Transcript
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It's no surprise that newsmakers try to manipulate the audience. They want you to believe that they are the one holding the line, and they'll use any trick they can to get you there.
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But don't let them fool you.
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Get Unspun. I'm Amanda Sturgel. I've been a reporter, and today I teach future reporters to cut the spin and think critically about what newsmakers say. My podcast, Unspun, shows you how to know when you're being manipulated by the news, learn to spot the tricks, and how to make up your own mind about what's true. So if you're tired of being fooled by the news, subscribe to Unspun today. Unspun because you deserve the truth.
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MSW Media.
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News we're swearing Jelly beans. Jelly beans. Jelly beans. Daily Beans.
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Hello and welcome to the Daily beans for Thursday, March 12, 2026. Today, an investigation shows it was the United States that bombed the school in Iran, killing over 150 children. Trump has questioned AIDS about whether Corey Lewandowski profited from Kristi Gnome's $220 million ad deal. White nationalist Jeremy Carl has withdrawn from his nomination to the State Department. Pete Kegseth spent $9 million on crab legs, lobster, and steak at the end of the fiscal year. Democrat Sean Harris forces a runoff in the Georgia special election for Marjorie Taylor Greene's old seat. Democrats deliver a stunning flip in a New Hampshire special election. And the Pentagon bars press photographers over unflattering pictures of Hegseth. I'm your host, Alison G. Hey, everybody. Happy Thursday. Dana's out. She's doing her comedy show. I'll be here solo. Thanks for hanging with me. She will be back, I promise. We have so much news to cover today. I'm also gonna be delivering the Beans Talk on video for you at MSW Media's YouTube page. That's free every day. It comes out on weekdays, so you can check out our video podcast over there. It's different from this. I think you'll enjoy it. If you haven't seen it yet again, just Google MSW Media Beans Talk and you'll find it. It also has its own audio feed wherever you get your podcasts. Free to listen there as well. So, like I said, Dana's out. Thanks for hanging with me solo. Let's get to the news and hit the hot notes. Hot notes. All right, first up from the Times, an ongoing military investigation has determined that the United States is responsible for a deadly Tomahawk missile strike on an Iranian elementary school. According to U.S. officials and others familiar with the preliminary findings. The February 28th strike on the elementary school building was the result of a targeting mistake by the US Military, which was conducting strikes on an adjacent Iranian base of which the school building was formerly a part, the preliminary investigation found. Officers at U.S. cENTCOM Central Command created the target coordinates for the strike using outdated data provided by the Defense Intelligence Agency, according to people briefed on the investigation. Officials emphasized that the findings are preliminary and that there are important unanswered questions about why the outdated information had not been double checked. Now, striking a school full of children is sure to be recorded as one of the most devastating single military errors in recent decades. Iranian officials have said the death toll was at least 175people, most of them children, and I have some thoughts about this. This is people leaking preliminary findings to the New York Times, according to the Pentagon's investigation into this so that's what this particular Pentagon is saying happened, that they had outdated maps and outdated targeting data from the Defense Intelligence Agency. So if for some reason that's not actually the case, they would rather go for incompetent than cruelty. But regardless of the reason, those children are dead. There's also some reporting, and I haven't confirmed this with any other news media outlets, but first responders on the ground have said that there was actually a double tap strike on that school. That's a war crime because basically what they do in a double tap strike is you hit first and then as everybody comes and rushes to the scene, you hit again and you maximize the the death toll. But again, hasn't been confirmed by any other media outlets. But I'll be watching this very closely because the Pentagon is investigating itself in this particular case. Next up from the Independent Secretary of Defense Pete Kegseth's Pentagon apparently isn't feeling the same affordability struggles as many average Americans, as he approved spending more than $93 billion with a B in September alone, including luxury food items and iPads. A new analysis published by the government watchdog Open the Books found that in September, the end of the fiscal year remember, the fiscal year for the government ends September 30 and begins October 1. Hegseth reportedly burned through cash, including spending $9 million on crab and lobster dinners. According to Military.com, an increase in military officials eating pricey meals has traditionally been viewed as a sign that that something may be brewing, such as President Donald Trump's war in Iran. Though it appears Hegseth has been dining well at the Pentagon since at least spring, the Spending review found that in the month of September alone, the Defense Department spent 6.9 million $7 million in total on lobster tail. $7 million on lobster tail, 2 million on Alaskan king crab. That's according to the government watchdog. In 2025, the department also spent more than $7.4 million on lobster tail across the months of March, May, June. The decadent seafood wasn't the only expensive sustenance purchased at the Pentagon. Hegseth also spent about $15.1 million on ribeye steak in September, 124,000 for new ice cream machines, and 139,000 on donut orders. Due to the way the federal funding works, there is pressure on department heads to end their fiscal years without a surplus of funds, because if they do, it raises questions to Congress in Congress as to whether or not the agency needs a reduction in its annual budget. This is common. I worked for the federal government in budgeting. It's very common to spend a bunch of money, because if you don't use it or lose it, basically in order to justify the same or higher budget in the next fiscal year, you have to show that you needed that money. But I've never seen this kind of money spent on these kinds of items before. This is where we get the old trope, oh, $400 hammer, $10,000 toilet, right? But at the VA, it was a little bit different. When I worked at the Department of Veterans affairs, it was a little different because the way that we would do things is if our VA hospital, for example, had a budget surplus based on all the money that was appropriated out and divided equally amongst the hospitals or by patient numbers. If we had a budget surplus, we would give that money to a different VA hospital that had a budget deficit so that they could make up the money and we would all come out even. But we had to beg for every penny because Republicans often cut or lowered our budget at the Department of Veterans Affairs. And so it was very difficult. We fought so hard for about a $12 billion increase back in 2014 because Republicans didn't want to give us too much money. $12 billion. But the Pentagon spending 93 billion billion alone in the month of September, including tens of millions of dollars on this kind of food. There's more, and I'll get into it here as the article goes on, and the Independent says some of the purchases are lavish. And September Heg spent nearly $100,000 on a Steinway grand piano to outfit the home of the Air Force Chief of Staff. $100,000 Piano he also spent $5.3 million on Apple devices, including brand new iPads. According to the report, The Pentagon paid 225.6 million for furniture, including $12,500 for fruit basket stands and more, and then $60,000 for recliners from high end furniture maker Herman Miller. That's who makes the Eames chair. Those are $7,000 chairs. Congresswoman Melanie Stansbury, a New Mexico Democrat, says she plans to launch an investigation into Hegseth spending. Quote, in addition to billions of taxpayer dollars being burned in this war in Iran, reports are showing that Secretary Pete Hegseth blew $93 billion in federal DoD funding at the end of last year. That's what she wrote on social media before listing the various expenditures. Quote, you better believe we'll be investigating. In February 2025, Hegseth said he welcomed a Department of Government efficiency review of Defense spending to help him find ways to reduce waste. Really, Quote, we need to know when we spend dollars, we need to know where they're going and why. That simple accounting and that has not existed at the Defense Department. That's what Hegseth told Fox News at the time. Quote, we're going to fix that, he said. This reminds me of when Kash Patel sat there and criticized. I think it was Jim comey, oh, that's $15,000 every time you fly that private FBI jet, because the director of the FBI has to fly that jet because he's got to have secure communications in case something happens, etc. Etc. And meanwhile, he's going to Italy, drinking with hockey teams, going to Boondoggle ranch down in Texas, visiting his girlfriend, singing the national anthem in Tennessee, spending. I mean, that trip to Italy alone was hundreds of Thousands of dollars. 70,000 for the jet alone. And back then, he's like, oh, we should just ground that jet. I can't believe we're wasting money on shit like that. So Hegseth's like, yeah, we need to look into the Defense Department. We're going to fix that fraud, waste and abuse. Now, the Pentagon spending spree came just weeks before millions of Americans lost access to their snap food benefits, leaving the states to fill in the gaps. Now, six months later, Americans are learning the astronomical cost of, of Trump and Hegseth's war in Iran. So I'm very much looking forward to that investigation. We'll get further in that investigation. If we flip the House and the Senate, we could have, we could have investigations in both of those. All right, we have more news to get to, more hot notes but we're going to take a quick break, so everybody stick around. We'll be right back after these messages. We'll be right back. Hey everybody. I live with several cats, which means I start every day with a lot of opinions and almost all of them are about food. They do not care what story I'm covering, they don't care about the news, they don't care how many tabs I have open or whether I'm on a deadline. They just want breakfast handled asap. Around here. Smalls helps me keep the peace, the bowls get emptied, the protests stop, and my furry little managers let me begin my day now. 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