S2 Ep1014: Adam Kinzinger: Mortal Damage to the American Empire

Summary

The Bulwark Podcast – S2 Ep1014: Adam Kinzinger: Mortal Damage to the American Empire
Release Date: April 4, 2025
Host: Tim Miller | Guest: Adam Kinzinger

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Introduction and Guest Background

Timestamp: 00:38 – 01:46

Tim Miller kicks off the episode by welcoming former Republican Congressman Adam Kinzinger from Illinois. Highlighting Kinzinger's background, Tim mentions his military service in the Air Force during Iraq and Afghanistan, his founding of the "Country First" movement, and his work as a Substack newsletter author.

Notable Quote:

• Tim Miller (00:38): "Could not have a better day to bring back our friend... it's Adam Kinzinger. What's happening, buddy?"
• Adam Kinzinger (00:58): "On the day when the stock market collapses, that's a good day to have me."

Economic Impact of Trump's Tariffs

Timestamp: 01:46 – 07:26

The discussion delves into the detrimental effects of former President Donald Trump's tariff policies, drawing parallels to the historical Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, which exacerbated the Great Depression.

Notable Quotes:

• Adam Kinzinger (03:31): "I think the dude is just insane and like really loves tariffs. And now he's going to be in a fucking stubborn off with every world leader around the globe."
• Adam Kinzinger (06:50): "This is a self imposed wound for absolutely no reason. And this China loves it, man. They're going to be so powerful from this because they're picking up the slop that we were leaving behind."

Trump's Leadership Style and Its Consequences

Timestamp: 07:26 – 17:00

Adam critiques Trump's leadership, describing him as a megalomaniac driven by a desire to feel powerful. He argues that Trump's impulsive actions, such as implementing tariffs without strategic foresight, have led to significant economic instability.

Notable Quotes:

• Adam Kinzinger (04:46): "If you're a true narcissist... There's no better way to, to be powerful than frankly, than to tank the world economy."
• Adam Kinzinger (05:30): "Supply lines in the last five years have been rapidly onshoring or nearshoring, including, by the way, Mexico and Canada from China... we've instead put these massive tariffs."

MAGA Movement and Its Defense of Trump

Timestamp: 17:00 – 26:01

The conversation shifts to the staunch defense of Trump by the MAGA movement, despite the economic downturn. Adam expresses frustration over Republicans blaming economic issues on Democrats, highlighting a shift in accountability.

Notable Quotes:

• Tim Miller (07:26): "I think he's just a fucking moron. But if he were a Russian asset in the White House, it's hard to think about something that he would have done differently the first seven years."
• Adam Kinzinger (17:00): "The GOP is not conservative. The conservative movement, it's dead, basically."

Critique of Influential Figures Supporting Trump

Timestamp: 26:01 – 38:44

Adam and Tim critique various public figures who continue to support Trump despite evident economic setbacks. They specifically mention Richard Hanania and Dave Portnoy, questioning the rationale behind their unwavering support.

Notable Quotes:

• Adam Kinzinger (15:36): "Dave Portnoy... he's starving the economy because of Trump's tariffs."
• Adam Kinzinger (10:36): "Specifically... This is somebody that is a 911 truther. ... She's nuts. Not just performance art here. So she gets into the White House, and in front of, from what I understand, in front of Mike Waltz is going after these..."

The Decline of the American Empire

Timestamp: 38:44 – 48:17

Adam discusses the broader implications of Trump's policies on America's global standing. He suggests that the U.S. has inflicted mortal damage on its own empire, jeopardizing long-standing alliances and diminishing its role as a world leader.

Notable Quotes:

• Adam Kinzinger (20:34): "We may have just taken everything that you and I learned about post World War II... And we have just bombed that whole order."
• Tim Miller (28:49): "Canada must be looking elsewhere to expand our trade to build our economy and to protect our sovereignty."

National Security Concerns and Personnel Changes

Timestamp: 48:17 – 55:23

The hosts address recent firings within the National Security Council, attributing them to the influence of Laura Loomer, a controversial figure with extremist views. Adam underscores the alarming shift where MAGA bloggers seem to wield undue influence over national security decisions.

Notable Quotes:

• Adam Kinzinger (37:49): "The fact that she could go into the Oval Office is frightening."
• Adam Kinzinger (42:19): "The GOP is not conservative. The conservative movement, it's dead, basically."

Military and Foreign Policy Issues

Timestamp: 48:17 – 55:23

Discussions touch upon ongoing military operations in Yemen and the implications of America's retreat from global leadership roles. Adam expresses concern over inadequate support and strategic failures in foreign policy, particularly regarding Russia and China.

Notable Quotes:

• Adam Kinzinger (35:41): "We're doing the right thing in terms of... blowing them up at the end point."
• Adam Kinzinger (43:35): "The GOP is not conservative. The conservative movement, it's dead, basically."

Conclusion and Final Thoughts

Timestamp: 55:23 – End

As the episode wraps up, Adam emphasizes the need for the Democratic Party to reclaim its messaging and appeal to the middle American. He warns that without addressing economic grievances effectively, Democrats risk losing the war of narratives to the entrenched MAGA messaging machine.

Notable Quotes:

• Adam Kinzinger (26:01): "You need to start formulating your arguments, pinning this on Donald Trump and on Republicans."
• Adam Kinzinger (51:17): "Thank you, Tim. Thank you. I so appreciate you. You're so amazing. You're my favorite."

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Key Takeaways

• Economic Policies: Trump's tariff strategies have significantly harmed the U.S. economy, reminiscent of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff's impact during the Great Depression.

• Leadership Critique: Trump's impulsive and power-driven decisions are portrayed as detrimental to both domestic prosperity and international standing.

• MAGA Movement's Resilience: Despite clear economic downturns, the MAGA movement continues to defend Trump's legacy, often deflecting blame onto opponents.

• Erosion of Alliances: U.S. alliances, particularly with Canada and European nations, are fraying under Trump's policies, threatening the traditional American-led global order.

• National Security Concerns: The influence of extremist figures like Laura Loomer in national security positions poses serious risks to effective governance and international relations.

• Democratic Strategy: For Democrats to regain traction, there is an urgent need to address economic issues convincingly and reconnect with the middle American voter base.

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This summary encapsulates the critical discussions between Tim Miller and Adam Kinzinger, highlighting their concerns over Trump's policies, the MAGA movement's influence, and the broader implications for America's economic and geopolitical standing.

Transcript

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[Tim Miller]

Hello and welcome to the Bulwark Podcast. I'm your host, Tim Miller. Could not have a better day to bring back our friend. He's a former Republican congressman from Illinois, served in the Air Force during Iraq and Afghanistan. He's the founder of country first and he writes a substack newsletter and he's got to turn off his notifications. It's Adam Kinzinger. What's happening, buddy?

[Adam Kinzinger]

What's going on? How are you? Thanks for having me. On the day when the stock market collapses, that's a good day to have me.

[Tim Miller]

Thanks for saying nothing happened. And you know, we just have like maga, conspiracy blogger, white nationalists running the National Security Council and the stock market collapsing, global economic crisis, the Canadians dunking on us. Nothing, nothing much to talk about. So we'll get into all that. But I wanted to start, you texted me yesterday this clip and we're 90s kids, you know, so. So Ferris Bueller's day off was obviously pretty formative. I don't know how old you were, but you know, when I was, when I was 11 or 12, getting into my troublemaking phase, catching up, catching Ferris Bueller's day off on home video, I don't think I'm quite old enough to. I didn't see it in the theater.

[Adam Kinzinger]

I was born in 78, so however.

[Tim Miller]

Old you probably saw it in the theater then, you might have seen it.

[Adam Kinzinger]

I did, brother. I saw it.

[Tim Miller]

We were legit. Well, it's funny, in that movie, Ben Stein, who has now become a big Trumper, gave the class a lecture on a topic and the elder millennials and young Gen Xers among us will remember what it was. But for everybody else, let's take a listen to Ben Stein speaking to Ferris Bueller's class.

[Ben Stein]

In 1930, the Republican controlled House of Representatives in an effort to alleviate the effects of the Anyone? Anyone? The Great Depression passed the. Anyone? Anyone? The Tariff bill, the Hawley Smoot Tariff act which anyone raised or lowered, raised tariffs in an effort to collect more revenue for the federal government. Did it work? Anyone, Anyone know the effects? It did not work. And the United States sank deeper into the Great Depression.

[Tim Miller]

It did not work. Smoot Hawley, actually, I would think that.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Trump has seen that. Right? Like, like that's why it's important to talk about because if he all of a sudden sees Ben Stein saying that Smoot Hawley didn't work and yeah, that's been the interesting thing, by the way, Tim, is I've seen like a few Republicans try to try to reimagine Smoot Hawley actually as having worked, which is the weirdest thing. And they blame the recession on or the further into depression on something else. Kind of feels like where we're at now when you see some of these guys saying, well, we're just in essence front loading the recession because we were going there anyway and it was going to be way worse and now we're front loading the recession. You got to trust Donald Trump. He knows what he's doing. I mean it's madness.

[Tim Miller]

Trump's more of a musical queen. He's familiar with Cats, Phantom of the Opera, Top Gun. I don't think he might not have seen Ferris Bueller's Day Off. Yeah, it didn't work. No, it did and we're finding that out as we tape. Right now the Dow is down looks like another two and a half percent. Nasdaq down another 3% plus. I mean it got slaughtered yesterday. The markets, we saw job losses already in various sectors, you know that. I mean any minute now they're going to be little signs outside of stores because the businesses don't want to get, don't want the customers to be mad at them that they're like, sorry we had to increase the avocado prices but it's the tariffs. It's not me, you know, that's coming. And it's like the Trumpers have no rationale for it really. I mean they're like there's going to be some magical golden age to come off the back of it. And then our old friends and non friends, but the, the people from the pre Trump time, like even Ted Cruz is out there like, well, I don't really like tariffs but this is just a negotiation, right? And it's like, no, I don't, I don't think so. It doesn't seem like a negotiation to me. I think the dude is just insane and like really loves tariffs. And now he's going to be in A fucking stubborn off with every world leader around the globe. So it doesn't seem great. What do you make of it?

[Adam Kinzinger]

Yeah, look, my wife said something yesterday that I guess I had. I mean, I've thought about it, but not really these stark of terms, which is like, you know, everybody's like, well, why is Trump doing this? And so the assumption for the magas is this is some grand negotiating tactic, like you said. Here's the truth. I think, I think this makes him feel powerful. Now listen, if you're a true narcissist, I don't even know if narcissist is what he is. I think like, and I mean, this megalomaniac. Yeah, whatever the worst possible thing is. Megalomaniac. All you care about is feeling powerful in the moment. You're impulsive and you want to feel powerful. You want to have people gravel to you. And honest to God, I mean, there's no better way to, to be powerful than frankly, than to tank the world economy. And he may not be intentionally tanking the world economy, but what he's doing is saying to the rest of the world that we're in control, which we aren't. He' going to learn that soon. And here's the, here's the other thing. So we're going to watch, you know, the stock market's going to fall. There's, there's going to be a day. It could be, you know, ultimately by the time people listen to this today or whatever, where it's going to kind of settle and you may get 100 points in the green at some point, because ultimately this is just, it's when people make the decision, okay, now it's gone down enough. I'm going to invest some money. But that's the initial hit of what we're seeing from the tariffs. That's the emotional stuff. The deep tariff stuff is going to last over the next, frankly, five or 10 years. You know, we talk about supply chains. I'm watching even Mark Wayne Mullen who says, well, it's really easy. You don't want the tariffs. Just build your company here in America. Okay, It's a great idea. First off, you're then saying that that company can't really trade anywhere else around the world, just to America. But let's say you're a company that trades primarily in America. He sells primarily in America. Great. It's going to take you at least five years to build a factory in the United States, by the way. And by the way, there's a 99 chance that the next president of the United States will see the follies of this and lift the tariffs. So this isn't doing anything to return supply lines. And by the way, supply, this is another big point. Supply lines in the last five years have been rapidly on shoring or near shoring, including, by the way, Mexico and Canada from China, who we were supposed to. Not like in the past after Covid. So Covid created a lot of reshoring of supply lines. And instead of like taking that and incentivizing that like we should have been doing, we've instead put these massive tariffs. So we're going to, we're going to shoot ourselves in the sack. I mean, that's what I said yesterday is like, this is a self imposed wound for absolutely no reason. And this China loves it, man. They're going to be so powerful from this because they're, they're picking up the slop that we were leaving behind.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, two thoughts on that. And, you know, one is just on the Trump psychology. There's also the notion that, you know, getting inside Trump's brain is not a fun process. But you have to think about this. Like, the dude became president fucking twice, right? Everybody told him it was insane the first time. He had no chance of winning. He didn't think he had a chance of winning. He won. He gets indicted four times, doesn't have a chance of winning, you know, has his first reelection campaign event in his house in Mar a Lago. The only guy that shows up is the guy in the Brick wall suit. Even Matt Gaetz was like, I got to wash my hair that day. Like, nobody thought he could come back except us deranged, never Trumpers who are like, no, I mean, he might still win again. He comes back. So he has, in addition to his megalomania, he also really has bought the thing that everybody is wrong, all the smart people are stupid. And Trump is right. I think he deeply believes that. And so in a situation like this, when all the smart people and the Economist and the FT are out there saying, yeah, the globalists think it's going to crash, Trump is there. Like, no, they were wrong before. They were wrong on this, they were wrong on the fires. You know, they didn't realize it was the water. They didn't let the streams go down there. It's only Trump that knows all this stuff. I really think that he's embraced all that. And so it's hard to, like, rationality cannot break through. So I mean, that's the one side of it. And then to Your point? On the onshoring, it's like. It's all so fucking stupid. We're tariffing Madagascar like 35% or something like 75. 70% of the world's vanilla comes from Madagascar. It's like, why, what are we doing? Are we in a. We're in a trade battle with them over what? Like, Madagascar is screwing us on the. On the vanilla. You know, it's like your vanilla latte. You want it to be more expensive now by 35% to, like, get one over on Madagascar. You want. What do you want them to buy more from us? You know, you want them to start buying more jeans?

[Adam Kinzinger]

Well, and the issue of, like, Russia, I mean, okay, the MAGA defense now of not tariffing Russia, North Korea, Belarus, you know, all the bad countries is. Well, we don't trade with them anyway. First off, that's not true. We do trade with Russia. It's $2 billion. It's not a ton. But we trade more with Russia than we do with probably Madagascar and any of these other little places that we put a bajillion percent tariff on. And then we tariff, of course, Penguin island, you know, and then the Diego Garcia. The only asset on Diego Garcia is a United States military base. I mean, what it goes to show. And then you get into. I even saw Jim Cramer, a clip of him basically on cnn. Like, yeah, I feel like a sucker. And. And by the way, I just want to say, for people that admit they were wrong, give them grace. We need this, right? It would feel very good to dunk on the people that admit they were wrong. But that's what we need. And, you know, we all. At least. Maybe not you original, never trumpers, but we all have been in the position where we had to come to Jesus on that.

[Tim Miller]

I don't know. I might want to dunk on him. Yeah, we can dunk on. He's fine.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Specifically.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, I was gonna save it for the end. I had to around and find out segment of the pod. I was gonna say for the end, but why don't we flip it? It's Friday. I'll do the serious part. I have a dark. I have a dark purse. We'll do it now. Here we go. There are a couple people I wanted to shout out. There's a fella. We'll be nice to the first hole. There's a Richard Hanania. I think he did some pretty racist stuff in the past. I don't. I don't really know his whole. His whole background, but, you know, everybody can turn Over a new leaf, I guess. He was tweeting yesterday. He's very popular blogger in, like, the red pill tech world. Marc Andreessen and those guys read him. Okay. Anyway, he wrote this yesterday for those asking, yes, voting for Trump was a mistake. I thought we'd get a repeat of the first administration, but we didn't. The signs were there. I just did not take my own ideas about the awful elements of MAGA seriously enough. Here's the thing. On the one hand, it's like we all fucking told you it wasn't going to be like the first administration, anybody with eyes, and it was going to be like that. But okay, yeah, but the kind of hilarious part of it is, like, it's only been 70 days.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Like, it's like it took.

[Tim Miller]

It took 10 weeks for people to start doing the I screwed up thing. I mean, even I thought it would take, you know, six months, a year.

[Adam Kinzinger]

I did, too. Well, here's. Since we're going to dunk on it, let me just say this too. Like, okay, I got it. Your financial pocketbook is taking a hit. So now that it's affecting you financially right now, you all of a sudden care. Okay, good. I'm glad that brought you over. What about when you had heard about Russia kidnapping 30,000 children from Ukraine and erasing their identity, and then you saw Donald Trump say, yeah, I don't know whose fault this war is. Putin is actually a pretty good guy. We get along. And you see J.D. vance say, frankly, I don't care what happens in Ukraine, or you watch the missiles from Russia blow up high rises in Ukraine or blow up grain ships, shut down a grain corridor to starve Africa. So that wasn't the thing that made you dislike Trump. It was that all of a sudden, your gajillions of dollars are now only bajillions of dollars, and that's what made you finally stand up. Okay, I'm glad you came around. But a lot of us, it's not the financial side. Like, I would actually take a recession if we were a decent country again, over an amazing economy in an evil country. It's the human aspect of we can want to deport people that are here illegally, we can want border security. But you know what you don't need to do is do an ASMR video of dragging chains so that people can sit around and get their goosebumps up and feel like they're watching a patriotic video as families are torn apart and sent to Latin America. That is inhumane. That didn't do it. It was the financial stuff. Good. But I'm glad you came around. So welcome to the team. I hope, though, in the future maybe you actually care about decency and not just the finance.

[Tim Miller]

Let's get that on TikTok. That was a good turn on the TikTok camera for Kinzinger. Right now. I don't know if this segment's gonna need music because I feel like there's gonna be a lot of this. I'll talk to Jason about this. We might need a theme song for the Fuck around and Found out segment. I've got one more, though. I've got a short one. Dave Portnoy over at Barstool, the founder of Barstool Sports, he supported Trump. His Spidey senses had started to tingle during the signal chat situation, which he did a big rant about how incompetent that was. And here he is yesterday on his day trading show. Trump has put his tariffs all over, get some wacky formula, new tariffs, and everything's in the shitter because of it. I'm down 7 million bucks. Down 7 million. How many you think it's going to take to go for how many million do we got to lose before we can go for Commie Kamala and realize that maybe the tax rate going up by 2% wasn't actually the biggest financial threat to your life?

[Adam Kinzinger]

Isn't that amazing when you think about it? Like this whole, oh, well, they were going to increase our tax rates is a fraction of what it's going to cost these people in losses. It's amazing. Of a fraction, a fraction of a fraction. And so, yeah, I mean, look, Portnoy, I guess there's part of me that again, I, maybe I'm too young to be this old, but it's like, how is it that somebody like him is somebody we look to for how the political tone is going to go? This is a guy that drinks way too much. Nothing against drinking, but he drinks way too much. And then he does videos where he's sitting on his beach house in Florida and he. All he does on his videos is complain. That's all he does. This guy's like, literally. And I give him respect. He built something out of nothing. He was originally just passing out newspapers as a kid, basically, and started this company. Frankly, Tim, my time in politics, this was a big annoyance of mine, is going to meet with, like, people that are worth half a billion dollars or billions of dollars, and they sit with you and complain about the parts of government they don't like. And I always Left there feeling like, wow, money certainly doesn't make you happy because it doesn't make these people happy.

[Tim Miller]

Anyway, this is the part of the show where me and Kinzinger start to talk about our. Towards Bernieism. Yeah, the only. If you want to radicalize a. For a classical liberal into Bernieism, all you got to do is make them spend time with cranky billionaires, whiny billionaires. It is enough. It's a radicalizing experience.

[Adam Kinzinger]

I know a guy that was an. Is an independent oil producer. I mean, just worth a ton of money. And every time I met with him, he'd be complaining because oil's down to 68. He's only going to make however many millions this month. I'm like, bro, I'm open to make as much as you make in a month, in an entire lifetime. Right. And I would be happy about that. I would be excited. But listen, if it takes $7 million, the good thing I'll give Portnoy some credit for is it's much easier for him for his business to basically be a. A Trump bro, no matter what.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Because that's kind of what that. That group wants. When he does speak out, it has an impact, and I respect that. And I think when he spoke out about the signal chat, that was important as well, and so I will encourage him to do that.

[Tim Miller]

Have you talked to that oil guy? Because I was talking yesterday with Tracy Alloway, who's at Odd Lots, and she was pointing to the Dallas Fed survey where they survey a bunch of oil and gas guys. And it's like, things aren't actually great in the oil and gas sector right now. The idea that this is going to be a boom time of drilling for liquid gold because Trump is going to unleash the animal spirits. It's not exactly. Not exactly what's happening.

[Adam Kinzinger]

No. I think oil's down 8% even, either today or in the last couple of days. And you know what? It's got to hover around the 70. I learned this from Landman, by the way, one of the most annoying shows I've ever seen. I'm sorry, we don't need to get into it, but, like, how many times do you have to go to back to the same storybook? Okay. Anyway, what I learned in Landman as.

[Tim Miller]

A homosexual at the. The notion of a show about a Landman is so unappealing that I have no idea what you're talking about, but go ahead.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Oh, my God. Well, here's when I knew I wasn't gonna like it. Quick Aside is when they're in the bar and she comes over and she's like, guys, we got a special on Bud Light. And Billy Bob Thornton goes, how's that going for you? And she goes like a fart in church because of Bud Light. Right? Anyway, so. But Landman taught me that $70 is about where oil producers need to be to, to be in a nice sweet spot between cheap oil and, you know, good production. And we're going to be under that. You're going to see oil. A lot of these independent producers once again go under if this continues. And it's all because the people that are speculating on the price of energy are probably rightly assuming the economy is going to go into recession. When the economy goes into recession, people don't use oil. Oil goes down and, and it just furthers the recession in the energy community. And I live in Texas now. It's going to hurt here.

[Tim Miller]

Another group of people that didn't see what was right in front of their nose. Hey, guys, if you love John, Love it. Then you're going to love the YouTube series we're doing together called Speech center where we dissect political speeches with insight and chaos and gayness and laughs and despair. John, as you all know by now, is the host of Love it or Leave It, America's top late night political gay live comedy podcast where he takes on the biggest and most absurd stories in politics, helping you stay informed while laughing instead of crying. You can tell the John's producer wrote that this season is promising some big name guests unexpected conversations and can't miss moments. He does a monologue with jokes that are mostly funny. He does captivating interviews. Captivating, Lovett, are they captivating? They're pretty captivating. They're at times captivating. The one I saw last week with Tom Green. You remember Tom Green? I haven't seen that guy in ages. It was hilarious. What's happened with Tom Green is crazy. Lovett pulled it out of him anyway. Plus he's got signature segments and games. Love it or Leave it delivers the type of comedy you won't find anywhere else. So go catch new episodes of Love it or Leave it every Saturday. Watch on YouTube and go catch Speech center on YouTube or join a live show in LA to witness the Love it chaos in person. All right, I want to get a little. Well, it might go darker, it might be lighter. I was interested yesterday as the takes were flying by. Two things that you and my colleague Jonathan Vlas Jvl said you gave kind of the bright side of this argument and he gave the dark side, as is his tendency. You wrote this. This is the beginning of a massive fall of maga. No amount of division, fear mongering, lies and cheap lines will overcome the fact you just took many people's prosperity just because it makes you feel powerful. Mark my words, this is the beginning of the end. It's optimistic. Look, JVL wrote this. And just like that, the age of American empire, the great talks Americana ended. We cannot overstate what has just happened. It took 71 days for Donald Trump to wreck the US economy, mortally wound NATO and destroy the American led world order. So Adam Kinzinger, was yesterday the end of MAGA or the end of America?

[Adam Kinzinger]

Well, look, honestly I do agree with jvl. I don't think it's irreparable, but yeah, I mean, I think that's the thing I'm trying to get my arms around that I can't yet is literally, we may have just taken everything that you and I learned about post World War II. By the way, for anybody that somehow looks back at the Pre World War II era as a wonderful time in America, it wasn't America. It's been great to live in America since World War II. That's about it, right? And so I feel like we have just bombed that whole order. And now let's say we get, you know, Jesus H. Christ as, as president in the next administration. How do you get Europe and these other countries to trust the United States of America again? I don't know. So I do think this has done mortal damage to at least the American empire, if you will. But I also think that when you hit people's pocketbooks, right? I've always thought that part of America's problem has been our success. We've been so comfortable that we have the luxury of hating each other and being annoyed by transgender issues and being annoyed by Bud Light because they sent a can to somebody we didn't like. Because we're comfortable. It's like Maslow's hierarchy, right? Let's call that those arguments over Bud Light Light. That's like self actualization. Sort of like you can, you can argue about the pinnacle of issues, but you take away the, your economic prosperity that most Americans have felt, even, even those that are in challenging financial positions have never really had to worry about starving on the street. You start taking that away and all of a sudden your, your interest starts working down that, that pyramid. And I got to tell you, I think once you mess with people's financial livelihood, there's nothing you can do to bring them back to saying that. Donald Trump, everybody. Look, there are some, I mean literally, Donald Trump could skin a cat alive on TV and they wouldn't care. I think there are people that, once they start really feeling that economic pain, maybe we'll never admit they were wrong, but we'll change how they vote in the future.

[Tim Miller]

I hope you're right. The concern I have, the thing that dances around my head on that is I basically used to say exactly what you just said, like in 2018 and 19 and then Covid happened.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Yeah, I know.

[Tim Miller]

And like the thing, my shtick was always when I would go, like when I was doing my book tour, a common question a lot of interviewers would ask me is what will break the spell? What will change things? What will make these people come to the light? And my answer then was always like, it's going to take some outside shock. They're going to have to be forced into seriousness. There's going to have to be some other event that makes people come to terms with the fact that this is silliness in games. And then we had a global pandemic and people got fucking craz people, people got even crazier. And so that kind of shook my confidence that a outside negative event will, will bring people back towards reality or seriousness. Now in that case, it was the, it was the Chinese or whatever. It was either Chinese and Chinese incompetence or, or bad luck or whatever, but it came from China in this case. I guess the argument in favor of it is like it's pretty much just Donald Trump doing this. Like Donald Trump is just like, there's no. And I guess people could blame it on, come up with something else to blame. But it's pretty much just Donald Trump.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Look, I think it's going to, it's going to ride on something here which is are the Democrats able? And it's always on them because they're the opposition party. Let's just be honest. Are they going to be able to form an argument pending this on Trump? Because listen, 90% of every Republican in the House right now. I mean, I put myself in that position. If I was a sitting U.S. congressman, what would I be doing? I would be preparing my arguments for why somehow magically this is the Democrats fault that the economy has collapsed. And trust me, they will use whatever magic, you know, thing to twist into telling you and convincing you that actually it's the Democrats that have caused this. So Democrats, here's the point. And I know some listen to this, you need to start formulating your arguments, pinning this on Donald Trump and on Republicans. And by the way, please, God, the answer is not further left. It's not leftism. I get it. You know, there's, there's a group of Democrats that still believe they lost the election because they were, because they tried to appeal to people like me. That is not true. You have got to make the case to the middle American that you are the Bill Clinton Democrats again. You care about the blue collar, you care about the working class. That is the only way you're ever going to come back and win. What Cory Booker did in his filibuster, that showed a fighting spirit. Everybody has to show a fighting spirit. But again, the key to the Democrats is this. I don't care if you speak for 25 hours or 25 seconds. The only weapon you guys have is messaging. That's it. So go out and win the message here, because that's going to determine who takes the ownership of this. Because trust me, Donald Trump is very good. As you were saying, and even on the show yesterday, he's an amazing political messenger. He's going to find a way to pin this on you and you're going to be surprised and angry and you're going to go out and say, well, it's not my fault, of course he's president. But unless you come up with a compelling argument, it will be your fault as far as America is concerned. You know, during COVID by the way, the left went way too.

[Tim Miller]

A little less complicated to do that this time. I mean, they control everything and the economy was fine before he came.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Yeah, well, totally. And if you think about, though, Covid, like, you know, yes, the right went too far in saying, no masks ever. We're going to have Covid parties. The left, some on the left, went way too far with, like, masks all the time. I remember, was it my good friend Gavin Newsom or somebody that said, like, when you go to the restaurant, take your mask down in between bites of food. Like that kind of stuff annoyed people. So don't do the equivalent of that, please.

[Tim Miller]

Trump sucks. It's probably pretty good. Trump is really stupid and he bankrupt a casino and now he's bankrupting you. That was, that's probably, you know. Welcome in.

[Ryan Seacrest]

Hey, it's Ryan Seacrest for Albertsons and Safeway with the stock up sale at Safeway and Albertsons. Stock up and earn four times points at your local store when you purchase participating products. Save now on your favorite beverages, from Red Bull to Coke Monster 7Up body armor and Pepsi. Clip the offer in the app for event savings and look for participating items throughout the store. Shop in store or online. Plus you can even have your groceries delivered or use Drive up and go to have your groceries brought to your car at the store. Restrictions and exclusions apply. Visit Albertsons or Safeway.com for more details.

[Tim Miller]

I want to go back to the JVL dark side because as usual he was channeling me because this is kind of what was rattling around my head before I saw that he wrote it, which is like I really am not sure that it's fixable. I really do think something fundamentally has changed and I don't mean whatever. It takes a long time for empires to collapse. I know that you're a straight man, so you've probably spent a lot of time thinking about the Roman Empire. It took a long time. It didn't just happen overnight. It takes gener. So I'm not saying that the whole country is going to collapse or whatever. We're going to become an anarchist Libya state. But the world has changed in a way that I don't think is fully reparable. It just has. And other countries are going to have to make calculations and they look at us and just be like, you elected your stupidest American a second time after he got indicted, after he got convicted on criminal charges. You put him back in there and now he's us.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Yeah.

[Tim Miller]

How could we possibly trust you? How could we possibly trust that you'll, you'll have a stable, you know, leaders in the future? Like you're acting like a Libya, like you're acting like a failed state. The world reserve currency is not the Turkish whatever, you know.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Right.

[Tim Miller]

Like the lira is not the world reserve currency because people are worried that they can't trust the government, the stability of those countries. They felt like they could trust us. You know, we've got decisions but that our, our institutions were strong. And I just think that that has changed permanently. And there was one piece of evidence of that which is Mark Carney speaking yesterday. I want to apply that for you.

[Mark Carney]

At the same time, Canada must be looking elsewhere to expand our trade to build our economy and to protect our sovereignty. Canada is ready to take a leadership role in building a coalition of like minded countries who share our values. We believe in international cooperation. We believe in the free and open exchange of goods, services and ideas. And if the United States no longer wants to lead, Canada will.

[Tim Miller]

I mean that's crazy that that is real. You know, I mean we made mistake Vietnam or Iraq or whatever. But Canada wasn't out there being like, seems like US has joined the baddies and so we gotta find a new alliance that is a new thing that's hard to change.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Yeah. And by the way, one of the great ironies is the conservatives were set to crush it in Canada and that's not the case anymore. Because of Trump. Yeah, I mean look, it's a smart speech and here's the thing, what the magos will tell you is well this is really good cuz we've always wanted the world to step up and do more and that's not really true. Now first off, I mean yes, we always wanted Europe to spend more on defense. That's important. We haven't wanted Europe to basically become a competitor to us, kick us out of the the realm and basically be a competition. Because listen, you know, when the United States for instance, liberated South Korea, when we took down the Nazis, we took down the Japanese, we invested a ton of money in rebuilding those economies and we've gotten that back 100, 200, maybe even a thousand times of what we've invest because we have great trade relationships. Obviously Samsung, you know, you think in South Korea, you think of BMW and Germany, whatever, all this stuff has been beneficial to us. We get to write the rules of trade for the world. We get to be the ones to determine freedom of navigation of the seas. This is one of the things that annoyed me about the signal chat more than anything, J.D. vance, you know, on there talking about how basically Europe needs to be cleaning up the Red Sea and, and the Houthis and, and you know, stupid Pete Hegseth agreeing with it. Well guess what? The United States Navy has always claimed to be the ones that are going to enforce freedom of navigation of the seas. And by the way, every time we've bombed the Houthis, up until the Trump administration, sometimes the French and always the British have been with us to help in those bombings. But instead we have basically said to the countries in the past we are going to be in charge of freedom of navigation. It's been beneficial to us and now all of a sudden we're mad at Europe for not it. Even though we said this was our responsibility. And so what we're doing is we're giving up these leverage. Look, I get it, the United States is a very generous country and I honestly think we benefit from that generosity. But if you think that for 200 years we've built this post World War II order out of generosity and not because it does good things for us you're insane. This is amazing for us and we're blowing it up because somebody on Fox News wants to go on and make a 5 second cheap line about how Europe needs to pull its own weight. And it's insane. And by the way, European, if you are in invested in the American defense industry, look, I'm not giving you advice, but I would say get the F out of it because American defense industry, a good percent of its weapons go to Europe. Europe has made it clear that they're going to buy European and weapons now and get off American weapons. Portugal just canceled the purchase of the F35. Canada is considering doing the same. This is going to kill the American defense industry. And then we sit around and wonder what's happened to the American defense industry that we don't have enough shells to take on China. Which by the way, this administration actually doesn't want to take on China. Let's be clear. And anyway, that's my rant for the moment.

[Ryan Seacrest]

Hey, it's Ryan Seacrest for Albertsons and Safeway with the stock up sale at Safeway and Albertsons. Stock up and earn four times points at your local store when you purchase participating products. Save on family snack favorites like Frito Lay chips, Tim's Cascade Chips, Dan and yogurt and Oreos. Clip the offer in the app for event savings and look for participating items throughout the store. Shop in store or online. Plus you can even have your groceries delivered or use drive up and go to have your groceries brought to your car at the store. Restrictions and exclusions apply. Visit Albertsons or Safeway.com for more details.

[Tim Miller]

Since you mentioned the bombing of the Houthis, that stuff is still ongoing. It's kind of like gotten pushed out of the news, I guess because what the world economy is collapsing and I don't know that Donald Trump really wants to talk about it for some reason. But what do you make like what's happening? And we, we've continued to send more jets over there, more bombings. I mean they like part of the spin from MAGA out of the signal chat situation was like, yeah, sure, it was kind of dumb, but the operation was a huge success. It's like, okay, maybe, I guess but like the seas aren't clear. I mean we're, we're still kind of getting into this. I don't know if you want to call it a quagmire, but we're still involved over there. So what's, I mean, you're kind of monitoring this stuff closer to me. What do you make of what's happening over there?

[Adam Kinzinger]

Yeah, first off, they just shot down their third MQ9 of ours. They shot down 17 MQ9s, which are the unmanned drones. But this isn't like a small drone. They're the size of jet airplanes, they're expensive. They just shot down their third in the last month. So let's be clear about this, they have anti air capability, which is why the signal chat was so dangerous. And so what do I make of it? Look, we're doing the right thing in terms of, you know, when you find anti air or you find cruise missile sites, you know, blowing them up or weapon stores. Yemen is, by the way, it doesn't look big on a map. I've been to Yemen actually, right before the Houthis took over. It's a very dangerous country. It's actually a huge country and it's very rough terrain. The UAE has tried to use troops in Yemen. Saudi Arabia fought with Yemen for a long time. And nobody can beat the Houthis. I don't think we're going to beat them because we're not going to put American troops on the ground in another quagmire in Yemen. So the best that we can hope to do, which again is, is not a bad decision, is try to degrade their weapons as they come in to open it up. The problem though is the issue with shipping around Yemen is the insurance companies. And you have to basically clear the threat to get insurance companies to start insuring chips again. That's really the key to how to, how to like kind of open up the Suez Canal. So that's a big concern. But really if you actually want to starve Yemen of the weapons, you have to interdict them coming from Iran. And I haven't heard the administration doing that. And frankly the last administration did a terrible job of that, that. And so as long as we just kill them at the end point and we're not blowing up weapons in transit, I don't know what's going to happen. I also think it's possible. I don't know anything that you don't, but it's possible that this military buildup is kind of a cover for a potential strike in Iran, which I hope if that happens, it's not based on, because Netanyahu's asking us to. I hope it's based on real intelligence that is saying, you know, for instance, Iran may be a few months away from a nuclear weapon.

[Tim Miller]

Well, here's the good news. Those are complicated issues, thorny issues, requires a lot of expertise. People are familiar with what happened in UAE with UAE and Saudi when they fought with the Houthis. There's a lot of ins and outs and what have you. So we want to have the best people involved. And there's some news. Yesterday, four officials were fired from the National Security Council. Brian Walsh, who's a Director of intelligence and a former top staffer for Marco Rubio, Thomas Boudre, senior Director of Legislative affairs who previously served for Mike Waltz on the Hill, David Faith, somebody that oversees technology and national security in the State Department, and another official. They were fired because Laura Loomer, the kook who's tweeting at me right now, actually, the kooky, unapologetically white nationalist, anti Muslim conspiracy theorist, 911 questioner. She was in the White House with her new face talking to the President and I guess convinced him that he had, I don't know, neocon spies in his midst and that he needed to fire them. She also is pushing for the firing of Alex Wong, who's a guy I know who used to work for Romney. He has maintained his job so far, but she's accusing him of being like a Chinese operative because, because of Wong, he's of Chinese defense. His name is Wong. So that's the kind of stuff we're dealing with here. Somebody is just like, oh, the name's Wong. He be a Chinese spy. So that person successfully engineered the firing of four national security officials, two of which are former high level staffers for Rubio and Walt. So it seems like the MAGA blogger has more influence over our national security staffing than the Secretary of State or national security advisor. So what do you think? What do you think about that?

[Adam Kinzinger]

By the way, you must be a Miller's German, right? Is that German or is it Spanish?

[Tim Miller]

Miller's German, yeah.

[Adam Kinzinger]

So you and I must be German spies, right?

[Tim Miller]

Nazis. You never know.

[Adam Kinzinger]

First off, someday you need to dedicate about 10 minutes to Mar a lago face to understand, like, that whole thing. Yeah, Kristi Noem, among that. Like, I have so many stories about Noam, but anyway, okay, by the way.

[Tim Miller]

And I just want to say I support people that want to get a little Botox, want to freshen up, whatever. I just, I do find it strange when somebody's like, I'd like a whole new face. Like, I'd like to completely change my face and become a different person. That is like, like in the uncanny valley between human and robot. Like, that's just. I don't, I don't really quite get the appeal of that.

[Adam Kinzinger]

And Christy Gnome rolls out her new face with pigtails, you know, like, dude. What? What? Come on. And this is the woman that, by the way, when I was elected with her, she and her husband decided she was going to do no national TV because there were inappropriate comments about her on Twitter whenever she would do tv. It went from that to this. Anyway, okay, another story. Laura Loomer. And I saw your guys's tweet back and forth, by the way, Laura, if you're listening, you can be nice. Ish. And still batshit crazy, just so you know.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, it's not. Those things aren't in conflict. Yeah, yeah.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Nope. The fact that she could go into the Oval Office is frightening. This is somebody that is a 911 truther. I was in a specific. I don't remember which committee it was, but a committee hearing that she interrupted back, you know, before she was in anybody's good graces. She's nuts. And literally nuts. Not just performance art here. So she gets into the White House, and in front of, from what I understand, in front of Mike Waltz is going after these, and it kind of goes to him where he tries to defend these members, and then she wins. The fact that Mike Waltz was overruled by Laura Loomer and then still put his head down and walked out into Trump's helicopter like a whipped puppy. Don't tell me you're an alpha male. Okay, please stop saying that. You guys are alpha males if you're going to let Laura Loomer come in and stomp all over you. Okay, I want to be very clear about that. I met Mike Waltz in Bluffton, South Carolina, when he was thinking about running, and I'm like, what do you think about Trump? I hate Trump. Okay, I'll support you. And I supported him. He came in until he flew one day in Air Force One with Trump, and he was totally different. Right. This is a beta male. I'm sorry. It's okay to be a beta. Nothing wrong with it. It's America. It could be whatever you want, but quit trying to pretend like you're an alpha. And so, yeah, if I was him, I would have resigned at the spot I would have said, literally. And maybe the president wants him to resign and everybody wins, but I'd be like, Mr. President, if you listen to her over me, I'm out. You don't need me. Obviously, the fact that he then tucked his tail and walked onto the helicopter is the. Is the one image of him I will never forget. Never.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah. It'd be one thing if it was like, you know, Doug Burgum over at the Interior, and you got some staffer who did some tweets in the past that were mean to Trump, and you got Laura Loomer going into the White House. And like Donald, we got to get rid of the, you know, deputy under Secretary at Interior. You might take one for the team on that one. I mean, I wouldn't. I would never be in terms of Canada, but you could at least understand it. You're the fucking national security advisor, right? You're the national security advisor. You're. You're senior director for technology and national security. Like your top staffer that you brought with you from Congress, that you trust, one of Rubio's top, top experts on foreign policy are getting fired because Laura Loomer said so. Somebody with no foreign policy experience, someone who thinks 911 was an inside job, she gets to be in charge of the staffing. And that is just madness. And it's just humiliating. And to go along with it, like, why? What are you. Like, what are you even getting out of this? And I throw, on top of that, my old boss, Susie Wiles. What is she doing? I thought you were the Chief of staff.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Yeah.

[Tim Miller]

Isn't Susie Wilde supposed to be in charge of the staff? She's getting, you know, layered, I guess, would be one way to put it by Laura Loomer.

[Adam Kinzinger]

I don't know. And I'll tell you the crazy thing about this. This is a moment where I had implied, it looks like we may be planning a strike against Iran. We are certainly having an anti. Whatever campaign against Yemen right now. You know, there's still the Ukraine, Russia war that we supposedly were going to solve in 24 hours. You know, China's still growing, and at the same time as all of this, you know, the Laura Loomer national defense establishment, we also are now saying that we're going to cut the military 8% and 90,000 active duty troops. Now, by the way, we have struggled in the past 20 years to grow the size of the army, because without a draft, you have to grow through incentives. And obviously, when the economy is good, it's hard to incentivize people to go in the army.

[Tim Miller]

So that's the grand plan that. Yeah, totally crush the economy. So people have to go into the military.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Yeah, maybe that's it. Brilliant, brilliant. But now they want to cut the military 90,000 people. This is insane.

[Tim Miller]

Was that in the budget or the reconciliation bill or.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Yes, it's, like, put out as they're what they're trying to do in the budget or something. Remember, they want to cut, they want to cut 8%, which they claim. They do that through fraud, waste and abuse. Guys, can, can we just drop the fraud, waste and abuse thing? It doesn't exist to the level that people think it does. Is there fraud and waste? Yes. Is it 8% of the budget? Oh, hell no. And by the way, we used to fight tooth and nail with the Biden administration, with the Obama administration, that we had to grow the defense budget every year by more than they wanted to grow it or they were peace hippies. Now they're talking about cutting at 8%. And somehow that's still consistent with the conservative values we've always had since Ronald Reagan. People, can we get rid of this idea that there is anything conservative about the GOP anymore? The GOP is not conservative. The conservative movement, it's dead, basically. There's some people with conservative views, but the movement itself is dead. Yeah.

[Tim Miller]

Kind of like the American empire.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Right?

[Tim Miller]

So, you know, we've killed a lot of stuff the last 71 days.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Yep.

[Ryan Seacrest]

Hey, it's Ryan Seacrest for Albertsons and Safeway with the stock up sale at Safeway and Albertson. Stock up and earn four times points at your local store when you purchase participating products. Save on household essentials from General Mills, Kellogg's, Philadelphia Quaker and Tide. Clip the offer in the app for event savings and look for participating items throughout the store, shop in store or online. Plus you can even have your groceries delivered or use drive up and go to have your groceries brought to your car at the store. Restrictions and exclusions apply. Visit Albertsons or Safeway.com for more details.

[Tim Miller]

In addition, while this is all going on, four Americans died in a NATO operation in Lithuania. Yeah, their funeral, their service was last night. First in Vilnius and then they get brought to Dover Air Force Base. Traditionally, the president goes to those things to, you know, kind of greet the families and the caskets. Trump did not do that. He flew to Doral, his golf club in Florida, where he went to meet with the Saudis because the Saudi Golf league liv is having a tournament at his golf club. So our American first president skipped the services of the dead soldiers to go cavort with the foreign autocrat that is trying to disrupt the American golf tour. That's what's happening.

[Adam Kinzinger]

The level of self dealing corruption that we are going to discover someday. You know, we're discovering it now, but I think when the Trump administration is over and we're kind of doing the postmortem, no matter what our country looks like is going to be astounding. And I really believe there will be new laws that will have to be passed in the wake of Donald Trump because of the absolute stuff that we used to think human decency just would prevent that. It doesn't prevent. You know, you talk a ton, and I would encourage you to keep talking about it. About the cryptocurrency stuff. I didn't even realize the depth of that until you had that one gentleman on who was really good talking about it.

[Tim Miller]

Zeke. He's really good.

[Adam Kinzinger]

And the golf thing, you know, the, The PGA version versus the live. Like, this is a big battle right now.

[Tim Miller]

And shouldn't we be on the side of the pga? I mean, probably. Shouldn't the president not care about this, given the fact that the economy is collapsing? But if you were going to pick a side, shouldn't you pick the PGA side?

[Adam Kinzinger]

Yes, absolutely, you should. But he thinks the PGA is Democratic now all of a sudden. So there's something about that for some reason, because, anyway. And then about the soldiers. Look, these are four Americans, one actually from my old district. They're on a recovery vehicle. They basically flip in a. A swamp that's like, you know, deep, deep mud. Like kind of what you think about almost quicksand. So it took a week for Lithuania and the United States to recover their bodies. But if you actually look at what the Lithuanians have put out, their level of respect for these soldiers is something that'll put a tear in your eye. I tweeted one of the videos yesterday that the defense minister put out. They have been honoring these four soldiers as if they were their own. And you see this, like, this, this brotherhood between America and Lithuania and America and frankly, all of our all. And even though, you know, Trump and the leaders of the countries don't like each other, the brotherhood on the military level is still very strong. And, and I mean, literally, you see the whole country, a moment of silence for these four Americans. They come back here and Donald Trump doesn't even bother to show up. Is. Is, you know, I'll just. All I can say is what I say basically to all this stuff. Had this been Biden, this would be Fox News front headline every hour. That he didn't show up to Dover. When it's Trump, like, that's crickets, right? That's okay. There's no consistency here. Fox News and the Republicans no longer believe in any value. The only value is what is good for me and what can I convince people is good for them. That's it.

[Tim Miller]

I will go to your feed and we'll put in the show notes that the link of the Lithuanian thing because I would like to see it because this thing is sad again, who it's. And obviously the deaths are tragic, but it is like it comes to this moment where it's like this. It's an artifact of like a previous time where like we really had these alliances and valued them and cared about them. I've been noticing for the YouTube viewers, you'll see this for the listeners. Adam has a Statue of Liberty behind him as your backdrop. Is that a comment on how like we should we need to give that back to the French or is there.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Honestly, man, I think it's just time at least let them, you know, what we could do for the next three years is they could take like ownership in, you know, of it.

[Tim Miller]

Even though we don't necessarily need to move it on Ellis Island.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Yeah, they can take ownership of it and then we should prepare to move it.

[Tim Miller]

I think we should ship it back.

[Adam Kinzinger]

We're getting to that point.

[Tim Miller]

They can give it to somebody else. I mean, I don't. We're not really. I don't think our shores are the. Are the shores of liberty. All right, you've kind of mentioned a couple times. I just do want to close because I think it's worth mentioning because it's the Russia deal. I thought we did a deal. What happened there? We had this Trump and then we sent Steve Wyckoff over there and he met with Putin and Putin gave him that great painting and everything was going to be cool. And it doesn't seem like everything's cool. Seems like Russia's still bombing Ukraine.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Well, they are. And look, Zelensky comes here, gets chewed out in the Oval Office. And Zelensky has agreed to everything that we've put in front of him. Them, you know, a ceasefire in the Black Sea which does not benefit Ukraine because they've actually won. I mean, this is like the most untold and amazing story is the Ukrainians defeated the Russian Black Sea Navy with no navy, you know, and energy infrastructure, you know, ceasefire that that would have benefited Russia because of their energy, the bombings that are happening. Look, Russia's not interested in peace period. And by the way, Donald Trump, who said he was going to to inflict, you know, intense sanctions or whatever against Russia if they didn't do it. Well, they didn't do it and you don't hear anything. And Russia doesn't even get put on the frickin tariff list. I mean, I don't know if Donald Trump is necessarily truly in the tank of Russia, but I think he feels a kinship to Putin. And I gotta tell you what was.

[Tim Miller]

What would he be doing differently? What would he be doing differently if he wasn't? I also don't believe it. I also don't believe that it's actually like. Because I think it's way stupider than that, that he is. I think he's just a fucking moron. But. But if he were a Russian asset in the White House, it's hard to think about something that he would have done differently the first seven years.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Well, he'd be less obvious about it.

[Tim Miller]

If he was an asset.

[Adam Kinzinger]

You know what I mean? Like, he wouldn't be this blatant. I think, you know what was very revealing was in the Zelensky meeting when Trump went off onto how he and Putin together had to bear the Russia, Russia, Russia hoax books. Like, Putin didn't have to bear anything. He loved it. But that's what you start seeing is I think he feels a kinship with Putin and he's jealous of the fact that he has control of his country, and Trump wants that. And at least we're doing the intel sharing with Ukraine. I think the. The aid has basically wound down, to be honest with you. Ukraine can now produce 40% of its own weapons. It's going to produce 4 million drones this year, which is amazing. They did 1 million last year. Europe is stepping up, so Ukraine's not lost without the United States. But there's no doubt it's going to cost more Ukrainian lives than it should. And I gotta tell you, every day, I mean, it's not rare that I watch a video out of Ukraine and get pretty choked up watching this, because it just reminds me of really, honestly, The World War II generation of Americans that just, you know, went to fight fascism. And, you know, it's. It's. I don't know, it's inspiring to me, but sad at the same time.

[Tim Miller]

Slava. All right, Adam Kinzinger, have you said thank you yet? I've had, John, quite a few times. Have you said thank you? I haven't heard a thank you. Thank you.

[Adam Kinzinger]

Thank you, Tim. Thank you. I so appreciate you. You're so amazing. You're my favorite. You are very talented.

[Tim Miller]

Oh, okay. Appreciate that. All right, that's Adam Kinzinger. He used to be a congressman. Now he's got a substack. Go check it out. Everybody else have as good a weekend as you can. Don't look at your Charles Schwab account. We'll see you back here on Monday with Bill Crystal.

[Unknown Musician]

Peace One last dance Here at the end of the empire Makes me cry watching the moon on the ocean.

[Adam Kinzinger]

With.

[Unknown Musician]

California used to be it's not half bad Spend half your life being sad wow don't be scared uhoh Just be chronically intelligent oh just take my hand oh Standing at the end of the American empire Here at the end of the movie they seem so sure at least that's the way I remember.

[Adam Kinzinger]

The.

[Unknown Musician]

War When New York used to be not half bad Spend half your life being sad wow don't you weep uhoh Half your life fast asleep uh oh Feeling uninstall spire Standing at the end of the American empire and we know that it's time to go Heard the news on the radio the last round before we go through the pain atmospheric glow and the oxyges carry Sing the song that we used to love One last round before we go One last round before we go so sad.

[Tim Miller]

The Bulwark Podcast is produced by Katie Cooper with audio engineering and editing by Jason Brown.

[Ryan Seacrest]

Hey, it's Ryan Seacrest for Albertsons and Safeway with the Stock up sale at Safeway and Albertsons. Stock up and earn four times points at your local store when you purchase participating products. Save on family snack favorites like Frito Lay chips, Tim's Cascade Chips, Dan and Yogurt, and Oreos. Clip the offer in the app for event savings and look for participating items throughout the store. Shop in store or online. Plus you can even have your groceries delivered or use Drive up and Go to have your groceries brought to your car at the store. Restrictions and exclusions apply. Visit Albertsons or Safeway.com for more details.