Me.
I've got some tallisker going today.
And John wis sippy cup, well whiskey.
Come and take my pain, the moneys, my ry, oh whiskey.
Why think alone when you can drink it all in with.
Ricochet's three whiskey Happy Hour. Join your bartenders, Steve Hayward, John Yu and the International Woman of Mystery, Lucretia.
Where they slapped it up. It'll live it ain't you easy on the shoulder?
Tap you got to give.
Me and let that whiskey goo boy. I don't know you guys if we can even do a show.
Listeners, we are coming to you this week having just received the dreadful news of the passing of Roger Mandigo. Roger Mandigo was the inventor of the McRib, so this is a mortal blow to John.
You John, I don't know how you're gonna carry on. I mean, are you Are you okay? John? How are you doing?
I'm gonna call for a moment of silence. It's you know, you know, the Eagles won the Super Bowl last week, and now we have this terrible news that's kind of balancing everything out in the world. You should also give the man credit because not only the McRib. But chicken nuggets. Now that if that had never been invented, that could have ground American civilization to a halt.
Well, you know, I'm having a hard time.
I was going to add that we're going to call a temporary ceasefire in our unlimited total war against commentary.
For dissing the McRib. But you know, it is kind of amusing.
He was a professor in the Department of Meat Science at the University of Nebraska.
I didn't know there was such a thing, and darn it, I could have gone there. But of course.
His specialty was restructured meat, which just sounds a little dodgy.
Doesn't mean you know, there was years.
Steve that was almost you, because if you looked at the bio he grew up in Pomona, the son of an aerospace engineer in the defense industry. Steve, if you had only picked up nick Rib at the right moment instead of Plato, who knows what a great life you could have had.
I think I've told you this story.
I had a big rib in February of nineteen eighty two when they were first test marking it, and it's.
The last one I ever had. But I didn't like it. Yeah.
One of my favorite Jay Leno routines from a million years ago now was him making jokes about chicken McNuggets and about how it's you know, compressed meat that lasts forever.
And he said, you know, you could put a.
Chicken mc nugget in front of a chicken and the chicken would say, I've seen nothing here that defends me because it's fake.
Right. That was funny.
Way, But if that isn't bad enough news, Luke Kreesha, it's also a sad news for.
You, very sad that Kentucky happens to have a democratic governor and that old bastard didn't just retire today. That's my sad news. Don't even go there.
I can't even make Fox mock's sadness about Mitch McConnell's thing is not going to run.
Because I'm sad about the democratic governor.
Yeah, I know, I know by the way he'll be if he decides to run to the seat, he'll be a formidable candidate.
That's a seat they could actually win, which is not good. But we'll see, no, no Kentucky.
How much Trump win Kentucky by.
Well a lot.
But remember the Basher won re election against a strong Republican candidate backed by McConnell, and uh, you know, he's one of those moderate Democrats.
You know.
The rumors are that Obama and some of the other party elders were trying to promote him among the two or three candidates to replace Biden, but then Biden jumped in and said it has to be Harris, and that's when they said, Okay, we're screwed.
Okay, what about Cameron? Uh uh, I mean the guy that the Repartment. Yeah, and he's a lot I mean he he is something of a McConnell accolade, but he's a hell of a lot more sound than McConnell. I could go for him, but it looks like it's just might be a race between Thomas Massey and Cameron, and they're not going to vote for for pretty boy mcsheer sorry this year whatever.
Right, I still don't get why you hate McConnell so much.
Well, we've tried this before, John, without success. But right, I'd like to say that it is. I can praise him for all my wonky, you know, Senate Majority Leader reasons, but he's the person who said we're not going to have Merrick Garland a Supreme Court and we are going to have Amy Cony Barrett.
I don't care if the election is just three weeks.
Away and it's only been a tiny bit better because of it.
Oh what Really?
Garland convinced me that Garland wasn't an absolute unmitigated disaster as Attorney General, and he would have at least been reined in on the Supreme Court. Number number two, You don't get to spend forty years of your life in a corrupt position, drinking at the public trough, making millions off your Chinese wife, and take credit for one bold act in your entire forty year career. Sorry, the rest of it was come he did.
Well.
Why are we finding out that there's so much waste, fraud and abuse in the government. Where have the damn Republicans been?
Huh?
Where's Mitch McConnell, who's been in power all these years? Why wasn't he cleaning it up? Because he was corrupt as the damn Democrats. I am so glad he's leaving. I cannot tell you.
So, John, I think we'll well.
Mark Lucreaty Down is undecided on the question of McConnell's legacy.
And I'll move.
On to our third item before starting a round robin, which is, if you think we're having a bad day.
Because of all this horrible news, how do you like to be a liberal? Right now?
He realized that we're now one month into the Trump presidency, in other words, one month down, forty seven months to go, and you think the liberals could make it? I mean, I think their mental health problems are only going to get worse from here. And of course, going with this, and we might spend some time on this in the end, is the Trump administration understands something better than any Republican administration maybe ever, which is always be on the attack.
That's the first rule of politics.
And they're great at it, and they're going to make some mistakes, but but you never lose when you're on the attack.
Anyway, I'll just throw that out there that our poor liberal friends are.
They work themselves into a lather and they've got forty seven months to go.
So should we invest in drug companies that sell antidepressants? Yes, and alcohol companies.
Because yeah, I think so.
If you'd like to see four years from.
Now, Javier Xavier Milier is that how I say his name gay to Malaya to uh elon today. Yeah, Cherry Fancy united him with the chainsaw. It's so.
Yeah, that's you know, you you really do get the feeling that some of these Trump people are having fun doing this. Certainly what's her name, Caroline Levitt, the Press secretary. You know, she's got that twinkle in her eye when she smacks the press around every other sentence.
You know, they made it so easy for her, though, because they've been so disingenuous, so duplicitous, so orthodox, and you know, ugh that it's so easy to just smack them in the face because they're just not expecting it. You know, they don't think they have to know the facts or they just have to repeat the talking points. And she's way way ahead of them. It's amazing to watch, and so is Jadie Vance.
Right, Well, something is happening that I expected. And we'll hear a lot more of this in the coming weeks and months. And you saw this play out in the Reagan years. You'd have an announced program cut. The Reagan cuts were really pretty modest, but that didn't stop the hysteria and the TV networks, in the newspapers, would go and find some person whose benefits for being cut off for eligibility or other reasons, and how they were going to be hurt by this.
And it was a terrible SOB story.
And CBS News US ulsters might remember this, John, you were too young. They did a week long special series, you know, like an hour every night, called People Like Us, and it was always the people like us that Reagan is hurting with his dastardly policies. And Reagan, who had the discipline to ignore the media, was furious and called Dan Rather on the phone and yelled at him about it. The point is, they never did a story about, oh, welfare fraud, they never did a story about waste fraud
and abuse in the government. They're totally incurious about that side of things. So now we're getting the stories about federal employees losing their jobs and isn't a terrible and it's causing plane crashes and you know, measles outbreaks and everything else, and that's not working out well. Partly it's the new media landscape, right there was it was hard to you know, back in the early eighties, Nation Review,
Human Events, the American Spectator. They published articles pointing out why this was wrong and distorted it and all the rest of that. But that was always Day's letter at best. Now you can do it on Twitter in.
Real time, and okay, so a lot of fun to trust.
I mean, the Democrats are trying to uh broaden their horizons a little bit. But when they go and put on CBS Samantha Powers, Ugh, the woman has been beat with an ugly stick inside and out. I'm just gonna
say that. But her speech writer goes and claims to be just some poor little little servant who's dedicated her life, but now she's gonna pay a mortgage and take her kids to chther And of course, you know it takes, as you pointed out on on X five seconds to point out that this woman is lying through her tee. She's not a civil service, he's not this. And then they're just so stupid. But it's worked for them for so long they can't think any other way, and it's
not working. You want to you want me to feel sorry for a civil servant whose job is guaranteed and they're you know, they're gonna have the most amazing retirement and they sit at home and watch porn all day. I mean, that's what the American people are thinking about. These people.
No.
No, at the EPA, they watched climate porns. What I've been saying for a long time. But that's a different thing.
And do it outside. But whatever.
All right, let's get to the main event. Another big week. But John, what's on your mind this week?
My issue is President Trump's comments about Ukraine. Uh. You know, I'm all for you know, as I've written in some pieces, you know, trying to uh match American strategy with the limited resources we have, which may require reordering of what our goals are, like Trump refocusing on the Western hemisphere and the Monroe doctrine. But you know what, I think what he said about Ukraine was unfortunate, and I used to don't. I think it was just the wrong thing to say about our ally.
But which which specific John, I mean he said about to read this, Yeah, I'm going to read the quote.
So he uh he said just Wednesday that you know, mister, you know that Zelensky was you know, quote unquote a dictator who you know, wasn't wasn't having elections during the war. He also said that that he had tricked the United States and supporting a war here's a quote that couldn't be one that never had to start. That Zelenski refuses to have elections, is very low in to Ukrainian polls, and the only thing he was good at was playing Biden like a fill.
So, I what do you disagree with about that?
John Well? I, first of all, I don't think Zelenski is a dictator. I don't think it's wrong to suspend elections during the war. That's trying to destroy your national existence. You know, Churchill didn't have elections during those World War two either, right, but that was an agreement amongst the leading you know, it's a parliamentary system, and you know.
I mean, I'm not really I'm not finished.
Well Lincoln, Lincoln chose to have elections, But I don't think that it makes you a dictator to say we're not going to have elections during war. I also, I mean, Trump is implying that Ukraine started the war. I mean, I think this is I mean, I just think that's factually erroneous. And I mean, here's you know, they are someone. You know, there's a country that we you know, the United States has pledged to support now Trump and we have spent billions of dollars to help them defend themselves.
They are not the aggressor in this war. Now Trump can come along and say, Okay, this is a war that started under President Biden, and so I'm going to try to draw to a close. I don't think it's wrong to have a conversation with Putin and a foreign minister of Russia. And I don't think Zelensky has to be at the table. I don't think the Europeans have to be at the table. But you have to start talking to someone the other side if you want to bring you know, negotiate to bring the war to an end.
But I don't think you should treat Dar. I don't think we be treating our allies this way. And I worry that if we would, you know, end the war in Ukraine really badly, it would be just like Biden the way he handed the war in Afghanistan. He could have said, you know, I didn't start this war in Afghanistan. I campaigned to bring it to a close. But if you bring the war to a close, even though it's not your own, in a bad way, it could really
be the thing that tarnishes your presidency. Biden's fall started because of the way we left Afghanistan. I do not want us to leave Ukraine in that way. I don't want to leave I think it would be a terrible disaster for US to leave Lukraine in a way that would allow Russia right to continue its fighting or to start encroaching on NATO. And that's what really, that's what really worries me.
Just one short point of order, our question, John, and then I'm gonna let Lucretia maul you to death, which I think she's all coiled and ready to do.
About the elections question, you're quite right to.
Point out, and actually pointed it out in some email to people today, that yes, there were no elections in World War Two in Britain or World War One, but in both cases, like Israel right now, you had a government of national unity that all parties were part of. I don't know if Zelensky has done that in Ukraine, don't. I think it's just him and his party. I don't think it's an all party government.
He has abolished all other political parties.
Guys, Well, that's why, That's what I understand, and so I think that's that's a problem. If he had done the British route or the you know, the other national government National Unity wrote, then I would absolutely cut him some slack, but I think that there are some questions about his democratic legitimacy. But John, let me introduce another statement of Trump's that you left out.
That was startling to me. But the more I think about it, I think I get it. It makes sense.
It's back to the old tap Trump literally and serious lead dichotomy. And that's when he said and repeated apparently later in the week, that I demand that Ukraine give us essentially fifty percent of the revenues from mineral and oil development in their country once they have their country secure again. There's tribute, right, This looks like old fashioned
you know, Roman or imperialist tribute. And I mean it seems outrageous on the surface, and I found it shocking until I stopped for a minute and thought, oh, like so many other things Trump does, like the Gulf of America and you know other things he does, like that, he's trying to reset things in a radical way instead of trimming around the edges. So just give you one example. We know that there's people have been talking about this
since the war started. Well, there's going to need to be billions of dollars in international aid for Ukraine to rebuild when the war is finally over.
And you know how that.
Would have gone in the past. They'd say we need a hundred billion dollars and we'd say we'll give you ten, and that meant we'd end up giving them forty or fifty, it doesn't matter the number. But that's the way that game would have been played. And Trump saying, no, you're going to pay for it. And by the way, you know, whether you think the aid is corrupt just to our
own defense industry, however you want to characterize it. At least Roosevelt had the wit in the in the len Les program before World War.
Two of getting written to give us some of their bases.
I mean, we got something from written for that aid in that desperate hour they had, right. So I think that this puts into a larger pattern to what Trump is really about. It's a grand strategy, or I call it the Great reset. He's now overturning essentially a century of the character of American involvement in the world. And I'll stop there and just say I'm all for it. I could go through the whole I'm gonna write a piece on this at some point. I'll just stop right there.
Actually, I actually don't when I read about this idea, you know, Trump has about getting essentially some kind of reparations from Ukraine, I actually thought that Ukraine should rush and Embraceist's idea as fast as it could. And this actually was This actually shows to me the way Trump thinks about Ukraine is not really strategic, because that actually would strengthen the relationship with between the United States of Ukraine. It would make it harder for us to pull up right.
We would have an interest then in Ukraine remaining an independent country, and we would have to send a lot of Americans and American companies to Ukraine to develop all
these resources. But to me just says, oh, but you know, the think about Ukraine's not co here, because he shouldn't want to do that if he really wants to cut off Ukraine and pull us back, and we don't want to have a steak in Ukraine after So, if you're someone who actually likes America supporting Ukraine, this idea is actually a great idea.
Oh interesting, I like that, Lucretia.
Okay, John, I listen I will concede that you could be right and I could be wrong. I promise you nobody is going to sue me for libel on this because in six months or less, I believe I will be proven right. And there is a lot of evidence of people getting filthy rich all across the entire elite Washington swamp on Ukraine and you, I believe that you'll have to, just like you did with JD. Vance and other things, confessed that I was right.
We'll see.
I'll just leave it at that way.
Other than Advance, when did I have to concede to or right? Steve's keeping score because also asked to keep track of whenever he has to say you're.
Right, I don't even hear him.
I won't press it.
And I just make one one point, just I totally buy that. I mean, look, you guys are right that Trump is trying to reset form policy, and you know it does involve right like the Monroe doctrine. I mean, that's the only way to make sense. Like if you wanted to say things like the Panama Canality, saying things like green Leve what he's saying, they make sense. They
actually kind of make a strategic sense. For the United States to reassert himself there because of the Monroe doctrine, and so you could say, because of the threat China poses to us, he is trying to write pull back our commitments in the Middle East. Maybe I don't know. Actually it seems like might be ramping up the Middle East. He should pull back from the Middle East is less important than Europe.
No, it's not.
Wait strategic anymore. If you just I don't measure power in the world by the number of people and the size of the economies. The Europe is like a whole order of magnitude more important than the Middle East. Asia is more important too than the Middle East. Africa is not.
But you know, like if you look the point, you know, American strategy for one hundred years has been we don't want anyone to be in the Western hemisphere and we don't want any power to control Europe and Asia because the wealth and power of those two parts of the world are the only ones that pose a.
Threat to us.
The Middle East poses no serious threat to us. There's not enough people live there Thereomy sure it.
Was Europeans who launched those planes against the Twin Towers and so forth. We don't have anything to worry about. What the Middle East, They don't have any resources, they don't that we care about, et cetera, et cetera.
No, but I mean, but they're they're not nation states. Look, I was, you know, one of the people who was involved with nine to eleven. I mean, if that was the only kind of threats we had in life, that would be great for our countries, that we had to worry only about terrorists. But nations like the ones in Europe, like the ones in Asia, the ones that can really inflict harm on us, I believe.
But who in Europe is going to inflict harm on us? They can't even protect themselves, that's what they need us.
Well, this is all of Europe. This is all of Europe. I mean, we have an interest like not having I mean, during the Cold War, would you have been happy the Soviet Union had taken over Western Europe war anymore?
Well? I well, okay, we're starting to lose the threat here a little bit. I might say.
I'm astonished to say these propositions, John, you know, we're were leaving Europe.
In the dust.
Economically. I don't know if you've seen the economic growth statistics of the last ten fifteen years.
It's really shocking.
But more than that, I mean when I describe the Great Reset, it's not just trying to break the Cold War mentality. I can do a storyline and will later, but it will start with Theodore Roosevelt mediating the Japan Russell War of nineteen oh five, which we didn't have a particularly close ally there, I don't think. But then Wilson, of course, Wilson's the original center of the mistakes of
a modern American foreign policy. Then Eisenhower stops Britain in France and Israel from a season control of the Suez Canal that would be their Monroe doctrine, and we foolishly stop them, and it's all been downhill from Europe ever since then.
They've Afterpeat become weak.
They depend on us to go to the bathroom practically, And part of what Trump is doing here saying, you know, Europe, you say you want American leadership, Well, here's still American leadership. Oh you don't like it, Well you need to step up and get your act together. He wants to make Europe great again. Indirectly, I think that's one way of putting it. And you know, we saw in the nineteen nineties. You have this dreadful war.
In the former Yugoslavia.
Europe was helpless to do anything in their own backyard, and we had to go in and and bomb Serbia.
Right, I think it was Serbia. Whoever it was Melosavi, It's right, we bombed the heck out of him. Okay.
I think it's time for tough love, not saying please please, will you spend a little more on defense? And would you be a little tougher on these No, he's I'm talking.
Like, and I'm going to stop and just.
Say I think that's and I'll be okay with it.
Okay, I can't do that. It's anyway. I think that's what's going on. And I'm a Europhile, John.
I want Europe to be strong and robust in our allies, but they need to grow up.
And you know Georgia, Oh she's the one good one there, right, yeah.
You know Business past week. They're no longer democracies, they are no longer allies sharing the same values. They're as bad as the Middle East.
By the way, a little a little trivia point for you, John, you may know this.
You know, we never we never forgave the World War One war debts from Britain, which they did not pay off until the late nineteen nineties. Hardly anybody knows that we were still making them paying their ward debts. See, they didn't pay him off I think till like nineteen ninety eight.
Yeah, but probably not taking inflation into account.
I'm sure not. But there was interest involved.
So but still we made him pay it back, you know. So same thing goes for years now.
To my just one last little thing in my defense is I wasn't saying the United States has an interest in controlling Europe. Our interest is just not letting anyone control Europe. That's been a point of American strategy for a long time because.
If someone organized out whatever.
All right, I give up. I will stop talking so I can't be interrupted.
That was a good life Europe right on its own.
I can't believe Steve is arguing for forty years is not thought of that.
Wait a minute, that's because Churchill thought of it in nineteen thirties.
He held it round. I don't in.
Trouble if I don't stop you saying ridiculous.
Churchill at dinner yelled at Randolph stop interrupting me when I'm interrupting you. Yeah, well, all right with that, Let's turn to you, Lucretia, what's on your mind this week?
About so many things on my mind? I do want to talk for a moment about Gaza, because you know, I get that they're just, you know, one little partial family, two little tiny kids and their mom being kidnapped by subhuman There are not enough adjectives for me to describe the despicable people that not just are the Palestinian terrorists jumas, but the entire Palestinian people who are out there today cheering and dancing, and the caskets of these tiny little
children and their mom. And it turns out it's not their mom. It turns out that after DNA evidence has been investigated, it's not the mom, it's some other strange woman. They are just and Trump, to his credit, said after he saw the videos of that he believes Gaza should be leveled. And I couldn't agree with him more. If any person in the West is so lacking it any moral standards, any moral compass, that they could take sides with that scum of a excuse of people they don't
deserve to live in the West. They should go live among the gossens. That's my belief, and I'm angry about it. I mean, I know little children are killed all the time. It's a very sad thing. But if you're a parent, something like that happening is worse than your worst nightmare, you know, five hundred plus days of not knowing what happened, and then they're dead and the scum are celebrating their coffins. So I do see our our show, we call it intervention.
I don't think we need to intervene in the Middle East. I don't think we need to intervene in Israel. We just need to let them do what they need to do. That's you know, maybe we let them buy all the weapons that they want to buy. That's flye. They don't need our money, that's fine too. Just don't get in the way and let them destroy that place. That is my big thing for today, And I have cannot have respect for anybody who takes a different position, not after
what I saw. I mean, we've known it's that bad, but it was just thrown in our face today.
Well, I think it ratifies the longtime contention that Hamas is a death cult. I mean, who would or I mean, if I want to be not exactly flipping, but if I want to be sarcastic about it, I'd say Hamas clearly isn't using Fentom communications for their pr strategy.
Fans that left make jokes about this is too Seriously, I.
Said it was sarcastic, right, but really, I mean, this has to enrage the Israelis and build support for going back to war to finish it.
I want here's one interesting thing. I'll try to sort of tone down the rhetoric for a moment. But two different leaders of Arab countries in the Middle East, right, came out and said Wan Saudi Arabia and I forget anyway, came out and said, this has brought shame upon Islam. Yeah they were embarrassed.
Yeah, well, I happened to.
Think that Islam leads to that, but we can leave that one aside for today. Good for them that they were at least willing to call it out, and they get my praise for that.
But well, I think that I caught that too, and I think that's significant because look, I think we know privately most of the other Arab nations hate the Palestinians. That's why they won't take any of them in. But they're useful to them for a bunch of domestic political
reasons and other things. And so for them to publicly put some distance between them suggests that they're giving up on the Palestinians, and then maybe a signal that you know, you know, our patience with you guys is quickly disappearing. I do wish who am I talking to you about this recently?
Oh?
It was Eli Lake last week that I wish in addition to talking about Iran, we would talk about the Kataris and say some very tough things to the Kataris because they have a lot of influence with Amas in Gaza, and you know, we could threaten them with all kinds of things that would be very trumpiing to do my two observation, one observation of one question. Sorry, John, I'll just finished, and I have no more to say. You know, even in World War Two there were Germans who helped
protect Jews. I'm not aware of any evidence any Gossens have helped any of the Israelis who were in captivity.
Quite the opposite, I think.
And then I also wonder, I mean I know there's been a lot of pressure in Israel to not only get live hostages out, but also the bodies are the ones they knew who were dead, because the families would like to have them for proper Jewish burial rights and so forth. But I'm starting to wondering how many I'm starting to wonder how many hostages are still alive, and that maybe the next shock we get.
And I want John to speak. I don't want to interrupt him, but I just want to say that the condition of the hostages that have come back alive is so awful. I'm not sure that Israel cares anymore well or should care right anyway, Sorry, go ahead, John.
So, I you know, connect it to the last discussion. I'm glad that the Trump administration is not a cold bloodily realist. There are people in their administration who are, you know, taking important positions, who have said that we should pull out in the Middle East and focus on China. But that would yeah, that would be the realist thing
to do. Actually. But I'm glad that we defend democracies in the world, and that's the reason we support Israel is because because of its domestic political structure and that they're like us there. I mean, I've been there. It's
it's like more America than a America. It's like it's like a lot of the best features of America are even more pronounced there, I think, especially now, not so much when it was a socialist country in the nineteen fifties, right, but you know, once it was a you know, and the United States wasn't so friendly to Israel in the fifties and sixties, so you know, I saw but you know, you know, the cold realists and all this were you know,
the Democrats, you know, Obama and Biden. You know, they were the ones who are saying, oh, Iran is the really the powerful country in the region. Why are we supporting the smallest country with the tinest population that everybody wants to destroy. We should write this is the realist approach. We should reach a deal with Iran and settle, you know, settle our differences so that we're not always on the
you know, defending the little guy. But I'm glad we're defending the little guy because the little guys at democracy, at capitalist democracy, like us, and we have such deep cultural ties with them. So I actually think that there is is now you know, it's not Wilsonianism, but because we're not going everywhere in the world trying to you know, support democracies even in unstable countries, so that we always
have this mix of realism and realism and idealism. So I you know, so this is the other weird thing. I don't understand why Trump. I mean, I hope he's changed his mind now. I didn't understand why Trump would want to take over Gaza, you know, displace the Palestinians and then turn it into some kind of a you know,
American run territory. I agree we should just I would I think the best way to you know, align our limited means with the you know what our strategy would be to just fully army Israelis and stop trying to tell them what they're allowed to do with our weapons, and then let let them defend themselves. They're going to take care of Ron if we give them the weapons we don't need to take care of you know. Let let you know, let the nations there pursue you their
self interest and defend themselves. And I think we should defend We should arm Israel to the hilt. I don't think we should ever intervene there again where there are troops and forces, and I don't think, you know, Trump would ever have any intention to. So I always think like this idea of developing Gaza, because you'd have to send troops there and Americans there. I just think that was some kind of fantasy that he had. But it can't be serious.
Oh well, wait a minute, jo, I mean, ah, I can't believe I have to you must know this.
That what he said about redeveloping Gaza and moving the Palestinians out.
Uh.
Once again, that's you take him seriously, but not literally.
Again, Look what that did was implicitly with a capital I implicitly say there's not going to be a two state solution. Let's just shut up about the stupid idea. That is the fantasy of our state department in the international elites. And it exposes the hypocrisy of the Arab nations who say, oh, we're all for supporting Palestinians, but we don't dare want to take them in and help them.
And I think it's wonderful. I don't think I.
Would be even more minimalists than that. I would just say we're going to arm the Israelis yeah, right, Okay, much as much as they want to buy, and we don't care about what the diplomatic solution is. Let the Israelis and the Saudis and the Iranians fight it out and then they can have whatever settlement they want. I think it's been a mistake for us to continually think that we, like the every American president thinks that they have to have some kind of solution to the Israeli
Palestinian problem. It's not our It really is not our problem.
Noah.
I think I don't know why they're not, and Ukraine is, but that one alone.
I think Trump is again implicitly embracing the old Reagan strategy on the Cold War. When it comes to Israel's enemies, Israel wins and they lose, and that's all we need. Okay, Well, huckemy his ambassador isn't an interesting choice. Not usually both parties send someone who's Jewish to be our ambassador Israel. His sensus evangelical Christian, who, of course, because of that fact, is like more pro Israel than many Jews are. I think you might say, I'll get in trouble for saying that.
But and he's the.
One He's the one who said, you know, maybe israelogist the next the entirety of the West Bank, it's their historical land from biblical times.
Oh my god, nobody would say that in the past.
That would get you fired from the first Bush administration if you said something like that out loud, I think, But all right, nothing.
That went alone, because I've got something that I want to tell John. I don't know if be seen. I think this is actually very new, the latest. I think this is the latest presidential executive order. The Constitution vests all executive power in the president and charges him with faithfully executing the law. Since it would be impossible for the president to single handedly perform all the executive business of the federal government, the constitution also provides for subordinate
officers to assist the president in his executive duties. We're all, I'm sure in agreement so far. And he goes on and basically what he says is, however, previous administrations have allowed so called independent regulatory agencies to operate with minimal presidential supervision, so we don't need to overturn Humphrey's executor, including the stupid quasi legislative CALAUSEI judicial rationale behind it.
We just need to see Trump's claiming. And this is, I think what you're always saying, John, in areas that are clearly within his executive discretion, he doesn't have to answer to anybody. Get rid of those damn independent agencies and put them under the complete control of the president.
And then, of course the other part of Lucretia's die tribe about this is then hold him accountable, right, And you can only hold him accountable if he actually has the ability the responsibility to control those agencies.
Right, Yeah, I agree, And in fact, the interesting thing is even Humphrey's executor wasn't an order by a court that Humphrey had to go back to the job. It was only that Humphrey's estate because he died, gets back pay. So I agree, Like, the president is still going to fire somebody if he wants, and I think I don't think courts are going to try to reinstate people. They might just say, oh, the federal government has to pay whatever salary you would have made for the rest of
your term in office. So I know, I completely agree that I actually find that not that controversial. The one that is more controversial I think is there's another executive order that issued I think maybe today or yesterday, where he ordered all the agencies to re examine all their regulations to determine which ones are beyond their constitutional powers, which ones are not supported by statute, and which ones
are not in the public interest. That is, that is a much bigger threat to the administrative state.
What do you mean my question? I just one when you gave those three criteria, are they one of the three or all of the three?
No? No, it's just one of the three. And also when you say they aren't in the public interest the criteria, Yeah, but the other two but that means you but no, No, I mean this is a much greater threat to the administry of state, even then attacking the independent agencies, because then the president could give an order next. The next order would be now all regulations that you know been reported to me as falling into oney three buckets, are
are are not valid? Regulations will not be enforced. Well, right, so suppose you know Steve's favorite statute, Right, suppose the e p A, the current e PA director says those are all not covered by the commerce clause. Right, maybe only things that go across right, state borders are covered. So what if you know? The EPA director says, a lot of the Endangered Species Act is not within federal
power because the animals don't cross state borders. About that, But the thing if you apply that across the administrative state, that's you know, if you know, but if you so, if you are real, you know, progressive, this is the order you should really be freaking out.
Well, by the way, but wait a minute. I mean, first of all, the EPAD notice well they're not the EPA is.
Not the lead agency for endangered species. I think it's Interior but fish and wildlish, fish and wild, but I mean they have a role in it. But remember it was you know, what held up John Roberts from confirmation was his saying in the appellate court about the hapless toad in California who doesn't cross state lines, and can the dangered species accurately reach the species?
So that's been out there for a while.
Mike Consicle is the Trump administration ought to think carefully about issuing some guidelines of some degree of specificity about what qualifies as public interests because that's such a vague phrase through which the bureaucrats will demand all kinds of stuff and in other words, try to constrain them and channel them in a certain way that will resist them and put them, make them put themselves in a box.
I think that requires some thoughts.
Can I ask you, Steven John, if you think that Trump did that more or less successfully with the DEI stuff, as in, did he make it clear that the reason why he could ban DEI across the federal government and then across universities and schools and so forth that take federal funds and contracts and so on, because he claimed that any attempt to discriminate on the basis of race, ethnicity, religion, alien status, sex, et cetera violates the Civil Rights Act
of nineteen sixty four. And that's how just so, I just want to say this because I'm dealing with this every day for about fifteen hours a day, because of course, the angst at my university is palpable because we haven't no.
Mood.
I am dealing with it. I mean, part of me is happy, but but you know, dealing with anyway. By next Friday, everything has to be certified that yes, we have either turned it in or we have gotten rid
of it. By next Friday. So you know, there's all this stuff about hiding it and what can we eat this and that, but but it's pretty clear really, I mean, you don't have have to have a law degree to understand that we're not allowed to one race versus another are are unconstitutional under Harvard, the Harvard case, under this Rights Act, etc. I'm just wondering.
This is a this is a theme I think that that Steve has been suggesting in other areas, but I think it's true here. This is something that Reagan people thought of, but they didn't have the political right balls to try it, and Trump is But it goes all the way back to Lincoln, right, because you know Lincoln's theories about the Constitution or that the president gets interpret the Constitution to do and gets to implement that understanding in his sphere of authority. And that is also Jackson,
that's also Jefferson, that's also Washington think this. So I think that's right. If the president thinks that these race based programs violate the Fifth Amendment, right, it's the Fifth Amendment here, he's that would be violated because it's the federal government acting. He only he has to actually stop, right, So the thing. But I think that's true if all these other regulations too. If what if President Trump, you know, he doesn't have to share the broad reading of the
Commerce Clause that the Supreme Court has. What if he thinks the Commerce Clause should be narrower and so the regulatory state much of what's doing is unconstitutional, then I think he has the power to say I will not enforce regulations that go beyond the proper reading of the Commerce Clause. And I think in your case, christ say, I don't think that I have to have I will not not will I not enforced, but I'll make sure no federal dollars are spent to violate the Constitution, which
would be to create race based preferences. I mean that that does follow. But this is not Trump didn't invent this, like people should understand. This is like the Reagan administration thought about this, but they didn't pull the trigger. And Lincoln did do this, Jackson did do this, Jefferson did do this. It's I think it actually makes sense because you have to enforce the law. The president has to enforce the law, and the Constitution is the highest form of law.
We want to conclude this and move on.
I just want to say, and that is it.
Hold on.
This is important. That the reason that this particular subject is so call it poignant, is because this is the thing that divides the right from the left more than anything else. Call it wokery, call it whatever. The idea that the left wants to pick and choose victims and then reward those victims, reward themselves in the process of handing out goodies to those victims. That's what it really comes down to, of course, and that has been I can't tell you what an orthodoxy. You guys know this.
You're in a university. You know you've said, you've given us examples John that the university wokeer elite can't even fathom that. There's another interpretation to say, the Civil Rights Actor, the fourteenth Amendment or Fifth Amendment, that might say, yeah, you really shouldn't discriminate against people on account of their race, whether that race is white or black.
The universities. The universities are where the massive resistance is coming from YEP, to the Harvard case to the end of DEI you're going to see I agree, You're going to see you You're going to see all kinds of efforts to right to get around all these directives. I think though this, So here's the thing that might be different, because I always thought that it would be really hard for the federal government to actually beat back all the
clever ways universities are going to cheat. But the thing that the you know, if Trump goes and is setting if you don't cooperate, we're going to cut your science grants, right, like you know the federal funding you know for student loans, like those are the two big sources of funding right for the federal government and universities is you know, research
funding and student loans. Right, then you're going to have constituencies that are going to be really really upset and don't have to say, oh, yes, the sociologists get to run the university and we are going to die on the hill of sociology to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars. So I think that's very clever. I don't even know if Trump deliberately thought of how universities kind of have science people who kind of let the humanities people run wild as long as it doesn't interfere
with their work. But now it interferes with their work.
Yeah, yeah, Well, I mean this was a problem.
By the way, the Reagan people did actually assert themselves in a few specific areas, but they didn't have the manpower, they didn't have the clarity of how bad the problem was. They learned too late what was going on, and we benefit from those failures. There's always a problem of playing whack a mole, and there's gonna be a lot of that going on here with a lot of Trump efforts.
I'm trying to think of a metaphor where when you've got a problem with moles, you know, you start using heavy weapons and blow up the whole tunnel system at once, which would be denying them funding right on the commerce clause, John, I'm sorry, I have to do this. Under that certain statute, you can't aim. It seems to me, it seems to me that you could nuke all of the climate change
regulations by simply saying CO two is produced globally. But this is true if you have complete compliance with all these crazy plans of Biden's settings, no difference, It makes no difference to global temperature fifty or one hundred years
from now. I mean, that's using the unci the basis of it well, but never but never mind that by their own processes that they set in place to evaluate these things, that they admit this, so using their own weapons against them, you don't have to even challenge the basis of it.
By the way they are going to challenge the basis of it.
That's a long story I know all about and I'll say more more than.
That, but that's when that shoot.
Right, here's a terrible proposal for a podcast is we should have a special podcast without Lucretia, where it's just Steve talking about the Cleaner Act. Oh god, you said for like two hours, three hours?
Right, yeah, we shouldn't.
We should record how many people actually listen at the beginning and how many people make it to the end.
So, John, there was a whole thing in the comment section on one of the platforms I forget, which about what is the statute that can be named? And then it was.
See how success said, man is so awesome. I love that.
I love it be named. And my answer to it was because whenever Steve starts talking about it, sales of ambient fall precipitously.
So the people that do the readers, when the listeners want know. The real story is that when Steve first came to Berkeley, we taught, you know, classes together. We taught a class on the Presidency, and he mentioned the Clean Air Acts so often I forbade him from mentioning the statute again for the rest of classics. This is a class on the Presidency, not on the clean Air and he worked it into every single class. We'd have
a class on the war power. Steve would want to talk about how the pollution was so terrible from drop bombs. I don't know what, but in class he found a way to mention the clean X I said, is ver boten?
Okay, I assert that this is all fake news.
But since I brought up, since I thought up brought up fake news, let us now turn to Lucretia to give us our weekly fill of the good Babylon bees.
Did you not get my cue on that? I thought, But it's okay.
I have it up here. I just have to get to it. I just haven't gone through.
I well mentioned.
While you're getting them in line and picking out the ones you want. I got to have dinner last week ago with David Diebel, my stand up comic pal who lives mostly in Germany, and he writes a lot of items for the Babylon Bee.
I've kind of forgotten that. But he has a lot of fun.
Some of him as a guest on the podcast that was stand up Comics, very funny.
Oh yeah, I had him.
Don't do politics, stand up a little bit, not much, but he can't have him come.
On his His tweets on x are usually about politics, but sometimes just you know, normal things.
Yeah, I guess anyway, Okay, what do you got for us?
Clinton says he doesn't want Ukraine anymore now that it has all these holes in it. Oh, I gotta get down hold on delta, adds a little hanging tennis ball to end the runway for female pilots.
Was it a female pilot who landed?
Yeah, it's actually an airplane, an airline. John that that their their motto is unmanned. It's not talking about drones. It's talking about the fact that there's no male pilots.
Yeah, but that's not that's not the whole airline. It's just that's a promotional Look. I heard a cockpit recording today and the pilot answering them Plaine is clearly male.
So there may be a female.
Coat pilot, but make these it is bad that they're not releasing the names of the pilots and so forth. I don't know why that's a mistake, I think, but I think it's not true that's an all female airline.
But okay, so all passengers fear dead after plane crash. Survivors given free Canadian healthcare. I thought you left that he's for my two favorite nerds, geeks, whichever you want to call it. Elon admits he's Luke Skywalker's real dad.
Well that's good, since Mark Hamill is such a woos.
Yeah, I think I have to end there because what what what's happening now with the with the Babylon b is wonderful and I encourage everybody to go there. But instead of these cute little clever lines, they're they're asking you to, you know, click on it and I'll give you one example, uh, Facebook memories or mind man men of his men of his embarrassing libertarian phase. And then there's a whole list of things, and say with the first ten things, Cash Betel's FBI will investigating first, and
if you go into them, they're really really funny. I'll leave it at this. Well promises full investor into why she was allowed to become la mayor.
All right, because she said I'm having an investigation of why I was allowed to go to Ghana.
I mean, yes, she really said that. It's mind not nothing stupid.
I'll just give you Dave Deebels and then toss to you John and I have a new exit line.
You're gonna love it.
Okay, Dave Diebels this week, which had a story going with it that was very funny, but the headline was something like a German arrested for firing twenty five means in crowded marketplace?
Can I throw in Mike yellmanism. I don't know if we've mentioned this, but for those who don't know, Mike Yelman was a professor at Claremont Graduate University, where Stephen Lucretia went. But also he has a wonderful ratcontour and a scholar and a significant figure in the Reagan administration and in the seventies in the US Senate. So he said, if you ever want to test whether something is a good idea, like a law or a regulation, read it
out loud in a German accent. Right, Yeah, And that's a really good advice.
Sure is, because I don't.
Even though I defended Europe earlier, I don't want to be read to be at all sympathetic to the German the political or legal system. Right.
I do want to encourage listeners to go to the Babylon b and read the read the whatever you call it the joke, it's actually a story, an article, and it's the trumpet admin says Department of Education should be dismantled. This is why they're mistaken. But you have to read it understand why, because it is the most ungrammatical, uh infelicitous use of the English language you will ever read.
Why it's so important for us to keep the Department of Education teaching our children how to read and write.
So Steve, we'll always drink your whiskey knee And Steve, what's your new exit line?
Well, remember that for several years we use the line supplied by someone the power who was mentioned earlier by the Acre Show. And I've updated that and uh changed it around. And the new sign up, which I'm going to keep for a while because I think it works, is don't forget to milk the Margaret Brennan dividend. Bye bye, everybody, Ricochet, join the conversation