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Dave Smith
What's up? What's up everybody? Welcome to a brand new episode episode of Part of the Problem. I am Dave Smith and I am rolling solo for for today's episode. But thank you guys very much for tuning in. Rob is off porching or traveling the country God knows what. Wreaking havoc somewhere, no doubt. I should let you guys know right at the beginning of the show because we're only about a week out from what is maybe me and Rob's biggest comedy weekend of the year. That's Denver Comedy Works, which is just really one of the best clubs in in the country. It's basically Denver Comedy Works and the the Comedy Mothership in Austin have kind of become like my two favorite clubs in the country. So really looking forward to going back there. If you'd like to come out, grab tickets now because they're moving fast. Comic Dave Smith.com June 18th we will be in Greenwood Village and then 19th and 20th Denver Comedy Works downtown. So come on out. Really looking forward to that. And then after that we'll be in Houston, Huntsville, Al, Alabama, Nashville, Tennessee. I will be speaking at yalcon, the Young Americans for Liberty Liberty event in Cincinnati, Ohio. Then stand up shows in Fort Lauderdale, Appleton, Wisconsin Austin, Texas, Louisville, Kentucky Fort Worth, Texas, Dallas, Texas Salt Lake City, Portland, Portland, Maine, San Diego, California and I believe looking to add a Las Vegas state in there as well. So comicdavesmith.com please come out to some of those shows. And then another quick reminder. I will be tonight, I believe it's at 6pm Eastern, 9pm Pacific or wait, no that would be 6pm 3pm Pacific. I will I check double check me on the time but I will be guest hosting the Young Turks tonight. I'm filling in for Jank. So I'll be guest hosting with Anna Kasparian. So that should be, that should be a fun time. I'm looking forward to that. All right, so let's get into some stuff for today's show. Well, as I've said before, this has been just about the worst ceasefire ever. I believe Donald Trump actually essentially called it the same thing. He said it in slightly different, more Trumpian language, but he, I think he said there's never been a ceasefire that's been violated as much as this ceasefire, which is kind of another way of saying that it didn't work, which is a pretty big theme of Trump's war and Trump's presidency. You know, I was thinking, I was thinking about this earlier today and you know, I've been saying for a while now that Trump has destroyed his presidency. I think I probably first started saying this, you know, last summer. It's all, it's already almost this summer, but certainly really for the last few months. I mean, I, I think I said that Donald Trump, when he launched the 12 Day War and he covered up the Epstein files, that he had essentially destroyed his coalition but going back into Iran, I mean, I think this very clearly destroyed his presidency. And we're watching that right now and we're going to get into some more of the specifics about that. But I've just been thinking about this morning that, you know, I've probably, I, I've probably only really seen one or maybe two presidencies destroyed before in my life. You know, I'm, I'm 43. I was born in 1983. And so, you know, I've only seen, I've, I've only lived through two one term presidents. There was George Bush senior and Joe Biden. And, you know, like, I'll kind of, in a way, Joe Biden is a little bit of an outlier. He kind of doesn't count. Now, I would. Look, you could, I wouldn't, I wouldn't really say that George H.W. bush Senior destroyed his presidency. Hey, he didn't get reelected, but, and he was very popular at one point and his approval rating fell. But it was also like, you know, he, he came up against Bill Clinton, who was kind of this superstar. There was a major third party contender in Ross Perot in that election that I think had a huge impact on it. Also, the Israel lobby turned against George H.W. bush and favored Bill Clinton because he was angry about them expanding settlements in the West Bank. That's another story for another day. But I wouldn't, you know, it wasn't as if, like, George H.W. bush had been. I just wouldn't categorize it as his presidency being destroyed. You know, hardcore conservatives maybe never really loved George H.W. bush, but I don't know, it wasn't like. It wasn't like he was a laughingstock as he left. It wasn't like the, you know, even amongst the Republican voters, they didn't support him anymore. I mean, look, his son with the same name was the next Republican president. So, like, for example, when Jeb Bush. Jeb Bush was running For President in 2016, everybody knew Jeb Bush wasn't going to be the next president because his name was Bush. Like that. It was like he maybe could have won the Republican nomination if Donald Trump hadn't run and things had gone differently. But maybe not. But there was no way he was going to beat Hillary Clinton because at the end of the day, his name was Bush and her name was Clinton. And the ad writes itself. And you got to put yourself back into 2016 here. But the, the Clinton years. Bill Clinton's presidency wasn't a failed presidency, but George W. Bush's was. His was a failed presidency, even though he got two terms and his dad only got one term. And the point proves itself right there. He could still win the presidency with the last name Bush, whereas after him, there wasn't going to be another Bush. George W. Bush was the first one I really saw destroy his presidency. And again, to be clear, this isn't a comment even on how, who I like or who I think did a good job. I mean, I think all of them did bad jobs in their own way. But what I mean by it is it was so destroyed that, yes, after George W. Bush. Okay, so think about it like this. After George H.W. bush. So George H.W. bush is president. He wins the election in 1988. He's president till 92, when Bill Clinton beats him, technically, January 93. So George H.W. bush is president, the next Republican. Then there's eight years of Democratic rule under Bill Clinton. The next Republican president is a Bush, his son with the same name. It's President George Bush. Eight years of Bill Clinton, President George Bush. After George W. Bush, there's eight years of Barack Obama. The next president is Donald Trump, who ran on George Bush, lied us into a war. Like, not got it wrong or didn't prosecute the war the right way. He the strongest possible repudiation of a president that you could have. That's what was eight years after George W. Bush. That's what I mean when I say a failed presidency. George W. Bush started his presidency with record high approval ratings. Nobody before or since has had them. And he ended in the toilet with two disastrous wars and the worst economy in 100 years. So now that's a destroyed presidency. Okay, Now Obama I think was every bit as bad as George W. Bush, maybe even a worse president overall. Debatable. But he wasn't destroyed in that way. Yes, he had higher approval ratings and they went lower, but they weren't record high to in the toilet. They were just better to not as good. Still overwhelmingly popular in the Democratic Party. The idea that in, in, let's say. So we did the same game we did with the George W. Bushes, let's say Barack Obama, he stops being president in 2016, January 2017, if you want to be technical. Then there's, there's four years of, of, of Trump now. Okay, it's not two direct term. So it's not an apples to apples. But like even if you count after Joe Biden's term or even now into, into Donald Trump's second term, the idea that the nominee, like the next Democratic nominee would have won by running on how Barack Obama was a war criminal who lied us into wars and is responsible for the deaths of a million people is just right. That seems kind of crazy. Like no one's saying that even Bernie Sanders, even like the more left wing guy, nobody is actually running on that. And by the way, to be clear, that would be true if someone wanted to say that, that would be absolutely true about Barack Obama. But the point is that his presidency wasn't destroyed in the public opinion in the same way. It just wasn't. Whether right or whether fairly or unfairly so, Barack Obama is again, you may notice that like Barack Obama and Michelle Obama still go and speak at the Democratic National Convention. Did you, did you see a Dick Cheney speech at the Republican National Convention? Has anyone seen George W. Bush speak at anything that was. No, of course not. So anyway, just to be clear here, that's what I mean, that's what I'm saying is the difference here. Now, okay, Joe Biden is, I'll grant you that one's a little bit debatable. But the reason why I almost, like I said, I think of him as kind of like an outlier, is that Joe Biden, like in the same way, you know, Joe Biden never really had the juice. Joe Biden was never really the guy Joe Biden just, he was there and he was Obama's vp. And the Democrats were unified by one thing, which is that they were against Donald Trump. And so like, I mean, I'm far from the first person to make this, you know, this comment, but there were no pro Joe Biden votes. There were only anti Trump votes. And even amongst people, like I remember, I know I've told the story here before, but I was, I was in New York City on the day that the election got called. So this was an election day 2020. It was like, whatever, a couple weeks later. But when they called it officially for Joe Biden, I was in New York City that day in the afternoon. And you know, if you can remember the story I told this, 2020 was a real rough year for New York City. The lockdowns had really devastated it. And just everybody was happy that day. And I remember even though I knew Joe Biden was going to be a disaster, I was like, let him have their day. Let him be happy. But they weren't happy that Joe Biden won. They were happy that Trump lost. And so anyway, Joe Biden comes in, he's obviously senile through his. Anyway, I'm not really going to argue if you want to count that as a failed presidency too, or destroyed presidency, fine. But it's just a little bit different because he was just kind of senile the whole time. Like, I don't know. Anyway, I really look at the two examples of George W. Bush and Donald Trump destroyed presidencies where they just totally humiliated themselves and they've lost. Like Donald Trump I think is going to go into the category of George W. Bush. He, the, the next Republican who wins will be doing it running against Donald Trump. Donald Trump will not be speaking at the Republican National Convention. You know, ironically, the only thing he's concerned with his legacy and his legacy is going to be that of a complete failure. But you know, he's really done it in a more spectacular fashion than George W. Bush. He really has. All right guys, let's take a moment and thank our sponsor for today's show. Longtime sponsor been telling you guys about Prolon's diet for quite a while now. It's really incredible. Prolon by El Nutra they have the five day fasting mimicking diet that works at the cellular level to reset and rejuvenate you from the inside out. It supports sustained fat loss, lean muscle, better metabolism, slower aging and even glowing skin. Prolon is a plant based nutrition program. It features soups, snacks and bever that are all designed to nourish the body while keeping it in a fasting state, triggering cellular rejuvenation and renewal. It basically tricks your body into thinking it's fasting. So you get all the benefits of fasting without having to give up food. And it's all, there's, there's science behind this. It was developed over decades at the USC's Longevity Institute and it's backed by top US medical centers. Prolon has been shown to support biological age reduction, metabolic health, skin appearance, fat loss with muscle protection, energy and a health relationship with food. And right now, if you're ready for your own reset for a limited time, our listeners can get 15 off site wide plus a $40 bonus gift. When you subscribe to their five day program, just visit prolonlife.com potp that's P-R-O-L-O-N L I F E.com P O T P to claim your 15 discount and your bonus gift. Prolonglife.com potpour all right, let's get back into the show. First of all, George W. Bush, it took him eight years, it took him eight years to do it. You know, he won reelection. He was a two term president. And Donald Trump, well I mean he's two term but not back to back terms. You know, George W. Bush needed eight full years to really destroy everything. Donald Trump despite his disastrous first term which of course gave us culminated in Covid and lockdowns and riots and just awful. Just you know, for somebody like Donald Trump who says himself the way the metric to judge Donald Trump on is winning, winning or losing. Well, the guy who ran on elect me and I'll win four years into his first term was the worst year in modern American history. And you could say that's not all Donald Trump's fault. But you know what, enough of it is his fault that it buck stops with him. And and again a lot of it is his fault. He's, he's the reason we had Fauci on the job for at least that first full year. He's the reason why there was a national emergency declared. And of course he also bailed out all of the lockdown states. He, he ruthlessly mocked all of the, the non lockdown areas and including foreign countries like Sweden. Anyway, Donald Trump despite all of that came back to having his highest approval ratings ever when he came back into president. He has destroyed his presidency in such a short period of time and in such an obvious and avoidable way. You know, George W. Bush and I'm not making any excuses for him, he's a, you know, a monster of history, but I guess he's still alive. But that's how I think of him. That's, that's how failed and irrelevant he is now is. He's basically gone. But George, you know, W. Bush, well, I mean, look, 911 did happen. Now, he's not without responsibility for that. He was 10 months on the job, and by all accounts, he had just really not been taking the Al Qaeda threat seriously. And there's a lot that he failed on. But 911 happened, okay? He, he responds in the worst possible way and has the worst people around him. But it took at least that long for the wars to fail and then ultimately the economy to, to collapse. Donald Trump, again, even with George W. Bush, there's a lot that he's responsible for the economy crashing is partially on him. It's also partially on Bill Clinton. It's also partially on, you know, the Federal Reserve and Congress and a lot of other. But with Donald Trump, it's like this was essentially the mandate. The mandate was to not do this. You said you wouldn't do this, and yet here we are. You know, it's like, obviously we're going to get, I'm, I'm getting to all of this to transition back into where we are in the war right now, but just to kind of zoom out a little bit and to get some perspective on just how bad this is and, and how obvious it was. I mean, if you, if you, going into Donald Trump's second term, it was, what, what percentage of the people would you say were like, listen, the last thing we need is another disastrous war, particularly regime change war, particularly in the Middle East. Super majorities, high super majorities for sure. Out of, out of Donald Trump's entire voting coalition, a huge majority of it supported this idea. And for no reason whatsoever, he walked us back into this one.
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And.
Dave Smith
Well, I shouldn't say for no reason whatsoever, but for really, really bad reasons, like being, you know, controlled by a foreign lobby. Donald Trump, it is now, you know, there's been almost the strategy of propaganda while Donald Trump is prosecuting this war has essentially been to throw everything at the wall. It seems at times like the goal is to exhaust the American people. But just to be clear, as we now zoom back in to the short term, for those of you guys who haven't been paying attention for the last 48 hours, there's been a major escalation. The last two nights, the US has been bombing Iran. Donald Trump has promised now to, to bomb Them again even harder tonight. And also he's now said that we're going to take Carg Island. Iran in response, has said the strait is completely closed now and they've, they've been firing some retaliatory shots. I know there were, I was reading earlier today there were sirens in Bahrain. Not clear exactly how many of these missiles have been intercepted or how much damage has been done. But we're right back, we're right back into escalation at this point. Just to keep in mind, it's Thursday as I'm recording this. It was one week ago today, one week ago today that Axios reported that the deal was done one week. And now we're in major escalations. I mean, this is the, the speed at which Donald Trump has just completely discredited be clowned himself is unlike anything I've ever seen. I mean, I remember, you know, I lived through the George W. Bush years. I've lived through another failed presidency. And okay, I was young, I guess I was. So I would have been 17 when George W. Bush was running for president. So I was like 17, 18. And so it was for those eight years, you know, 18 to 26 or whatever was, was the age I was when George W. Bush was there. And it was like little by little by little. But by the end you just got to the States. That's just, no one believed him anymore. Everyone was tuning him out. He was just, it was a joke. He was a laughingstock. And it is, it's the way people describe the late stage Soviet Union. Just no one believes the government anymore. I remember like in, in like 2007, 2008, George W. Bush would come out and say something about how much we're winning the war in Iraq or Afghanistan. Everyone's just rolling their eyes at this point. So Donald Trump, I mean, guys, he's now saying we're going to hit him harder than ever tonight. We're going to take Carg Island. Was like a few weeks ago that they all declared the thing was over. Remember when we had epic furious over day? You remember just last week, last week, way back when Axios was saying we've reached a deal. Last week Marco Rubio was testifying before the Congress and someone mentioned the war and he interrupted him and said, the war is over. They're just bleeding credibility. And it is just something to watch this happening in slow motion. And look, it's not good. None of this is good. It doesn't bring me any joy to describe it this way. And look, obviously I've I've always, I've always disagreed with Donald Trump on a lot of issues. And I've always thought that he's just kind of a contemptible figure. And, you know, I don't know, I think that's just obvious. But anyway, that's always been my opinion. But nonetheless, he was the guy who said drain the swamp and these wars are stupid and George W. Bush lied us into war and Hillary Clinton should be in jail and Barack Obama made ISIS and we have a right to have border murders and you know, wokeism is insane or whatever. Like, he's the guy who represented a lot of issues that a lot of us agree with. Some of us have been on the front lines, like really fighting for these ideas for a long time. And to watch that guy just totally disgrace himself is not good. It's not good for any of those causes. And one can't help but notice, I know I've made this point before, but one can't help but notice that all of the Never Trumpers who were terrified of what the America first movement represented have been at the steering wheel while driving the thing off the cliff. That is hard. That is hard to ignore. Anyway, let's get into some of the latest here. Donald Trump, he spoke on the phone with Fox News earlier today. Take a listen to some of what President Trump was saying. We only have a minute left, but will it be more bombing tonight?
Donald Trump
Yeah, there will be more bombing tonight. It'll be a bigger, a bigger, more powerful. Don't forget, we've knocked out all of their anti aircraft. They don't have any anti. They have nothing. I mean, they may get lucky with a shoulder weapon or something, but for the most part, you know, they, they have no, they have no defense.
Dave Smith
What did the representative say in your phone call?
Donald Trump
They're finished. Excuse me? They're finished. But the papers. The media refuses to write it. They're finished. We can walk in there tomorrow. We could take soldiers. I don't want to have boots on the ground, but if I wanted to, we could put a small group of soldiers and take over the whole place. They're finished. And the media is crooked. They're just like our elections. The media is crooked. Mr. President, thanks so much for joining us today.
Dave Smith
All right, so here's what Donald Trump is going with. After all this time, that we, we could do it. We could take all this stuff. But what. So why don't you. Well, I'd rather do it the other way. Okay. But they're not willing to. Right. They're not willing to agree to what you agree. I mean, like what, you know, we've all watched there like throughout this thing. Donald Trump has threatened total annihilation of the whole civilization. They didn't buckle. You know, we're, we're now in a situation where we're going to start, we're, we're blowing up, we're killing people. Again, I, I, I suppose here the goal is what, get them to capitulate. Maybe we do enough damage that the regime is just willing to make this deal. But again, there's no signs of that. We're going to talk more about that possibility, but there's no sign at all that this is the case. And Donald Trump continues to brag about how Iran can't do anything back to us. You know, they've been completely destroyed and yet this week has seen a barrage of Iranian missiles including, well, they're claiming it was a drone that shot down a US Helicopter. We, again, we'll get into some more of that in a moment here. But yeah, I mean, you're going to sit here and say we could just do this, we could just take this, we could just win, but we're not going to because we're very close to a deal. How many weeks in a row has Donald Trump been saying that now? How many months in a row has Donald Trump been saying that? And you know, given that he's lying about everything else, it seems like this is in line with that here. Let's go to the next clip.
Donald Trump
It could be the greatest deal in history. They could wave the white flag of surrender. They could say we surrender, we surrender, we're finished, we've had it. The United States States is the greatest power, praise be to Allah. And they could do all of this. They could say it loud and clear and the fake news would say it was a great victory for Iran. I mean, it's the craziest thing I've ever seen. We're killing them. They're killing them. They have no navy, they have no air force, they have no anti aircraft. You know, we're flying planes over the middle of Tehran and they don't, they don't have no idea what we're there. We've knocked out all of their radar, all of their anti aircraft, much of their missiles. They have probably less than 20% about, we think about 20%. Most of their launchers have the missile launches which are quite important. Their drone capacity is way down. You see it, I mean it's way down. Their attacks are very minor. They're finished.
Dave Smith
Here he is. Donald Trump says they are finished. They are finished. I gotta tell you, from my perspective, the only one who's finished here is Donald Trump. And a big part of it is because this is just not related to reality, you know, there. Let's just the, Essentially, the, this is what Donald Trump pivots to. Kind of anytime he's asked about this war, he pivots to how utterly destroyed they are and how the media won't report on that. Now the media is acting like Iran is winning the war. And just a couple things on that, because I gotta say, it's. It's unclear a lot of these times, like, what media is Donald Trump even talking about, right? So there's like, there is the, the legacy dinosaur corporate media, right? There is. There are newspapers and networks and cable news shows and things like that. Then there's the whole Internet, you know, podcast world and other news shows online. And then there's a whole bunch of, like, online publications and stuff like that. Now, online, like the media, including all of Donald Trump's biggest supporters. Yes, they've all turned against the war for obvious reasons. And whether they're on the left or the right, most of them are rejecting this because they. Yeah, this is what we were all against, including you, Mr. President, when you ran for president in, in terms of the corporate media, you know. Oh, sorry. I should say with that, with the podcast scene, it's not like nobody is exactly making the claim that Iran is winning in the way that he's arguing against the claim. You get what I'm saying by that? So, like, nobody here, certainly, if you've turned on this show, it's not like I'm sitting here going, the Iranians have degraded our navy more than we've degraded theirs, or something like that. No, they, they are not able to touch us. If we're still considering America to be the middle part of North America, like, if you're still thinking of between Canada and, and Mexico there, if that's what your conception of the United States of America is, as most of ours is, okay, they can't even touch us. They don't have the capacity. So, yes, in that sense, we're winning. We're bombing them a lot more than they can bomb us. All they can do is touch our bases in the region and touch Israel or whatever. But, or, or, but, okay, even within that realm, there's no question we've dropped more bombs on Iran than they've dropped on our bases and on Israel. No one's really arguing that. So, no One in that sense is claiming that Iran is winning the war. But what are we talking about here? Well, you know, I said when I was debating Will Chamberlain on Piers Morgan, this was about a month and a half ago, we were doing this debate where he told me that he'd be shocked if the Iranian regime was still standing in a month. Okay, it's a month and a half later. So Will Chamberlain evidently is shocked. I, I'm not shocked. And I guaranteed to him that they would still be standing. Anyway, there's. So when, when you, you look at, say like, okay, so where Donald Trump launches this war. So anyway, so what I said to Will in that debate was, I said, he goes, look, we're destroying a lot of their stuff. You know, the same Trumpian line, like, we destroy their navy, their army, their this, their missiles, they're there. And I went, I said, hey, you know, we could blow up the world many times over the American military, but if we did that, we wouldn't say that was a win. Right? Like, if we just declared war on China and started dropping H bombs everywhere and we're just going to destroy the whole world, we wouldn't go, well, look, we've blown up so much more of their shit than they've blown up of ours, right? Because even though that's true, what does it do for us? And so what do you, like, average American, you know, what, like, person listening to this show, what issues do you have in your life, you know, that you might think government maybe ought to be in the business of solving, or perhaps more accurately, government was in the business of creating the issue, and you'd like them to not do that anymore. I mean, we could think of a lot, right? You think of a lot of major problems in this country, and obviously the big one is going to be that the currency has been destroyed and that it's like, impossible. It's, it's not impossible, but it is harder than it's ever been to get ahead in this country in a very basic sense at this point. It's almost like if somebody, if somebody were to tell you that they, they, they own a nice home and they send their kids to a nice school, so let's say they got three kids. Someone would say, we have a really nice house in a safe neighborhood. I send them to really good schools, I'm putting them all through college, and none of them have to go to in debt to go through college, and we take like one or two nice vacations a year. Like, if I were to tell you that you would go, oh, so you're a multimillionaire. That's America today. That's. Who gets to do that is multimillionaires. And everybody else does not. You know, you might have a major problem with, like, our. The state of our infrastructure. Obviously, we're $40 trillion in debt. We have something. I think the numbers are down a little bit, but I think there's like 80,000 drug ODs a year, which represent a lot more people who don't overdose, but just have ruined their lives becoming addicted to drugs. There's hundreds of thousands of people who live outside in this country. I don't know if you guys have been to California in the last decade, but it is a major, major problem. And then we've got all types of other kind of, I don't know, just. Just issues of cultural decay and relativism and nihilism. You know, a lot of our young people just are, I don't know, girls on only fans and guys are like, you know, looks maxing or something. I don't know, just a lot of things. We got a lot of issues in this. Okay, so anyway, my point. Think about. Whatever. Maybe I missed some issues that, that you're, you know, thinking of, but, you know, the price of groceries, the price of daycare, the price of college, people living outside, people dying on drugs, our culture falling apart. What about that is improved by Iranian naval ships being at the bottom of the sea. What does that do for anyone? If we were to just carpet bomb Iran tomorrow, how is your life any better? Let's say we nuke them. What does that do for you? Okay, this has. All that Donald Trump's talking about has nothing to do with what the war aims were, what your stated war aims are, and in fact, what's become very clear over the last couple of weeks. Marco Rubio himself said it two weeks ago, we played it here on the show that the. The main goal here is to get the Strait of Hormuz open. This is the major problem we have here, and it was open before the war. It's really hard to get away from that. All right, guys, let's take a moment and thank our sponsor for today's show, which is Cowboy Colostrum. If you finally want to fix your gut, make your hair healthier and stronger, and add some glow to your skin in 2026, you need to add colostrum to your daily routine. Cowboy Colostrum offers the highest quality bovine colostrum available in the U.S. cowboy colostrum is 100% made in America from 100% American grass fed cows. Unlike other colostrum brands, Cowboy Colostrum is true. First day whole colostrum rich in bioactives. Don't worry, Cowboy Colostrum only collects the surplus colostrum after the baby calves have had their fill. So nobody's losing here. Cowboy Colostrum isn't processed or stripped down. Their colostrum is whole, full fat and high in protein for ultimate nutrient density, making it the highest quality bovine colostrum you can buy. It's also easy to drink and is made with delicious natural ingredients and no artificial flavors. You simply add a scoop of their chocolate, Madagascar vanilla, matcha or strawberry into your coffee or smoothie and feel great the entire day. Not only will Cowboy Colostrum bring stability to your gut, the peptides and growth factors will make your skin and hair look amazing. And for a limited time, our listeners can get 25% off their entire order. Just head over to cowboy colostrum.com Dave and use the promo code Dave at checkout. That's 25 off when you use the promo code Dave at checkout@cowboyclostrum.com Dave. All right, let's get back into the show. And so it all the war goals that you stated, which this is before the strait was even closed, it was about the nuclear threat, it was about the intercontinental ballistic missiles, it was about the proxies and it was about, I don't know, the treatment of their own people or something like that. None of that has been changed. That's what people mean when they say you lost the war. But when Donald Trump or that Iran is winning, that's, that's what people mean, that they're winning on the chessboard. You know, if you think about the game of chess or something like that, right, you win when you get checkmate. You don't win by just tallying up who's taken more pieces off the board. Which, it's good to take pieces off the board in an effort to win, but if it's not in an effort to win, it doesn't matter. And, and so the, you know, the, the bottom line here. And again, this isn't George W. Bush. This isn't eight years ago you said this and then this happened. The bottom line here is that Donald Trump said out loud many times what the war aims were. The war aims were very clear from the very beginning of this war. And it was none of the stuff that Donald Trump's mentioning now. Donald Trump didn't launch the war and say we're going to destroy their Navy, their air force, their anti missile missiles, their intercontinental ballistic missiles. That's going to be and their drones. That's going to he said, regime change, the people take over the government, unconditional surrender, open the strait, we get all the nuclear material, the dust, which of those have been achieved. So that's what we're talking about when we're talking about winning and losing, obviously. But it is also worth pointing out that as Donald Trump talks about the media reaction to this, that is very different. Let's say if Tucker Carlson is criticizing the war, that is very different than what's going on say over at MSNBC or I shouldn't say MSNBC. Ms. Now, NBC doesn't want any part of that anymore. But here was a post the other day just so you can see what the media is actually doing. Here was a post from Joe Scarborough. Okay, so this was a post. This was so this was the day before yesterday. So if you to keep the timeline in your head here straight, the not last night, but the night before we started bombing around last night we bombed them more. Trump says today we're going to do more. We're taking Clark Island. We'll get to some more clips in a second. But so this is the day before yesterday, during the day. This is before Donald Trump started bombing them. Okay, so during the day, as you guys who are paying attention to this might notice, every time Donald Trump talks about like negotiating, the Israel lobby flips out on him. Then he goes back to bombing, they all cheer and say finish the job and all this. But so when one when the Israel lobby was flipping out on him, when it looked like maybe he wasn't going to go back to bombing Iran, this is what Joe Scarborough posted. This is this is the media. Okay, is this I'm sorry, is the administration so desperate for a deal that they now work desperately to overlook? By the way, doubling up on desperate there thought you're supposed to be a journalist. Okay, is the administration so desperate for a deal that they now work desperately to overlook the Islamic Republic of Iran shooting down American helicopters first trying to cave on nukes, then on the straight, then sanctions, and now they're okay with US Helicopters getting shot down? Okay, so in other words, Joe Scarborough here, the guy at msnbc, Ms. Now the host of Morning Joe, arch enemy of Donald Trump, right? The guys, the number one pusher of Russiagate and TDS and all this stuff. What is his position exactly here? Oh, no, no. When it looks like Donald Trump's going to end the War. He's egging him on, calling him a bitch for not going and bombing the crap out of them. Now, maybe this is as good a time as any to get into this, but this. All I'm going to say is this, okay? When it comes to wars, they are all sold on lies. Okay? This is a rule of thumb. It will never fail. Wars are sold on lies. There's that old saying, the first casualty of war is always the truth. And that is true. Before any young boys end up dying, the truth dies first. And you can go back and you can look at the lies that got us into World War I, into Vietnam, into you know, Iraq, of course, like into Serbia, into whether they claimed. They claimed Milosevic had genocide. At a hundred thousand people, they. They make up anytime they want to get you into a war. And as I've been saying since before. Well before the 12 day wars, I've been saying for 20 years, this Iran war is no different than any of those. This is WMDs all over again. And by the way, it's literally WMDs that they don't have. That's the war we're fighting right now over a nuclear weapon that didn't exist. Just to be clear. And you. You see this, and I've done tons of these debates, everybody, they're all like, Iran was going to nuke the entire world if we didn't go to war. How about that, Dave? Are you okay with them nuking, you know, Europe or the United States of Americ? And I mean, it's literally, it's. It's talking about Saddam Hussein nuking Kansas. Kansas. Sorry. They. They literally, they. I apologize. My apologies to Candace Owens there. Did not mean to bring her into this Kansas. You're. You're talking about a weapon that they don't have, let alone the capability to deliver it, which they also don't have. Like, they. They don't. Even if you gave Iran a nuclear weapon right now, they couldn't nuke America because they can't reach America. They don't have. It's not deliverable. But regardless of that. But you know, so anyway, this is another war based off. Off lies. As. As they always are. As they always are. And, and what. As you, you get into these things, you just. I'm just saying there are. There are all types of events. And you can go again when I said like World War I or Vietnam, this isn't even like a conspiracy theory. This is declassified. This is known. Like these, these were absolute lies that they got us into this War and of course, Iraq. Everybody knows that as well. This helicopter being shot down makes no fucking sense. The story makes no goddamn sense. I don't know what really happened. But I'm just telling you, what is being reported here makes no sense. And they're lying about everything else. And by the way, that original rescue mission also seemed to be pretty fucking shady. But even this, before we even get into that, just think about what Joe Scarborough is saying here and think about the fact, right, that the corporate media and of all people, Joe Scarborough. Right. Like, if you think about how radioactive they all attempted to make Donald Trump in his first presidential campaign and in his first term. Notice we don't really have that level
Donald Trump
of
Dave Smith
entrenched institutional pushback against Donald Trump right now. Isn't that interesting? This isn't kind of interesting that, like, through Donald Trump's first term, his own deep state was trying to frame him as a foreign spy. Pretty big scandal. We covered it a lot here on the show where. Why aren't they doing that this time? Well, MSNBC was calling him a Nazi and, you know, pushing the Russia gate. He was a Nazi. He was a foreign spy. He was an illegitimate president. What's Joe Scarborough doing now? He's egging on his policy, his war of choice. He's supporting the war now. He's still masking this with, like, a criticism of the president, but what's he criticizing him for? Thinking about getting out. Thinking about getting out of this war. And, and even, like, the way he. He frames it, as if, like, we're. Let's go back to that tweet. So he says, is the administration so desperate for a deal that they now work desperately to overlook the Islamic Republic of Iran, shooting down American helicopters, first trying to cave on nukes, then on the Strait, then sanctions, and now they're okay with US Helicopters getting shot down? Well, like, first of all, did they really cave on nukes? What? Nukes? There are no nukes. You're just making this up. There are no nuclear weapons. There's a little bit of enriched uranium in the country. Don't have any nukes. But, okay, we caved on nukes because we. But, and by the way, caving means they can't have a civilian nuclear energy program. Somehow that's. That's caving on nukes by even, what, allowing them. And by the way it's being demonstrated, we don't really have a choice. We caved on the straight. What does that mean? We blockaded their blockade. Is us caving. In other words, we can't open it. You caved on sanctions. Yeah. Out of desperation for the world economy. And now. Okay, but now we're okay with US Helicopters getting shot down. My point here is just that Joe Scarborough says it almost as if the Iranian, like the IRGC came over here to America and just shot down a helicopter, and you're like, hey, that was an American helicopter. Dude could just shoot that down. But that's not really the case, is it? No, it's more like you launched a war of aggression and somehow. My point here is that Joe Scarborough is somehow trying to frame a country, shooting down an invading country's aircraft as a war, as an act of aggression rather than defense. Like, it's, it's like if, if someone, it's like if a black dude broke into my house, you know, with a gun, prepared to kill my family, and I killed them in self defense. And then, you know, Joe Scarborough goes, we're just okay with murdering black people. You know, we're just okay with shooting down black people. Well, you're leaving out a lot of context there. Anyway, I did want to mention Danny Davis posted about this, by the way. His show is phenomenal. If people don't, if, if people don't watch Deep Dive with Colonel Daniel Davis, phenomenal show. He's a retired colonel and he's like a, you know, a legit military expert. And so this was what he said about it. Okay. And I'll, I'll defer to him on this because I think this is exactly right. He said, it's still not clear that the US Helicopter was actually shot down by Iranian fire. The story floating around of an Iranian Shia drone taking down a US Aircraft. Excuse me, taking down a US Aircraft is incredibly suspect as a Shiad is not maneuverable. And the chances of it intercepting an American attack helicopter is very unlikely. And if it did, the explosion would have destroyed the aircraft, not just disabled it. It. Okay. Seen several other military experts making this similar point. The claim that Donald Trump's making here, the claim that CENTCOM is making here, is that this drone, which is not a very maneuverable drone, took down, hit one of our helicopters, didn't explode, but just disabled it. Every military expert I've heard talk about this is like, this just doesn't make any sense. It doesn't make any sense. Here's another thing that's a little bit suspect about it. The Iranians are not taking credit. They're saying they didn't do it. And you could immediately look at that and go, oh, so what are you saying you trust the Iranians or something? If they say they didn't do it, then they didn't do it. And it's, it's like, no, that's not what I'm saying. I've been very clear about this from the beginning of the war. You don't read drop site news, which you should all read dropsite news, but you don't read drop site news and go, okay, that's the truth. Because the Iranian regime said it. They're a regime, They're a government, just like our government is a government. They have incentives to lie, too, and they do lie, and they have lied. But you look for admissions against interest and then you look for their narrative and you compare that to the facts on the ground and you see who, you know, how it adds up. There's no reason Iran wouldn't take credit for this if they did it. It just doesn't make any sense at all. First of all, it's a huge feather in their cap. They're, they're down in American helicopters. Well, Donald Trump, by the way, is over here saying we own the skies and they've been completely destroyed. But they're downing a U. S. Helicopter. They'd want to take credit for that. By the way, it's not as if Iran isn't being open about the retaliatory, the retaliatory nature of their current campaign. They're talking about their 1.5 doctrine and they're talking about how they hit all these bases and they're talking about how they are closing the straight. Like they're not sitting there going, hey, we didn't close the straight. We didn't fire off missiles toward, you know, Kuwait or Bahrain or whatever. They're, no, they're saying, yes, we did that. It doesn't make a lot of sense that they wouldn't be taking credit for this. So anyway, just something they're not really buying this whole story, which conveniently did lead to the last escalation of this conflict. So who knows what really happened there? Anyway, I, I very open to the belief that Donald Trump believes this is what happened, and I'm not sure it is. Okay, let's go. Let's play Donald Trump's next next clip.
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Thanks for joining us.
Dave Smith
So you say you're announcing you're going
Donald Trump
to hit them very hard tonight.
Dave Smith
What went into posting that?
Donald Trump
Well, it's just one of those things. They have no defense. They can't do anything about it. The only thing they have is fake news. You know, they have the New York Times writes stories like they're doing great and they're not. They been wiped out. CNN and that Ms. Now or whatever they call it nowadays. NBC had to get rid of it because it was bad for their reputation. But the, the, you know, publicity they have is incredible. It's almost like they're doing well and they're getting decimated, just decimated. And they're dying to make a deal. They want to make a deal so badly. But, you know, you read the New York Times and you read the Wall Street Journal, which is so fake. I mean, I know you guys own it, but it's a real piece of garbage. And you read the Wall Street Journal. It's like they did an editorial today about we're not hitting them hard enough. I mean, it's just not hitting them hard enough. We dropped $250 million worth of bombs on them last night. You know, the whole thing is crazy, but. And they're really in submission. They just don't know it yet. Okay? To be honest with you. They just don't know it yet. And we are talking to them and all. But, you know, look, my preference has always been take Carg Island. That's been. Brian knows that. I spoke to him a long time ago. Lawrence knows it. I spoke to him a long time ago. I said my preference would be that I don't know that America has the stomach for it, to be honest with you. You make a fortune. But I don't know that America has the stomach. I think they'd like to see us come home. But we did it with Venezuela. Venezuela has worked out great for everybody. We've taken millions and millions of barrels of oil out of Venezuel them to Houston and various other places, Louisiana, where, you know, refineries that we have that are incredible. They're going 24 hours a day making a fortune. And, you know, I like that in this case, too. But I'm not sure that America has a long time. You know, it's a little longer process. Something that's a guarantee if I want to do it.
Dave Smith
Mr. President. All right, so there's a couple things there that are really worth noting. Number one, Well, I mean, you know, look, he goes back to his, oh, we're winning, we're destroying them. The media won't report on it. Taking his shots at the media, whatever. But first of all, the claim. So Iran is in a state of submission. They just don't know it yet. It's again, it's like Donald Trump. He just doesn't he doesn't exactly understand concepts. He struggles with them a lot. Submission is not something that you, you don't enter into a state of submission, but you don't really know it yet. That's not what submission is. You might he, Donald Trump might mean to say that they're in a really bad place and they're going to have to submit and they haven't figured out yet that they're going to have to submit is kind of more like what he means. But, but again, that means they're not submitting yet. And this is a fact, we know this to be a fact because Donald Trump's been saying sign this deal for weeks now, and they haven't. So they have not submitted, but he's arguing that he can get them to submit. Now, again, what is the, the obvious issue with that? Well, I mean, if you couldn't get them to submit by threatening to destroy their entire civilization, I, I'm not so sure that even dropping $250 million worth of bombs in a night, and I bet it was more than that, if you look at the total cost, not so convinced that that's going to do the job. I mean, it is, it is worth noting as the, as the Houthis just recently entered this, this conflict, if you think about, which really is something I think for Americans, particularly Americans in 2026, to think about. You know, like I used to say this back at the beginning of the, the war in Ukraine when I would say, just like, look, when the Russians say, like Ukraine is a big threat to us, we can't have Ukraine being a part of, of the, of America's military alliance. You know, you gotta understood that Russia was invaded through Ukraine multiple times in their history. And if you're, you know, if you're an American, we've had lots of wars, say in the last hundred years, and that's a part of our story. And everybody knows that. And there is a lot, you know, in my generation, like I'm a millennial, my grandfather fought in World War II and a lot that was like a very common thing amongst people my age. Like your grandfather fought in the Great war, World War II. But you know, I guess a generation earlier would have been World War I. But okay, so now I guess today young people are a little aged out of that. Maybe it would be their, maybe not quite great grandfather, but not their grandfather, I guess, who fought in World, maybe their grandfathers fought in Vietnam or something like that. But war to us is kind of like, oh, the older men, they packed their Bags and went off and fought in a war. It was like they went over there, even if it was World War II. It was like, maybe they stormed the beaches or something, but they. They fought in Europe or maybe they fought in the Pacific theater. Maybe they were stationed in North Africa or something like that. But, like, it was over there. Pearl harbor was one day and Pearl Harbor's over there. Right? It's not like Hawaii isn't really part of America in, like, mainland. Like America proper. I mean, it's proper, but not part of the actual, you know, piece of land. So 9, 11, of course we have is this one day this thing happened, and that really did shake us up. But it is a different thing than, say, like, the perspective of a Russian who you. If you were a Russian, you know, if you were an American in the year 2000 or 2005 or something like that, and you were 100 years old, you had lived through the boys packing up for World War I and the boys packing up for World War II. Maybe you went on one of them, I don't know. But, like, you. You had, you know, you had seen Pearl harbor on the news or you had seen 9, 11 on the news. But if you're a Russian in the year 2005 who was 100 years old, you had seen your country collapse multiple times. Like the entire regime collapse. People starving in the streets. You'd seen your country invaded and people just like. And this does have a different. It creates a different psychology, a different mentality, a different aversion to. To these type of conflicts and a different spirit. And anyway, I'm just saying, look, the Houthis. Go, go read up what the people of Yemen went through from 2015 through 2022. I know this show was one of the only ones that really cared about it. Man, we talked about this all the time. People used to make fun of me in those years for always bringing up Yemen. That was like an inside joke. Like, even people who liked me go, there's Dave. Talk about Yemen some more. Because no one cared, but I just wouldn't stop talking about it. I got. I shouldn't say no one cared. I got Joe Rogan interested in it, and I got some people interested in it, and obviously Scott Horton and Dave De Camp and, you know, there were, like, a bunch of really great people, but not nearly enough. But what Saudi Arabia and the U. S did to Yemen for seven years was every bit as bad as what Israel did to Gaza over the last two and a half. It was that literally just on a Bigger scale, basically, that. I mean, the Saudis were bar. They were bombing farmland and wheat silos like it was a war on the civilian, on the civilian population. That's the war was. Natalie is telling me here that people are saying Trump called off the strikes for tonight. All right, I'll. Let me finish this little rant and then I'll check that, but thank you for putting that in here. There's what, what the Houthis and the people of Yemen went through over the last years, and they're still here fighting. Want to talk about Lebanon? What's been going on in southern Lebanon for many years, but particularly for the last few months. You know, the Hezbollah fought through not one, but two invasions and military occupations by Israel that lasted years. Obviously, Iran has been a sanctioned, crippled, relegated, isolated country. They've, they've dealt with lots of issues. Attacks from Israel. They dealt with a, a war last summer from Israel and America. Big protest movements, civil unrest, and now a huge bombing campaign in, in this latest war. They're still there. They're still saying the straits closed. They're still launching off missiles. And so I'm just saying, when you think about people in this situation who have been through this much and they're still there and they're still fighting. You know, you read about the way that the, the Iranian Shiites conducted the, the 1980 Iraq Iran War when Saddam Hussein invaded, use chemical weapons on them, slaughtered them by the hundreds of thousands. They still wouldn't quit. But the idea that Trump's going to drop a few bombs and that, that gets him to quit seems highly unlikely. Seems highly unlikely. All right, guys, let's take a moment and thank our sponsor for today's show, which is Quint. Summer always changes how I get dressed. I want a piece that feels lighter and more breathable. Things that are easy but still put together. That's why I keep coming back to Quints. They focus on high quality essentials that feel and look amazing. Think breathable linen and soft organic cotton. Well made basics, but without the luxury markup. It's that rare balance where everything feels elevated but still effortless. I, I just actually got a couple more pieces from Quince. I really love these guys. They're my type of clothing. It's exactly the type of clothes I like. It's stuff that looks good, you kind of look put together, but there's a lot of casual stuff and it's actually affordable, which is very nice. Quince's European linen pants and shirts are the perfect warm weather upgrade to add to your rotation starting at $34. Their tees are soft and easy to wear, and their lightweight cotton sweaters are perfect for cooler summer nights. Everything at quince is priced 50 to 80% less than similar brands. They work directly with ethical factories to cut out the middleman. So you're paying for quality, not brand markup. Quince goes way beyond clothing. They have custom upholstery, sofas, ceramic cookware, premium bedding. It's the kind of brand you end up recommending to everyone for everything. So elevate your summer wardrobe this year by Quince.com PotP for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada, too. That's Quince.com Q-U-I-N C E.com P O T P for free shipping and 365 day returns. All right, let's get back into the show. And then the thing to keep in mind here is that you look, let's just say like the absolute best case scenario here is what I mean. I think the best case scenario is that Donald Trump just stops. You guys said he's, he just, his latest is he called off the strikes. Okay, well, let's see if that's true then. I think that is the best. All right, I will. But I should make the point that let's say, let's say he is able to pull this off somehow. Let's say that somehow, despite everything I just told you, Donald Trump inflicts a little bit more pain on them and they go, this is just too much. We can't bear this. Maybe they're worried their own people are going to overthrow them. No evidence at all that that's the case. They seem more popular than ever. Seems like a rally around the flag effect is what's happening. But let's say that's wrong. And they do eventually go, fine, we'll sign a deal. We'll promise to never get nuclear weapons. We'll turn over the enriched uranium, we'll open the Strait of Hormuz. Like, like what? They give him it all. Guess what? Those are all things we had under the jcpoa. I'm not somebody in the business of giving Obama credit, but the fact is they didn't have 60% enriched uranium. They were down to like 3% or 3.25, whatever the number exactly was, they were very down in enriched uranium. The Straight of Harus was open. We had all of this. What are we actually doing? But Donald Trump's whole thing is Iran can never have a nuclear weapon. That's what the Ayatollah said before you murdered him. And then it still seems to me that I, I, I suppose that the worst case scenario is quite likely that the regime collapses and we're just looking at a Libya type situation or even worse, a Syria type situation. All right, here, let me see. So here, Barack Ravid post. Barack Ravid, of course, is Donald Trump's mouthpiece over at Axios. This is Trump Truth Social based on the fact that discussions with the Islamic Republic of Iran have been brought to the highest level of Iranian leadership and approved. I have, as President of the United States of America, canceled the scheduled strikes and bombings against Iran this evening. Discussions and final points have been in both concept and great detail. Deal approved by all parties. All right, so there we go. Guys, guys, in the show, within the course of this show, he's contradicted what he said earlier and now I guess he's back. Barack Ravid is, is tweeting this again. Barack Ravid is the one who published the piece one week ago today saying that the deal is done. So now they're back to saying the deal is done. You know, Donald Trump, for all of his talk about how they're totally destroyed, we could take Carg island and we could do all of these things. Donald Trump seems to be pretty hesitant to do any of those things. It's almost like maybe he can't pull that off. Guys, I don't even know what to say as my prediction on this. I think this is bullshit and we're going to be right back in this circle over the next week. Then again, look, I will say this and this will be the last thing I say, we'll wrap up. But the Iranians have said, yes, we're willing to make a deal. We've already sent you the outline for what we will agree to. And maybe it is the case that Donald Trump, you know, what they were saying is that it was, the Iranians claimed it was a lie that Donald Trump had said we were waiting for them for weeks. They're like, they weren't waiting. We've told you this entire time what our deal is. They said that Trump tried to add some other things that they just weren't going to agree to. So if they are saying they have a deal, be interesting to see what's actually in that thing because it's certainly not going to be what Trump has been promising. Anyway. We will catch you guys next time. We'll do members only episode tomorrow. Tomorrow at noon. Members only episode. Catch you guys then. Thanks for those of you who have subscribed. And thank you to everybody who listens. Share the podcast with a friend. Give it. You know, like subscribe. Hit the bell. Five stars. Whatever you're supposed to do. Comment. You guys know this better than me. All right, catch you next time. Peace.
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Podcast: Part Of The Problem
Host: Dave Smith
Episode: The Destruction of Trump's Presidency
Date: June 12, 2026
In this solo episode, Dave Smith delves into the unraveling of Donald Trump’s presidency, drawing comparisons with other recent presidents. He analyzes how Trump's second term, especially his handling of recent foreign policy crises—most notably the war with Iran—has led to a self-inflicted political downfall. Dave explores the swift collapse of Trump’s credibility, the escalation with Iran, the failure to achieve stated war aims, and the unified opposition from Trump's original coalition. Using his signature libertarian lens and direct, engaging tone, Dave scrutinizes the media landscape, questions the legitimacy of government narratives, and leaves listeners weighing the costs of endless wars.
Quote:
“Donald Trump will not be speaking at the Republican National Convention...the only thing he's concerned with, his legacy, is going to be that of a complete failure. But you know, he's really done it in a more spectacular fashion than George W. Bush.”
— Dave Smith [16:26]
Quote:
“The mandate was to not do this. You said you wouldn't do this, and yet here we are.”
— Dave Smith [21:59]
Coalition Betrayal: Trump's support evaporates among the “America First” movement and original base due to war escalation (22:33).
Many of Trump's media supporters and podcasters have turned against the war.
Trump on Fox:
Memorable Exchange:
Trump: “They’re finished. But the media refuses to write it. ... We could take soldiers... I don’t want to have boots on the ground, but if I wanted to, we could put a small group of soldiers and take over the whole place.”
— Donald Trump [24:09]
Dave’s response:
“From my perspective, the only one who’s finished here is Donald Trump. And a big part of it is because this is just not related to reality…”
— Dave Smith [27:36]
Quote:
"Wars are sold on lies. ... The first casualty of war is always the truth."
— Dave Smith [44:58]
On the Unraveling of Power:
“We're right back into escalation at this point. Just to keep in mind, it's Thursday as I'm recording this. It was one week ago today, one week ago today that Axios reported the deal was done. One week. And now we're in major escalations...”
— Dave Smith [19:38]
On Media Culpability:
“Notice we don’t really have that level of entrenched institutional pushback against Donald Trump right now. Isn’t that interesting?”
— Dave Smith [43:40]
On the War’s Impact:
“What about that is improved by Iranian naval ships being at the bottom of the sea? What does that do for anyone? ... If we were to just carpet bomb Iran tomorrow, how is your life any better? Let’s say we nuke them. What does that do for you?”
— Dave Smith [33:31]
On Comparing JCPOA Outcomes:
“Guess what? Those are all things we had under the JCPOA. ... What are we actually doing?”
— Dave Smith [62:50]
On Endurance and Resistance:
“But what Saudi Arabia and the US did to Yemen for seven years was every bit as bad as what Israel did to Gaza over the last two and a half. It was...literally just on a bigger scale, basically.”
— Dave Smith [56:12]
| Timestamp | Topic/Quote/Highlight | |-----------|-----------------------------------------------------------------------| | 03:05 | Explains what constitutes a “destroyed” presidency | | 08:30 | Comparison of Bush family presidencies and “destroyed” legacies | | 16:12 | Asserts Trump’s collapse mirrors Bush’s, but faster | | 18:31 | US-Iran escalation: “major escalation...US has been bombing Iran...” | | 21:59 | Trump breaks promise: “The mandate was to not do this...” | | 22:33 | “America First” coalition betrayed; base turns against Trump | | 24:09 | Trump on Fox: “They’re finished...We could walk in there tomorrow...” | | 26:36 | Trump: “They could wave the white flag of surrender...” | | 33:31 | Dave on war’s pointlessness: “What does that do for anyone?” | | 37:03 | Joe Scarborough and media urging escalation | | 44:58 | “Wars are sold on lies...” | | 46:35 | Skepticism about the helicopter incident | | 52:22 | Trump says Iran is in “submission” but “doesn’t know it yet” | | 56:12 | Yemen/Houthis: “endured far worse and [are] still here fighting” | | 62:50 | If Trump “wins,” US just returns to JCPOA situation |
Dave Smith’s diagnosis is scathing: Trump’s second term represents an unforced collapse of trust, legacy, and purpose, driven in large part by betraying key campaign promises and engaging in another Middle Eastern war. The episode is a cautionary tale for those who trust presidents to “drain the swamp” or transform foreign policy—and a thorough rebuke of bipartisan, media-fueled war narratives. Dave leaves listeners skeptical of both political power and official wartime claims, maintaining a libertarian skepticism throughout.
For more, subscribe to Part Of The Problem via partoftheproblem.com or your preferred podcast platform.