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Good morning, everybody, Happy Monday. We have an amazing show for everybody today where we have Crystal d.
We do glad to have you back, my friend.
Thank you. Yeah, it was it was a rough one out there.
It's the worst flu season since two thousand and nine, So everybody out there please take precautions. Stay away from anybody who tells you that they're feeling okay, it's not too bad, Stay away from them.
Yes, yes, be free to breaking out the mask and so for.
Real, Yeah, this will be the only time I will endorse mask we're in culture, especially if you're people who have children and all of that.
It's it's a rough one.
I know multiple people who've been inflicted, so stay away from them. And if you hear my voice crack, it's not my fault. I apologize.
My daughter's second grade class has been absolutely decimated.
Horrible.
We've gotten i won't.
Say unscathed, but we've escaped the worst of it so far this year. So fingers crossed, the weather turns nicer and some of these things died down.
Yes, it's been a rough one.
It's been bad.
So in any case, glad you're back. We've got a lot to talk about.
ELON sent out a weekend ultimatum to old federal government employees. Interestingly, though, a lot of the agencies are telling their workers, including you know, FBI now under cash Betel, Department of Defense, et cetera, don't respond to this email. So very interesting dynamics playing out here. We got some new polls revealing the latest about how the public feels about DOJ and ELON and all of these things that are unfolding. We also had a purge of some of the top brass
at the Pentagon. We'll tell you what happened and what it potentially means elections in Germany. So the far right party there AFI, which have been boosted by Jade Vans and also prominently by Elon Musk comes in second. Really interesting political dynamics there. Inflation, the war in Ukraine, immigration economics, incumbent parties, all of these trends playing out in Germany.
So we'll break that down for you as well.
Bernie is out doing some barn burner town halls in Nebraska and Iowan particular, massive overflow crowds, kind of leading the way for Democrats. He actually has a strategy that he is pursuing low and behold. At least one person has some idea of what they're doing out there. Warren Buffett is hoarding the most amount of cash in Berkshire Hathaway that he ever has, So what does that indicate. There are also some other troubling economic indicators. We're going
to take a look at all of that. And Luigimngioni main appearance in court. Our own Spencer Snyder was there on the ground talking to people who are outside protesters and his supporters who were outside, explaining what they thought about his case and why they were there to support him, so really interested to get that on the ground report as well.
Yes, that's right.
Continue to monitor the faq on his website with a lot of great interest.
Did you watch that segment?
No?
Yeah, Ryan and I did it.
It was an faq all about how people can send him photographs and to keep in mind that those photographs are screened by the police. Just it turns up the number of third straft Luigi finds himself.
Receiving on what did you say?
He's a great I have to say, I told you guys on the call, I am absolutely in love with Luigi's sweater. I'm in the market, so if anybody knows where he got it, please let me know. All right, let's go ahead and start with does so actually a very interesting showdown happening here in Washington? And I would say the first like major institutional pushback within the MAGA coalition the government against Doe. Here.
Let's put this up there on the screen.
It began with like an office Space style meme email that Elon sent to the entire federal workforce on Saturday around three pm, and it says, what did you do last week? Please reply with approximately five bullets. Note of like the weird pronunciation, There five bullets of what you accomplished last week and c see your manager. Please do not send any classified information, links or attachments. Deadline is this Monday at eleven fifty nine EST. So let's go
to Elon's explanation for that email. It says, consistent with President Trump's instructions, all federal employees will shortly receive an email requesting to understand what they got done last week. Failure to respond will be taken as resignation. So this appears to have been probably the most explicit example of elon slash dose quote unquote overreach with pushback, because what immediately happened was their agencies telling them not to comply.
Keep in mind Trump has not spoken out about this at all. If anything's been encouraging him to go further, put that next one, please so we can show people. It says Elon is doing a great job, but I would like to see him get more aggressive. Remember we have a country to save, but ultimately to make greater than ever before Maga. Imediately, though, following that email, Cash Patel, the newly confirmed FBI director, directed his entire workforce not
to respond to the email. It just says all FBI personnel, may I love may have received an email from OPM requesting information. The FBI, through the Office of the Director, is in charge of all of our review processes and will conduct reviews in accordance with FBI procedures. When and if further information is required, we will coordinate the responses for now. Please pause any responses. Thank you, Cash Ptel.
On the right is RFK Junior actually, who reversed his original policy telling his workforce to reply to the email, saying HHS leadership continues to work with APM officials and how to best meet the intent of yesterday's notice. Employees are therefore directed to pause activities and answering the OPM email. Additional guidance will be provided on or around noon tomorrow. And then finally, the Pentagon also weigh in here. Let's go to a four. Please just to show people, Apartment
of Defense, the entire Pentagon received the following email. When if required, the Department will coordinate responses to the email you have received from oer PM. So I do think this is very significant, Crystal. I think it's the very first time that you've seen Doge and or Elon, you know, send one of these mass emails.
Beyond even the quote.
Unquote fork in the road the buyout, this one was one where the directors of the agencies really step forward and they're like, yeah, that's just not happening in terms of you trying to run my workforce.
So I do find it actually very interesting.
And I mean I'm presuming that there's at least some Trump support or maybe the Chief of Staff Susie Wiles somebody like this, because it's just obviously like overriding chain of command, you know, the Senate, confirmed appointees and the workforce and others. So this could be a turning point. I'm actually curious to see how it goes.
Yeah, we'll see.
There's a lot that's interesting about this and the dynamics and the way that it played out. So first of all, I didn't realize this, but apparently previously, like before cash Battel was not needed to be director of the FBI, and certainly before he was confirmed, et cetera, he was quite critical of Youwan.
He went on a bunch of podcasts.
Our friends over at drop Site actually compiled all of this information. But he went on a bunch of podcasts where he's very critical of him, like kind of similar to like the Steve Bannon style criticism critical of him
on his Twitter account. And you could just imagine for all these people who like you know, got their spot as an agency head and went through Senate confirmation, did the whole thing, and then you get in there and on basically day one, you've got this goofball over here, richest man on the planet who thinks he can just come in over your head and be like, yeah, I'm going to fire a bunch of your workforce if they don't respond to my email in a couple of days time.
And so whereas congressional Republicans seem to have been pretty comfortable just like feeding all of their power and authority to Elon into Dooge, these agency heads were like, wait.
A second, no, no, no, no, no, this is my workforce.
I have some authority at this agency, and you're not going to just completely bigfoot me on all of this. So we'll see, you know. The RFK one was interesting as well because initially the guidance he put out was go ahead and respond to this email, and then they sort of backtracked and said like, well, I actually, you know, pause your work on that email was I think the way they phrased it in the sort of like awkward
worded email. I'll tell you I've mentioned this before. You know, the town I live in, which is the town I grew up on, which is not DC, which is not even northern of Virginia. It really is this like you know, rural community totally built around a naval base where they do a bunch of civilian research. So it's mostly like civilian There are active duty military there as well, it's
mostly like civilian scientists that work there. And so I was talking to some of my very non political, like parent friends there about all this is going down, and I mean they're completely panicked. They have never seen anything
like it. They're deeply confused about what to do. One of them showed me the communication that they got from the captain who runs their particular group at the base, and it was like, actually, the think of it was kind of funny because they were like, we're not sure this email is real, so while we're investigating, just go ahead and don't respond to this email.
But you know, it.
Really is for the federal government workforce, which by the way is I think a majority of them actually work for the Department of Defense. It is not necessarily the like caricatureish view that people have of some like you know, super liberal political activists bureaucrat. Many of them live and work outside of DC in rural areas, many whom are Republicans. By the way, I mean most of these people who work on this space, I know for a fact vote Republican.
The town that I'm from is like sixty to sixty five percent Trump supporting kind of a county. So anyway, there's a vast wat of people who are really being shaken by this approach from Elon and the chaos that it's injected into this entire workforce.
Yeah, the numbers here from Claude. We have four million people who work for the federal government. It is the largest employer in the United States. Approximately eighty five percent of federal employe civilian employees work outside of the Washington,
DC metropolitan area. The distribution exactly as you said, military bases which are located throughout the country, federal agencies, national parks, VA hospitals, border patrol, and the Social Security Administration, which has an office in most counties.
I believe every county across the United States.
So let's put a five up there on the screen just to show people even more so kind of what this is leading to. The OPM email has been met not only with some of the most high profile agencies saying not to comply, but you also have some of the largest unions of federal workers telling them as well to be cautious responding or not to respond at all.
But I think most important really is the State Department said not to do with THEE and the Commerce Department specifically Noah and NSA employees were told the same not to I guess, you know, theoretically they should, right.
Well, that was.
Actually another point that one of the parents in King George County where I live made as well. It's like he's like, you know, we all have like really high levels of classification, and so if you're just like mass firing a bunch of people who have some of the highest security clearances in the government, He's like, you know, how loyal do you think they're going to be feeling to the country after that?
You know, I mean, I don't don't like that because it's.
Like a risk as well to all of this because it is done in such a like, you know, there's it's just such a blanket across the board, no thought into how many years of service you've put in, how effective an employee you've been, how significant you've been into the organization, just like zero loyalty whatsoever.
Yeah, the only reason I don't like that is because it presumed that it's like, oh, if we don't pay them, then they're going to go work for somebody else. It's like, why that might be true in theory, is just it kind of you know, hits against the idea.
I mean, I'm not ultra like advocating to it, but I am saying it, like, these are human beings, you know, right, And if you've shown if you put in twenty years of loyal service to the government as a civil servant and then you're just booted out unceremoniously for literally no reason, I think that's probably going to impact how loyal you.
Feel to your Maybe the Russians in the Chinese are just rubbing their hands.
They maybe they maybe.
Let's go to a six here we have. This was flagged by Ken Clippenstein. He's Jerry Connelly, who is what is he? The head of the dem Oversight Committee.
That's correct.
Yeah, he's currently battling cancer. But Ken has really mounted a war against him just for not because of his illness, just to show like gerontocracy and who the Democratic Party chooses.
They chose this guy over AOC, right.
So yeah, here was his response on the federal email. Let's take a listen.
What are you recommending federal workers should do?
When they turn on the news today, they hear this and they're like, I got a deadline by tomorrow night.
What should I do this? Yeah? I hesitate to give personal advice.
I guess if you can cover yourself and do the five things you did last week, just to be able to say.
Well I did it.
So yeah, he's like, well, maybe just respond to the email. We were I'm you and I are willing to cut the guy.
I'm a little sympathetic. Well.
First of all, background on Jerry Connolly. He before he was in Congress, he was the chair of the Board of Supervisors in Fairfax County.
Yeah, he has been.
He his district represents Fairfax County and the environs. He probably has more federal government workers in his district than any other district in the country or certainly among the top. So this is very like like he knows these people, so he's thinking about He's not thinking about like how do you make a political point.
He's thinking about, like, you know.
Susie who works in wherever, wants to keep her job. She's not trying to make some political stance. And so I'm actually sympathetic to this because if somebody, you know, my county just asked me, like what should I do, I don't know what I'd say.
I don't know what I tell them.
I'm I don't want to put them at risk to like get fired out of some stupid over some stupid emails. So you know, a better response would have been talk to your union, talk to your supervisor, like figure out what the coordinated response is, versus like, I don't know, I guess just respond to the email and cover yourself.
But I am a little bit sympathetic to him.
Here on this one.
I think you're I think we were willing to cut a little bit of slack. I have also taken a personal census of some of the federal employees who.
I know, and they're not happy right now.
Maybe I'm sure there's some mag of people who are cheering about it, but really what it is is about the chaos and people just not really knowing what to do.
How this will manifest politically. I genuinely have no idea.
I have been thinking about that statistic about the number of people employed by the federal government, just because as we know formula and people work for the government. Than if we think about family, then everybody probably has a cousin or you know, a friend or some daughter, son, whatever, somebody who works for the FEDS who is currently experiencing this.
And what we know from COVID is that the reason why I think that the twenty twenty election is the highest turnout election in modern history is because it was the first time that government really touched people's lives in an ultrati way, be it checks, be it lockdowns, be it vaccine mandates, Like the government policy had never been more directly intervention in your bank account and in your life.
And so in this case, you know, if the government is seen as being axing your job or causing stress or any of that, it could certainly activate and give people a reason to turn out, which is something I think is a good transition to our next polling segment, which is just about how people are feeling about Elon and or Doge. I'm gonna give my normal caveat just everybody, remember how wrong the poles were back in twenty twenty four,
not that long ago. So keep that in mind when you're looking at this and all the other structural problems. It's all we really have to go off of. So based on that, what are we seeing? Can we make possibly some inferences. CNN's Harry Enton, who we always respect, broke some of the numbers down that we do have.
Let's take a listen.
The people are mad, they are angry, they are rising up to look here top worst things that Trump has done. This is among the folks who oppose Trump actions in office so far. You might have thought going into the election ry afterwards of the immigration policy, but that comes into just ten percent. Check out on this side of the screen. Tho, I'm coming over to mister burman'side. Must doge or the funding freezers right, these funding cuts? Look
at that that takes the cake twenty four percent. That is the top answer amongst those who oppose Donald Trump's actions in office, saying it is the worst thing that he has done so far. It's must it's doge, it's those funding cuts. The people are mad, and if last night is an example that town hall, they ain't gonna take it anymore. The most significant Trump action this term so far. Look at this. Democrats are more angry about
this than Republicans are happy about it. Look at this. Democrats, eighteen percent say that the must doze access to data is the most significant action so far for Trump this term. Bring it over to this side of the screen. Look at this. Just nine percent of Republicans say that must doge and the access to data is the most significant Trump action so far. So Elon mus is becoming this rallying point for Anger, this rallying point for Anger. On the left. Back in December of twenty twenty four, he
was underwater, but just underwater by five points. Look at where he is now in February twenty twenty five. The American people are turning against Elon Musk. His net favorable rating way down there pass now minus ten points, minus twelve points. The bottom line is this, the voters are angry with the Elon Musk. They're angry with the cuts of the federal government.
So that's the top line here in terms of the numbers.
Krystal and I were just talking while the thing was going in terms of the polls, and I guess it's worth talking about in terms of what it is.
What do you think? So overall the.
Statistical analysis saw so like a rough like three percent miss across the word. It's not terrible, but of course that was within the margin of error, especially in a lot of these swing states. My only caution, as I was telling you, is about the oversampling of Democrats. That
was clearly a big problem from twenty twenty. It was a big problem twenty twenty four part of the reason where the MYSS was and especially right now, just because Democrats, if that is to be trusted, especially enthusiasm number, if they're a lot more likely to be politically engaged and or respond to, can skew things differently from where they are.
I just want to caution people just considering how I mean, the Iowa stuff and all that is just too too ingrained, and it's been too soon since all of that for me to fully put my trust in all of this.
Although I think that's all valid.
The only thing I will say is if we're thinking, if we're projecting these polls out to like, Okay, well, what does a mid term performance look like. Which side is more energized matters a lot.
That is exactly, and that is the one that matters the most in a midterm.
Yeah, and that's what I saw.
I mean, I ran for Congress in twenty ten as a Democrat in the two party wave, and so, you know, it was Democrats had control of everything. They were sort of like demoralized or not that energized or you know, not that excited to come out and vote, and Republicans voted on mass and they were pissed and they wanted to take back power. And you know, we're going to show you the or any town halls. We're going to show you a little bit of like the pushback at
some of the Republican town halls. There is a very similar vibe that is starting to emerge to you know, the twenty ten twenty tens. It's just the reverse in terms of which political party is more energized this time around. And I think, you know, naturally, when you have one party that's in power, typically historically there is a backlash and there is you know, a adjustment in the next minterm where the party that's in power performs really poorly.
And then when you add on top of that, you know, dose taking these incredibly aggressive, chaotic actions, the consolidation of power in the hands of this one dude that people are increasingly like, really not psyched about, and the ways that it really does touch, you know, so many communities across the country, because again, federal government workers are not just here in d C. They are spread out in
communities across the country. The impact of federal government spending is spread out in you know, places across the country. Are a bunch of articles about and this is actually really sad to me because I love our national parks and I know you do too. Soger like the impact there and how they've had to stop taking reservations and you know, they're so short staff they can barely function
at this point. Those national parks are huge economic drivers for the mostly rural and many of them Western communities that you know that exists out there. So the impact is a lot more diffuse and a lot more widespread than I think people are taking into account. And in addition, I was seeing one analysis that also suggests, you know, for every federal government worker that you fire, you're also talking about probably two or three contractors that are.
Impacted by that.
And again, you know, back to by small town that I live in, I know that's like the whole economy there is around this base. If that takes on, if that is cut significantly, it would be devastating to the whole entire town and community, et cetera. So I think people are very upset and unhappy with the really callous, chaotic way this is all unfolding.
Yeah, part of the problem is is that it doesn't feel like there's some grand plan. And that's always the issue is if I think about the tariffs we talked about from twenty eighteen, one of the reason why I think that Trump never got any real sustainable pushback is it was directly connected.
We're like, look, we're doing this around China.
Yes, washing machines will be more expensive, soybean farmers, We're going to cut you guys checks from these tariffs. This is all about restoring the trade deficit. And people were like, Okay,
I understand that. The thing is with dose right now is it doesn't feel It feels both slap shot and it also doesn't necessarily feel as if it's working to some broader end, and the more that that stuff permeates, Like you said, I mean for me, you know, if somebody messed with my Zion reservation, I would be very upset. So I feel very much with a lot of those
people out there. It's already a shitty program the way that the National Park Service reservations worked, and if you had stuff like that planned for the future, it would be infuriating. Because it is one of the cheapest vacations and American can take to go to a National park. It's literally what like seventy dollars or something for a year long past, and you can have unlimited entertainment in them. So absolutely, anybody out there go as quick as you
possibly can. This Spartan to be spring. Shannandoah's here nearby us. It's an amazing park. I've never been to Smoky Mountains, that's next on my list. Yeah, But Zion, Yosemite, Glacier, any of these, they're just incredible, incredible places. Let's put this one up there on the screen a eight, please, because this is.
The probably the most noteworthy one.
If we want to go off of people who were accurate, Trump's own polster certainly was accurate. And he says a poll of swing voters is showing warning signs for Republicans bent on helping billionaires. So it is interesting because if you dig down into the memo from this polster, it finds quote sizable majorities in competitive House districts are unhappy
about their economic predicament. It gently warns that Republicans that some of Trump's priorities they would enact would prove unpopular, though it does avoids saying this directly, the memo suggests that some Republicans at least do think that public opinion matters, and even that maybe, just maybe they do fear being held accountable in the future election. Says fifty nine percent of voters in eighteen swing districts are worried about their
personal financial situations. Republicans have to play catch up here. Trump's approval the district is forty seven forty nine. So still, I mean, it's competitive, definitely within the margin of error. But you should pay attention to the Tony Fabrizio one obviously is very accurate in the Trump pulls in the Trump election. Trump obviously trusts him, and it may inform some of the future decisions here around Elon and one thing we know about Trump is that Trump is the
ultimate transactional figure. Now I don't think that at this point he cannot sideline Elon because Elon has become a cause celab for the left right, like in terms of the number one vector and Trump more than anything from what I understand that people around him, his biggest regret of his entire presidency is ever caving to liberals so Arlottesville, apologizing and firing Mike Flynn, like his main takeaway from the first term is that he should just not listen
at all. So anybody predicting some like grand firing and all that, I.
Don't see it.
I do think that this sign of this email and saying hey, don't reply and all that, that could be the slow phase out. You also don't forget those Technically is only supposed to exist until July fourth of twenty twenty six, so it could be like an initial sidelining and then like a nice disbandment where they don't acknowledge
it one hundred percent, but don't forget. July twenty twenty six is right around when you would have the midterm elections, so it's like, right the summer season is exactly when people start to pay attention, so I could see, you know, some stuff like that in the future, or just a general ongoing move of being like, all right, you own, you can tweet, you know, whatever bullshit statistics that you want about however much money supposedly saved the government, but
these emails and all this other stuff like.
That to stop.
We'll see, We'll see.
I don't mean there's no real sign of that at this point, but maybe if the poll numbers get more, die or he'll decide like, all right, I'm kind of done with this guy, you know. Part of the problem, also outlined in this memo from Trump's own polster, is warning signs about the way that they craft this tax bill coming up as well, because they ask people, you know, what the top priority of tax policy should be, and unsurprisingly a vast majority sixty three percent so that the
top priority should be helping working class families. Only one percent said it should be helping corporations and the wealthiest Americans. And yet we already know that in terms of the tax package that they're putting together, whether or not no tax on tips or some other of the more populist proposals that Trump put out there whether or not any of them make it into that package still really an open question.
But even if they.
Do, the vast bulk of that four point five trillion dollar tax cut is going to go to the wealthiest incorporations through the extension of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. So you've got that, and then you also have the fact that Americans are still saying, hey, my biggest priority is still inflation. It's still cost of living, and there is zero focus on that from the Trump administration. We've already seen inflation tickup. Now he's saying, oh, that's the fault of.
The last guy.
Maybe people will give him some grace for now because he is still so no into office. But if those trends continue, which they very possibly could, especially with the you know, the tariff threats certainly feed into that, et cetera, then he could really be in quite in having quite a lot of problems politically.
There already are a lot of polls showing.
That one of his greatest strengths as a politician has always been the way people trust him on the economy because they just think, oh, this guy's a businessman, like he must know what he's doing, et cetera. He is deeply underwater on the economy already, and so saga. I think that's the other problem with doge is it is the sense of like I didn't ask for, like Gulf of America renaming. I didn't ask for this, like just go and randomly fire a bunch of federal government workers.
And you know, I didn't vote for this random guy, richest man on the planet, like consolidating power and doing all of this just blatant self dealing. And why aren't you focused on the priorities that actually impact me and that I'm focused on in my day to day life.
I think that's a real risk for Heemisop.
Well, not surprised me, but I'm still just vote so burned, I think by a lot. It just seems a little too cute for that to happen, as in like check the box of every liberal slash mainstream critique and I've just because of the way that twenty twenty four meant, I'm like, maybe we'll see just in terms of what it means for how people internalize all of this. Remember my warning, the more tapped in you are, the more
likely to work to vote for Kamala. So how many people out there are even aware of those Golf of America, or even if they are aware of Golf of America, people are pretty aware of it. I think it's funny. But that's what I'm saying, is that you can be aware and like it. And I think that's the one caution I would always give people is remember the way that the media or the liberals will frame something is not necessarily how it lands. Remember Phereto recogate the childless
cat lady, stuff like brat Summer, all this stuff. It was a complete opposite of how it all eventually turned out.
I just really think that's important for people to take away.
Well, you know, if we had paid attention to just the material concerns of Americans, we would have been much more you know, more people would have had a much more accurate view of how this election was ultimately going to go. Because people were consistently like, my biggest problem is inflation, and I'm not happy with the economy, and I'm certainly not happy with the way the Democrats have handled the economy. And so when you have all of them,
We're going to do an economic segment later on. A lot of warning signs, consumer sentimental, you know, turning really negative, inflation ticking up, concerns about inflation ticking up. Trump increasingly underwater on the economy. Like I think those are very
important warning signs for him. And when you couple that with this agenda that seems really clearly cropped, like all the populist you know, positioning from the campaign is gone, and now you've just handed the keys over the richest man on the planet who's out there looking out for himself and his interest and you're about to couple that with a gigantic tax cut for the rich. I think that is very politically perilous, to say the least.
Yeah, the tax cut, I think is again I actually think that might be the most perilous one for Trump because there's no getting around it.
If anything, he was lucky.
That he passed it so early last time around what was in April I think of twenty seventeen, remember if I recall the TCJ, or maybe it was jud it was.
Something like that.
Yeah, that was the first like major accomplishment. It was obviously, as I always say, the lowest approval rating for Donald Trump. And by that point, though three four years later, people had mostly forgotten about it. So that's one of those where it could be politically perilous. I definitely think it
will be for the midterm elections. In the long term, I have no idea been thinking about the Clinton administration A lot, which similarly had a very rocky nineteen ninety three, got blown out in nineteen ninety four, but by ninety six is still able to pull it out and somehow win. So it's not always a you know, a predictor of how things will go.
Obama is another example of that part.
You know, tea party wave happens and then Republicans think, oh, we're a lock to win, and then you know, he wins in actually quite a significant landslide. On the other hand, I mean this also raises the question, like Trump is out there, I'm going to run for another shouldn't I run for another term? And there's a whole Bannon and lots of other people that are trying to push for a Trump term number three, which obviously is unconstitutional. I don't at this point see how they could actually make
that happen. But you know, the other thing is that it is unlikely to be Trump who's running again. So in those situations you have incumbent presidents who were both extremely politically talented, like you know how we feel about them ideologically, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama were both generally
generation generational political talents. Trump is in his own way as well, so you are unlikely to have him on the ballot again, which I do think sort of complicates the picture because nobody has been able to really consolidate and put together the amount of enthusiasm and this particular coalition that Donald Trump has been the face for.
It is the eighty eight election. The eighty eight election was very interesting.
HW was a very weak candidate, of course, like the blue blood and you know with the grocery store stuff that all happened eventually and sunk him in ninety two, but really it was like Reagan hangover. People trusted him the twelve years of government supply side economics and all that narratively was there, and then Ducaccus was just horrible.
So it's one of those where you could see if the Democrats choose a Ducaccas style figure, all that you really all HW had to do was not just run on the Reagan legacy, but really against like institutional leftism as it kind of existed at that time. So I've been thinking about that as well, but obviously that's a long long way away. Let's put some of the polling up here, just to see what we have so far.
This from the Washington This is from IPSO some new polling that just came in approval of mus shutting down federal programs he decides are unnecessary. Disapprove is fifty two percent approved twenty six net minus twenty six. Let's go to the next one, please, just to continue to show people approval of Elon Musk's job in government. Disapproves at forty nine. Approve is at thirty four net minus fifteen. Next one as well, just to continue, would you rather
see the next control Congress by Democrats or Republicans? Has Democrats there with fifty four Again, remember it's only been a month, I think a month and four days and all of that. Things definitely there, And keep in mind all the caveats I gave about oversampling and all of that. But I will just say initially, it would not be a surprise. In fact, it would be historically a trend. It would be very in line with historical trends for the Republicans to have a blowout in the mid terms.
They already don't have control of Congress.
Their number one achievement, the only legislative achievement I can track right now with any regularity, is.
This tax bill, which is not going to be popular. It will be popular for a lot of rich people, but that's it. So you're going to have that.
You could have potentially higher inflation and an economic crisis or some sort of international situation. None of that could happen, and you would still fit within a historical trend of the Democratic thermostatic public opinion that turnout being high. This is an interesting theory I've been looking at is that united control of Congress, of Congress and the presidency often leads to some of the bigger midterm blowouts. So if you think about Obama a similar thing. I was just
looking at the margins. Those were margins were insane. Fifty seven seats in the sent is crazy for the Democrats. But the fact is that their ability to pass the two thousand and nine the healthcare reform, obviously, that's what ignited the Tea Party wave and that's what led to
the huge blowout in twenty ten. For that, if you look back to the Democrats, a little bit different, you know, with Clinton in terms of the control, but the similar the ninety three push for that initial healthcare reform that led to the Chip Act or whatever it was called. Under Hillary Clinton experienced a significant amount of blowback with the Contract for America. So you could easily see something
like that happen with Donald Trump. Is that very often United control of government leads to a midterm kind of blowout, which it wouldn't surprise me.
And I think they are really flirting with like historic just like disaster and political disaster, because as we've discussed before, by putting their hands in all of these agencies, you know, even air traffic controllers got the elon justify yourself your existence to me in five bullet points like across the board, so you have, you know, one, you're one major disaster
away from people completely turning on this administration. Not to mention, as we're about to discuss later in the show, a lot of very concerning economic indicators, So you know, there's a possibility out there of real political collapse outside of even what like the Tea Party waves was, or what the backlash in the Clinton administration was, et cetera. So I do think that they are playing with fire right now.
And just to wrap up this block, go back to A nine, which shows some of the numbers for Trump in particular, because in the very early days of the administration, Elon seemed to be taking on water, but Trump was kind of hanging in there. You know, his approval rating was staying war less fifty to fifty, which for him is phenomenal. Greg Sargeant here as kind of a compilation of some of the recent polling that has warning signs,
not just about Elon but about Trump himself. Only thirty four percent of approve of Musk's role, sixty three percent worry about his data access. According to CNN, fifty four percent say it is bad that he was given a big role. And now you have majorities disapproving of Trump in CNN, Washington Post, and Gallop and also Trump's own polster, as we showed you before, has him underwater in swing districts.
So Trump's approval pretty consistent trend in all of these seems to be trending downward as he now takes on water because of the unpopularity of Musk and Doge and the actions that they're very possible.
Like you said, also keep in mind, though, is that I came pretty damn close in the twenty twenty election, even with what what did you have, like a thirty percent approval rating, So you never know, there are a lot of people out there who vote for Trump who don't like him.
I will say one again, he's not supposed to be on the ballot again, so.
Oh true, Hey, listen, we'll debate this another time. I'm very for getting rid of the twin I don't like the Bannon way because they're trying to craft it so that it's only Donald Trump.
I think I think the entire two term elament.
Should be completely gotten rid of, and if Obama wants to run again, let him. I hate Obama, as everybody watches a show know. I think he should have been able to run again. I think Clinton should have been able to run again. Arguably would have been way better off if Clinton had won the two thousand election, you know, in terms of how he would have handled all that. So that twenty second amendment really did actually cost us
some bad. What it did is it created the current dynamic of the swings back and forth and led to the inability for an FDR style king and or President. I know we've had this debate before to basically enshrine twenty years of rule, which if that's what America wants, then I think that's what America should be able to have. Actually, in tradition, be damned at.
This point, completely unprincipled view of this, which is in general, I agree with that, and I do not want Donald Trump.
I want to run again, so but I'll let the people decide.
Also, like you said, they're trying, Okay, so it is they are not going to be able to pass a constitutional amendment. That is not going to happen. So let's just put that out there. So I don't know what other pathways they would pursue, perhaps just making some like Kakamami theory that they push up to the Supreme Court and hope that those people are just so enthralled with Trump at this point that they give him whatever he wants.
But yeah, what they want it to be is that you can't serve to more than two consecutive terms, and so that would rule out Obama but would rule in Trump. That's what they're going for, which is totally unprit.
Even I wouldn't hate it. I wouldn't hate it just to set the precedent for the future. Maybe we'll getting really old too, by the way, like yeah.
Run against him.
Then tell the American people they care about age obviously, whether that's what they said about Biden.
So there we go.
Trump making some significant moves over at the Pentagon, in particular removing the previous Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Let's go and put his announcement up on the screen. This was on true Social He says, I want to thank General Charles C. Q. Brown for his over forty years of service to our country, including as our current Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He has a fine gentleman and ann outstanding leader, and I wish a
great future for him and his family. Today, I'm honored to announce that I am nominating Air Force Lieutenant General Dan Raisin Kine to be the next Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. General Kine is an accomplished pilot, national security expert, successful entrepreneur, and a warfighter in quotes for some reason, with significant interagency and special operations experience. So we'll tell you a little bit more about the
individual who is General Brown's replacement. But this was one of a number of moves that were made at the Pentagon and what some are describing as a purge. So in addition to the Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff being removed, the Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral Lisa Franchetti also removed. The Air Force Vice chief of Staff,
General James Slife also removed. And then in addition to this, in what was I think maybe the most eyebrow raising part of this whole maneuver, the three top lawyers for the Army, Navy, and Air Force, So the top JAG lawyers for those three service branches were all fired as well.
Obviously, you know this raises.
Questions, why do you want to get rid of the top lawyers in these various for these various branches.
Of the military.
And Pete Hegsath, who of course is nown Secretary of Defense, was pressed on exactly that point on one of the Sunday shows. Let's take a listen to that for.
People to may not know, I mean, they give advice to the military about what is lawful and what isn't. Not surprisingly, there's been some backlash to those who are worried about their removal. One Georgetown law Professor says this Trump also firing the Army, Navy, and Air Force jags. In some ways, that's even more chilling than firing the four stars. It's what you do when you're planning to break the law. You get rid of any lawyers who might try to slow you down.
Your response to her.
I don't know who Rosa is and what her hyperbole is all about. Ultimately, we want lawyers who give sound constitutional advice and don't exist to attempt to be roadblocks to anything anything that happens in their spots. What we know about these t jags are called t jags inside the military. Traditionally they've been elected by each other or chosen by each other, which is exactly how it works often with the chairman as well, small group of insulated
officers who perpetuate the status quo. Well, guess what status quo hasn't worked very well at the Pentagon. It's time for fresh blood.
So one of the things we know about Hegxeth because he's written about it and also because of his public advocacy, is he has pushed for their to be fewer limits on what he calls war fighters in terms of you know, following the rules of war. He went to the mat for a number of people who had been either indicted or convicted of war crimes, one of whom was turned in by his own soldiers underneath him for what he had, you know, what he had done while he was in battle.
And so for him to push these individuals down, I think it's pretty consistent with his desire to I guess the polite way would say it would be like loosen the rules of engagement. It's very much what you heard kind of, you know, way back in the Vietnam era, there was this sense of oh, if we let, you know, our guys do what they do, then we would have
been more successful there. You also heard it from Pete Hegseth, you know, in the context of the Iraq war, which he supported up until shockingly recently, that you know, you needed to let them be more you know, have fewer rules of engagement and effectively like green light more war crimes.
So it's consistent with that. Also, the moves I think overall are consistent with you know, Trump wants to make sure that the people who are at the top of these chains of command that they're going to do whatever
he wants them to. Do whether those whether that pertains to executing on his foreign policy, which I think he feels justifiably that he was stymied at times by the top brass, or whether it comes to executing orders that would be unlawful or unconstitutional, as when he wanted to, you know, shoot protesters in the legs during the Black Lives Matter protests and riots, and the current chair of the Joint Chess of Stavas, Mark Esper, at that point was like, we're not doing that.
So I think it's.
Importantly Yeah, Milly was, Yeah, they were both involved.
Yeah, Look, I mean my main thing is this traces back to I have sympathy. There are a lot of GWAT veterans who watched the show, and in a sense they're not wrong in that they were constrained because they were basically put into a situation where they became State Department diplomats in his job that they never signed up for nation building and others that was not sold to
the American public. So you have these guys National guardsmen who were previously cops in Kansas, who are trying to negotiate between two rival sheiks who are literally at war over which boy they get to sexually molessed and they're like, what the hell am I doing here?
Right?
So in a way they're right in terms of a lot of the way that the jag Officer Corps at all of that this was under my crystal. It's kind of the hr buification of the military is they put an intense amount of restrictions on people whose job was
not to do this in the first place. This is where I sympathize with the Vietnam vets and with the g Want Vets in terms of their like, look, we didn't know what our job was or was it was to kill the enemy or was it to negotiate, you know, with all this bullshit between these tribal leaders, and then train a bunch of guys who are the most corrupt police force literally on planet Earth in Afghanistan.
So I don't I.
Sympathize with Pete on this simply because that is the overwhelming feeling of how betrayed many of the people there are. In terms of the four stars CeCu Brown, everything I did in terms of research, this guy's mediocre at best and basically just a complete representation of the four star bureaucracy inside of the Pentagon terrible f thirty five review over the program. Literally like a DEI person in that nobody could say anything about his track record as a general except for, oh, he's black.
It's like, okay, well, what did he do?
I read a twenty twenty three dissent against his nomination which went through his background at the Air Force, not a single major, remarkable thing. He was basically promoted because of his race under Lloyd Austin's like, okay, well, so
I have no problem with him getting fired. I think really what it comes down to is the Mark Milly stuff that you talked about previously, which is that Trump correctly saw how James Mattison, Mark Milly and the previous Joint chiefs all basically worked to steymy his direct and lawful orders, for example, like saying pulling out of Seria, negotiating with the Taliban. These are the people who worked
inside the bureaucracy to keep it from happening. One of the main reasons he picked Headsets Hegsat's entire formation as a member of the United States military was joining because he believed in Iraq.
Obviously that was bad.
But while being inside of the bureaucracy watching both the constraining at the political and at the legal level, trying to turn the Pentagon into something that it's not supposed to be, both in terms of a social experiment through DII, which CQ. Brown, by the way, literally on record talking about how he would put his thumb on the scales to promote more black officers. I just think that's totally counter to what Trump ran on. So I don't care
whatsoever that he got fired with the jag stuff. It also very much fits with Hegsat's view of the military and his overall war on Pentagon bureaucracy. So I mean, currently I don't have an issue with this. I was looking to Pete has told the Department to prepare for major budget cuts. Great, let's do it. Let's cut even more four star generals. The commonly held thing that Pete often talks about is the number of four stars that we have today as opposed to the actual winning fighters
of World War Two. And I think he's completely correct in terms of the explosion of all of the bureaucracy inside of the Pentagon, where, in the words of Steve Mannon the real budgets a trillion, we could lop a hundred billion off the top, and not all that much would happened over there.
Here's what I would say.
I think it's insane to imagine that the problem in I Rock was that we were too protective of civilians or in Afghanistan.
But do you understand how they get there, Like in terms of their sent over there, what they think is to kill terrorists. They show up and they're like, well, we're supposed to. The brass tells you kill the terrorists, but you need to have.
Eyes on him. He needs to be shooting at you.
And at the very same time you need to not disrupt that civilians the job.
Of a soldier, no, but really just to give you a specific so I mean, which is part of why you want good JAG officers to advise you on the rules of war and to make sure you're not just blanket massacring civilians, which did happen at times. I mean, one of the guys that he went to bat for, which is the one that I said, his own men
turn him in. He instructed them to fire on a group of civilians that they knew were civilians, and after the fact tried to cover it up by saying, oh, well, we weren't able after the fact to check them for weapons, so we really don't know. So again, it was his own like the soldiers who were serving under him, who did not want to execute that order because they knew it was just a slaughter of civilians, who turned him in.
And then he's found guilty and heg Seth add Gates Warm goes to that gets Trump to pardon him, even though you know, it was quite clear and getting was found guilty by Jervispeers, turned in by his own men that he had just gone out and slaughtered civilians. So, you know, I just I don't think that that's acceptable. I don't think that's the way that we should be conducting ourselves. I don't think that that helped. That type of you know, just brutality towards civilians helped us either
in Iraq and Afghanistan. Of course, we never should have been there in the first place. And the fact that Pete Hegseth was in favor of the Iraq war long after even you know, some of Hillary Clinton and some of the most died inable neocons had said, you know, this wasn't a great idea. Does not really particularly recommend him. So you know, the other thing I would say about the Chair of the Joint Chiefs here, who you know, I don't have a lot of specific knowledge about him.
I know hag Seth, and his book didn't really offer a lot of analysis about why he suspected that he wasn't sort of deserving or you know, meritorious of this particular position. It seemed to be just an assumption like, well, he's black, so he must not deserve it. But putting that is send But I think it probably is true.
I think it's pretty single thing St. Q.
Brown did before he was.
But sorry, that's the thing. Here's the thing.
I think it's very difficult to argue that the guy that they're putting in now is there out of quote unquote merit. I mean, it's really clear Trump is putting him in place because he thinks he's a Trump maggot. Diehard will do whatever he wants. And I'm not just talking about, you know, executing his lawful orders with regard
to Siria or whatever. I'm talking about even if he wants to use the military in ways that would be unconstitutional, unlawful and yes, fascist, that this would be the guy who would greenlight those sorts of things, and you know, to bolster that point, Trump has long been telling stories about this guy, claiming he put on a maga hat and said, I love you, sir, I think your great, sir.
I'll kill for you, sir. He is he actually has to get a waiver in order to be elevated to this position because he doesn't meet the technical qualifications you're supposed to have for this job. So the idea of this is like just about merit. I think it's kind of preposterous. I think it's preposterous for many of the positions.
Now we worship at the altar four star generalship and say, oh, well, he's not on star.
I'm just saying.
I'm just saying that if you're trying to argue that he's being put in place because of merit, I think that is relatively preposterous.
Honestly, what I am arguing is that I don't care about the I don't think most people care either, whether somebody is quote like a check all boxes of having satisfied military bureaucracy up to the four star level so that they can get their nice little stamp of approval for jo Chairman of the jointies. By the way, see Q Brown will be just fine. Give Raithian or Lockheed literally tomorrow. Okay, so we all know how that worked. I'm not going to dispute. I don't actually know a
ton about this new guy. I've been trying to read about Kane. But why don't we play the clip of Trump talking about Kane before we weigh in.
Let's take a listen.
A general, another general, a colonel, a staff sergeant. Could be in any movie. These guys, it's like perfect. They're like perfect individuals. If I were casting a movie on the military, I would pick these guys. There's nobody you could hire in Hollywood that looks like this. So I walked down and this is where I met General Raisin Kane.
And what's your name?
General, what's your name? And he gave me his name, what's your name.
Sergeant, sir?
And I love you, sir, think you're sir. I'll kill for you, sir. Then he puts on a make America right again. You're not allowed to do that, but they did. I remember I went into the Hangar and there were a lot of there were hundreds of troops and they're not supposed to do this, but they all put on the make America great again.
Well, so that's what Trump has said, there's this qualification for the job, and you can't like this is what this is why Trump picked.
Do I think Trump is mister Merritt and wants all of this stuff?
No? Do I think that Pete Hegsath and them do. Yes.
Actually they have a much longer track record of being against military bureaucracy, of restoring the Pentagon to its singular purpose.
And you know, to counter what you.
Were talking about early, because I think this is very important, is you were saying that's the job of soldier. The problem is that we made that the job of the soldier when it's not actually the job. The job of the soldier is to win and to fight a war. It's the job of the State Department and of the presidents and others to not put people in a situation
which is actually counter to their job description. From Should nineteen year olds from Topeka really be negotiating, you know, tribal warfare between them?
Absolutely not. Well, again, this problem with the entire mission.
Back to you know, you're right, obviously we should never have been there at all period. But when you look at a track record of judgment. Pete Hegseth has had a very bad one. You know, he was he was wrong about Iraq, he was wrong about Afghanistan, he was wrong about Ukraine up until very recently. So you know, if you're looking for someone who but you know, what matters most is that you took the correct position when it was hard to do, when it was unpopular, when
it didn't serve your political and career interests. He does not have a track record of that. He has a track record of being I want to go, and even more, I want to send even more people in. I want to go to even get us involved in even more wars. So I certainly don't trust him on that front. But yes, once you're there, part of the job of the soldier is to is to try to protect the civilian populations that are in the area.
Did I'm not arguing that they shouldn't have. What I'm saying is the reason why they felt. This is the thing again that people need to remember the rules of engagement would change on an almost yearly basis in Afghanistan as to whatever the political mission was. First it was light up the Taliban, then it was McCrystal came in. Then Obama fires my Crystal, and it changes again, literally on a year by year basis. The type of shots that you could take were completely up in the air.
They'd have to call up to the chain of comand they had no idea what they were doing. There's a book Jake Tapper wrote, there's a movie as well. I think I'm blanking on the name at the outpost. That's what it is. People should watch it in terms of what it actually was like for people when they're getting ambushed within those rules of engagement now obviously, and none of them would dispute they're want to protect the civilian population.
That's not it at all. As far as the Gallagher current case, I recommend there's a book called Alpha about Eddie Gallagher.
It's very anti Eddie Gallagher.
If you want the case for why I should have been convicted, there's a lot of stuff online you can go and read against it. It's a lot more complica then people think. I will say that in terms of whether he should have been convicted or not, I'm still up.
In the air in terms of what I've read about the case.
But the point that I come back to is that if you're going to get into a war, and this was what the Vietnam people would often say too, is if we're going to get into a war, then we have to be able to fight. Now. I don't think we should have gotten in those wars in the first place, and we should if before we light it up. If it's not capable, if you're not capable to win purely through military means, then you should not be fighting in the first place. You shouldn't turn these people into these
quasi diplomats. But then at the same time tell them that their war fighters. And I think that gets to the actual crux of Hegsett's ideology.
Just in terms of everything.
I've listened to the guy and I can't say I disagree with him at all, which is, don't get involved if you're not going to do it the way that you're supposed to.
Yeah, but I just func mentally dispute the idea that like if we had had more gloves off and killed the billions, had more collateral damage, then it would have gone better for us in Iraq and Afghanistan.
I know you're exactly right, all are.
Opposite of the case, but that is Pete Hegsas's position is that we should have been more gloves off. I mean the case I'm talking about, this guy knew these were civilians and he was like kill them and tried to cover it up after the fact, hide the weapons, Like we weren't able to go and check and see if they had weapons so that they could have plausible
deniability that they just mass murdered civilians. And it was not, you know, it was actually the people who were lower on the totem pole, who were probably less experienced, who were like this was wrong.
And by the way, the just one.
Last thing on this and we can get into this last piece of with regard to you know, the dude who's now the chair of the Joint Chiefs. Those rules are not just put in place for protecting other civilians. It's also put in place so that our war fighters can live with themselves afterwards, so that they can come home and be able to go back to a normal life and not be completely traumatized by the things that
they did. And you know, inevitably, when you have humans killing other humans, it's going to be a horrific and traumatizing experience, no doubt about that. But if you feel like you conducted yourself honorably, and that the you know, expectation was you were just killing the bad guys. You weren't just going out and like murdering whatever civilians happen into your path because some psycho who was above you was ordering you to do that. Like that's also protection
for our own soldiers. And I don't think, you know, I think the firing of these JAG officers, the top lawyers in these three services indicates, you know, he has no respect for that whatsoever. Obviously that's what he's written in the past. And I also think, you know, again, the overall program here. Yes, it may be something about the bureaucracy and making sure that even the lawful orders
are properly executed. Fine, but I think at core, as judging by the way Trump himself describes who's put in here, it really is about making sure this is someone who will do whatever I say, no matter what it is, whether it is legal or illegal or somewhere in between, going to execute on my orders. And the last piece of this is this was pulled up, so this is this is kind of weird. I just put this out there. Make of it what you will. The new guy who got put in Dan Kine. He had just retired from
the military, so they're pulling him back out. And I'm talking about like just retired in January. Immediately after he retires. Oh look, if he gets snatched up by three different crypto firms, one of them in particular, Thrive Capital, was founded by Jared Kushner's brother Joshua, had an investment by Peter Teel, and also let a funding round for Open Ai in twenty twenty four. And so you know, the other thing that Trump gets out of selecting this individual
for this position is number one. I mean, how much money did he make while he was there? Like is he now responsible for sort of like his financial security? But certainly he would never have ascended to anything like this level in term of his career. He just retired without Trump. So he owes Trump everything is what I'm trying to say. And so that again speaks to this part of I want you to be loyal, no matter what I ask you to do, and I think he feels like with Dan Kaine, that's what he's getting.
So Cain, first of all, I will just say this, this is not a pro Kaine argument. They all glow out and join crypto cybersecurity firms and or prime contractors after that.
So he's not particularly they are.
They all started by Jared Kushner's brother.
However, right Capital?
Ye, yes, does Joshua Kushner own a stake in thrit But but this is what I'm saying in terms of if you look at the board seats for all of these people.
What's the first thing that they all go out and do.
And by the way, Jim Mattis literally was on the board of Pharahos if we all recall so to show, just to show folks saying how this all works, Trace is at KKR Capital.
I could go on it's an accident that he gets snatched up and hired and who knows how much money he makes in this short period of time from a firm that is connected both to Peter Teel and to Jared Cuk.
I actually don't think it's the Teal connection. Everything I've been able to read is that Trump met this guy six years ago in Iraq and was like, man, I just love it.
No, I'm not saying that, I'm saying that this means that so he retires, he has a short window of time to go on the private sector and make bank and guess who shows up at his door to be like, we will pay you. We don't know how much, however much happens to be Jared Kushner's brother's firm.
Like, that's not an accident.
I honestly don't think it's nearly as intentional as you think.
I think literally all of these guys, especially because he's a former Air Force person and work flu F sixteen's, is going to go join some space like firm. They all have them on the payroll. This is not a defense of him, per se. This is the entire general offers class. This is the problem.
It's just an accident that it's Kushner's brother's firm that happens to give him this man.
I don't think it's a quote unquote accident or whatever. I don't know if they necessarily picked him because they thought he was going to be the next chairman. Again, everything I've read is that Trump is obsessed with this dude because of his quote can do attitude from a visit to Iraq six years ago. Maybe because they knew that Trump liked him, they hired him. So I can't,
you know, rule that out, per se. But everything I've been able to see from his background as he joined that main firm apparently that was paying him, was this cybersecurity firm in Washington that seems to be like the major source of his funds.
I'm not defending any of this. I think it's gross.
And this is the problem I have with all of this is the bureaucratization, the corporate basically fusing of the entire general officership. So whoever this guy is, I would really hope that who at least don't keep that ethos whenever you're at the top. But I'm not naive in terms of who and why he got picked. But I don't think that the connection is as solid as people are trying to make.
I just think it's very convenient that this man now owes both his career and his wealth to Trump and the Trump family.
Okay, but this is where I just well, first of all, I mean not really right, like Joshua Kushner basically denounced.
His own brother whenever he was in the White House.
And who was he married to the super Harley class or something like that, who is putting out anti Trump stuff. I don't think the connection is as close as you're making it out to be. But again, this is the problem with the systemic corruption around here, Like did people really care when Lloyd Did democrats really care when Lloyd Austin literally coming from prime contractors back into.
The Defense Secretary? Not really c Q. Brown.
He'll be employed tomorrow by probably the same type of people here because of his past experience. So I just don't think that people have a huge light to stand on in terms of pointing out corruption.
It's not just about the care it's about the direct family time. So if we're if my case is he's put in there because of loyalty, and if you have been responsible not only for the career elevation, which is very you know, again, he has to get a waiver to even get put in this position. He had retired, very unusual come back out of retirement like Trump. He owes Trump his career and you have this connection family
connection to as well. I'm just saying that if you owe that much to this one person, then that is another attempt to help guarantee that whatever it is that you want to do in the future, this person is going to be loyal no matter why.
I see what you're saying.
Yeah, I think that's probably fair, although I mean he probably was picked for this exact reason specifically be.
The person, but this is going to be guarantee.
Yeah, I mean, I just would say, it's not like any person who serves as the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs is ever hard up for money.
Literally.
Ever, if you go look at all these spaces, you don't need Peter Teel or Joshua Kushner to cut you a check. There's oceans of money here in Northern Virginia to be made for all of them. So I don't think it's nearly as clear cut. And you know, people are going to say that I'm defending this guy. I'm
just pointing out how disgusting this entire system is. Every single basically one Star Onward becomes a multi millionaire within a year after a year after they resign, through these boards, through whatever Fox News or CFR contracts and all of this, And unfortunately it is par for the course that we have here. And again, I just don't think that these people have much like to stand on when their literal heroes are doing the exact same thing. So it's like, Okay,
you're arguing within a broken system. The next Democratic president is almost certainly going to pick somebody who's also on the board of Lockheed or whatever. It's a systemic problem that we have, and it just makes it probably more cynical in terms of the war over like who's really corrupt, because easily people can point out that it's everyone