(4-16-26) Ep. 189: Ceasefire or Not, Hegseth Says U.S. Is Locked, Loaded, and Waiting & Much More.

Today's Articles:

(Reuters) - US military: 'locked and loaded' to strike Iran's power plants, energy industry if ordered. (The Daily Express U.S.) - Europe has just 6 weeks of jet fuel left in 'largest energy crisis ever'. (The Hill) - Scarborough: US allies ‘very positive’ about US blockade of Strait of Hormuz. (Time Magazine) - Senate Blocks Iran War Powers Resolution for Fourth Time. (Fox News) - Trump says Israel, Lebanon agree to 10-day ceasefire as US enforces blockade of Iranian ports. (Washington Examiner) - Hasan Piker 'rooting for the violent downfall of this country': Joe Concha. (ZeroHedge) - DEI Practices Reduce Productivity, Cost $94 Billion Annually: White House Economic Report. (Breitbart News) - California Gov. Candidate Tom Steyer Pledges to Open Borders and Arrest ICE Agents. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Due to the graphic nature of this program, viewer discretion is advised. Thank you for tuning in here. Today's groundbreaking news right here in America and across the board, where the facts are facts and hard truths thrive. Let's begin the best out of radio, informative, uncensored, unapologetic, and ready to go. Ladies and gentlemen, we've got to start the show off today talking about some very important topics pertaining to the war in Iran and what's going on with this ceasefire. We were hoping that President Trump would broker some sort of peace negotiation, schedule a talk in the near future. He said that he was days away from getting back to the table with the Iranians, yet there is no sign of that at all. In fact, the exact opposite is beginning to take place during this so-called ceasefire, which ends next Tuesday. Let's break it down first in this article I have for us in Reuters today. And it says here that the United States military is locked and loaded to strike Iran's power plants and energy industry if ordered to do so. Yep. Does that sound like we're coming to terms with peace? Does that sound like the United States is getting these requests from the Iranians that they definitely want to make a deal? No, it sounds like the exact opposite. It's reverting back to old behavior. Do as we say, otherwise we will bomb you. We'll bomb your civilian sites, we'll bomb your energy infrastructure, your electricity grids, we'll bomb your oil wells. I mean, this is the same thing we're reverting back to right now. And I told you on yesterday's show, I think that this idea that Trump says that someone he's talking to in the Iranian government, we were never told who, wants to make a peace negotiation with them and obviously have another round of talks, yet we're never told who this is. And I told you before, I think this is just more obfuscation, just to prop up the markets. I do believe that. Why are we not sitting down with the Iranians if this is what they want? And they're gonna give Trump exactly everything that he wants. You would make statements like this if this is the way they were moving towards things. Quite the opposite. Now we're talking about the U.S. naval blockade now of Iran is just one of the examples of so-called polite behavior that the United States is working on. Again, I find this very funny. We're supposed to be in a sea spare with them, yet we're going to continue to help them block the Strait of Hormoes. And I just want to be very clear with everybody that's listening. Only about four to eight ships since this blockade was talked about. I believe it was March 31st. Since that time, only four to eight ships have even traversed the Strait of Hormoes. And we'll get into who those ships are in just a little bit. But let me ask you this. We're upset that the Iranians have blocked the Strait of Hormoose, so-called. Yet we're gonna go now and blockade it ourselves? Does this make sense to anybody that's listening? Now some people are saying, well, Drace, now it's just gonna be on the Iranian side. Just the Iranians are now blocked from using the strait and crossing over and international trade continues on with everybody else. Well, folks, that's not happening. That's clearly not happening. We haven't heard of any record numbers of UAE ships, Kuwaiti ships, anyone from Bahrain or Qatar or Saudi Arabia, or any of the other ships from any of our allies in the region that have crossed over. Four to eight ships since March 31st? I mean, this is this is not good if this is the truth. So we come into all these questions now, and again, where do we stand here? Where do we stand here? Now Pete Hagseth came out and made some discussion about what was taking place, and he said that we are reloading with more power than ever before and better intelligence. What did I tell you about this ceasefire? He just said this this morning in a Pentagon news briefing. What did I tell you about this ceasefire? We needed a pause because we were getting hammered, our allies were getting hammered, Israel's getting hammered. Yeah, we needed to reboot. We need to get more munitions, more troops to the region right now. They just came out that the 10,000 troops that are now in the region are going to be assisting with this U.S. naval blockade of the Strait of Hormuz. It's amazing to me to see this. He wants to say, we are locked and loaded on your critical dual use infrastructure, on your remaining power generation, and on your energy industry. We'd rather not have to do it. Again, I mean, is he really going to be boasting that he's going to be committing war crimes here essentially? So, in other words, give into the ultimatum that we want, otherwise, we will bomb this critical infrastructure to you. But we'd rather not do it. I still don't see anything that's causing the Iranians to shiver or to sway in the way that the United States, I don't believe they'll be coerced to do so. I simply just don't see it. I think we're right now we're in a standstill. I see no sign that this blockade is being really truly enforced, especially since we know that certain ships, two Iranian ships and a Chinese ship flying under a Muawi flag, have moved through the strait and on with their route. So, what is Hagseth talking about? What is Raising Cain talking about right now? I don't see any enforcement of this blockade. I just think that we're in a ceasefire and ships are really not moving like they were prior to. Now, General Dan Cain, the chairman of the U.S. Military Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that American forces are ready to resume major combat operations at literally a moment's notice. Again, because we have everything in place. The only thing they're missing is the USS George H.W. Bush, which is somewhere around Africa right now, because they didn't want to go through the Red Sea. That's amazing to me. So we're in control of the entire region. The Huthi rebels are essentially nothing. Yet somehow we don't want to traverse through the Suez Canal, down the Red Sea, around the Gulf of Aden, and over to the Persian Gulf. Makes sense. It also makes sense that we moved our ships, like the USS Tripoli, about, you know, 700 miles away from the Persian Gulf, because we're doing so well in the region, right, folks? You try to make sense of all this. Now they wanted to say the US Navy ships would pursue any Iranian flag vessel or any vessel attempting to provide material to support Iran. And so I say to myself, then, how did the rich stari, the Chinese ship, go through the strait? They paid the said toll of two million dollars. They went on their way and they were never stopped. Obviously, that's aiding the Iranians. They're collecting these fees of the ships that continue to go through. Our destroyers trying to get through during the negotiations last Saturday. The Iranians said, You better turn around, or else we will fire on you. Gave them two warnings and we turned around. Who's in control of the Strait of Four Moose? Certainly doesn't sound like it's the United States. And again, we have yet to stop any of these ships that have been continuing to cross. And by the way, how are they even determining what ships are these so-called Iranian flagged vessels? The Chinese ship was a U.S. sanctioned vessel that shouldn't be flying. And they were flying under a false flag, yet they still got through. Now I'll level with you and tell you they went to the UAE to pick up the oil that they were transporting. Was not an Iranian port, but how are we figuring this out if we're so far away? With 12 to 15 vessels to enforce this so-called U.S. naval blockade. Is this more bluster, ladies and gentlemen? Well, I'll let you decide. But this is uh very interesting to me. By the way, Hegseth came out this morning, and like always, in great Hegseth fashion, again try to use a lot of bluster, and I think mostly bluff in this case, uh essentially about what is going on with this strait right now. Uh let's talk about that right now. Let's listen to Hegseth in his own words on clip one right now.

SPEAKER_00 8:37

This blockade, which the chairman will detail this morning, is the polite way that this can go. Your energy is not moving and will not move, and we can do this all day. You like to say publicly, Iran, that you control the Strait of Hormuz, but you don't have a navy or real domain awareness. You can't control anything. To be clear, threatening to shoot missiles and drones at ships, commercial ships that are lawfully transiting international waters, that is not control. That's piracy. That's terrorism. The United States Navy controls the traffic going in and out of the strait, and we're doing this blockade, performing it with less than 10% of America's naval power.

SPEAKER_01 9:30

So let me understand this. We are controlling the Strait of Hormuz right now, yet none of the regular traffic has resumed. Again, I find this very incredible. Why not? Why have the UK ships, for example, not traversed? Why have any of our allies in the Gulf Arab States? Why are their ships not resuming the regular traffic? Well, there's a couple reasons for that. Number one, as I told you before, a lot of the oil refineries, the liquefied natural gas refineries, they're all offline right now. They're not operating. So we're not going to get that resumption of the same amount of traffic for quite some time. So I want Pete Hagseth to tell us if this is true, why are ships not traversing and going to the Gulf Arab States to transport goods into these countries that desperately need it? The food, the water, the other natural resources these desert countries need in order to sustain a habitable lifestyle. Because a lot of them are under lots of trouble right now. When you shut off desalinization plants and what have you, that's a cause for concern of a lot of these countries. How are they going to survive? Pete doesn't answer this. But does Pistol Pete really believe that the Iranians or even the Iranian people will now cower in fear over this? This new threat now, again, of hitting the power plants, the energy infrastructure? Are they going to hear this and call President Trump right now and say yes to all these demands? Not gonna happen. Again, I don't see this happening. You have Iranians in the streets every single night. That's a fact. You have them in the streets all around the country every single night in support of this government. And again, they're calling out the United States and Israel for what took place back on February 28th. This is the truth of the matter. It's not the Iranian government putting them in the streets, it is the people of Iran that are doing this. Again, I'm telling you the facts, I'm not telling you what I want to hear. Hegseth knows he can't defeat Iran. And he knows that they aren't solving the problem at the negotiating table because they're not interested in negotiating. They never were. When you send Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, you know right away this is not a serious negotiation. When you sit down at a table and you say, okay, let me see your demands, and we say, We're not doing this. Even though you said they were negotiable. And then hey, and then excuse me, Vance gets right up and he leaves. He's got to call President Trump multiple times. Calls Benjamin Netanyahu. They're not serious about these negotiations. They never were. It was again to control the markets. That's the only way I see to control the markets, to get more munitions and weaponry and more troops to the region, and to hopefully try to open up this strait themselves, which they're having a very difficult time doing. Again, I'll just refer you to look at the traffic leaving the strait right now. If everything was safe, if everything was fine, if the for example, as Heg Seth just said in the audio I played for you, if we control the straits, then why are the ships not moving? And then he calls it economic terrorism. Well, I'm sorry, Pete, didn't you, for example, blow up a bunch of fishermen boats in the Caribbean without any due process whatsoever and label them drug terror boats? And he's gonna lecture the Iranians now on controlling the Strait of Hormoes? Very interesting, Pete. Very interesting. Hypocritical, I might say. So this is gonna go back and forth, I think, and I don't know how this ends. I don't know if on Tuesda next week we'll just continue with the bombing, if we'll actually strike a lot of these power plants and what have you. I really don't know what's gonna take place here moving forward. I really don't. Uh, but I know it's not gonna end well. I know it's not gonna end well. Especially if we, for example, go ahead and do this. I think you will see the Houthi rebels close the the Red Sea down. I think they'll shut down that transportation on the Gulf of Aden. I think that will be shut down clean. So you'll have two Gulfs shut down now. The Persian Gulf, and of course, everything that's trafficking through the Red Sea, which again will not be good for the Egyptians, it won't be good for global traffic if you've got to now go around the entire continent of Africa. Just that I don't think that's gonna be positive. I really don't. And by the way, let me just say one more thing. Yes, there's been restrictions on these Gulf Arab states. No doubt about it. They've been hosting the United States. But ships that want to cross through, they've made the terms very clear. You will pay in the Chinese Yuan, you won't be paying in the petrodollar, and you will pay us a fee to get through. So the traffic's open for these ships that want to do so. Now, whether or not they do that is up to them. Um, but again, this is the way that the Iranians have called for now. They said on day one, if you attack us, we will close the Strait of Hormuz. The strait will be closed by us. We will decide who goes in and who goes out. And the United States said, yeah, right. Well, this is not gonna happen. They're not gonna do that. And then they did, and now we're calling them economic terrorists. Uh, interesting, folks. Very interesting. And by the way, we've got the global woes uh going on about this, the persistence of the global economy right now. Out of the express, we've got now the International Energy Agency warning that Europe has maybe six weeks or so of jet fuel left as the oil price is beginning to climb and really hit those markets right now, again, due to the continued closure of the Strait of Hormuz. So, if the United States has opened this up, why do we have the largest energy crisis we've ever faced in Europe? I went on to say, in the past three weeks, there was a call for the dire straits, so-called, and they're in dire straits right now. And they're gonna have major implications for the global economy, especially in Europe, especially in Asia. We know countries are running out of the oil, the liquefied natural gas, the again, the jet fuel that's necessary that comes out of that region. And the longer it goes, the worse it will be for economic growth and for the inflation all around the world. The consequences already are seeing higher petroleum prices, higher electricity prices in these countries. Uh, this is again following the discussions that just took place between Iran and the United States. And now they're set they're gearing up for a second round of talks, but I see no sign of that. I see no one on the Iranian side saying, yes, we would definitely want to talk. Certainly not right now. But what happens after this ceasefire ends? Do we just resume this war? Does it continue to go back and forth? Where is the end game? Where do we say we we can't meet these objectives we want? The Iranians are not budging. Do we really just continue to try to keep this straight closed? Are we really going to board foreign ships and take control of them and take production that they've paid for already and take it? What do we do here? What is going to happen right now? So this is again very concerning to me. We're already looking at things inside the United States that are being affected by the closure of the strait. You got U.S. farmers now saying that their prices for fertilizer is now 20 to 40 percent more just right now. By the way, what comes out of there is not even the number one import of urea and fertilizer and nitrogen and what have you coming into our country. We get the bulk of it coming in from Canada. But this is still hitting the markets and it's affecting the global price. Doesn't matter if we get uh the a certain amount from the Middle East, we do get some. But that production, that product is shut off now from us. So when you lose 20%, let's say it is 20%, I'll be generous, let's say it's 20%, and you cut off 20% of that fertilizer inside the United States, you got 20% now that's no longer there. So therefore the prices must go up, folks, because everyone else is vying for that product that is wherever they can get it. The price has got to go up. The markets respond to that. We look at gas price in the United States. Despite us being the number one producer of petroleum in the the world, 19.4 million barrels of oil produced per day, we export 10 million barrels of that. We still got 30% higher unleaded fuel prices. 40% diesel increase. That's a big problem because most of everything we ship goes through diesel. So that's more expensive for the truckers in this country, they've got to pay more for that, and you as a result have to pay more. So you're getting more paid at the pump, and of course, again, like I said, the crop production is waning now in this country. Farmers are saying, listen, I don't know if we can hack these prices. I don't know if we could do this. I mean, we could try to charge more for the crops we produce, but everything becomes more limited now because you have less supply in that field. So, folks, I only say this to you because, and by the way, I've been saying this to you, and you of that listen to the show, you understand this. But I think it's funny now. I see this is becoming now to the mainstream now. Now the people, the talking heads on the mainstream media are even saying this now. They're like, oh my goodness, my the farmers are saying this now. Well, yeah, I've been telling you this for weeks now. I said this to you before this even took place. When you can't get things like aluminum, fertilizer, oil, liquefied natural gas, jet fuel, all these things out of the Middle East, you're gonna have a lot of problems worldwide, even here inside the United States. And again, referring back to this article I'm looking at right now, you're seeing certain countries that may be hit even worse than what's taking place in Europe right now. Think of Japan, Korea, India, China, Pakistan, Bangladesh. All these nations are gonna be bearing the brunt of this major energy crisis that is coming. These are the countries that will suffer the most, and that's why I believe China and Pakistan were really trying to push Iran into these negotiations to see what could be done, but they were never gonna happen because Netanyahu does not want that. They want regime change. That's this is their end goal, folks. Because you haven't figured that out yet. This is exactly what they want. They're not satisfied that the Iranians have said, hey, listen, we're not gonna build a nuclear bomb. We're not gonna build, we're gonna have the nuclear program dedicated to it, we're not gonna do that. The United States has made it very clear. They're gonna go with what Israel wants. And, you know, you can say that, for example, Vance went in there trying to look to end this, but yes, but look at who we were speaking to the entire time. If you have to call the Prime Minister of another country during negotiations that we are negotiating on behalf of, that's a big problem, don't you think, folks? I mean, I think Trump can solve this. I don't think he he's incapable of doing that. But when you have to consult with Netanyahu, time and time again, and they say, listen, we want this regime changed. We this is our end goal right now. We want our puppet president in there. We want our puppet leader involved. They will control everything that we want them to control for us. Iran is not going to stop enrichment down to zero. They're not gonna do that. It's just simply off the table for them. They're not going to do that. They're not gonna stop funding their proxies in the region. They're just simply not going to do that. And we see the end results of this. What's taking place in Lebanon right now with Israel? What's taking place in Gaza right now with Israel? They're supposed to be in ceasefires with these, well, the nation of Lebanon and of course the territory of Gaza. This is all, again, the result of what Israel's doing in the region. Again, there's no other way for me to tell it to you, folks. This is the this is what's taking place. Israel is the aggressor in Gaza. Now you could say, well, Jerace, what took place on October 7th? Yeah, we could talk about that. And again, I've chastised Hamas for anyone they've killed that day, and I don't like people taking hostages, but you act like this was the first thing that took place between these two groups of people. This goes way back, ladies and gentlemen. Way back, and I'll implore all of you who disagree with me on this to look up the term mowing the grass. Yeah, or mowing the lawn. Whatever you know, vernacular they use, and see exactly what they're saying about that. What does that mean, ladies and gentlemen, when they talk about mowing their lawn inside of Gaza? What takes place? You know, we could talk about terror attacks all day long. We can talk about terror attacks that Israel has performed against the Lebanese with the pagers or the beepers, of which they try to target Hezbollah, they end up killing and hurting hundreds of civilians in the process. That is a terror attack. And we have to look at how Hezbollah even formed. If we want to go about doing that. We can talk about all these things. When did why did Hezbollah form in 1982, folks? Who invaded Lebanon in 1978? Oh, that would be Israel. Okay, now it's starting to make more sense. Again, folks, I tell you the truth, not what I want to tell you. Again, if you don't believe me, I implore all of you to look it up. If you don't believe me, have at it. Let's be honest with what's going on here. And by the way, I'm not happy with what's taking place inside of Israel right now. I don't like that people have to be in bomb shelters night after night. I don't I don't like this. I don't like this at all. But this is what Nanyahoo wanted, and Trump went right along with it. That's the sad fact of what's going on. This article's on the hill right now, Joe Scarborough. Joey Scarborough, right? Oh, you gotta love Joe Scarborough. On MS Nobody Cares. Says U.S. allies are very positive about the U.S. blockade of the Strait of Hormuz. Are they? Are they really happy, Joe? Is that what you got from this? Joe Scarborough said on a Wednesday that the U.S. allies are reacting with very positive attitudes about the American blockade of the Strait of Hormuz. Oh, why wouldn't they? There's a blockade in effect. Now we have another blockade. Fantastic! We're so happy we're running out of jet fuel. We're so happy electricity prices and oil prices in the countries are going up. Couldn't be better, right, Joe? I guess everything's fine down in Jupiter, Florida, though, right? Isn't gas over a dollar now in Florida too, by the way? I mean, look at it, look at it in California, though, up around seven, eight dollars a gallon. It's unbelievable. The Trump administration, as the article goes on to say, has effectively closed the strait this week. Well, we talked about that, and I've said to you before, where is the proof of this? Where's the proof that we've called for opening up the strait and now we have blocked the strait? Blocking Iran from choosing which ships are allowed to pass through the critical choke point. Okay, so what ships of ours are going through? Name them. I want to hear it. Name me the ships. Name me the countries that have resumed their transportation at their ports. Back to their regular scheduling. You can't do it, because it doesn't exist. Scarborough said on Wednesday morning, there was a growing unease that the United States was going to get a bad deal in Islamabad. There was a growing unease that the president may come home, bring the troops home before getting the job done. What job is that, Joe? Does anybody know? Do we know? Does the president even know? What job are we trying to accomplish here? Nobody can tell us. One day it's regime change, then it's freeing the Iranian people, then it's stopping a nuclear program of which they're not even trying to pursue, then it's getting rid of ballistic missiles. Then it's opening up the Strait of Hormuz, which is open before the war ended. Excuse me, the war started, excuse me. All these things that we're trying to do never had to happen. None of this had to happen. They didn't have to fire off ballistic missiles. They make it sound like the Iranis were just firing off into all these areas, just out of nowhere. No, we attacked them first. They make it sound like they were weeks away from having a, you know, 10, 11 nuclear bombs. They weren't. They're not building it. There's no evidence of it. Tulsi Gabbard and Joe Ken have said this much to us. This is our intelligence agencies, ladies and gentlemen. Even John Ratcliffe agreed with this. Again, he was one of the people that was pressuring Donald Trump not to go through with this. You can even believe that. And I don't really even trust a lot of what he says. But even John Ratcliffe of the CIA was saying exactly this. But let's get back to what Europe is doing right now. He went on to say, this is Joe Scarborough, though, and they are actually very positive about the blockade, and have signed on to what I'm sure historians will long remember as the Haas Plan. The Richard Haas Plan, who 10 days ago started saying it's all or nothing. You either let all the ships go in and out of the strait, or you let none of them go out. Well, that's good, isn't it now? Now this Richard Haas guy sits on the Council of Foreign Relations, that's globalism, ladies and gentlemen, just for all the those that don't know, was the former special envoy to Northern Ireland. Good for him, by the way. Congratulations. What the hell do I care about that? And proposed an open for all or closed for all policy. So good. I guess it's closed for all then. Except for, you know, the Iranian ships that have gone through, and of course the Chinese ships that have gone through. Good job, Joe. Way to go. Absolutely fantastic. Again, effectively closing the strait is debatable at this point to me. I don't see any proof of this, especially when we see that the rich stari has gone through. We know that the two vessels linked to the Iranians have gone through. The Christiana and the Elpis have both transited. This is what Iran has said. Now SENTCOM has said no ships have crossed the strait since the blockade began. So which is it? Are the Chinese and the Iranians lying, or is SENTCOM lying to us? Which one is it? Nobody can tell us. Um again. How is this going to help our allies? We have a blockade and these ships are in standstill. When I start seeing French ships, UK ships, Italian ships, all these other ships going through the strait, and I see other ships going in to bring uh their exports to these Gulf Arab states, then I'll say, okay, the United States has opened up that strait. But right now it still looks like we're in a standstill right now, and the only ships that are going through are the ones paying the tolls to the Iranians and getting through. Nothing else we could say here. Morning Joe, co-host, who is this? God only knows. Doesn't say, doesn't say what just steam coast it is, but they said economically Iran was doing better. Trading oil and moving their oil across the globe and getting good money for it than they had in years. Well, of course, we released the sanctions on their oil, right? We did this for Russia too. And as a result of what we've done, now the price of oil is up. Go look at Brent Crew today. It's just under$100 per barrel. And, you know, folks, while we say this, I was listening to Larry Johnson this morning. He said that there was ships going to, for example, Singapore. And while the oil for whatever company is was trading to them, I think he said it was maybe around, again, a$100 mark, somewhere around there. But when it got to that port in Singapore, it was sold for about$210 per barrel. So I want you all to understand that just because the Brent Crude price or the WTI price or the Merol's or Eurals crude or the Merbane crude or whatever it is is the benchmark, it's still being sold for much, much more when it gets to some of these locations that are starving for oil. So let's just keep that in mind as well. So when we talk about blockades or when we talk about the strength of this blockade and the dynamics of this war, is this really helping a lot of these countries? It's certainly not helping the Asian or European markets. And again, I don't think it's helping us. I've seen gas prices well over a dollar where I live right now. Everything seems to be going up. And by the way, this article I have for us in Time magazine now states that the Senate now blocks Iran war powers resolution for the fourth time. Yep. All these things are taking place right now. It says here the measure failed with a 47 to 52 tally with Senator Ron Rand Paul, excuse me, of Kentucky joining the Democrats in voting for the resolution, and Senator John Fetterman of Pennsylvania opposing it. Senator Jim Justice of West Virginia, the Republican, did not vote. And so again, it looks like everything voted primarily along party lines in this democratic effort forced to end the U.S. military involvement in Iran. Obviously, it seems the Republicans are again punting it to President Trump, and we're going along those lines as of right now. So it looks like we're resuming with that, and we're seeing that we are continuing to fund this as time goes on, according to this article. But the 60-day clock is continuing to run down as of right now. And it says here that the U.S. campaign against Iran, which again began on February 28th, the legal deadline now for this administration is really starting to come up and will arrive sometime around May 1st. So we'll see what takes place if we start to cut off aid of the region if the Senate decides to do so. I don't think that's gonna happen. I really don't. I think we'll see things continue to go further with this. I think they want to see Trump end this on good terms, not on just simply running out of munitions and troops to the region. But one last thing I do want to say to everybody that's listening. We gotta understand something. These ships that have been out there for quite some time now, uh we saw, for example, the USS Gerald Ford. They'd been out at sea for quite some, I think it was at least 10 months. They'd been out at sea. Now they're sitting in a port in Cyprus, I believe, or I think it might be Greece, if I'm not mistaken. But these ships have to go, they have to replenish what they have, they have to give these troops a break, too, by the way. They just can't be out at sea for months on end. They have to get some, you know, rest. That's that's what's necessary for you know these military men that are, you know, in the Navy. So I just want to make that very clear too. We can't just keep them there forever. You have to have some kind of break for the men and women that that serve in their Navy. Alright, so we've talked about the war and where we are. It seems like we're in a standstill. The strait may be closed, it may be open. We get different things from different sides and what goes on. But let me slide over to another topic here, just to stir things up and what's going on. Apparently, that the Israelis and the Lebanese have now agreed to a 10-day ceasefire. Amazing because they were already in a ceasefire. But I guess we're going to try this yet again. As U.S. enforces blockade of Iranian ports. There we go. This is out of Fox News. President Trump took to Truth Social saying, I just had an excellent conversation with the highly respected President Joseph Aoun of Lebanon and Prime Minister Benjamin Nanyaho of Israel. These two leaders have agreed that in order to achieve peace between their countries, they will formally begin a 10-day ceasefire at 5 p.m. There we go. On Tuesday, the two countries met for the first time in 34 years here in Washington, D.C., with our great Secretary of State Marco Rubio. I have directed Vice President J.D. Vance and Secretary of State Rubio together with the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Dan Raisen Cain, to work with Israel and Lebanon to achieve a lasting peace. Yep. I don't see how we can have lasting peace when we have one country bombing civilians in Beirut, but, you know, this is where we are. Again, I think this is more about trying to get Lebanon to put a halt to what Hezbollah is doing because they're the ones who are standing in the way of the Israelis from taking everything south of the Latani River. I think that's what they want to see take place right now. And I think that's what the whole ceasefire is all about. I don't think that Israel, again, Israel's never held to any ceasefire. There's no ceasefire in Gaza right now. I don't know that they would hold their word. They never held their word. And I don't say this to you because I'm anti-Israel. I say this to you because they haven't done that. So they were already supposed to be in a ceasefire, and they again, uh excuse me, again began attacking inside of Lebanon as of late. So we'll see how long this so-called ceasefire lasts. I don't know how long it will last. Once they decide to attack again. Obviously, the Israelis are are wearing thin. They've used up a lot of their defense missiles, their the Thad and the Patriot missiles that we give them. And we'll see what takes place on Tuesday if Iran begins to bomb again, if the Houthis in Yemen begin to bomb again, and what Hezbollah decides to do. But I don't think you're gonna get rid of Hezbollah. I don't think you'll have any inner fighting with all this. I just don't see that taking place. Obviously, you have a Christian president versus the Hezbollah who is Shia Muslims. I I still don't think right now you're gonna see them go at odds against each other, which I think is the idea with all this. I think that's what they want to try and do, to tame what Hezbollah is doing, because they're the ones that are standing in the way of Israel from advancing right now. All right, let's move on to another topic. Again, a ceasefire is good, I suppose, even if it is just for a short period of time. But on a different front, I think you'll enjoy this one too. This is out of the Washington Examiner. Joe Kansha has now said that the left-wing streamer Hassan Piker is a bad pick for the Democratic Party. Well, who is Hassan Piker? Well, his uncle is Schenk Uger of the Young Turks, and it seems as he worked for this organization for about seven years. Started in sales, then the business department, then he was a fill-in host, then he was a regular host, then he was a producer, and then he was the creator and host of what is called the breakdown on the Young Turks digital series on Facebook. And it was dedicated to debunking Republican propaganda, so-called, highlighting corruption, and critiquing US political hypocrisy. Well, now he is, I believe he's a Twitch streamer now, if I'm not mistaken. And he goes to campuses and talks to young college students right now. But who is this guy? What does he really stand for? Well, he was born in the United States in New Jersey, largely raised abroad. I believe he was living in Turkey for some time. I know his parents are both Turkey, uh, excuse me, Turkish. They're not Turkeys, excuse me. But he's he's done some talks on universities, and he's really taken aim at the United States in general. He's not just critiquing U.S. foreign policy, he's critiquing America as a whole. And one of the things he said, Joe Concha said to Fox and Friends on Thursday, he said, I'm pretty sure he's the enemy, considering that this guy is the same guy who was rooting for the violent fall of this country of which he lives in right now. Piker spoke to the Yale Political Union, this is their University Debate Society, on Tuesday of this week. And he said it's an interesting resolution. End of the U.S. Empire, because how do you end something that is already in the process of dying? Because that's the situation with the American Empire as it stands today. Um, there's discussion about that. The United States is standing in the world. Uh do we drop our mantle, do we drop our torch, and do we give it to another country as what we are doing with our foreign policy right now? I mean, that's up for debate. But why do you want somebody to champion that? What is the positive aspect you have in getting all that? Now, again, it appears that uh he's gone on to say, for example, if the Democrats want to make Hassan Piker the team's next mascot in an effort to, I guess, capture more anti-American, pro this is Joe Conscious speaking, anti-Semitic voters, roll the dice and take your chances. I don't know that the young Americans would go for this. I gotta be honest with you. I I don't know that they would want to go for this. That someone that's talking about the decay of society and the pleasure in seeing America and its downfall in our standing globally. I don't see that as being something that's really positive for them. This is the same guy that has talked about America deserving 9-11. This is the same guy who calls Jews inbreeds. Uh again, I don't know that this is the I don't know that this is the guy on campus. I don't think this is the guy that's going to turn people around. He said that America deserved 9-11, the 3,000 Americans incinerated and otherwise murdered in the Twin Towers, men and women falling and plummeting to their deaths from skyscrapers. I don't think this is going to captivate young Americans. I really don't. Saying they deserved it? People that went to work that day deserve to die? Again, I don't understand how you think this could resonate with certain people. Now, obviously, there are people in our country that dislike the country, they hate the country, we understand this, and they want to see the country get weaker. Again, I don't understand this thinking why you'd want the country you live in to get weaker, or what positive benefit you think that will have to us. Now, we can criticize foreign policy, we can criticize wars we have been in in the past, and the mistakes we may have made, of course. That's always up for grass. So why would you want to see your country weakened? Why would you say Americans, who have absolutely nothing to do with foreign policy, on September 11th, um, 2001? Why would you say people deserve to die? We've heard this from several people, obviously, in the past, saying we we deserve this. Again, I don't understand this thinking that innocent people going to work deserve to die because of American foreign policy in the 20th century. I don't understand that level of thinking. I don't want to understand that level of thinking. Again, we can criticize foreign policy, but why would you not want to improve the foreign policy? But I do want to say something. I was listening to another show this morning, and they were talking about how this Hassan Piker is kind of the opposite of what Charlie Kirk was. Where Charlie Kirk went into college campuses, and he would speak to people about Republican and conservative values, he would get into debates about who Jesus was and American values and Christian values, and Charlie obviously was very successful at turning people, turning people around, turning point. That's exactly what he did. And we don't have anyone in that arena right now. Yeah, people trying to keep that organization alive, but I don't think you have somebody that goes to college campuses right now that has the charisma, that has the knowledge, that has the willpower to turn students to thinking that conservative values are the next wave of what we should do. I don't see that taking place right now. I just simply don't have that. And if you have a Hassan Piker, a guy who wears a Sex Workers for the World shirt, by the way, everything that is vile and again about hating the country, I don't think that is a win for us as a nation, certainly not for our young people, though that is a easy group to pick on, especially if you're on a lot of these liberal universities. But who takes the torch of Charlie Kirk right now? Because it's nobody in this organization right now. It simply just isn't going to work that way. Charlie was, again, I told you at the time, you go back and listen to my show then, Charlie was one of a kind. There was nobody quite like Charlie. Now, Charlie could have guests come on stage and they'd be good speakers. But Charlie himself was unique because he understood how to speak to people. He understood how to get people to understand his point of view. He opened up discussion and dialogue. He didn't go there just to chastise people. And you saw that the day he was speaking, he had hundreds, if not thousands, of people in that courtyard at Utah State University listening to him speak that day. Can anyone just show up to a university campus that's a prominent Republican or prominent conservative or political pundit or whomever go and get a crowd like that? I don't think so. I think that's something that's going to take time to build. Who that person is, I don't know, but I don't think that person is in that organization today. I'm just gonna be honest with you. But the way we solve a Hassan Piker, the way we as conservatives combat somebody like this, that has these vile attitudes and sentiments towards the country of which he lives in, you need proper debate. That's what you need. You need someone that's going to go and say, Okay, I'll debate you, Mr. Piker, or I will take on your positions and I will debunk every single one of them. That's the way you solve these problems. You don't solve it by saying, you know, this person's scum, they shouldn't be speaking on campus. It's not gonna work. That just simply trying to silence people, censoring them, is not going to work, especially on a college campus, where those ideas might be favorable. The way you solve that is through debate. The only way this is negated, you speak on your behalf and you get people to listen. Now I will say something Charlie's movement, the turning point movement, which he did very effectively. You see a lot more people coming to Jesus Christ today. I talk with you about this, about what I saw across the country, people coming to the Catholic Church over Easter weekend, the Protestant, the Orthodox weekend, people converting. In numbers we haven't seen in over 50 years in this country. A lot of people are coming back to Jesus, and I think that's a very positive thing. Because again, we are a Christian-based nation. We are. We are. Sometimes our leaders don't reflect that, I don't think. But we are a Christian nation. Our values, our laws, everything that we do, our traditions, is based in Christianity. And we should be keeping it that way. That doesn't mean you can't have people come to this country and being of different faiths or not having any religion at all and thrive here. But you have to understand you are in a Christian-based nation. We are not going to have Sharia law courts in this country. We're not going to count out to certain values of other religions. That's not how we operate. We operate based on the Constitution, and the Constitution is based in Christian values, first and foremost. And I only say this to you because whoever takes what Charlie was doing and can perfect it to the T that he did has to be someone that projects power, understands reason, has the knowledge of events, and can critically think about all of them. You know, Charlie was a guy who said, okay, I'll have a debate with you. I might not agree with you, but I'll have a debate with you. I'll give you my understanding of a situation. And you see that Charlie, before his death, was even changing. He didn't want the war in Iran. In fact, he would call President Trump and tell him, This war is a bad idea. Don't do this. Don't do that, don't prolong this, don't go back to war with Iran. Charlie was that voice. And we lost a great voice that day. And unfortunately, Charlie was that voice of reason on those college campuses. And look who came out for President Trump in 2024. A lot of it was young Americans, college age, coming out to vote for President Trump and JD Vance. So, again, ladies and gentlemen, I just tell you this. Whoever picks it up for Charlie has got to have that same level of charisma, that same level of knowledge, that same level of commitment to go into the college campus and do the things that Charlie was so great at doing. And again, I tell you this before, you aren't going to replace a Charlie Kirk. You're simply not going to do that. You're never going to do that. But you can have people go that speak, that are effective, that are good speakers, that speak to students in a similar fashion, then get students to say, oh yeah, maybe I should look into this conservative movement. Oh yeah, maybe I should look into Christianity. Maybe I should listen to this person speak more. And again, Charlie was brilliant for so many reasons. First of all, he also had a talk show, so people that liked him could turn into his show and his podcast. And by the way, I did for quite some time. I said to myself at the time, I go, this guy's on college campuses all the time. He's traveling all the time. He's speaking at this event. He's on this news channel, and he's also doing a radio show for three hours every day. And the guy was just ironclad, folks. I mean, again, a one-of-a-kind. One-of-a-kind. And a brilliant guy. And again, I didn't agree with every single thing he had to say, but again, I agree with most of what he said, as I do with most people in the conservative movement. But Charlie has got to. Excuse me, the whoever replaces or tries to be that next person has to have that same level of commitment. And whoever that person is, God bless them, because they have a lot of work cut out for them. But I think someone like a Hassan Piker, someone that's going to try to come in and kind of do what Charlie was doing and speak in in such a way about the country, I don't think that's going to go well for the democratic movement. I don't think a lot of people are going to buy into that. We've had a lot of these voices in the past. But I again I don't see that as something that's going to be very positive for this country. As time goes on, and we see a lot of these liberal movements, we see a lot of these liberal ideas, for example. And another story worth noting today that kind of reflects what I just talked about, since we're talking about the downfall of America, or so-called. And again, I think America is a very positive and strong country still. This article in Zero Hedge says that DI DEI, I almost said DIE, which it really should go to die, but these DEI practices reduce productivity, costing some$94 billion annually, is what a new White House economic report came out and stated. Says here, researchers calculated that the DEI policies reduced output and lowered the country's gross domestic product by about$94 billion each year, amounting to approximately$1,160 per year for families with two working adults in it. So these DEI policies, they actively encourage employment discrimination, according to this report, which cited fourfold growth in the percentage of minorities holding management positions between 2016 and 2023. During that same time frame, industries adopted these DEI protocols were 2.7% less productive than industries that avoided this culture phenomenon. That makes sense. You hire people based on meritocracy and not how they look or what's between their legs or what they believe they can get the job done. And you have a more productive corporation or company or whatever it is. They wanted to figure out that we've ended the tyranny of so-called diversity, equity, and inclusion policies all across the entire federal government. And indeed, the private sector and our military and our country will be woke no longer, is what Trump said in a joint session of Congress in March of 2025. This was, again, one of the bonuses of what Trump was doing, and he's absolutely right to do so. We believe whether you are a doctor, an accountant, a lawyer, or an air traffic controller, you should be hired based and promoted on skills and competence, not race or whatever sex you are. Exactly right. Exactly right. And by the way, this just violates the Civil Rights Act of 1964. You shouldn't be basing how you hire people on race, color, gender, religion, national origin. You shouldn't be doing that. The best person should get the job. But what did a lot of these corporations, what a lot of these companies want to do? They want to hire an X number of, let's just say, black females. Okay, for whatever reason they want to do. How is that going to benefit the country? What if you don't have qualified, and I'm saying they're not qualified people that are black women? I'm not saying that at all. There are. But when you go looking for a quota of something, or it could be anything, it could be all minority, it could be all immigrants, it could be all illegal aliens. You can't have something like that in your business model and say, this is how we're gonna hire people. I only want half my staff to be, again, minorities. Minorities, whatever the hell you know they they want to make that out to be. Um I don't think that's gonna be beneficial for that corporation. And the Trump administration has figured out that while Joe Biden accelerated these DEI practices with executive orders implementing these programs, for example, in the military and of course, and across the federal government as well, you saw less productivity. And when a lot of these corporations do the same thing, you see the exact same trend. We should be against this. Everyone should be against this. Because why would you want to be hired based on how you look, simply checking off boxes? They call it intersectionality. Why would you want that? Why would you want to be selected because of how you look? I mean, it just doesn't make any sense to me. I want to be selected because I'm the most qualified person. There's some merit. I worked hard to get that. I studied, I excelled, I have the experience, I have the fortitude and the perseverance to do the best I can at this job, and I'm qualified to do it. I didn't just check off a box because I'm a white male, for example. And it doesn't make any sense. Why would somebody want this? And it's just a lack of obviously merit, first and foremost. But we we've moved away from this. We've said we we need our company to look like X, Y, and Z, whatever that may be, whatever that company wants to do. And as a result of that, they're getting less and less GDP pushed out, they're getting less revenues, and it's not better for the country. It simply isn't. We've moved so far away from the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by allowing these college admissions to get a certain number of students. We talked about this on my show a couple weeks ago when I talked with you about Thomas Sowell's interpretation of college admissions in education and how detrimental that is to, again, largely minorities, the people that they're trying to so-called help. By having their university have X number of whatever number of students they want from a certain demographic. It's stupid. Of course, there are students of every demographic in this country that can achieve at the highest level. That's not up for debate. We know that's obviously true. But when you say, no, no, no, no, no, we're gonna have a certain number of black students, Asian students, women, this and that, migrants, whatever it might be, it doesn't matter. And you take students in that can't keep up, you have students that have to drop out. How fair is that to them? And you say, Yes, you can come to this university when they could have gone to another university and excelled and been just fine. And as Dr. Thomas Sowell said in the presentation he had, as a result of it, you have students that go to these universities, they get put on academic probation because they can't keep up with the workload, they end up dropping out, and there's this animosity towards the system. Well, the system is what let them down. But it was a system that was diverting away from what it should have been. Meritocracy, experience, being able to keep up with the workload. And when you hire people in a company or take them in in a college or work for the government or whatever it may be, and they can't do that, they can't follow what the protocols are for the job, that's a major, major problem. And so I think this is very greatly highlighted in this article because Americans deserve a government that is committed to serving every person with equal dignity and respect. And to expanding the taxpayer resources uh, you know, to hire people how on they look is simply just not going to be something that is positive, folks. It just never is. It never goes well. It might make people feel good. It might make people look at something and go, wow, that's great. You have X, Y, and Z number of this DEI protocol. But it never works out well in the end. Again, look at the Biden administration. Look how that went. Okay, folks, you know, I think we'll go to another topic that I think is very important to talk about what is happening right now. Let's talk about what's happening over with our friends in the great state of California. Or maybe it was the once great state of California. I don't know how you would look at it. Look at all of Gavinusome's fails and what he's done to that great state. That's not a bright bar. It says California governor candidate Tom Steyr pledges to open borders and arrest ICE agents. So it looks like the ludicy on the left is alive and well and will never cease to exist, it seems. You get one ridiculous person after another. I digress, though. But now Tom Steyr is now pulling in the top end of the democratic field for the governor's race. And they've unveiled that he's just as radical, left as just a lot of these other people. Open the door for migration to the state, anti-ICE platform as he continues his run for the state's top office now. And this hedge fund billionaire, who was polling very poorly, by the way, up until Eric Swobell decided to drop out, somehow has gotten this boost to come in. But what does the 68-year-old founder of the Farlane Capital Management, turned radical environmentalist, do for the state of California? What are his positions that he wants to do now? Now he knows we know now that he wants to abolish ICE, put ICE agents in jail and treat them like the mob. Bring those that have, quote unquote, according to him, kidnapped and detained by ICE back home. So he's talking about illegal aliens that have been deported. He wants to bring them back. This is who this guy is. Now, this is again very interesting to me that he's getting all this traction all of a sudden, and I think a lot of it's completely manufactured in a lot of these polls. And we know that they can stipulate these polls any which way they want to. So, Steyer, who desperately wants to be governor so he can run for president again. By the way, look how he polled for president. Parely got it was in the single digits. So he got really nowhere with that. Now all of a sudden he's this champion for the left. But he doesn't understand the Constitution. Uh, he definitely doesn't understand what he's talking about. But he feels like he can run the state of California. But I find that interesting that he's all of a sudden gained all this momentum overnight. But what's more is that the left in California does not like the ultra-rich. They eschew this. Steyer's worth$2.4 billion. I mean, one of their own from Texas has traveled to California just to try to kill Sam Altman just a little while ago. Now, while Steyr pretends and parades around anti-immigration, or at least pretends to be pro-immigration, I should say, but against anti-immigration enforcement. This guy's invested and made lots of money, get this, off of ICE detention facilities, private prisons, which again the left in California hates. They want to end all prisons, don't they? Oil, gas, and coal production as well. Again, he pretends to be this environmentalist, and this is what he's put his money into. This is how he's made himself rich. And again, uh, I find that once they find this out, what will he run on? Again, the internet goes all the way back, folks. And once people find this out, if people actually pay attention before they vote in California, which I don't know is always mutually exclusive, uh, I don't think they're gonna like Tom Steyer too much. I just don't. Which is why a debate is very, very important in the state right now. We need somebody in California that is going to prop up the markets and the failing schools and the crumbling infrastructure and fix all this. Now, do I think that's going to help a Katie Porter who's insane just like he is? I mean, this is a woman who threw hot mashed potatoes on her ex-husband's head. Uh, but will these freaks turn out for her? Who is it going to be? Who will be the next person that comes in to save the day, I guess is what you may call it. Uh, I don't know. I really don't know at this point. But I do know that, again, Steyer is seemingly coming in second place right now. Uh, depending on which poll you look at, it's either Bianco or Hilton for the Republican ticket. Um, I don't know how it's gonna turn out. But all I know is that both need to get out there and try to pull independence and like-minded Democrats alike. That's how you change the state. That's how you save the state. You take it away from the lunatic Democrats that have been running it for the last 15 years. Campaign up and down the state, debate, put up ads, and run a square campaign and save the state. Folks, thanks for being here. That'll do it for today's show. I'll see you back here tomorrow for more groundbreaking news on the next Marvel Dre show. Keep your house in order. Keep yourself prepped up. Have a great rest of your day, and take care.