

  • Trump and allies immediately use the incident to justify anti-immigrant measures, inflame Islamophobic rhetoric, and press for expanded military deployments in American cities (29:15).

7. Political Violence and Incitement

• Escalating Rhetoric:

  • Trump’s pattern of violent language and distraction tactics, e.g., attacking Somali Americans, mocking political opponents on personal grounds.
  • “Trump incites violence every time he opens his mouth. And that to me is, if there’s one issue here... all he has... is violence.” (33:20)

• Systemic Incompetence and Bureaucratic Leaks:

  • Discussion of leaks undermining Hegseth, Kash Patel, and Kristi Noem, revealing inner disarray in the Trump administration.

8. Broader Implications and Realignment

• Political Opportunity:

  • The hosts emphasize the lack of effective organized opposition from mainstream Democrats; real vulnerability for Trump comes from protests in the streets and cracks within the military and Republican ranks (35:58).

• Populist Cross-Currents:

  • Figures as diverse as Marjorie Taylor Greene and Zohran Mamdani evoke “America First” rhetoric with a populist (sometimes anti-imperial/left) twist—highlighting how anti-war and anti-austerity themes can unite unlikely political actors.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “Americans trust their military, but that trust is at risk. This administration is pitting our uniformed military and intelligence community professionals against American citizens like us.” – Mark Kelly & co., [08:30]
• “You must refuse illegal orders. No one has to carry out orders that violate the law or our Constitution.” – Mark Kelly & co., [08:56]
• “Trump called for public execution... said they should be hanged. There should be public executions.” – Scott, [07:57]
• “Getting attacked by Trump is actually good for your political career.” – Bob, [12:50]
• “Trump's basic argument now is if the President says it, then it's not illegal. It's the old Nixon argument on steroids.” – Bob, [17:03]
• “It’s a clown car. Except they got a lot of power and they're hurting a lot of people.” – Bob, [19:02]
• “I can't think of a more obvious example of blowback in recent days than what has happened with this shooting.” – Scott, [21:57]
• “This country is getting scarier and more violent by the day.” – Bob, [29:15]
• “Trump incites violence every time he opens his mouth...” – Bob, [33:41]

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Timeline & Timestamps of Core Segments

• 00:24–02:15: Introductions; Trump, Hegseth, and military infighting.
• 03:10–04:10: Venezuela, Halsey firing, and fraudulent “drug war” justifications.
• 06:55–09:26: Kelly/Slotkin video, its contents, and immediate right-wing backlash.
• 11:30–12:50: Trump’s threats of court martial and Kelly’s rising political capital.
• 14:35–15:50: Emerging bipartisan criticism and Republican fractures.
• 16:20–17:36: Rules of military justice; historic atrocity cases.
• 20:35–22:48: D.C. shooting by ex-CIA Afghan paramilitary, explained as blowback.
• 24:53–26:32: Other cases of CIA-backed foreign operatives engaging in violence in the US; historical parallels.
• 29:15–31:26: Gun violence; Trump’s responses to the D.C. shooting; further militarization.
• 33:16–34:41: Trump’s violent rhetoric analyzed.
• 35:58–38:24: Systemic opposition to Trump; anti-imperial populism crossing partisan lines.
• 38:56–41:45: Wrap-up; future shows will revisit these unfolding events.

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Conclusion

This wide-ranging episode dissects the cascading crises set off by the current administration’s militaristic policies, the exposure of war crimes and extrajudicial violence, and the dangerous, inciteful rhetoric of Trump and his allies. With a blend of historical perspective and contemporary analysis, Buzzanco and Parkin stitch together the ways these threads—illegal orders, political careerism, the legacy of blowback, and shifting party alignments—all portend a volatile period for U.S. politics and society. The show maintains its signature radical, acerbic tone, calling out both governmental hypocrisy and failures of mainstream opposition.

Final Takeaway:
The empire’s violence abroad inevitably comes home, and the cracks in the military, political parties, and American society are deepening under the weight of these self-inflicted crises.

Transcript

[A]

Welcome to Green and Red Scrappy Politics for Scrappy People, a regular podcast on radical environmental and anti capitalist politics. Brought to you by Bob Bozanko and Scott Parkins.

[B]

Welcome to the silky smooth Sounds of Free and Red podcast. I'm your co host Scott Parkin in Berkeley, California. And as always, I am joined by.

[A]

Bob Bozenko in Niles, Ohio. Today we're going to return to one of our favorite themes. Trump and the military are fighting. These kids that can't get along, they're always fighting. Maybe they need some good Christian counseling.

[B]

Yeah, exactly. This is like three, we're going to talk about three big interrelated stories today. This is very much in our wheelhouse. Bob has written on this extensively. He wrote a book on it. And then it's also a field which I've done some study as well. We're going to be talking about the recent controversy where Senator Mark Kelly and Elisa Slotkin and and other members of Congress were produced a video telling military members to refuse illegal orders, which sparked a very intense response from Donald Trump and Pete Hegseth. Other story is this one that's still blowing up right now, which is around Pete Hegseth allegedly giving the double PAP order on a boat that had been hit near Trinidad and then they circled back around to take out the survivors. And then we'll also talk about the DC shooting by this Afghan former member of a Zero squad, which was a CIA backed death squad that had worked in Afghanistan and had been evacuated after the fall of Afghanistan in 8-20-21. Blowback. Blowback. So we'll be talking a little bit about blowback and maybe potential blowback.

[A]

Yeah, just a little bit. And we've talked about this so many times. It's very clear that Trump and Hegseth in particular don't have the warmest working relationship with the military. We had a show.

[B]

When was that?

[A]

Like two, three months ago when they had that spec. We did a couple actually when they renamed it to the Department of War. And then when they had that spectacle where they flew all the generals and admirals in to scold them and tell them that it was their job to go out in the streets of America and suppress people and, and things like that. And it's very clear that Hegseth is not to say he's not liked is obviously an understatement. He's pretty, I think, I would assume, reviled within most quarters of the Pentagon since Trump and Hegseth have taken over. And what is that, nine months now, over two dozen Top ranking military officials, generals and admirals have been fired by. By Trump. The initial group included people who had worked closely with Mark Milley, who had been the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who we've talked about quite a bit, who Trump despises. So anyone associated with Millie really was at risk. There's a one general named James Patrick Work who was in line to become the leader of Central Command CentCom, which oversees the Middle east. And that appointment never happened because of his association with Milley. But the two, I think within, with within the context of the three things you mentioned, especially like Venezuela, who are useful to talk about right now are Admiral Alvin Holsey. Halsey was the commander of Southern Command, which includes the Caribbean, and he was either, he claims retired, but in mid October. And that date becomes even more important now that we know about Hegseth's double cap order of September 2nd. I don't even know. Do we have to say it's alleged? Because they're defending it. They're not claiming it didn't happen. They're just defending it.

[B]

Yeah, that's true. I was trying to be tough.

[A]

I'm not giving you a hard time. I was just saying, these guys, you don't even have to use that gun because they just. They doubled down. Yeah, I did it. So what? But he either. He was probably fired and reports came out at the time that he was concerned about what the United States was doing in the Caribbean with regard to these contrived ideas about a drug war in Venezuela. There have been multiple government investigations into this. Fentanyl comes from Mexico. None from. There's no record of any fentanyl coming in from Venezuela. Venezuela, I suspect, may have some transshipment of drugs never been linked to the drug trade.

[B]

It should be noted that some of the national leadership of some countries in Central and South America which actually are linked to the drug trade, particularly in Ecuador and perhaps the return of some leadership in Honduras. They have been linked, as are the actual narco states, not Venezuela.

[A]

And we'll point out, and I think we know, right, Trump just pardoned ex president of Honduras who was responsible. What is it, 400 tons of cocaine coming into the.

[B]

Juan Orlando Hernandez, he said that we're gonna, we're gonna, we're gonna stick that cocaine right up the gringo's nose.

[A]

So that's years ago, one of the Callistas said that cocaine is an atomic bomb aimed at the United States. Their point was always like, hey, why don't you deal with Americans who are using this stuff rather than trying to subvert us. But that has nothing. This has nothing to do with drugs. This is about oil and trying to get rid of Maduro, just like they tried to get rid of Chavez and anybody else who doesn't play by their rules. So Halsey, and at the time it was reported that he had misgivings about what Trump was doing. They've executed what, like 80 people now, I think on these boats, they claim they're narcos. Even if they were there in motorboats, you can't. The boats aren't going to make it to Florida. They don't have enough gas to make it to Florida. It's preposterous. Right. They're doing it in the Pacific now. These are just extrajudicial killings. These are war crimes. And we're going to get to that because that's the kind of the crux of this Anyway. So Halsey retired, but actually I think was pushed out in mid October and then. And this is not as much of as much consequence, but I think it's important because just recently, I think like a week or so ago, the commandant of the US Naval Academy, Captain Gilbert Clark, was fired less than six months into the job. And the Naval Academy is also responsible for training. And I've been around military officials quite a bit. I spent a lot of time, especially with back when I was doing my original research with Naval officers at the Marine Corps historical offices, I used to go to lunch at the Navy Yard quite a bit and sit at tables with these guys and chat with them. A lot of them take that kind of oath fairly seriously. Like they're not, like they're willing to go out and kill people, but they actually, I've heard them speak and if you read their internal memos, that's just how they train people. And so it's not. There's no link to it made publicly, but I wouldn't be surprised. It's like they're just basically don't want this guy at the Naval Academy. They don't want the Naval Academy teaching soldiers like the universal code of military justice, which is important. So he was just fired, too. So this has been going on already. There's been this ongoing battle. And then I think the most recent upsurge occurs because of what you just pointed out. On September 2, there was an incident. The US attacked a boat. There were two survivors. Hegseth sort of were kill them. And they went back and they killed these two folks. Right. That only recently came out. Right. Almost three months later. And there's been enough war. Now, amid that, we had this public display by Mark Kelly and Elise Slotkin and four others, Jason Crow, Goodlander, Houlihan and Deluzio. I think it doesn't matter who are Democratic officials. Slok and Kelly obviously are senators. Kelly is very well regarded. He has a long career. And they put out a video on Twitter and in other places and I think we're going to play that. I think that'll come on after this where they said that it was a message to active duty military personnel saying you are not obliged to obey illegal orders and in fact, you are obligated to reject, not, not accept illegal orders. And this created a firestorm, obviously, with Laura Loomer and Hegseth and Megyn Kelly and all the talking heads.

[B]

Trump. Trump called for public execution.

[A]

Public, yeah, he called a seditious conspiracy. Trump said they should be hanged. There should be public executions.

[B]

And play that video.

[A]

I'm Senator Alyssa Slotkin. Senator Mark Kelly, Representative Chris d', Aluzio.

[B]

Congresswoman Maggie Goodlander, Representative Chrissy Houlahan, Congressman Jason Crow.

[A]

I was a captain in the United States Navy, former CIA office, former Navy, former paratrooper and Army Ranger, former intelligence.

[B]

Officer, former Air Force.

[A]

We want to speak directly to members of the military and the intelligence community who take risks each day to keep Americans safe.

[B]

We know you are under enormous stress.

[A]

And pressure right now. Americans trust their military, but that trust is at risk. This administration is pitting our uniformed military and intelligence community professionals against American citizens like us. You all swore an oath to protect.

[B]

And defend this Constitution.

[A]

Right now, the threats to our Constitution aren't just coming from abroad, but from right here at home. Our laws are clear. You can refuse illegal orders.

[B]

You can refuse illegal orders.

[A]

You must refuse illegal orders. No one has to carry out orders that violate the law or our Constitution. We know this is hard and that it's a difficult time to be a public servant. But whether you're serving in the of state, CIA, the army, our Navy, the Air Force, your vigilance is critical. And know that we have your back because now more than ever, the American people need you.

[B]

We need you to stand up for.

[A]

Our laws, our Constitution, and who we are as Americans. Don't give up. Don't give up. Don't give up. Don't give up.

[B]

The ship.

[A]

A little bit about this from again, studying and talking to tons of. When I began doing this many years ago, I was initially talking to people who had been active in Veterans for Peace and gis United against the War and vvaw in particular, a lot of stories about stuff like this. Given famous example, that would be Eli. But in Vietnam, it was common, right? To get to the nuts of it all, which is pretty simple, right? You are not allowed obey illegal orders. You're not allowed to kill civilians, not allowed to engage in atrocities or anything like that, right? And to a large degree, that's how Hegseth and Chuck City cases from Afghanistan and the other battle fronts in the Middle East. One involves somebody named. Was it Goldstein? Another one named Gallagher, civilians in Afghanistan. And it's funny, in Goldstein's particular case, he had been stripped, I think, of his Silver Star and for forced to retire. But he kept complaining about it so much that the army launched an investigation and actually was going to court martial him for murdering a civilian. Like Hegseth, he didn't say, no, I never did it. He said, yeah, I did it. I thought this guy was a threat. He was a civilian, right? And Hegseth intervened with Trump to get pardons. For several people like this, Goldstein, I think, is the best known. Gallagher is also very one of them.

[B]

In the first, in the first term, when Hegath was just a Fox News host, he was Fox News.

[A]

He was on Fox News, right? He was just a. I was gonna say he was a nobody, but I'm not sure. He's just somebody. He was just this drunken, abusive Fox News host, not the abusive, drunken Secretary of Defense, Secretary of War, whatever he wants to call it. So they go back on these issues, too. If you watch the video, it's actually really boilerplate stuff, which everybody at the military academy, everybody at the Naval Academy, every soldier who's sworn in has in the oath, right? Swearing oath to the laws and the Constitution, all that kind of, of those liberal pieties and all that kind of stuff, which not all of them, many of them actually take seriously. Obviously not all of them, but many of them do take that seriously. And we're at this point now where and when they put that video out. They're not stupid. They knew that they would get a response. And I would assume they had to know that Trump would accuse them of being traitors and all this kind of stuff and threaten legal action. So what they're doing now is they're threatening, I don't know if they've done to everybody. But Kelly, they're threatening to force him back into active duty so that they can court martial him for seditious conspiracy or whatever. They're not going to do that. There's a 0% chance they're going to do that. I think Kelly. I don't know what Kelly's. I don't know much about him, but this is not hurting him. He's raising a ton of money. He's running up in the polls for 2028. Yeah, it should be.

[B]

Kelly was one of the top three finalists to be Kamala Harris as vice president.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

As well. And Kelly has a. You know, he was a fighter pilot who saw combat the first Gulf War, and he was an astronaut and his wife was a former member of the House who actually got shot by a gunman at an event.

[A]

She'd become a gun violence advocate. Gavin Giffords.

[B]

Yeah, exactly. And like, Kelly was already a little bit known, but this is definitely helping his.

[A]

Yeah, I mean, there's. There's only one like John Glenn, but Kelly would be a minor league version of a modern John Glenn.

[B]

And he's playing up to run for President 2028 or Vice President in 2020.

[A]

And this is helping him.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Getting attacked by Trump is actually good for your political career. Right. Yeah. The money's flowing in. I've been getting. I stop all these messages, but I still like the Mark Kelly ones lately been getting through. This is the battle of our lives. Send me five bucks a kind of thing. Right. So anyway, now that the headset September 2nd stories come out, it makes you wonder if Kelly and Slotkin and I would assume they had to know about this. Right. There are people, you know, to be sure, who hate Hegseth. We know that. We saw the response hit that meeting where. How many people were there? A thousand. They just sat there.

[B]

800, something like that.

[A]

They didn't blink that you could see that they were just contemptuous of what they were hearing. Right. And afterward, a lot of stories got out. Anonymous source, anonymously sourced, saying how the military just thought that was insane was surreal to them.

[B]

So it should also be noted, like we've done a couple of shows on the sort of. On the cracks in the Republican coalition. And six months ago, we saw Democrats and universities and law firms terrified of Trump, but we saw the Republican Congress walking in lockstep. And we're now seeing around these issues, around bombing Venezuela, around this double tap order, around other things is berseean. Members of Congress really begin to publicly come out against what Trump and the Trump administration are doing. The most recent example is that Roger Wicker, who is the chair of the Armed Services Committee, is saying that he is going to conduct vigorous oversight to determine the facts related to the circumstances of the September 2 double tap. Double tap on the boat, we also saw Mike Turner, who's a Republican from Ohio, actually come out and very critical, very critical of this as well, and saying that is it really America first to be doing what we're doing in Venezuela? And of course, this was less of a surprise to me, but Rand Paul has also been very outspoken on Trump and Venezuela and Hegseth, and more than.

[A]

Anybody, more than Bernie Sanders, more than anybody.

[B]

And the same is going to lead to the destruction of the MAGA coalition.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. Rand Paul, Marjorie Taylor Greene has been speaking about this. She's actually, I think I had dismissed her, but maybe she's not that dumb after all. But she's talking a lot about America first. And America first has. Isolation is a key component of that. In addition to the people you mentioned, like Whitaker and Turner, who come from very red states, Mike Rogers, who is the House Armed Services Committee chair from Alabama, has also called for an inquiry. And this is along with Jake Reeb, who's, I think, a Marine veteran.

[B]

Jack Reeb, he's from Rhode Island.

[A]

Jack Reed. Jack Reed, I'm sorry, Jack Reed, is he Marine veteran from Rhode Island, I believe.

[B]

Yeah, I think so.

[A]

Democrat. But he's. So, you know, they do have some Democrats, but Rand Paul, I think, by far, and Marjorie Taylor Greene has gotten a lot of publicity talking about this. So it really is a problem. And the media has started to, I wouldn't say take the gloves off, but they are starting to push a little bit more than they had before. And so I think this does have the potential to, to create a problem for Trump.

[B]

And the one thing I want to say about the double tap is that it was, if they did an initial strike on the boat, there were two survivors. They were clinging to the burning wreckage of the boat, and then they, and then Hegsev came and said, kill them all. And under, under rules of war and law, military law and things like that, people who are helpless and have surrendered and have to execute them is actually highly illegal. It's murder, right?

[A]

I think just a very brief thing. There's. There's something called the universal Code of Military justice, the ucmj, and which lines out there. You laugh, right, about the rules of war, but there actually are, and rules of war really don't mean anything anymore, especially after what we've just seen Israel do, right? Reject international jurisdiction, reject the UN Reject the International Court of justice and so forth. But there really are rules of engagement and rules of battle. And I think the one that's really particularly relevant here is that in particular, like, you don't attack civilians and you don't kill people who are trying to surrender. Remember what was about a year and a half ago in Israel, three Israeli soldiers who had been held hostage escaped and they had their hands up holding white flags and the IOF killed them. They were Israel, they were idf, IOF themselves, Right? So that's very clear cut. And we have all kinds of examples of that.

[B]

Just, just last week in the west bank is there were two Palestinians who took their shirts off and were surrendering.

[A]

In the iof and they killed two kids, right? So that we've seen that. But in Vietnam, this was really commonplace. I think, like I said, My Lai is the most common, but there was Tiger Battalion. And I mentioned before, I talked to a lot of folks when I was doing research years ago. I mean, everybody had art, everybody had stories like this, and not everybody was happy about it. Like most people that I talked to in VVAW rejected what Cali had done. They thought Cali was a scapegoat because the orders had come from higher up. And I think they're probably right about that. But Cali was court martialed for it. Nixon basically pardoned him. But there are rules of engagement. Abu Ghraib, we saw that those were legal orders. It's very common throughout World War II. Obviously the Germans did it, the Japanese did it all the time, right? So there are rules and there are o. And you're supposed to be. So Trump's basic argument now is if the President says it, then it's not illegal. It's the old Nixon argument on steroids. Right? And, but there, there are rules of engagement, there are rules of fighting, there are rules of war. And I think the most common and the most basic one is that in particular, you don't kill civilians, you don't kill people trying to surrender. Although we see this every day in the streets of America with police, right? They're beating the shit out of people, they're killing drivers who have a tail light out or whatever. But it is a rule of war and some of these folks take it seriously. Right. We're dealing with that as well. What it leads to, I don't know. But clearly I think there are issues with that Trump is going to face with this. I think the level of concern is greater. I think a lot of people are seeing now that he's not this big, fearsome Moloch, but he's really this like, insane, sociopathic old man surrounded by a bunch of people who are like Laura Louver and Pete Hegseth and Cat Patel, who would be dismissed as clowns. It's a clown car. Except they got a lot of power and they're hurting a lot of people. Christy Noem.

[B]

Right. Very dangerous. They're very dangerous.

[A]

They're very dangerous. Thank God they're incompetent and they're clownish because I think it would be way worse if they were efficient. But they are very dangerous as well. So all that's happening and then amidst all this, a few days ago we have this incident in Washington D.C. where the West Virginia National Guard sent by Governor Jim justice, who just was found to be $5.2 million in arrears on his federal taxes. He didn't pay them.

[B]

Oops.

[A]

He forgot. You know, thanks. Can we not pay our taxes this year? It's going to be okay.

[B]

Exactly.

[A]

But he sent them there. And all of these governors have sent National Guard to other cities or.

[B]

No, Jim justice is the senator. It's actually Patrick Morrissey who's the governor.

[A]

Oh, that's right. Justice ran for Senate. He has may have since old seat.

[B]

I'm sorry. But, but federal official who forgot to pay his $5 million in taxes. More, even more, more of a telling story.

[A]

All of these governors are trying to suck up the Trump. They're just planting their tongue on his ass. There's no reason to do this. I will say, and we never mentioned this and it still strikes me and I need to look into it more. But at the time, the governor of Nebraska said he's not going to do it. He said no. He said if Illinois National Guard came into Nebraska, we'd be pissed off. So I'm not sending my troops to Illinois or to D.C. or whatever.

[B]

But it's really more the fanatical slash gutless members. Abbott, Abbott.

[A]

Abbott's the worst. Yeah. Abbott and the rest of them. Yeah. But so we have these West Virginia National Guard there. And then this tragedy occurred. What was it, three or four days ago?

[B]

It was the day before Thanksgiving.

[A]

Day before Thanksgiving.

[B]

Yeah. Where. Where two West Virginia National Guard members were shot, one of which Sarah Beckstrom, who's 20, who'd only been in the, who had been in the service for about two years. So she joined when she was 18 and she actually died from her about a day later. And it's, it's, it's a terrible tragedy. The kind of more interesting part of the story is that the shooter is, was an Afghan national who had been repatriated after the fall of Kabul in, in 2021 ra. He actually had been part of a paramilitary unit called Zero Unit 03, which had been under contract with the CIA in Afghanistan. He had been recruited at 15, so he was a child soldier. And he had been assigned to what essentially was a death squad run by a drug lord who worked for the CIA. He was a top. His name was Ahmed Wali Karzai, related to the former president. And basically they would base, they would run anti. It was almost like a Phoenix program style program, which was pretty common since Vietnam, but also happened in Central America and has happened. Happened in Iraq. But they, they were doing counterinsurgency against the Taliban and when Kabul fell, because tactics like that are never good to have the population on your side. He moved to Seattle with his family. He was, he is, he's still alive. He was wounded, but he's still alive. And he has five children. He lived in. Not in Seattle, excuse me, in Bellingham, Washington. The. It's. There's. I can't think of a more obvious example of blowback in recent days than what has happened with this shooting. It's like he, he lost his mind. He apparently was very addicted to drugs. He was very disturbed by what he did when he was in Afghanistan. And so he drove to Washington D.C. and took some shots at some National Guard members and killed one of them and critically wounded the other one. It's terrible tragedy.

[A]

And in response, Trump has basically said no more immigration, especially from Afghanistan and other Islamic countries.

[B]

Can I say one other thing about the Zero unit is that these, his unit was actually started under Obama CIA. And so assassinations, these night raids was all developed in, under the Obama administration. So that's possibly. The Trump administration approved his final visa, cleared his final visa, even though Trump says no, we didn't. Also, we know Trump lies and doesn't know what he's talking about, but it's like this is a, this is a pattern of a policy that dates back to at least the 60s, probably further back. But it's Bush, Obama, Trump, Biden, Trump. It's all there. And it's the, it's a legacy of the forever wars, which we've also talked about in great detail.

[A]

Yeah, I think the fact that he's 15 really needs to be discussed more because this is common, this common thread, you know, all of these things.

[B]

And we're trying to line up some other guests that talk to us about this to go a little bit more in depth this. But he was like 15 in 2011 when he started.

[A]

Yeah, we talked to some degree, obviously with the Epstein case. About trafficking, sex trafficking, which we should. It's horrific, right? But there are over a million boys under the age of I think 15 who are part of global armies all over the world right now at the time and most of the time armed by the United States. And you give a kid, 15 year old kid, you put him in assassination squad. It's obviously going to be very traumatic. Some years ago in Houston give him.

[B]

Also a supply of unlimited. Unlimited supply of drugs too. It was the heroin racket they were working for.

[A]

Sure. Yeah. Some years ago in Houston, I met a Cambodian whose parents. The Kamarus killed his parents and then they gave him a. I don't know, I forget what gun it was at the time, but they gave a gun and they put him in an assassination squad. The kid was like 10 or 11 at the time. And it's like he's doing good stuff. He's trying to use it as regenerative justice kind of thing. But he's just. He said he still has those nightmares every day. He sees the images in his head.

[B]

Just doing a little bit more research on this Afghan thing. Is that the also. He's not the first Afghan hired killer that came over, that has, that has also Bus burst, right? There was a guy named Jamal Wally who was a. An Afghan mercenary, came to the US After Kabul fell. He shot a cop in Virginia. He was videoing himself as he did it. He said, I should have served with the fucking Taliban instead of this before he shot the cop. There's another one named Mohammed said who killed four people in Albuquerque in 2022. He claimed to have worked for the Afghan National Army Special Operations Command. The CIA has brought about 10,000 of these folks to live in the U.S.

[A]

Go to Houston. You know how many old ARVN officials are living there, Some of whom were really highly on the most wanted list of criminals. Right. War criminals. You mentioned the Phoenix of a Phoenix program, which is I think also relevant here. Right. That's. That was a program in the United States during the Vietnam War where they specifically put together these target lists of people they claim were communist officials. And there's drug. There's a very active drug trade in Vietnam as well. Alfred McCoy's famous book the Politics of Heroin is really good on, on all that. But Phoenix went out and they assassinated. I forget the numbers were huge actually. And they would brag like we got rid of a significant portion of the Viet Cong infrastructure. They did because it killed everybody. Like they just, they were indiscriminate. So yeah, they actually did get like People who were higher up in the National Liberation Front of the VC or whatever, because they just killed everybody. And at the end, that's what these.

[B]

Squads were doing in Afghanistan. Right?

[A]

Yeah, yeah. So the idea behind this is they would cutify it, right, by calling it hearts and minds. We're going to win our hearts and minds. Right. But the fact is the way they do that is they just go in and kill everybody. And it never works. Right. It creates even greater resentment. It did in Vietnam, does throughout Latin America. There's nothing in Venezuela today. Maduro is not the most popular leader in the world and nor was Saddam Hussein. Right. But when you can rally your people against the United States, then that actually helps you.

[B]

Right. The Taliban in 2001, the Taliban wasn't very popular either. Right.

[A]

But once you assume that mantle of the anti American leader, of the anti American forces, the anti imperial forces, it matters. And so these things don't even work. These programs don't even work in a long term. But they're good for the warlords, they're good for the drug traffickers, they're good enough for all these.

[B]

They're good for the kill counts for the military and the CIA too, in those places.

[A]

As soon as you read the story, the guy was 15, he had serious mental problems, drugs, alcohol, violence, apparently sat around, played video games, things like that. It's not surprising. I've also seen the conspiracy theory people come out and we, how we both feel about that. But in their minds, like this guy knew that they and he headed there and there were these Google searches on this woman from West Virginia, like four days ahead of time. They knew she was going to deploy in Israel.

[B]

In Israel, in Israel.

[A]

They knew she was going to be deployed to D.C. and this guy knew it and he headed there just to kill her. Come on, people, like, why is it so hard to understand? This is blowback. The guy was used, he was exploited, thrown aside by the United States. He came in the country, he has these probably horrific nightmares about what he did. He's on drugs. And he said, I'm going to do something about it. Why is that? That's not that hard to understand, is it? No, no.

[B]

And like I said, there's. This is not the first time, this is not the time this has happened. Albuquerque killed more people.

[A]

So happened again. This is, unfortunately, this is the way the empire works. Right. People come in and we see, and.

[B]

We, we also see like high rates of overdoses and suicides with military vets who were in Iraq and Afghanistan, U.S. u.S. Citizens who were in Iraq.

[A]

Suicides a day. Right. What this guy did is actually the same outcome as Aaron Bushnell. Right. Aaron Bushnell had that same idea. What am I doing? This is horrific. And he turned it inward. Right. Against himself. Whereas these people, just nihilistic and they want to destroy everything. Right. This woman is. She's 20 years old, she's from West Virginia. She's. She has no control over any of this. She's not making any decisions. Right. She just happens to be caught in the crossfire of Trump's rhetoric, of Trump's incitement bullshit about sending troops into American cities. Right. This country is getting scarier and more violent by the day.

[B]

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And Trump's response, you've already mentioned this, but he said he's going to send 500 additional National Guard troops to be deployed in D.C. as well as cutting off deport. There's all kinds of deport them all rhetoric coming out of Republicans. Tommy Tuberville, the intellectual giant that is Tommy Tuberville, has really doubled down on the anti Islamic rhetoric. Many other members of Congress have.

[A]

Oh, you mean like the Saudi government? Anti. Anti Muslim, like that, Right. Or anti Jelani, obviously. They must hate this guy. He used to be like, what, the Al Qaeda commander, right?

[B]

Yeah, exactly. I don't think that. I don't think they're worried about. I don't think they're worried about the head of Syria and the Royal Family.

[A]

Trump has a man crush on Mamdani now, too, right?

[B]

Yeah, exactly. They probably would like to deport him. So it also just like, feeds. And I actually saw a clip of Bondi on Fox where she was talking about how because of this, we're going to send even more National Guards into Blue Cities, more National Guard troops into Blue Cities to control all of this, like, this violence that's going on. I wonder who made those gun laws so easy for him to be able to get the.357, which he used to shoot those folks, too. Gun violence is also like an epidemic in this country.

[A]

And it's not even. This is something I've been dealing with my whole life, and it's just not even. They don't discuss it anymore. Last night in Stockton or two nights ago in Stockton, California, four kids at a birthday party were killed, ten others were shot. Yeah, no, no mention. It's just not even really newsworthy. Yeah, but the whole issue is clearly guns. But yeah, I always thought it was funny. Like Blue Cities. The guy drove all the way from Washington state to go to D.C. and randomly shoot a couple people. Hey, like, I don't know how. Putting more guardsmen. What you're doing is you're essentially creating. Giving them 500 more targets.

[B]

Exactly.

[A]

And something else, which is a different show, but I think it's worth mentioning here, too. What's striking, too, is that a lot of the. A lot of the stuff they did in Washington is being thrown out. Judges are. Lawyers are dismissing charges, judges are throwing them out.

[B]

Grand juries are refusing to indict, which is actually. Which is saying something.

[A]

Yeah. It's absolutely pointless. So these things all connect together, right? The orders in Venezuela firing military officials, the video that Kelly and Slotkin and others put out, Trump threats against Kelly and Slotkin. I'm never going to say that Trump is vulnerable because he's up against Schumer, Jeffries. And if you're up against Schumer and Jeffries, you always got a chance. They are the Washington generals. Right. You could be ahead. You could be. They could be ahead 80 to 40 with three minutes left in the game, and they would figure out a way to lose it.

[B]

So pre fumbles at least. Right?

[A]

Yeah, they cuck themselves. But clearly there are. You mentioned earlier, like, Marjorie Taylor Greene is really striking in all this. Right. Green has been. And I don't know if her apostasy is sincere or not. Right. But she actually apologized, which is really stunning. But Green was part of that mod that was going after people and librarians and David Hogg and people like that who were getting death threats all the time. She criticized Trump, and within two days she had to have private security because she was getting that right when she was on the other side. She had no problem when she was doing the threatening as soon as she broke ranks. Right. Trump incites violence every time he opens his mouth. And that to me is, if there's one issue here, the guy, all he has, I don't even know if he has fear left anymore, but he has violence. That's all they have, right? Yeah.

[B]

And it should be noted that after this shooting, where he's trying to distract from the fact that his administration cleared this Afghan national, is that he goes after Minnesota. Right. He talks about how the Somali community there is, like, really problematic and they're undermining domestic tranquility. He mocked Tim Waltz. He also went after Anil Omar's hijab. Like, it's also very striking that, like, he's both distracting and inciting violence to get away from, like, where they're completely incompetent.

[A]

This is a very liberal Observation by me. But he called Tim Walsh retarded. I've seen a lot of MAGA people who were just so excited. Yeah. I can say that word now. Dude, that's messed up. And I'm not one of these. I hate Trump voters. I think there's. It's a little nuanced and complex situation. Right.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

But there are people who are just like. That's all they give a about. Yeah. I can't buy hamburger anymore and coffee's too expensive. But I can say the word retard in public. It's all.

[B]

Can't use pronouns. Pronouns are illegal now, so. Right.

[A]

They're giving. I saw a video the other day. This sheriff, I forget where he is from, said all these illegals are getting free stuff. They're getting free health care, they're getting free computers, they're getting free cell phones. And the guy kept saying, where are they getting them? He's like, getting it for free. Who's giving it to him? They are. But Trump is the insider in chief. Absolutely. That's why we did a show not that long ago again, on political violence is not a both sides issue. Hey. We're not defending Democrats and liberals, but the fact of the matter is they're not.

[B]

If anything, they're. Oh, we think they're overly civil.

[A]

Oh, my God. Yeah. Yeah.

[B]

To say the least.

[A]

Yeah. But I think these things connect together. It'll be interesting. I. I'm not going to say he says days are numbered, but at the same time, he's probably more vulnerable than any of the other people in Trump's cabinet at this point.

[B]

And I'm sure he has his pardon already written.

[A]

Oh, God. Yeah. Yeah. You know that in the military, they hate the guide. Just. I'm sure there are people in the FBI who utterly loathe Kash Patel, and they're probably emboldened, too, because the. The. What do you call it? Indictments against James and Comey have just been tossed.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And Trump's lawyers. Oh, my God, they're. I would rather have. What's the guy. Lionel Hutz from the Simpsons.

[B]

I feel like Patel is. The leaks that are, like, really been increasing from both the Pentagon and from the FBI is that Patel is constantly. There's like, he flew his girlfriend in an FBI jet to a wrestling match in Las Vegas. He hired a. He had a FBI SWAT team as security for his girlfriend.

[A]

Like that.

[B]

That those leaks are coming from within the FBI bureaucracy because. And they're more emboldened. I feel like those leaks have been happening with people like Patel. Like the Charlie Kirk shooting.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

With this D.C. shooting, New Yorker scene. Like they, they caught the guy during the shootout. Cause he was wounded. And then Patel does a press conference. We'll bring this, we'll find this guy and bring him to justice. He doesn't even know what's going on.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And so he, he always looks just meth out to me anyway, like he's all on crank or something. But I think it's, I think the tell is how much the leaks keep coming on people like this. I'd say with Gnome, like we see a lot of evidence of corruption being leaked about her as well. Because I think these bureaucracies just despise them. And, and it really, it's really showing.

[A]

The Justice Department, there was a story last week about how many lawyers, like important people at senior positions have resigned and retire early because of this. Yeah, it's. Unfortunately, I do think that the, their strongest asset at this point, Trump's strongest asset at this point is having no, no kind of organized opposition to him. Not in the streets. They're doing an amazing job there. That's what's actually put him, if he is at all vulnerable, even a little bit, it's because of what people in the streets have done. Not a damn thing because of what the Democratic Party has done. And, but yeah, Kelly, you knew, Kelly and Slokin, they knew what was going on. I bet they heard about these hegseth, this Hegseth thing. I'm sure they're in communication all the time with people who are still on active duty.

[B]

That's the other place where the leaks are happening is that these folks are leaking to members of, at least Democratic, if not Republican members of Congress.

[A]

Yeah. You know, again, I've studied the military like that. They communicate all the time and that's not at all unusual. The idea that the military is non political has always been silly. Of course they're very good at it. In fact, look at the budgets they get. If the trillion dollar budget. You're pretty good at politics.

[B]

Exactly.

[A]

Oh, I've been seeing the other day, what did I see that Trump personally gave, I Forget how much $10 million to the FBI to pay people to work overtime to scrub his name from the Epstein files. You never know. It's 2025, anything's possible. I find it hard to believe that there are people and there are that many enough people in the FBI who would do that. I think there are a lot of people in the FBI who would add Trump's name to it. If it wasn't there.

[B]

I also find it hard to believe that Trump would actually give away that amount of money.

[A]

He likes to hold on to his money. It's definitely not his own money. But no. And the point here, I think there is, like, this internal movement against him. And you're seeing people like Rand Paul and Marjorie Taylor Greene, who I think are really important. Mamdani. Marjorie Taylor Greene and Mamdani, I think right now, in the last month or so have posed the greatest kind of contrast to Trump, which is striking. Right. Because Mamdani and Marjorie, Kayla, very different. But what's the issue where they meet Israel, God, genocide, and like, America first, really? Mamdani doesn't use the phrase America first when he's talking about affordability and buses and food stores. That's what he's saying. We have to take care of people in New York. Right. And that's what Marjorie Taylor Greene is saying. And they're onto something. There's. Right. Yeah. They're not. Like they both said, we won't take AIPAC money. Cory Booker says the Democrats need to have tough conversations. Right. Cory Booker is one of the biggest recipients of AIPAC money in the entire Senate. That conversation is going to necessarily exclude Israel.

[B]

Cory Booker has bromances with APEC lobbyists, right?

[A]

Oh, God. Yeah. Yeah. I think Mamdani and Marjorie Taylor right now are showing how you go after these people. And it's stuff that people on the left have been Saying for what, 50, 60 years? Right. This isn't rocket science. Right. Instead of focusing on things like pronouns, maybe talk about literally the price of bread and milk and coffee and hamburger.

[B]

Yeah, 100%.

[A]

And. But everything Trump says is an incitement. That's the threat of all this. Expect more from people like Kelly. Right?

[B]

Yeah, I think more from people like Kelly. And then also, it seems like Marjorie Taylor Greene has cracked the coalition, the MAGA coalition. And so I think I would expect more from, like, various members of the Republican Party at this point, both. Both MAGA and anti MAGA folks who are going to see their opportunity and.

[A]

More from the Senate, too, because they're a little different. You have crazies in the Senate like Mike Lee and Mark Wayne Mullen, but they're. The fact that Wicker is saying, we need an investigation. This is troubling, isn't unimportant.

[B]

Or Rand Paul. Rand Paul.

[A]

Rand Paul, yeah, The guy from Alabama, Mike Rogers Turner from Ohio. So there are people who are starting to say, and I think there's a sense too especially after the elections a few weeks ago, that like Trump, Trump may not be the guy you want to attach to at this point.

[B]

And one last thing I'll throw out there is that we're going to have the special election in Tennessee this week. And so we'll also see that's plus 20% plus 22% Trump district. So we'll just see how that goes in. Like at one point, I think Tennessee was the most pro Trump state in the America.

[A]

I'd still be surprised if the Democrat won, but she's within three or four points in the polls if she comes that close. The fact that the Republicans have dumped like what, $10 million into it recently, that's a big deal.

[B]

Yeah, I think, and I actually don't think she's going to win either, but I do think it's important to see how close she gets.

[A]

No, that exactly. She's definitely not going to lose by 22 points. Right? Yeah.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And a lot of other people are resigning, too. You're starting to see a lot of Republicans resign. One of the guys in Houston, in Fort Bend just resigned and his twin brother is going to run in his.

[B]

Troy now, Troy Nels is his name.

[A]

So I, I wonder if it's going to just the same guy. It's going to remind you of the Patty Duke show when you're too young.

[B]

We should probably wrap it. We're going to have some more shows on this coming up because this is the sort of like this kind of story that we like to cover here on the Green and Red podcast. And this is this, we think this is important. And also just connect the dots on these three big, for example, these three big interrelated stories today.

[A]

And Keg's Breath's in the middle of.

[B]

All of it and Keg's breath's in the center of it all. But you've been listening to the Green and Red podcast. Please check us out on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Sky. If you're watching us on YouTube, hit that subscribe button. If you're listening to us on audio platform, give us a rate and review. And then if you really like us, go to greenredpodcast.org and hit that support button or become a [e-mail] backslash greenredpodcast and we will talk to you again soon. Make trouble and misbehave and see you later.

[A]

Sam.