← Truth in the Barrel
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When I found out I was going to be a parent, I immediately felt a lot of anxiety and worry. So I went on to BetterHelp to try to look for a therapist to help me with that.
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My relationship with my family and with my boyfriend and with myself were suffering.
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I really needed help. I was ruminating a lot.
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Really getting those thoughts out to a
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therapist and getting feedback was just life changing. Discover what BetterHelp online therapy can do for you and visit betterhelp.com today. Hi, everyone. Welcome back to an unfiltered edition of Truth in the barrel. I'm Amy McGrath. I'm here with my good friend, co host Nicole Malachowski. Great to see you.
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B
It's good to see you too, friend. Thanks for having me.
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A
Yeah. We have a big news week this week from Trump going toe to toe in China with Xi Jinping to what's going on in Iran, the sort of stalemate right there and then with the Republicans gerrymandering everything after the Voting Rights act was essentially gutted and taken away. So we've got a lot to get through. Let's start, Nicole, with what's going on with the summit between our president and the Chinese president there. It's a two day summit. It's in Beijing. He flew out there to talk about lots of different things. I feel like, well, right now we're halfway through the summit and it doesn't appear, at least to me, that there's really any movement on anything. I'm not surprised because I feel like our president went over there in kind of a stance of weakness right now because, because of what the United States has done in the Strait of Hormuz. But he put this trip off by six weeks, assuming that there would be different conditions heading into this conference. There aren't. I think the conditions are actually worse.
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B
Correct.
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A
But what do you see us getting anything out of this at all?
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B
No, I don't see anything coming out of this at all. I think, you know, I'm trying to find positives. You know, the positive thing is that we're keeping a dialogue with China, which is supremely, you know, important. We don't want them to have big global ambitions, but we do know they have regional ambitions. And what I do hope is that they're talking about Taiwan. And I hope that our president administration is reaffirming our commitment to the protection of the Taiwanese, Taiwanese people. And as you probably know, there is a bipartisan bill that's currently, you know, in D.C. trying to be passed to go ahead and sign an armament weapons sale to Taiwan. And so that's obviously going to be a point of contention. And I certainly hope that that is at least a conversation that comes up. Maybe other things that come out of it could be some sort of economic deals with Chinese investment. You and I could spend hours arguing whether or not that is a good or a bad thing for the American people.
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A
Yeah. I don't know when, when, when our president comes back from some of these talks and says, you know, these countries have committed billions and trillions of dollars, I just, Yeah, I mean, I feel like other countries are going to say anything to this president. So he could. Or he's just going to make it up to come back here and, and, you know, say that he got a win. Yeah.
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B
If there are investments, you know, the majority of any kind of benefits are going to probably benefit the billionaire class and not the average American worker.
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A
Well, in one thing, Nicole, I mean, that Trump needs to address here, and I'm not sure he's going to, is China. We think and know our intelligence is telling us that they're supplying targeting data and technology to the Iranians right now for their missiles. You know, and I know we're going to talk about Iran later on here in the show, but the images of US Bases being damaged, that came from Chinese satellite pictures that were given to the Iranians. So, I mean, we know there's a connection there. And also Trump is going there, we think, to get China to use its influence with Iran to get open the Strait of Hormuz, which baffles me now, we need China. Right. To help us.
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B
So to your point, the footing of our power, our influence is on shaky ground. And it wasn't prior to us, you know, having this new administration come in. So we are coming into, I think, this summit with a position of weakness. For sure.
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A
Maybe China will help. I mean, they get 30% of their oil and gas from the Strait. But I, I don't know, I kind of feel like China is going to make, would love to make the United States and hurt a little bit here.
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B
Well, the fact of the matter is, you know, President Xi is already watching this whole Iran debacle and he's probably going, you know, he's smiling just a little bit because it feeds right into his regional desires and goals. They want nothing more than to see a weakened United States of America. So I don't know. This is a, an interesting time for US China relations to be sure. And I think hopefully maybe they will help open the Strait of Hormuz. But remember, with Any kind of deal like that with our deal president, there's always second, third order effects or second, third order, you know, complexity. So I wouldn't just take whatever top level message comes out of this tomorrow.
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A
Well, and you talked about Taiwan. A lot of people were worried, including in Taiwan, that our president would go over there with being a little bit weaker right now and kind of give a little bit to, to the President of China on Taiwan. So far, we're halfway through this. We don't, we don't know. The readout from the first day from both sides doesn't really say much. The Chinese sort of did their normal don't, don't mess with us, you know, kind of on Taiwan readout. And the United States readout apparently really didn't talk about Taiwan at all. So I don't, I don't know if any things going to, going to happen there.
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B
I, I don't know. I think it's interesting though, because there is that bipartisan, you know, weapons sale bill from the United States to Taiwan that is sitting on Capitol Hill right now. And I know that the folks sponsoring that bill are putting pressure on the current delegation to at least bring up the subject.
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A
The United States needs the output of the semiconductors in Taiwan. So, you know, we don't want to give Taiwan up. The, the AI chips are the core of the AI revolution. That's kind of the next technology that we know we need. So, you know, this is a, this is a big deal.
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B
Yeah. And to that point, you know, China has a lot of things that we buy from them as well. So they have definite economic leverage here. I think you started this out correctly. Right. You know, our president delayed this summit because he had hoped we were just going to go into Iran militarily only get exactly what we wanted, and he was going to roll into China as some sort of strongman. And that's exactly the opposite of what's happening. So China has, at this point, they do.
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A
And the tariff thing that was started, you know, over a year ago really hasn't turned out the way that, that our president expected it to turn out. That's a huge issue for the Chinese. But, you know, the Chinese see that they were able to get Donald Trump to back down when they cut off the rare earth, you know, metals to the United States. And now the Chinese see our Congress, well, not our Congress. I wish our Congress would stand up. But as the Supreme Court saying that, hey, these, these tariffs are illegal. So they're kind of watching what's going on and, and Seeing that Donald Trump doesn't have as much power as, you know, he might think.
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B
Yeah, I agree with you.
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A
Yeah. Well, I want to get on to what's going on in Iran because I've been really wanting to ask you here. Right now, we're in this ceasefire, which is kind of a ceasefire, but not kind of a ceasefire. The United States floated an agreement, potential starting point for talks. The IR response was, hell, no. And then Trump rejected that response.
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B
Right.
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A
And where do you see this end?
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B
Yeah, you know, it's funny because people have asked me the same thing. You know, what is your prediction? I'll tell you. Well, the first prediction I had is exactly what's happening. Right. There was never going to be a military only solution to the Iran problem. The fact that our administration thought that there could be a military only solution blows my mind. But we have a terminal major who never went to war college as our Secretary of Defense. So maybe I shouldn't be surprised. But you and I both know from our military schooling and training, we war game Iran. From, from the time, you know, I entered the Air Force to the time I retired, Iran, we war gamed. We knew. I could have told you a million years ago, just like you, that where we are was easily predictable, where we are was easily avoidable. There was never a military only solution. And so the point to your question is moving forward, it ain't a military only solution. Right. I mean, this is going to have to be all the different elements of national security, to include diplomacy, to include economic. I think the military part, the shock and awe part, is already done. We can continue to plink for months, years to come if we want to. But I think we've seen where that's gone for our country and it certainly doesn't go well. So I think there's going to have to be some kind of diplomatic solution eventually. Right now we're just dragging out a stalemate. It's painful and it's hurting our economy and it's hurting the American people.
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A
I hear you. And when I think about the spectrum of where, what the future holds now, if you think things could change, look, if the Iranian regime collapses, for example, okay, now we're in a whole new world.
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B
Sure.
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A
But if that doesn't happen, I feel like the spectrum ranges from kind of these two points. One, like we would have to, in order to change things on the extreme end, invade a country that is larger than Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan combined. Okay, horrible choice. Nobody, nobody wants to do.
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B
Nobody, nobody.
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A
On the other end of the spectrum I don't see a whole lot of good options. I really feel like the best option, sadly, is a negotiated settlement in which Iran gets a lot of stuff.
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B
I think Iran's going to come out of this stronger. I agree with you. I think there's going to be a negotiated, diplomatic type settlement. It's going to take several more weeks, months, maybe even years to get to. And that settlement is going to have them better off than the Obama administration had us. The ones that are going to win out of this whole thing, not just tactically, but strategically.
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A
I feel like they're not, they're not going to give up their nuclear material. I feel like they, you know, they, they have that control of the Strait of Hormuz that they know they have now. And I feel like that we've, we've undergone, and I hope this is not correct, but we may have undergone a complete shift here in that if Iran is able to control the Strait of Hormuz and charge for it. Now, you're the, the whole idea of the, the maritime, the, the, you know, certain areas, the common areas are internationally. They're not owned by anyone. That, that kind of post Cold War or Post World War II World is, is gone. If they're able to keep control and charge for it, which I, I think the Chinese might be okay with.
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B
You're going right where I'm going. I think this is the top of conversation at the summit right now. I think the Chinese would love nothing more than to partner with Iran and controlling the Strait of Hormuz and being a partner in taking some of that funding and the charges and the fees. I think they're going to charge like $2 million a ship or something like that for passage.
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A
Yeah. And I'm really worried about, because what's. That's going, what that's going to do is to all the other choke points in the world.
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B
Sure.
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A
You know, I mean, now. Yes.
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B
And the thing is, is, you know, the administration keeps throwing this out. Well, you know, the United States only gets, you know, less than 20% of its oil. You're not the Strait of Hormuz. We're not dependent on Iran. We don't care. Well, okay, someone who's not maybe studied global economics might fall for that line. But remember, oil and stuff is priced globally. So whether or not we get our oil, you know, directly from the Strait of Horrors is irrelevant because it impacts the entire global economy. So it is an issue for us. And I guarantee you China is pushing for that kind of deal right now.
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A
You know, when people would say to me when the rise of Donald Trump, you know, back in 2016 and that sort of, I would, I would think about it in terms of like, wow, this is, this is really bad. The global world order that we know is at risk. And a lot of people didn't under. I mean, it kind of goes over people's heads. This is, this is like an example of this, you know. And I feel like that is true with nuclear non proliferation too. I feel like there's a lot of other countries that are going to look at the United States and say they can't protect us and want to get nuclear weapons. And we're seeing, I think, the crumbling of a world order that frankly the greatest generation build for us. And I'm very worried about that.
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B
I'm worried about it too. You know, the, the global world order that we have enjoyed is relatively stable. Right. It hasn't been perfect by any stretch, but we had an opportun, I think, to make it better. Instead we came in with a sledgehammer with no, like, vision for what the replacement is going to look like. Right. We're just cracking at the foundation of something that, you know, was imperfect but at least was keeping the house up, if you know what I'm saying.
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A
Yeah. And we talk a lot about strategy because, you know, we had, we were military officers that rose to a rank where you did some strategy. Right. As opposed to tactics. But tactically here we, apparently the. Iran's military is much stronger than claimed. There's this secret US Intelligence assessment that just came out that said Iran's military remains much stronger. I mean, I want to get your take. I was always skeptical when we started bombing. You and I have done this. Air power is, can do a lot of things, but it's not perfect and it can't win these wars. And I just feel like it doesn't surprise me that we have intelligence that says Iran has operational access to 30 of the 33 missile sites along the Strait of Hormuz. Still, it doesn't surprise me at all. It doesn't surprise me that the strait is still closed, that this Project Freedom that I don't even know really what the objective was other than to try to escort ships through the strait.
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B
Didn't last 36 hours, I think.
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A
I mean, but I guess I want to get your take. I mean, first of all, you operated in the area of the Persian Gulf, but like, did you ever do, you know, war games that talked about this, you know, that, hey, air power is not going to 100%.
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B
I mean, interestingly, as an Air Force officer, I happen to actually be the distinguished graduate of the US Naval War College. So I've actually got a little bit of. You got both, believe it or not, knowledge on this and 100%. Look, Air Power 101 that you learned as a brand new lieutenant flying that F15E or F18 is that Air power does some things really great. Right. It can definitely secure the environment necessary for a strategic victory, but it never is going to take ground, it's never going to do regime change, it's never going to secure enriched uranium. Right. And the idea that air power alone was going to solve this entrenched, you know, decades long problem with Iran is extremely shortsighted. And to your point, Iran and China are the two. Iran, China. Right. And North Korea I guess are like the three main things that we consistently studied on a daily basis across my 20 plus year military career. We, where we are right now was completely predictable. And it shows again that we had a secretary, we have a Secretary of Defense who topped out at Major, never went to a war college. I'll be honest, I do have some hope in General Kane. I do believe that he is a man of character and I do believe that he is smart enough from a strategic thinking standpoint. How much is he able to, you know, shape that and keep the bumpers on? I don't know. How do you feel about General King? Well, it's okay. It's crazy.
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A
I don't know him personally. It's nice to see just from what I've seen in the press conferences, somebody that has some character.
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B
Yes.
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A
And somebody that's able to focus on the things that matter and not be as thin skinned as a person like Pete Hegseth. And so that gives me hope. On the other hand, I think this is a huge strategic failure. What has happened.
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B
Absolutely.
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A
And it is. I just wish I knew what kind of military tactical and strategic advice was given to the Secretary of Defense, to the President of the United States and clearly anybody that like you and like me that have done these war games, if we, we knew kind of what was going to happen. And I feel like man, it was almost be something that you would want to resign over. And also the thing is that I've been very disappointed in this from a, from a military perspective. You know, we got the F. F15 shot down the first day because we didn't tell our partners, you know, they were shot down by our partners. We didn't do the coordination on the, on the civilian side. With other nations in the region. It was just, you know, United States, we're going to do this by ourselves. And that, that is a recipe for just disaster. And it did. And I just, I feel like that, along with the damage to our bases, I mean, Nicole, why. Why does the American people have to see pictures of the damage to our bases that were handed over by the Iranians from Chinese satellites? Oh, it's a we can't trust situation. Right. We can't trust our own Secretary of Defense. We can't trust our own president to be honest about the, the cost of this and what has happened.
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B
Let's just say they keep throwing out that 29 billion dollar, you know, number. And from the last count I had, we've lost 39 different kind of aircraft or aerospace vehicles. You know, that's more than $29 billion, the years that it's going to take to rebuild those installations or to improve those installations. The money involved in that, like, we have been set back not just billions of dollars, but we have been set back in time, and time was not something that's on anybody's side. You know, when you're in these kind of, you know, big strategic fights, you know, going back to General Kane, I want to be transparent. You know, I do know him. And so I bring a certain level of bias to the statement that I made. And I agree with you at a certain level. I've talked to some of my friends that are still in, like, at what point do you fall on your sword and just resign? Because this is so ridiculous. It's so outside of any kind of process, procedure, professional standards that we have. That's why it's called the profession of arms, because it's a profession. At the same time, along with my bias in support of General King, the man, I would say I'm glad that there are people that are willing to stay, because if he were to just resign and abdicate, what happens next? Right. It's just like we're seeing with regime change, you know, if you cut off the snake, what comes in next? And so I'm holding out a personal biased hope in support that General Kane is the guy that's trying to keep this within some semblance of reason.
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A
That's fair. That's a really good point. You know, Pete Hegseth was on the Hill this week and answering questions from lawmakers, and I, you know, I've been asked, what would you ask him as a senator? You know, I mean, the first thing I would ask him is, what is the strategic Goal now.
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B
Right.
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A
You know, I mean, I know he likes to think in tactical terms, but he is the Secretary of Defense. What. What is the goal now? Is the goal simply to open up the Strait of Hormuz?
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C
What.
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A
What are we doing?
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B
Yeah, we have no idea what the end state objectives is because they've never been articulated by this administration. Or they throw things out one day, sort of, and then the next day it's something, you know, completely different. And this goes back to this idea that there is a profession of arms, there is a way that we plan and we execute our nation's wars. And all of that was bypassed or completely ignored. Look, you could make. Someone can make the argument that a military strike on Iran at this time and date was the right thing to do. Maybe that argument can be made. But it needed to be brought to the American people through our Congress. Right. It needed to be brought to the American people for discussion, because that's why we have senators and representatives, so that they can ask the question that you just asked, that we can have that end state objective, the goals, the level of risk we're willing to take, all talked out. And then the second step we forgot about was, I don't know, talking to our allies, creating a coalition and making sure, at a minimum, that we coordinate with them. Two major, just junior varsity steps in any kind of military action. And we just blew off both of them.
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A
And the other part of this is you can't just do all of this with just the military. I mean, no matter what the objective was, you need something beyond the military. And we have. You know, our military has performed really well in many of the areas that we've asked the military to do, but we have completely bungled the rest of it. The diplomacy part of this, you're right. The strategic thinking part of this, we. It's like we don't even know who we're negotiating with. And if you're the Iranians, why would you ever trust the United States? Why would you ever trust Donald Trump? Every time they send a negotiating team, we bomb them and try to kill them. Like, it doesn't. It just. It is beyond my understanding or ability to comprehend what we're doing. And we're asking our military to do everything, which is impossible.
- [23:10]
B
Absolutely. And so I completely concur with you, the American people, and all your listeners. We need to keep our service members and their military families in our hearts, in our prayers, and think about it every time we talk to our representatives, because these are America's sons and daughters who are out there risking their lives and we've already lost, you know, 13Americans over this. So this is very real and very serious. And you're right.
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A
Absolutely.
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B
There was no way this was going to be a military only solution. This just goes to show the lack of just education and knowledge on strategy by both our President and the Secretary of Defense. You know, this idea that, well, we went into Venezuela with military action alone and in just a few hours we had regiments change and it worked out great. So that's going to apply to Iran. Right. This idea that the Venezuela situation is equivalent to Iran is, shows a deep lack of understanding. Yeah.
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A
And the complete discounting of all other elements that are important of power. Like, you know, you can tell we didn't coordinate with any of our, our, our partners and allies. We just, I guess we don't need them, you know. Yes, we do. You know, I mean, it's just I, that part of it almost unbelievable really.
- [24:26]
B
For me, he's just, he's not qualified for the role or the position that he's in. And I don't say that to be partisan or to be trite or to just, you know, throw a spoon at the hornet's nest. It's just, as the days go by, it becomes so obvious to me how deeply disqualified he is. And it's, it's sad because it's costing American lives.
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A
When you're spending your time doing videos of pull ups and talking about, you know, the run standards.
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B
Yeah.
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A
Or women in combat and you're just, you're missing what you're supposed to be doing as a Secretary of Defense and we're all paying the price. I mean, strategically brain dead right now.
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B
He's feeding right into the 25% of his base though. They love it.
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A
I know, I know.
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B
Well, what I've learned, what I've really learned over this last, this administration. And this is going to sound obvious to you because you're smarter than me, I'm sure. But like education is a national security imperative. And I think one of the biggest priorities of whoever comes in the next administration, Republican, Democrat, anything in between. We need to really get America's education levels back up because our lack of critical thinking, our lack of being able to sort through information and misinformation has gotten us into this, what is now going to be an entrenched war.
- [25:47]
A
Yeah. We need to do a whole other show on that because there's a lot of data coming out saying, you know, hey, our educational standards here in the, you know, our kids, we're, we're failing them right now.
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B
Right?
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A
This past week, the Supreme Court completely gutted the Voting Rights Act. And the Voting Rights act, of course, passed in the 1960s. It was one of the most momentous pieces of civil rights legislation. And it was really important because minority groups have been discriminated against since the Civil War. And it made that discrimination in terms of voting. It gave rights. It gave that, you know, that. That ability for black Americans to have representation. And that's really important. And the Supreme Court basically said, oh, we, we don't need that anymore. We're in a colorblind society. And now, of course, the gerrymandering wars have reached a new level of bad. And I just, you know, I want to get your. Your take on this. I know there are some people out there that, that don't believe we need the Voting Rights act anymore. I just think that the fact that all of these states immediately started to gerrymander right after this tells you we
- [27:12]
B
do 100% agree with you. So this is, I think, a very, very dark time. Think of everything our country had to go through to culminate to that point of needing the Voting Rights Act. Oh, God, I'm a little bit, like, just taken aback because I. I cannot believe that it's happening. I mean, this is a just foundational Civil Rights Act. That's important, I think, to the fabric, you know, the fabric of America. I think that it was also predictable in so much as looking at this Supreme Court. Justice Roberts has made it very clear for decades now that, you know, he thought that that had gone, you know, too far, right? That race shouldn't be a part of any of this. So he has said that publicly for a while. So now we have a Supreme Court that tends to be obviously more conservative. So I think time and place kind of came to this, you know, culminating moment where the Supreme Court can say, we are in a post racial utopia here in the United States of America, right? There is no racism in the United States. That is distant past history. That is unequivocally false. And any person that is even remotely reasonable knows that that's not true. I mean, Ruby Bridges has a TikTok channel, right? Ruby Bridges is still. This isn't past history, man. This is now. And we could very easily start slipping back to that. Look what they did in Tennessee. I mean, I. I tuned into the television. I was watching those very brave, I think, Democratic Democrat lawmakers, you know, take an appropriate stand there. You know, Memphis, 60% black Americans, all of a sudden, they do this really weird. Like, you know, three district split and cracking. Now there's not, yeah. Now there's not even a majority black American vote in any of those districts. That is insane. And here's how I know that they were racially biased when they did it, because when you watch those Tennessee lawmakers get questioned by the, the very, you know, strong Democrat representatives, they were like, did they asked one guy, did you know that Memphis is, you know, predominantly a black community, 60% black. This guy in his 50s or 60s looks into the camera, goes, no, I had no idea. Who in their right mind who lives in Tennessee doesn't know that? You know, And I, in transparency again, Tennessee State Senator Romesh Akbari, and I highly recommend the listeners follow her, is a friend of mine and, you know, I've been talking to her, you know, a lot about this and they're not done. Right. This isn't just something that's, that's settled. I think you're going to see Tennessee and the Democratic Party there, you know, fight back.
- [29:48]
A
Good, good. And we're seeing this chaos in Louisiana. Right. The governor there canceled the election, the primary and in which was, you know, already happening. People had already voted, I think, or 45 invalidated, 100,000 ballots that had already been cast. I mean, the cracking as you talked about, it's, it's, it's terrible. And I think about John Roberts and, and this Supreme Court and what you said really hit me. It's the same concept when they passed Citizens United, when they, when they struck down and allowed all this money into elections. Like, oh, you know, this money, these, this is going to influence elections because, you know, they're third party organizations and so they should have the right of speech and, you know, you should be able to get, have, you know, folks like elon Musk spending $10 million in a place that, you know, to buy an election that he's never even set foot in the state. It is this concept that I, I don't really fully understand it. It's, it's like they, they're not living in the real world.
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B
Nope.
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A
They, they're just some sort of post
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B
racial utopia going on in the United States. There's no racism. I guess they want to consistently say, you know, we don't see color.
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A
Okay, well, I think what has to happen is the Senate and the House have to be flipped and we have to get a president that will sign the John Lewis Voting Rights Act.
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B
Yes.
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A
To reinstitute this because it's really important for our democracy, for real representation, for Everyone.
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B
Absolutely. And, you know, thank you for teaching me the term cracking. That's why you should be a senator. So the very thing that is going on with the cracking and the gerrymandering is the very thing that led to the. The dilution of the black American vote way back when. Right. That led to the Voting Rights Act. Right. The exact things that we are doing right now in this country are the things that forced the Voting Rights Act. If past this prologue, I guess it's. It's terrible. You know, you bring up Louisiana, New Orleans, Louisiana. I keep. I follow Ruby Bridges, you know, on Instagram. This isn't past history, friends. That's a real quick and easy slope we can go back to.
- [32:09]
A
We are going backwards in so many ways. You know, between Citizens United, between the repeal of Roe v. Wade and. And now this. I.
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B
It's just.
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A
It's bad.
- [32:21]
B
Well, I hope. I hope people will. This is a, you know, a complex issue, but it's an extremely important one for our country. And I hope people. I'm serious. Tennessee State Senator Romesh Akbari. Follow her. She's excellent. She makes sense to me.
- [32:34]
A
Well, at least we've got people fighting. And we need to be fighting from the outside, too. All right, so gas prices are up, as we know. We talked about why. We all know why we're shooting ourselves in the foot. We did that with this Iran war. You know, we don't. We don't need to have gas prices through the roof. The average is $4 and 50 cents a gallon around the country. What is it in. In Kentucky, I can tell you it's about 4, 422, 430. What is in Colorado, is it.
- [33:02]
B
I am in col. And I purposely, after I dropped my kids off at school this morning, I purposely detoured to see what the price of unleaded fuel was. And it's $4.59.
- [33:11]
A
And the thing about this is, we're talking about. The president is talking about suspending the gas tax here. Our governor is talking about suspending the state part of the gas tax. But all of that we didn't need to do this is just, again, it's just crazy. Shooting ourselves in the foot. And the gas tax, I'm a proponent of suspending it, but really there are consequences with doing that. Right. You know, it costs us. We are creating a hole in the highway trust fund when we do that. That repairs our roads. You know, it doesn't really lower consumer prices that much.
- [33:53]
B
You know, I'm not saying I disagree with you as much as I don't think it does anything. So what? The federal tax, take 18 cents off. Okay, great. Now I'm paying $4.40 a gallon and I'm doing it at the cost to the highway trust fund. Right. Our infrastructure, which we already know is old and dilapidated and needs to should have started fixing a long time ago. Right. Our highways, our bridges. And even if the Colorado, you know, state tax, that's going to take it down another, you know, 20 cents. Great. Now I'm, now I'm paying $4 and, you know, 15 cents, it's still ridiculously high. So in a lot of ways I feel like especially the Trump administration at the federal level is treating this as a symbolic statement. Right. Again, people that aren't maybe well versed or don't want to look into the economy and the economics of oil and all of that, they're going to be like, well, that's great. Right. He's passing the, you know, a reduction in the tax. Okay, first of all, it ain't going to make that big a difference to your wallet. And second of all, it's going to have second and third order effects down the road to your local, state and federal infrastructure.
- [34:51]
A
Yeah. And we just, it's, it's almost like this. It's the standard Trump thing. Create a problem and then do a little bit to try to fix it and then call it a victory. Look at, look how much I've done. It's like here in Kentucky last week, it was hilarious to me to watch. Well, it was right after, remember when King Charles came to the United States and met with the President. And afterwards the President said, I really liked my meeting with King Charles and I'm going to take off the tariffs with England. And so the bourbon industry, we had Republican politicians here, some of whom I'm running against, all come in and say, oh, this is great news. Thank you, President Trump for helping our bourbon industry. I mean, he's the one that screwed over the bourbon industry to begin with.
- [35:44]
B
I don't get it. I don't get the people that fall for this. I think that's the part that blows, just, you know, blows my mind. Right. Yes. We all of these are kind of self induced errors.
- [35:57]
A
Yeah. In, in airfares that the price of airfare is going up. The diesel fuel, of course, is up. That means everything that is delivered by truck or train, you know, goes up, your grocery prices will go up, energy costs, everything. The, the whole supply chain. And again, it didn't need to happen. And of course, inflation is now the highest it's been since COVID And, you
- [36:24]
B
know, we're coming into the summer season, right, which is where American families like you and I like to hit the road, go on a vacation, spend time with our kids. I think people are going to really start feeling that, right in the cost of, you know, Secretary Duffy, right? He says, get out there and do the great American road trip with your family. Yeah, dude. If I, you know, have to mortgage my, you know, stick out a second mortgage on my home to afford the fuel or to afford those airline tickets or the cost of hotel and everything else, I think this summer is gonna. I don't know. I think it's gonna hit quite a few American families.
- [36:54]
A
And there's a real disconnect with our leadership, whether it's the President of the United States saying, I'm not interested in the finances of Americans, which, you know, maybe may or may not have been taken out of context, but, you know, it's that kind of stuff. And then it's this Golden Ballroom that he wants to make, which originally he said, hey, I'm going to have donors pay for this. Well, now we need to have a billion dollars of taxpayer money pay for, you know, some kind of security upgrade for this thing. I mean, the American people don't. Don't want this.
- [37:28]
B
No, I mean, come on. Again, this is another one of those bait and switch. It's all going to be paid for this and that. And then we had, you know, the unfortunate event that happened at the White House correspondence dinner. So now they're utilizing that to say, well, Now I need $1 billion. Right, for security, you know, upgrades for the Secret Service. Look, I'll be honest. I've been in the White House three different times under both Republican and Democrat administrations. I physically had an office where I sat in the East Wing itself. And I can't admit, honestly that the East Wing certainly needed a renovation or a facelift. It didn't need to be completely torn, you know, torn down. And we certainly don't need the monstrosity of the ballroom that's being put in. Can there be some security upgrades done? I bet you. But that needs to be done transparently. It needs to be done in accordance with the formal processes that are in place for a reason. All right? And it's all just.
- [38:24]
A
I mean, he just continues to act like a dictator. But I. I want to finish today with some. Some goods and bads, because that deal with veterans and military retirees. So there is. You talked about it earlier when we were chatting before the show about the Major Richard Starr Act. And this is. Can you tell us about that? Because this is something that's really good that's happening.
- [38:50]
B
I think so, too. And, you know, when the conversation you and I had before this started, it was my kids were kind of like, hey, mom, can you find anything good, you know, about the current administration? Because I tend to be very critical right now, you know, vis a vis the conversation you and I have had over the last 30 minutes. But one of the things I agree with our secretary of Defense on is the administration support of the Major Richard Starr Act. And so what this does is it allows our combat injured, medically retired folks to be able to receive both full retirement pay and their VA disability compensation. They don't have to offset between the two, like most people. It's not for everybody that's on VA disability pay. This is reserved for combat injured, medically retired, that they can get both of those additively, which I think is completely reasonable. It'll impact about 54,000 veterans across the United States. I think it's a good thing. I fully support it, and I'm delighted to see Secretary Hegseth support that publicly.
- [39:48]
A
Well, it is the right thing to do, and I'm glad that it's done as well. I mean, we want to talk about protecting our veterans, our combat veterans. This makes sense to me and it should make sense for all Americans. I feel like there's not enough that we give to the people who have sacrificed for our country. And this is one way to right a wrong.
- [40:11]
B
Yeah, I concur. And this should be a completely nonpartisan issue.
- [40:15]
A
Yeah, good. Well, on the other hand, I've been really shocked. I shouldn't be shocked, but I am still shocked about Pete Hegseth's judgment when it comes to going after Senator Mark Kelly and frankly, going after all retirees. And there are freedom of speech. Last week, the Judges of the U.S. court of Appeals for the D.C. circuit questioned the Pentagon over its assertion that Senator Kelly, who is a retired Navy captain, is subject to military punishment for participating in a video that called service members simply to refuse illegal orders. Which everything that those folks said in that video was true. And now the Pentagon going after Mark Kelly is really trying to go after us, go after military retirees and say you don't have freedom of speech. If you speak freely, you're going to give up. You're going to potentially give up your retirement pay, give up your rank, give up all the things that you, you know, the benefits that you've fought for that, you, you, you earned.
- [41:35]
B
Right.
- [41:35]
A
And that's the price that our military retirees and veterans have to pay if they want to speak freely. I mean, and the court said no.
- [41:45]
B
But, you know, I gotta tell you, that's exactly what's happening. Right. Senator Kelly, fighter pilot, astronaut, someone who has more credibility, experience and skill than our Secretary of Defense, is a litmus test, I think, for the larger, you know, veteran community. When I watched Secretary Hegseth get asked about, you know, this issue with Senator Kelly, as I was watching the television, all I kept thinking to myself was like, secretary Hegseth is palpably insecure to the point of breathtaking. I mean, this, what he is doing is so ridiculous and so beyond the pale. The very things that were said in that video are the very things both you and I learned over and over throughout our military career, studied it, and was part of professional military education. Oh, by the way, we take an oath to the Constitution, which includes, of course, the First Amendment, which is freedom of speech. This is 100% testing the waters to try to stop podcasts like yours and mine.
- [42:44]
A
Yeah, yeah. I mean, here's the good news, and I just learned about this yesterday. There are people like you and I speaking out. There are people of many ranks also. I know National Security Leaders for America, which is a group of retired generals and admirals, have been speaking out about this in Kentucky. The Kentucky state Senate, the state legislature, which is a super majority Republican, passed a unanimous resolution that said that, that supported Senator Kelly. I mean, I, I, that, that's. Yeah. On this issue, that's. I mean, now the Kentucky state literacy doesn't have, you know, any lawful enforcement of this. Can't tell the Pentagon what to do, all that stuff.
- [43:35]
B
I got it.
- [43:36]
A
But just the fact that the super majority Republican in Kentucky, the state legislature, and it was put together by Kentucky veterans and put this together for the legislation, pushed it along with a Democratic state senator who said yes, who's not a veteran, who put it out there, and it was unanimously approved. And I just feel like that kind of shows you, hey, this is something in America shouldn't be happening.
- [44:10]
B
Right.
- [44:11]
A
It's not even a, shouldn't even be a partisan thing here. And there isn't a partisan thing. Hegseth is in the wrong.
- [44:19]
B
Right.
- [44:19]
A
And he needs to stop.
- [44:21]
B
Absolutely. You know, thank you for sharing that with me, because that actually is very heartening, and I hope it serves as a model to other legislatures across our country, because I actually gave a speech on May 1st. May 1st is what's called Rule of Law Day in the United States. And the Bar association of San Francisco invited me to come give the military's perspective on the rule of law. And the main theme and the one I want to share with you and your listeners is that for all of our differences on policy, all of the kind of partisan crap that goes on, there's one unifying feature or there should be, and that's the rule of law. Right. And that's the Constitution. You know, lawyers take an oath. Military officers take an oath. The thing that should and can still, I believe, unite us is this oath to the Constitution is the rule of law. And I think that's what we're seeing in that unanimous vote that you just shared with us. Which is, which is great to see.
- [45:18]
A
Yeah, it really is. Well, listen, Nicole, this has been wonderful. We're going to have to do this again maybe sometime over the summer. I know you've got probably a busy summer planned, but this is really important. I love talking with you and bringing you back on the show and really appreciate your insights. I know everybody does.
- [45:36]
B
Thanks for the conversation, Amy. Let's do it again soon.
- [45:39]
A
You bet. All right. Truth in the barrel, unfiltered,
- [45:46]
C
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B
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