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- [00:00]
A
Welcome to Kibbe on Liberty. I'm talking with my good friend Kelly Vlejos, who is editor in chief at Responsible Statecraft and a senior advisor at the Quincy Institute. Why did we get into this war? What are they thinking about? And what is the best possible outcome for the war in Iran? Check it out. Welcome to kibby on liberty. Kelly?
- [00:54]
B
Yes.
- [00:54]
A
It's been a while.
- [00:55]
B
I know. I'm so glad to be back in the studio.
- [00:57]
A
I meant to look it up, but I feel like it's been at least a year since we talked, at least. And luckily all the wars have ended and there is peace throughout the realm. But I wanted to talk to you about everything that's going on in Iran. We're like a week in right now. And I want to start with something that really gets me the wrong way because in many ways, I feel like it's Groundhog Day and I feel like it's 2003 and the fox News talking points are exactly the same as they were then. And Laura Ingram said, I think it's three or four days ago now, maybe a little bit longer, that if it's quite simple, you're not anti war or pro war. You either love America or you're siding with our worst enemies. How many times have I heard that before?
- [01:49]
B
I'm just not sure it's working anymore. I almost feel bad for Fox because their audience is shrinking by the day and getting older by the day. And so they are. They are desperate to, to keep that narrative and to ensure this audience of generally older Americans who just want comfort food, really. And their comfort food consists of them being told that this is a righteous war, that this is good versus evil, that our military is a force for good in the war in the world rather, and we, we will be vindicated, you know, in terms of, of this military offensive. And that's all they really want to hear. So Fox is delivering that we're going to. But these people, like Laura Ingram, who you mentioned, has been around since 2003. I remember seeing her on the COVID of a magazine in the 90s as the Hot new conservative generation of her and Ann Coulter, who had come and they had clerked for Supreme Court justices and they were really giving a new, fresh face to conservative politics. So this is a long time that she's been around and she knows better, and the fact that she is, is. Has just sort of thrown her soul over to, you know, voice. This propagandist machinery at Fox News is really pathetic because I think most Americans don't buy it anymore. I mean, you see that in the polling. You don't see it with the hardcore magas because the hardcore magaz are the ones that are watching Fox News all the time. But the rest of America is like, no, we're not buying this anymore. We don't even understand why we're in this war. We much less supporting it day in and day out.
- [03:31]
A
It reminds me of one of the first conversations that Megyn Kelly had and maybe she was talking to Tucker Carlson at the time. I don't remember where she was talking about the culture at Fox. Like the pro war. You had to be a cheerleader for the next war in order to work there and you weren't allowed to think otherwise. And she had drank that Kool Aid and I'm putting words in her mouth, but as I recall she said, I didn't even think about it that much because certainly the bad guys we were attacking were bad guys and I thought we were the good guys. And it wasn't until I left Fox that I started consuming other perspectives because it was a bubble. You weren't allowed to think otherwise, but you probably didn't anyway because everybody around you thought the same thing.
- [04:21]
B
Absolutely. I worked there myself. I would say there's a, I would say a little bit differently. I think the personalities, those who were on tv, the executive producers, the senior editors, sure they were all on board, had drunk the Kool Aid and all of the sort of the missives about what to cover and how to cover that day would come from the top every day. But I would say the regular reporters, producers you didn't see or writing the scripts, the cameramen, all those guys, they, they were there for a job and they typically kept their head down. So when I was there during the war working for FoxNews.com, i had very specific criticisms of, of how the war policy was being pursued from the beginning. When I was hired, I was hired before 9 11. So I was there when the Patriot act was being debated, when the wars were being debated, the AUMFs. And I worked really hard to try to get both sides of the story, get libertarians on board in terms of like, because there were the Ron Paul's and there were Russ Feingold and a few smattering of others who pushed back on both sides of the aisle and trying to, you know, write the stories that would reflect that there was a debate. But overall there, there wasn't much of a debate. But when I went into work every day, you know, I was maybe talking with a couple People offline, so to speak, about why we were distressed about the coverage. But I agree with Megan that it was an echo chamber. And if you did disagree, this wasn't the place to pipe up. You're gonna have to take it elsewhere. And that's why I started writing for the American Conservative, because here was a conservative magazine that was inviting writers to talk about the war and criticize all elements of it, whether it be the big picture foreign policy or the smaller or not more granular picture of like the contractors and the defense industry and how much money they were making or, you know, the burn pits and other other things that weren't being discussed at say, Fox News and, and frankly, and mainstream media writ large.
- [06:41]
A
Yeah. Our friend John Utley, who had been the chairman at the time, as I recall, he really, I want to say he transformed the American conservative. But maybe I just started paying attention because the content started helping me do my job.
- [06:58]
B
Oh, absolutely. I mean, he's a treasure. He was a treasure. And he's missed every single day at the magazine, but just every in Washington. I mean, he'd helped so many people and so many issues, not just war issues. But I remember talking with him about how he led a conservative anti war movement and the Persia, the first Persian Gulf War. And I said, oh my goodness. Because I, I mean, I was much younger, I was just getting into college at that time. And it was not an atmosphere of dissent over that war. So many different layers and pathologies going on the, the post Vietnam, you know, everybody wanted to show their support for the troops. So there wasn't, at least where I was not in Washington at the time, there wasn't a strong anti war vibe going on or movement. And to think that he was leading a conservative, not even a left or a libertarian, but more of a conservative movement against the war. They were very tiny, but they were vocal and they had press conferences and whatnot. And I was like, wow, what a guy.
- [08:00]
A
Yeah.
- [08:01]
B
You know, they saw right through everything and most Americans did not. And it's too bad because I think that seeded the confidence of the U.S. military Industrial Complex to pursue that amazing, like, global war on terror after 9 11. And I think that's because they felt they had proven themselves in the first Gulf War and wanted to finish the job by taking Saddam out. And it was an absolute disaster. And now we're doing it again in Iran.
- [08:38]
A
This particular war. I mean, there's been others and I've been critical of all the wars going all the way back to Kuwait, but it gives me ptsd, because you're describing a culture in the early days when I thought that there would be plenty of us. When I started writing about this and I couldn't find an outlet, I had to take the affiliation of my, I was working at the U.S. chamber at the time. I had to take my affiliation off to write anything. But I couldn't even get platforms that you would think would accept a critique of the war to do that. And it's just not a, it's just not a well compensated point of view being for peace.
- [09:19]
B
No, it's not. And I recall I went into journalism right after college after that war and I started writing about veterans and with the experience of the Vietnam veterans in mind because it was something that I grew up with all around me and something that just really inflamed me to think of how we treated them when they came home. And you know, so it was only like what, 20 years after the war at that point. And then these guys started coming back from the Persian Gulf War with unexplained illnesses. They called it Persian Gulf Syndrome. And I, I started getting angry. I said, well, this is happening all over again. Because the first instinct of the government was to, to blow them off and act like they had psychological problems that they didn't have. These physic, these physical manifestations were, were, I don't know what, psychological, rather that something that they, that was connected to their service. And then this went on for years. I followed this and it was slowly they started recognizing and they talked about the pesticides, they talked about the anthrax shots they were getting. They were talking about things that had come together while they were in the field. Probably some of the dust with the metals in it like had all come together and had caused these long term illnesses when they came back. But we weren't prepared to acknowledge it. We weren't prepared to take care of them at the VA. And I said, my goodness, this is only 20 years since Vietnam when we went through the Agent Orange and them having to fight for, for recognition for PTSD. And so when 2003 happened and we started ramping up for war there, I remember I was working at fox. I called the VA and I said, listen, are you prepared for the incoming? And of course they gave me the standard line. And I talked to Vietnam veterans and Persian Gulf advocates and they said they're not ready. They, they have no idea what they're. And guess what? We had tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of troops coming home with some level of ptsd. And then you had the brain injury, the amputations, then you had the burn pits, which caused all sorts of, again, unexplained illnesses, from skin rashes to gastrointestinal problems to cancer. I think that's how Beau Biden had succumbed to cancer that his family believes it was from the burn pits. And so it's like, wow, this is all like one war experience after another. And now, again, heading into this unknown territory here with how our troops could be abused once again.
- [11:59]
A
Yeah, Which. Which gets me to Laura Ingram's point. It strikes me that if you are a patriotic American, if you love this country, you. You would oppose forever wars, both on principle, but just the practicality. Kind of the George Washington approach was entangling alliances costs a lot of money, and we can't afford it. We'll bankrupt our country. And that's how empires die. But equally important, maybe more so for the troops, the people that actually die in these wars, nobody seems to care about the collateral damage in life.
- [12:33]
B
And.
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A
And those that survive again and again and again, we misuse them, ignore them, let them suffer in silence. How could you be pro American and pro this war? I don't quite get it, because I
- [12:49]
B
don't think they've ever managed to convince the majority of Americans that speaking out against the war is not speaking out against troops. If you don't support the war, it doesn't mean that you don't support the troops. And I. I know that sounds cliche at this point, but I do think that there is a certain hesitation by a lot of Americans for speaking out because they want to believe. They want to believe all of those golden things that Pete Hegseth is saying about our warrior class and how they're all doing this for, you know, not just the pride of the nation, but for. For. To, I don't know, go out and be the redeemers of the world and. And help people. And they. They want to believe that all of this is good and righteous, and to go out and question that and criticize that is somehow casting aspersions on the men and women who are fighting. And that's ridiculous. But I do think that there is a little bit of psychology going on there that, that. That. That stays the hand. And I think most Americans don't want to believe that they're being lied to. They want to believe that their government is doing whatever it takes on our behalf. And so I do think that some of that sheen or some of that hesitation is falling away now when you look at the polls, I mean, there was 72% of Americans were in support of the 2003 invasion of Iraq. And I think it was, it was definitely below 50 on the day after the Iranian strike. So that would have been March 1st. I mean, those were some of the first polls, and I think it was like 44% of Americans approved. I don't have my, all my polls correct, but it was a drastic difference. So I, I think that, again, Americans have spent the last several years, last decade really grappling with whatever happened in the 2000s, like seeing a war in Afghanistan last for 20 years. Trillions of dollars, tens of millions of Americans served in that war. Many went through multiple deployments. And we're just, and even now just really getting a sense of, like, what it all meant and what they all did over there. I don't think they're ready for, to send them over there as blindly as they did before.
- [15:20]
A
Thank you for joining me today on Kibbe on Liberty and for being part of our fiercely independent audience. Every week, my organization, Free the People, partners with BlazeTV to bring you this show. My guests bring smart perspectives on everything from current events to timeless philosophical debates. If you like what you hear, go to freethepeople.org and support Kibbe on Liberty so we can continue to produce these honest conversations with interesting people. Now, let's get back to it. So the, you know, the question is, so let's get into what's happening. And I struggle. I'm sure you and your team struggles as well, figuring out fact from propaganda when you're trying to figure out how the war is actually going. But we're like a week in now, and we're definitely not doing Venezuela this time. We're not going to go in with our secret kinetic weapons and zap everybody and kidnap the dictator and bug out. We got Khomeini, but now we have a more radical Khomeini. So from your perspective, how are things going?
- [16:29]
B
Things are on fire in the Middle East. I can't even wrap my head around how bad it's gone. And I think the Trump administration, and this is not just me talking, much smarter people than I were kind of assessing, and they see how Trump is talking about the war, and he seems to keep everything on the table. I mean, I wouldn't be surprised if tomorrow he suggested maybe we might even be using tactical nukes. He's already suggested that sending ground troops isn't off the table. And so he's, he's maintaining this visage that he is unpredictable. He's crazy don't mess with him. But I think it's also sending a message to the American people, like, are they even in control of this thing? Why are we talking about ground troops when supposedly our air power was so superior that we would have decimated them within the first 48 hours, which obviously didn't happen. But Trump keep talk, it keeps talking about decimation, about the, the regime being destroyed and everybody can see that that's not true. And now they're seeing all of these attacks on our partners and allies in, in the region in terms of like their energy infrastructure, the shipping that now they're starting to hit desalinization plants, information systems, like they know the Amazon warehouses and, and whatnot. And so like there's a sense of insecurity everywhere. You see the price of oil. I don't know how much it's going to be when this airs, but it's over $120 a barrel. I think right now India is starting to tell people to stop using gas like Bangladesh is. I mean, this is, this is, this is, this is going to have a serious impact on the economy. And it is. Though the Trump administration had not had any forethought of what was going to happen. Even though experts everywhere were saying you cannot do what you want to do with air power alone, they blew that off. They thought shock and awe times two or whatever Hegseth said was going to win the day. And it obviously hasn't. But it spread throughout the Middle east and we don't know where this ends. We thought, you know, the Iranians would just collapse. I didn't think that, but I think the Trump administration did. And so now they're in uncharted territory.
- [18:55]
A
Yeah. Tucker Carlson, I think, is the one that says that Trump is surrounded by an echo chamber. So he doesn't get, well, this might happen versus this might happen. He just gets one monolithic, you know, they're going to fall like dominoes. Is that, have you heard this?
- [19:13]
B
I've, I've heard this, but I just don't understand it. I mean, supposedly J.D. vance was the realist and restrainer in the, in the White House that he would play that sort of red teaming role, others as well. And so I, it, it seems to me that the voices are in there. I mean, Tulsi Gabbard, another one. But they've been more marginalized. It's not. And so like, it's not that like he's looking around and not finding other alternative perspectives on what could happen. It's that for some reason, he's only surrounded himself with people who, who believe and think the, that way. And I do feel like Israel plays a major role in this. I, I don't understand why we can't talk about that more. But when you see we'll have to
- [20:07]
A
bleep all this out, by the way,
- [20:09]
B
when you see the efforts that they have made throughout the last year of his presidency to make sure that certain people stayed and certain people got marginalized or bullied or pushed off into the shadows, you not, you start thinking, okay, it was for a reason. You know, they, everybody sort of entertained. Oh, no more war for, you know, for forever wars and more restraint foreign policy until it became clear that they needed us to be, you know, four square in line behind A, the Gaza policy and now, B, the Iranian policy. And now you're starting to see some cracks where in the last 24 hours, Trump and even Lindsey Graham have suggested, well, we're kind of asking them to tamp down their attacks on, on Iranian oil infrastructure, because that's like all civilian and we don't want to destroy the civilian population. We actually were hoping that they were going to rise up and take over and so don't be so aggressive. Now. Why would they have to do that if they weren't working, you know, at two different distinct goals? And I think there has been some suggestion, even Elbridge Cole testified last week that when he was asked about some of the civilian targeting and he said, well, I don't, I don't know about that, or he said something effect that, that's, that's, that's part of Israeli operations. Well, I thought we were doing this together. So I do feel like the, the President has gotten a lot of bad advice, but, you know, at the end of the day, he is the decider.
- [21:51]
A
Yeah.
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B
And I don't want to let him off the hook either.
- [21:55]
A
Let's talk about Netanyahu's seemingly by, I don't think anyone would disagree with this, the tremendous amount of influence he has driving foreign policy. It's, you know, part of it is the Miriam Adelsons of the world who, you know, Trump. Two of Trump's most audacious and kind of shocking brags is how much money she's given to his campaigns over the years and how she actually probably does love Israel more than America. He just blurts that stuff out. But Trump doesn't pretend that all of this isn't happening. But have you ever seen a country with so much influence on American policy?
- [22:37]
B
Absolutely not. And it's Never. I mean, if we're just looking at US History, no, this has not happened before. There have always been relationships, whether it be the UK Or France, that, you know, during the Civil War and at other times where they've tried to go to send, you know, Winston Churchill trying to get us into World War II. I don't think you can compare those relationships of the moment with what we've been dealing with over decades now. I mean, I've looked at this, I've published stories on responsible statecraft. It wasn't really until the Clinton era that it was that we became unconditionally cleaved to Israel. I mean, you had some, you know, pushback by Obama and his White House over settlements, but they kept building them anyway. I mean, that, to me, that's the only time that I can remember in recent history, history that there had been some condemnation. Please stop building those settlements. Other than that, we've just keep plowing them with billions of dollars. We know what they're doing with it. And then when October 7th happened, I knew this is, I knew it was going to change everything. And it did. I mean, the way that they have responded in Gaza, they, they are on full on ethnic cleansing there and they're annexing the west bank as we speak. And that's just not my opinion. That's happening with no pushback by Washington whatsoever. And Biden was not much better. I just think that the Democrats managed to try to have it both ways and they would say all the right things but not do the right things. Whereas Trump is just, he's not saying it, he's letting everything happen. He pretends that he, you know, brought peace to Gaza. We know that that's BS And I, I just think it's, it's spiraled out of control. But it definitely started like at least 35 years ago. And I don't know why, Matt, because I look at the history and you know, even, I mean, Ronald Reagan, he, you know, he, he condemned Israel for its behavior in that Lebanon war. He got our troops out of there after the Marine barracks bombing. Previous president said we're, you know, at least threatened to withhold aid. We didn't just hand over $4 billion with no strings attached and that, and that's basically how we, we got here. But with the Democrats, with the, the human carnage that we've seen since October 7th in Gaza, I feel like they have been stained more than anybody because the Republicans don't really, they don't try to pretend that they care about human rights. And all that, but the Democrats have sort of made that their badge. You know, human rights, social justice, you know, sovereignty, you know, self determination. And we've seen that all wiped out in Gaza. And they've just made excuse after excuse after excuse. And so I feel, I don't know how they come back, like establishment Democrats come back from that, but it's, it's, it's deplorable. And then now we see how we've gotten pretty much shanghaied into this war in Iran by Netanyahu. I mean, consider this. Trump in his first administration had actually called for direct talks with Iran, okay? He also killed Soleimani, their chief military general as well. So, I mean, I'm not saying that he was the man of peace in his first administration when it came to Iran, but he still wanted to talk. He wanted a better deal, a better jcpoa. You know, he was, he was still kind of at least pretending that he had his own foreign policy irrespective of, of Israel, the second administration. He just seems to be entirely cleaved to Israel. And when he did say he was engaging in peace talks, we don't know if they are ruses or not at this point, but it, but Netanyahu kept coming to visit and telling them, no, you got, we don't, you know, this goes beyond the nuclear question. We got to get their ballistic missiles, we got to get their proxies. I mean, it was pressure. And I don't, honestly don't know because I don't, I'm not that close to anybody in the, in the inner circle. So I don't know why Trump succumbs to such pressure by Netanyahu, but he clearly does. And now he has dragged the United States in, into a war that nobody asked for and nobody supports and has completely upended any mythology that he was a peace president or he was the restrainer president, the sort of antidote to the whole Bush years of the gwat. It's just he's gotten us into a worse GY as far as I'm concerned.
- [28:00]
A
You were talking about this on a different show recently that in many ways it wasn't Ron Paul who started the conversation, but it was Donald Trump who made it safe for conservatives to question never ending war. And of course, Ron Paul perhaps always viewed Trump as the guy doesn't have an ideological bone in his body, has a huge ego, but he certainly always had his finger on the pulse of where voters were. And that, to me, is something that's changed. But, you know, he, he Created the monster along with Ron Paul that said, you know what? Forever wars are not conservative and they're not good for America. They're not patriotic. And now he's, he's trying to tamp that down. Like, he's even finally come out criticizing Tucker Carlson, which he hadn't really done before, though, certainly not anyway, in the way that he goes after Thomas Massie.
- [29:00]
B
I don't get it. I don't understand it. I blame Israel. Can I just do that? I just blame Israel because I don't understand. He had conservatives eating out of the palm of his hand, and not just conservatives, but also the libertarian right, because they really did believe that he had a different vision for our foreign policy. You can call it Jacksonian, you can call it whatever, but, like, they really believed in that. And I, and, and he seems to, like, taken his finger off the poles, lost the thread. I don't know. I think he expected, no matter what, everybody would go with him. Remember when he said, I define what MAGA is? Who says that?
- [29:41]
A
He actually said, I am maga.
- [29:43]
B
I am maga. And I think my gut on this is that I think if he had his druthers, he would just make a lot of money and stay out of war. I've never seen him as a guy who was impulsively in support of military force. He certainly didn't portray that as the 2016 candidate. But you have this, whatever influence that Israel has on his foreign policy. And it's not just like you said, Miriam Adelson and all these big donors. But that has a lot to do with it. I mean, he, he, he recognized the capital of Jerusalem or Israel as in Jerusalem as. And he said he did it for the Adelsons. Okay, so he's already acknowledged that he has made policy changes. The recognition of the Golan Heights as, as Israeli, the, the complete cutoff of aid to Palestinian refugees during his first term. He, he has said, I did this for the Adelens. So, like, it's not a stretch to think that he is tied or tethered to Israel in ways that we can't fathom. And when they say, well, we have to. To take this aggressive posture on Iran, meaning let's like, launch attacks in June and now. Launch attacks now. And yeah, in the, in your base isn't going along with that. You know, his, his first reaction is like, well, they. He's lashing out at the base because he's know he's. He has this tether on his other. On his other arm, and that's that's all I can conceive of because I don't know why he would fritter all of that away. And if you notice, the Republicans that he really goes after and he really hates are the Republicans who have countered him on his foreign policy. Marjorie Taylor Greene and Thomas Massie and now Tucker Carlson. I mean, we'll never know how the relationship between him and Charlie Kirk would have gone. But like, you see people raising all of the things that Charlie Kirk had been saying about and warning about war with Iran at the time time, I remember putting that in a Responsible Statecraft article before he was assassinated. So I feel like, why is it, why is he lashing out at those Republicans the hardest? Because I don't, I don't think he can get away from what he started on the war front. And, and I wish he would. And there might be a break with Israel, we don't know. But it does seem like his sense of balance is really off and he doesn't see his political survival as keeping the coalition together. I think he sees his political survival as keeping Israel happy. But he's better look at the Gulf too, because they're getting really hurt right now. And that's where a lot of his investments in his family's investments are right now.
- [32:41]
A
If you made it this far into the show, it means I must be doing something right. Key Beyond Liberty is just one of the amazing products we created for your, the people. We tell emotionally compelling stories and produce educational videos for the Liberty Curious. Our award winning documentaries personalize all things liberty, independence, creativity, hard work, integrity and perseverance. After the show, check out our work@freethepeople.org and if you like what you see, donate to support what we do. That's freethepeople.org now back to the show. I think this is public information and if it's not, it's about to become public information. You know, one of the last, I don't know if I don't know the timing precisely, but before Charlie was murdered, he was the one powerful voice inside the Oval Office that could go to President Trump and say starting a war with Iran is a bad idea. And as the story goes, he got his head taken off and Trump just wasn't going to put up with it anymore. But he was the only person that wasn't part of that echo chamber. So his loss reminds me a little bit of, you know, when I was a young economist, I worked for Lee Atwater at the Republican National Committee and Lee was the only one keeping George H.W. bush from breaking his read my lips, no new taxes pledge. And then Lee got cancer and died quite suddenly. And of course, we know that history. Everything flipped. Charlie was playing that same role in the Trump administration, but it's not at all clear that he could have stopped this train either.
- [34:27]
B
No, because I think to a certain extent, Tucker was playing that role, too. I remember during the first Trump administration, him having one guest after another to talk about how a forceful retaliation against the Iranians would launch a much greater war and warning Trump against that. And he had Doug McGregor on, and he had Danny Davis on, he had me on, and I think a couple others. Like, his show was filled with anti war, non interventionist conservatives. And Trump stayed his hand. He said, okay, I'm going to do a symbolic retaliation. And I don't know if you remember this. You know, we killed Soleimani. And then they responded, and then the, the question was, how hard are we going to go after him now? And Tucker said, please don't do this. You know, just, you know, do a symbolic hit. We don't want to start World War iii. And he didn't. And I, you know, so Tucker has been very consistent on this Iran issue, and I think he's played somewhat of a role, but he's absolutely outnumbered. I mean, I'm sure you've read how he was at the White House the week before this all happened, and everybody's like, well, what did they say? And from what I hear, he didn't come out very happy, you know, and a lot of people who had meetings with the president that week came out a bit despondent with what they had heard. We don't know exactly, you know, if they were told something was going to happen. But unfortunately, now that he's in the doghouse, who's left? I. I don't think any. I think you're right. I think that the circle is closed around him very tight. And influencers who had some say, like, you know, you know, Bannon has had a number of critics of the, The Iran policy, Iran war policy on his show. He's platforming at least, folks. I don't know if how close those two are, but, yeah, that. That number is absolutely dwindling. And I'm glad to see Marjorie Taylor Greene out there, but I darn, I wish she was still in Congress and able to do something, because Congress is just absolutely worthless at this point.
- [36:49]
A
I understand why she would walk away with such a bitter betrayal, but I wish she would have stuck it out like Thomas Massie. But who am I. To judge, all I know is, and Thomas has said this on this show, that as attractive as it would be to go back to my farm and live the beautiful life that I created for my family, not now. I'm not going to stop this fight, because this Massie's election has very, very big consequences for the future of the conservative movement, the future of the Republican Party and the future of the country. And that sounds like hyperbole, but he's kind of the last man standing.
- [37:33]
B
Well, and, I mean, I think he was one of the first members of Congress. I mean, maybe there was a couple on the Dem side who have been really fighting against aipac. And I think they're actually having a serious effect because you have a lot of Democrats, especially, who are now feeling they have to go out to microphones and say, I'm not taking AIPAC money. Now, that's a first for Capitol Hill. And I think. I think Tom Massie was the brave, lone voice who went out there and said, I'm not going to get bullied by aipac. And he didn't, and he's not getting bullied. But, like, he. Somebody had to do it, and they had to be the first. And on top of it, he has a president who hates him and calls him a moron every day and is sending the dogs out to try to, like, you know, wipe him out.
- [38:21]
A
And, I mean, Trump's actually going to Massey's district. I forget when, but soon. So he's bet, no joke intended. He's betting the farm on this one. Because, you know, if Massie survives, it is devastating for Trump's political capital. How's he going to bully anybody into doing anything for him anymore? And that's how he operates. He bullies people into voting for usually really bad legislation, but it's all or nothing. And we're in, at that point, let's say we're in the second week of a war in Iran. He's going to Kentucky instead. Bizarre. Bizarre priorities.
- [39:05]
B
Bizarre priorities. Well, just like Jared Kushner and Ivanka out there attending Rupert Murdoch's birthday party yesterday and all of their finery. And I'm like, here's the guy who basically helped get us into this war out for a night on the town, you know, with the Fox News mogul Rupert Murdoch and friends. And it's just. It's so jarring. And it just. I think it does remind me, remind. And it should remind conservatives and MAGA that the. What the elites have wrought in this country. The reason why Donald Trump is The president right now is because you eschewed Washington and the elites. You can't just start, like, worshiping them again because Trump says it's okay. You know, go with your initial instincts. There is something rotten and wrong about this, this town. And Donald Trump cannot say that he is not part of it, that he is not benefiting from it, that he's not profiting from it. And now he's done the absolute opposite in getting us into this war. I mean, I think MAGA will wake up, and I think is waking up. I, like I said, you have that core that want to follow him to the ends of the earth. But I think even he knows, you know, with the Jeffrey Epstein files, I think that was the first chink in the armor there. I mean, he wasn't able to. He was to kill that vote, and he couldn't bring enough Republicans over to kill that. And that was devastating.
- [40:31]
A
I think Couldn't, Couldn't keep all of his once loyal influencers quiet about that because they'd built their entire brand on bringing Epstein and his other clients to justice. And.
- [40:44]
B
Right.
- [40:44]
A
You can't, like. And Trump has always believed this. He famously said, I could, I could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and it. My. My fan base would still love me. At some point, that wears off.
- [40:55]
B
Yes. And I think, and I think that the Epstein thing was the first example of that. This guy isn't like the complete Teflon don because he. That, that was a betrayal. Because this encapsulated translates everything. The, the elites, the corruption, the, you know, all, all the way going back to the pedophilia and all that. So you have so many layers. You got the, the QANON at the very, the very base level that has been warning about this sort of, you know, cabal of pedophiles and criminals and sex traffickers. And then you got these other layers up here where people recognize and thanks, because people like Cash Patel and Dan Bongino have been, like, banging the drum all these years that these are the elites that are everything that's wrong with our society today, and they need to be brought to justice. And so, like, Trump comes out and says, oh, it's all a hoax. It's all a Democratic host and there's nothing to see here. So you have. That whole pillar of his support was like, wait a minute, we were told XYZ all these years. And by the way, I'm one of those people. I believe that there is. There, there is so much more to this that we don't even know and while that wasn't why I ever supported Trump, I am massively disappointed to have somebody who was supposed to be representing the people and representing transparency and brightness, bringing corrupt politicians to justice suddenly turn on a dime and say, oh, this is just a republic. This is just Democratic hoax.
- [42:38]
A
That's, you know, it's funny. Just like. Just like creating an acceptable narrative for Republicans to be against the neocons forever wars in the Middle East. It strikes me that Trump was the one that made the Epstein files a politically salient issue. Like, he's the one who kept bringing it up. Kept bringing it up. I don't think any Bill Clinton wasn't bringing it up. No, it was him that created this narrative that made it a. We must get to the bottom of this thing. Because at that point, the machine had put it under the rug. So Trump brought it back. Now it comes.
- [43:15]
B
He's totally right about that.
- [43:16]
A
Now it comes to bite him in the butt. The. So I just watched rewatched for the first time in God knows how many years, the 1997 movie Wag the Dog.
- [43:28]
B
I have never seen it, or maybe I did, but it was probably 1997, so I forgot it.
- [43:33]
A
Well, here's the plot. A president is in political trouble for a sex scandal involving an underage girl. And his team contrives a war to start to change the narrative. I don't know if that's possibly. Sometimes I feel like history doesn't rhyme. It just keeps repeating itself. So watch this movie.
- [44:01]
B
I will.
- [44:02]
A
It's sort of creepy.
- [44:04]
B
Who started?
- [44:05]
A
It's De Niro and shoot Dustin Hoffman.
- [44:09]
B
Dustin Hoffman, Yes. I have seen that.
- [44:11]
A
And this was right after one of Bill Clinton's wars. I'm trying to remember which one. So 97. So whatever that was. So in some ways, it's a critique of the Clinton White House, but it could certainly be a critique of this White House as well.
- [44:28]
B
I mean, thinking back, I think you're referring to Operation like Desert Fox, or there was something we were strafing Iraqi targets against Saddam Hussein because he wasn't doing xyz. I can't remember now. And I. I do think that that was in the late 90s, and it was right around the time of the Monica Lewinsky scandal. And so that whole idea that he was distracting from that just seems like small potatoes now. Just even say it. You know, the whole Monaco Lewinsky thing.
- [45:00]
A
Yeah.
- [45:00]
B
Wow.
- [45:02]
A
At Kibbe on Liberty, Freedom is a lifestyle24.7, something you live and breathe and wear every day. If that describes you, you need the very best Liberty swag in the market today. Just like this shirt I happen to be wearing. Go to freethepeople.org kol and check out our exciting merch. You too can love Liberty and look cool. So I've had Chris Coyne and Abby Hoffman, Abby Blanco on my show multiple times about war propaganda. And I was rewatching this movie and it's such a poignant critique of the Washington war machine. I don't feel like Hollywood makes those movies anymore. No, they've been bought too.
- [45:49]
B
They've been bought too. And I mean, well, I mean, you look at Top Gun and some of these other. I mean, they were steroidal military action films. And like, the Pentagon is literally consulting on them. The Pentagon is literally lending all of their planes and, and other like, military assets to, to the production. They're, they're literally like filming on, you know, bases. So like, they get a say in the script. So never expect like a Hollywood action blockbuster to ever that not reflect some sort of like, you know, military propaganda. But I do, I, I agree that even the films that are supposed to be anti war come off as, as false and, and, and weak and tone deaf. They don't really get what Americans are feeling or what they would respond to. Like, and so, and I don't know what. I'm sure there are myriad reasons behind that. Like the people who are funding these movies, you know, the, the whole idea of film writing by committee. And so everybody's in on writing the script and they don't want to, they don't want to alienate that audience and they don't want to alienate that audience. And so they end up making some like, just stupid schlock that nobody buys. I mean, I remember the Michael Hastings book, the Operators, they made that into a movie. Now some people like it. Brad Pitt starred as the ersatz Stanley McChrystal figure.
- [47:18]
A
My wife likes every film with Brad Pitt.
- [47:20]
B
Yeah, I mean, I like Brad Pitt, but I, I feel like they pulled their punches on that one. Here you have the source material. You have Michael Hastings book, which is like unbelievable. And they pulled their punches. And I think it's because at a certain level, Hollywood just doesn't want to mess with whoever is funding. And we can go into the conversation about like, who's funding money, movies and whatever, but it means that you're just never going to get a good anti war film. You just don't. I mean, they're out there, but I think probably they're more foreign.
- [47:50]
A
Foreign films, not Hollywood Yeah, there's a guy in a trench coat backstage the soundstage.
- [47:57]
B
One of Tom Massey's minders.
- [47:59]
A
Yeah, maybe that's the wrong word to use in that script. So I don't know about you, but I'm both just. I was pretty despondent, and now I'm just, like, sort of pissed off about this whole thing, because this one's so much bigger and so much more consequential than other foreign policy blunders that I have opposed in the last six, eight, ten years. What's the best thing that can happen now that we've broken it?
- [48:31]
B
I mean, the best thing that can happen. And again, this is. You know, I have smarter people than I who are advocating this, that somehow Trump is convinced. Convinced that he needs to declare victory and go home. Like, whatever he's got to do to save face, he needs to do it. In which we've seen that before. He did that with the Houthis. You know, he. We were kind of getting our ass kicked, but not because we couldn't just, like, nuke these guys if we wanted to, but it was the fact that we were expending all these missiles against their real cheap drones and, and, and, and homemade missiles and that we were losing a lot of money and we were causing disarray in the Red Sea and shipping was being affected. So what did Trump do? He just said, I'm going to declare a ceasefire with the Houthis. And I, you know, I gave them a bloody nose, and they know what's what, and if they bother us again, we'll just have to resume. But I'm going to stop this now. Obviously, this is on a much grander scale, and will he be able to pull something like that off? I do not know, but he's going to do something. We know this guy has a huge ego. He's not going to say he lost. So he's got to find some way to declare victory, because if he lets it go. I don't. I do not think the Iranians are in the mood for capitulation. I think that's clear. I mean, they just appointed Khamenei's son to the position of supreme leader. This guy whose family was just pretty much wiped out. He's not capitulating. He's not looking to talk. This is existential for the.
- [50:05]
A
Is he more radical than dad historically, or is he just motivated by the fact that they just killed his family?
- [50:11]
B
From what I understand, and I'm not an expert, that he's just radical. He is not One of the reformists. So you're getting Khomeini 2.0 on top of that. He's got a lot of vengefulness in his heart because his mother just got killed, his, you know, his grandson got killed, or, or one of his nephews, I think a brother in law. I mean we're talking immediate family here. So like, I don't think so. You got like he's twice motivated to continue fighting and, and, and not conceding anything. I mean, it is existential. Is it existential to me and you that we fight this war? No. We'd be happy if it was over tomorrow. Nothing would change in our lives. But for this regime, this is all or nothing. And Trump was told this, this is what bothers me. And it bothered me during the Iraq War. The first one in 2003 was that you had all these experts that were saying, well, history tells us, or this is the intelligence and this isn't going to go right and you're going to have an insurance insurgency breakout if you don't, if you don't get out of there right away or if you eliminate the Bath regime. They were, they were advised. I feel like it's always the hawkish, you know, messianic voices that always take precedence with these guys. And then, then we have to pay the consequences. The American people and civilians in, in the region have to pay the, the cause. And I thought we were going to ask for these Iranians who we supported so much to rise up and take over their government. Why are we bombing the hell out of them right now? Because that's what we're doing. We're probably radicalizing everybody as we speak. There's, there, there is no mobilization in Tehran right now, but yet we heard these neocons over and over for the last two months saying, we stand with you. And you know, we, the same stuff you heard in 2003, we stand with you. We want you to take your government back, blah, blah, blah. And that's not happening right now because they're all hunkered down and being bombed out of their homes. And now they have like black rain coming down from like all of the fumes and the, and the, the carcinogens that are out there that we've like blown up all these different refineries and everything. And it's like, okay, so basically you've bombed them back to the 79. Revolution Spirit is probably what you got.
- [52:40]
A
I doubt they're inclined to believe American promises anyway. But they could also just look at Afghanistan and see how that liberation turned out, not so well. But of course, to do any of this, Trump would have to tell Benjamin Netanyahu and Israel. No. Yeah, doesn't seem to know how to do that.
- [53:03]
B
No, he doesn't. And I, again, I don't know what they have on this guy, because Trump really comes. Comes across as a strong individual. I mean, come on, you wouldn't get to where you are today if you didn't have a certain type of I don't give a shit character when. But when it comes to Israel and Netanyahu, he defers. I mean, he actually said the other day, I don't know if it was sometime over the weekend, that we will decide together when this ends. You know, I've. I've never sat. I've never in my, My whole. I mean, and I'm pretty conspiratorial. Ever thought that we would ever let another country decide our foreign policy, particularly in matters of when to end a war. I mean, this goes beyond any. Anything that I've ever lived through.
- [53:50]
A
And then to say it out loud over and over again, because Rubio did it, it's almost comical. The reporter asked him, you said this thing. He's like, no, I didn't. Were you even there? I said, I asked the question. Yes, and Pete Hegseth said it as well. But it's pretty obvious. It's bizarre to me, too. I don't fully comprehend why anyone would sort of wholesale just hand over foreign policy to. To any country. And I think in a lot of ways, the demagoguery, like, the moment you criticize any military action by the Israeli government, you're declared an anti Semite, you're pushing a lot of independence further and further away from the Israeli cause and certainly from the Trump administration's foreign policy. And I just, I don't think they comprehend this perfect storm that they've created because inflation's still a thing. Can't fund all these bombs without running the printing presses. And we're spending everything on everything else, too, at the same time. And I still believe in what James Carville taught the Republicans the hard way. It's the economy, stupid. So if your grocery basket costs twice as much much as it did three or four years ago, and you're watching the meter run, what are you. Spending a billion dollars a day in Iran is about what we're spending?
- [55:22]
B
Yeah, it was like 5 billion, but that was like, on last Thursday. So, yeah, it's way over 5 billion now.
- [55:30]
A
some point when we go into the midterms, and the economic issues, regardless of anything else that happens, the economic issues are the most dominant ones. And it's not about stock market. I know the attorney general told us it was, but it's not, it's about how the economic security of actual people trying to feed their families. On top of that, the Epstein files and Trump saying, if you believe this hoax, I don't even to want, want your support. On top of that, the forever wars. I don't think they know that midterm elections don't work out all that well for the incumbent party in good times. So I don't know what's going to happen. And then what are they going to do when Democrats control one or both houses? I don't know. How have they even thought about that?
- [56:29]
B
I don't know. I mean, you see, see them doing a lot of funny stuff with trying to like bully election state election officers and, and registrars. I don't know what's, I haven't delved into that. I think the fact that they're paying so much attention to what's going on at this state election house and that one and the voter rolls in there, I think they're, I think they're very mindful. I don't know what they're up to. But you're right, this not good historically for the, the party in power and for all the reasons you just mentioned that people think it's going to be a total wipeout if the Democrats take over the House and the Senate. They could go for an impeachment, which would, that would drag the country through another one of those and maybe he would be impeached. Either way, I think he's a, he's a lame duck after these midterms and maybe that's why he's pulling all these stunts now. I don't know. He's kind of flailing about like a wounded animal. And so what happens after the midterms if, if say, they manage to hold one house or the other, Got super divided, never going to get anything done. And then you're going to have the prospect of the next presidential election. So I think there'll be less attention on Trump, but then more attention on, on like, you know, exposing or, or taking advantage of all of his failures to take out whoever is going to be his heir apparent. Is it, is it J.D. vance? I don't know. It's not looking too good. And it looks kind of like Rubio might be positioning himself for an open primary. Yeah, I just, maybe he feels like he's Got to do everything now because of this, this clock that's ticking. But as you said, we're the ones who are suffering for.
- [58:15]
A
Okay, bold prediction. It's 2027, and this is my bold prediction. And you can tell me I'm crazy. The House impeaches again because it's controlled by the Democrats and they, they have Trump derangement syndrome, and they'll, they'll find a reason. And yeah, you know, maybe there's legitimate reasons for that. The Senate convicts led by Lindsey Graham and John Cornyn, who Trump is about to save his bacon from, from, from the MAGA base in the state of Texas, all these neocons that have gotten him into this mess, they're the first ones to convict. Yeah, and maybe that's karma.
- [58:53]
B
I don't know, you know, maybe that's karma. But I do feel like those neocons are going to, if there is an open primary and say you have Rubio and Vance, they're going to go with Rubio. I think, I think Rubio is more dangerous than I had ever given him credit for. He's very smart. He's very politically astute. I still think that he's a neocon at heart and somewhat of an empty vessel when it comes to foreign policy. That doesn't mean he's not smart. I think he was created by the neocons. I think that's where his core is. He managed to sort of make himself more palatable to the MAGA crowd by using Jacksonian, like America first language. But look what he's doing in the, in Latin America. God knows what we're going to do with Cuba. He's been foursquare on the regime change in Iran. And so I do think that he's setting up as an individual who will not only get the hawkish Republican crowd, but he'll bring back all those Never Trumpers who just could not stomach their, any support for Donald Trump. They have a visceral reaction to the man. And Rubio, not so much so. I mean, this could get much worse if there isn't a competent, strong person to oppose him. And I think increasingly, you know, J.D. vance is looking weak. And so, like, I don't know, I have no idea what happens.
- [60:19]
A
He also inherits all of this.
- [60:21]
B
All of this.
- [60:22]
A
And that's, that's, that's probably a good reason why vice presidents don't usually make it to the presidency. But so thinking about, you know, I guess I have some responsibility on my hands because as the Tea Party organizer, we were pretty instrumental in getting Marco Rubio elected, he was not the establishment candidate. He never talked about foreign policy.
- [60:45]
B
No.
- [60:46]
A
He was preaching the Tea Party gospel of balancing the budget and reining in Washington and returning to. To individual liberty in the Constitution. And Ted Cruz, more pointedly, he claims now that he was elected to be. I forget how he says it, but it's something like Israel's best friend in the Senate, like, pretty on the nose. I never heard him talk about Israel once. And we again, like, pretty intimately involved in organizing in that primary because he also beat in the establishment Republican. So there's something about the Blob, there's something about Washington, certainly the money, certainly the influence, certainly the echo chamber. But otherwise, reasonable people turn into the thing that they ran against.
- [61:37]
B
Right. And if you don't have a strong foreign policy instinct, you know, this isn't something that animates your politics. You get into Washington and you find, like, maybe the momentum, I'm sure, at the time that he got in. What. What year was this?
- [61:53]
A
Cruz was 2012.
- [61:54]
B
Yeah.
- [61:55]
A
And Marco was 2010.
- [61:57]
B
Yeah. I mean, that's. I mean, we're still in the thrall of the war, and neocons were absolutely ascendant, if not predominant in our foreign policy discourse. And so, like, yeah, I mean, if you're a new guy on the block and you don't really have a fully formed foreign policy and your donors want you to lean in a certain direction, yeah, it makes. It makes sense. But to me, that doesn't get him off the hook. I disliked him from the beginning because of that foreign policy swing that he was sort of like Bill Crystal's little guy coming in, and he sort of said my all the right things in front of a camera, and it just. It was a super turnoff. And so the idea that he comes in after being totally dispatched by Trump in the first election in 2016, now comes back as the best, greatest secretary of state that we ever had, according to Trump. It just. It boggles the mind. It says, actually more. More about Trump than it says about Marco Rubio. Because, I mean, like I said, Marco. Marco Rubio is capable and even smart and good at what he does, but it's sort of like. Like in a way that a villain is because he's pursuing these regime change fantasies that he's had supposedly from the beginning. You might not have heard it, you know, when he was mouthing all the. The Tea Party things because he needed to get Alexa. And, you know, then he did the same thing when he wanted to make right with Trump is to talk about America first and talk about, you know, using force when only was necessary. He's good at that.
- [63:43]
A
Yeah, politics does encourage that kind of behavior.
- [63:47]
B
Yeah, Unless, you know, of course, you're Ron Paul and you just basically you, what you say, you know, you know, what you see is what you get, you know, and there are so few of those guys. Tom Massey is another one, you know, they will risk total annihilation by a president who's out to get them just to stand up for what is right. And I, and I appreciate your show and you for, for platforming him and platforming all these good guys because the majority of Washington, they're a bunch of sheep and they're spineless and they'll just, like you said, say what they have to to get, get the funding and stay in office.
- [64:29]
A
You know, I suppose I don't have that many politicians on, on my show for a very explicit reason. I suppose my ratings could get bigger if I pretended to be Fox News.
- [64:42]
B
Yeah.
- [64:43]
A
But my problem with politicians is that you can't actually have a conversation with them. And they're like robots that have talking points. They'll spout and at the end of that when they run out of talking points, they just recycle them and start saying again. So it's the worst possible. It's not a conversation, it's a performance. And you can do that on Fox because you have a three minute hit or a five minute hit if you're doing a deep think piece. But they go in and they memorize them and they do that. And I also platform the notorious Quincy Institute. I want to wrap up on this because you guys are now a campaign issue in Thomas Massie's reelection because you guys had the audacity to give Thomas Massie and Ro Khanna explain the award and then explain the controversy.
- [65:40]
B
Well, I mean, the award is for standing tall and standing firm for diplomacy over militarism, for being a voice for anti interventionism in the Congress, standing up for and against wars and sending our troops to foreign adventures just in the spirit of John Quincy Adams, which we shall not go in search of monsters to destroy. These two men actually exemplify that every day when they're introducing legislation and they're fighting for war powers and it just happened to, you know, coincide maybe a day or two within the Jeffrey Epstein vote. But again, when we gave them the award, they talked about this and how proud they were of each other and supportive of each other that they managed to get this bill passed and they got Big rounds of applause. So yeah, we give this award to people who exemplify the spirit of our mission. And that has caused a little bit of a target on his back because we have people who don't like our positioning on media say this Iran issue and we've got a target for him because people don't, you know, don't like what he's said about AIPAC and, and Israel. So like, yeah, I mean I, I'm proud to stand with Thomas Massie. He is one of the, the most honest, authentic politicians I have ever met in my life. And that like there's like a small little handful that include two Polish Paul's, you know, in that, you know, and Marjorie Taylor Greene. I'd give her an award right now too for what she's done, but there's so few of them.
- [67:33]
A
Yeah.
- [67:34]
B
So I'm, I'm proud that we gave him the award. I'm, I'm proud that he accepted the award and that he is, you know, actually helped me with reporting that I've done over the years. He's just an amazing voice.
- [67:49]
A
And you like the Quincy and stuff is explicitly either nonpartisan or bipartisan or post partisan, however you guys frame it. Because you come from the anti war right and you certainly have colleagues that come from the anti war left. And that I guess is one of the talking points is that Charles Koch and George Soros were seed capitalists in the founding of this. I think we talked about this the first time I had you on the show and what was it, four or five years ago?
- [68:21]
B
Whenever it was, I mean our founders had a vision that we're never going to change the foreign policy in this town until we harness the power of both the left and the right. Non interventionist, non authoritarian movements that do exist. I mean I wrote for the American conservative for years, antiwar.com, another libertarian right platform. We have folks, you know, coming to Quincy who toiled away in the anti war left and this idea that we have to be bifurcated or this, this, this effort to bifurcate and divide us has worked for a long time because all of these wars have been so hyper politicized that you know, the anti war left will stand down and like maybe the Ukraine war and getting involved there, but then get really agitated over Israel and then the anti war right is maybe not as agitated over Israel, but agitated over Ukraine. And as long as you just keep those two divided, then we just don't have. We, we're not loud enough. We can't convince Members of Congress enough to support war powers bills, for example, or to end funding for weapons for Israel. And so, I mean, it's a beautiful thing to try to run an organization where you say, hey, we're not appealing to one side or the other. We're not carrying water for either side. We're not running campaigns, we're not pulling punches because one's in power and one's not. It's, it's kind of liberating because you're like, this is about the issue, this is about the principle and not about the party and the politics. And so, yeah, seated by, you know, Soros on the left and, and Coke on the right, got a lot of hell for that. And we still do. But, you know, six years running and we're bigger. Like three times the size is one. We were, I mean, responsible statecraft. I mean, for our, like, little magazine. We're getting like a million hits a month. We're getting like 150,000 when I first started in 2020. So I, I do think we've touched a nerve because people are tired of the politics they want, they want to talk about foreign policy through the, the prism of non interventionism and restraint. They want to figure out how did we get in this, this terrible rut Post World War II where we've, where we're so engaged in fighting wars, but we don't know how to engage diplomacy. We don't know how to gauge the rest of the world without like bullying them or staging bases everywhere. Like, something has to change and the younger generation understands this, you know, and so I think we, I think we have gotten quite a, a base of support. And when we give a reward to Ro Khanna and Tom Massey like we did, it really exemplifies the spirit of what we're trying to do. Here are two guys coming from two different parties, two different states. You know, we got a left coast guy and you got the Kentucky Southern guy. You know, it's just, it's wonderful. And we, you know, and I, I think this is our moment because unfortunately we're in another war. But I do feel like we have like, in, in our movement, we have people, we have conservatives and we have progressives. And I'm sorry, but that, that, that, that's a powerhouse strategy because at any given time you have somebody like Trump in office. Now, who's he listening to? He's listening to other conservatives. He's not listening to President Progressive. So unfortunately, they can march all they want down the street and he will ignore them. And and, and marginalize them in his mind. But if they. If there are anti war conservatives like Tucker Carlson, who is going on and delivering monologues like he did last week on Iran, to, like, millions of followers, he's listening. He doesn't like it, but he's listening. Well, we're engaging all those people. People we're engaging concern. We've built trust with that side of the aisle and looks like we have trust with the other side of the aisle. It's not easy in this partisan environment. But when you have people like me who are really dedicated to bringing both sides together and not in a sort of patronizing way, oh, well, I'll get along. It's about knowing how to talk to people, not insulting their intelligence, getting them where they are. You know, not pandering, but like talking to people where they are, understanding where their concerns about war and peace are and engaging them on that level. And I think it's worked.
- [73:13]
A
So I think I tell you this every time you come on the show, that I, for one, really appreciate a resource inside the Beltway that can give me real time, vetted information, information and analysis about what's going on in foreign policy. Because when I was the Tea Party guy, I had to go on Fox News Sunday and talk about tribal factions in Syria. And I'm an economist, so I didn't know anything and I couldn't find anything, so I had to do the research for myself. And now you guys are one of the first places I go. The last question platform for you to just brag about the work you do is what are the resources you guys offer to people that are trying to think independently. The fog of war and all this propaganda, all these fake AI videos. I never retweet anything without vetting it because I don't know if it's real or not. But people are trying to figure out what's actually happening today in this war. What do you guys offer? And do you have other recommendations?
- [74:25]
B
I can't tell you how proud I am to work at a place with the caliber of experts I have. They're not only like, the best at what they do, like really smart guys and gals, but they chose to work at Quincy, so they could be working at Brookings. They could be, you know, working at the Belfer center, the Harvard or Hoover Institution, where.
- [74:45]
A
Where they could have a more highly compensated point of view.
- [74:48]
B
Highly compensated, prestigious. They could be teaching at all of these universities, but they chose to come to Quincy because they wanted to make a difference. So you have the benefit of their expertise, which is top notch. But it is, it is, is, is framed in a way that they're, they're not hiding a point of view. And that point of view is how do we fix what's wrong with the status quo? Like, why. What you're hearing out of the Council on Foreign Relations is a, is a bunch of bunk, you know, and able to do that with facts and arguments that are, that are steeped in academic, but in research, like, I love that because they're all like, in my office. And so I know when I'm commissioning a story on what's going on with the Ukraine war that I'm talking to experts on Russia and Ukraine and in that region who aren't, like, they don't have Trump derangement syndrome. They don't, they haven't been sort of, you know, bought into the Russia gate, that they, that they are true scholars of the region and they're telling you that this war has to end for X, Y and Z.
- [76:05]
A
Z.
- [76:05]
B
And this is what's really happening beyond what the mainstream media has been telling you about what's happening in that war. Because they have been talking to the wrong experts, in my opinion. I love that. And that's, I do think that a lot of our growth for our magazine came during that Ukraine war. Now, we were accused of being tankies and being pro Putin, but honestly, I would, I bank on every single analysis that has come, come out and has come true in that war. We said it's not going to be won on the battlefield and it's not going to be one on the battlefield. That. And then, of course, all of our Middle east coverage, the coverage that we do on the military industrial complex, we have a whole set of experts who spend their time just pouring through foreign influence filings through, you know, think tanks and what, who, who they're getting money from and whether they're disclosing that when their people are out there on cnn. And so I'm like, I love these guys because they're, they're, they're, they are deeply committed to getting at the truth. But it's not for personal gain. It's not for professional glory. It's to, to advance this idea that we have to do things differently. And so, like, I just feel very lucky. But I do think going back to, it's like you choose to work at Quincy for a specific reason. It's because you want to engage your principles and, and make a difference. Where a lot of think tankers, you know, they have myriad interests but none of them, I don't, they're not to advance like a goal or a message or a point of view. It's usually, you know, an academic or a self interested
- [77:50]
A
thing.
- [77:50]
B
And so. Yeah, so that's why I think you can come to our site now. You might not like our point of view. Maybe you, you think we should be engaging in regime change and using our, you know, military to as a force for quote unquote good in the world and to advance our values. But if you are tired of the status quo and the Washington blob and the failures of the last 30, 40 years, then you come to us because we will give you the tools on how to think or like not telling people what to think. I mean I don't really like OP eds for that reason because they just do a little talky points and you know, you're sort of spoon fed a point of view. We give you the tools and the facts and the arguments to understand complex foreign policy issues through a window that the regular establishment doesn't deal with. They just have pushed that to the side. And now I feel like our view is becoming more and more predominant because most Americans just aren't buying the usual blather anymore.
- [79:00]
A
So where do people find you?
- [79:02]
B
Well, if you want the reports and the briefs that are experts like you want to do a deep dive into these foreign policy issues, you go to the Quincy Institute website. If you want the day to day news and analysis written by both staff. But a lot of outside contributors go to Responsible Statecraft, which is our, is our foreign policy magazine. And there you're just basically you're getting an up to date view on what's going on in the world through a realist and restraint perspective.
- [79:36]
A
Okay. Hopefully next time we talk we'll have a happier story.
- [79:40]
B
I hope so.
- [79:41]
A
I sure hope so. Thank you.
- [79:42]
B
Thank you.
- [79:44]
A
Thanks for watching. If you liked the conversation, make sure to like the video, subscribe and also ring the bell for notifications. And if you want to know more about Free the people, go to freethepeople.org sa.