The Signal Disaster

Summary

Podcast Summary: "The Signal Disaster"

Podcast Title: Part Of The Problem
Host: GaS Digital Network (Dave Smith)
Episode: The Signal Disaster
Release Date: March 26, 2025

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Introduction

In the episode titled "The Signal Disaster," hosts Dave Smith and Robbie the Fire Bernstein delve into a significant breach involving high-level U.S. government officials using the private messaging app, Signal, to discuss sensitive military operations. This incident has sparked intense debate over governmental communication protocols, potential security lapses, and the broader implications for foreign policy and national security.

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Main Discussion: The Signal Disaster

Overview of the Incident

Dave Smith introduces the episode by recounting a recent scandal where U.S. national security officials, including the National Security Adviser, Defense Secretary, Secretary of State, Vice President, and CIA Director, were found participating in a private Signal chat. The chat included journalist Jeffrey Goldberg from The Atlantic, a figure known for his critical stance towards former President Donald Trump.

Participants Involved in the Signal Chat

The conversation highlights the inclusion of Jeffrey Goldberg in the Signal thread, raising questions about how a high-ranking official could inadvertently or otherwise include a journalist in such a sensitive communication channel. Dave expresses skepticism about the legitimacy of Goldberg's presence and intentions, labeling him as a "professional liar" devoted to undermining Trump.

[04:16] Dave Smith: "It's wild to think that the absolute highest levels of our government are communicating about a upcoming bombing campaign on Signal. That is just bizarre."

Implications of the Leak

The leak reveals discussions about the U.S. bombing Yemen, shedding light on internal deliberations and justifications for military action. Officials appear to casually discuss strategic moves without apparent concern for civilian casualties or long-term diplomatic consequences.

[09:19] Robbie the Fire Bernstein: "It's odd that our world leaders are discussing bombing Yemen like it's planning a barbecue amongst friends."

Reactions from Officials and Media

The podcast covers the mixed responses from officials involved. While some, like J.D. Vance, expressed reservations about the bombing, others remained supportive, emphasizing strategic interests and alliances. Congressional hearings ensued, where officials like CIA Director John Ratcliffe were questioned about the appropriateness of the communication breach.

[56:40] Senator: "Do you share that view of the Secretary of Defense?"
[56:40] John Ratcliffe: "Well, I don't have a view on..."

Analysis of the Administration's Handling

Dave and Robbie critique the administration's handling of the situation, pointing out systemic incompetence or potential intentional negligence. They argue that such lapses undermine public trust and highlight deeper issues within the government's operational protocols.

[10:32] Dave Smith: "There's a lot of questions raised by it... It's pretty clearly happened."

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Key Points & Insights

1. Government Communication Protocols:

   • The use of Signal by top officials for discussing military operations raises significant security concerns.
   • The lack of oversight in the inclusion of non-government personnel in sensitive chats suggests potential vulnerabilities.

2. Incompetence vs. Intentional Leak:

   • Hosts debate whether the Signal breach was a result of sheer incompetence or a deliberate attempt to leak information.
   • The rapid congressional response hints at either immediate acknowledgment of wrongdoing or an urgent need to address the scandal.

3. Political Ramifications:

   • The incident has broader implications for foreign policy, especially concerning ongoing military actions in Yemen.
   • Public perception of the administration's competence and transparency is severely impacted.

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Notable Quotes

• Dave Smith at [04:16]:
  "It's wild to think that the absolute highest levels of our government are communicating about a upcoming bombing campaign on Signal. That is just bizarre."

• Robbie the Fire Bernstein at [09:19]:
  "It's odd that our world leaders are discussing bombing Yemen like it's planning a barbecue amongst friends."

• Dave Smith at [10:32]:
  "There's a lot of questions raised by it... It's pretty clearly happened."

• John Ratcliffe during [56:40]-[60:40]:
  "I don't know how he was invited to the Signal group."
  "No, of course not."

• Senator at [56:40]:
  "Is your testimony that it was appropriate that he was added to this Signal threat?"

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Conclusion

"The Signal Disaster" episode by GaS Digital Network's Dave Smith and Robbie the Fire Bernstein offers a critical examination of a major security breach within the U.S. government. By dissecting the events surrounding the misuse of private communication channels for discussing military actions, the hosts highlight significant flaws in governmental protocols and raise essential questions about accountability and transparency. This episode serves as a call to scrutinize and overhaul the methods by which sensitive information is handled at the highest levels of government.

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For more insights and discussions on current events and Libertarian perspectives, subscribe to Part Of The Problem at https://partoftheproblem.com.

Transcript

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[Dave Smith]

Hey guys. Today's show is brought to you by yom.com Home of the $60 kilo. Longtime sponsor of Part of the Problem and a great company run by great guys. If you are over the age of 21 and you enjoy Kratom, make sure you go get your kratom from ycratom.com all of their stuff is lab tested. It's delivered right to your door so you don't got to go driving around looking for it. And it's the best price you will find anywhere. The only price I can think of over the last five that has not gone up. Yocratum.com Home of the $60 kilo all right, let's start today's show. What's up? What's up everybody? Welcome to a brand new episode of Part of the Problem live in studio live only to people [e-mail] that's where you got to go to sign up to support the show to get the episodes live ad free uncenso be part of our live chat. You get the bonus episode every week but for everybody else you just consume it. Wherever else you get podcasts of course. I'm joined by Robbie the Fire Bernstein. How are you sir?

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

I'm doing well. I'm excited to head up to Boston, work on some jokes.

[Dave Smith]

We are going up to Boston the day after tomorrow, which would be March 27th, 28th and 29th. We'll, we'll be up there. I'm very much looking forward to Going back to Boston. Been a while since we've been there and been a while since I think. What's the spot we're playing at Laugh Boston? I think is the spot.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

Never done that in the past. We did Nick's comedy.

[Dave Smith]

That's right. So this is our first time at Laugh Boston. I'm trying to think if I've ever done. Because I've done shows with you in Boston. Right. It was back at Nick's Comedy Stop. That's right.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

And this is a more proper comedy club there.

[Dave Smith]

There you go. We did it at Nick's Comedy Stop, and I believe it was me and Lewis co headlining. And you and Tim Dillon were the special guests who talk about three people being in the same place and one person being drastically further than them. Holy moly. All right, guys, Tim Dillon, special guest this week. All right. I can't back that up, but it will be a great show. I'm just kidding. We're not in the same place. We're fucking killing it, bro. Doing good. And then we got a bunch of stuff coming up after that. Nashville coming up pretty soon. Comic Dave Smith.com For All Me and Rob's gigs together throughout the year. And then, of course, you've got some stuff coming up as well.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

Des Moines, which apparently is supposed to be pronounced differently, but I give up on getting names right.

[Dave Smith]

I always thought it was Des Moines.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

I don't give a shit anymore. However the fuck it's supposed to be sounded out in the most logical way is now the name of your city. And I will make that by. If I have to run for government in order to get that law passed, that it needs to be spelled the most logical way that it should be read.

[Dave Smith]

Or. Or we just get real angry Jew about it and we call everything New York. But then we. Or, like, it could just be. It could be like, New York seven. New New York. We could go a lot of different ways of this, but we can't learn how to pronounce all these goddamn names. Although I do always enjoy coming to.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

Your towns and then also up in Steamboat, and I think I have my entire porch door mapped out. And so that will be announced shortly.

[Dave Smith]

Ooh, new spots. Same spots. Lot of mix of both.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

Lot of mix both. Mix of both. And then hopefully we'll be able to tack on some porches as more people reach out and extend their yards to the. To the cause.

[Dave Smith]

All right, well, you heard it here first. If you're. When you're planning out the rest of the porch tour, maybe stay Away from Signal. Maybe not the best. Or if you're going to do it, just add the right people to it.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

I mean, if anything, what an endorsement that our own government relies on the software Signal to keep its messaging safe and secured. Who would have known?

[Dave Smith]

It is. This is a wild.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

The greatest option in all of technology.

[Dave Smith]

Well, you know, it's funny. The story broke about, I want to say, a half hour. It was less than an hour before we went live yesterday. So I saw this story, but let's just say it's from a not very trustworthy source. And so I was like, well, I gotta, like, actually dig into this before I just take this on air and give a thought on it, because I don't want to, like, come on here and then give a whole take on it and then be like, oh, it turned out it wasn't true at all. Um, now that it's kind of 24 hours old, I mean, Jesus Christ, not only is this thing real, but it is. Let's just say it. There's a lot of questions raised by it. So for. For anybody who doesn't know, there is. I hesitate to even use the word journalist, but there is a. There's a hack propagandist who. Named Jeffrey Goldberg, could be from any ethnicity or background. No way to know for sure. He was a big. He's the. I believe he's the. Like the editor in chief now or senior editor. He's one of the big shots at the. At the Atlantic, which is a pretty garbage publication, but he was known for being one of the, like the Russiagate, you know, like, you know, if you go find all his Russiagate takes, it'd be embarrassing how bad, you know, like promising we've got the dirt. Donald Trump is clearly in a conspiracy with Vladimir Putin. He is one of. Not that this is that small of a list, but he's one of the journalists who Donald Trump really hates. He's like, called him out by name many times. Trump does not like this guy. Okay, so evidently, Waltz, the national security adviser, who is one of Trump's worst picks. I know this from both his public Persona and inside information that I've gotten. Just one of the absolute worst picks that Trump made. Evidently, Waltz set up a Signal private chat. This was weeks ago, right before the US Started bombing Yemen again. The most recent time. And apparently on this Signal chat, it seems that it was. There were several people. It seems it was obviously Waltz, Hegseth, the Defense Secretary, Tulsi Gabbard, the national security adviser, Marco Rubio, the secretary of state, J.D. vance, the vice president, and Ratcliffe, the CIA director. And then Witkoff, I think, was on it as well. Anyway, so there's a big. And they add this guy and just some anti Trump reporter. So some. So, anyway, so this is the story there. He has released the signal chats with, but redacted, taken out some parts for national security. And then he just ran this big piece on it yesterday. Now they've got. I'd say at this point, as of right now, the. The evidence is overwhelming. Seems like an understatement. I'd say it's conclusively the case that these people were all on Signal. They were. They were talking about the bombing before it happened, Then the bombing happened, then they were celebrating the bombing happening. After that, there was some discussion about, you know, how people felt about it. We'll kind of get into all of that. But more importantly than any of that, at this point, what we have today, that we didn't have yesterday is that Hegseth has been asked about this. Tulsi Gadber. Tulsi Gabbard and Ratcliffe both testified before Congress today, and they've all kind of admitted it in the sense that none of them are denying. Ranges from. I think Hegseth and Tulsi Gabbard would be in the not denying it camp. And then Ratcliffe was just in the like, yeah, we did it. And there's nothing wrong with us doing that. So anyway, this pretty clearly happened. There's a few different angles we could go with this. So I. You could. Any thoughts you have, Rob? Just about the story in general.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

Well, first, I'll just say that it's odd that our world leaders are discussing bombing Yemen like it's planning a barbecue amongst friends.

[Dave Smith]

Who is it?

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

And the. The casualness and the way that it's in this group. J.D. vance, hell of an employee. Hey, I don't agree with this, but if that's what you guys want to do, I'll back it. What's most surprising to me about the. The story is as to how this guy was added and no one realized amongst that group of people to go, hey, who's this other person in our group? I mean, just think of it. You're talking Secretary of State.

[Dave Smith]

Yeah, it's a pretty exclusive club.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

It's a pretty exclusive club for someone to be like the CIA director. I mean, if that was the room of people that get together, minus the President, I guess, to make really big decisions, it's remarkable to not go, hey, who's the Other name here. The other part that's just really shady about this story is usually when there's trouble in an administration, it's a very long time before anything gets investigated. Think about the lapse of time between the Hillary Clinton email scandal and when she was actually brought in front of Congress. Or think about how little we've seen of Foushee as we unwind this Covid story. I was unable to watch the hearing because it was while I was driving here. But the fact that they had a hearing today to address what happened yesterday, when is the last time you saw that happen in government?

[Dave Smith]

And that is a good point. I think that there's also just. Look, it's just to start the thing because there's no kind of getting around is remarkable, the level of incompetence to allow this to happen. Or perhaps this was intentional. But those are kind of the only two options right here. Now, there's.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

I still can't believe that government relies on private technology for secret communications.

[Dave Smith]

Well, there's. I do not think this is how it's supposed to go.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

Well, I understand that there's supposed to be, I guess, the Presidential Records Act. And I also understand that if you're working a government job, I mean, I've worked at sales jobs, and I don't want a record of every conversation I'm having about every sale. And so you use your own email. I mean, so, like, I understand if.

[Dave Smith]

This is why Hillary Clinton was using a private email server. Yeah.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

I get that she's not allowed to do that. I also get why she's doing that.

[Dave Smith]

Sure.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

And anyways, if I'm working there, I don't understand how. First day you're not calling up CIA and going, hey, where's my BlackBerry for communicating with my team? It's shocking that it's a public app. That's the best technological option for these people to have a private conversation.

[Dave Smith]

Well, look, if you have Hillary Clinton using a private. A private email where she's talking about, say, like, whatever, she's yoga. Yeah. Well, you know, she's talking about some private and then some very, you know, like, kind of shady public. That's one thing this is not. There's nothing that they're planning out a military strike which is going to be made public. It's not like there was some secret scandal that happened here. And you could see in there, like, oh, this is why they wanted it on signal. It is wild to think that the. Again, you can't overstate it here. The absolute highest levels of Our government, the highest levels of the foreign policy regime are communicating about a upcoming bombing campaign on signal. That is just bizarre. Like, they're all in Washington D.C. i guess the vice president wasn't. He mentioned that in the chat. But aside from that, the rest of them are all in D.C. like, isn't there? I don't know. I always thought there was a, like a situation room type thing. I don't know. Something like this is just very bizarre. And again your point, which just cannot be overstated and it really implicates all of them in terms of incompetence, not in terms of like necessarily being malicious. I think Waltz is the. Is the one who's. There's a question mark about, but yeah, that nobody noticed. Hey, who's this other fella in here?

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

I've literally had friend. Firstly, I do. I don't do any group messages. I just muted. I can't stand it. It drives me nuts. It's too many notifications. And then I start getting too concerned about what I'm saying in a group format. Ten years ago, when I partook in group messages or group whatsapps, I always check the group to make sure, hey, wait, who's in this group?

[Dave Smith]

Yeah, even Rob would have been like, hey, who's this? Jg? Yeah, right here. Who's that guy?

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

Even before just saying some offensive, stupid remark, I would check that. It seems very remarkable to me that they're having their exclusive group of what, 10 names that are supposed to make these giant decisions in a secretive way. And they're not just checking, Wait, who's this other name?

[Dave Smith]

It's unbelievable. By the way, twight, in the group chat that got me, he wrote Joseph Goebbels, which is pretty big. That's what they thought it was funny. It is, yeah. It's unbelievable that they wouldn't have seen that either.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

The Trump administration is being undermined by the walls guy. I hadn't even. I'm not. I wasn't too familiar with him or his name or. This is classic Donald Trump administration, where there's some good and then there's some reckless slop.

[Dave Smith]

Yep. No, well, it's. Look, I'm not sure which one it is. I will just say, okay, this is. I might really be speaking out of turn here, speculating. I just know that, you know, I've like, I've sent the wrong text message before. You know what I mean? Like, text the wrong person. Like texted my buddy, like, I love you, baby, be home soon or whatever. But it's always because that was the last guy I was texting and my wife was the other last person. Like these were the last two people I was texting and I hit the wrong one or something like that. It seems very weird that walls would add a Trump hating Atlantic journo. Like, how did that mistake get made? What now? He's claiming, by the way, that he's never. He has no relationship with. With Goldberg. That they. He's like, I don't know this guy. I've never talked to him. I've never anything. It's like, that seems weird to me. I don't use signal. But like, wouldn't you have to have his name saved in your thing to Adam? Or maybe not. Maybe I'm wrong about that. It seems like a strange mistake to make. I'll just say that seems like a really strange mistake to make.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

And I also just can't believe the way that foreign policy is being implemented based off of the scattered screenshots that were apparently. I guess he put enough screenshots over to go, look, I was in this conversation and I couldn't believe I was. And that the details turned out to be true. And then he took out all the military details. That's the way I understand it. The conversation flow of JD Vance pointing out, hey, our entire messaging right now is we need to do things that are in the strategic interest of the United States. Why are we doing this when it benefits them? No conversation at all about civilian casualties.

[Dave Smith]

Oh, that's. Yeah, well, let's get into that in a second, cuz I do think that's really worth diving into. I will say the only thing. Did you read his piece in the Atlantic that he.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

Well, it was paywalled and I couldn't. Maybe you're more sophisticated on getting.

[Dave Smith]

Oh, I didn't think mine was paywalled. They may have had it behind the paywall and taken it off, but I didn't. Or maybe they had it off and then put it behind. I'm not sure. But I read it and did not subscribe. I do not subscribe to the Atlantic and I didn't go through like the archives or anything. But the one thing that stuck out to me that was like a head scratcher, that was like something here doesn't add up, is that he. He says he removed himself from the conversation and he was like, oh, this is going to let him know that I'm leaving, but I've got what I need. I'm out of here. Who the hell removes that? What journalist would remove themselves from that Conversation. Like you just accidentally found yourself in a conversation between the National Security Advisor, the Director of National Intelligence, the Defense Secretary, the Vice President and the Secretary of State. And you're just sitting there and the CIA Director and all the. And you're just sitting there like, what? They just accidentally left the press in? And then clearly you've gotten deep enough into the thing where you're like, nobody's checking who's in this group. And then you just left. That seemed very strange.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

You know why? It was because Radcliffe at the CIA said, hey guys, I just got my orders from the Jews that, you know, run things.

[Dave Smith]

I'm out. Oh, shit it. Yeah, I guess. All right, you know what, Fine. Let's just, let's get into that right now because you kind of touched on it. And it is in many ways to me the most interesting part of all of this. And of course I do want to be clear. This guy is literally is a professional liar whose job it is is to damage Donald Trump and who might also like to damage other people too. So it is not. I don't want to assume it's quite possible that he took out other stuff too. Like maybe there would have been some message that made Tulsi Gabbard look really good, like she had some principled opposition to this or something. And he didn't put that in. It doesn't seem like it though. And it seems like, because really, if you remove yourself, if you, if you zoom out, the real scandal here, which is so much bigger than this signal scandal or so much bigger than any of the other, the real scandal here is that you have after like 20 plus years of what have been dubbed forever wars, the longest wars in American history, the longer wars than our most countries ever fight in their. You know, like most countries don't ever fight a 20 year long war. We fought essentially two of them, three if you count Somalia, where there's the JSOC war the whole time there, and also had regime changes in Yemen and Libya and ultimately in Syria. So after all this debt, all these wars, Donald Trump runs on this America first. We're, we're not going to be involved in stupid wars anymore. Down to specifically Yemen. And I'm not even talking about him objecting to say like Obama's drone bomb campaign in Yemen in 2009 or him objecting to the Saudis invasion and Obama backing the Saudis invasion in 2015. I'm saying during the 2024 election, it was on Tim Pool show, Donald Trump was straight up asked about the issue of war and peace. And he brought up Joe Biden bombing Yemen over the shipping lanes and talking about how stupid it is and how. So like Donald Trump comes in now at his most popular wins, every swing state has all of this energy behind him, and yet we're still within a month and a half bombing another country in the Middle East. And like that is the bigger scandal out of all of this. It's like the old Tom woods had this old saying, and man, does it age well. No matter who you vote for, you get John McCain. Like, that's just always what ends up happening. You vote for Barack Obama. Sorry, all we can do is John McCain. Oh, you like Donald Trump? Sorry, you're getting John McCain. No matter who wins, we get John McCain's foreign policy. And so that's kind of the backdrop of this. And then of course, what is the most interesting thing politically in this is that, at least from what's being reported, only one person in the room seems to even have a principled objection to this at all. And it is J.D. vance. Now, I gotta say that in itself is some, is an important piece of information that we should keep in our minds. Like going forward, if you were thinking about who you might support in 2028, let's say, I mean, JD now to your point too. And I, you know, like, I'll give him a little bit of credit for being the only one who stood up, but I gotta say, it was like pathetically weak. Pathetically weak. Totally with the contingency of like, I'll go along. I mean, like, if you guys want to bomb them, I'll bomb them. But. And the only objection he has is over the, like the, it's always the worst Trumpian objection is that Europe should pay for the bombing a little bit more. That's essentially what his objection is. I'll read it in a sec.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

I was just somewhat shocked that it's not much of a strategy conversation. It's more of an optics conversation. And I would just think that, you know, for the pitch of maybe we don't always see the geopolitics behind what these conversations actually are. No one's coming in and going well. We've planned this out in strategic strike and we know that we can have blank result or hey, this is a clear directive from the President. It's a very loose conversation of. It's almost like the way I would go, hey, I don't know if we need any TVs in the studio, but I saw a good deal over here. Oh yeah, maybe, maybe That's a good idea. It's a very casual conversation. There's not a lot of, hey, I just got the military intelligence on this. And we know that the bad guys are hiding out here and we can have a real impact, but we got to act quickly. There's no, like, significant intelligence here. It's mostly a conversation about, hey, should we go? I think we're going to go and do this. And I think the optics match the President's agenda at the moment. Okay, I'm all right with that. Yeah, I'm good with it, too.

[Dave Smith]

They're alluding to Trump seems to be the loosest of directives. Like, they're like, at Donald Trump, he kind of. He gave the green light. You go, he said, open back up the shipping lanes. And then it's kind of left up to us to figure out how. So, like, in your example, you're almost like where you're like, oh, you know, I saw this monitor that looks cool and this one's on sale. And then you'd be like, well, the owner of the studio said make it look cool. You know, like, there's not even like a specific thing. Like, you were tasked with getting this monitor, and I found it at a good price, and therefore it was just a general like, yeah, whatever you think looks good kind of thing. And so, anyway, so this is the, the only real. Aside from, from this, it all seems to just be them agreeing. By the way, you know, again, there might be something in here that wasn't reported. No principled objection from Tulsi Gabbard whatsoever. Look, I'm just saying, I think I, I think we were saying this the whole time, right? Like, the whole time throughout Trump, before the election, after the election, during his selecting his cabinet, that you were just like, look, he put a lot of bad people in there and the foreign policy team isn't good. And even Tulsi Gabb Gabbard is not good when it comes to this type of, like, target targeted strikes. Anyway, okay, so I'm going to read from the article at this point. A fascinating policy discussion commenced. The account labeled JD Vance responded at 8:16 team. I am out for the day doing an economic event in Michigan, but I think we are making a mistake. He also was in Michigan. So this is part of the reason, the part of what was confirming that he writes, 3% of US trade runs through the Suez. 40% of European trade does. There is a real risk that the public doesn't understand this or why it's necessary. The strongest reason to do this is, as POTUS said, to send a message. Now, look, I give Vance some credit for at least being against this thing, kind of. I mean, he does say, I think we're making a mistake. But this idea that, like, well, it's a. It's a bigger percentage of Europe's trade, therefore, it's kind of like we're bailing out their trade. I mean, this is the. Like, if there were a list of 15 reasons why you shouldn't do this, this is 15th. This is the last reason. You know, like, I'm not even saying it's not a reason at all, but it's not one of the major ones. It's not as if he's sitting there and saying something like. Which I can. You could call me like a hippie or something like that all you want to, but, like, is it really that unreasonable that when my political leaders are murdering people, they might consider whether the murder is absolutely necessary or not? Like, you know, we're dropping huge bombs on people here. There's going to be civilians who get killed. Do we really need to do this? I just don't think it's that crazy that that could maybe even enter the conversation. Of course it is that crazy, and it doesn't enter the conversation at all. Then you would think after that, the concern would be that, like, we could be getting dragged into a wider war. You know, if the whole argument is that Iran is arming them, well, okay, do we really want to move closer toward a conflict with Iran? Do we want to move closer toward a conflict in Yemen? Do we. Like, why are we doing this? It's not in our national security interest. We're doing this on behalf of a foreign country. None of that comes up at all. It's just this, you know, vague. I think it's a mistake. Vance goes on to say, I am not sure the President is aware how consistent this is with his message on Europe right now. There's a further risk that we see a moderate to severe spike in oil prices. I'm willing to support the consensus of the team and keep these concerns to myself, but there is a strong argument for delaying this a month. Doing the messaging work on why this matters, seeing where the economy is, etc. Then Joe Kent. I forgot Joe Kent was on this. Joe Kent then comes in and says, there is nothing time sensitive during the timeline. Will have the exact same options in a month. Okay. Pete Hegseth comes in and says, vp, I understand your concerns and fully support you raising with Pres. With potus. Important considerations Most of which are tough to know how they play out. Economy, Ukraine, peace, Gaza, et cetera. I think messaging is gonna be A, to is gonna be tough no matter what. Nobody knows who the Houthis are, which is why we would need to stay focused on, one, Biden failed and two, Iran funded. Isn't that just disgusting? Like, you know, you're sitting here, it's only. And by the way, I, I just cannot stress for, like, I think for people, Americans like us, how, how unique this is about our country. And I know that there's sometimes, like when things happen in your country, you just kind of think of them as normal. I'm saying, like throughout the world and throughout human history, how abnormal it is to be bombing a group of people who you have no idea who they are. Like, for most of human history, if there was a war on, the people of that nation would know who they were fighting a war against and understand why they were fighting a war against them. We're such a rich country and such a powerful empire that we're just bombing little third world shitholes. And you're like, yeah, the problem here is the American people don't even know. And you know what? They're absolutely right. I mean, how many Americans, what percentage of Americans do you think could find Yemen on a map, let alone know the name of the group of people who are in charge? You know, like, I don't know, like, I'll even give him a hint. I'll be like, here's a map. Find Yemen. Oh, it's, it's right at the bottom of the Arabian, the Arabian Peninsula. Go. How many Americans you think could turn and find that on a map? And so it's like, look, for him to be saying this, it's like, yeah, in other words, stated differently, there is absolutely zero political desire from your base for you to go bomb Yemen. There's no, it's not even kind. Like, it's almost. It's said in plain English right there. Because I mean, he's not saying it, but it's all. It's in the information he's giving out, right, Is that there is, this is a totally top down move, not bottom up. There is nobody. This isn't mass deportations or, you know, eliminating waste in government or turning around the economy or bringing prices down. This isn't like, oh, there's this desire from the people and they elected you to do this. You're saying, how do we trick them into thinking this? And here's the answer, 1 and 2. By the way, this is something that should be a useful tool for people. This is one of the positive things to come out of this signal chat, and it's one of the things that I kind of challenge people like. I'm talking to you listeners of our show right now. When you see the MAGA influencers out there, right when you're thinking about who to listen to, oh, this guy makes a good point. But then I also think this guy makes a good point. But I like this lady's point. There is a. All right, I acted like. Women make points. Fine. I'm just saying, for the sake of argument, think about how many of them were just saying, number one and number two, right after this strike in Yemen. And I'm not like alleging that they're colluding with Pete Hegseth. I'm just saying they're repeating the same dumb fucking mindless propaganda. Keep in mind here, Pete Hegseth is not saying. This is a very clear sentence. Pete Hegseth is not saying the reason we need to do this is because, number one, Biden failed, and number two, they're backed by Iran. He's saying that's what you tell the fucking people. It's the only thing I could think of to tell people that they'll maybe resonate with them. Is there. Is there a real desire amongst the MAGA base for us to start bombing the shit out of the poorest country in the Middle East? No, but they do think Joe Biden's awfully weak and they're pretty suspicious of Iran because we've been propagandizing them with a bunch of bullshit about them for. For years. So that's how he's saying you could sell this to people. It's a very revealing comment. And anyway, so that's. That's what you were getting from Pete Hegseth. Okay. All right, Hagseth. Message went on to state, waiting a few weeks or a month does not fundamentally change the calculus. Two, immediate risks on waiting. Number one. Two immediate risks on. On waiting. One, this leaks and we look indecisive to Israel takes a shit. Oh, man, did I not. I may not have screen grabbed the right part there. Okay. To Israel. Sorry. You can accuse me of covering up for the Israelis now. I'm not sure what that was. I lost it. It's the Atlantic piece. I'm. I'm not sure what the title is. I just. Screen grabbed this part. Hold on one second to. Okay, there's. I'll. I'll go on. But if you find it, that's. That's fine. Oh wait, hold on. Sorry. Israel takes an associated and levy them on the Europeans. No, I don't think that's the right part. JD Vance goes on to say to Pete Hagseth, if you agree, we should do it, let's go. I just hate bailing Europe out again. So again, J.D. vance, who is I suppose the hero in the room here, judging on a curve, you turn that heat down a little bit. Rubbish. He literally goes, hey, you guys want to do it? Fine, let's do it. I just hate bailing out Europe. So there is simply in JD Vance no concern about killing innocent people, no concern about us getting drawn into a wider war, no concern about dropping bombs on people on behalf of other countries. This is clearly a result of Israel's beef, not ours. But he sure doesn't like those. Those Europeans being welfare moms, doesn't seem to have any issue with Israel being a fat welfare mom, but he really doesn't like the Europeans being on the doll. So that's what you. That's what we got here so far. Hagseth responded to that said vp, I fully share your loathing of Europeans freeloading. It's pathetic. Capital letters. But Mike is correct. We are the only ones on the planet on our side of the ledger who can do this. Nobody else. Even close question is timing. I feel like now is as good a time as any given POTUS directive to reopen shipping lanes. That's what I was referring to before. I think we should go. But potus still retains 24 hours of decision space. All right guys, let's take a moment so we can thank our sponsor for today's show which is Monetary Metals, an amazing company I've been telling you guys about for a while. If you own gold, you've probably been happy to see prices hitting all time highs this year. But your gold can do more than just sit there waiting for the price to go up. It can generate passive income for you. With Monetary Metals, you can earn up to 5% interest on your gold and silver paid in more ounces of metal and accredited investors can even achieve double digit returns in their bond offerings. All interest payments are made in ounces of gold and silver stored in your account free of charge. Whether your metal is gathering dust at home or costing you annual storage fees, it's time to stop paying to own gold and start getting paid to own it and put it to work with Monetary Metals. Check them out monetary-metals.com to learn more about how you can start growing your wealth in ounces. Today that's monetary-metals.com. all right, let's get back into the show. All right, so what can you say about this, Rob? I mean, it's just. It's really just, you know, it's not to be unexpected, but, man, it is disappointing. And it's just. I. I will say it's. There's already just signs of, you know, look, like you kind of said before, this is what you get with Donald Trump. It's a. It's a mixed bag. I suppose a mixed bag is preferable to a bag of nothing but shit. But there's. There is just this level of, like, incompetence that. Not just to be doing this whole signal chat and to, you know, forget it. I'm. I'm totally open to the possibility that the National Security advisor, like, was setting them up, but no one else to notice. And that is a pretty high level of incompetence. Nobody else goes, like, you know, from what I've understood. Cause some people have been talking about this. It's like they say, you know, signal might be used between these types of people to, like, coordinate a meeting or something like that. Ah, we're all meeting here at this place or whatever, but there's seems to be no feeling from any of them that, like, hey, we're. We're talking about, like, a planned targeted strike, and we're doing this over signal. That seems pretty weird. Um, There is no. One of the things I found particularly disgusting. Again, people can call me a hippie for this shit if you want to, but after the bombing's done, everybody's just sharing emojis, which is like, first on. On one level, you're like, what is fucking. Am I the only one? Am I the only grown man who doesn't text emojis? But when did everyone become a teenage chick? Including the. The Secretary of Defense, evidently. But there, it's all just like. I mean, again, call me crazy. I think when you drop bombs on human beings, even if there were, like, even. Let's just say in a scenario where you had to take out some bad guys and it came with killing some innocent people, but it had to be done. Let's just. I'll. That's the starting point that I'm wrong and that it has to be done and these innocent people have to be killed, you still think there would be a little bit of a somber tone. You know, it's like, I don't know. You know, it's so funny because, like, I'm not, you know, like, I believe in God, But I'm not like, a particularly religious person, but all of these people, Tulsi's got her own thing going on, but, like, Pete Hegseth and all these guys, they lead with how Christian they are. That's like a big part of what they present themselves as and run on and it's like, but, yeah, but don't. Do any of you really believe in God? Because, like, wouldn't you. Wouldn't you think, like, if you just killed some people, there'd at least be a part of you that was like, man, I sure do hope that God understands why I had to do it. You know, you'd think you would have to at least show a little bit of, like. That part sure does suck. That's a tragedy. Sorry about that. No, it's. It's muscle emojis and American flag emojis. Going to ask what? Emo.

[Senator]

Oh.

[Dave Smith]

Oh, yeah. Muscle. It was a lot of. A lot of, from what I understand, the bicep and the American flag. And then, you know something like, about a hot boy not calling you back. I don't know. It's all ridiculous to me, but this is. Someone in the chat just said, this is my Vic moment where I'm going after emojis. This where. I don't care. They're all gay. You're all very, very gay for doing this. Stop it. All right, fine. You could put. Put the emojis in the chat is. But you know what I'm saying. Anyway, there's just. Just none of that. None of it whatsoever. But look, I'm sorry. It's just. It's hard to not look. What Elon Musk is doing over at Doge, I think is awesome. It's. It's inserted these ideas back into the national conversation. But I gotta say, we're looking at this already. And it's very hard for me to not point out that it does seem that, like, in terms of the actual mechanisms of government, there's just so much failure around already. I mean, it's just like, even Doge, right? Like, everyone in the news could talk about how they're making these severe cuts, but they're not. There aren't drastic spending cuts. You know what I'm saying? Like, we just passed cr. That's. That's increasing the deficit. Like, there's. We're not having drastic spending cuts. And, you know, you. We're not having mass deportations. Look at the numbers. There's no mass deportations going on, but we are sending a few hundred to this horrible prison in El Salvador. Like, what is. What when you finally actually have the, the, the support of the people for mass deportations and you're elected on that. So your move is to just send a few of them to the, like, worst fucking prison? What, are you trying to poison the well against mass deportations? And then, of course, here on foreign policy, I mean, this stuff is just. We're already bombing a poor country in the Middle East. Hasn't even been two months since Donald Trump's been in. And again, it's, it's kind of like the first time around all over again. It's like the worst thing about Donald Trump is not any of the things that the Democrats tell you about Donald Trump. You know, the worst thing about Donald Trump is that he's pretty much the same as Obama and Biden. Like, that's the actual. Actually, the worst thing about him is that he's not that much different than all the other presidents we've had when it. Act. I'm sorry, when it actually comes down to substance, you know, stylistically, he's much different. Um, and, and on the substance, he's maybe 5%, maybe 10% better than the other presidents. And that comes with a whole lot of incompetence, too. And so that's kind of the mixed bag that we're in. And people could try to convince me otherwise, but it's just, I gotta call em, like I see em. There's kind of no way around that. Um, I don't know, Rob, any, any thoughts on any of this stuff or anything else?

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

It seems so incredibly sloppy this early into the administration. Uh, you never wanna have a moment where even Hillary Clinton can go, you know what I mean? Hillary Clinton, what legs does she have to stand on on any topic whatsoever? But even on this one, she tweeted something like, oh, did she? I didn't say you might be able to find it. It was just something like, this is crazy. And. Or maybe it was just actually talking about emojis. It might have just been like the, look at this emoji. And even on that, you'd be like that. You got a point, Hillary. How often, how often does something so sloppy happen that even Hillary Clinton can open up her dumb mouth and you can go, well, you got a point on that one.

[Dave Smith]

Yeah, that's, that's, that's when you know you're really screwing up. When anybody, when, when Hillary Clinton is ever granted a point on anything, you know, it's, you know, it's not going good. Oh, here's the Trump eyes. You have got to be kidding me.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

Yeah, and what can I say? Hillary's got a point.

[Dave Smith]

And of all the reporters to send this to Jeffrey Goldberg. Oh my God. Oh, it's just horrible. Now I will say that. And I saw yesterday after we got done with the show, I saw Sager and Jetty from Breaking Points, who I think is great, you know, he was tweeting about this and look, he's, he's posing this stuff and I guess I'm retweeting some of the stuff he said too for our own kind of opportunistic isn't the exact right word. But like, okay, we don't like the national Security advisor, so where. But he was saying like, yo, he's gotta be fired for this. Like, I'm sorry, this is crazy. It's like you, this is could not be a better example of a fireable offense like you, you. Look, we'll, we'll get into some of the details in a second because we're going to play some of the video of what's been said here. But you leaked very sensitive information about an upcoming military strike. You accidentally leaked that to a journalist who the President hates his fucking guts. Who hates the President's guts. It's embarrassing. It's created a scandal for the president. Like it has all of the things that you would be like, okay, well, you gotta get fired over this. And at least as of now, Trump is doubling down that he supports him and that he's a good guy and shouldn't be fired for it. So we will see. Let's. We got a couple videos here. If we could go. Let's go to the Pete Hegseth video first, because I did. I found this to be kind of interesting. I mean, he's doing what he can here, but here's the Secretary of Defense.

[Pete Hegseth]

One question.

[Congressional Witness]

Can you share how your information about war plans against the Houthis in Yemen was shared with a journalist in the Atlantic? And were those details classified?

[Pete Hegseth]

So I. You're talking about a deceitful and highly discredited so called journalist who's made a profession of peddling hoaxes time and time again to include the, I don't know, the hoaxes of Russia, Russia, Russia, or the fine people on both sides hoax. Or suckers and losers hoax. So this is the guy that pedals in garbage. This is what he does. I would love to comment on the Houthi campaign because of the skill and courage of our troops. I've monitored it very closely from the beginning. And you See, we've been managing four years of deferred maintenance under the Trump administration. Our troops, our sailors were getting shot at as targets our ships couldn't sail through. And when they did shoot back, it was purely defensively or at shacks in Yemen. President Trump said, no more. We will reestablish deterrence.

[Dave Smith]

I think what you're saying is Biden was weak, and we will ultimately decimate.

[Pete Hegseth]

The Houthis, which is exactly what we're doing as we speak from the beginning, overwhelmingly.

[Dave Smith]

I mean, look, what can I say? That all of that's just pathetic. It's just pathetic. It's a. I. I understand the situation he's in. It's probably the best answer you could give. But you could sit here and say, yes, we all agree. Pete Hagseth, yes, Goldberg is trash. He's a terrible journalist, but the fact that he was pushing the Russiagate hoax, or the fact that he was pushing the very fine people on both sides. Hoax. You're not calling this a hoax. And also, he didn't put. You can't really demonize him on this, because at least according to the story, he didn't push it. He didn't go searching for it. He didn't decide to run this story. He got added by your national security advisor to a group chat with the most powerful people in the world, leaking war plans, and he was like, well, I mean, I'm gonna run this in my publication. There's just nothing here. Unless something else comes out that we don't have right here, there's really nothing you can blame him for. And so then to turn it around and then to try to. To try to pivot toward Joe Biden was weak, and that's why we were struggling. Like, hey, I recognize this. This is number one. I think you're giving him the old number one. I was waiting for Iran to come in. After that, you're like, oh, yeah, right, right. Okay. And. And by the way, it's just not true. It's just not true. Joe Biden bombed them for the exact same reason, the exact same way. It had absolutely no impact and didn't change anything. Just like. This won't. Mark my words on that. By the way, there's. The Houthis are still gonna be messing with ships in the Suez. Like, you know, I don't know. This. This is just thi. This is pathetic. He's got nothing.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

It seems like a particularly bad move when the White House isn't otherwise denying the incident.

[Dave Smith]

Yeah.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

And it seems like almost getting thrown under the bus. When you get asked the question, you're. I mean, I guess he doesn't deny it as much as he says that that guy's terrible. But that's trying to deny it. And you might as well own it because everyone else is. And this just makes you look like more of a douche.

[Dave Smith]

Yeah, yeah.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

Hey, that was an epic fail. And the team's going to have to get together because clearly we need to use other platforms and protocol so that plans of this nature aren't getting in front of the media. I stand in front of what we did, and we obviously have to address that.

[Dave Smith]

Yeah.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

I also, the only way to respond to this.

[Dave Smith]

Look, I know that the, the Yemen's, you know, I'd have to go back and check this. Remember from reading it last week, but Yemen's like health officials said that I think they claimed that 53, like civilians were killed, something like that number. And then there were like a few hundred who were wounded or something like that. And, you know, maybe that number is not right. You never know. You're trusting governments and government agencies. Our own government doesn't tell us the truth. I'm not saying we should take the word of some other government. But there is something that I really object to that I just hate where it's like, you know, Pete Hegseth having this, this line of like, you know, I'd love to talk about the precision and the, the, you know, the excellence of our troops and how they pulled off this strike. And, you know, that's actually really just not the most interesting conversation. And there's also like, something about it that's a little bit offensive. That's a little bit, it's kind of cheap in a way, you know, that, that ends up being what defense secretaries always want to say. I've heard this so much, by the way, you know, it's meet the new boss. You know, like, I've heard this so much over the last 25 years from all the different defense secretaries, whether it was Rumsfeld or Gates or Gates again under Obama or whoever. You know, they always like brag about the precision with this latest flare up in the war and how great you wouldn't believe what our boys can do, you know, and there's something, I guess this really started in Vietnam, although it does seem like it's really in a whole different league in the war on terrorism. But, you know, if you go back.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

To, if you, if you targeted firebombing in Cambodia.

[Dave Smith]

Well, look, I mean this. Right. Well, the point I'm Making is that if you, you know, when you read about, say, World War I, okay, now, before American entry into World War I, World War I is like, it's already the worst thing that's ever happened in the history of the world. You know, they don't know that there's a part two coming, but at the time, it's the worst thing in the history of the world. By the way, that just reminded me. It's one of my favorite Simpsons jokes. I don't know if you remember that. Goddamn, the Simpsons in their day were so great. It's a flashback to the Grandpa. Abe. Abe Simpson, and he's fighting in World War I. And he goes, I can't believe I'm sitting here fighting in World War I. And all his platoon guys are like, why do you keep calling it that? And he goes, you'll see. Anyway, but if you read about fighting, right? So they're fighting to, like, the bloodiest of stalemates. It's essentially a big stalemate before America gets in. Because, like, you know, I don't remember the details, but, like, the Germans are running out of shoes and the Brits are running out of ammo, but you're in like a foxhole. And there's tremendous parity between these militaries. Like, it's an even fight, kind of. You got young boys shooting rifles on their side, and they got young boys shooting back at you on. On. On your side. You know, it's kind of an even fight. Even In World War II, obviously, there's been technological advances, and of course, by the end of the war, we dropped the atom bombs. But at the. It certainly before American entry into the war, and I think even after American entry into the war, it's in doubt who's going to win. Like. Like losing a war back then was a possibility. And I don't mean losing the way we lose a war today. I don't mean meaning like, oh, we couldn't. The army that we built in Afghanistan couldn't stand and the Taliban took back over. We lost the war. I mean, losing the war, like your fucking forces got annihilated and you had to surrender to the enemy. There by Vietnam, you've got like these kind of sophisticated weapons that we're using against, like, just like a poor peasant, you know, population. But in the terror wars now, it's like, it's almost like if you looked at the World War, like if you looked at World War I, World War II, and then you think America as an economic superpower just keeps advancing and advancing and advancing. And then we went to fight a war with a group of people who were less sophisticated than those countries, less sophisticated than Europe in the 40s. You know, our boys are going in there. We have night vision, and they have monkey bars. We call in airstrikes, and they have more monkey bars. We send in the Navy, they have more monkey. Like, it's just. And so when you're bragging about, like, how fucking awesome it was, nobody doesn't get that we're awesome at blowing shit up. Nobody doesn't get that. Nobody doesn't understand that our military and our level of technology and sophistication and. But so. But when you're doing that, you're essentially like, it's. It's. I mean, it's like a grown man fighting a toddler. You know what I'm saying? Now, I'm not trying to downplay the risks. I mean, people do get killed, and things still happen. And, like, when someone's shooting a gun at you, that's still a gun being shot at you, but it's just a little bit in bad taste to, like, be bragging about the percent, especially when we're going on our third decade of these fucking wars in the Middle east, that you're like, nah, dude, but you should have seen us, man. We blew up their shit. Our boys were so brave. They were so brave for having technology a hundred thousand times more powerful than the enemy is and blowing up their. Like, I don't know. Could we just get to some real questions here? Like, why exactly we had to do this? I mean, if you're saying in your own goddamn signal mess that, like, yeah, the timeframe's not really important. We could do this in a month. We could do this now. No one's cl. Could someone clearly articulate why it had to be done? What is it? What did they articulate in the message? The truth is a show of force. It's a show of force. Let them know who's boss. Just let them know we can do whatever the we want. Even in your part of the world, we can do whatever the we want. And you should cause no problems for it for us, you know, no type of thought of dealing in, like, what's the strategic plan here? What's the best pat. Best path to peace and prosperity? Do they have a legitimate grievance? What's going on? Is there a diplomatic solution to that? None of that blow shit up and then praise our boys for blowing up. I don't know. I just don't. I'll just Never go along with that shit. I also don't. You know, it's Bill Maher. Bill Maher got fired, if you remember what he got fired for.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

The bravery thing.

[Dave Smith]

Yeah. I was like, you know, Bill Maher was right when he said that. He was absolutely right. And like, if that offends anybody, like, I don't give a. That's fine. This isn't fucking 2002, and I don't work for ABC, so I get to say whatever I want. But it's like, if you're just talking about bravery, like there's. It's hard to argue that someone fighting with 19th century weapons against someone fighting with 21st century weapons doesn't automatically win the bravery competition. There's something braver about going after the US military with nothing than it is to be like, oh, the bravery of our boys launching Tomahawk missiles on the poorest country in the Middle East. Okay, all right, let's go to. Let's go to some of the. The Congressional testimony videos.

[Senator]

Cliff, it sounds to me like your testimony today in the sector and the DNI's testimony is that there was nothing wrong at all with the signal thread that you were on, that it didn't include any targeting information or battle sequence. That. That is your testimony, that's your testimony, and I'm a little staggered that that is your view. Director Radcliffe, does the CIA have any rules about handling of classified information? Yes or no?

[John Ratcliffe]

Yes.

[Senator]

Thank you. Director Radcliffe, do you agree? Secretary of Defense Pete Hexseth said this morning when asked by members of the press what had happened, he said this morning in Hawaii that Atlantic Editor in Chief Jeff Goldberg. Goldberg is a, quote, deceitful and highly discredited so called journalist who's made a profession of providing hoaxes time and time again. Do you share that evaluation, the Secretary of Defense's evaluation of Jeff Goldberg as a journalist?

[John Ratcliffe]

Senator, I didn't see those comments. I don't know Jeff Goldberg.

[Senator]

So do you share that view of the Secretary of Defense?

[John Ratcliffe]

Well, I don't have a view on.

[Senator]

Do you. Do you? Assuming that he has that view, I'm curious about whether you are the CIA Director. Okay. This has happened. We know it's happened. Did Jeff Goldberg somehow. Was it a. Did he create a hoax that allowed him to become part of this signal thread? Please answer the question. You don't, Don't. Don't insult the intelligence of the American people. Did he invite himself to the signal thread?

[John Ratcliffe]

I don't know how he was invited.

[Senator]

But you did not added clearly it Was. Finish your sentence, please.

[John Ratcliffe]

Clearly he was added to the signal group. Your question is.

[Senator]

You don't know that the President's national security advisor invited him to join the signal thread. Everybody in America knows that. Does the CIA director not know that?

[John Ratcliffe]

I've seen conflicting reports about who added the reporter to the signal messaging group.

[Senator]

Perfectly appropriate that there was a reporter added. Especially one that the Secretary of Defense says is deceitful, highly discredited. A so called journalist who's made a profession of peddling hoaxes over and over again. Do you. Is your testimony that it was appropriate that he was added to this signal threat?

[John Ratcliffe]

No, of course not. And why.

[Senator]

Why did you not.

[John Ratcliffe]

Hold on.

[Senator]

Good. You can you answered the question. Let me ask you, when he was added to the thread, you're the CIA director, why didn't you call out that his. He was present on the signal thread?

[John Ratcliffe]

I don't know if you use signal messaging app.

[Senator]

I do. I do not for classified information. Not for targeting.

[John Ratcliffe]

Well, neither do I remote. Neither do I send.

[Senator]

Well, that's clear. Your testimony is today.

[John Ratcliffe]

It absolutely is not. Senator, were. You know, I'm listening at the beginning.

[Senator]

No.

[John Ratcliffe]

When I said that I was using it as permitted. It is permissible.

[Senator]

I agree. That's your testimony.

[John Ratcliffe]

Yeah, I agree.

[Senator]

That's your testimony. You asked me if I use it and I said not for targeting. Not for classified information.

[John Ratcliffe]

And I said I don't either.

[Senator]

I also know Jeff Goldberg. I don't use it to communicate with him. But you thought it was appropriate, by the way. I think he's one of the more outstanding journalists in America. But I'm shocked to find him on a thread that he's reading in the parking lot of a grocery store in Washington D.C. and your testimony as the director of the CIA is that it's totally appropriate. Is it appropriate?

[John Ratcliffe]

No.

[Senator]

The President.

[John Ratcliffe]

That is not what I say it was. When did I use the word appropriate?

[Senator]

Well, go ahead, please.

[John Ratcliffe]

Well, I didn't.

[Senator]

That everybody in America, clearly. Senator, here is what your testimony is.

[John Ratcliffe]

No, I never said.

[Senator]

That's just a normal day at the CIA where we chat about this kind of stuff over signal. In fact, it's so normal that the last administration left it here for us. That's your testimony.

[Dave Smith]

All right, we can, we can pause it here. I mean, look, this is. I don't know, look, obviously this is, you know, you're making the worst people in the world look good. You know, it's just one of those things like it's almost. I'm sure we've all had this just like in our personal lives, whether it's at work or with a friend or in a relationship or something where you just fuck up and they're just giving it to you and you're just like, I just gotta take this. Now. There's just really no. Like your, your job here now is just to hear. It is. You gotta say, listen, obviously he's grandstanding and obviously he's trying to mischaracterize Ratcliffe's, you know, testimony to some degree. But damn if that's not a punch that packs some weight to go. You're the Director of the CIA, you're the head of the Central Intelligence Agency, and you couldn't figure out that there was a freaking Atlantic reporter on your group chat. And he's like, have you ever used Signal before?

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

It's like, Jesus Christ, I just can't believe that this is happening one day later. I mean, the way that I operate, usually after failures, it's five, seven, eight years later after three months of a Durham or two years of a Durham thing. When, when have you ever seen a day after a mess up that all these people get pulled in, or at least I can't think of other examples of that. Often the top of my head.

[Dave Smith]

No, that's a. It's a good point. It's a very good point. And I really don't know what the answer to that is. Like, were they coming for something unrelated and then they just made it all about this? I mean, it's pretty crazy that they were there right away. I will say though, also, I haven't ever really seen like the national security state planning a military target on and it's just in the news. I mean, this is pretty wild, dude. Like it's. It's hard to get over that. I don't know. This is a pretty wild reporter in.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

Secret government Signal chats. Yeah, what else do they know?

[Dave Smith]

Right? And then what was the other video? I think we had the Tulsi Gabbard one just being chastised up there too. Did I send that or no? Okay, maybe I thought I sent the third one too, but I guess not. Oh no, you know what? It was just the two. Okay, that's fine. Yeah, Tulsi had to take her her medicine too, and she basically just wouldn't answer. She was like, I'm not going to comment on an ongoing thing.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

Oh yeah, classic.

[Dave Smith]

Well, I got to say, like, in this case, that might be the best way to handle it. Ratcliffe seems to be like, no, I can explain it to these guys. And you're like, you're not having a real conversation here, dude. They're just making you take. You know, they're making you accept your punishment. Yeah, look, I don't know what else to. To say here. I mean, I would feel.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

Guys look like a bunch of assholes.

[Dave Smith]

Well, I would feel like a little bit more of. I would feel a little bit more motivated to say, like, defend the administration if, you know, look like the same way we've defended Doge and Elon Musk a bunch, where people will say, hey, this isn't the correct process. He's doing this in a sloppy way. He's got these young, you know, tech guys who have all this information. Have we vetted that? You know, we don't know all these things. You go, okay, even though some of that is legitimate criticism, I don't know, man. They're trying to do the right thing. It's vitally necessary for this to be done. And none of the proper channels have a 1% chance of working. It's a 0% chance that this is gonna happen through the appropriate channels. So, you know what? You gotta try something new. And there might be some mistakes made along the way, but at least they're trying something new. If that were the ca. Like, if this was. If this was a meeting where they were trying to end a war and it got. It'd be like, yeah, let me defend them here. Okay, they're using signal. But you know what? This is a new team. They're trying, but they're not. They're. They're just in the business of trying to defend yet another act of war in the Middle East. And so what the. You guys. It's the worst of all worlds. The worst of all worlds. And I gotta say. And, you know, I don't. I take no pleasure in. In saying this. And I'll. I'll give her the slight caveat of I don't trust this journalist. And not everything has been released. But particularly for Tulsi Gabbard, I just think it's damning that, like, look, you could say, like, she's the Director of National Intelligence. It's not exactly like she's at the Defense Department. But, like, when the Vice President's weighing in and saying, I think we're making a mistake. Maybe Tulsi should have caught his back there and been like, yeah, this is kind of a mistake. I mean, Tulsi Gabbard at least, is supposed to be good on this type of stuff. Um, you know, that you know who the Houthis are enemies of, by the way? Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. That's their big enemy in Yemen outside the Saudis, the Israelis and Al Qaeda, that's their enemy.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

So you're saying we should team up with Al Qaeda worked in Syria.

[Dave Smith]

Well, I'm saying we are teaming up with Al Qaeda and have been in Yemen as well as Syria and Libya. And you'd think that might be one thing that Tulsi's at least good on.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

It's time to discuss the strategic asset that we're investing in of Al Qaeda.

[Dave Smith]

Yeah, really.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

That's the, that's the congressional hearing that we need is finally coming for the American people and making the Al Qaeda pitch. Right, because al Qaeda and going against them was the failures of the prior administrations.

[Dave Smith]

Yeah, right, right, exactly.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

Obama and Biden who did such terrible work against our beds adversary. I mean our best ally in the Middle east outside of Israel.

[Dave Smith]

Well look, I'll we could end the show on this note but there's evidently is just as we're recording the show, it's the Washington Post is reporting right now that Russia and Ukraine agree to expand the partial cease fire. So you see, if they could just.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

Wait one day, you could say after they saw the American might and Houthis that feared the Russian, the Ukrainians to respect to make a deal. If they could have just delayed this hearing by one day and gotten their.

[Dave Smith]

Story straight, it more like be like, look, this is still America and we're ending a war and you can't really end a war, so we just have to move the war over. No.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

Europe only backed us because we said that if they go along with our peace agreement, we would take care of their problem in Yemen and no one else has the strength to do so.

[Dave Smith]

Yeah, there you go.

[Robbie the Fire Bernstein]

I'm for hire. I got to pay later. All right.

[Dave Smith]

But an absolute disaster. That's our show for today. All right. Peace.

[Congressional Witness]

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