← The Bulwark Podcast
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- [00:00]
A
Sam.
- [00:27]
B
I surrender.
- [00:29]
A
I surrender. Hello, and welcome to the Bulwark Podcast. I'm your host, Tim Miller. Delighted to welcome back to the show a former member of Congress from Illinois, served in the Air Force and Air National Guard. He's got a new podcast, the Kinzinger Report. He's on Substack. It's Adam Kinzinger.
- [00:56]
B
Hey, buddy, what's up?
- [00:57]
A
If we're going to have a surrender, if we're going to celebrate Donald Trump, the cheese eating surrender, monkey signing away the war that he started in France next to Emmanuel Macron, I can't think about anybody better to have to discuss it than you. So thank you for joining.
- [01:14]
B
Yeah, thanks, man. Thanks. You know, when my brother and I used to play, you know, those Green army men, and then you had the Gray army men, we used to play that game. And of course, my brother's five years older, so he'd always win. And I just, I remember once, I was a kid, of course I was a kid. I'm playing Green Army Men. But I remember I. I surrendered to him. And there was an old church song. It's like I Surrender all. You know that one? So I started singing that and my brother made fun of me. And so anyway, there you go.
- [01:40]
A
Okay, well, obviously I went with the alt rock suicide song, but sure. Hillsong worship. I Surrender. We can look into that one, too. I was discussing this with JVL yesterday. We were reading select excerpts of JD Vance's book together and his conversion to Christianity. Excuse me? His conversion to Catholicism. It's hard to tell, kind of from the book. He wants to be a Catholic. He's trying to be everything. But in the book about his conversion to Catholicism, he talks about how the music is so much better at evangelical churches. He's got to throw some bones to the evangelicals for the primary. And he said that he's telling his priest to maybe go check out the local Baptist and Evangelical church to hear how they do the music. And it's kind of like, bro, you just joined the club. You just joined us two minutes ago. Don't be fucking telling the priest what music to play.
- [02:30]
B
I mean, you can kind of have a vote on what you guys are having for potluck lunch, but you're not at music yet. And I got to tell you, like, I don't know, you know, I've only been to a few Catholic services as a Protestant, but I can't imagine a drum set up in front of the priest. And I mean, maybe, maybe that happens.
- [02:47]
A
But when I was growing up in like the 90s, there was a move, you know, as the evangelicals were getting some steam. You know what they would do at Catholic churches is on Saturday nights there'd be like a teen mass. And they're like, this is how we're going to.
- [03:01]
B
There's always the teen service.
- [03:02]
A
This is how we're going to appeal to the youth. And there'd be like a rock band doing Christian rock. And I just remember going to those things and being like, this is awful. Like, this is making me less interested.
- [03:12]
B
And you always had like the youth pastor that's like, bro, we're going to bring pizza, we're going to hang, we're going to talk about stuff. And it's always like some 25 year old that ends up getting caught up in the skin.
- [03:24]
A
The old Catholic hymns are the only thing I liked about the Sunday morning church. You've taken them away and now you've got this ear poison.
- [03:31]
B
By the way, speaking of JD I saw Jason Kander actually, who was the former Secretary of State, I think, in Missouri, he, he found J.D. vance's tell. So J.D. vance, now, when he's gonna go into talking points, right before he does it, he says, let me say this or let me just go ahead and say something. And he said every time he says that there is the administration approved talking point, I gotta tell you, it's too early for JD to be revealing his tells if he wants to run for president.
- [04:01]
A
I should check in with Jason. Cam. That's a good dude.
- [04:03]
B
Y.
- [04:04]
A
All right, let's run through the elements of the surrender, the 14 points in the MOU. We're going to talk about how it's in Versailles. It really is. It's really something that we're back in the Treaty of Versailles to Electric Boogaloo, but we're going to go through a couple of them because I think actually reading them is pretty telling. Speaking of tells, this is point one of the mou. The United States of America and the Islamic Republic of Iran and their allies in the current war are signing this MoU to declare the immediate and permanent termination of military operations on all fronts, including in Lebanon. The final deal will confirm the permanent termination of the war on all fronts, including in Lebanon. It goes on. There are three mentions of Lebanon in the first point. Like the war wasn't even about Lebanon. And so I think that tells you a lot about who felt like they had the cards, so to speak, in the negotiation.
- [04:58]
B
Completely. I mean, look, and from Israel's perspective, and there's a lot to criticize Israel for. But from Israel's perspective, they have this requirement, honestly, that if they get attacked and they get attacked by Hezbollah from time to time, that they have to respond. And somehow this was drug in and forced on Israel without Israel's approval of it. I mean, it is clear in reading
- [05:25]
A
that it's almost as if Donald Trump grabbed them by the. Because, yeah, when you're a star, they let you do it. Exactly.
- [05:32]
B
Yeah, exactly. And you know, by the way, the other thing is even just noticing when they say there is now a permanent ceasefire, and of course we get into this later, but it's like, then we're going to negotiate everything else. But that term permanent is basically laying out there to say there is no intention to ever resume military operations. And again, a ceasefire typically is with the understanding that hostilities can resume. And it's that sort of Damocles that's hanging over you, that is compelling you to an answer. This is already saying, no, we're never going to fight again. Don't wor about that. Now let's talk.
- [06:05]
A
This was on the nmou, one of the crazy. I mean, Donald Trump said so many insane things last 48 hours, but one of them was where he was just like, you know, we should just go let Jelani in Syria kind of deal with Hezbollah now. In part because BB's is kind of like bombing all these apartment buildings and it's like it's not even Hezbollah in there sometime. And it's like Trump's basically, basically saying that we should just go ahead and trust the Al Qaeda leader running Syria to handle Hezbollah because, you know, we. He's a little more suit now. Yeah, he's a little more controllable, you know, and a little. And is showing a little bit more prudence than, than the prime Minister of Israel, our ally in the war. Totally insane.
- [06:45]
B
It is incredible. By the way, I'll just say quickly too, I've. I'm one of the few people that U.S. congressmen that have actually been to the Hezbollah, the Lebanon side of the blue line. And one thing you realize is Hezbollah is extremely integrated there. I mean, it's a real problem. But also Israel should fight this differently. But this is a, it's a real existential threat to Israel. And, and not that they should necessarily blow everything up there, not that they should invade, but they should at least have the ability to fight back if they're attacked. That's the only way to prevent, you know, to, to push off, frankly, future attacks.
- [07:20]
A
It is totally a real threat. And, well, I, I don't want to get sidelined down the Israel track again. We can circle back to that at the end. But I do think that, I guess my short point about this is that, that is why getting in bed with Donald Trump in this war and totally isolating all of your other allies was such a stupid strategic move, because they do have real security interests completely. They've undermined their ability to execute them anyway. Number two, the United States of America and the Islamic Republic of Iran undertake to respect each other's sovereignty. You got that right. People and territorial integrity. And to refrain from interfering in each other's internal affairs. Iran wasn't really interfering in our internal affairs. Maybe trying to do some cyber attacks here and there, but we had a lot of involvement in their internal affairs. Covertly had a lot of things to say about their internal affairs. And so again, the first two points are clearly things that Iran wanted in there.
- [08:24]
C
Yeah.
- [08:24]
B
And if you, if you take this to its, its logical conclusion. So this doesn't mention cyber. Iran is very good at cyber attacks. They're getting better at it. This doesn't mention cyber attack. In fact, as far as I know, there's no mention of that in the whole MoU, the cyber attacks, which is certainly, if I'm the United States and trying to get something out of it. That's one of the things. One of the conditions I would put on. The other thing is it's not like we're going in and, you know, creating opposition to the Iranian regime. Many of the Iranians are actually more affectionate to the United States. We may have liaison with them. They also are very important for our CIA. Right. For the ability to gain intelligence. And by the letter of this, and certainly the CIA can still do its thing, but by the letter of this, we have to basically cease all of those operations even to get intelligence on the, on the Iranian regime. In theory.
- [09:19]
A
I mean, remember when the Shah was going to. Fans of the, of the former Shah was going to republican events. People were like, we're going to. We're bringing them back.
- [09:29]
B
Yeah, I do know.
- [09:30]
A
Doesn't seem like that happened. Okay, we're going to skip ahead to point six. It's a pretty short document, actually. I'd recommend everybody just read the whole 14. It's pretty easy to read. But, but you know, we only have an hour.6. The United States of America undertakes with regional partners to develop a definitive, mutually agreed plan with at least USD 300 billion for the reconstruction and economic development of the Islamic Republic of Iran at least 300 billion. Not just for the reconstruction, but for economic development.
- [10:00]
B
Yep.
- [10:01]
A
And that's like most of Iran's gdp.
- [10:03]
B
Yeah, it is.
- [10:05]
A
I'm pretty sure their gdp is like 300 billion. I'm googling this right now. Yeah, it is.
- [10:09]
B
Yeah.
- [10:09]
A
So it's basically, we're saying we're going to double your GDP for. For a year.
- [10:13]
B
And remember, literally 48 hours before this, J.D. vance said the rumors of the $300 billion were BS. That's information operation. Now, we're not only finding it's $300 billion. That's the floor. So they're basically saying in this, not up to $300 billion in reconstruction economic funds, at least. So it could be a trillion dollars. And frankly, if, you know, if Kushner gets in there and he finds that we can put a Trump Tower in multiple locations, I think you could see this thing rise above that level. And, you know, this idea of making Iran great again. Remember when people were. Lindsey Graham was. Yeah. He was wearing the. That. That hat. And it's like. Yeah, I guess. I guess in a way he's following through on this. It's just the Iranian regime is in control in this process.
- [11:00]
A
Yeah. There's a lot of coastline there, you
- [11:04]
B
know, and by the way, we have to mention here the obvious thing. For years, for years, and I was part of this, we were attacking the Obama administration for the, quote, unquote, pallets of cash that was released to Iran. And I still think it was the wrong move. But in comparison to this, Holy cow. This is 300 times what Obama gave to Iran in order to seal that deal. This is brutally the worst thing. We can get to the top lines of it after we get through this. But, my goodness.
- [11:36]
A
Yeah. More than 300 times. Because of what we get to in the future. And the other elements of the MOUs. Number 7.7. The United States of America undertakes to terminate all types of sanctions against the Islamic Republic of Iran. I don't know if you can actually do that via MoU. And I was making fun of Lindsey on the pod earlier this week where he's like, the agreement has to come through Congress. The war didn't have to go through Congress, but the agreement does. But the sanctions are. Those were passed by Congress and signed into law. So that is the one part of this I don't know that Trump can actually just do.
- [12:08]
B
Yeah. What they can do, because they've done this with Russia. Remember the Russian sanctions. They can waive them. Yeah. And so what he'll do is waive them. He will probably get enough of his toadies to, to get rid of it in Congress. But at least when you simply say we're going to waive these, we don't have an intention of enforcing them. It'll be a law on paper, but nothing else. And that's what you're going to end up seeing here.9.
- [12:33]
A
Pending the final deal, the United States of America and the Islamic Republic of Iran agree to maintain the status quo. The Islamic Republic of Iran will maintain the current status quo of its nuclear program. I skipped point eight. There is a lot of discussion in point eight about what we want them to do with their nuclear program at the 60 days, but that's more of an aspirational item for the MoU itself. It says right there, 0.9. Iran will maintain the current status quo of its nuclear program. So that's what we got out of the deal.
- [13:03]
B
It's incredible. And on top of that, when we were in Congress, and this is where I can bring value is like, here were the arguments we were making that I think at the time were founded in legitimate concerns, which is, okay, yes, they have restricted Iran's nuclear capacity. That's, that's something that we all acknowledge, at least for the time being. What the Obama administration didn't do is restrict their ability to create ballistic missiles that can ultimately deliver these weapons. And that was from Donald Trump's perspective, from the Republican perspective, that was a huge failure of the Obama administration. Donald Trump yesterday said basically Iran deserves to have ballistic missiles because other people do too. And again, we have taken a party that claimed in the past to be based on this idea of international values and like security and stuff, and they have waived everything because a guy that's aiding years old that just had a birthday party, like a 14 year old, got his ego hurt. Yeah, that's where we're at.
- [14:03]
A
Because he's bored. Toddler got bored. Birthday boy, big boy got bored, wanted new presents and he wanted, he wanted
- [14:10]
B
an MOU on his birthday because that would be the most special present he could ever get.
- [14:15]
A
And then he wanted to do it in Versailles because there's so much gold. Okay, two more points in the MoU. We'll go through these quickly and then come back the lines up a bit. Number 10. The U.S. department of treasury will issue waivers for the export of Iranian crude oil, petroleum products and derivatives and all associated services, including banking transactions, insurances, transportation, et cetera. 11. The USA undertakes to make fully available for use the frozen or restricted funds and assets of the Islamic Republic of Iran upon implementation of this mou. So that's today that's happened.
- [14:48]
C
Yeah.
- [14:49]
A
So all of the whole stuff where JD was going around talking about how they need to behave good and we'll give them carrots and if they do good behavior, they get rewards. Now, upon the implementation of this MoU, which happened last night at Versailles, now they have fully available their frozen or restricted funds. So the 300 billion in at least in rehabilitation of the country, the immediate availability of the frozen or restricted funds, waivers on their sanctions, waivers for the export of crude oil. I mean this is an unbelievable bounty. Unbelievable for the Iranians.
- [15:28]
B
Unbelievable. And right now, if by definition of all this we are treating Iran the same we treat Germany, France, Spain, the uk, they are now basically welcome into the global economy to do business at free will. And that's where we're at. And you know, Europe could make a decision to try to restrict if they wanted. They won't obviously, but they could. But they don't have the strength we do.
- [15:53]
A
Well, we had to be the kind bad guys on this one with Europe and Iran is right there. They are actually a threat again going back to the beginning of this and how stupid this fucking war of choice was. But we didn't have any real security threats with Iran. At least the short term proxies in the region. There's certain things, but the American homeland didn't, Israel did. Europe does. They can reach Europe, they can reach Italy with their ballistic missiles like now, forget development. So their calculus is different. This is not like the Ukraine war,
- [16:25]
B
you know, and in all of this, Tim, one of the biggest mistakes that this administration made that they probably will never realize because they're that dumb is. You know, I think I've talked about with you that dime model, right? Diplomatic information, military and economic. The military hammer we actually used. Well in this now what I would argue is during the last 30 days negotiations as the strait has remained closed, we probably should have continued bombing. There would have been really no downfall in that. That would have been hammer that would have compelled. So the military aspect of that did what it was supposed to do. I mean the, our military, they were given an order, they achieved it. The problem is on the diplomatic side, we alienated our allies. We should have brought all of them to the fight if we were going to go to the fight. And I would argue that we weren't ready for this fight and we never should have undertaken it. But still you should bring that you should isolate Iran further economically. At no point should we have lifted sanctions or allowed them to sell any of their oil while we were striking them. And you know what was it it informational. I mean the biggest problem in all
- [17:29]
A
the information that we got crushed.
- [17:31]
B
I mean, dude, I watched 10 times the Lego videos that Iran put out. They were hilarious. And what did this White House do instead of put. And I'm sorry to say this, but the information war is now fought by memes on, on the Internet. That's, that's, it's no longer Radio Free America as much as it's memes on the Internet. But this administration, instead of putting out their own meme, you know, the ayatollah is gay or whatever it is, instead they after Democrats. They spend their whole time going after Democrats and then they wonder why they lose the information war and then blame Democrats for it. They made no effort to engage in it. And in the 21st century, information is just as powerful or more powerful than military strikes. They walked into this blind. Donald Trump wanted to see things blow up. He got bored scared and gave away the store because he was desperate to get out of this. That's the reality of what happened here. And America is far weaker. My 4 year old son is now much more likely to have to face a better armed, bigger threatening Iran because of what Donald Trump just did. And he's more likely to have to face him alone without allies like we have had in every other war we fought.
- [18:44]
A
I have to slightly quibble with you on the diplomatic and ally front. This is something from Hugh Hewitt that he posted yesterday. Ally of the President's, one of President's big foreign policy hawks. And he thinks that the kind of diplomatic failures weren't really Trump's faults. Actually it was our allies in Europe that let us down. NATO took a pass, Hewitt writes, because of Greenland. Think on that a while and assess the character of our allies. They have as much as anyone, save Israel, Toulouse, typo from a crazed regime with ballistic missiles and nukes. And they let the reality of Greenland's important part in North American defense and President Trump's style get in the way of showing up. Hard to see NATO the same way now as on 227.
- [19:31]
B
Okay, so let's open the curtain here and I want people to peek into the psyche of Donald Trump supporters that are upset with him here. Okay? And Hugh Hewitt is a prime example. They will never. And Lindsey Graham, everybody else.
- [19:45]
A
Ben Shapiro is blaming J.D. vance on Fox yesterday.
- [19:48]
B
Exactly. And so is Lindsey Graham, by the way, for God's sakes. But here's what you do. Because, I mean, I've been in this. I've been in this seat where it's like, okay, I'm opposing Donald Trump very publicly on this one thing. Now I need to hedge by finding something I can be very supportive on with him so that he'll be upset at me on this, but then I'm going to come out and talk about how brilliant he is in this other thing. And this is what Hugh Hewitt's doing. I mean, Hugh Hewitt, if you put him on CIA Truth Juice, which doesn't exist, by the way, sadly, but let's pretend it does. If you put him on CIA Truth Juice, he would tell you like, yeah, we probably shouldn't be threatening Greenland. Yes, all this stuff. But he knows that he can hit that to kind of give Donald Trump the pass on the ally front. Let's be very clear about something. You could be critical of the allies if just like, you know, and keep in mind, also, Donald Trump gave the State of the Union two days prior to the beginning of this Iranian war and barely even discussed it. So not only didn't he prepare the American people for it, he clearly didn't prepare the allies. You think of the painstaking effort that George H.W. bush and his son took in preparing for the wars of the last decades. And, and they took months to bring the allies on board. It's like being in a bar fight. Look, you could be the biggest guy in the bar, and your chances of getting in a fight are pretty high if you're the biggest guy in the bar with 10 friends that are my size. Nobody's gonna fight you because they know that you're gonna. They have nothing to prove and they're gonna.
- [21:16]
A
You also got to get your friends on board. I mean, you got to come in bar fights back in the day where I didn't. Where I threw the last punch, you know, and so somebody is shit talking me, and it's more of a go up to my drunk buddies and be like, hey, you want to kick his ass? That's how you do it. Okay? That's how you do it. You don't, you don't start the fight. You don't throw the first punch against
- [21:36]
B
the biggest and then expect them to jump in.
- [21:37]
A
Yeah, and then expect them to jump in while you're on the ground. Okay?
- [21:40]
B
But that's the point. So the war starts and then he offends the allies. Yeah, he says we don't need them. Yeah, we don't need them.
- [21:49]
A
And we might invade you, by the way. We might invade you too. Who knows?
- [21:53]
B
We might invade you, we may fight NATO. And then, by the way, now we desperately need you. Get your ass over here. You're not coming. You're not our friend. We hate you. We don't need you anyway. And if I'm, if I'm the leader of the uk, I'm sitting there going, dude, let's just let him figure this out. If he really needs us, come talk to us. But I'm not going to sit here and be his whipping boy because we're a respectable country. That's unreal.
- [22:17]
A
This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. For some people, summer is their favorite season. That's me. You're hearing from one of those people. I feel like in my retirement I'm going for never ending summer, hopefully. I feel like that would be achieving life success where you never leave summer. Where I can experience summer in the American south and then spend winter here in summer, I don't know, Montevideo or something. You got travel. Kids are out of school and around. Me and Toulouse were down at Audubon park yesterday doing something she called moss fishing. I don't really know what moss fishing is, but she was enjoying it. So it's great. But for some people, summer is a little bit stressful. And even for those of us that like it, you know, you gotta build some time for yourself, maybe away from all the screaming children. Therapy can be one way to do that. That therapy can help people better understand their needs, feel more confident setting boundaries, and create a version of summer that feels good for you. And now it's easier than ever to find a therapist with better help. BetterHelp is the world's largest online therapy platform. Better Help therapists work according to a strict code of conduct and are fully licensed in the us they do the initial matching work for you so you can focus on your therapy goals. The short questionnaire helps identify your needs and preferences. And BetterHelp's 12 years of experience and industry leading match fulfillment rate means they typically get it right the first time. If you aren't happy with your match, you can switch to a different therapist at any time from their tailored wrecks. You don't have to say yes to everything this summer. Find support in therapy. Sign up and get 10% off@betterhelp.com the bulwark that's better. H E L P.com TheBullwerk Speaking about our allies, we love the French, love Emmanuel Macron, love Brigitte Macron. They're good allies to us on the world stage. But we're going to just take a moment to be former Republicans for a second. It is pretty telling. I mean, and it's pretty ironic and mockable that Donald Trump signs the surrender in France. I mean, in France, we called them cheese eating surrender monkeys for a reason. And he's there, Marco Rubio, looking over his shoulder as he is signing the document. The French leader next to him, he's like, Mr. Mullah, Mr. Ayatollah, sir, I surrender to you. I don't know how to say I surrender in France. I should have Googled that before we started the podcast. But just.
- [24:38]
B
We surrender. How. How did. How does there. Do they have nobody that understands history or optics? Like, dude, stick with the docusign. Because remember, they. They electronically docusigned, like on Monday. Stick with that dude. Right? Don't. This is insane. I don't get it.
- [25:00]
A
I surrender. The other bad optics of it is, you know, the first Treaty of Versailles didn't go well. A lot of differences. And part of the reason why that didn't go well is because of the, like, just how tough the sanctions were on the losing party there and obviously the economic fallout in Germany. And we don't need to explain how World War II started, but it's still just, again, from an optical standpoint. And also, Wilson had his 14 points and it's all just a peril. The MOU is 14. Wilson has 14 points. Henry Cabot Lodge, we're doing junior year high school Western Civ here. Had the 14. What was it called? It was the 14. Oh, I did too many bong hits in college. It was called the 14 something reservation.
- [25:49]
B
Okay. All right.
- [25:49]
A
At Henry Cabot Lodge did great states. I don't know.
- [25:51]
B
I'll pretend like I knew that, but
- [25:53]
A
we don't have a lot of Henry Cabot Lodges. Did you do AP Western Civ? I think this was just.
- [25:56]
B
Yeah, I did all kinds of stuff. That one. That one fell out on that penguins on the iceberg.
- [26:01]
A
Right, Fair enough.
- [26:02]
B
Every new penguin, another one pops off, you know, downtown.
- [26:05]
A
I don't think cares about any of that. Obviously he hasn't read any books. No, he doesn't know anything about the Treaty of Versailles. He literally said it. He wants to go to Versailles because of the gold. Yeah, he likes gold.
- [26:15]
B
I mean, look, he's 80. He's clearly been wrestling with his mortality kind of publicly. Right. And if he wasn't president, I would have some compassion for him. If he wasn't bringing the country.
- [26:26]
A
You're a good person. You're still Going to church on somebody.
- [26:28]
B
I'm trying. Yeah. But I think he. I think he thinks in terms of, okay, how long am I going to be alive? Maybe in his mind he understands it's not extremely long and he doesn't care about the consequences past that. He really doesn't. And unfortunately, he's surrounded by people, Tim, that have no desire to tell him the opposite of the truth or to say, hey, let's not try, let's not do Versailles, even though you want all the gold because of this reason or, Mr. President, we're going to really have a hard time spinning to the American people. And by the way, don't think, Tim, that there aren't senators out there trying. I checked Twitter this morning, but we're gonna have our time for the American. Yeah. And Eric something from Missouri, Schmidt. Yeah, he's out there, like, literally a
- [27:10]
A
blood and soil nationalist. And I think True would be happy if we weren't involved at all over there and just wants white people in the country. So that's true.
- [27:17]
B
Here's the big question, though, and this is, this is something I wrestle with. So let me ask you this question because I've never understood this. If you are a, like, as arrogant as Donald Trump is, you want to be seen as tough, what is the benefit in coming out of these things weak? What is the benefit in alienating NATO? What is the benefit in dropping to your knees in front of Russia? This is something that I haven't been able to put together in my own mind, why a nationalist who wants to look tough would not be out there, you know, leveraging NATO to take down Russia or stand.
- [27:50]
A
I can answer this. I got this.
- [27:51]
B
Okay. I want to know.
- [27:52]
A
There are some critics among listeners, friends of my initial analysis of this war. And, you know, they're like, you don't really understand all the players. And I was like, I don't. You're right, I don't. I can name like, two cities in Iran. I would fail Tucker Carlson's Ted Cruz quiz on how many people lived in Iran. And I was like, I know Trump, though. Well, I know Trump, and Trump is a bully who's a wuss. And so, you know, and that it's like, as simple as that. He wants to seem tough, but he can't back it up. He doesn't have the gumption to back it up. He also believes very strongly he loves that book. Did he ever read the book or did he just meet the author and the author explained it to him? Probably you remember, this was an 80s self help book, I think the power of positive thinking. Yeah, this is Trump. This is Trump. Trump is the power of positive. And he, like, believes that he can warp reality to his will. And so he's a wimpy bully that didn't have the backbone to finish the fight. And he thinks that he can take this dog mou and through the power of positive thinking and spin, convince people that it's good. And I think that's up to this.
- [28:57]
B
Up to this point, he's done that. And now, granted, the thing about X that I hate is the algorithm, how that works, right? You reply to one tweet, now all of a sudden you're getting all the White House stuff. And so I understand reality on this is skewed, but it. It appears that the right that just yesterday thought this was a complete surrender document is now making their decision to come around and defend it. Newt Gingrich put out something about how brilliant this is and how this gives us a chance to really. But what they're doing, though, and. And I think every listener should understand this is they're bracketing it with, okay, this is perfect. Now he has 60 days to really drive and get what he needs to get, and then he should resume the attacks if that doesn't work. And so that gives them the ability to kind of play both sides. But I want to be very clear about something. If Donald Trump actually ever resumed kinetic action because of what he doesn't get over the next 60 days, that will surprise me more than I woke up, than if I woke up with, like, three heads. He's not going to do it. He has no intention of doing it. Iran knows this, and they're going to drag him for everything he's worth. And this is going to end up being just some kind of unfinished war that just kind of fades into memory with Iran and control the straits.
- [30:09]
A
Exactly. And I would say right now, I would say 60, 40 against there being another agreement. I agree. I think this is it. I think this is it. Why would Iran keep negotiating? Trump doesn't want to. Trump's gonna move on. He's gonna do Cuba or whatever, I don't know, find some island that he wants to take over or do, you know, do a new project on the National Mall, a big Trump statue or something. He's gonna move on from this. Let's talk about Marco, who can't move on for this, wants to have a political future. Marco, as mentioned earlier, was standing over Trump's shoulder when he was signing the surrender. And so that's Gonna make it pretty challenging for him, I think, to pitch that he was on the other side of this. I'm not sure that this is as much of a political parm within the Republican Party as some of the commentators think. I do think that there's a Trump cult, and increasingly, Republican voters are kind of isolationist. But anyway, that's for another. His face told the story, though, when Trump was doing the press conference. He's like, joking about how if it goes poorly, it's JD's fault. If it goes well, it's mine. And Lutnick's laughing. Marco looks like he saw a ghost.
- [31:20]
B
Yeah. Yeah.
- [31:21]
A
So I think Marco's face told me.
- [31:22]
B
He's clearly not happy with this. Marco, let me say something complimentary to him. He is. He has actually.
- [31:30]
A
His ears are just unbelievably big, and it's, like, amazing how big they are. They're like. They've got their own weather system.
- [31:36]
B
I know, dude. I know.
- [31:38]
A
The compliment.
- [31:39]
B
No, that wasn't it, actually. It's funny. I met with Marco for breakfast right after he dropped out of the presidential race over at the Senate dining room, and we had this, like, plan to, you know, fight back for the gop, and here he is. But anyway, he. He's a political survivor, and I will tell you, he's been. I have to compliment his ability to. I couldn't do it morally, but his ability to kind of walk this line of being almost Trump's favorite, you know, and. And Marco, Mike Weiss was saying this. You know, when it comes to things like Ukraine, it's good to have Marco there compared to, you know, let's put Rick Grinnell in there or something like that.
- [32:14]
A
Sure.
- [32:14]
B
But I don't. I don't really.
- [32:16]
A
Marginal, but okay.
- [32:17]
B
Yeah, I don't know if this is going to impact him or not, because here's the thing. Once we make the decision, we being if I'm a Republican sitting here thinking, once Republicans make the decision to accept this Iran agreement, it is now in their interest for this Iran agreement to be the best thing that signed or negotiated. And so Marco is playing this position of, okay, let's say Iran somehow starts attacking Israel again, this thing falls apart and the agreement looks bad. He can point to those pictures where he's frowning. But otherwise, if what is probably going to happen, which is the Republican Party rallies around, this is the best thing that's ever been thought of. You know, Iran probably does not initiate a war again or anything like this. This kind of fades into history. There he is. He's made Donald Trump happy. He's there for the signing and his soul is burning up. I think his soul is a hollow husk and filled with dust. But, you know, look, he's played this politically right as well as you can play something like this.
- [33:15]
A
I would say, well, here's something that might be an issue for him is that we do have videotape. And I want to play for you Marco's thoughts on the JCPOA on the Senate floor. God. About a decade ago now, Iran will
- [33:30]
C
immediately use the money that it's receiving and sanctions relief to begin to build up its conventional capabilities. It will establish the most dominant military power in the region outside of the United States. And it will raise the price of us operating in the region. They're going to build anti access capabilities, rockets capable of destroying our aircraft carriers and ships. Continue to build these swift boats that are able to come on us, these fast boats that are able to swarm our naval assets and they'll make it harder and harder for US troops to be in the region. They'll also work with other terrorist groups in the region to target American servicemen and women. And they may or may not deny that they're involved, but they will target us and raise the price of our presence in the Middle east until they hope to completely pull us out of that region. They'll also continue to build long range missiles, missiles capable of reaching the United States. Those are not affected by this deal. And they'll continue to build them as they been doing. And then at some point in the near future, when the time is right, they will build a nuclear weapon. And they will do so because at that point they will know that they have become immune.
- [34:30]
B
I didn't know swift boats were coming on us though. That's a, that's a big threat. I mean, look, dude, this is, that's perfect. I mean, that's a perfect video that literally describes this exact moment, like times 100.
- [34:42]
A
By the way, it's worth mentioning that like, that stuff didn't happen after the jcboa because like, Marco was exaggerating the amount of money and resources of what the sanctions regime looked like, et cetera. But it very aptly describes the deal he just signed.
- [34:55]
B
Completely. Completely. And here's something that I've been trying to wrestle with a little bit. I remember maybe even just a month or two, three months ago, whatever, thinking about how quickly the Middle east had changed from this looming Iranian threat with the Israel situation to basically Israel crushing all its enemies, Iran. I remember I was watching a TV show called Tehran. I think it's on Netflix or something. And it was this big Iranian regime and these people within the regime and it's like, boy, that regime is gone. They've been crushed. And they basically were. After the 12 day war, Iran's position in the Middle east was humiliation and we have single handedly resurrected them. Had Donald Trump after the 12 day war, maybe allowed Israel to mow the grass, as they say, every now and again, maybe we even mow the grass every now and again, Iran would have been massively diminished. The only thing that Iran was able to do, and this is the point about why you don't go to war unless you're ready to see it through. The only thing that Iran was able to do effectively, they had some kinetic strikes that worked, right? Like credit where it's due, I guess, from a military perspective. But they were able to bear far more pain than we were. And why were they able to do that? Because Donald Trump from day one, Tim, signaled to the Iranian regime that he wanted out. Day two, he's like, we've won this war. What is it? Day 20, he's like, open the straight, you crazy bastard. Day 25, he's threatening to destroy civilization. Day 26, he's begging for a ceasefire. Day 29, I don't know if these days are actually right, but he's begging for our allies to come in. And all he is doing is signaling to the Iranian regime, like, all we have to do is wait this guy out. He immediately ruled out the use of ground troops. Look, I'm not saying we should have used ground troops here, but I hate when politicians rule them out because that is a sort of Damocles you hold over the head of Iran. Maybe we will use ground troops. Even if you have no intention of using it, you, he should go quiet and say, we're going to strike until this thing is complete, we'll negotiate with Iran, but we're going to keep going. Instead, he's out there hysterical in public and Iran in their meetings, wherever they have them, caves or not, they're sitting around going, this dude is desperate and we can outlast him. That's what happened here.
- [37:18]
A
And I think the important part of that is to just kind of enunciate is we are so much worse off in the region than the status quo. Totally. The regime was kind of collapsing already. What would have happened? Who knows, right? But the regime was very weak before the start. And that was one of the cases that the hawks made for it. It was one of the cases that Israel made for it is that they thought there was an opportunity. And I think the degree to which the credibility of America to use our power overseas is weakened by this, the degree to which Israel is now like, isolated after being in this moment where they're gaining Arab allies and you know, where they had the back of the US and had demonstrated their power in the region, I feel like that Israel is in a way worse position, way more isolated, facing now a foe that, as Marco said in that video from 10 years ago, is going to be much more militarily powerful. Just a catastrophic fuck up.
- [38:23]
B
Catastrophic. And can I say this to my Democratic friends? Because I've heard your debate on this show as you've discussed it, guys, if any of you think that we should not be humiliating Trump for this, that's why you lose. I'm sorry. Right, Trump. Trump lives and feeds and breathes and his whole existence on this faux idea of strength, loudness, tweeting in all caps, going to war. The truth is he is weak and that has to be called out. And I got to tell you, no tweet from a US Senator or a political operative is going to compel Donald Trump to re enter a reckless war. But if you are not out there making it damn clear to the Republicans and to the American people that this is faux strength, this dude is a coward, then you cannot expect to win as big as you should win in November.
- [39:15]
A
It's like this weird, like, oh, you got to hand it to him as a good deal thing is better than it's like, no, it wasn't actually terrible. It wasn't. And you can, and you can do both, because I do. And this is maybe where you and I might have like some disagreement on the strategic path forward for Democrats. But I do think it's important for them to recapture the voters who are skeptical of foreign incursions excursions, as Donald Trump like to say. And I think to say to them that, like, these are stupid and they backfire and we should be investing in America more. I think you can do that while also being responsible on the global stage, et cetera. And I think that the Democrats, you can eat, you can walk and chew gum at the same time. You can say that this was a really stupid military engagement. We will not engage in stupid Middle east wars. And also he lost it and he's humiliated and he's weak. You can make both those arguments at the same time.
- [40:03]
B
Yeah. What is it they used to say about abortion? It should be rare, legal, safely going rare.
- [40:08]
C
Yeah.
- [40:08]
B
Yeah. And I think Democrats can kind of play both sides here and be like, war should be rare and it should be overwhelmingly in our favor. If we engage in it. We're not going to just start bombing stuff because we feel like it. But if we find it's in America, America's national interest to attack Iran, we're going to do it and be victorious. But I got to tell you, you don't have to worry about us going into war for things that are out of our interest. I think you can play kind of both sides on that and actually mean it. And actually. Exactly.
- [40:37]
A
Yeah, Trump did, by the way. Trump played both sides of this successfully. He convinced, and this gets us to our game. He convinced both the Palestinian protesters and the Israel Haqq that he was on their side. So Democrats can play that game too. So this takes us to the game. I did a post yesterday on social media. I should be posting less, but you
- [41:00]
B
know, I should too, man. I should too.
- [41:02]
A
I'm going to be reviewing this on vacation at the end of July and you know, talking to the therapist about it and you know, talking to my colleagues and see what I can do about my posting habits. But you know, a little bit of posting is good balance in all things. But I did a post, but I don't know who was more, who's been more humiliated by Donald Trump in his second term? The Dearborn for Trump, People that were going after Joe Biden and Kamala Harris and protesting them thinking that he was going to be better for Gaza or the Israel hawks for Trump? The MAGA hawks for Trump who now are left holding the bag. And I got some feedback on that and I decided it'd be a fun game to play with you, Adam Kinzinger. We can have a draft. Who has Trump screwed over the worst of his supporters? Which group is the most cucked, has been the most betrayed by Trump. Who has he screwed over the worst? We'll do it draft style, open ended. You're the guest. I'll let you take the first pick in the draft.
- [42:03]
B
I think the first people that have been humiliated the most and cucked the most are the fiscal hawks of this administration.
- [42:11]
A
Right. He wasn't even on my draft board. I love that.
- [42:13]
B
I think it's the fiscal hawks, man. Do what? You want me to explain it or you just say, okay, the fiscal hawks. Because I remember shutting down the government or coming close to it over a 500 million dollar discrepancy in the federal budget once. I don't remember what it was back
- [42:30]
A
in the Tea Party days.
- [42:31]
B
Yeah. And now we're spending a billion dollars on a ballroom. We're painting a reflective pool that's algae ridden again so that we can have three days of post of how beautiful it is. We're building an effing arch for God's sakes. We're buying a new jet for every cabinet secretary. I mean, it's absolutely incredible. So I think they've been. And I think they're sitting here pretending like this is still a fiscally conservative administration.
- [42:56]
A
Now the fiscal hawks, Tea Party crowd, the first draft pick and who's Trump screwed the worst? Okay, well, I guess I've got to do it then. I assumed you were going to do it. I'll take the MAGA Hawks.
- [43:06]
B
Yeah, let's go.
- [43:07]
A
I will take the MAGA Hawks. I just. Here's one. Why for me, they were riding so high and they all knew better. If you look at Mark Levin, Ben Shapiro, this crowd, they all Martiessen, they were all never Trump originally because they all knew who Trump was. John Potter Chesterday was going back and forth with David French and he's like, I knew this was a risk. And I was just like, oh, you knew the leopard was gonna eat your face and then you got into the cage. Anyway, the MAGA Hole Hawks did the snake poem. They knew he was a snake and they let him in. They were all against him, but they let him in anyway and he gave them what they wanted for a year and a half. You know, he goes bombing Iran, bombing Venezuela. They were all bragging about how they'd made this bet. And now he has signed the most humiliating surrender since the civil war in this country in France.
- [44:06]
B
Yes.
- [44:06]
A
And I think that the MAGA and the Maga Hawks now are going to lose their party and lose their credibility. And I think that they have been screwed the worst. That's my first pick. Okay, round two. Who do you want?
- [44:19]
B
So I'm worried this comes under MAGA Hawks, but I'm going to go with it anyway. Which is kind of the Israel Republican crowd. So three years ago, four years ago, the aipac. And again, I'm not one of these aipacus.
- [44:32]
A
Miriam Adelson.
- [44:34]
B
We'll use Miriam Adelson as the figure like you know, three, four years ago, the kind of the pro Israel crowd played both sides pretty well. You know, supportive Democrats, they supported supportive Republicans, they, in the last few years they've really gotten into bed with this idea of BB and Trump and they just got absolutely waylaid right now. Just absolutely waylaid and I've talked to a few of them. They're kind of sitting there humid a humida right now, trying to figure out where to go from here. I think they got screwed probably as
- [45:03]
A
big as on top of that, by the way way. They had a really good partner in Joe Biden.
- [45:07]
B
They really did.
- [45:08]
A
Hawks had a really good partner in Joe Biden. That gave them like 85% of what they wanted in the face of real legitimate at times and harsh criticism from within his own coalition. And he stalwart with them. And Kamala Harris kind of wasn't really showing his cards on that husband. Doug Emhoff, I think, was obviously potentially somebody that could be worked with on these issues. He's been talking about antisemitism a lot since she lost. And so they had a partner there that was not 100% of what they wanted, but was a lot of the way there. And they decided instead to attack him and smear him and throw all of their eggs in with one of history's greatest con men.
- [45:57]
B
Yeah.
- [45:58]
A
And now he's conned them. And it's kind of like, like, whoops.
- [46:01]
B
Yep, yep.
- [46:02]
A
Oops. Kind of deserved actually sit in it.
- [46:04]
B
And you have alienated the Democrats who are going to be in power soon.
- [46:08]
A
Right.
- [46:08]
B
And. And by the way, sometimes, you know, like, October 7th, terrible day. There's a lot of emotion. Probably every Israeli wanted to nuke everybody. But you need somebody on the outside that's like, all right, you know, hold on. Hold, hold back a little bit. You need a moderating force. We all need a moderating force in our life. And my Twitter feedback.
- [46:29]
A
So there you go.
- [46:29]
B
That's what happened. So now they have.
- [46:31]
A
All right, that's your pick. I'm glad you said that. Okay, good. Good choice. Boy, I'm looking at my draft board here. A lot of good ones. This one's not as funny, so I'm just going to be brief on it because it's pretty depressing. But the Hispanic Trump voters, I've got.
- [46:42]
B
Yeah. Oh, yeah.
- [46:43]
A
I've got to go with as my second pick.
- [46:45]
B
Little shock there.
- [46:47]
A
A little bit. But I mean, it's also horrifying. Yeah, it's horrifying what's happening in their communities. And was also predictable.
- [46:54]
B
But he said he was gonna do it.
- [46:57]
A
He told them they were gonna do it. They had signs that said mass deportation. Now, there were signs. It was clear. Like, not like there were signs. Like you could have seen signs. Like there were literal placard signs.
- [47:09]
B
Yeah, I know. It wasn't a Jesus sign. It was like a real printed sign from Kinko's
- [47:16]
A
third round.
- [47:17]
B
Okay, I'm gonna go with. This is one that's personal to me.
- [47:21]
A
Great.
- [47:21]
B
Is the man the manosphere?
- [47:24]
A
Oh, yeah, they're on my board.
- [47:25]
B
I've got to use the manosphere because
- [47:27]
A
Andrew Schultz, Joe Rogan, Theo.
- [47:31]
B
Yeah. And I don't. I don't know if they've gotten their comeuppance yet fully, but it's coming. Here's the thing, like, so let's be. Let's be critical of Democrats for a second or some on the left. I'm not even going to say Democrats, which is, you know, there was this period we went through where everything masculine was called toxic. And so you created this environment where young men felt like masculinity was evil and wrong young. And men like us weren't out there defending healthy masculinity, which, to me, healthy masculinity is fighting for a cause, punching up, not down. Defending your family, stuff like that. It's a good thing. But in the absence of that definition, this toxic manosphere comes along, and it really is toxic masculinity. And it exploded. Well, so people began to believe it was all tweet caps, be mean to people, be loud, that's masculine. Make sure you lift weights, all that kind of stuff. The truth is, the guy that they are seen as this masculine hero who is a fat, sick man, who's a husk of a man, now President of the United States, who smells ridiculously terrible, who needs a UFC fight, he is collapsing in front of them. They're now waking up to it. And I think the backlash, unfortunately, I think it's going to be too strong, but I think the backlash against the manosphere is going to be pretty intense.
- [48:45]
A
Also, what were the main issues that they carried about anti war? Yeah, Epstein. Epstein, Free speech. Like, those are, like, the three main things that they were criticizing either the Democrats or the unit party about. Like. Right. Was that, you know, not dealing with all this. Trump got us into a stupid war, did an Epstein cover up, and it's been a full assault on free speech from this administration. So. Yeah, no, those guys got totally cucked and humiliated. Okay, my third round pick. Well, I've got. How many more do you have? How many rounds can we do?
- [49:18]
B
I can give you two rounds. I got one dark horse.
- [49:21]
A
Okay, we'll have two horns. I'll pair then. And for my third round choice, I will pair with the Manosphere, the Crypto Bros. Oh, God. I was just Googling this As we were chatting, year to date, Bitcoin is down 39%. Ethereum was down 41%. Oh, yeah, I bet if we went and looked at Trump coin, that'd be down about 98%. And so Trump is making ungodly sums of money on crypto, like unimaginable generational wealth. And your average crypto investor, if you want to call it that, is holding the bag and getting their ass handed to them this year. Thanks, Donald Trump. All right, round four.
- [50:04]
B
So my wife is Salvadorian, by the way, and you know, El Salvador is big on the crypto thing. And last, I'm going to El Salvador week or two, but a year ago we went, and I'm sitting next to this fat dude, sorry, overweight man, whatever you're supposed to say. And he started talking about how great El Salvador was. And I'm like, all right, what's going on here? And, yep, huge Trumper, thankfully didn't recognize me, sold me on bitcoin, and shortly after that is when it dropped 40. Anyway, I don't wish him. I wish him no ill, but. Okay, here's my dark horse. This is one nobody's going to think about. So that's why I wanted to mention it, which is veteran advocacy groups.
- [50:41]
A
Okay.
- [50:42]
B
Because we have allowed. You talked about this. I think it was you talked about. I only listened to two podcasts, so it was you or somebody else. But it's like, I don't, I don't, I don't remember who this one was, but like maybe Sykes or something. But anyway, people were talking about how we have let the Republicans basically own the flag and own patriotism. And I think some of that came on the veteran side of things, too. And people have kind of seen the Republicans as pro veteran. And I don't think Republicans are anti veteran. But what we've seen under this administration is criticism of VA disability. Now, that's with Graham Platner. I've also seen it on the total expenditure. And by the way, VA disability is not there for if you can't walk or you can't move your shoulders. It's granted based on any physical ailment you have on war.
- [51:35]
C
Right.
- [51:35]
B
But this administration has looked at things like the VA to cut people to cut things to save money while increasing their tax cuts for the wealthy. And I think pro veterans advocacy groups have been screwed by this administration.
- [51:50]
A
Good pick. My fourth round pick is the farmers. Yeah, good one. Fully on board. The economy and farm country is worse than anywhere else in America. Tariffs, we're destroying them on both sides. Like, so there was. They were destroying their markets. Like, demand is down. They don't have China sell to. And then we had the war. And the increase in cost of fertilizer meant that their inputs are up. So it's harder to sell and it's costing more to buy. That's tough for the farmers. The Doge program cuts, we should mention a lot of farmers supported school lunches, healthy school lunches. USAID did work that where some of it was American food. And also did research into things such as the screw warning worm. He also cut from Doge the program that was looking into the screw worm. Now that's getting into our cattle. Farmers are just getting bent over left and right by this administration and I'm hopeful that they'll come around. Welcome. The farm wasn't that long ago that farmers voted for Democrats. There's some good farm Democrats out there. Josh Turek, Dan Osborne.
- [52:56]
B
This is why the Democrats. This is why the Democrats need room. You talked about this yesterday for social moderates to conservatives in their coalition. You can win over the farmers with that.
- [53:08]
A
Yeah, there's like a couple good candidates. And I don't, I don't. I'm not putting my finger on the scale because I'm kind of intrigued by the Kansas Senate race. Roger Marshall, I mentioned earlier, is a clown and was on tv like, kind of doing like, yo, Iran does deserve missiles. It's just like they'll just do whatever Trump wants. And they've got a couple candidates, but, like, one of them is, is, is like a pastor. And, and I'm just intrigued by that kind of model. Somebody in farm country that reflects farm country and maybe has some socially conservative views. But it's going to be with the Democrats on economic issues, foreign issues, democracy, et cetera.
- [53:44]
B
And also the ketamine industry got screwed because ketamine is a helpful therapeutic. But Elon Musk made this, so that
- [53:51]
A
was your fifth pick. The ketamine industry. I'll go with the ketamine. I already mentioned. I was. I had steel workers and Shaw fans for my honorable mentions. Fans of the Shaw.
- [54:00]
B
You win. You had a better list.
- [54:02]
A
The steel workers. Yeah. Manufacturing jobs. Okay. Yeah.
- [54:08]
B
Yeah.
- [54:08]
A
Well, we spent so much time on the draft that the podcast is over. It's a shade and Freuda podcast. We deserve it. I had other things I had. We cover. I cover Ukraine with Michael Weisson and Applebaum. We can kind of move forward on that. I guess. The one thing I want to get your take on is, is what you think you start to see now from Congress. I mean, like, these guys have, the Republicans in Congress have been really, on the one hand, totally embarrassed by Trump in every way. I mean, particularly in the Senate, there's still a lot of old school hawks that kind of have swallowed their pride at various times and I think are looking at this going, you're really going to stuff Bill Pulte down my throat still you're going to do this Surrender in Iran. Like, there's no consideration for what the Senate wants to put forward. Priority rise. There's Cornyn, Tillis, Cassidy, who have all gotten directly screwed by Trump. So on the one hand, I don't know, I think we might see for the first time some real pushback. On the other hand, the ending of the war is really bad. Medium term, short term, probably helps Republicans in Congress because I think the worst case scenario was like a true energy crisis, obviously. And so maybe Republicans in Congress kind of just do the same thing they've always done and kind of use that as their rationale for coming back around. How do you kind of see that shaking out?
- [55:32]
B
Look, I think they're desperate to get out of town and to go home. I think they're desperate to get this midterm over with. They're desperate to get past their primaries. For those that have them, I don't think you're going to see a meaningful opposition to Trump grow. And here's the important thing for people to understand. I lived it and thankfully I decided to go a different route when I got out of Congress. But people ask me all the time, you know, why will Bill Cassidy now not speak out on everything? He occasionally puts out a tweet or something and it's this. It's because, yes, you want to get invited to the cocktail parties. Your political affiliation is now your tribe and getting kicked out of your tribe sucks.
- [56:08]
A
You want to go lobby again, which is something you didn't do. Kudos to you afterwards. And Cordyn said that directly. He was like, he's like, ex senators make a lot more money.
- [56:16]
B
That's exactly right. And I made a conscious decision to keep speaking out, out. And that would cost me an ability. I didn't want to lobby anyway. But yes, if you want to lobby, you think about it, what is it based on? It's based on your ability to call somebody and access them. And if you were a, if you're a, what is it? An un, an unchosen or you're an unworthy or you turned against the party, they're not going to take Your call. And that affects your value. That's why you can sit here and say, I did my best while I was in. And now my job, somebody else's job. My job is to make money. There's an argument to be made on that. Tons of people leave. Leave the federal prosecutors and go be defense lawyers. This revolving door happens everywhere, but it's kind of sad.
- [56:57]
A
All right, lastly, you're in Texas now. A lot of big races there this year. Just kind of just wanted to do a temp check with you. I was kind of interested one of Sarah's focus groups recently. And this is where sometimes I think focus groups are very valuable for just, like, curing sentiment among people. Like, not as valuable among, like, candidate stuff, because you just, like, might get a group where that. And so it was interesting, like, in this group, Gina Hina Hosta, who we had in Austin with us running against Greg Abbott, like, was more popular than Tal Rico, which is among the swinger group. I don't know if there's that much to read into that. That's not what the polls say, but I don't know. So you've got those two races, Governor's race, Senate race, our guy Bobby Polito. Anything else you're looking at, your sense for what's happening there.
- [57:40]
B
Yeah, in terms of Texas, I try to stay out of Texas politics, like, just personally, because it's nice to live somewhere where you're not. Not involved. But, yeah, I think Talarico's got a real shot here, and I think we're going to best know in September. I think that's a good time to take a poll. If Talarico's down, it's going to be hard for him to come back. If he's up, it may be worth investing a little more money in. The reason I kind of want to temper expectations in Texas is because at the end of the day, everybody comes home. Because if you think about it, you can be one of these George H.W. bush Republicans that are like, I might vote for Talarico, and then the Republican Party will spend millions of. Doll is talking about how Nancy Pelosi is going to rise from, you know, from the ashes again, and you end up holding your nose. So I do think there's enough swing vote here. Beto came within, what, a couple points at one point? So it's doable. And I think there could. There's a couple of races that the Republicans expected to win with the remap for the House that they're not going to. So I think it's going to be a pretty big reflection of what you see nationwide.
- [58:44]
A
It's interesting. I'd like to see some more aggression going after Paxton. I know it's early. It's June, but I'd like to see. There's a lot of material there to work with.
- [58:52]
B
There is.
- [58:54]
A
Hopefully that comes to fruition. I do think the one other counter thing in Texas, this kind of relates to my draft question about the farm country. And this is a sense. Not something that's hard and fast, but it's kind of something to keep my eye on. It is the stupid war in any place where it didn't hurt. The economy was Texas and the oil and gas companies are doing great and
- [59:14]
B
I'm right by them. Yeah.
- [59:15]
A
Yeah. And in farm country, it's not as good. Right. And so I kind of look at that. Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas, if you're, like, going to get a stretch seat. It's like maybe a surprise comes from there where things are going worse anyway. I don't know. Something to monitor. We'll keep an eye on it. Adam Kinzinger, always appreciate you, man. Thanks for coming on.
- [59:33]
B
Yeah. It was great being with you again, man.
- [59:34]
A
Who else was I going to make fun of the French with? We love you. I'm going to France. We love you, but, you know, sometimes. Sometimes you tease with love.
- [59:42]
B
All right, you guys and France, you make fun of us. So come on, we're going to. We're going to punch back a little bit.
- [59:47]
A
We'll be back tomorrow with another edition of the show, Weekend Pod. It's going to be a good one. We'll see you all then. Peace. Podcast is brought to you thanks to the work of lead producer Katie Cooper, associate producer Ansley Skipper, and with video editing by Katie Lutz and audio engineering and editing by Jason Brown.