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Some die of no way of knowing
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A
which way it's going. Hope for the best. Expect the worst. Hope for the best. Welcome to the Commentary Magazine daily podcast. Today is Thursday, February 19, 2026. I'm John Pot Horowitz, the editor of Commentary magazine. With me as always, executive editor Abe Greenwald. Hi Abe.
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C
Hi John.
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A
Washington Free Beacon editor Eliana Johnson. Hi Eliana.
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D
Hi John.
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A
And senior editor Seth Mandel. Hi Seth.
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B
Hi John.
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A
So many places to go today and I'm going to take the least important story first because it's the one that made me angriest yesterday. This is the nature of Internet rages is that they, they, they sort of, they're like old faithful. They just, they. They spout up hundreds of feet in the air and then you're like, why was I even bothering? But they grab you. Abe wrote a wonderful newsletter yesterday. If you're not subscribing to Abe's newsletter, Please go to commentary.org look at our banner at the top and go and subscribe to Abe's newsletter, which you get mid afternoon Monday through Friday, a basically said, I don't understand what's going on anymore because the world of the Internet and the controversies on the Internet and the vocabulary being used on the Internet is. Is now beyond my capacity to understand. And we are now living in a dumb time where dumb scandals make everybody dumber and are incomprehensible. Abe was a great piece. We could talk about a little bit. I just want to talk about the dumb. The thing that happened yesterday, which is Tucker Carlson flies into Israel, decides he doesn't want to, you know, tour around, just gets off his plane at Ben Gurion Airport, goes into the VIP lounge, interviews U.S. ambassador Mike Huckabee, gets back and then gets back on his plane, I guess, and flies out, but not before he tells a reporter for the Daily Mail, who coincidentally is somebody who, whose first job he got through Tucker at the Daily Caller, that he was detained at the. At the. At the airport. And obviously with hostile Israeli intent, he was detained. And, and this story then went viral with the BBC saying things like, Tucker Carlson arrested at airport or stuff like that. So, of course, the minute anybody, anybody who has ever been, including Jews, including people who've been there a thousand times like I have, immediately your bullshit detector goes off. And, and here's what happens when you go to Israel and whether you're in a VIP section, you're on a private plane, you're on a. You're on an El Al flight, you're on a Delta flight or whatever, you go through an extensive process of clearance, some of which is customs and some of which is actual security clearance. And it doesn't matter who you are or what happens, they ask you quite. They will take you aside and ask you a few questions or more than a few questions or dozens of questions or whatever. And. And though Tucker was in the vi, so he somehow, with malice aforethought, lying as he does, trolling as he does, and being a person of evil intent as he is, and a person of despicable character which he is, invented this story that while he had to go through some form of passport clearance, he was detained and asked questions that obviously he was only being asked because he's hostile to the state of Israel or critical of its government. So I told some stories about my own experiences through this. I'm sure every one of us may have a story or two about the bizarre things that happen sometimes when you come into the country. My story that I told was how I was pulled aside because this is 40 years ago. I came from Paris, the dollar was very strong. The franc was very weak. I saw a very expensive dress in a store window in Paris, and I bought it for my sister Ruthie. And when. When they opened my luggage, as they do, just to make sure I didn't have a gun or whatever it is that they were doing, the. The security officer saw a woman saw the dress and took it out and said, what is this? And I said, it's a dress. And she said, why you have a dress? And I said, I bought it for my sister.
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B
Who?
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A
Your sister? Where does she live? What her address? What her phone number? What are you doing? Why are you in Israel? Why? How long are you staying? Are you working? Are you not working? Who is it? How many time you been here? And then, of course, one of my favorites which didn't have is will you bar mitzvah. What was your bar mitzvah Parsha. That's a big one, by the way, because it also happened to Ariel Davidson and others, like where they pull you aside, ask you what your bar mitzvah parsha was when you claimed to be Jewish. This happened to me. It's happened other incidents. Once I was traveling with my sisters, and we actually had three different last names at the time. So we were all taken to different rooms and asked questions to make sure that we were actually family members. Like, this is what happens. This is what happened in the wake of the early 1970s when Israeli airplanes were being hijacked and planes were being blown up and stuff like that. This is when Elal started and Israeli airport authorities started instituting this incredibly aggressive security protocol system that has worked since. No Israeli aircraft has been. Or aircraft to. From whatever Israel has been hijacked in 50 years anyway. So that's the Tucker Carlson madness. And so the question is, was it worth it? Was it worth it to, like, have a fit on the Internet about Tucker Carlson lying about Israeli security? Did we fall for it? Did we give him more? Did I give him more oxygen than he deserved? And others? Or is it important every time somebody does something that is a vicious and despicable lie about Jews and Israel that you have to face it down, you have to go, you cannot let one pass, or you cannot say, I'm not even going to grace this with a reply.
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C
This is the maddening question, in part
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B
because
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C
they do it, the anti Semites, yes, to spread some lie about the Jews or Israel, but also to get you crazy, to provoke our responses. So I have to say, in this case at least, the lie was completely exposed pretty quickly. Now Maybe that's has to do with the fact that you and other people called BS immediately and piled on or not, I don't know. But I just want to add this. If I were Israeli security, I would still be interrogating Tucker Carlson. I have a library of questions for him and everyone he's traveling with.
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D
I had the total opposite reaction. So this would be a funny, funny debate. I had two reactions. The first would be, and far be it for me to criticize the Israelis. I'm saying this a little bit tongue in cheek, but if I were them, I would have put out a banner on the. The guy didn't leave the airport. Right. I would have put out a banner on the tarmac, welcome, Tucker. Because this is, this was so predictable. Any interaction that he had with an Israeli, he was going to turn into World War Three a news event. So if I were them, banner on the tarmac, welcome, Tucker. Here's, you know, platter of hummus and falafel and a big welcome party for you. And here's the photographs. And we're going to give it to the Daily Mail. Here's how we welcomed this guest to our country. And that my second thought was, you know, this, this reporter at the Daily Mail, Philip Nieto, worked at the Daily Caller and it appears to be, you know, after Tucker went to Fox News. But nonetheless, he's linked to Tucker through the Daily Caller. How do they not disclose this affiliation,
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A
the Daily Caller? Are you criticizing the Daily Callers?
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D
You know, when I was at Politico and would write about Sean Hannity or Fox News, it was always disclosed that I used to work for, you know, like, if you're a reporter, you disclose this. Daily Mail is like the biggest English language publication, biggest traffic. And Laura Loomer's disclosing this, like, are you kidding me? It's a joke.
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A
Fair enough.
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C
Can I just also respond to your, to your welcome approach idea?
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D
Yeah. Yes.
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C
If you were to roll out the red carpet for Tucker and give him hummus and whatever else he would say. This I thought was unusual. Do countries usually bribe Americans upon landing?
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A
See, I think that is a very good point. I also think that it is a, it's a funny idea that Eliana puts out. It is so alien to the Israeli national culture. And Israel does have an Israeli national. It's really like, fine, come in, we'll give you what you want. Hummus. We have hummus. You don't want it, you don't have to have it. The hell would you not eating our hummus. That's. That. That is actually a welcome in Israel. It's like, oh, you're here. Fine, good. Come over to dinner. You come for Shabbos. It's fine. You don't want to come. To hell with you like that, you know, so. So just. Just to say, I don't know, that they have a red carpet at Ben Gurion Airport. I. I would be very surprised to say they would. They would literally, like, take you into surgery and give you one of their kidneys before. Before they would lay out, roll out a red carpet for anybody.
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B
Bethany and I once traveled to Israel together, and she has. She's been to 30 countries and, you know, has, like, Indonesia and all sorts of crazy places. I don't know, maybe Indonesia, but, you know, all sorts of places. Many Arab countries, you know, a lot in Southeast Asia, whatever. And we were there together, and when they taught, you know, when we went through passport control, for me, it was like, oh, do a family here. You should move here. You know, oh, you're a journalist. We have lots of journalists here. You would have a. You know, you would. You would have something to do. You should consider making aliyah. This. It was like a. It was like a welcome home. And they were cold as ice to Bethany. Like, didn't want to let her in because they're, like, looking through her passport and going, this person is highly suspicious. So, you know, it's. It's like, even people traveling together, it's totally routine. But I. I've come to. I've come to decide that. I think that there is a certain amount of societal importance in making fun of Tucker Carlson and being mean to him. I think I. I've come to. I know this is strange because I'm. I'm not exactly a bully in my. In, you know, in my normal mean. But I actually think that Tucker is such a whiny loser, he's such a baby, that any opportunity to just point out that he's like, a really whiny giant baby is a good opportunity is. Is. Is an opportunity one should take. That's all. You know, I don't. I don't know how much you get into the details with him, because the arguments don't matter, because he doesn't. He isn't searching for the truth. He doesn't want the truth and all that stuff. But I think it's important to say, like, this is your God to the people who watch him and follow him and hang on his every word. He is. I mean, he's a. He is a wet piece of paper. And so I, I just think that that's, that's the important part, which is just, you know, we don't necessarily have to get into an argument with Tucker over the truth, although we do have to be careful that something he says that isn't true catches on. I mean, it's, it's hard to know exactly what. But I do think it's important just to, you know, just to note that among all the Israel critics on the right, Tucker is a uniquely embarrassing figure. And, and it's an up and he puts himself out there as such. And so we should say.
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I mean, the one thing I will say, because I was angry at myself, at the, at the fact that I was provoked so hotly by this little stunt that he pulled. And I know that when he got back on his plane, he was cackling, you know, with kind of demonic glee. That demon that supposedly he wrestled with, like, you know, like Jacob, you know, the demon that he wrestled with all night wasn't a demon. Obviously Jacob wrestled with all night. An angel was an angel. But whatever it was that attacked Tucker apparently actually did penetrate through his skin and possess his body. So there is something demonic about him. And I'm sure that he thought this was hilarious and he giggled and laughed all the way home. And so I felt like I had somehow get, I had provided him, me and others, you know, had provided him with the kind of masturbatory pleasure that he had sought by making up this little story that he got his little catamite at the Daily Mail to provide to the world. And at the same time, there is one thing that you say that I think is important, which is that stuff like this, the thing that makes him important isn't that he's got a lot of followers or that he makes a lot of money on, on the Internet. It is that he has the ear of the Vice President of the United States and has some access to the President of the United States and he pulls stunts like this and they are surfaced visibly enough and that they, they go against what even those people know to be the truth from their own life experiences. It make may make them say, you know, like, next time he calls, maybe I'm going to wait a day or two before I call him back, or maybe we shouldn't let him come into the Oval Office. It's like not, it's not worth it. Who knows what's going to come out of his mouth once he leaves? You can't trust, you know, who knows? And so it is possible under those circumstances because of the specifics of his relationship to power, that it is important when he does something that's particularly easily exposed as a, as a fraud intended to create Loki like chaos, disorder, unpleasantness, and, you know, demonic disorder, that it be called out because maybe it'll have a cumulative effect and push him further away from people whose ear he should not be able to whisper into. All right, so moving on, moving on from, from, from. That is the fact that very much against Tucker's pre elections and ideas, we are hearing of very serious preparations for war against Iran, Israel. The Israeli public is now being given guidance on preparing for strikes from Iran should military conflict happen. You know, making sure they remember where the nearest shelters are, maybe stocking up on food, obviously, in this case, because Iran's weapon of choice is the ballistic missile. The air defenses of Israel are not, this is not the rockets from Gaza or, or, or Lebanon, you know, that are, that Iron Dome, you know, shot down at a success rate of 95% or something like that. These missiles take eight minutes or something like that to land. It's very hard to hit them, you know, get them down. So the fact that Israel is preparing and is, is, is, is feeling the heat there is the most salient sign that something really big is maybe in the offing. And we're hearing maybe as early as this weekend or maybe it'll be March because they're still assets that need to be positioned and all of that. And finally, after like months of this, I'm saying finally, like I care, because I don't really care. But finally, the kind of liberal internationalist view, the kind of UN Foreign affairs Richard Haas simpering, you know, oh, what really matters is what people in Davos think world is her saying, wait a minute, are we, are we actually. Is the United States actually about to go to war with the Islamic Republic of Iran? How did this happen? Where did this come from? Why aren't we having hearings? Where's the Senate? Shouldn't we be declaring war? All of that stuff. It seemed that all seemed to somehow not be in the discussion.
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B
Yeah, well, I, I would just say that Tom Massie, who is putting forth a resolution to stop the Iran war, has been distracted of late because he's been Playing with the Epstein files and doing literally nothing else. He and Rokhan have been sitting, you know, at Starbucks and sifting through 10,000 pages of printed out emails to look for the Epstein class and find the Epstein class. And in the process they apparently have named people falsely. And I, the irresponsibility of their behavior is growing and becoming clearer by the day. But my response to Tom Massie is that we've been talking about real things you haven't, but we've been talking about global geopolitics, we've been talking about the prospect of war and we've been talking about things that go right to the heart of the safety and the security of America and the American led world order. And you've been talking about Epstein. So that's why you're surprised. But we didn't actually, no one's actually tried to ignore the process. It's actually been a public discussion. Are we going to war with Iran this weekend? Every Thursday at this time every week it's like, oh, might be, looks like, looks like a weekend war with Iran. And I don't know, it's been what, 32 weeks of that. So anybody who missed that, it's their own fault.
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C
Also, I think not going to Congress to get some sort of resolution for military action is among the least norm breaking things that, that Trump or his administration has done at this point. You know, it's that, that, that's, that's already, that, that, that's already a multi administration bipartisan kind of thing.
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A
Look, that's a very important point. Dates back of course to Panama, right? Which was George H.W. bush did, did Panama without congressional sanction. Reagan did GRE without congressional sanction. Clinton did Bosnia without congressional sanction. The war that everybody seems to be invoking here, as you know, if people are invoking like, oh my God, we're stumbling back into war in the Middle east was something for which we got a declaration of war. I mean we got two, essentially two declarations of war. One was the Auma, the, the post 911 authorization for military action against terrorists who hit us, which governed the war in Afghanistan. And then of course we did have a declaration of war against Iraq that went through the Senate, went through Congress. So those were actually authorized wars of the United States. If you're going to invoke that, don't say that. Now they've made up this whole legend in which because we were lied into war, you know, Bush lied us into war, that that war was illegitimate. That was a legitimately declared war of the United States, affirmed by the Congress, signed by the President of the United States. Trump is acting as president. Oh, I forgot Libya. Right. That was another. The strikes against ISIS in the, that that Obama took in 2013 and 2014. All again, not, not only not authorized by Congress, but in, in many of these cases that I'm mentioning, Congress was not briefed beforehand out of security concerns, meaning that the president that the executive branch could not trust, that the people that they would conf, that they would confer with in the legislative branch could keep their mouths shut and not reveal.
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B
They're right, Chris. You can't tell Chris Murphy anything without it immediately going on cnn. There's a number of these guys, they're, they're absolutely right. They, Congress. There's an element of the Democratic leadership now that everybody is running for president every year that is obsessed with whistleblowing. Something in the Trump administration that will blow it all up. And they go on TV and they don't. I know that Trump isn't care. It's not like it's, look, it's a pie, it's a pot and kettle. I know Trump complaining about people saying, you know, possibly secret or confidential information and revealing it on TV is not something that Trump can complain about really. But, but we can because these guys don't, they're not looking to, they're not looking to actually reinforce constitutional war powers. They're, they're, it's all part of these public want everything to be public. They want their face to be on it. And he's right. You can't trust that.
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A
One of the reasons you can't trust them is this 25 year accretion of authority and power by the executive branch which has had two qualities, one of which has been to maybe over empower, get, you know, sort of like supercharge the power of the executive branch in a way that is not healthy for our democracy. Since Congress should be, you know, providing oversight, providing checks and balances, but also liberates members of Congress to be irresponsible because if they were part of this process, excuse me, if they were part of this process, they couldn't behave that way. Our friend Michael Durant of the Hudson Institute has a very good piece in the Free Press this morning about, we talked yesterday about how wars often happen based on the miscalc. Always happen on the basis of a miscalculation on the part of losing wars, on the part of the body that kind of like creates the conditions for war, misunderstanding the intent, purpose or the strength or the determination of the people they think that they can beat in the war. And this piece is about the differing ideas about what constitutes success or failure in a military action on the part of the United States and on the part of the Islamic Republic of Iran. And according to Duran, quoting the Ayatollah and various other people in the Iranian leadership, they cast the war Midnight Hammer, which was our and Israel's effort to destroy the Iranian nuclear program. They cast it as a victory. And we can look at that and say, well, this is insane. You know, we flew in and didn't have a casualty destroyed. You know, this 20 year project destroyed much of their ballistic missile capacity as well. Humiliated them. They're defenseless. Over the course of the six months that followed, their, their currency devalued to zero. What on earth are they talking about? And according to him, he says that survival is victory, that, that they, that their, their timeline is that the regime survives and that these Americans and all these people come and go, but that existence itself is victory when you are faced in this fashion. And that they're ruthless, that it just triggers their own greater ruthlessness and that they think they can outwit, they can outlast, and they can out fight Trump because they don't have to fight. All they need to do is still be standing and they win now. So Duran, in the conclusion of the piece says, whatever has to happen here, some form of clearly denoted victory has to be secured. And in his case, he actually kind of implicitly likens it to Maduro and says the Ayatollah Khamenei must be removed from power at the end of this conflict. The regime has to be beheaded. We don't know what comes next. It's very complicated what comes next. But there has to be a clear scalp, let's say, and that is, that is the Ayatollah Khamenei scalp. He must no longer be there or this mission will be for nothing. Anybody have a response to that idea?
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C
I haven't read the piece, but I mean, that sounds very solid to me. And I would say that, as we've been saying, the, the American military buildup in the region is of a scale that suggests they are looking for a scalp. If, if, if they're looking for anything. If, if there's going to be a war. This is, this is not, this is not about hitting a few sites and going home. This is obviously about doing something conclusive
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B
and, and a call. It's also an invitation, I think, maybe to the Iranian people or, you know, you know, some Sort of open hand outreach to them because it suggests that if Khamenei is ousted, that will be considered a victory in whatever we want to call this, the war or whatever, that he actually, that giving Trump ahead on a, on a stake like, well, not a head. Giving Trump Khamenei's head. The guy who, you know, if anybody, the guy who ordered, you know, two assassination attempts against Trump, if you give him Khamenei's head in return, it sounds like Trump is ready to make hay out of it. And also he knows the chaos that would ensue because, you know, there's. We don't know exactly what the succession plan is, but obviously it would be chaotic and obviously there would be some sort of internal power struggle if Khamenei, you know, went away rather than, you know, convened a council and put something in writing and gave them structure. So he, you know, one would lead to the other, I guess, is what I'm saying. But really, Trump would be delighted for that reason because it would be maybe victory in itself, but, but also it would, it would keep things rolling toward a firmer victory on the ground. And so I think it's his way of saying, like, hey, if anybody, you know, wants to, anybody, you know, anybody want to, anybody angry about their parking tickets a few years ago wants to take it to common A, you know, maybe now's the time.
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D
I have a couple of thoughts. First bit to our previous discussion. It's. It's rich to see Robert Malley, the architect of Obama's nuclear deal that was deliberately designed to bypass Congress, caterwauling on social media, that the Trump administration is not bringing this to Congress for a decision, and all the other Obama administration officials who were a party to that deal complaining about the same. You know, the Duran piece is really interesting because he essentially argues that victory for the regime is just outlasting the Trump administration and that they are bargaining that the next administration, Republican or Democrat, will not have the cojones to do what Trump is doing. I actually still think that Trump has not decided what he wants to do, but is building optionality. And his options are essentially, does he go after the nuclear program, does he go after the missiles, or does he try to topple the regime? But it is clear that he is going to have maximum optionality. It is not just Israel that's preparing for war, with a senior Israeli official telling Israelis not to travel over the weekend, but there's a Wall Street Journal piece that Iran is preparing for war even as Iranian leaders are trying to string out the negotiations, which is their specialty, they are fortifying their nuclear sites and there's been great reporting from David Albright and his team on this and expanding their crackdown on protests which are re appearing on this. But Duran essentially says that knowledge can't be bombed away. So without removing a regime that is hell bent on achieving a nuclear weapon, we have not solved this problem. I think the real challenge for the administration is that this is not like Venezuela where there's a number two waiting in the wings that we can co opt and then bank on their desire for survival and bargain with and issue orders to. And then where, you know, we've got a situation like that, this is much more challenging. And I don't even know how really how to begin to think about that.
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C
I've got to say, again, not having read Duran's piece, part of me feels as if it would also be okay to, for the US to go in, knock out the missile sites, crater whatever new nuclear nonsense they have going on, hit some IRGC sites and let the regime think it won because it survived. Like it would, it would be neutered and declaring a victory.
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A
So what, I mean, the regime is then like the, you know, the Black Knight in Monty Python and the Holy Grail. I mean, if you, you can, you know, first you slice off one arm, then you slice, then you cut off a Sweden, he's still like, you know, have it. You, you know, I will, I will defeat you. I mean, there is whether, if Iran has the delusion that it won the war of Operation Midnight Hammer, again, let it have the delusion the world will record. There are two ways of looking at this, one of which is will the regime survive? Which is the most obvious way you show its defeat. But even if it does, are its neighbors still afraid of it? Is it, is it as valuable a trading partner for Russia and China and North Korea as it was before, or does it seem more injured? Do those countries that trade with it or deal with it, like, have the whip hand over it and like, cause it, give it onerous conditions for this sorts of thing and then like, and accelerate its economic and fiscal collapse because it has no cards to play, it's not like an equal player any longer. Like, if it's not real that it won the war, that it pretends that it won't, then it doesn't matter what it's, what its pretense is that that would be the kind of repast, is that just, just because it wants to pretend that it won a war it lost doesn't mean that it won the war. It lost. Michael Oren's brilliant book, Six Days of War, which is the story, you know, which tells the story of the 1967 war between, you know, Israel, Egypt, Syria and other Arab states in this, you know, unbelievable triumph, describes the Egyptian behavior as the war. As both the war was coming and then as the war is being conducted and as the war ended, as the entire structure of the military command, civilian command and dictatorial command of, of Nasser, the dictator of Egypt, forcing themselves to labor under the delusion that they had not been dealt this world historical humiliation. And like, deploying rhetoric and claims and things like that that caused a kind of, what would you call it, like a kind of rhetorical crisis or sort of epistemological crisis inside everybody on the planet, which is. What are you crazy? Like, what do you mean you won't. What are you talking about? Your entire air force was destroyed in 45 minutes. This little piss and little country just like took out your entire air force in 45 minutes. And you're like walking around saying, we have defeated you like that. That has knock on consequences over time. Like, you don't, you don't.
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B
It's very Tucker of them.
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A
Very Tucker of them.
- [40:08]
D
The other aspect to this is that a potential military action that again hits the regime's tools of external repression and potentially its apparatus of internal repression will have an impact potentially on emboldening the population. Again. That's an unknown here and may take a burden off American and Israeli forces and allow Iranians to take their future into their own hands. But that is like, that's the real challenge of planning something like this is like you can make the plans and then like, you don't know. Plans are good on paper, but you don't know what's going to happen or how things are going to play out once the first plane leaves the tarmac.
- [41:04]
A
Well, in Abe's, the way Abe described this is, is not dissimilar to what Trump promised when Operation Midnight Hammer was over, which is, okay, we've done this. We're proud of what we did. It was a great accomplishment. If they start up again, we're just going to go and hit them again. Which is, which is essentially like the Israeli mow the lawn strategy that now people say was a failure in Gaza. But, you know, the idea being, okay, we hit them, you know, there are green shoots of the program starting to pop up. We're going to go spray the, you know, we're going to go spray the defoliant and and, and kill them off before they start taking root again. So even there, this wouldn't be anything more than a kind of follow on to Operation Midnight Hammer. That, that is one way of looking at this is that it is what was promised that Trump said, don't start reconstituting your program or we'll hit you again. They started reconstituting their program. He hit them again. He wasn't going, when this is all over, he wasn't going for regime change. He wasn't going for any of that. He was just doing what he said he would do if they didn't sort of like stay in their lane or, you know, keep to the boundaries that he had set out for them in the first place. The problem with that as a strategy is that the world changed in the last week of December when the Iranian people rose up, as they rose up really, in response to horrible economic conditions, and then started protesting in 90 different places, in places that no one, no Iranian, had ever protested the regime before. And then of course, the real change, which was the decision by the regime to be as ruthless as it possibly could and mow down tens of thousands of people for the crime of saying that they were sick of the regime that had led them to this incredibly sorry pass. And Trump evoked the, that in accelerating this military buildup and this march toward military conflict and also in giving the
- [43:23]
B
Israelis a green light to mow the grass, so to speak, in Lebanon, which they have been doing because precisely because, you know, without a looming, possible looming conflict with Iran, what Trump actually wants in Lebanon and certainly, you know, Tom Barrack, his, his envoy wants in Lebanon is quiet and to be able to claim that they're ceasefire agreement that they struck, you know, at the end of the, at the tail end of the Gaza war, also in concert with that was, you know, sort of brought peace to the region. They had, they got a ceasefire in Gaza, they got a ceasefire in Lebanon and whatever. But he's been telling them, you know, reportedly for months that not to let Hezbollah get back on its feet and not to play around with Hezbollah's capabilities, not to underestimate it and to go in at the first sign that the Lebanese armed forces are not holding up their end of the put Hezbollah in a box plan.
- [44:23]
C
I've been thinking about Hezbollah throughout this conversation because, you know, the, the Iranian ballistic missile threat is very real. You know, we've been focused on their nuclear program for so long, but they've built up quite a threatening arsenal of ballistic missiles. And if you Remember part of the problem that Israel faced, Israel's multiple amazing actions against Hezbollah. Yes, there was the beeper plot. Yes, they, they took out all the senior leadership, you know, a few times, but they also decimated that arsenal. And that was a, that was a very big deal. They had to do that. Hezbollah had ballistic missiles that, smart rockets. They had thousands. And whatever happens here, whatever Trump does or doesn't do, Israel has to at some point, sooner rather than later address the Iranian ballistic missiles, which is a
- [45:36]
A
very big challenge for them. And I mean, you know, we, we, we are, we are used to the idea that Israel has almost sort of like mystical, magical powers to confront and screw around with, with, with Iran. But remember, Iran is 900. I mean these sites are 900 to a thousand miles away from, from Israel. Israel, you know, does now have some capability to do in flight, what do you call refueling and all of that. But it, but it's not, can build its military, is not built for long range strikes against ballistic missile programs. Like, that's what, that's why Midnight Hammer was a joint operation and not an Israeli operation. If, if Israel could have done it alone, Trump would have let Israel do it alone. And so it may have to do it. It's not, that's just wheelhouse. Like if you have the rule of allies and comparative advantage. Israel's advantage on Iran is on the ground and America's is in the air. Israel's advantage is intelligence. And it's the fact that it knows every square inch of the country and seems to know everything that is going on in the country on the ground, because it spent 25 years or 50, however long it's been penetrating Iran's entire governmental, intelligence and municipal structure. And so that's what they can add. That's their unbelievable virtue in actual going in the conflict. If you actually need to take things out from the air, that's an American, that's something America can do without breaking a sweat. That's what we learned in part, not only from midnight Habron, but from the Venezuela strike. We are now, you know, we are dominant in the sky in a way that since the air became a battlefield right at the beginning of the 20th century, there has never been anything like this. We are almost impregnable from the air. And so it would be weird if this is thought to be something that needed to be done for the safety of the world, that America would be, even Trump, who doesn't want to get involved in wars or whatever, that America would leave it to Israel, which had much Less likelihood of success in doing what Abe is talking about. So the other.
- [48:07]
B
And also they increase America's chance of success even more. Make it. You know, when Midnight Hammer happened, Israel had control of Iranian airspace. They had literally closed Iranian airspace. It was just fly the planes and push the button at the right moment. There was almost nothing else in on the minds of the pilots. So the, the combination of the two also makes it what. What the US Is already capable of. It makes it, you know, as you said, kind of a sleepwalk for them.
- [48:35]
A
Right. If you're. If you want to push the button and go and do. And that braces what Eliana talks about, which is that if you don't have a real clear understanding of what follows the conflict, then that may be the thing that is making Trump hesitate if he's hesitating or meaning that he's still weighing his options. Because maybe the options haven't been fully developed yet, or maybe they don't really. Maybe they're still testing and probing and getting intelligence on what might happen should A, happen and then B, happen. What happens on the ground in Tehran or what happens within the IGRC or within the Iranian military writ large or with the Basij or whatever, all these forces. Maybe they don't. Maybe they are still trying to get all of that a picture in their head so they have some idea of if they decapitate the regime, whom they go to second, who is the most likely asset inside the country to be the Darcy Rodriguez or whatever to, like, say, okay, we don't want to. We don't want any more trouble from you. We'll try to follow along as best we can. You know, you know, what do you need? Or I'll, you know, let's talk. They don't know who that is yet. Maybe. Who knows? We. We. That. That we don't really. The other thing we don't really know is what on earth is going on today in the White House and around Washington with this meeting of the peace. The Gaza Peace Department of whatever it's called. What is it called? Who?
- [50:18]
D
Remember Peace.
- [50:19]
A
The Board of Peace.
- [50:20]
D
Board of Peace.
- [50:21]
A
The Board of peace with its $5 billion plan, which is really Trump's board.
- [50:28]
D
Judge, jury, executioner.
- [50:30]
A
Yeah.
- [50:31]
D
And with this, I do think most everything with the Board of Peace is secondary to the disarmament of Hamas, which it appears, of course, the IDF is going to have to do. And the question is when, not if.
- [50:51]
B
So, yeah, I think the Board of p. The point of the Board of Peace meetings is to have people Come in from around the world and say, that Trump guy is pretty great. I gave him a billion dollars to be here. He's great. We back his plan. And that's really it. I don't think that there's anything substantial, you know, substance wise to come out of it. I think it's. I think it's. It's kind of like when Trump has those Cabinet meetings, those televised Cabinet meetings, and, you know, it's like Kristi Noem starts like, I just want to say what a privilege it is to breathe the same air as you, Mr. President. You know, something like that. I think he just wants the world to, you know, keep saying Trump is good and the plan is good and let him do whatever he wants.
- [51:31]
A
I saw this. I assume that it was real, but I'm not sure. I saw this plan for the day of meetings with the list of sort of speakers and then the list of interventions. So at these international fora, people are, like, assigned, like, 15 minute speeches or whatever. And then there are what are called the interventions where somebody is given, like, two or three minutes to respond, and they're kind of like set up elaborately. So an intervention isn't really a speech. So I think there are like eight speakers and eight interventions or something like that. And the most interesting aspect of this is that the Israeli representative, Giron Sar, is not going to speak. He's neither a speaker nor is he an intervener. And so it's going to be some strange Kabuki play in which apparently Jared Kushner concludes the festivities with some speech on, you know, where he shows a hotel or something like that, or a casino or, you know, something, but that the single most important player in bringing the Board of Peace's plans to fruition, as you guys are saying, is going to be sitting there silent while, you know, everybody else talks. So it doesn't raise the issue of what possible serious working agenda could come out of this meeting, you know, except for, you know, everyone saying, yes, I'm putting in a billion dollars. I'm going to put in a billion dollars. I'm going to put in a billion dollars. Except they have.
- [53:14]
C
I mean,
- [53:17]
A
they're going to say it again. Where. Where's the checking account?
- [53:22]
C
Right.
- [53:23]
A
Which member of the Witkoff, Trump or. Or Lutnick families is going to have signing privileges on that checking.
- [53:29]
B
Can we play? Can we pay in bitcoin?
- [53:32]
A
And I'm sure you can pay in bitcoin, hopefully in one of the bitcoins that are advertised on the Fox News Channel. You would think would be probably the best medium for that. There was something else that I thought was important to bring up, and now I'm totally blanking on what it is.
- [53:52]
B
I think it was hockey.
- [53:53]
A
It wasn't hockey. Seth, I'm going to give you 30 seconds on hockey, and then I'm going to cut you off. Go ahead. Do your little hockey thing. Go ahead.
- [54:05]
B
I just want. I'm proud of the American, the men's hockey team USA for beating the men's. The Sweden men's hockey team yesterday in overtime. It was a great game. They let up a late goal. Sweden tied it at one in the last minutes of the game. And. And then the US Team won in overtime. And all the stories are about how devastating this is for Sweden because they had real gold medal hopes, which is why Americans should be proud, because although we don't think of Sweden as an Olympics powerhouse, in general, it was a very big win. So go America.
- [54:42]
A
So America, you're saying, should celebrate because we crushed Sweden.
- [54:49]
B
Yeah, I know it doesn't sound like much.
- [54:52]
A
It doesn't sound like. I'm sorry, didn't even crush them.
- [54:56]
B
So I can't give you.
- [54:57]
A
When we beat the Soviet Union in 1980, when there was the Soviet Union and they were a better hockey power than we were, that was. That was a big story. But I. But you're just. You can't. You're not going to get me to care about hockey.
- [55:10]
B
What if they beat Canada? Can the. The women's gold medal game today? Isn't it against Canada? Is Canada big enough?
- [55:16]
A
I would know. Seriously, like, I would know. The only thing I saw last night when. When. When my wife was changing channels was some female curling final. And there. There they were with the brooms and the. And the. And the weird puck and. And. And then they sort of stopped in the middle, and then they were standing around talking to each other while the puck was in some circle. And I'm like, john, you.
- [55:41]
D
You as a commentator on the Olympics would be excellent.
- [55:46]
A
Yeah. Yes. It would be great. It would be like. It would be the ultimate sort of like, what the hell is this?
- [55:58]
B
There's a scene in the Simpsons. There's a soccer scene in the Simpsons like that where they have two announcers. One is the, you know, Spanish guy and one is the American guy. And the American guy's going wing passes to the center. Center passes to the other wing. Wing passes to the defenseman back to the center. And the Spanish guy's going wing passes to the center, center to defenseman back to the center. So it's all. That's how you would describe it.
- [56:23]
A
Now we've gone on. Now you got, you got another 30 seconds to talk about hockey by, by bringing in the Simpsons. Very clever. It's a very clever side move there. So you're always thinking, did you want
- [56:37]
C
to bring up Prince Andrew? Was that what was on your mind or. No.
- [56:41]
A
You mean Prince. You mean somebody called up the tobacconist and said, do you have Prince Andrew in the can?
- [56:48]
C
That's. Yes.
- [56:49]
A
Okay, that was good. Thank you very much. I have nothing to say about Prince Andrew.
- [56:56]
C
Yeah.
- [56:56]
A
Does anybody have anything to say about Prince Andrew?
- [56:59]
C
No, I didn't know. But you said you. There was something else on your mind, so I didn't know what it was.
- [57:02]
A
It wasn't that. I mean, I have nothing to. Apparently he gave confidential information to Epstein in the form of trade files. Wasn't. Wasn't apparently arrested for sex crimes. So.
- [57:14]
C
Right.
- [57:15]
A
Who knew that there was any confidential information to be had about Britain and, and trade like, you know, that's already. I'm. I'm happy to know that Britain has confidential files still that the, that Kim Philby didn't give to the Soviets 80 years ago. That's about as much as I know about Britain and you know, MI5 and M I, except for what I see on Slow Horses, which by the way, is a great show. If you haven't watched it, it's on Apple five seasons or six seasons. There's a. We've recommended it before.
- [57:49]
B
Not coming. It's not coming back for a seventh. Right. Or whatever it is.
- [57:52]
A
Oh, it's coming back.
- [57:53]
B
Oh, it is. Okay.
- [57:54]
A
It is coming.
- [57:54]
B
I saw somewhere that there was a, you know, I'm a new show, a new spy show coming to Apple for fans of. Of Solar. So I assumed that that was.
- [58:04]
A
No, it's coming back. Okay, now I do want to say one thing. I'm going to make a recommendation I made before. I'm going to make it now because I saw that it's now on streaming and. And so I'm doing it a second time because I'm going to browbeat you people into. Into watching this. It's Marty supreme, nominated for seven or eight or nine Oscars. Timothee Chalamet likely to win best actor for his performance. Performance in the title role. This is a movie set in 1952 New York about a. A ping pong hustler who was trying to get himself into. Into several international competitions and the pickeresque journey of disaster, comic and otherwise. That he has to go through to try to get the money together to go to England and then go to Tokyo. It is the best American movie in years. And many people have complained about it because they find the central character unpleasant or unappetizing or, you know, not. Not attractive enough. To which I say, don't be ridiculous. Like, great popular works of art often involve characters that you must feel ambiguously about. Like, what was the Sopranos, My Friends? What was Game of Thrones, My Friends? What was everything that you've loved over the last 20 years? To suddenly object to this because there's a. There's a character that you don't like whom I actually do like actually, but it doesn't matter. Like, there's plenty of movies about and shows about unappetizing characters that are nonetheless works of remarkable brilliance. And Marty supreme is one of them. And. And is the. Is exciting and funny and thrilling and shocking and incredibly surprising and goes places you never expect and depicts a world you've never seen before and depicts New York and Tokyo and London in 1952 with a kind of verisimilitude that is absolutely jaw dropping. So go rent Marty Supreme. Watch it, and if you don't like it, there's something wrong with you. That's all I'm saying. And we will be back tomorrow. So for Abe, Eliana and Seth, I'm John Podwortz. Keep the candle burn.