"Regime change" in Iran and a long conversation with Brit Hume

Welcome to today's podcast sponsored by Hillsdale College, All Things hillsdalet Hillsdale dot ed or I encourage you to take advantage of the many free online courses there, and of course I'll listener to the Hillsdale dialogues, all of them at Hugh for Hillsdale dot com or just Google, Apple, iTunes and Hillsdale Supreme Leader.

In irandeworried right now.

I would say he should be very worried.

Yeah, he should be.

As you know, they're negotiating with us. Morning Glory and evening Grace America. I'm Hugh Hewitt. That is President Trump. An hour ago, NBC News released that teaser talks have broken down. They've been they never began, but they've been canceled, is perhaps the right way to put it. And the cancelation of those talks suggests very much that the armada that is building, this immense gathering of American strength in the Middle East is going to be put to use.

I think in some of the Gang of Eight meetings that it's been high level stuff.

You but you know, I obviously don't talk a lot about.

What it's said in those meetings, but I don't think a lot of specificity.

I would say, what would you conclude from the cancelation of today's meetings and the dispatch of the George H. W. Bush carrier to join the Lincoln.

I think that you know, obviously they're the administration perceives the Iranians to be escalating, and you know, clearly cutting off the talks was a was a huge signal that

Well, last question on Iron, mister leader, if we go to a battle with them, what is an acceptable conclusion of that battle from your perspective.

Well, obviously, for me, you what would.

Be regime change? I mean, I think you've got to get new leadership.

And there's no guarantee that new leadership might be the answer either.

I mean, we've seen that before in other places around the world.

But I do think that the Iranian people are clamoring for a voice.

In their government and for the.

Same rights that people and freedom loving countries have around the world. And I think that's what we ought to be supportive of there, And so if that were an endgame, I think that would be at least a great starting place.

We will pick it up from there. Next time we talk. I want to thank you, by the way, and congratulate you for getting the Defense appropriation built done as well as eleven of twelve appropriations built. Die, I don't remember the last time that that happens, so hack tip to you the leadership Chairwoman Collins, Senator Collins, of course, the leader of the Appropriations Committee. When was the last time that happened?

You know, it's been a while, Hugh.

I was actually ran into one of my former colleagues in the House of Representatives. We had come in together, you know, almost now thirty years ago, and he said, I think the last time we did all the appropriation bills was nineteen ninety six.

Okay, well it's been a while. I've been doing this show for twenty five years, and I do not remember it ever happening before. So congratulations on that regular order is restored, except for the Department of Homeland Security. So I'd like to go there and ask you where the status is of those talks, what the Democrats are asking for, and whether or not we have creative ass facts.

Well we do.

I mean I think there are if you kind of put it into three categories, there are things administrations already doing which are significant, and there are a lot of the things.

That Democrats have asked.

Or then there are things you could do through that DHS funding bill that are funding oriented that you could you know, increase or withhold funds into.

Certain categories of the DHS budget.

But then there are the things that I think they want, which are policy changes. And if they're going to insist on any kind of policy changes, we're going to be at the table with ours two. Because I don't think we want we do not want these negotiations evolving into something that makes it harder to deport and detain dangerous illegal aliens.

That are in this country.

And so you know, that bill needs to be focused on protecting and ensuring that law enforcement officers are safe in their jobs able to do with the American people expect them to do, and to deport and detain dangerous illegal aliens. How you go about that matters, and I think Tom Holme has done a great job on the ground there of you know, sort of getting that situation a little bit more in a place that hopefully the Democrats.

Ought to be pleased with.

I mean, I just think of the things that have already been done here, including in the DHS funding bill, the original one which they I agree to and help negotiate, by the way, that it had a number of reforms in it, including body cameras, and then they walked away from it. And then they walked away from the two week funding bill, at least a lot of them did. And the two week funding bill is way too short. In the first place, I mean is.

They don't know what they want.

All they know is they want to fight Trump, and that to me is a really bad motivation and it's going to get them to make some bad decisions.

Which I think they're doing well.

I think they're in a box canyon out leader. I'm going to suggest that we Republicans offer them the Dreamers, which everybody in the country except five percent on each edge want to be done, along with the ability to cut off federal funding the sanctuary cities. Because sanctuary cities are a problem. They are a refuge for dangerous illegal immigrants and possibly even worse than criminals, maybe terrorists, and everybody wants the Dreamers done. We can flip the script here.

There are some conversations around that, And again I think if this does get if the Democrats were actually serious about negotiating, I think those are things that could be put in place. Certainly, as you know, there's a lot of interest on our side and doing the way with sanctuary cities, which, as you point out, is a huge problem, and I think the President has expressed in the past

On this issue.

But in the end you got to have a willing partner, and I don't know.

He's going to have that with the Democrats. We'll see.

I mean, I think right now what I've suggested, and I think it's true, is if the Senate Democrats you don't want to make a deal here, they're going to have to sit down with the White House and figure out a path forward. But I don't think the Democrats know what they want. I mean they haven't. They haven't given us the list of their demands yet other than these vague categories. And I just think they're in a

Do they even have a lead negotiator, Leader Throne? Do they have someone that they've had you know, it's going to be Chuck Schumer is going to sit down with later Throne and the President to work this out? Or is it their appropriations? Vice Chair?

What is it?

They haven't said And we've been asking, you know, we've we've we've said we're prepared to negotiate the White House, is right, I believe.

To sit down.

Katie bred who chairs the subcommittee on Homeland on the Appropriations Committee, has sort of taken the lead role or at least as offered up, you know, the opportunity to sit down with them, whatever the Democrats want to put forward. And you know, obviously we will be engaged.

I will be engaged in that as well.

But you know, in the end, the Democrats have got to tell us what they want and be willing to negotiate with the White House.

And at this point it seem like.

They're more interested in having the issue than they aren't having a solution.

Would you personally support a deal that included both the dreamers and a funding cutoff switch for sanctuary cities? And that might be one hundred percent, it might be fifty percent, it might be twenty five percent of all federal funds in all categories. I don't know what it is, but a.

Trigger, yeah, I mean, let me think about that. I hate to, I mean to not negotiate in advance or negotiate against yourself so to speak, until we kind of figure out what the Democrats want.

But I think like I said.

I think there's some things that could be put on the table. This is a president who obviously likes to find solutions and is willing to go places that others haven't, and so let's see where the conversation goes.

Yeah, I did the first Step Act in term one. A first Step Act on regularization would make a lot of sense to me. Let me close by asking you about the poor people at TSA. During the last shutdown, I was flying a lot and they were working without pay for a long time. Are they back in the same hopper again working without pay?

Yeah? I mean that's that's the problem.

Now. Fortunately, I mean that it falls on the.

Pay period, so they probably paid for a couple of weeks.

But if this continues, that's what's going to happen. In fact, I was just talking to one of my colleagues who flew in just you know, over on Monday here to come back into town and said he.

Was asked by TSA.

Agents at the airport, you know, are we going to be in this situation again where we don't know where the next paycheck.

Is coming from.

That's what the that's what the Democrats are. This is where this ends up, where this leads us, and again that's not a good outcome for anybody. So I hope they figure out what they want, are willing to sit down, negotiate in good faith, and let's see if there's a there there, But if not, at least helped let us fund these agencies with a continuing resolution.

Until the end of the fiscal year.

You know, at a minimum, they ought to be willing to do that.

Majority Later, John, thank thank you for joining me. By the way, good luck to your South Dakota quarterback who's leaving the fabled Halls of Columbus for greener pastors. But good luck to Lincoln.

He's a good quarterback.

Yeah, it's gonna be a great, great kid down there. Thank you, Leadership. Don't go anywhere, America. I'll be right back with Mary Katherine Ham. Then the one and only Brit Hume joins me for a long conversation about the President and Iron and about the Washington Post and about generally speaking, all the presidents that he has covered and how they have used force. Don't miss any part of that, and it rolls out throughout the today's program on the

I mean they did at the time.

It was a little bit of a you know, work in progress.

We had to keep it running, yes, for sure.

Well, my first car, and I'm considerably older than you, since you're the age of my daughter. My first car was a nineteen seventy three Dodge Dart Sport with a racing stripe, I will tell you. And it was nice. It went until the frame cracked a two hundred and fifty thousand miles. Let me ask you what you and Vic did not talk about is your theory of cars as adults. Do you buy them used or new?

Most of ours have been Well, I haven't had that many cars because I drive them until they die pretty much, or until I have more children and need a new car because I just can't fit anymore so, But I'm now on a plan of we buy usually new, try to negotiate well, and try not to have a long term loan on it Ramsey style.

I buy lightly used cars, and I think I've persuaded all the kids to buy lightly used cars rather than lose forty percent of the value when they drive it off the lot. But then I never ever ever give them back. I'm still driving a twenty ten car that and it will drive forever, I think, because I'll pay the repair bills because it's free to me. Mary Catherine, you mentioned that you were a wrencher, in other words, a gear gal. How much actual work did you do on that bug?

No, I didn't do a ton.

I could change spark plugs, I can change brake pads if I really have to, and I regularly changed oil.

Those are the three things that I could do well.

Those are three things I've never done, not once on any car. So you're way ahead of me. What about Steve, the husband, have said Mary Catherine Ham.

He knows his way around. I have not.

Actually since we've been together, you know, we have newish cars, so there's not as much call to do anything. And this is one of the things that has changed about car culture. It's not easy to work on your car now because it's got eight thousand computers inside it, and you can't do what you used to be able to do when you could just figure things out.

You are a do it yourself person and I am done. I believe in the in finding experts and have them come and then pay them. Does do the girls Do your kids have any knack for this yet? Because I believe it's either it's a genetic thing and I don't have the gene.

Well, I will say that we train them to do household things right, so they're going to know when they get to college and they live with some hopeless roommate who can't do anything, They're going to know how to change the tank of the innards of their toilet tank.

They're going to know how to patch holes and walls.

They're going to know how to do some stuff, take out trash, put the dishwasher stuff away.

I mean, they know how to do that kind of thing, in.

Valuable skills that my children do not have as we did not have them. Now, Mary Catherine, we might be going to war as we speak. I'm going to go back to a very serious thing, then come back to a light hearted thing, and then a very serious thing. Do you think we're going to war where.

They were on?

I mean, it seems likely to me every time Trump says that he's going to do something that it is likely to happen. In the case of the Iranian protesters, he seemed very explicitly to encourage them. I know that not doing anything obvious doesn't mean that there aren't things going on behind the scenes, but I did feel like a pretty large promise was made to look out for

Yeah. I did a long interview with Brit Hume before the program today, and Britt and I agree that if he doesn't do anything, he goes into the Obama category, gives away all the credibility he built up with Operation Midnight ham or Absolute Resolve, killing SOLEMANI, killing out Back Daddy. It all goes away if he doesn't do anything. Do you agree with that assessment?

I agree with that. I think that's what he cares about.

I think it is a danger for him, and I think it's something that's on his mind because he very much values that credibility to be able to make the call and follow through on it, and it ends very badly, as we saw with the Obama doctrine.

If you let red lines just go right past.

Now to a lighthearted subject. I'm intimidated by Brit Hume because he's been doing that. He's been a five star game forever. It's sort of like the Lebron Jaime of news. Do you have you done panels with him?

Yes?

And I would say the same, Hugh, because I've been watching him for years and trusting him and seeing him as someone I would like to emulate the best I can because I'm never going to be Brit Hume. But when I am on a panel with him, you know, I got to really I got to really bring my a game. But you can't get in your head because then you'll get too nervous.

Yeah, trusting him, that's the key word. Trust. We also talked about the Washington Post, which is collapsing in real time before our eyes, and I feel bad about that, and he feels great regret about that. How do you feel about it?

I don't love it.

I do think that, even though I don't have rose colored glasses about the past and the way that news was covered, I do think newspapers. I grew up in a newspaper family, and my father was a newspaper editor. I think particularly local metro dailies.

Were quite important.

I think the newspaper fights between those local metro dailies meant that city and state government got covered in a much more thorough.

Way than they do now, even if it was a.

Little biased on state level, not as bad as it is on a national level. So I have some sadness about it. I'm an original, ink stained wretch. I worked in newspapers, and yet they have brought this on themselves. The industry has not adapted and has not maintained trust because it keeps handing out trust like it thought it was going to last forever on the advertising dollars of the year nineteen ninety eight, and once Craigslist came about,

Trust is the key word again. Now I want to close reething very scerious I spent a couple of hours yesterday very anxious because in my daughter's neighborhood in Virginia, it was believed that an eight year old had gone through the ice, and it was very, very worrisome for a couple of hours. It turned out not to have happened. Eight year old turning goodness, I know, but going through the ice is something I know about because I grew

No, we know nothing.

We know nothing, And I know my limitations, which is why when it's like this outside, I'm like, you won't see me going very far from the house.

You won't see me going on great adventures.

I consider myself not a very timid person, but when it comes to feats of winter Olympics style, it's not for me.

It's not for me.

Your girls know about not going on ice in nearby creeks and stuff like that. Now, you don't live in an area with a lot of water. You might maybe there's a lake in your area, but it's just not something that Southern kids ever learn to judge.

Yeah, we don't really encounter it, and they wouldn't know based on color, how thick the ice was, or anything like that.

But they are they're generally not risk takers.

I should probably have a discussion with my younger two, who are risk takers.

Oh, they didn't the rooms.

They're not big enough to get where they would need to go to try this.

But in the future we will have to have a discussion about that.

All right, good, I'm bringing it up just so that the entire radio audience now knows, and those watching on the Sale News channel talk to your kids about ice. Don't let them go on the ice. That was a long two hours yesterday, Mary Katherine, I'm Getting Hammered is back. I loved it so much day I want people to go like and subscribe Getting Hammered. The car Talk edition is what we'll call that. They got the other stuff too,

I think that's likely because Iran is going to make it happen. That's this is the ball is now in Iran's court. So if they're going to have fire drones at us, if they're going to try to board our ships, we're gonna swat away the drones. We're going to ignore them on boarding our ships. But they not only do they not want these talks, they want to provoke us into fighting them, and so we're going to end up

Earlier, in the first start of today's program, I had on the majority leader of thone and I began by asking him what the result of any battle ought to be? Can we play that clip for John? Last question on Iron, mister leader, if we go to a battle with them, what is an acceptable conclusion of that battle from your perspective?

Well, obviously, for me, what would be regime change? I mean, I think you've got to get a new leadership. And there's no guarantee that new leadership might be the answer either.

I mean, we've seen that before in other places around the world.

But I do think that the Ranian people are clamoring for a voice and in their government and for the same rights that people and freedom loving countries have around the world. And I think that's what we ought to be supportive of there, so that we're an endgame, I think that would be at least a great starting place.

John bod Ortz, I find that clarity to be refreshing. Regime change and decapitation is what I think. I would say. Just get rid of the Iatolas. I don't care if it's a general or not. Get rid of the Iotola. They're fanatics.

There can be no other purpose for our military conflict with Iran but the ending of the mollocracy. What would be engaging with them for otherwise to teach them a lesson to who are we attacking? I mean, the only thing that we have to attack here is the regime that killed upwards of or may have killed as many as thirty thousand people in forty eight hours in an effort to stem a genuine nationwide revolt against their leadership.

We don't really know that. But there is.

Genuinely no purpose to kinetic military action of any kind that does not result in the regime being ended.

I listened to yesterday poadcast of commentary podcast but Eli Lake explaining that Reza Pablobby has a thirty percent approval rating. It does. I don't have an opinion on who runs they They can't have nukes and they can't have ballistic missiles. That's my opinion. And we have other monarchies in the Gulf that are our allies, and we can have a monarchy in or a military hunta provided they don't threaten the world with fanaticism. Is that a fair accurate statement

Caused a war with Iraq that cost a million or two million.

Lives over eight years.

Still the world's premier state sponsor of terrorism, killed a thousand Americans in Iraq, you know, suppressed revolt after revolt after revolt, and then of course organized this twenty year effort in the north, from the north end, from the from the coast of the Mediterranean to destroy Israel and you know, take over Lebanon and take over Syria and all of that. It has been nothing but an evil

Can't be worse.

It can't be worse like literally, no regime can be worse than this regime has been for a half century. And of course I didn't even mention taking our hostages and holding them for four hundred and forty four days.

And you didn't mention the mat and you didn't mention Kobar Towers, and you didn't mention the Argentina Jewish Center, and you didn't mention there so.

Many there are so many.

Yeah, it's impossible to enumerate the evil that this regime is done outside its borders and inside its borders.

So if there's a partner, I made the argument, there's also only one power in the world that can punish them for a slaughter the magnitude of which has not been rivaled in my lifetime, not anything remotely. Tannem And Square was perhaps four thousand people, minimum thirty thousand people slaughtered, mostly teenagers and college students, young people. I don't think the West can just walk away from that. It's got

I mean, that's we are, and obviously so are the celebrities who said nothing about it after you know, talking about ice and talking about Gaza. Nobody at the Grammys, nobody at these awards ceremonies is saying boo about this massacre of you know, thirty thousand people or more that took place just on January eighth and ninth. So, yes, there is a kind of weird blind eye being turned to this, and yet we are the only people who can punish them for this barbaric evil. It is not

I had britt him on before the show. I'm playing the tape out in the course of the program, and Bridd said, after a build up of this sort and the statements that have been made. He has to use the military there now. I'm aware of the threat, the Sheffield threat. You know when Argentina hit a British ship during the Falklands I'm aware that they could hit our

I think that's pretty true. And look, remember the Iranian timeline is on it. The Iranians have a different perspective on us and our involvement in the Middle East than we have. We think that we were engaged in a war with Iraq in two thousand and three with the Saddam Hussein regime. The Iranians think that they beat us in Iraq. The Iranians think that they after the war was over, they stimulated a civil war.

This happened. That happened.

The other happened.

They hit us and killed our people in within the borders of Iraq without any response and without any complaint public complaint, although people did mention it in congressional testimony and things like that, and they may look at us, with the exception of the Solmani assassination and the obviously the strike in midnight Hammer and say, you know what, we talk a good game, and once we really hit them hard, but you know, they just stick at it and we'll go away because we don't have the stomach

And Trump needs to prove them wrong. I think he did last question John Podhortz, and maybe he discussed it this money. I'll be listening to commentary tonight. What is the window here for timely action? I think it's to the middle of March, or however long it takes to get every fad battery and Patriot battery over there to protect Israel and our allies and the Gulf. So I'm not really concerned about tomorrow. What do you think we got about a minute?

Yeah, I would say we have.

I mean, in some sense we have all the time in the world, by which I mean if we have determined that the regime must go, and there's no immediate reason that the regime.

Must go, we could do it today. We could do it in March.

We could do it in May as long as we are assured of succes. So that may be the thing that's holding the president back is the decision to ratchet up the percentage chance of success from eighty eight percent to ninety six percent, and then he'll go.

I think that's well said, and at the same time defend our people, our military, and our allies as much as possible by letting them know this is what we're going to do. We're not going to tell you when be ready. John bod Ortz, I can't wait to listen to the Commentary podcast today. All of you ought to like and subscribe Commentary. You'll be smarter every single episode that you listen to. It's available on YouTube. It's also available on iTunes and Spotify. Thank you, John, Follow me

Well, we were thrilled to have Erica Kirk here. We've been promoting Turning Point USA's program to help get high school students to love America.

This is called Club America.

Twelve percent of all the high schools in Montana have a Club America. These are really civics organizations, and we stated very clearly Erica Kirk was here to support the effort that we want a Club America chapter in every single high school in the state of Montana.

So what is Club America set out to do? Governor? Is it a bipartisan or a neutral as to R and D civics course or is it center right?

Yeah, that's right.

This is about American exceptionalism, our founding fathers, and engagement with our community. So it teaches young kids, mostly conservative of kids that love America to have a peer group so they can support each other get involved in community service. Whereas Turning Point has their college campuses those lean more a little more political, the high school chapters are really focused on civics education, limited government, and American values.

Kevinor, I've always been when I've talked to young people, a big advocate of speech and debate only because they actually have to stand up and learn something about the way the country is working. For exact, we're about to go to into a battle with Iran, I think, and I want to get your opinion on that in a second, and I think speech and debate is probably the best way to do it. But Club America would be a good option. Have the principles and the teachers been open to it.

Well, we had a young lady, Naomi.

She spoke to the group, we had about seventy these high school students here at the Capitol today along with Erica Kirk and other representatives, and she said that she had to.

Fight her way through to get a charter in her high school. We're hoping with.

Our advocacy to provide a little air cover for him so it's easier for these high school students to start these chapters.

You know, our mutual friend, the late Foster Freeze, was a big force behind Charlie getting started. I'm glad to hear Erica is back in Montana picking up the baton in that great state, the very patriotic state to begin with. I just can't imagine Montana would not want to put its arms around Club America.

Well, we're going to have one in every high school.

And as you know, I mean you've known, you knew Charlie for a long time.

I did as well.

Foster, I understand, wrote Charlie his first check when Charlie trapped him in a stairwell at some national convincement.

Charlie told me a number of years ago, as we've had.

Him to our home many times, Charlie and I spent three days hiking and hunting in the mountains of Montana together, just the two of us.

He told me. My wife and I.

Wrote after Foster, we wrote Charlie his second check. Am I Good fourteen years ago to help Turning Point get started.

And we just we love the organization. We love it. It embraces American values, and you know.

It has just exploded since his assassination. And I'm so proud of Erica, both the message she sent to America around forgiveness and walking out her faith in what she did in that memorial service in Phoenix. We were right there in the near the front row, and continues to do and it's difficult, but she is persevering because for her, it's truly a calling to reclaim America for conservative values.

Yeah, I've never met Erica Kirk and I just admire her courage from Afar and the fact that she picked up the flag and carrying it forward. Now, Governor, I want to draw on your experience in Congress as well as no doubt the National Guard in Montana has had to deploy before. Looks like we're about to go to war with Iran. Is that how you're reading this situation.

It does not appear that Iran is willing to come to the table and do the things they must do.

I mean, I think the.

President has laid out the terms very clearly, no nukes and you got to stop killing your people. The President is the master of the deal, but the terms are on the table. The Iranians need to pick them up.

That is well said, Governor, and I'm going to leave it right there because that's what John Thune said apparently in the Mountain West People Prize Clarity interactions. So I appreciate that. Governor Greg Janforte, thank you for joining me today. I appreciate it very very much. I want to play again for all of you just tuned in. Here is what John Thune said to me earlier today on this

Well, obviously for me, you what would be regime change?

I mean, I think you've got to get new leadership.

And there's no guarantee that new leadership might.

Be the answer either.

I mean, we've seen that before in other places around the world. But I do think that the Iranian people are clamoring for a voice and in their government and for the same rights that people and freedom loving countries have around the world. And I think that's what we ought to be supportive of there, and so that we're an endgame, I think that would be at least a great starting place.

I think that's the kind of clarity we need. I appreciate greatly that the majority of Leader was that blunt. A lot of people hate the term regime change because they attribute to it. It's like talking about regularization for dreamers. They attribute to whatever it is you're saying qualities that are not there. We don't want to run around and

Should the Supreme Leader in Iran be worried right now, I.

Would say he should be very worried.

Yeah, he should be, as you know they're negotiating with I think very worried is the right thing. Coming right back America.

Oh beautiful day.

I'm just so glad of a leaf.

Quarter back America. That is jelly Roll, of course, And jelly Roll was honored at the Grammys, which were mostly noted for how stupid they were, But jelly Roll was actually quite inspirational. I know about that. I didn't watch it because of a column by my guest Selena Zito, who joins me. Now, Hi, Selena, anybody interesting talk to you recently?

Oh?

Yeah, I just.

Talked to the President of the United States.

So what's on the president's mind as we get close to war? Can you tell us? I don't want obviously, you can't break comment.

I cannot tell you other than it has to do with the great state of Ohio.

Well, I hope he's going, and I hope if he's going, you're going, And I hope if you're going, you'll tell me about it.

Of course.

Okay, it was a grand column about jelly Roll. By the way, how long did you talk to the president.

For about fourteen minutes.

Yeah, it's it's always kind of fun the interview. You have to have talked to the president because then it proves to my audience in fact, she is the president's favorite journalist. I believe it's a matter of statistical proof. Number of minutes spent in conversation with a journalist on the record is Selena Zito And you can tell by Butler. So Selena tell people about Jelly Roll and I honestly didn't know anything about him ntil I read your column.

Oh yeah, he.

I have been a really big fan of his, not just because of his sound. He has a unique sound, sort of in the way that Johnny Cash had a unique sound when when he first came on on the scene back in the sixties, fifties and sixties. But he

I have not been a good person.

But he talked about we.

And he and he.

He gave thanks to God, and he gave thanks to his family, and he gave thanks to his fans and showed this gratefulness that we don't see a lot in our culture. And it was such a powerful moving moment. And he held up his little red Bible and he said, there were times in my life where all I have was this little red Bible and a radio about the same size, and that's what got me through it. And that, by the grace of God, here a mine.

So Selena, I'm interested in this for a couple of reasons. One, the only story I saw about the Emmys was about you can't be a legal on Stolen Land by Billy and I thought to myself, this was a dumb show. So did anyone notice Jelly role other than you?

The middle of the country did for sure. Right where, no matter what your faith is, your belief in God and faith is often central to your life and how you get through your daily life and the people that support you, whether they're family, whether they're spouses, whether their community, and it was just it is such an un heralded characteristic that you hear coming from people in Hollywood, and but yet it is something that is very important to those of us who live in the middle of the country.

All those those are church, those who believe in Jesus, or who believe in God, or just generally have even an ethical view of the world, might be indeed inspired by that. I'm not surprised it did not get picked up by legacy media. I'm so glad you wrote that column because I would never have known that that happened, because, like most of America, you couldn't pay me to watch the Grammys. Now, Selena, I want to turn to your telephone friend. I don't know if you talked about Iran,

I think, much like with what happened in Venezuela, will know it when it happens. He for as much for as transparent as Trump is, for as much as we seem to think we know and understand his every thought, there are many things that happened in the back channel that he comes close to his vest and we find out when we find out, and I believe that that's what's going to happen with Iran.

Next hour, I'm going to play part of an interview I did with great humor earlier today in which he says media has so missed and misunderstood President Trump because of how loud he is and how out of that mold he is, that they don't really cover what he does. And it resonated with me. Does that resonate with you?

Yeah, it absolutely does.

I mean, he was triumphant at Davos, and because he was so loud, it's because he was so outside the it was covered as though it was a failure. But the things that he got down at Gabos are are absolutely unbelievable, and the relationships that were formed there. But because my profession fails to understand how he does what he does blows my mind. And I really want to

It's true.

Read it.

Very unfortunate for the people of Iran who got murdered by these fanatics they didn't read it before they did that. Because what is coming, I think is as certain as I think Eisenhower said, as certain as sunrise follows night. What is coming to Iran is certain. I don't know when, I don't know how, and I know it's dangerous for our military. I don't take it lightly, but I think it's certain. Selena Zito always good to talk to you.

Well, I think the President is going to hit around and he's given her He's very predictable. He gives these bad guys a chance to do the right thing. When they don't, he hits them, and he hits them hard. And he's given the Iranians a chance to give up their original program, which is a bare minimum for the United States.

We have to have a nuclear free.

Ad He's given her a chance to give their ballistic missile program, and they've use US missiles to hit him Eric Basis and to trialize some friends in the region. And he's given a chance to stop supplying the huties and the headline and amas with the weapons of bass destruction to hit America. So he's got three opportunities, and I think they're gonna they're gonna turn it.

Turn it down now, mister ambassador, the when you were with the President, he did strike Sulimani, and he didn't give any warning about that unless it was given through back channels. This is very very loud and clear, in fact, so clear. Here's what Senator John Thune told me the majority leader of the Senate earlier in the program today.

Well, obviously, for me, what would be regime change.

I mean, I think you've got to get a new leadership and there and there's no guarantee that new leadership might be the answer either. I mean, we've seen that before in other places around the world. But I do think that the Iranian people are clamoring for a voice and.

In their government and for the same.

Rights that people in freedom loving countries have around the world, and I think that's what we ought to be supportive of there.

So I'm mister ambassador, what do you think about regime change?

Yeah, So later though, it was absolutely right, and Santa Too hit the nail on the head. This is a government that's been at war with America for fifty years, Hugh. I mean they started out their regime by taking our amplomat's hostage for four hundred and forty four days, right to humiliated the United States of America. Certainly Jimmy Carter. They did in a continue too, bombed our embassy in Beirut through the heads blow the Party.

Of God which they founded in Lebanon.

They then killed two hundred and forty one Marines at the Marine barracks and beaut the largest loss of life of the marine course in tb with Regima.

They then hit.

Kobar towers and hit our soldiers in Marriman and Saudi Arabia. They killed hundreds, if not thousands of the U. S. Soldiers and who were having to bring democracy to Iraq. And they're threatening even today to kill the President of the United States. So this is a governments of war with America, and the only way to the war is in that government.

Is there in your mind a preferred successor at many I mean the president has said nothing about the Crown Prince, he said nothing about the Iranian army. He said nothing about anything, just that they have to they're not going to give up their missiles. And that means regime change. What do you want to see happen there afterwards?

As the leader that will respect their rights and not kill them and hang them and and kill the women for not where he's come, and kill gays for being who they are and hanging out from cranes. I mean, this is a very evil regime, perhaps most evil regime in the world. I mean, think about it. They killed over thirty thousand people last week or two weeks ago. That's many more times than the Chinese kill and tim and square there. These people deserve to go. And it's

Or if they turn to a general or a civil leader.

That's really up to the Iranian people that the current government and the current policy of killing Americans has to end.

So a last question, mister ambassador, do you have a time frame for this? Because the George H. W. Bush carrier group just was announced to be heading in the Middle East, that's at least a week's transit time. Do you expect any showdown that is kinetic, to use the term of art of the day, is going to wait until the Bush is on station.

Well, we don't need to.

I mean we showed without operation midnight in Hammra that we can use the aircraft launch from America for Missouri to do with significant damage to Iran. We have the averring Lincoln, which has ninety aircraft on it embarked on it right now. The Bush certainly gives them the sentcom Combatant commander and the admirals more firepower, no doubt. But we could start tomorrow, we could start a week from now.

Get out of there, or you can choose to stay and face.

The wrath of America if you don't take the deal, and if the President see him a very fair deal.

Do you think they're from from here? I know you wouldn't have the classification anymore, although you're on the Presidential Point Intelligence Advisory Board or whatever Pithyap's called. Now, is there any indication that someone might just shoot the Iatola in the back of his head because they're afraid they're going to get blown up?

That's something a dictator always has to worry about.

You is an assassination if the king, but the ipol is surrounded by an attics, religious fanatics who believe he's the voice of God on the earth.

He's in a bunker, so he is probably unlickily that.

Someone from the regime takes him out, and the penalty is so high if you if you don't kill the king, or even if you do, in that circumstance, he'll kill your family.

He'll kill your extended family.

He'll kill your uncle's aunts, you know, anyone related to you. So it's not likely that he'll he'll be assassinated or they'll be a cut regime.

What's more likely is that he'll he'll run for the hills with all his money. You know, he's the man of God who has sold billions of dollars and put it overseas to feather his nest. I assimilar go to the cash to them and faced American military power, he would he can.

Have a villain next to Asad and the Assad family because they're all in Russia. Now, Ambassador Robert Seale Brian, good to talk to you. Thank you for joining me. Always a pleasure. American Global Securities Chairman of the Board. I want to get that right, ags, chairman of the board. Now former National Security Advisor Robert Selbrien. Hi, it's you, Hewitt. You've heard me talk a lot about consumer cellular how you can switch your carrier and save money without sacrifice.

Well, I'm in southwest Florida, which is now my home.

Well, I'm glad that you and I are both in a warm place, poor old DC. When I set this up weeks ago, I was going to talk to you about every president and covering them. I still will in a kind of way. But two things happened today. The Post Washington Post kind of exploded, and Iran may be exploding by the end of the show. I don't know, but I would like to talk to you about both of them. But first I got to recall you worked for Jack Anderson a long time ago, didn't you.

I did. For several years.

Was he published in the Post?

He was? He was published in the Post? It was It had been Drew Pearson, the famous Drew Pearson's column for many, many years. It ran on the comics page because the Post had even though Pearson was wildly popular and so was Anderson after him. It was wildly popular with readers, but the Post didn't approve of it being stuffy in the way they could be at times back in those days, and so they ran on the comics page. And at some point somebody proposed moving it off the

I know that former President on the comics page. Yeah, former President Dixon had it in for Anderson, and I know, I don't know if you got caught up in that, but it goes back to Drew Pearson days. I used to I worked for Nixon out of college in his exile at the Elbow of America out in San Clementy, and he told me once that he broke up a fist fight between kil Gunner, Joe McCarthy, and Drew Pearson at some you know, could have been any of the

Yeah, another story it happened. The fight that was broken up was at the Celgrave Club, which is a very elite club right near DuPont Circle in Washington, where my only reason I went there is I got on the list for debut parties and used to go. And they were apparently they were tussling on a stairwell and then in the lobby and and Nixon broke it up.

Well, you're the only guy, I though, who can go back and talk about Nixon first person the way I can. But I really want to talk about Carter and Harmoni because you're probably one of the few people that remembers the Revolution of seventy eight seventy nine. I watched it with Nixon and San Clementy and Great Price on the couch in the West Wing the Western White House Oval Office replica, and we couldn't believe every day what we were seeing as the Shaw flat after a year of marches.

I do remember it very well. I guess I was covering Capitol Hill at the time, and of course it was widely watched there as well. It was a very big story, and of course, you know, it was succeeded by the famous hostage taking and hostage crisis that really was terribly damaging to the then President Carter's political standing. And you know, I think, well, you could make a pretty good case, Hugh, that it was that as much as anything else that did him in as the presidential candidate.

I think it was. And then the big question to ask you, has any president until Trump ever tried to deal with the Iran regime and the crazy Toya tolds Homini and Imani from a position of strength the way Trump is doing after Midnight Hammer because Reagan got ballocks by them. I don't remember much on HW's watch, but Clinton couldn't figure him out. W never struck back when they began blowing up American soldiers in Iraq, and of

My view is that we've never seen a military build up on the scale that we're seeing now. This is striking. I mean, this is really a massive allocation of military force in that region. And my guess, true Hugh, is that the president is in a position where, you know, failing some extraordinary and utterly unexpected a areement on nuclear weapons and other things from Iran, he's in a position where he's going to have to use that for us.

I think I agree with that. And when the Iranians canceled the meeting today, that's why I said Iran might be blowing up as we speak. We wouldn't know about it. The Iranians seem to recognize that they are at wits end. They're not going to give up what Trump wants, and they also don't seem to realize they have no leverage. I mean, I don't think they can actually threaten America at all, do you I don't.

I think they can threaten, potentially at least threaten the US bases in the region, and I think they can threaten some of our allies in the region, which I presume is the reason why we're said to be moving anti missile systems into the region to whatever extent we can.

Well, I think that's correct too. I think they they have been publishing pictures of the bases in Jordan and the UAE and cut her A on the far As News agency, which is the unofficial arm of the of the government, and that's a veiled threat. Do you think threats work with Donald Trump very well?

Well, I think they can. They sometimes do, perhaps, but he's in these in these matters, he's about as bold a president as we've had in some time. And you know, he's willing to take risks and and and order daring missions, the mission in Venezuela being the most conspicuous recent example. But he's willing to do this stuff. And of course he with considerable health from Israel, was able to successfully

So I want to try an argument out on you. I heard Lindsey Graham in the Oval yesterday say to the President that the President Trump was Reagan. Plus I actually thought it's more like hw Bush because HW Bush went to Panama, and I think you were at the White House at this point, covering the White House. Hw Bush Panama. Okay, he did Panama, and he did Iraq in and out massive use of force, then cut it off after one hundred hours in Iraq, after a month

Well, in terms of the length of the missions, he's more like hw as you suggest, Hugh, and I think you know this is a somewhat different matter, because he had a very discreet mission did hw in Iraq, which was to evict Saddam Hussein's army. He had a grant from the UN, a grant of authority from the UN UN resolution supporting that mission, which was very important politically around the world, and it was very important in the

Is he?

Is it regime change? Is it toppling the Saddam? I mean tumpling the current Irunian regime? And I don't think we know the answer to those questions at this stage.

I don't, But I've just finished reading a book by a fellow named Siliski about the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps. And there is no killing every part, root and branch of that. It's too big, it's too vast. It's the besiege, which is a million volunteers that run over demonstrators and kill people at close range. It's a quarter million IRGC hardcore professional. It's not the Iranian army. I mean, they can blow up the missile depots, they can try and

And I think and I think that the question you have to ask is would any short regime change end up making the difference in being worth the risk? And of course if you do, should see eat in toppling regime. Then you have the question of what next, which is a question that has been devilist in other places, principally in Iraq. So, I you know, I think this is this is a very big and risky situation we're in.

I think that is exactly the calculation Howmonia has made, that it's unimaginable that he can not do something. And when he does something, ha MANI is going to try and inflict massive damage on the American basis. He's sent up a drone at the Lincoln yesterday, which is not a very good idea. I've got a son in a law of no aircraft carriers and they're pretty well defended. But I do remember the Sheffield. I was reminded of it this week that an exost missile was filed fired

Uh, I think that's right.

Yeah, yeah, it's Thatcher and it's Reagan, and HW is a rock and Thatcher. So I get to confuse. But Argentina took out the Sheffield. I'm not being casual about the danger to our troops or to our ships, but I don't think he cannot The President Trump can do nothing. I think he actually asked to now go and punish them, and punish can be very very big. As you point out, have we ever done a mission before?

And I think hughes that. One of the things that the President can feel that he may have accomplished by virtue of the actions he's taken in Iran and then later of course in Venezuela, is some restoration of the kind of deterrent that our foreign policy has been built on for so long. Is not that we want to go to wars, that we want to have a big military establishment everywhere, but we want people to feel that we have enough power to strike them in a powerful

I agree with that. I also think politically and I don't think that ought to be the primary consideration, but it's never not a consideration. If he backs away, he's basically becoming Barack Obama two point zero. And he spent the last ten years announcing the JCPOA, and the JCPOA deserve to be denounced. But I don't know that he doesn't end up in the pile with Obama and Biden if he backs away. Now, break Hume.

I think that's exactly right. I think that's what he has to worry about. That they did some real damage to our deterrent posture and he's maybe rebuilding it. But you can't start backing away from things and expect that's going.

To do that.

I hope he hears that. Second thing I want to talk to you have, Ben, now is the big news today. The Washington Post is down. They're down another three hundred to four hundred people. It is my policy I don't talk about people that I worked for before, and I worked for the Post for a good decade. It was a fun time. So I don't have anything but nice things to say about Fred Hyatt and Ruth Marcus and fred Ryan. But what do you think that tells us about the news business now, Brett.

Well, I think he's suffering the fate of a great many newspapers. It's a tough business to be in now. People have a multitude of sources from which to get news. They're a customed now to read online. You can subscribe to newspapers for any publication you want to. There's a multitude of other sources of news, from podcasts and newsletters to individuals who have sort of hung out their shingle

You know, when Mike and Jim Vanda Hay left the Post and started Politico, that was sort of the moment. I think that the Post missed. I wasn't working for them at that moment, but Mike Allen and Jim Van Day went over and started no overhead Washington Post, you know, a mini post, and they covered politics exclusively, and they did it well and they did it deep. Now Politico has gone off a left cliff, but in its place, there's now Axios, and there's punch Bowl, and there's Semaphore

I do, and I enjoy it very much. And it's kind of a It's a rollicking podcast, to be sure, and it's fun to listen to. It's not serious deep reporting, but it's a bunch of smart guys, and you know, with a sense of humor, giving you a little insight into how they see things in Washington on the Post. You know, Hugh, the Post used to be fun, you know. The style section was kind of a trendsetter at the time, uh and used to be full of lively, sometimes gossipy, stuffed.

So now Fox News has got Foxnews dot Com. I reade a column for it a couple of times a week, and its reach is massive. It's it's it's up there with any other like the New York Times website or the Wall Street Journal website at which is part, of course, the Fox Court. I don't know that any I don't know that anyone will take over the Post and try and revive it. I just can't imagine that happening, can you.

It looks this looks like the death rattle to me, Hugh, it really does. It makes me sad. I mean, I you know, I subscribe to the Post as a Washington you and I grew up there. I don't live there anymore, but I grew up there. Uh you know. I root for the Washington teams and so on. And one of the reasons why I got the paper was, you know, I'm at the age where my friends and contemporaries are dying, and I'd like to be able to know about that, because you don't always hear about it when you're a

People who spent decades on the hill don't get an obit anymore. In The Washington Post, I noted that it's the only critique I'm going to give. I will know the comics section. I have no idea if it exists, because I only took it digitally for years, I doubt it very much whether Jack Anderson could even ask to

I don't and I think if you're if you're if you're trying to revive that newspaper and you're not going to cover the local sports teams, I don't. I mean, that's one of the things i'd go there for. I'm a I'm an ardent fan of the Washington Redskins now Commanders and have been somemselves a little boy, and one of the reasons I still keep my subscription to the Post is to catch up on the team. And if they've killed that, then I you know, I'll probably just cancel my subscription because.

That's a uh, that's a restaurant Redskins commander's fan, Brett, I'm a Browns fan. I know what that's like. But that's a that's a rough way to go. And are you hopeful?

Yeah, I've always had a lot of sympathy for Browns fans because that's one of those you know. It was one of the original teams of the NFL, and a great team for many years and had Jim Brown and Paul Brown and great stars through the years, and and uh, and to see them struggling in a way they have in recent years has been painful for me, just as a simple just as one sympathetic to its fans.

Did you turn the corner? Did you become a Nationals fan after the Senators folded up in there and bad the O's for a long time? They covered the o's greatly, But did you become a Nationals guy.

When the Senator? I was a Senators fan and where I lived in Washington, Uh, you could walk. It was a long walk, but you could walk to the old Griffith Stadium and get in for a very little month and sit in the bleachers and watch them. When I was an ardent fan of the way, they were always a weak team. I mean they was saying, you know, Washington first, and war first and peace and last in the American League was start true, but I was so.

That is not exactly but very similar. I don't care about the Nationals a lick because I grew up watching the American League. I'm an Indians fan, now Guardians fan, like the Redskins. They've changed their name to the Commanders into the Guardians. But I'm still an American League guy. And it doesn't matter as much to the youngs because of interleague play. But to you and to me, there's only one interleague play a year until we were fifty or so, and then they started the It never caught on.

Well, I think you can. If you're good, you can still develop a following. In fact, what you're seeing is journalists, you heard me say earlier, hanging out a shingle and trying on the strength of their own byline if you will to attract an audience and make a living, and of course, in a country as large as America is now, if you can get yourself out there, as any number of people are now doing, you become the product and your byline is the thing. So I do think as possible.

Almost every day I listen to commentary podcast which has four or five very smart people on it. Ruthless is a rollicking I love that way. I'm going to use that. They are a rollicking good time three times a week and they know they hell, they actually know of which they speak. You covered the OLL for a long time. A lot of the people that I hear reporting from the are shouting questions at legislators like Marjorie Taylor Green or AOC who are marginal to the actual discussion of

No, I don't really, and I don't know. I like, Actually, I think our corresponds a Fox do a pretty good job of covering the Hill. But it's not like it used to be. I can remember we used to cover when I was at ABC News and I covered the Hill for eleven years. We used to cover budget hearings and we didn't cover them live, but I would be doing you know, tape packages on the evening news about budget hearings and budget markups and they're, you know, they're

Night, even with all day newscasts. See Span has not replaced Fox because Fox has a point of view that comes into the play at various times on the panel and things like that, but for deep dives into For example, I open with Senator Thun today the program and we talked about the Department of Homeland Security funding bill, and that's a very interesting thing to me. But only radio has enough time and cable has enough time to actually

That's true. And I think it's one of the things that's challenging about this environment is and we worry people are not going to be very well informed if we can't find a medium in which to convey this stuff. And when you see these newspapers dying out, it's concerning in that way. In particular.

Well, let me let me conclude by asking you about Donald Trump.

Uh.

I thought I had seen everything, having worked for Nixon in exile and then Reagan in the in the Reagan years, and then going back and forth between DC. But of course he's a very different, uh, sort of almost otherworldly figure. In politics. He's not of anything from which I'm used to. Is there any recreating him or is he a genuine sort of one off.

He's a one off in my opinion. There's never been a politician, a successful politician I know of like him, And I think one of the great failures of journalism in this age has been a failure to get it about what he is and it, you know, people have been so mesmerized by his personality, viewed by so many is obnoxious and abrasive, and viewed by many, nearly a huge majority of journalists as an absolute rascal who should not be treated as anything other than that at all times.

Him, and that when history gets around to writing the books, the books go on read and it becomes a paragraph in Wikipedia. He's going to be the guy who took out the Iranian nuclear program and maybe more maybe the regime. And I don't know if he's going to reach some sort of understanding Reji that leaves Taiwan free. I hope so. But he's a very significant national security president along the

Oh, I think he's the most overrated recent president of our time. An enormously talented politician, tremendously likable. I think, even though I disagree with a lot of his policies, I can see the man's strengths. This is the thing with Trump. Too many people look at the man and they're mesmerized by the outward appearances. They're mesmerized by the excesses and the braggadocia and all the exaggerations, and they failed to see the achievements.

Okay, bonus question, going way back to Nixon? What was your take? What is Anderson and your take on Nixon at the end there? Because the press dras Trump like it treated Nixon, and I think they missed a lot of Nixon as a result.

I think that may be true. I tell you, we were all a little bit afraid of him. We remember the stuff that came out when the so called White House horrors were revealed in the course of Watergate. I did a story for Jack Anderson that broke before Watergate. It was a much lesser deal about the effort to fix the IT T any trust cases, and it wreaked

And we did took down Henry Peterson, didn't it, did your story taking out.

Henry Peterson took down Richard Kleindeast that's ad East. Yeah, Well, Tiny's pleaded something else, but he was guilty in that, and he'd been involved in that, and he'd been pressured by John Elickman in the White House and so on. So,

Yeah. The friendship between Donald Trump and Richard Nixon, which developed after the former president moved back to New York in nineteen eighty has always fascinated me. I've talked to President Trump about it a couple of times. It just there could be more different dirt, poor your Belinda California Whittier College versus developer pen New York Glitz, Ritz Glamour. They could not be more different, but they operate I think in very similar ways when it comes to the

Yeah, I think Trump does it on instinct. Nixon probably did it on intellect.

Oh that's well said, Uh, Brittany, great fun talking to you. Watch out for the iguanas falling from the sky down there in South Florida. I hope I see you in the Beltway against soon.

Thank you, Hugh, It's always good to talk to you.

Thank you.