Victor Davis Hanson: It’s ‘Do or Die’ for America in Iran Right Now

Summary

Victor Davis Hanson: It’s ‘Do or Die’ for America in Iran Right Now

Podcast: Victor Davis Hanson: In His Own Words
Date: May 22, 2026 | The Daily Signal
Host: Victor Davis Hanson

---

Episode Overview

This episode is a news roundup where Victor Davis Hanson analyzes the week’s major political and cultural stories, focusing primarily on escalating tensions and U.S. policy toward Iran ("the Iran war"), key outcomes from recent election primaries, shifting U.S. military posture in Europe, left-wing activism and leadership in America’s cities, and broader themes of cultural decline and political blame.

Throughout, Hanson provides historical, political, and cultural context, often contrasting contemporary events with lessons from the past and highlighting the stakes he believes are facing America.

---

Main Themes and Key Discussion Points

1. The Iran Crisis: Strategic and Political Crossroads

U.S. Options and Pressures

• Arab Nations' Dilemma (02:52):
  Gulf Arab states want the Iranian regime gone but lack the will or capacity to act independently, instead relying on U.S. intervention but fearing a premature U.S. withdrawal.
• Victor’s Analysis:
  • The U.S. is at a “do or die” moment—negotiations with Iran are stalling, giving Iran time to regroup and intimidate neighbors.
  • Victor doubts the effectiveness or sincerity of current negotiations, suggesting substantive military action is the only way to ensure regional security and U.S. credibility.
• Notable Quote:

  “It’s do or die…You’re going to have to use force to a degree that makes it impossible for them to hurt anybody else.” –Victor Davis Hanson (06:47)

• Suggested Military Strategy (07:25–08:31):
  • Hit missile sites, coastal infrastructure, and oil export facilities to cripple Iran’s offensive capabilities.
  • Let regional allies—mainly Israel—take out Iran’s command and control.

Domestic Political Ramifications

• Trump’s Calculus: Trump is reluctant to escalate, seeking to balance military resolve with “magnanimity”, concerned about U.S. war fatigue and political costs (05:19–07:45).
• MagA Base Risks: Trump risks losing support from both doves (e.g., Rand Paul, Tucker Carlson) and hawks who want a decisive finish.
• Notable Quote:

  “Once you’re over there, they [hawks] want to finish it. So he can’t facilitate or he’s going to lose them.” (10:30)

Iranian Regime’s Propaganda (11:39)

• Regime Survival Tactics:
  Iran is training civilians and engaging in psychological operations to convince its people and neighbors of its resolve, while also using civilian recruitment as a deterrent against U.S. or Israeli intervention.

---

2. 2024 Primary Elections and GOP Civil War

Kentucky GOP Primary (15:36–21:59)

• Thomas Massie’s Defeat:
  • Massie, once favored by Trump, lost his seat after alienating core conservatives by opposing key party initiatives, attempting to mislead voters about Trump’s support.
  • Hanson criticizes his “anti-Semitic” undertones after defeat and opportunistic principles.
• Notable Quote:

  “He gave an anti-Semitic rant, he gave a dishonest appraisal. He’s a luxury of the ideology you can’t afford…” (20:15)

• Takeaway: GOP voters in deep red districts want unwavering loyalty and competence; maverick or moderate behavior is punished.

Texas, Louisiana, and War Powers

• Texas: Trump backs more reliably conservative Ken Paxton over moderate John Cornyn, betting big on a strong-red electorate (22:23).
• Louisiana (Cassidy): Hanson uses the “Parthian shot” metaphor for Senator Cassidy’s last-minute lashing out at Trump after voting to convict him post-presidency (25:29).
• Notable Quote:

  “Cassidy’s out now. So he got on his little horse and he’s riding out…but he’s turning around with his little bow and shooting Trump.” (25:50)

---

3. U.S. Troop Posture in Europe and Transatlantic Relations (28:12–33:46)

• Context: Trump withdraws some U.S. forces from Germany, negotiates with Poland to keep presence due to front-line status.
• European Allies:
  • Western Europe (Germany, France, Spain) seen as “deadbeats”; new NATO frontliners (Poland, Finland, Romania) are more reliable.
• Historical Parallels: Rumsfeld’s “Old” vs “New” Europe distinction resurfaces.
• Notable Quote:

  “The deadbeats are the people to the west and they’re the most adamantly anti-American.” (32:48)

---

4. Left-wing Activism: The Luigi Mangioni Phenomenon and NYC’s “Socialist” Turn (35:04–44:08)

• Mangioni’s Courtroom Stunt: Comparison to Manson family—followers advocate violence against capitalists as “social retribution.”
• NYC’s City-Run Grocery Store:
  • Hanson ridicules Mayor Mangioni’s plan as economically naive, predicting it will become an unprofitable entitlement.
  • He lampoons Mandami’s hypocrisy, calling out double standards on “settler colonialist” rhetoric and future policy failure.
• Notable Quote:

  “Once you did that…if they were successful and established social murder as oppressed, anybody could do it…They’re completely nihilist.” (38:30)

---

5. International Blame America Refrain (49:47–59:26)

• BBC & Politico: Criticism for blaming Trump/U.S. for Afghan child marriages and Ebola in Africa, instead of local or European responsibility.
• Cultural vs. Economic Explanations:
  • Uses Afghanistan, Mexico, Switzerland as examples of culture shaping national outcomes over mere racial or economic explanations (59:26–67:00).
• Notable Quote:

  “Each culture has these different proclivities…It’s culture. And…they shouldn’t come and beg and say you owe us this.” (62:00)

---

6. Reflections on DEI, Trump, and Cultural Devolution

• Trump’s Impact:
  Hanson sees Trump as a disruptive force exposing the Democratic Party’s drift into radicalism and identity politics—comparing him to the Terminator or Road Runner outsmarting his opponents (54:00–57:30).
• Notable Quote:

  “His legacy will be most remembered for destroying the Democratic Party or making it go crazy.” (54:36)

---

7. San Diego Mosque Shooting: Media Narratives and Dissonance (74:58–78:53)

• Initial Reports vs. Reality:
  Media initially frames attack as “white nationalist,” but reality: disturbed/transgender shooters with a muddled antisemitic/nationalist manifesto.
• Victor's Critique:
  Hanson criticizes how the media selectively reports identities and motives of assailants, linking this to a broader failure to confront uncomfortable social realities.
• Notable Quote:

  “If they were going to commit suicide, they should have commit suicide…not homicide first. He killed an innocent person for no reason.” (78:40)

---

8. Listener Feedback and Reflections on Iranian Diaspora (80:01–81:51)

• Iranian Diaspora: Hanson distinguishes between conservative, older Iranian-Americans and later, more left-wing arrivals after the 1979 revolution.

---

Additional Notable Quotes

• On Leftist Leadership:

  “He [Mangioni] just kind of grows up as a professional agitator without any work history, really…” (41:02)

• On Journalism:

  “Our journalists…know nothing. You created an echo chamber. I fed them what I wanted to hear and they fed it back to me.” (45:08)

• On Political Dialogue:

  “We try not to use…profanity and we don’t try to get conspiracy theories. And we don’t hate the people we disagree with.” (82:24)

• On Expertise:

  “We don’t consider [PhDs] significant…People are people. You judge them by their behavior, their character, and their performance.” (83:33)

---

Structure & Tone

Throughout, Hanson maintains a conversational, historical, and often sardonic tone while dialoguing with his co-host. Historical analogies, references to Greek and Roman history, and sharp asides abound alongside earnest critique of contemporary American journalism, politics, and culture.

---

Timestamps for Key Segments

• Iran and the Arab Gulf Dilemma: 02:52–05:08
• Do-or-Die Decision on Iran: 05:19–08:31
• Kentucky GOP Primary Breakdown: 15:36–21:59
• Texas Primary Analysis: 22:23–24:54
• Cassidy and War Powers: 25:06–28:12
• U.S. Troop Repositioning in Europe: 28:12–33:46
• Luigi Mangioni/NYC Leftism: 35:04–44:08
• Blame America for Global Ills: 49:47–59:26
• Cultural Explanations/worldview: 59:26–67:00
• San Diego Mosque Shooting: 74:58–78:53
• Listener Mail and Iranian Diaspora: 80:01–81:51

---

Conclusion

Victor Davis Hanson’s episode is an intense, opinionated tour of American and global affairs, tying present-day crises to broader ideological and cultural questions. His message: America is at a turning point, particularly in its dealings with Iran, while at home, internal decadence, political opportunism, and ideological radicalism threaten to corrode the republic’s historic strengths—and only a robust, historically grounded conservatism can provide a way forward.

Transcript

[A]

Foreign. Hello, and welcome to Victor Davis Hanson in his own words. This is our Friday News roundup. So we'll be looking at the news from the week. Top stories are, of course, we've been starting with the Iran war. We'll look at the primaries that went on on Tuesday. We're recording on Wednesday. And then also Trump polling U.S. troops from Europe. Stay with us. And we'll be right back.

[B]

As an advocate of truth, you know that women shouldn't have to share locker rooms with men, women shouldn't have to compete against male athletes, and they shouldn't be punished for speaking the truth. But across America, that's exactly what's happening. Men are being allowed to compete in women's sports, robbing girls of scholarships, medals, titles and safety. Now, the U.S. supreme Court has heard two cases, West Virginia vs. BPJ and Little v. Haycocks, that happened on January 13 that could decide the future of women's sports nationwide. This could be a watershed moment in the fight to protect biological reality and fairness. Alliance Defending Freedom needs your voice today. Visit joinadf.com hanson or text Hanson to 83848 to add your name to their declaration and side with truth and fairness. That's joinadf.com Hanson or text Hanson to 83848. What starts in women's sports spreads to schools, medicine and parental rights. This is our moment to push back, stand with alliance defending freedom today.

[A]

Welcome back. This is Victor Davis Hansen in his own words. And Victor is the Martin o' Neilly Anderson Senior Fellow in Military History and Classics at the Hoover Institution and the Wayne and Marshabusky Distinguished Fellow in History at Hillsdale College. You can find him at his website, victorhanson.com Please come join us there for all things Victor, his articles and his podcasts. So you'll find him there. So, Victor, the Iran war, a couple of things this week are one is very interesting statement by Tom Cotton. He said the Arab nations want to join the war rather than stopping it. And just because we know Tom is always speaking on our side of things and we like to hear from him. I looked at Politico and they are left of center, I guess you'd describe them. And they have an article that Arab nations are afraid Trump may walk away. So both sides of the spectrum seem to think the Arab nations are afraid

[B]

of they have a very nuanced that's a euphemism position. Essentially, they want Iran, the regime, out, kaput, dead, gone, the regime. But they don't want to. They don't have the power or the inclination to do it themselves. So to the degree that the United States is doing it, they're happy. What they're unhappy about, if the United States cuts a deal that leaves this wounded animal right across the Gulf from them. Because although they have 600 fighter craft, the Gulf Council, they don't have the wherewithal to attack Iran. And they're worried that they'll shut off the, especially countries like Kuwait, that you have to go way in the Gulf to get the oil. So they're worried that Iran, even if they, they don't batter them with missiles when we leave, they'll shut the Gulf down and then a Democratic president will be in power someday and he'll say, nah, I sort of don't want to do it. Sorry, wouldn't want to be you. So what they really want is either Trump just to stop and stay there, the present status quo, or to get rid of the regime. And because we're not going to stay there with that sizable force, the only thing they're wanting now is to get rid of the regime. But they can't say that because if they say that out loud, the Iranians are saying to them every day, we're going to come and get you. That clip where that guy's shooting the gun, he's shooting at the uae. So Iran is saying, you think you're tough now? Wait till your big bully leaves and we're teat to teat, head to head, and we will bury you. So they're saying, either leave us a carrier group here or get rid of the regime, but don't go home with a negotiation concluded with a treaty that means nothing. I don't want to be cynical. I hate war. I don't want any more killing, but I don't think anything they do can be trustworthy.

[A]

So would it be fair to say that you think that Trump is going to have to use military force sooner or later and he better do it, he should do it sooner rather than later.

[B]

Well, we had 42 days of conflict, all of March and 10, 11 days in April. But since early April, now we're over a month. We've had about 35. We're getting to the point where we've had more days of negotiation than the war, which is good. People haven't been killed, but that was advertised as a two week negotiation, and it's not. It's going to be six weeks. And so that's precious time that we lost as a country. And they have regrouped and they've been emboldened and they keep terrifying everybody by these claims that they have hundreds if not thousands of missiles all over the country and they have terrified the Gulf and they've attacked American ships and yet we've been saying, well, they're going to negotiate, they're not going to. And Trump is being very magnanimous because he doesn't want any more war and he wants to get back to the economy and he feels that if he goes in and bombs them and takes them all out in two or three days, then they'll still, it'll be a mess. He doesn't want to put ground troops in. So I guess what I'm saying is it's do or die. If you keep negotiating and stay over there, they're never going to give you what you want. And if they do give you what you want, they're going to backslide as soon as you leave. So you're going to have to use force to a degree that makes it impossible for them to hurt anybody else. And that would be more missile sites. All of the coastal apparatus that supports Carg island and the Strait, just a corridor all along, probably most of their dual use bridges go and then unleash the Israelis after the command and control, four or five days. If he's going to do it, we're speaking on a Wednesday afternoon, he should do it on Friday, Friday, right before Memorial Day. If he did it at noon, say Friday, it would be dark over there and then he would have no news. Friday afternoon, Saturday afternoon, Sunday afternoon, Monday afternoon, nobody would be, everybody would be on vacation. I'm not being cynical. I'm just saying that's what presidents do. That's what Bush did, that's what Clinton did, That's what Obama do. Anytime they want to drop something sensational and the Mueller report or something and you're they, you know, they do it at a dead news cycle.

[A]

Well, I ask because this is just my sense from reading the presses and watching that there is some hesitancy on how long this has gone on now by even more newscasters, even more people. So what would this option look like that Donald Trump said, okay, I've dismantled their ability to do anything on my watch. I'm going to step away right now. Would that be an option?

[B]

Fred Flitz at the American greatness, whom I greatly admire, is a really good writer. That's exactly what he said. But you could do a little bit more damage and do that. I don't you, you want to do enough damage if you're going to if you're going to walk away, you want to make do enough damage that they can't go out and control the straight and that. And they control a straight by two mechanisms. One Dr. And missiles that they threaten the Gulf with and then those PT boats. So you want to get rid of all of those PT boats and then I think you want to dismantle the ability to unload and sell oil out of Carg Island. Not the storage, not the pipeline, not the wells, just hit the piers and the docks and the ports facilities so big, these huge tankers can't come in and unload oil for a long time. Keep them busy, then they would have no income. And so I think that's the problem he's having politically is the left was always against it, which was weird because they always brag. Clinton bragged, Obama bragged that they can't have a bomb, you know, and they used to be pro Israel, but they're completely not just against it now. They're for Iran. They really want Iran to survive and to beat us and have a. They want an Afghan style humiliation. I was very critical of the Afghan pullout in August of 2021 with Biden, but not for 1 nanosecond did I want it to fail. I wanted it to succeed. If that was the policy, I didn't agree with the policy. I thought we should have taken Baghdad Air Base and made a big fortress. We'd put 300 million into it and it was way off from Kabul and it was completely defense, you know, defensible. But once a decision was made and Milley, as the counselor to the President and the Joint Chiefs did this disaster, I was really upset. I thought, wow, can't you restore this? You want to root for your country, but they're not rooting for their country. And so the problem is that they're against Trump and he's going to lose some of his MAGA support. I mean the Massie and the Rand Paul and Tucker and all those people, he's lost them on it, but they're not that influential. The never Trumps are not. What's really important is the hawks that want to get this problem. They may not want to go over there, but once you're over there, they want to finish it. So he can't facilitate or he's going to lose them. And one of the barometers of that sentiment is General Jack Keane. He's not a neo Connie, he's sort of a Jacksonian. You know, just don't touch the United States. But if you, if you dare mess with us, we're going to hit you hard. No better friend, no worse enemy. Don't tread on me. That kind of. And you can see that he's been on TV less and less and when he is, he's more and more frustrated because he's saying we've got to finish the job and you don't want to lose that base of the MAGA people.

[A]

Well, since you mentioned it. Also, I guess the other thing, I don't know what you make of this. The Iranian videos of training their civilians, I guess, or I should say subjects to defend the regime. And the, especially the one, the guy that was a news anchor that ended up shooting off his around in the studio as he was being trained. I mean, what is the meaning of that coming from Iran? Anything or is it just nonsense?

[B]

A third of the population is for the regime, 70% is not. And the third that is traffics with the people who have all the money. They have all the money, they've stolen all the money and they're drafting people. And so they're basically saying to the Iranian people, we killed 40,000 of you, but now we're going to draft 150 new recruits from you. And so you think you want the Americans to win and free you, but do you want your kids killed? Because if the Americans come, they will, but we're going to put them on the front lines. That's what they're trying to do. I still think we can do it without a ground war, but maybe the Israelis will do something on the ground to get the uranium. Seems to me they're going to delegate. If they go back in The Gulf states, 600 aircraft, I don't know who are piloting those planes. You get rumors that every once in a while retired military from various countries are, you know, but they seem to be adequately staffed and they're as large, they're twice the size of the Israeli air force. They're not, I mean not nearly as effective. But if you put the Israeli air force and their planes and the United States and you divided up the task, I think we're going to get infrastructure, the Israelis go after command and control and the uranium. And you had the UAE know they know more about the oil and Iran, they can do whatever they want with it. And I think you could do it and you could start Friday and you'd be done Monday night. And then you could say you want to negotiate. If you don't want to negotiate, see you. And then from time to time keep some ships in the Gulf and they could monitor it.

[A]

Victor, let's go ahead and welcome back one of our sponsors, My Patriot Supply. If the last few years have taught us anything, it's that the systems we rely on can fail. And when they do, we're on our own. That's why I want to tell you about my Patriot Supply, America's original Patriot preparedness company. They've helped over 3 million American families get prepared since 2008 with more than 90,000 five star reviews. And right now they've got a special offer that you really need to check out. When you get their flagship solar backup generator, the ultra powerful Grid Dr. 3300. You'll also get over $1,000. That's $1,000 worth of survival essentials absolutely free. Four weeks of emergency food, water, filtration and much, much more, all free. It's in stock and ready to ship right now. But with everything going on right now, there's no telling how long it will be available. So go to prepared with VDH.com that's preparewithvdh.com right now to see everything you can get for free. Don't wait until it's too late. Get your complete preparedness set up today at preparewithvdh.com that's preparewithvdh.com and we'd like to thank My Patriot Supply for sponsoring the Victor Davis Hansen show. So Victor, the primaries on Tuesday. So we had some primaries play out in Kentucky I think was the one that was the most watched because there was a incumbent by the name of Macy, I'm sorry, I don't know his first name. And then the guy who was actually elected and supported by Trump gowering and very strange things Macy did, one of which was to send out a Trump supports me email on the day on Tuesday in the morning to the entire constituency as far as he could, you know, identify their emails obviously. So and that was not true, except it was true maybe like four or five years ago I think when he first. So a very strange thing on the part of that Macy Massey.

[B]

Massey, I think he got infected with Ms. And cnn. So if you go on there and these hard left communist socialist activists flatter you, then you absorb that. Not just the ideology but the methodology. So he thought he was some kind of folk hero. You should look at the ratings and see that Ms. And CNN together are less than Fox.

[A]

But just in that vein, I think Galrain won by nine points or something like that. It was a huge win.

[B]

Yeah, he did. And Scott Jennings, whom I really respect He's a really great commentator. He takes on people at cnn. He summed it up. I can add something to it, but he did a wonderful job. He pointed out a couple of things, that the district that Massie represented in Kentucky is probably the reddest district in the United States. So those people wanted a strong, strong conservative. They didn't object as long as he was libertarian, if he was going to be a libertarian, strong conservative. And by that I mean he came to prominence during the COVID when he said there was overreach. They even gave him some slack when he was opposing the big spending by both parties. But what they couldn't countenance was this, that when you, you can have the luxury of a Susan Collins in the Senate or Rand Paul that don't vote 95%, you know, they're mavericks. They, and sometimes they're, they, they work. Lisa Murkowski that's a indulgence. When you have five seats in the Senate margin, you can have three defections, okay? But when you're close in the House, every little seat and they only got two seat margin, you can't afford that. So, and so when he started, after he became a folk hero on the right by on the right, he decided that he was going to become famous on the Epstein files. And the problem with that was he didn't say a word really when Biden was president. And the majority, the vast majority of people who appear, whether it's Larry Summers or Reid Hoffman or all these people, they're on the left. So it didn't condemn Donald Trump, it didn't condemn a bunch of conservatives. And that's what he was trying to partner with AOC and others and saying, oh, there's going to be Republicans, you get. And it was a farce. So that blew up on him and he kept trying to get back onto the mainstream and get attention. And Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Bobbitt and Tucker, all those people loved him. That didn't work. And then so he voted. The big defections came when he voted against the big beautiful bill. He voted against the closing the borders and he voted against the SAVE act voter id. And once he did that, he crossed the Rubicon. The left made him into brave maverick, but he was always an ambiguous, problematic person as he didn't have a lot of principles. He had convenient principles because as you pointed out, to save his skin, he put out a false ad that years ago Trump had endorsed him when he won 80% against no opposition, essentially. So he reran that to fool people and think that Trump had flipped. Number two, he said in his defeat that he couldn't find his opponent because he's in Tel Aviv. Does anybody really believe he lost because of the Jews? He opposed the war and he always votes against Israel. But that's not why he lost. He lost because he deliberately, on key votes that had nothing to do with Israel, turned on Donald Trump from a red district. It would be the analogous of, say, Nancy Pelosi's district. It's the bluest in the U.S. san Francisco. And then she started to vote with Republicans. That would be the end of her. And then she started to give sanctimonious criticism of her own party. Well, that's what he did. So he gave an anti Semitic rant, he gave a dishonest appraisal. And he's a luxury of the ideology you can't afford if you're in a very, if you hold a very close margin. And now that he's gone, they're going to get somebody who's going to vote 100% with the Republican Party. He's going to reflect better the views of his constituents. And he's not an anti Semite, and that's a word that's been tossed around. But if you say out of the blue that your opponent basically won because he's for the Jews and you're not, that's despicable. And I don't know. He also had a checkered history. I thought it was kind of unfair. His opponents brought up the fact that his wife had recently died and that he had something kind of obscene. He called it his B O N E R phone. And he was bragging to, I guess, people that he was kind of a ladies man and a big catch. I don't know to what degree that was true, but that came up that he wasn't. If you're going to make the point that you're a principled, unusual guy who doesn't get tempted on any ethical issues, then you. And he also had a person who complained about harassment from him. So there were a lot of things that went into his makeup that made him vulnerable.

[A]

Let's turn to Texas, and I don't know what you make of Texas. Donald Trump supported Ken Paxton over the incumbent. These are both Republicans, John Cornyn, who are both running, going to be running against or actually the one who won will be running against James Talarico. So I was wondering if you had what's the significance of Trump's support there?

[B]

He's doing it on similar to Massie Cornyn's a nice guy. He's there 75% of the time. But the problem is, just like the Kentucky congressional district, this is Texas. This is not Iowa or Indiana or Ohio that are red but, you know, have some purple streak. This is solid red Texas. So Cornyn is an indulgence that is luxury. And when he votes against Trump or he's, you know, critical and he breaks solidarity a few times and he wants to be principal, you don't need that in Texas. You can get another Ted Cruz. Right. So that's the first thing Trump is saying. Paxton has a checkered history. Ethical. Cornyn's, I think, as far as his personal conduct is more ethical. He's very charismatic. He's a great guy, but he's not the conservative that they could get. So Trump is saying, I can get a real conservative, and I know he has some ethical problems, but this is Texas. So the third assumption Trump is making, Talarico, all that publicity, that's just like Beto mania. Remember that he was going to win, and then the woman who was the radical abortionist, she was going to win. The left always gets some young, charismatic hard leftist, and then they try to paper over the cracks about that. They're really socialist communists, and they try to package them. Oh, look how he's another jfk. He's another Obama. She's so photogenic. And then they think, Texas, remember we used to have Texas governors. It's going to flip. It's not. The people who are moving into Texas, with the exception of Austin, are from California, but they're conservatives for the most part. So what they're saying is that he took a risk by getting rid of an incumbent Republican who had a lot of seniority and was well liked by his colleagues, but created a little maverick stance, and he thought he could get away with it because this is Texas. And that means that Cornyn might have a better chance to beat Talarico and pick up more independence. But he thinks that's not going to matter, that Paxton can win in Texas against Talarico once they unleash what we know about Talarico. You know, it's pretty bad what Sufi says.

[A]

Yes. And then last thing, in Louisiana, one of the representatives, Cassidy, who was Republican, lost. And I don't know the significance of this.

[B]

Cassidy, the doctor?

[A]

Yeah, he's been out voting against Donald Trump. But the Senate, he's a senator, Sorry. In the Senate, they're going to do a war powers resolution. And the. The murmur out there is that he's behind that. To bring U.S. troops home.

[B]

Yeah, he's, I'm not sure that's constitutional. That's been. Both Democratic and Republican presidents have questioned that. Obama questioned it. He said it's 60 to 90 days. We haven't got to 90 days yet. But Obama was bombing seven months and he just said, I'm not going to do it. And Clinton was bombing 72 days in Serbia. He's not going to do it. So when Haikam Jeffrey gets up there and gives one of his war speeches like he did the other day, another one, he should just look at his own party. And I think Trump says, I think, I think Trump needs better communication sometimes. I think he needs people to tell him all he has to do is say, I'm just following the president of Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. I respect the War Powers act, but I want to follow their lead. And they just felt that it was unconstitutional. So I'm forced to agree and move on. But Cassidy, there's a word in a term in Greek, I've mentioned it before in Roman history, a Parthian shot. The Parthians were this proto Iranian Asiatic group that gave the Romans a terrible problem on the frontier in modern day Iran and parts of Iraq. And they had this tendency, they were horsemen and they could shoot arrows from their horse. And they would go up to a Roman legion that was not very mobile and it had auxiliary cavalry, which wasn't that good, and then shower them with arrows. And when the Romans came out to throw their lances, the pilot, they would ride back. But as they rode away, they shot from the back and really accurate. They were taught to turn around and hit people. So they would kind of go close. Then they would be and they'd wear out the Romans and they cut off Crassus head and put it in a version of the Bacchae on a plate, Euripides Bacchae. And they destroyed a whole Roman army at Carr 53, I think, B.C. but the point I'm making is Cassidy's out now. So he got on his little horse and he's riding out the door because he didn't get. He's going to be gone in January. But he's turning around with his little bow and shooting Trump. And that's not good, but that's what he's doing.

[A]

You call that a Parthian shot? Is that what.

[B]

Yeah, Parthian shot. And he also voted, remember, there was one red line that Trump can't tolerate if you voted to convict him. He voted to convict Donald Trump in the Senate. When Donald Trump was A private citizen. There was no point in that. Donald Trump was the first president in the history of the United States who was betrayed after he left office. Yeah.

[A]

All right, let's turn then to Trump in Europe. He is pulling out some troops from Germany, about 5,000, and he said he was going to pull out about 4,000 from Poland, but the Polish have convinced him to hold back on that. And one of his generals, Air Force generals, was talking to a news organization, and he said, well, what we're doing is this. We have convinced the Europeans to put more money into their own defense, and as they take over more, we're bringing U.S. troops or assets home from Europe as they take over more. And that was sort of the explanation. What were your reflections on that?

[B]

Well, I mean, there's a context, as I said that, Jack, and I think we've discussed it. When Trump didn't want to give away the plan or the time of the preemptive strike, he didn't tell the European, maybe you should, but they would have leaked it. So they had a choice. They could have done the honorable thing for NATO, that is the Spanish. Macron, Maloney, Stormer. They could have called Trump in and said, you know, we don't like this regime and we're closer to it than you are, and they have more operatives in our countries than they do yours. So if you're going to do it, do it and get rid of it. But there's some quality. And so you can use all of our joint NATO bases, many of which you paid for. Just don't go do it, but don't talk about it, and we'll do all we can. But we have a domestic political problem. We've got crazy constituencies that are like your American left, but they're in power and we'll lose power. And some of them are leftists, like in Spain. But they couldn't do that. They had to make a big deal and showboat performance art, virtue signal to their own people. Stormer, this is not our war, okay? Falklands is not our war either. Serbia is not our war either. Libya is not our war either. Chad's not our war either. These were all things they dragged us either directly into or to support. So that was stupid, and Maloney was really stupid because she had been a friend of Trump. And they could have done things like Greece. Greece is in a very vulnerable position. It's out there with this huge, crazy Turkish army and navy and air force. And Erdogan, who is an Ottomanist, his idea is Greece should return to where it was about 1480 or 1550 as a colony of the Ottomans, and it's not going to happen. But Greece knows that and they know that the Americans are on their side and they know that this is a pro energy administration. So they know that they can partner with the Israelis, they can partner with the Greeks and the Cypriots, and the United States Sixth Fleet will be there to protect them. And therefore they don't make a big thing. They have communist socialist majorities probably in their country, but they don't make a big thing about it. They just say, we're going to support the United States so much as. And this is a decision that one of our NATO allies made. And then privately, oh, the Gerald Ford has got some problems. Send it over to Crete and we'll get it fixed. Oh, you need some reconnaissance. You got some planes in Thessaly. Go ahead and use them, whatever they need. And that's a much better attitude. And Poland is kind of that way. So I think you don't. Trump himself said that Poland was an ideal NATO ally. And it's right on the front lines. It's got. It's gonna. Along with Ukraine, which is not a NATO. They have a huge army and they're going to be pretty tough. So if Russia ever got. Russia will never invade Poland. They did in 1922 and they lost. And they had. They had a lot of problems. And the Poles are really good fighters. So I think we should not take any troops out of Poland at all. And I think if we're going to take troops out, they should all come out of Western European, Western European countries. If you think about it, Germany, Western Germany, Italy, France, the Low Countries, Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Denmark, they're all way away. They're on the West. Where's their enemy? In the North Sea? Is it in the Atlantic? Is it in the Mediterranean? Maybe immigration, but no, but these guys, Sweden, Finland, Poland, Romania, Czech state, Slovakia, Romania, Hungary, they're all right on the front lines and so you should protect them and partner with them. The deadbeats are the people to the west and they're the most adamantly anti American. It was Donald Rumsfeld who made that distinction when he called the Western ones old European. And they got really angry about that because they thought, what? They're not new Europe. They weren't even Europe until the Berlin Wall fell. They were controlled by the Ottomans, some of them, and then they were Communist and we were all European. No, that's not quite true. You guys appeased Hitler just as much as anybody did.

[A]

Okay? So let's go ahead and take a break and then we'll come back and talk a little bit about Luigi Mangioni Mania. Stay with us and we'll be back.

[C]

Hey, I'm Bradley Devlin and just like you, I'm a huge fan of Victor Davis Hansen, whether it's his long form podcast, victor Davis Hansen in his own words, or his short form content for the Daily Signal. Victor Davis Hansen in a few words. I always leave an episode learning something new.

[B]

I think they forgot the 1982 Falklands War.

[C]

And in the age of clickbait and rage bait, that's a really good feeling, right?

[B]

The media. Thank you. You can leave now.

[C]

And if you agree, you might like my show, the Daily Signals long form interview podcast called the Signal. Sit down. Every week we take you behind the scenes of the biggest battles in Washington D.C. as they happen with some of the biggest names in politics. We explore big ideas and we analyze the policymaking process from an unabashedly and unapologetically conservative perspective. And that's important now more than ever, especially with the Trump administration back in office, because in 2024, you sent Washington a message it couldn't ignore. It's your government and together we're taking it back. So check us out on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, wherever you enjoy Victor Davis Hansen, we're there too. And drop me a follow on X Radley Devlin to stay updated with what's happening on the Signal. Sit down.

[A]

Welcome back. Victor Davis Hansen in his own words. You can catch Victor at on X, his had hashtag, his handle is Dhanson and on Facebook at Hanson's Morning Cup. So if those are your news outlets, please connect with Victor there. So Victor, these Luigi Mangioni followers who. Well, followers who ended up in the courtroom, in fact, because Mondami gave them tickets to be in the courtroom or permissions to be in the courtroom. But if you listen, that's one thing Mondami's acceptance. And then they made a big stir, of course. But the second, second thing I wanted to ask you about is that, you know, the media, or if you look at this phenomenon, even with Charles Manson, right, He had his crazy followers and so Luigi Mangione has his crazy followers. But if you listen to their argument, it is basically that capitalism is bad and killing capitalists, people at the top of the capitalist system, is a good thing. And so I was wondering your reflections on that argument. And.

[B]

Well, people made the connection with the Manson family, crazy Squeaky Fromm and those people, but they, they Never had any pretensions that they were journalists. Everybody knew that they were deluded fellow co conspirators or murderers themselves. But these people who are not involved, I must say they didn't help Mangione, but they're praising that he killed a guy that worked up from the lower middle classes. He worked all. He's going to leave two kids without a father. And they're delighted about it because they arbitrarily have said that he is an oppressor and that this was a social murder of retribution. They never document this though, they never say, look, here's the number of people covered. I know a lot of people that I worked with as teachers at Cal State Fresno and they found that the most competitive when you have your potpourri, when you retire you can pick a Medicare supplemental and I picked UnitedHealth and so far with some disagreements it's been fair, judicious. But these people don't know any of that. They don't bring any. They just. And then they wear these little dresses and they do all their little wiggly Gavin Newsom body motion and they think you get the cameras and they don't realize that they're atrocious people. They're celebrating and calling for the murder. Once you did that, if they were successful and established social murder as oppressed, anybody could do it. You could say this particular leftist, this particular leftist, this particular leftist, they do all sorts. George Soros does all sorts of damage. He's ruined lives. He has. Therefore if you take him out, nobody on the right would think that you could do that. That would be horrible to take Soros out as much as you disagree with him. But the left, it's going back to its ancient Marxist, Leninist and pre Marxist crazy anarchist roots. And it's so you can excuse a lot of things, but it's hard to excuse stupidity and ignorance. And when you see those three girls start to talk and you know, nah, they're just stupid. They have no data, no facts, no knowledge, they don't know anything about the healthcare system and they're advocating for a type of chaos which if anybody took them seriously and people follow that paradigm, it would ruin any society. They're completely nihilist. That's what the Democratic Party, as I said earlier, it's becoming a weird mixture of Pro Hamas, pro 10-7-Violence and Nihilism. And then this radical left wing lenist Jacobin destroy everything that's not leftist. And then you add in a little flavoring with the Green New Deal and open borders and dei. And it's really a crazy system of thought. And it's very important that people realize that, because I know there's a lot of conservatives that are mad about Trump going into Iran and I know there's a lot of independents that voted for him, but you should take a deep breath and look at the alternative. Because just because you disagree with him on 20, even 30, 40% doesn't mean that this alternate slate of candidates and ideas is scary. It's going to make, it would be the worst of Joe Biden. There's no pretense that you're going to get old Joe Biden from Scranton as a waxen effigy, that you pull his strings. It's going to be right in your face, Mondami ism in your face.

[A]

Well, since we're onto that New York world this week in the news, a New York woman got out of her car and fell straight into a manhole that was left uncovered. And two things about what's going on in New York, and I don't know what comments you have on this, but Mandami is unveiling the location of his first city run grocery store. And so that's brought a lot of contention out already, even before it's there.

[B]

Well, the first question, the first, second one, the answer to that is Mandami really thinks there's a law called Mandami's Law of Economics, that he, you know, he's a Nepo baby, he was spoiled, his parents, he didn't really get a job. He talks about settler colonialists and Israelis, but he's a settler colonial. He's an Indian. His family were Indian immigrants that ended up in Uganda and did very well in Uganda, which if you applied Mandami's rule, rules about settler colonialism that he applies to Israel, that he would convict him and die himself. And then he comes over here and his parents get these lush university and filmmaking subsidized beautiful jobs. And then he just kind of grows up as a professional agitator without any work history, really. So then he smiles with these big white teeth and he's the Roman poet. Catullus has a guy just like Mondalma. He said, every time I see him, he's a Spaniard. He just smiles. He just smiled. I smile. He says that's because he brushes his teeth with urine. It's a really funny poem. And it reminded me, what does that

[A]

mean, to brush your teeth with urine?

[B]

Is that in the ancient world, the acidic nature of urine was thought to clean your teeth and in any case. So he really does think that he can spend $70 million and open these supermarkets that make 2 to 3% profit margin. And he's going to assume a lot of things. I'm Mondami and I'm a social communist. So all you swarmers, street people, homeless that come in and steal and take 10% of the inventory, you won't do it with me and all you people who steal your clerks and all this stuff in New York because there's no real penalties. It's not going to happen to me. I'd like to see what happens when the first person goes in there and clubs somebody over the head and runs out with a bunch of alcohol. You know what I mean? And what Mondame Alvin Bragg would do. Oh, for you, you were an enem of our social estate and I'm berea and I've got a crime and I found you to fit it. Is that what he's going to do? I don't know. But there is no economic. So if he's going to subsidize the price and lose money, and he will lose money, unless he can say to all the clerks and the security guards and the viander, everybody who's there for the socialist cause, would you take less than the $50 I'm demanding that all the capitalist insects pay? No, he can't do that. So what he's to do is he's going to say for you people to buy food below cost or at cost, I'm going to lose this amount of money. So where is Ken Griffith? I got to go knock on his door again and get money from him and people like that. And then he's not going to tell you who's going to shop there. If for a month or two it's really clean and it looks like Whole Foods, I bet you 500 bucks that people from the Upper west side that are really wealthy will get in their jeans and their reusable grocery bags and their flip flops and go down there and be seen with the people but really want cheap food. You know, rich people. Is he gonna say, well, he can't ask for an ID he did with the snow thing because he's against ID to vote. He thinks voting doesn't matter. You don't need an id. But to shovel snow for New York, you have to have, what, three IDs. So I don't know if he's gonna have a class card. So when you come through the doors, you have to show that you're a member of the lower classes. I'm not kidding. You like a Costco card?

[A]

Yeah, sure. Privilege.

[B]

I bet you will be. I bet you have to be a member to shop there. Nobody's asked him that question. I'll be interested to see what he says. Everything about him is a. I keep hammering on when he said he was going to go after white people in nicer neighborhoods, then took about 1 nanosecond in a Google search to say, just ask any AI or go on yourself on Google and say which is the richest ethnic group in the United States? And they'll say, indian Americans on the basis of per household and per capita income. So he should have said, as I said earlier, I'm going to go after all my fellows in the Indian American community. Because they came there and for some reason they have more money than anybody. They've been here generations. How can people in Harlem be here since the 1870s and they're still poor? And yet the Indians have all this money. That's impossible. They may get an AOC to give a lecture and say, it's impossible to get a billion doll. How did you get all this money? Well, we came with it from India. Well, how did you do it in India? Oh, you had a caste system, did you? Where were the mandamis in the Indian caste system? So. But the problem with journalism is our journalists, like Ben Rhodes said, they know nothing. You created an echo chamber. I fed them what I wanted to hear and they fed it back to me. And that's as bad as cynical. That was. There was some truth to it.

[A]

Well, I think also that the store will become another entitlement system for the people that work there. And they'll get these outrageous salaries, do nothing.

[B]

And then when I was in graduate school, you went to the Palo Alto co, op, Stanford, it was kind of. Everybody went there. We were all poor students. And it was really funny. It was. Everybody dressed and talked like Trader Joe's or Whole Earth, Whole Foods, same thing. They had kind of flip cool long hair, mustaches. And then when you checked out some, the clerk would say to you, do you want some organic coconut water? I said, oh, you didn't bring your reusable co op bag today. Oh, well, we'll give you a paper bag, but try not to do that in the future. And then they'd have glass recyclable. They'd have instead of plastic. They didn't want plastic, so they had recyclable glass outside. And you'd see all these insects and cockroaches eating the syrup Inside, you know, they were sending them off to be clean. And so anyway, that's what they want.

[A]

Yeah, it's gonna.

[B]

And it closed. It lasted for a long time, but it recently closed.

[A]

Yeah. Probably had to be subsidized for a long time.

[B]

Oh, yeah.

[A]

VICTOR let's welcome back our other sponsor for this show, Allegiance Gold. If you've studied enough history, you start to see a pattern. Nations don't lose their way overnight. They drift through debt and division until one day you realize the foundations you thought were permanent were never permanent at all. Today, America is spending at levels once reserved for wartime. We've normalized deficits that would have stunned earlier generations. And policymakers now debate whether the only path forward is more intervention, more printing, more distortion. But here's the historical truth. Every society that pushes its currency beyond discipline eventually paid the price. The wise never waited for collapse. They prepared for the correction. That's why so many thoughtful Americans, especially those nearing retirement or in retirement, are reallocating part of their wealth into something that has outlasted every paper experiment in history. Physical gold, not as speculation, but as insulation. Our reputation here at Victor Davis Hansen, in his own words, matters to us, which is why we've partnered with Allegiance Gold, a company distinguished by integrity, reliability and an A plus rating with the Better Business Bureau. For years, they've guided Americans through transparent education and long standing relationships built on trust. And right now, they're extending a special liberty offer for our listeners to help you get started with real gold, whether your funds are in retirement or in a retirement account or sitting in the bank. If you believe as we do, that the best time to reinforce your position is before the storm becomes obvious. Call 844-790-9191. That's 844-790-9191 or visit protectwithvict. That's again the phone number. 8447-909191-84479, 09191 or visit protectwithvictor.com History rewards those who take the long view. And we like to thank Allegiance Gold for sponsoring the Victor Davis Hansen Show. So, Victor, I have two stories here about and this is all about blaming Donald Trump. For those of you who are listening, the BBC was writing about Afghan men selling their own daughters. A very sympathetic article about the sale of young daughters because of hard times. And they blamed the lack of aid and that US had stopped sending as much aid into the their economies or even the presence of the US had also helped their economies.

[B]

The BBC.

[A]

Yeah, the BBC did that. And then just to Politico, our left of center publication, they were looking at the Ebola outbreak in Africa. And once again they got down to blaming the aid reduction because, you know, Trump obviously got.

[B]

They don't have foreign aid. I mean, there are 340 million people in the United States. The combined population of all the EU and the NATO members that are not in the EU. But combine those two populae, it's 450 million people. They have 100 million more people. I don't know how that 100 million more people still do not give them an economy the size of ours. We have $31 trillion in GDP. They have about 21 and they have 100 million more people. But that be it said, don't they have any foreign aid? Why don't they just say, you know what, we feel guilty about the British Empire, so we're going to give you reparation. The second thing is we were in Afghanistan for 20 years. We poured money into that. We built infrastructure, we built. We gave them a gender studies program. What do they want at the University of Kabul? We gave them pride flags on our embassy. There were George Floyd murals on the downtown walls. We did a lot of good stuff for them. But more importantly, Joe Biden pulled out with some. And nobody knows the exact amount, but somewhere between 8 and $50 billion, depending how you. And he gave them Humvees and he gave them helicopters, he gave them airplanes, he gave them machine guns, he gave them M4s, M16s, grenades, explosives, rockets, missiles. And we're short of a lot of that stuff. So they could, They've been selling that stuff all over. And the other point is they have been selling their daughters since time, since Alexander the Great got there. When Alexander the Great got there, you should, you can read about what Afghanistan was. So the BBC is, I mean, when Donald Trump and everybody say fake news, everybody goes, oh, that's so unfair. To beat up the. No, they deserve everything they get. USAID was of the most corrupt things in the world. Everything was. So they're telling us that Ebola, whether it exists or is eradicated, depends on the United States. Well, why don't they get Bill, Bill Gates, the Gates foundation is helping to eliminate malaria. He's worth, I don't know, $100 billion. Why don't they get Reid Hoffman instead of giving, you know, I don't know, millions of dollars to E. Jean Carroll to sue Donald Trump? Why doesn't he go out up do that? But they think that they are cutting back on aid and they haven't cut back on everything because it's stolen. It's run by officials and their friends and relatives that rotate out of government. Anytime a Democrat elite lost an election, he went to work at a bureaucratic place like USAID or he went to Facebook or the old Twitter or something where they had a sinecure for them. But that's crazy. And to blame us for this ancient practice of selling your own daughters because you either don't want to dowry them or you think that they can be sexually exploited by wealthy men and they'll pay a lot of money for that. It's sick.

[A]

You know, it gets sick.

[B]

What can they else can they blame Trump for?

[A]

Yeah, yeah, I know they.

[B]

That's what you saw that debate in California. Finally, Villagrosa, who's going to lose? Who? He has nothing to lose. The former mayor of Los Angeles. He even said as a leftist, hey, you guys, you're criticizing all the things that are wrong with California. But there hasn't been a governor since Schwarzenegger over 20 years. There's no statewide Republican officehold. You have a super majority and you've had for a long time in the legislature, the homeless, high energy costs, gas prices, taxation, horrible infrastructure, high speed rail. That's all you. And that there's something weird about them. Like it's a psychological disconnect. I was watching them debate and it's like California is really in bad shape. Then it's like stare at the camera now. Remember I was prepped to say no, not mention Gavin Newsom or Jerry Brown or anybody. It's not our fault. It's got to be Donald Trump. Then they take a deep breath and say, can I dare say this? It's so weird and audacious and such a big lie. Will my nose go off the stage? And then they go and Trump and then that's all they need. Well, tell us what Trump did. And they can't. They can never say anything. That's what's so and then they know none of them have an agenda. What is your agenda, Kathleen Porter? What is your agenda, Havil Becerra? Just tell us you want to open the border again. How many want in? 10, 12 like last time? 5? How many criminals are you going to let in? 200,000? 500? Another million? Tell us what do you want to do about taxation? You want California 13.3 taxes everywhere on the states. Just tell us. No, they don't. They just say Donald Trump. Donald Trump. Donald Trump. God, he is really. Of all the things he's done. And this is one of the last things I wrote. I think it's the last line in the counter revolution, the fall and rise of Donald Trump and the mega movement. I think the last, as I remember, it's the last word. September 8th, it'll be. Out of all the. I'm almost quoting literally, of all the things he's done, his legacy will be most remembered for destroying the Democratic Party or making it go crazy. When he came in there, he had the remnants. Hillary was very loud. But when Hillary ran, she was always pretty much a neoconservative interventionist. He was to the right of her, but she wasn't crazy. She was just wrong on a lot of stuff. But it's very funny, there was still the remnants of Bill Clinton and maybe a little bit of this conservative side of Jimmy Carter. They weren't completely socialist communists, but once Trump came in, they went so crazy and they thought, the only way I can defeat this guy is get crazier and crazier. He reminds me, remember after the first. Schwarzenegger was the first Terminator. And then he was just big and strong. And then, I don't know, I think there were six of them, but there were two or three later, and they had this ability to discombobulate. Right? Well, that's what Trump is. He is the next generation super Terminator. He comes and just like in those movies, they get next to him, they, they fire javelins at him. They. They blow him up. They put him in the trunk and put gas on. They burn. And then they just go, he's gone. And then you see this big blob for going on for like 100 yards. And then they, they're all like high fiving each other. And then they look and it's Eugene Carroll, Alvin Bragg, get him off the ballot. Fanny Wills, Jack Smith, Letita James. Oh, I see a leg. I see an arm. Oh, two impeachments. Raid Mar Lago. Oh, I see a head and arms. And now there's a body. And then presto, I'm back. And so they keep trying to blow him apart and he recombobulates just like a Terminator. And they can't. It's either that image I had used the one a road drone or beep, beep when they were Wiley E. Coyote and they always thought they had him. And then he defied the laws of gravity. The funny thing about that was it was really a good metaphor because when Roadrunner would go off the cliff and he should fall down, he defies and he just stays there in midair. And then Wiley Cody jumps out and says, oh. And he goes down. And then he walks on air back. And that's sort of what Trump. Oh, Trump is going to use capital letters and exclamation points and say you're stupid on his tweets. Well, I'm going to do that. I'm Gavin Newsom. So he tries to do exactly what. And then Trump goes beep, beep. And he's back. And then Gavin Newsom going, well, everybody's saying that I have a foul mouth and I'm crazy and these tweets are stupid. Yes, you're Wiley Coyote, you fool.

[A]

So just to round off the blaming Trump, Trump for international problems like Ebola and starvation, I think your audience and I both feel that, you know, we're getting tired of these cultures not blaming themselves and their and these articles. Why couldn't the BBC or the other Art or the Politico writer go in and find out why these cultures cannot build? You know, because they, in the. Let me just give you an example. In the Afghanistan article by the BBC, they even wrote in there, the snow capped mountains that these people sit under. I'm thinking, okay, and then massive water pour. So if they harness that and build a whole bunch of farms, they didn't have to have more labor and more

[B]

food for the Soviets. And we did a lot of the work that's still there. We didn't blow it up. Still there.

[A]

Yeah, but they're, but they're growing opium and such.

[B]

I went to the West Bank. People are going to get really angry to hear this on two occasions. But I went with a Israeli and he didn't give me the commentary. We just drove through the west bank and I could not believe it. I left at like 5:30 in the morning. And then traffic was just jammed in Israel and people were working and everybody was playing backgammon at 7:38 in the morning. It was just. And I asked when we stopped at a village, next thing I noticed they were building the wall. At that point, the first time, I think I went and everybody was protesting. And so I said, wow, they really hate you guys. I took my Israeli person, he said, who do you think your protest. I said, well, obviously they hate Israelis. He said, no, no, they're not protesting us, they're protesting Arafat. I said, what? He said, well, the course of the wall, we have arbitrarily decided to include acreage of East Jerusalem and we're going to give the exact amount of acreage from 1967, Israel, pre 67, to the Palestinian. And this particular village, we're going to go around and take it out of Israel and give it to Arafat. And I said, you are telling me that these people, or they're demonstrating because they want to be inside Israel and they don't want to be with their hero Arafat. And he said, no, they can get pensions, they have health care, they get protection. There's habea corpus, the rule of law. They can even run for office if they want, if they become citizens. And over there, they can be killed if they make fun of Arafat or they sell land to a Jew. So it was, you know, it's that kind of disconnect that you would blame. You'd blame yourself for these. What these people do to themselves. That's that famous line from Sir Charles Napier, that British general who was basically a proconsul of India, when suttee, the ancient practice of widows having to mount the funeral pyre of their husband because wealthy, wealthy men during the mostly pre British occupation, but in parts of the British occupation, they had young, beautiful wives. So when they died, this young person would have to go on. And a famous Indian apologist said, well, you don't understand our customs. We have customs that are ancient. And Napier, who was an imperialist in their country, but he ran it and he said, we have customs too. So you build your funeral pyre and we'll build our gallows. And so you'll have your custom of burning the woman alive, and then the people who did it will be hanged right next to her. Because in Britain we don't do that. We don't kill innocent women. Well, that's kind of a. It's often quoted and misquoted, but the point I'm making is that the world will be much happier place when people get rid of this colonial guild and going way back, racial, ethnic, and just treat people as racism people and judge these nations on what they do. Does anybody believe right now that if you took everybody from Mexico and you put them in Switzerland, cold, inhospitable, and they had the same culture, and you took all the Swiss and put it in Mexico with all this oil and beautiful Mexico would look like Switzerland and Switzerland would look like. That's not a racial commentary, that's cultural. Cultural. And there's no word in Switzerland used like manana, you know what I mean? Or siesta. There isn't. So each culture has these different proclivities and some have good things about it. You know, if you want to have a beer and talk to somebody and you want to have a loyal. Maybe it's better to be in Mexico. Swiss can be cold and mean. Although everyone that I deal with is absolutely my friend Urs. And so they're very nice people. But my point is that it's culture and if they don't want to, they don't have to change our culture. I don't have. We don't. But they didn't. They shouldn't come and beg and say you owe us this and you owe us this and you're this. And they had though the other thing is they have the American European Westerners, so called white person down. Perfect. They're educated. It's a weird mixture in our country. It's a mixture of the pilgrim puritanical self righteousness. Some of it can be channeled. The abolitionists had it. They would not compromise like Lincoln. They hated Lincoln for a while but they were so pure and so self righteous and sanctum. And sometimes that was good to stop slavery. But we have that part in the white elite and then we have the therapeutic, Freudian, Marxist, narcissistic social sciences that they were all trained in the universities and that is that abstract empathy. Professor Said calls it suicidal empathy. I think I use the term toxic. That that is a mechanism to cleanse your soul and make you feel good about your privilege and it doesn't cost you anything. So you just say oh, I'm so guilty as a white person and didn't I? California transplant in Michigan, she's running for Senate. I'm so ashamed that I see all these white people go back then. But I think it's all coming to an end because it's sort of like the wizard of Oz and Dorothy, she thinks that you really have to go meet the wizard and fight the witch and do all this stuff to get back home to Kansas. And then you learn all you had to do is click your heels. So it's all a facade and you have to play by oh, I'm so guilty about what my great great grandfather did. And I feel so bad about being white. And some person who's not white who's much wealthier than you, swears at you and does this. I was in academia at the state university. I at least met 10 people who were as white or whiter than I were. And they were from Latin America, black Chile, Argentina. And they did not have accents. And when they came into our department and our school of humanities they all got accents and they Latinized their name. If they were Rodney Gomez from Argent, they were Rodrigo. If they were Matthew Garcia, they were Matthias, you know, and they trilled and they were very wealthy and white blue eyes, some of them from Latin America. And I thought, what privilege do you not have? Where everybody was saying, oh, we have to do this. You don't have to do any of that. That's what Donald Trump did. He kind of liberated everybody. He threw a rock. It was that commercial, like the Apple commercial of 1984. He was the figure, the woman who came in with the ball and chain. And there's a big brother talking to this mesmerized oxen. She throws it in. It's basically saying, that's IBM and Apple's the upstart. And then she just shatters it. And everybody goes, woo. What was that all about? Well, that's what he did with DEI. You mean we were giving DEI to people like Mandami? Are you real AOC with that designer dress. Ilya Omar with her 30 million one day. And then when she's caught, she. These people. We gave Dei to LeBron James with his little glasses reading, I don't know, Malcolm Xway makes 50 million bucks a year. Colin Kaepernick with all this privilege. You got half white guy with a German name, and he takes the knee. And everybody suddenly, including his mom, is a rape. We put up. That's what we did. Nobody can believe that. And that's what Trump did. He threw a ball in that screen. And maybe people didn't like it. It's going to be very hard to come back because based on a amoral principle that you judge people by the color of their skin or their name or their ethnicity, and you don't take into consideration individuals, it's collective. And you don't consider how wealthy people are, how many opportunities they had. Does anybody think that Mondami was hurt by coming to the United States? He lived in a predominantly black country in Africa, right? He was a person of color. Why did his parents come here? They would have thrived. They could have said, well, we went to Uganda because we were all people of color and we had solidarity and we thrived. Then we had to come over here and we were oppressed. And that's why I'm only endowed professor making. Making 500,000 a year, and my wife, she's subsidized by the government to make movies. And we were even more oppressed. And then our son, you know, he, he. He didn't work for 20 years because he was oppressed. And now he's a Mayor and he's trying, he's oppressed. That's what. That's how ridiculous it is. Now that squad is a joke. It really is.

[A]

Yeah, it sure is.

[B]

And Ilyan Omar, I mean there is such a thing called karma and nemesis what comes around. And she has transgressed on the rules of the universe so much with her fake identity coming into the country, her brother and all that mess and then her involvement that she's hid on the whole Somali thing. And then her Benjamin baby, all that. It's a Benjamin's baby. All that anti Semitism and then her complete ignorance when she thought World War II was World War 11. And then calling our country garbage. And, and then something, something happened on 911 when something happened on 9 11. Remember that? Yeah. It's called murdering 3,000 people by radical Islamicists. But my point is when you do that and you keep pushing it the rules across time and space said you pushed it too far and now you're going to have a comeuppance and she's going to have one. J.D.

[A]

vance. Yeah. J.D. vance said that the DOJ is now going to start investigating her role in the connections to the fraud.

[B]

JD Vance was not persecuting her. It wasn't hounder. And he just said, basically the subtext of what he said was for all of the Biden years, anytime we had, nobody did anything because she was sacrosanct. She's a heroine to the far left. She's not to us. We're going to treat her just like anybody else. And if she committed immigration fraud, we're going to deport her like we do any person that came a hiring leader. We deport people all the time. And if you think the statute of limitations is over, we're going to call her in and ask her under oath, did you or did you not marry your brother? And we're going to take DNA from her and DNA from him and we'll find out if she lies. That's a new crime, isn't it? And we're going to deport her. And so she's, she thinks that she's immune like aoc. They can do any AOC hasn't. I don't know, she's misused. They all misused campaign funds, both parties. But other than that she's behaved legally. You know, she's an irritant. But you don't want. There's nothing that justifies going she's someone who. She's someone when she does those little videos with herself selfies. It's Kind of res ipsit dixit. The thing itself spoke. You know what I mean? She condemns herself by her, I don't

[A]

know, her own talk.

[B]

Yeah, narcissism. It's almost as grading as Pete Buttigieg's sanctimonious self righteousness or Kamala Harris's. No, she's like the Joker. She's not. When I see her, I thought, oh my God, two martinis. Three. Or is it just one? Now and then she just giggles. I think I said that. I don't want to say it again too much, but man, whenever it's being self time, space, her eyes start to go. The Twilight Zone music comes in. And then she thinks, I shouldn't have had that martini. And then how do I get out of this? And then a little idea goes cackle. And then that's it.

[A]

Yes, that's it.

[B]

She wants to be president again. And then there's a rumor going around that Doug Im off her husband. That was very funny, actually. You know, somebody sent me a link to that. I don't know if Jack did or somebody. It was really hilarious that they have marital tensions now. He's a little angry because until he was a celebrity lawyer in Hollywood and he made a lot of money and he had a big Brentwood house and now he bought one for her in Malibu, which suggests they might be at odds. So these gossip columns are sane. But it was very funny because nobody knew that he had impregnated his nanny and caused the divorce of his first marriage. And that woman didn't fare too well. They took pictures of her. She didn't look happy and she was very obese and it didn't look good. And then there was the other one where he pushed his girlfriend. So he was a spousal abuser or partner abuser and that all came out. So he was kind of bitter about that. But he went along with her first escapade and he knows she's not going to do it again. She can't win. But he doesn't want her to do it anymore. But the only thing that ran false about that whole story was when he said when somebody, the commentator or the writer said, Doug doesn't want her to go through all that again. He just wants to get back to his private life with her. I thought, no, that's why he bought another home. So she's living in Malibu. And if you don't believe me, read the next paragraph of the story. Story. When she said. And she had her objections because when it was her Birthday. In the heat of the campaign, he came to take her to dinner and she thought it was going to be a special moment. But he, he went to a hotel and the curtains were broken and it didn't look very high end. And it was all this entitled like Martha's Vineyard, you know, Arrogant whiner and that. It just made them both look horrible people.

[A]

Really bad.

[B]

It wasn't intended to either.

[A]

Yeah. Well, Victor, let's go ahead and take our last break and then we'll come back and talk a little bit about the shooting at the San Diego mosque in California. Stay with us and we'll be right back.

[B]

Since the founding of America 250 years ago, many things have changed, but some things never do. The commitment of husband and wife, the importance of passing along our values to our children, the faithfulness of God. Some wonder how we can ensure America will continue to thrive as long as we keep first things first. We've only just begun. America the Beautiful.

[A]

Welcome back to Victor Davis Hansen in His Own Words. It's a subsidiary of the Daily Signal. Please go to the Daily Signal and check out all of the articles and podcasts that they have. They're doing a great job there. So, Victor, San Diego, we have a shooting at a mosque that killed three people. And the two young men that did the shooting in their process sort of of escape or leaving, they also committed suicide. Or at least one of them committed suicide and shot the other one. But I was wondering your reflections on that.

[B]

We know maybe it's because if I had health problems or I'm 72, but I'm so cynical now because the first news thing I saw that came up, I think it was on smart news or whatever it is, two white nationalists, it was something like two white nationalists stormed a mosque to commit a hate crime. That was basically the theme. And I thought, I don't think so. It's very rare. And it's probably, I thought to myself, they're probably either not white or they're trans or there's something there that they don't want to talk about. But I didn't say that to anybody. But that's how skeptical when I see two men, young men, and they go in and they do something and it's not directed at Jews that are much very common, but Islam, there's something I know they're not telling me. So then it comes out, what, three days later that they're trans. And then it comes out that they're not quite your store white supremacists that their manifesto really blames Jews for everything. And they like Hitler, but it's because he kills Jews. And maybe they don't like Arabs and everything. And then you think, well, per capita shootings and murders by trans assailants is way over the percentage of trans in the population. And maybe we should take a look at that. As people have suggested, that keeps happening and every time it does, they deny it or say that you're a transphobe. But they were like Charlie Kirk's shooter. They were very. And his Furry Flynn. They were very disturbed people. They were very incoherent. They were very ignorant. Their mother had. One of the mothers was terrified of them and tried. And they wanted to go into history as taking. I don't even know if they knew they were Muslims. I think they might have thought it was a synagogue or a church. They have no idea who they were. They didn't. Their manifesto, from the little bit that's leaked out about it, they just hated certain groups, but they really didn't know why or which group or particular group. And where did they get the idea that Hitler, Hitler, Hitler, Hitler, I don't know. But it's. It wasn't what it seemed. And they killed a security guard. If they were going to commit suicide, they should have commit suicide. That's what I always feel when that happened.

[A]

Just for the record, the mother that you talked about, she called it into the police and said, my son is gone somewhere. And I don't know, they were wearing fatigues. They've got guns that they've taken from me, yada, yada. So she was concerned about him, I think, even being suicidal. So there may be.

[B]

You know, the problem wasn't that he was suicidal. The problem was he was also homicidal and he reversed the sequence. If he wanted to be suicidal, he should have done that first. And then maybe his ghost could have tried to kill somebody, but don't do homicide first. He killed an innocent person for no reason. But it doesn't even sound if you read what they've said about the man. But of course, the media doesn't tell us what's. We never really got the Tennessee Manifesto, that trans Manifesto.

[A]

But anyway, anyway, Victor, we're at the end of our show and I'm going to read a few comments. And then we have a question for you. Agent K. Plissken has written. Victor looks freaking good today. He looks 10 years younger.

[B]

I know I look good.

[A]

From Steve Truth 2696. Great show, Sammy. And Victor, I think your strength is coming back. Mr. Hansen. Lynn Annette Pauluka, 2775, says, oh my goodness. Victor and his knowledge help America realize our strength. How can propaganda hope to win when we have the truth? Thank you, VDH and friends. And then from Norway, Raman Moab, he says an Iranian watching from Norway keep the amazing work of UP. Victor. The people following leftists in the US don't know what Islamic Republic brought to us Iranians in 1979, otherwise they wouldn't cheer these Qatari backed leftists in New York City or the Khan.

[B]

I know what it did. Iranian people are very bright people. I mean, you can read about them. And Herodotus, who was an enemy of them, had great admiration for them.

[A]

Yeah. And then. Oh, go ahead.

[B]

So they're very, very competent people. And that's the great tragedy that they got rid of the Shah, who did a lot of good things. He was an autocrat, but he would have transitioned. And then they all got very happy and they all thought they were going to get a European socialist. So Bonnie Sauter, Goatsbody, all those people. And then the second wave came in like the French Revolution and the Khomaniites were murderers. And that's important for people to remember because if you're in the United States and you meet somebody who's Iranian, 50 years ago they came. They're in their 80s now, but they are very conservative and very pro American. They're mostly Jewish, but not all. They were the people who were the wisest and saw what was going out, that when they got rid of the Shah, it was going to be a mess. So they came here in the first diaspora and they're very concerned. The next diaspora were the naive people. They were the media, the professors, and they thought, we're going to stay here and manage the revolution and we can handle Khomeini as a useful idiot and we'll make a socialist kind of, you know, German or French. And they started getting executed and then they came here. So when I was teaching, I saw a lot of Iranian Americans in the university and when I do interviews in the media and they were all left wing, but I would meet Iranian business people that own shops, farmland. They were all conservative. They were a little older. That's a generalization. That's not true in any case, but it holds true for the most part.

[A]

All right, Victor, we are coming up on a hard break, so I'll save the question that I have from somebody on the great game of the British Imperial System for the Saturday episode. We'd like to thank our audience for joining us on this Friday Friday news Roundup. And thank you, Victor, for the wisdom and as if you go in to read your comments, a lot of them say it's the sanity of the podcast that they like. After all those podcasts out there that are just clickbait, the world of clickbait, they really love it here.

[B]

We try not to use. We don't use profanity and we don't try to get conspiracy theories. And we don't hate the people we disagree with. With. I don't. They're in my own family and I love them. But I feel that we want to give a rational, alternative view in hopes that our people who listen it, who agree with us, realize that they're not alone out on a farm in Iowa or an apartment in New York, that there's a lot of people like you. And we want to give encouragement to them that we're kind of in battle now in a cultural war of sorts with people who don't like us and want to change the country to something that the founders wouldn't even know what it was. We want to give reassurance to them. And then for people who disagree, we want to show you that we can offer you an alternative pathway. And we're not angry that you disagree with us, but we hope we can politely enlighten you.

[A]

Yes. And that's the most important thing, I think, to a republic and a democracy is that people can talk different points of view.

[B]

One other thing I think we try to do is you have a PhD, and I have a PhD, but we don't consider them. What's the word? Significant. They're just letters after our name. And it's just like, I meet an electrician. I don't know whether he's a journeyman or a master electrician. I just want to know what he does with his skills. And we're all too caught up on where you went to school and your titles. People are people. You judge them by their behavior, their character, and their performance. So we don't try to say, oh, this person's an expert, or we got to listen to Fauci. He was this. Or this person went. We don't care. We don't try to talk like that.

[A]

Yeah, of course not.

[B]

And we don't want guests on that are that way.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Farming really cures you of that really quick. If you've been farming and some guy comes out in nice clothes and he gets out of his car and he says he's the chemical company rep and he knows better than you because he got a master's in agri science or somewhere, and then you talk. Any farmer in the world knows more than he does, I can tell you.

[A]

All right, Victor, that's the end of the show. Thank you. Thanks to our audience. This is Sammy Wink and Victor Davis Hansen, and we're signing off.

[B]

Thank you, everybody. Much appreciated. Thank you for tuning in to the Daily Signal. Please like, share and subscribe to be notified for more content like this. You can also check out my own [e-mail] and subscribe for exclusive features in addition.