Idiot Trump Accidentally Fires Wrong People… So Lost!

Summary

Legal AF by MeidasTouch Network – Episode Summary

Episode Title: Idiot Trump Accidentally Fires Wrong People… So Lost!
Release Date: February 15, 2025
Hosts: Ben Meiselas, Michael Popak, Karen Friedman Agnifilo
Executive Producer: Meidas Media Network

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Introduction

In this episode of Legal AF, Michael Popak dives deep into a controversial and alarming decision made by the Trump administration: the dismissal of highly trained nuclear bomb experts from the Energy Department’s National Nuclear Safety Administration (NNSA). Host Ben Meiselas and co-host Karen Friedman Agnifilo join Popak to dissect the implications of this move on national security and governmental functionality.

Main Discussion

The Dismissing of Nuclear Experts

Michael Popak begins by criticizing the Trump administration's decision to fire nuclear bomb experts responsible for maintaining and dismantling nuclear weapons, as well as supporting the Navy's nuclear submarine program. He emphasizes the critical role these experts play in national security and counterterrorism efforts.

Michael Popak [01:00]: "When you take a wrecking ball and a sledgehammer and you indiscriminately get rid of trained professionals holding the highest level of security clearances who are responsible for our nuclear arsenal... maybe that group should have been spared when you decided to get rid of them."

Popak argues that replacing these experts with individuals lacking the necessary training and security clearances could jeopardize the nation's safety. He highlights the impracticality of replacing specialized personnel with unqualified individuals, likening it to replacing a quarterback with wide receivers in an NFL team.

Michael Popak [05:00]: "If this was Madden 2025 NFL, I'd be like, that's interesting. Have an entire team of wide receivers get rid of your quarterback. Let's see what happens."

Impact on National Security

The discussion delves into the potential repercussions of such dismissals, including weakened nuclear deterrence and compromised counterterrorism operations. Popak underscores the severity of removing highly skilled individuals from critical positions, questioning the administration's priorities and competence.

Michael Popak [02:30]: "We as an American people invested in this group of technical experts... and we fired them. This group that's running the government."

Government vs. Private Sector

Popak contrasts the roles of government and private enterprises, emphasizing that the government’s responsibilities extend beyond profit motives to include maintaining national infrastructure, security, and social safety nets. He criticizes the Trump administration's approach, which he believes prioritizes short-term gains over long-term stability.

Michael Popak [11:00]: "The government has a role in our economy. Not just to increase investor and shareholder value... it's there to provide the social safety net, education, and ensure the economy is calibrated."

Consequences for Red States

The hosts discuss how the administration's policies disproportionately affect red states, which have benefited significantly from programs like the Inflation Reduction Act. The removal of funding and personnel targets these states' economic and infrastructural stability.

Michael Popak [04:30]: "The Inflation Reduction act with its hundreds of billions of dollars under Joe Biden went to 80% red states. You get rid of the Inflation Reduction act, you cut off all that funding, you get rid of all those people."

Notable Quotes

• Michael Popak [01:23]: "Maybe you should not make America less safe by getting rid of the nuclear bomb experts."
• Michael Popak [05:13]: "Two years of the bull in the China shop. Two. Except it's a nuclear China shop that's attached to explosives on either side."
• Michael Popak [11:34]: "The government is not a business. A business runs for one reason and one reason only: to increase investor and shareholder value."

Insights and Analysis

Popak provides a critical analysis of the Trump administration's disregard for specialized expertise within the government. He argues that such actions not only undermine national security but also erode public trust in governmental institutions. The conversation highlights the importance of retaining experienced professionals in key roles to ensure the effective functioning of the state.

He further explores the dichotomy between Democratic and Republican ideologies regarding the role of government. While Democrats advocate for a government that actively works to improve societal welfare, Republicans under Trump are portrayed as dismantling essential governmental functions in favor of deregulation and reduced oversight.

Michael Popak [17:00]: "If you don't like what's going on right now, if you don't like the wholesale dismantling of our constitutional republic and those things that you rely on... you punish them at the midterms."

Conclusions

The episode concludes with a stark warning about the long-term consequences of the Trump administration’s policies. Popak urges listeners to hold the administration accountable in upcoming elections to restore the balance of power and reinstate essential governmental functions. He emphasizes the necessity of a well-rounded government that balances fiscal responsibility with the protection and improvement of societal welfare.

Michael Popak [17:39]: "If you don't like what's going on right now... take everyone, every member of Congress up for election. Give the Democrats back the House and the Senate and you will see real change."

Closing Remarks

Michael Popak encourages listeners to subscribe to the Legal AF YouTube channel to stay informed about the intersection of law and politics. He reiterates the importance of active civic engagement to ensure the protection of democratic institutions and national security.

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Stay Connected: For more in-depth analysis and updates, subscribe to the Legal AF YouTube channel and join the conversation on promoting a balanced and secure America.

Transcript

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[Michael Popak]

Well, maybe you shouldn't dismiss all of the nuclear bomb experts for the Energy Department and its National Nuclear Safety Administration, the ones who have been training for years in order to provide nuclear weapons to the military and dismantle them and provide the Navy with nuclear submarine capacity who have top secret clearance. Maybe it was a bad idea for Doge and Elon Musk to dismiss those highly trained people with top, top level national security clearances who work around the world to counter terrorism involving nuclear weapons. Maybe that was a bad idea because now the Energy Department under Donald Trump has decided to recall the people they just dismissed. Who are these experts, by the way? We don't have slavery in this country any longer, so they don't have to come back.

[Co-Host]

Maybe you should not make America less.

[Michael Popak]

Safe by getting rid of the nuclear bomb experts. I'm Michael Popak and this explosive story I'm going to cover right here on Midas Touch and Legal af. When you take a wrecking ball and a sledgehammer and you indiscriminately get rid of trained professionals holding the highest level of security clearances who are responsible for our nuclear arsenal, our nuclear bombs, making the Navy and its nuclear submarine program run appropriately, being involved with counterintelligence, maybe, maybe that group should have been spared when you decided to get rid of them. I know that Elon Musk, who's really running the government now, believes that all government employees are fungible. And widgets, just fungible widgets, you could replace one for another. Hey, you there.

[Co-Host]

You work in the Internal Revenue Service.

[Michael Popak]

You don't anymore. Now you work on nuclear bombs. You see, that's not how that works. That's not how expertise and training works. And so now we're watching this hand wringing that's going on in the Trump administration. Like, wait a minute, we got rid of our nuclear bomb experts. Think about this. We as an American people invested in this group of technical experts, technical civilians with top secret security Clearance each having almost two years of training. And we fired them. We fired them. This group that's running the government.

[Co-Host]

This criminal enterprise that's become the government under.

[Michael Popak]

Donald Trump, first they send out messages to groups like the Small Business Administration firing everybody. Then they send out another email a day later said, no, you're not fired. And then a third email hours later says, no, you are fired. I mean, what. There are American lives not only inside these organizations that are being being made into playthings for Elon Musk's experiment, his social experiment, his governmental experiment, but there are human lives here that are being undermined. Are you any safer now? Are you safer right now? Let's ask that question they always love to ask around election time. Are you better off now than you were four years ago? Are you safer now knowing that there are that are critical nuclear bomb experts all got fired and have to try to be recalled? Good luck recalling them. The only way they're going to get these people back and not go into private sector is if they're overpaid, which is more waste of taxpayer dollars. Not every department in the government is filled with fraud and waste and woke and DEI problems. Okay, you may not like the policies of your predecessor, but you were not elected Trump to completely and wholly dismantle the government. And most of the programs and personnel that are being eliminated are falling disproportionately.

[Co-Host]

To harm red states.

[Michael Popak]

It's red states who were the beneficiary of most of these programs. The Inflation Reduction act with its hundreds of billions of dollars under Joe Biden went to 80% red states. You get rid of the Inflation Reduction act, you cut off all that funding, you get rid of all those people.

[Co-Host]

Those 800 numbers don't work anymore. Who do you think it's gonna off?

[Michael Popak]

Red state voters. But Donald Trump's got a short time horizon. He's a short termer. Yeah, both chrono, both from an age standpoint almost a chronologically he's a short termer. And from his administration he's got at.

[Co-Host]

Best two years for maximum destruction. Two years.

[Michael Popak]

Two years of the bull in the China shop. Two. Except it's a nuclear. It's a nuclear China shop that's attached to explosives on either side, which is the world around us. As Donald Trump decides he's gonna do some sort of put his thought experiments and tabletop exercises into practice. I mean if this was Madden 2025 NFL, you know, video game, I'd be like, that's interesting. Have an entire team of wide receivers get rid of your quarterback. Let's see what happens. This is Trump 2025. This is no video game. Let's tariff our way to prosperity. Let's tax cut our way to prosperity. Let's increase the trillions of dollars of national debt, meaning that China owns our country because they own our debt. And at the same time, let's give all of the supporters of Donald Trump that are, that just saw him as their ticket to their success. Heritage foundation, all the right wing MAGA think tanks, Conservative, they're not even conservative. Right, right, alt right think tanks. Let's reward them with whatever they want. Make out your Christmas list. Donald Trump will implement it.

[Co-Host]

You don't like transgender Americans.

[Michael Popak]

I'm going to attack them and I'm going to, and I'm going to go after them on your behalf. You don't like other Americans, fine. You don't like the Democrats, fine. I'm going after all of them. This is the revenge segment of the Trump administration. But to get rid of our nuclear bomb experts, how are you any safer today? So right now compared to under the Biden administration. When you put your head on your pillow tonight, think about this. You have Tulsi Gabbard, who many people think is a Russian asset, okay. Who was a, who pandered to our enemies like Assad in Syria before he was taken down by his own people, who catered to Russia and Russian television giving interviews there as well, that they celebrated. She's now in charge of 18 separate intelligence units of the American government. How is she qualified to do that? Because she was a short timer in the American military. This, this, this congresswoman from Hawaii or wherever she's from. And, and if that makes you lose sleep at night, then you're really going to hate Pete Hegseth out of the makeup trailer at Fox and Friends. Weekend Edition, not even primetime Fox and Friends is now the head of your Pentagon. Yeah. And there's not one military person at all in any of the hierarchy of our military. No one that knows what they're doing. Not even defense contractors who know what they're doing. So he's got no support. He's already made major errors. That makes us unsafe in undermining the negotiations between the Ukrainians and the Russians. Telling the Ukrainians before they even go into the room and announcing it out loud, they can't expect to get any of the property or territory back that was taken from them against their sovereignty interests. And they shouldn't expect that. And they shouldn't expect to go into NATO undermining their bargaining position before the bargaining has even begun. Rookie mistake. Rookie mistake. As the head of the Armed Services Committee, a Republican, recently declared, and now, on top of it, they just got rid of in the middle of the night, your nuclear bomb experts.

[Co-Host]

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[Michael Popak]

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[Co-Host]

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[Michael Popak]

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[Co-Host]

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[Michael Popak]

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[Co-Host]

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[Michael Popak]

And that and that title is is an understatement. They are the members of the National Nuclear Safety Administration, the nnsa, a semi autonomous unit within the Energy Department. And the three or four hundred people there are highly skilled, highly trained, top secret, classified information, right? They are responsible for our nuclear arsenal. They power the Navy. If there's counterterrorism around the world. You know every movie like Mission Impossible where everybody's Trying to get their hands on some nuclear device. This is the reason it doesn't really happen in real life because of how they work. And now they've just been dismissed by Elon Musk. So he can hold up a pad one day on a whiteboard or something and say that he saves $100 billion. To what end?

[Co-Host]

To what end?

[Michael Popak]

The government. To say it one more time, the government is not a business. A business runs for one reason and one reason only. To increase investor and shareholder value, right? Within the limits of the law and sometimes beyond that is its sole purpose, right? It might have a creed, it might have a credo, it might have a DNA, it might have a corporate philosophy, right? But all that's gone now. All the things where people said we're in favor of sustainability, gone with the Trump administration. We're in favor of diversity, equity and inclusion, gone. So now it's just avarice and greed. So companies have a job, the only job, the only reason they exist, right, is the mindless pursuit of profits for their shareholders. That's it. By the way, I'm a capitalist. I'm not saying it's necessarily a bad thing. I'm just saying companies will not, will not, unless they find it in their interest, do anything as good corporate citizens to contribute to the rest of society. If they could pollute their way to profit and not get caught and not worry about their own employees health, they would do it. Very few companies will voluntarily agree to regulation. There are some, but not many. And so that's their role. They're not here to make the society politic better, healthier or wealthier. They're not. The government has a role in our economy. Not the Trump, but the government has a role in our economy. It helps make the economy hum. It steps in through its fiscal and monetary policy and makes sure that the economy is calibrated because we can't leave it to the supply chain or the supply and demand of macro and microeconomics run by private business because they have no interest in helping you. There's no private company that would run Social Security. There's no private company that would run food stamps, health care for children, yet veterans disability, student loans, I mean maybe student loans, because it's loans. But generally this is not the province of private enterprise. There might be some private public partnerships, some PP, some PP, three as we call them, or P3s. They may step in if they smell a profit motive like private prisons and things like that. But in general, the government is there to provide the social safety net. Education, public education, properly regulated by the federal government, not by states, to make sure that we have equal standards and children are meeting those needs. Right. That's why we have these things. So the government has a role through monetary and fiscal policy, through the use of treasury, treasury notes and treasury bills, through the Federal Reserve, through buying and selling itself. Buying and selling for itself. You know, the American government holds $5 trillion worth of assets that had to be bought. They employ millions of people, and those are all workers with paychecks who are consumers. So it's an employer, it's a developer, it's a buyer, it's a supplier. It steps into a market when it's stuck. It stops strikes, it intervenes. It makes sure the labor unions do the job that's necessary to keep America's economy humming. This is stuff that only the government can do. None of the people around Trump administration have any experience or any belief that the government can help improve people's lives. That's the major fundamental difference in a dichotomy between the Democrats and the Republicans. The Democrats believe, properly calibrated, a government can improve people's lives and make sure the economy is ultimately for all. Yes, capitalists can make as much money as they want, but through tax and transfer, other people who can't, who don't have the ability to start an Amazon or fly to the moon, right, can figure out how to get three squares a day with clean clothes and get a bath. You know, there are people in this society through their own. They're Americans, right? Or they're documented. Or for the immigration group, there's that group that just doesn't have the skill set or the achievement or the mental ability to, or the drive to achieve at the top half of 1% of America. And that's okay. That doesn't make them lesser people. We're supposed to put our arm around our brother and sister. You know, we're supposed to lend them a helping hand. You know, he's not heavy, he's my brother. Right? Where did that go? That's why this country has never been pure, pure purely capitalism. Because you would not want to live in a Hobbesian purely capitalist society that's only concerned with the almighty, almighty dollar. You think you have a homeless problem now in your community? If you do, it would be worse in a purely capitalist system. We are not a purely capitalist system. We're not a pure democracy. We're a constitutional republic. That at its core is democracy, but it's not a pure democracy. We don't vote up and down on everything. This isn't Greece, Ancient Greece. And so once we understand who we are and what we are, then we can do the right thing. We have the polestar to navigate to. Starting point is how about we don't get rid of the bomb experts and send them packing and hope to replace them if we can with anybody we find on the street. It's not like we can go down to Home Depot and just find people and help us that day. Hey, we're building a bomb. Can you come join us? I got to continue to follow all this. What we're watching is something that we need to hold the Trump administration and Republicans accountable for in less than two years. If you don't like what's going on right now, if you don't like the wholesale dismantling of our constitutional republic and those things that you rely on and.

[Co-Host]

You'Re in a red state, for instance, and you're.

[Michael Popak]

And you're getting punished by Donald Trump's experiment, then you punish them. At the midterms, you take everyone, every, every member of Congress is up for election. Everyone and half the Senate, okay, Pay the price. Give the Democrats back the House and the Senate and you will see real change and the reversal of this power imbalance that's going on right now with Trump having all three branches. I'm Michael Popak. You're on the Midas Touch Network in Legal af. Do me a favor, it's the only thing I really ask. Come on over to Legal AF, the YouTube channel. Hit the subscribe button. Help us continue to grow that Pro Democracy channel as well. So until my next reporting, Legal A f the podcast, Wednesdays and Saturdays, 8pm Eastern Time on this channel, Popoc Live, a new podcast, Tuesday nights at 8pm and the Legal AF YouTube channel. I'm Michael Popak and I'm reporting in.

[Co-Host]

Collaboration with the Midas Touch Network.

[Michael Popak]

We just launched the Legal AF YouTube channel. Help us build this pro democracy democracy channel where I'll be curating the top stories. The intersection of law and politics. Go to YouTube now and free subscribe at legal a FMTN. That's @legal AFMTN.

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