The Ben Shapiro Show - NOTE TO AMERICA-HATERS: Sorry, We’re Busy Kicking A**

00:00:00.000 America is in a totally exceptional moment.

00:00:02.000 We're sending human beings around the moon for the first time in decades.

00:00:05.000 We're performing some of the most extraordinary military operations in human history. 0.98

00:00:09.000 We're killing terrorists.

00:00:10.000 We're delivering the most targeted strikes from the most sophisticated weaponry ever built.

00:00:14.000 We're rescuing pilots in Mission Impossible style operations.

00:00:17.000 All incredible stuff.

00:00:19.000 So, why the hell are so many people insistent that America is losing and should lose? 0.77

00:00:24.000 We'll get into the Iranian economic collapse, the human shield desperation of a dying theocracy, and New York City's 375 page manual.

00:00:33.000 On America's National Guilt, all on today's Ben Shapiro show.

00:00:36.000 Well, folks, yesterday the Artemis astronauts made history by traveling further than any human being has ever gone.

00:00:47.000 According to the Wall Street Journal, just before 2 p.m. Eastern Time on Monday, the astronauts on Artemis 2 steered their Orion craft into the record books, flying more than 248,655 miles from Earth, which is the furthest that human beings have ever gone.

00:01:02.000 This is a picture of the flight path. 0.99

00:01:04.000 Again, human beings doing unbelievable things because America kicks absolute ass. 0.97

00:01:09.000 The president of the United States called up the Artemis crew to congratulate them yesterday, and here's what it sounded like. 0.96

00:01:16.000 Tell me what is the most unforgettable part of this really historic day?

00:01:21.000 The whole world is watching and listening.

00:01:23.000 Please tell me.

00:01:32.000 President, this call is certainly special to all of us and we really have a lot of faith in our administrator, Jared Isaacman, who is with you.

00:01:39.000 We appreciate his leadership in NASA and in the international community.

00:01:42.000 We are doing great things and we are proud to be a part of it.

00:01:46.000 I have to tell you, as we came around the near side of the moon, seeing all the sights that we've seen from Earth for all of our lives, but we're seeing them from a different perspective and then we started to get a glimpse of the and we saw sights, oriental, sights that no human has ever seen before, not even in Apollo, and that was amazing for us.

00:02:04.000 And then the surprise of the day, we just came out of an eclipse where the sun, moon, and the entire dark moon, about that big, right out the window that we were watching.

00:02:15.000 We could see the corona of the sun, and then we could see the planet train line up, and we're at Mars.

00:02:21.000 And all of us commented how excited we are to watch this nation and this planet become a two planet species.

00:02:30.000 America rocks. 1.00

00:02:31.000 This country just kicks ass. 1.00

00:02:33.000 And you know what? 0.99

00:02:34.000 It's part and parcel of a vision for the United States that is actually inspiring.

00:02:39.000 I know we don't talk about the United States in that way, or we haven't in the recent past, but America is an unbelievably inspiring place.

00:02:46.000 That's the reason why everyone is clamoring to get here.

00:02:49.000 Not just because we can put human beings 250,000 miles away going around the moon, but also because when people come here, they are inspired to create and to build and to build better lives for themselves and their families.

00:03:03.000 And because we offer them that opportunity, because the American system offers them that opportunity, and because America is, in fact, The guarantor of security on planet Earth.

00:03:12.000 Because the United States, the same United States that takes humans and puts them 250,000 miles away around the moon is the same United States that stands up to the thuggish, theocratic tyrants in Iran who want to develop nuclear weapons and develop intercontinental ballistic missiles and who wish to spread terrorism all over the region against us and our allies.

00:03:34.000 We stand up to them.

00:03:35.000 What President Trump is providing is an inspiring vision of what the United States should be.

00:03:39.000 And guess what?

00:03:40.000 We are making it happen in real time.

00:03:42.000 Now, the president in Iran has provided them an off ramp over and over and over and over again.

00:03:46.000 This is the part that everyone seems to just ignore.

00:03:49.000 If Iran did not wish to be in the gun sites of the U.S. military, all they would have to do is stop developing nuclear weapons, stop developing long range ballistic missiles, and stop funding terrorism. 0.65

00:04:00.000 That is all the things they would have to do. 0.87

00:04:02.000 That's it.

00:04:02.000 And they could have done this at any time for five zero years, for 50 years, they could have done this at any time.

00:04:08.000 They would have been reintegrated into the world economy.

00:04:11.000 They would have been treated as a member of the family of nations.

00:04:14.000 Their concerns would have been heard.

00:04:16.000 Instead, they decided that they were going to double down on their theocratic tyranny, that they were going to rush toward a nuclear weapon, that they were going to back every major terrorist group in the region and beyond.

00:04:26.000 They decided to do that.

00:04:27.000 That was their decision.

00:04:29.000 The difference is that this president understands that it is not in the interests of the United States to allow that cancer to fester.

00:04:37.000 That the gangrenous limb that is the Iranian government, not the Iranian people who are wonderful, the Iranian government, that gangrenous limb cannot be allowed to poison the entire region and beyond.

00:04:46.000 That's why the president took the stand that he is taking right now. 0.96

00:04:49.000 And guess what? 0.98

00:04:50.000 We are kicking the hell out of the Iranian military. 1.00

00:04:54.000 We are. 1.00

00:04:54.000 There is no standard in military history by which we are not kicking the hell out of them. 1.00

00:04:59.000 We have put their entire Navy under the water.

00:05:01.000 We have taken their entire Air Force out of the sky.

00:05:04.000 We have taken their ballistic missile launcher capacity to near zero.

00:05:07.000 We have destroyed their steel factories.

00:05:10.000 We have been hitting specific besieging checkpoints in Tehran.

00:05:15.000 We've been bombing every nuclear facility we can find. 0.58

00:05:18.000 And once again, the president is offering them an off ramp because all they can do in response to this, all they have done, again, all they would have to do is open the Strait of Hormuz and give up their nukes.

00:05:26.000 That would be it. 0.64

00:05:27.000 We'd be done.

00:05:28.000 We'd be done. 0.99

00:05:28.000 Open the Strait of Hormuz, give up your nukes. 0.99

00:05:30.000 It would be over. 0.99

00:05:31.000 That's all.

00:05:32.000 They won't do it.

00:05:33.000 Ask yourself why.

00:05:34.000 Why?

00:05:36.000 Truly.

00:05:37.000 We would give them a permanent ceasefire.

00:05:39.000 Truly. 0.74

00:05:39.000 If they opened up the Strait of Hormuz and give up their nukes, we would. 0.74

00:05:46.000 They won't do it. 0.99

00:05:46.000 And the reason they won't do it is because they must terrorize their people. 0.99

00:05:50.000 They must rush toward a nuclear weapon in order to preserve their tyrannical regime.

00:05:54.000 And they must harass the countries around them in order to gain some sort of power.

00:05:59.000 They have regional ambitions.

00:06:01.000 They have beyond regional ambitions.

00:06:03.000 I mean, if you look at the religiously Shiite rulership of Iran, ambitions are not restricted to Iran in their philosophy.

00:06:12.000 This notion that radical Islam is restricted to a small portion of the world, and if only we would leave them alone, they would leave us alone, ignores, you know, the entire history of radical Islam going back to about the year 700.

00:06:24.000 In any case, Iran was presented a proposal from the United States, and as the Wall Street Journal reported late yesterday, Iran then rejected it.

00:06:34.000 The regional mediators offered to end hostilities for 45 days in exchange for opening the Strait of Hormuz.

00:06:40.000 Okay, not even in exchange for the nuclear materials, just for opening the Strait of Hormuz.

00:06:46.000 President Trump reasserted the Tuesday evening deadline.

00:06:50.000 He said the entire country can be taken out in one night, and that night might be tomorrow night.

00:06:53.000 He said that during a news conference yesterday.

00:06:55.000 Well, this morning, the president reiterated that on Truth Social.

00:06:58.000 He put out the following statement A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again.

00:07:03.000 Now, of course, he doesn't mean that Persian civilization will die.

00:07:06.000 The reality is that Persian civilization will flourish and survive if the Iranian government dies. 0.88

00:07:12.000 Persian civilization has been ground under the boot heel of radical Islamic thugs for the last 50 years. 0.83

00:07:20.000 Persian culture goes back 2,000 years, 3,000 years. 0.98

00:07:25.000 The notion that the civilization itself is going to, maybe he means radical Islamic civilization. 1.00

00:07:30.000 That would be a welcome thing. 1.00

00:07:32.000 He says, I don't want that to happen, but it probably will.

00:07:34.000 However, now that we have complete and total regime change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen.

00:07:41.000 Who knows?

00:07:41.000 We will find out tonight one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the world.

00:07:45.000 47 years of extortion, corruption, and death will finally end.

00:07:48.000 God bless the great people of Iran.

00:07:50.000 I know that there are a bunch of people who have dyspepsia over this.

00:07:53.000 And listen, I get the questions.

00:07:54.000 I do.

00:07:55.000 I get serious questions.

00:07:56.000 The questions about what happens to oil prices.

00:07:58.000 Do they temporarily go up if we, for example, bomb Khargay? 0.81

00:08:02.000 Yes.

00:08:02.000 Do we have an economic slowdown if the Straits of Hormuz remain a battleground for another month?

00:08:10.000 Perhaps. 0.80

00:08:11.000 What does the regime look like in two months?

00:08:13.000 These are all normal questions.

00:08:16.000 As we'll get to in a moment, those are not the questions that are being asked.

00:08:19.000 The questions that are being asked are about whether America ought to be a serious force on planet Earth.

00:08:25.000 Or whether it ought to recede into itself and become basically a European welfare state, useless to the world and dying on the vine, which so many people seem to want.

00:08:36.000 That's the part that puzzles me.

00:08:38.000 The questions don't puzzle me.

00:08:39.000 We answer those questions every day.

00:08:41.000 I take questions from friends on this, from family on this.

00:08:45.000 I mean, those are questions we have about every policy.

00:08:47.000 And let's be very honest about the approach the administration has taken to this conflict.

00:08:52.000 One of the reasons that they've not said that the goal is regime change is because that would necessitate.

00:08:57.000 Everything that would require regime change today.

00:08:59.000 And it may be that the goal here is just to weaken the regime.

00:09:02.000 So six months from now, a year from now, it just falls off.

00:09:06.000 That's possible.

00:09:08.000 Right.

00:09:08.000 Or maybe the goal here is to just weaken all of their forward capacities so much that we don't really care what they do internally as Americans.

00:09:17.000 And the reason that President Trump has not been absolutely 100% clear on quote unquote the final goal is because he's been clear about the military goals.

00:09:25.000 The question that people have is about the geostrategic goals.

00:09:28.000 Like, do we want the regime to survive or do we not?

00:09:30.000 And the reason that President Trump hasn't said that he wants the regime to just fall is because that might necessitate using means he does not wish to use. 0.58

00:09:37.000 And many of the questions that are being asked are kind of silly.

00:09:41.000 What are the specific things that you are going to do?

00:09:42.000 Well, no one worth his salt is going to tell you the specific things he's going to do in the middle of a war. 0.75

00:09:47.000 That's silly.

00:09:48.000 So, what level of specificity do we need answers to?

00:09:51.000 But again, there are honest questions.

00:09:52.000 There are good discussions that can be had on all sides, people expressing honest concerns.

00:09:56.000 And then there's the thing that's actually happening in the online world and beyond, which is a true belief that America exerting power on planet Earth is inherently bad, that it is better if America is weak, that it is better if America is focused only.

00:10:12.000 On the welfare programs of the United States and ignores everything happening on the rest of planet Earth as though it doesn't affect us.

00:10:20.000 And as though if we just pour money into the welfare programs of the United States, suddenly everyone is better off, which again is a very left wing point of view, economically speaking, and not borne out by the evidence.

00:10:30.000 In any case, yesterday the president did the Easter egg roll.

00:10:33.000 It was a very bizarre sort of visual juxtaposition.

00:10:35.000 The president kicked off an Easter egg roll, and here's what it looked like.

00:10:41.000 Everybody, I got no.

00:10:43.000 This is very athletic.

00:10:44.000 Focus.

00:10:45.000 Total focus.

00:10:46.000 Is everybody focused?

00:10:48.000 Ready?

00:10:49.000 Get set.

00:10:50.000 Okay, well, the president was then told by a child that he was the best, and President Trump gave a very, very Trumpian response.

00:11:03.000 Donald Trump, you're the best.

00:11:06.000 I agree.

00:11:06.000 Thank you, honey.

00:11:10.000 Thank you.

00:11:10.000 I agree.

00:11:12.000 Okay, well, President Trump.

00:11:12.000 That's pretty great.

00:11:14.000 He then was talking about the, he did a press conference where he talked about the conflict in Iran.

00:11:19.000 And he started off by saying, Iran could be taken out tonight.

00:11:22.000 We could take them out anytime we want, which, again, it's unclear exactly what he means by this.

00:11:28.000 But the lack of strategic clarity, the lack of clarity is the point.

00:11:32.000 When you are trying to say everything is on the table, you're going to be unclear.

00:11:38.000 In a moment, we'll get to what President Trump is still threatening first.

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00:12:59.000 So the president said yesterday that Iran could be taken out tonight.

00:13:03.000 Here's what he had to say.

00:13:06.000 The entire country could be taken out in one night, and that night might be tomorrow night.

00:13:13.000 And the president added that the Iranian people actually are yearning for their freedom.

00:13:18.000 There are a lot of people out there who are saying the Iranian people are very much against this bombing.

00:13:21.000 Have you taken a poll lately?

00:13:22.000 How would you know that?

00:13:24.000 Seriously, they were in the streets by the millions protesting the regime before we got into this current conflict.

00:13:30.000 What is your data that the Iranian people want us to stop and leave the regime in place, empowered and strengthened?

00:13:36.000 What is your evidence for that?

00:13:37.000 Here's the president.

00:13:39.000 Why would they want you to blow up their infrastructure, to cut off their power? 0.94

00:13:43.000 Wouldn't that be punishing Iranians for the actions of the regime?

00:13:47.000 They would be willing to, and it's suffering, they would be willing to suffer that in order to have freedom.

00:13:54.000 The Iranians have, and we've had numerous intercepts. 1.00

00:13:58.000 Please keep bombing. 1.00

00:13:59.000 Bombs that are dropping near their homes. 0.62

00:14:02.000 Please keep bombing. 0.65

00:14:04.000 Do it.

00:14:05.000 And these are people that are living where the bombs are exploding.

00:14:09.000 And when we leave and we're not.

00:14:11.000 Hitting those areas.

00:14:12.000 They're saying, please come back, come back, come back.

00:14:15.000 These are the people.

00:14:17.000 I don't know what they do.

00:14:18.000 All I can tell you is they want freedom.

00:14:22.000 He is right.

00:14:23.000 He's right.

00:14:24.000 You know how I know he's right?

00:14:25.000 Because Iran is shutting down the internet. 0.99

00:14:27.000 If you're wrong, Iran would have opened up the internet, said they could have flooded the internet with Iranians screaming for the president to stop. 0.98

00:14:34.000 The problem for the Iranians is that if they open up the internet, the Iranians would be giving us a target bank. 0.98

00:14:39.000 That is the reality. 1.00

00:14:40.000 The Iranian people would be giving us a target bank. 1.00

00:14:43.000 Of places that we should hit if they opened up the internet. 1.00

00:14:46.000 The tell is always in the action. 0.67

00:14:49.000 We will talk about other tells that show kind of the moral difference between the United States and Iran in a little while, because it's pretty insane the way that Iran is responding to the current conflict. 0.86

00:15:00.000 The president was asked about religion and God, and he said, listen, in his opinion, God supports this. 0.83

00:15:09.000 You've said, glory be to God in this conflict.

00:15:12.000 Do you believe that God supports the United States' actions in this conflict?

00:15:15.000 I do, because God is good.

00:15:17.000 Because God is good and God wants to see people taken care of.

00:15:22.000 God doesn't like what's happening.

00:15:24.000 I don't like what's happening.

00:15:25.000 Everyone says, I enjoy it.

00:15:26.000 I don't enjoy this.

00:15:27.000 I don't enjoy it.

00:15:28.000 These two guys don't enjoy it.

00:15:29.000 You know, people say, oh boy, they're so tough.

00:15:32.000 They don't like seeing people killed.

00:15:34.000 I've ended eight wars.

00:15:37.000 Nobody's ever done it.

00:15:39.000 The person who won the Nobel Prize came to me and said, You deserve the Nobel Prize.

00:15:44.000 She announced that when they announced, they said, Goes to Maria.

00:15:48.000 She's a great person, really a good person.

00:15:50.000 She said, No, no, no. 0.98

00:15:52.000 This is ridiculous. 0.95

00:15:54.000 They gave me the Nobel Prize. 0.94

00:15:56.000 President Trump aimed at eight wars.

00:15:58.000 I could go over every one of them, including India and Pakistan, where the Prime Minister of Pakistan said President Trump saved from 30 to 50 million lives.

00:16:09.000 That makes me much happier than what we're doing right now.

00:16:12.000 That makes me much happier.

00:16:14.000 We have one more to end, by the way. 0.76

00:16:18.000 And again, when the president says that he thinks that God supports the United States when we take out tyrannical dictators, when we kill Ayatollah Khamenei, a mass murderer, when we try to destroy the forward function of terror groups, he is correct about this. 0.74

00:16:34.000 See, here's the thing you're seeing a lot of people who have, shall we say, a casual acquaintance with scripture, like who admit that they had not fully read through the Bible until two to three years ago, who are suddenly, it turns out, bishops in their church. 0.88

00:16:47.000 It's amazing how quickly they have learned biblical literacy.

00:16:51.000 You know, these are the same people who will sit across from guests who tell them that the Bible is actually socialist and anti capitalist.

00:16:57.000 These characters.

00:16:58.000 Well, it turns out that for those of us who have spent a lot of time engaging with the scriptures, and here I'm talking specifically about the original Hebrew scriptures, it turns out that the Psalms, for example, are filled with calls to crush oppressors and deliver the weak and needy from the hands of the wicked and to break the arm of the evildoer.

00:17:18.000 Literally zero things in scripture suggest that Western civilization has some sort of a duty. 0.76

00:17:24.000 To uphold the rule of wicked Islamist theocrats who murder their own people en masse, spread terrorism throughout the region, desire the defenestration of Christianity, yes, ask the Shia leaders of Iran what they think about Christianity, and threaten the West directly. 0.82

00:17:39.000 Nothing in scripture suggests that going along with those plans is somehow scripturally mandated. 0.97

00:17:45.000 Nothing.

00:17:46.000 We can have honest conversations about just wars and unjust wars.

00:17:49.000 I've had those conversations with some of my Catholic friends, people like Matt Fradd or Matt Walsh.

00:17:54.000 Those are good conversations.

00:17:55.000 That is not the conversation that many people are having today.

00:17:58.000 And the president is right about this.

00:18:01.000 You know, when it comes to global affairs, God speaks pretty frequently in the Bible about global affairs and geopolitics and the way that tyrants ought to be treated. 0.96

00:18:11.000 And I have yet to see the part of the Bible where it says that Islamist theocrats must be maintained in power.

00:18:18.000 And by the way, you're not allowed to mock radical Islamism, which is a position taken by Tucker Carlson, as we'll get to shortly. 0.89

00:18:26.000 Well, the president then went on and he said, Listen, these people in Iran, they're BS artists. 0.98

00:18:31.000 That's why they've been BSing everybody else for 47 years. 0.99

00:18:34.000 I will not be BSed.

00:18:36.000 He is correct about this.

00:18:37.000 And he deserves full merit for this.

00:18:39.000 He does.

00:18:43.000 I honestly do not understand how either this has become a partisan issue or why it would split a conservative right that is focused on making America great again.

00:18:54.000 If you want America to be great in the world, if you want America to be what America has historically been, When it has been at its greatest, it is when it is doing things like we are doing right now, like what we are watching right now.

00:19:08.000 Here's the president.

00:19:10.000 They don't have any mind droppers anymore, but they put them on other boats and they could drop them.

00:19:14.000 I'm not even sure they have any minds yet, by the way.

00:19:16.000 I'm not sure.

00:19:18.000 Personally, they say there might be eight.

00:19:20.000 I don't know. 0.99

00:19:21.000 I think there might be none because they're very good bullshit artists. 0.99

00:19:21.000 I don't know. 0.99

00:19:26.000 That's why for 47 years they've been bullshitting other presidents and they haven't done the job.

00:19:33.000 And now, the president did unleash one of the great, I will say, American pictures in modern history yesterday.

00:19:39.000 He was standing next to the Easter Bunny because, again, they were at the Easter egg roll and he was commenting on global affairs next to the Easter Bunny, who was last seen guiding Joe Biden away from reporters.

00:19:54.000 Well, this Easter Bunny was not going to be stopping President Trump.

00:19:58.000 It's just wonderful.

00:19:59.000 Here was the president yesterday.

00:20:00.000 I know.

00:20:00.000 They were giving me a briefing about that.

00:20:03.000 And they said, normally, when you're in very hostile, territory and I don't think it gets much more hostile than Iran.

00:20:10.000 They're capable fighters.

00:20:11.000 They're very tough people and there are others like that.

00:20:15.000 You don't mind when the enemy is weak, but that enemy is strong.

00:20:19.000 Not so strong like they were about a month ago.

00:20:21.000 I can tell you, in fact, right now they're not too strong at all, in my opinion, but we're soon going to find out, aren't we?

00:20:27.000 But when a thing like that happens where a pilot shot down, in most instances you're really not able to go in because you'll go in with 200 people and lots of jet fighters and helicopters and You really don't have a chance.

00:20:43.000 They get shot down.

00:20:44.000 You lose 200 in order to pick up one.

00:20:46.000 It's a horrible thing, but it's very rare that you can do it.

00:20:49.000 And what we did yesterday is we picked up not one, we picked up two.

00:20:53.000 We kept the first one quiet, and we were able to keep it quiet for about a day, which made it a lot better.

00:20:59.000 But those two pilots were incredible, brave, and we thank them.

00:21:05.000 The Easter Bunny was standing there for confirmation.

00:21:08.000 I'm sorry, it's just funny.

00:21:10.000 There's no way to say that it is funny. 0.99

00:21:12.000 Well, the president was asked yesterday at this press conference about his post from Sunday, in which he said that these crazy bastards should give up the effing straight or we're going to bomb them into the Stone Age. 0.99

00:21:22.000 And somebody was getting very offended about all of this. 0.99

00:21:24.000 And the president said, I don't care, which.

00:21:29.000 Here he was. 1.00

00:21:31.000 Yesterday in your Truth Social, you called the Iranians crazy bastards. 1.00

00:21:35.000 True. 1.00

00:21:36.000 What is your response to critics who say that.

00:21:39.000 I don't care about correctness.

00:21:40.000 What is your response to critics who say that it is your mental health that should perhaps be examined as this war continues?

00:21:45.000 I haven't heard that.

00:21:46.000 But if that's the case, you're going to have to have more people like me because our country was being ripped off on trade, on everything for many years until I came along.

00:21:56.000 So if that's the case, you're going to have to have more people.

00:22:00.000 The president did say yesterday that he would consider taking the oil.

00:22:04.000 Now, again, a lot of people having a lot of heartburn about this statement.

00:22:08.000 But here he was.

00:22:11.000 We are a partner with Venezuela, and we've taken hundreds of millions of barrels, hundreds of millions.

00:22:19.000 Over 100 million barrels already is in Houston, refined, and out.

00:22:25.000 And paid for that war many, many times over.

00:22:28.000 Many times over.

00:22:29.000 You know, the old days, to the victim.

00:22:32.000 Okay, you know that.

00:22:36.000 To the winner belong the spoils, go the spoils.

00:22:39.000 And I've said, why don't we use it?

00:22:41.000 To the victor go the spoils.

00:22:46.000 Okay, so a lot of people upset about this.

00:22:49.000 Okay, now here, here's the thing.

00:22:51.000 The idea is not that we're just going to go in, grab literally all the oil for ourselves and leave nothing for the Iranian people. 0.93

00:22:56.000 First of all, let's be clear. 0.92

00:22:58.000 Every barrel of oil that is getting shipped right now goes not to the benefit of the Iranian people. 0.94

00:23:02.000 It goes to the Iranian government, which uses that oil to suppress their own people and shoot them. 0.91

00:23:08.000 Also, if we were to help manage their oil supply, if, for example, the government were to change its orientation and be reintegrated into the world economy, and we are allowed to bring American companies in to actually help pump that oil, We would probably double the amount of oil they are currently producing. 0.94

00:23:23.000 At its height, Iran is producing 3.2 million barrels of oil per day, somewhere in that neighborhood.

00:23:28.000 If we fixed their position in the world and their industry, that number would probably double, and the revenue would flow back to the Iranian people, unlike now when it all flows to the Iranian government, the IRGC, and the besieging.

00:23:39.000 That is literally the model we are using in Venezuela. 0.59

00:23:43.000 We are currently holding money in escrow so it doesn't go to shore up the communist regime to suppress the people.

00:23:49.000 In a second, we'll get to what.

00:23:50.000 What comes next?

00:23:51.000 What is the next thing on the table for the United States, for Israel, in this joint operation?

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00:25:08.000 Hey, so all of this raises the question of what comes next, because of course, 8 p.m. tonight is supposed to be the deadline for negotiations.

00:25:16.000 Well, the answer from the Wall Street Journal, and I've heard this from sources both American and Israeli because it's a joint operation, is that Iran's economy is next on the table. 0.78

00:25:26.000 Which makes perfect sense.

00:25:28.000 That to take out the final pillars of the Iranian government, you have to permanently damage their economic status. 0.93

00:25:33.000 Because if they don't have money to pay their people, it makes it very difficult for them to survive and also to spread their terrorism forward. 0.62

00:25:41.000 According to the Wall Street Journal, quoting Avner Golov, a former Israeli national security official, the U.S. and Israel are signaling we're serious.

00:25:48.000 And if you continue not to agree to end the war, the price you'll pay to your economy is going to be higher and higher.

00:25:55.000 And of course, Iran has been firing at a wide variety of energy facilities in the region already.

00:26:01.000 Israel knocked out sites responsible for 85% of Iran's petrochemical exports, according to Israeli Defense Minister Katz.

00:26:11.000 That represents something like 30% to 35% of their export revenue.

00:26:16.000 So is that likely to get worse for them?

00:26:18.000 Yes.

00:26:19.000 There are already preliminary strikes that are taking place.

00:26:21.000 So this morning, footage of Kharg Island being hit.

00:26:26.000 Started to cross the internet.

00:26:29.000 That footage is apparently of particular sites on Karg Island.

00:26:36.000 So, this is not bombing the actual oil facilities or storage facilities or refineries on Karg Island yet.

00:26:41.000 And it's not even bombing the landing docks, which would allow for the shipping to and fro of the oil.

00:26:46.000 Instead, according to Jen Griffin of Fox News, the targets the United States hit included bunkers, radar stations, and ammo storage.

00:26:53.000 So, it's quite possible that what we are doing right now, and these are U.S. strikes.

00:26:58.000 It is possible what we are doing right now is taking out their defensive installations in preparation for either a taking of Karg Island, which again, I think has been the longest telegraphed punch in modern history, or just blowing it up.

00:27:10.000 If we were to blow it up, they would be permanently damaged.

00:27:12.000 It would take out 90% of their economy.

00:27:14.000 They just would have no money.

00:27:17.000 Meanwhile, Iranian railways are being hit as well.

00:27:21.000 And so the sites continue to be hit.

00:27:24.000 Iran has responded by basically saying that they don't want to negotiate.

00:27:28.000 Now, again, One of the things I think that Americans need to understand, and this has been true throughout American history, sometimes you run up against an enemy that is so intransigent that against their own interests they refuse to surrender.

00:27:40.000 The reason that the United States had to use nuclear weapons at the end of World War II is because the Japanese government knew they were going to lose and felt that they could somehow reach a negotiated settlement with the United States more advantageous to them if millions of their own citizens were killed in a long battle for the home islands of Japan.

00:27:58.000 In fact, there was a segment of the Japanese government that was so extreme at the end of World War II that after both Hiroshima and Nagasaki had been hit, afterward, the emperor recorded a message surrendering.

00:28:12.000 This faction attempted to overthrow the emperor and take the recording before it could air to prevent surrender after both sites had been hit.

00:28:22.000 The Iranian regime, meaning the mullahs, and particularly the IRGC, are of that sort.

00:28:29.000 Now, maybe the president is talking to other people in the country.

00:28:32.000 Maybe the president of the country, Pzeszkian, who's widely perceived, as I've said before, as a very weak character, perhaps he's negotiating.

00:28:39.000 But it is absolutely unclear at this point whether such people even have power. 0.58

00:28:45.000 The IRGC may basically just be gambling, Taliban like, that they'll ride this bomb all the way into the dirt. 0.92

00:28:52.000 That may be what's happening.

00:28:53.000 And we don't understand that because that is not how we think.

00:28:56.000 But that is certainly how they think. 0.98

00:28:58.000 Iran is. 0.99

00:29:01.000 Honestly, anyone who's telling you that Iran is winning right now, I don't even understand how you could come to that conclusion. 0.97

00:29:05.000 You could have questions about whether we are going to get everything we could possibly seek in this war. 0.98

00:29:09.000 Again, that's a normal question.

00:29:11.000 You can ask whether we are going to have any sort of long lasting repercussions from the Strait of Hormuz situation.

00:29:18.000 Again, a normal question. 0.82

00:29:19.000 But Iran has been relegated to putting out AI videos of their current supreme leader, Moshtaba Khamenei, entering a command center. 0.56

00:29:28.000 This is AI video of him in a war room.

00:29:32.000 You want to know why it's AI video?

00:29:34.000 Because he's in a coma.

00:29:37.000 Because he's half dead.

00:29:39.000 He's been dead for weeks.

00:29:42.000 Here's that AI video.

00:29:43.000 This is insane.

00:29:57.000 And of course, he's standing in front of a map of the Dimona nuclear reactors that are going to hit Dimona, which is Israel's nuclear site.

00:30:03.000 Um, he's in a coma.

00:30:06.000 He is not alive.

00:30:08.000 He is not fully alive.

00:30:10.000 He put out a tweet yesterday.

00:30:11.000 And when I say he put out a tweet, I mean his prone body somehow reached out from beyond the quasi grave to put out a tweet in which he lauded the armed forces jihadi ideals.

00:30:24.000 He said, The unbroken ranks of the combatants and fighters on the path of truth in Islamic Iran, along with the self sacrificing armed forces, form such a towering, deeply rooted front that terrorism and crime cannot even crack their resolve for jihadi ideals. 0.76

00:30:36.000 Yeah, this sounds like a moderate. 0.98

00:30:38.000 This sounds like somebody we should allow to pursue nuclear weapons.

00:30:41.000 Well, the good news is that he didn't tweet that at all because he is in a coma, according to the Times of London. 0.92

00:30:46.000 You know, you're not doing great when you're basically doing the movie Dave, but Iranian Ayatollah version.

00:30:53.000 You got the actual Ayatollah in the back in a coma.

00:30:57.000 So, you go and you find like an impersonator via AI and put him out there to tweet.

00:31:02.000 According to the Times of London, he is incapacitated and receiving medical treatment in the holy city of Qom, according to an intelligence assessment, which suggests he is not capable of running the country.

00:31:12.000 Apparently, he is unconscious and being treated for a severe medical condition.

00:31:16.000 It is possible that the condition is being dead.

00:31:19.000 The memo also says that the intelligence agencies identified the preparation of laying the groundworks needed to build a large mausoleum in Qom for more than one grave, suggesting that other family members and possibly Moshtaba himself. Could be buried alongside his dad.

00:31:35.000 And meanwhile, President Pzeszkian is putting out statements about how 14 million Iranians are enlisted.

00:31:41.000 Sure, sure.

00:31:42.000 He says more than 14 million proud Iranians have so far registered to sacrifice their lives to defend Iran.

00:31:47.000 I too have been, am, and will remain devoted to giving my life for Iran.

00:31:50.000 Well, he may get his wish depending on how the rest of the week goes.

00:31:53.000 How do you know things are going poorly for the Iranians, aside from the fact they're putting out AI videos of their leader who is in a coma?

00:32:01.000 Iranian state TV is now telling young people, like students, like children, to go form human shields around power plants.

00:32:10.000 Ahead of President Trump's deadline for the bridges and the power plants.

00:32:13.000 Okay, so this says a couple things.

00:32:14.000 One, this is not something strong countries do.

00:32:16.000 If you aren't in a good military position, you're not calling out the youth to go.

00:32:22.000 This is something that the Nazi regime does in the final days in Berlin, where they call out the 12 year olds and they're like, okay, guys, here's a pistol, go at it. 0.88

00:32:29.000 That is where Iran is. 0.84

00:32:30.000 They are now asking or telling or forcing civilian 12 year olds to stand around power plants ahead of President Trump's deadline. 0.96

00:32:40.000 So again, number one, it shows they're incredibly weak.

00:32:43.000 Number two, you know what else it shows?

00:32:44.000 It shows that they know that the United States actually cares about human rights.

00:32:49.000 I know, this is the dirty secret.

00:32:51.000 The dirty secret is the reason that terrorists use human shields is because they believe it will deter Western powers from hitting the targets.

00:32:58.000 This is why, when people suggested that Israel was committing atrocities in Gaza, they were doing a genocide in Gaza, and then those same people will say that Israel is killing human shields.

00:33:10.000 The question is, why is the human shield in the first place?

00:33:12.000 You know what I would never do?

00:33:14.000 You know what I would never do?

00:33:15.000 I would never take my own kids and put them in front of me in the face of a terrorist.

00:33:19.000 Because I know the terrorist will kill me and my kid.

00:33:19.000 You know why?

00:33:22.000 The reason to use a human shield is because you believe that it will deter humane people from doing the thing you don't want them to do.

00:33:28.000 That is literally the purpose of doing this.

00:33:30.000 So, the same people claiming that America is deliberate, if you're Ryan Grimm and you're claiming that America deliberately targets school children at a school, explain to me this. 0.90

00:33:39.000 Why then would the Iranians put school children around power plants? 0.98

00:33:43.000 It would make no sense because the United States would be, hey, cool, look, school children, let's kill them. 1.00

00:33:47.000 That would be the logic. 0.99

00:33:48.000 But of course, that's not the logic.

00:33:50.000 They're all lying.

00:33:51.000 The United States is an incredibly humane power.

00:33:54.000 The most humane great power in the history of all humane powers.

00:33:58.000 We are not, in fact, the world's greatest terror apparatus, as Dave Smith has suggested.

00:34:04.000 That is not correct.

00:34:06.000 And the way you know that is by the way that our enemies are treating us.

00:34:10.000 According to Ali Reza Rahimi, identified by Iranian state TV as the secretary of the Supreme Council of Youth and Adolescents, he said, I invite all young people, athletes, artists, students, and university students and their professors to gather at 2 p.m. Tuesday around the power plants that are our national assets and capital.

00:34:25.000 Regardless of any taste or political viewpoint, they belong to the future of Iran and to the Iranian youth.

00:34:31.000 So, what an invitation.

00:34:34.000 Would you go?

00:34:35.000 Sounds like an invitation. 0.82

00:34:36.000 Okay, so if we're going to talk, by the way, about actual war crimes, we should note that that is a war crime. 0.65

00:34:43.000 Using human shields is the war crime. 0.59

00:34:46.000 That's the war crime because we are trying to deter people from doing this thing.

00:34:51.000 In a second, we'll get to those people who are trying to undermine the president and try to undermine the war by claiming he's a war criminal, claiming that.

00:34:58.000 He's insulting Islam.

00:35:00.000 Yeah, it's getting weird out there.

00:35:01.000 First, let's be real.

00:35:02.000 There's a lot in your life you actually have to keep track of.

00:35:04.000 You got tons of passwords, and they're all in different places, and you have to try every password 20 times in order to get to what you want.

00:35:09.000 You got your kids' school and sports schedules that are a disaster zone.

00:35:13.000 Your business, to do listed, it just never ends.

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00:36:24.000 Meanwhile, our fifth columnist at home who would like for America to erode, who would like for America to lose, many of them are just lying.

00:36:31.000 So the New York Times is putting out a piece today titled, quote, Trump revels in threats to commit war crimes in Iran.

00:36:38.000 What is the threat to commit a war crime?

00:36:40.000 That he said he was going to blow up the bridges and the power plants.

00:36:43.000 Well, just going to point out that threat is not a war crime.

00:36:48.000 And it's not even a war crime to blow up bridges and power plants.

00:36:52.000 It depends on the purpose.

00:36:54.000 It literally depends on the purpose.

00:36:56.000 You have Ro Khanna doing the same routine, the California congressman.

00:37:01.000 He says, oh, he's threatening war crimes, and war crimes won't end the war.

00:37:04.000 Tell us more about ending wars, Ro Khanna. 0.93

00:37:08.000 Let me tell you what won't reopen the Strait of Formula One threatening war crimes of bombing indiscriminately power plants, cursing at Iran.

00:37:17.000 What we need is statesmanship like President Obama had.

00:37:21.000 What we need to do is to stop the bombing, have a ceasefire, and then to work with Oman, to work with China, to work with the Gulf allies and European allies to have a solution to allow Hormuz to be open.

00:37:33.000 But it's not going to happen by massive escalation.

00:37:36.000 Is there any scenario where you would support new funding if it was determined necessary for the readiness of the military?

00:37:42.000 No, I'm not supporting new funding.

00:37:44.000 I mean, they're asking for $400 billion.

00:37:49.000 So, I mean, let's just be clear at the very end there.

00:37:51.000 He's asked about funding the military, like ongoing operations and also restocking the stuff that we're using.

00:37:57.000 And he says, no.

00:37:58.000 Yes, that's right.

00:37:59.000 There's a group of people in the United States, and it is quite large, who would rather starve the military for future conflicts, even if you don't like this conflict, than fund the military.

00:38:08.000 So, I'm just going to point out at this point, it is not automatically a war crime to bomb bridges and energy infrastructure.

00:38:13.000 Of course it isn't.

00:38:14.000 It's happened in pretty much every war under international law, which again, I don't care about international law, but some, because international law is a construct, Of a group of nations who don't abide by it.

00:38:24.000 I don't care what the Chinese and Russians have to say about international law, but some international law has been adopted domestically via the War Crimes Act of 1996.

00:38:34.000 So, under international law as adopted domestically, which is the part I care about, a grave breach of the Geneva Conventions of 1949 would be considered a war crime.

00:38:43.000 So, what would that include?

00:38:44.000 It would include extensive destruction and appropriation of property not justified by military necessity and carried out unlawfully and wantonly.

00:38:52.000 Now, notice that clause.

00:38:54.000 Okay, it's not just.

00:38:55.000 Extensive destruction and appropriation of property.

00:38:57.000 That alone is not the problem.

00:38:58.000 It has to be not justified by military necessity and it must be carried out both unlawfully and wantonly.

00:39:05.000 That standard would require reckless disregard for the asset's status as a civilian object and it would require no legitimate military purpose.

00:39:15.000 And then we have something called the Department of Defense Law of War Manual that goes into more detail.

00:39:19.000 Commanders are supposed to weigh the concrete and direct military advantage against the incidental harm to civilians.

00:39:25.000 Energy grids and bridges.

00:39:27.000 Are considered dual use in most circumstances, proportionality must be weighed.

00:39:32.000 So, in other words, it is not automatically a war crime to say that we're going to blow up the bridges and blow up energy plants.

00:39:38.000 That is not a war crime.

00:39:40.000 Every individual strike has to be justified in this way.

00:39:43.000 Well, how about human shields?

00:39:45.000 One of my favorite idiocies is people who are out there claiming, and it's insane to me that people fall for this trick, that if a terrorist immediately grabs a human shield, now the terrorist just automatically wins.

00:39:56.000 You do that, and what do you think you're doing? 0.92

00:39:58.000 You are literally incentivizing hostage taking and the use of human shields. 0.94

00:40:01.000 Yashmaks, you. 0.92

00:40:03.000 So, what is the status of human shields? 0.80

00:40:06.000 Under international and domestic law, using human shields is the war crime. 0.65

00:40:13.000 That's the war crime.

00:40:15.000 Not the going after the terrorist who's using the human shield, the human shield's use is a war crime.

00:40:21.000 And if you volunteer into being a human shield, then there's a pretty solid debate in the legal community about your status now. 0.65

00:40:30.000 If you just walk onto a battlefield and stand in front of a Nazi brigade voluntarily, you don't get to claim it's safe. 0.60

00:40:39.000 We're not playing tag here. 0.88

00:40:40.000 You don't get to walk into the middle of a war zone, waving your arms and shouting that you're a civilian, and then everybody stops firing.

00:40:47.000 That is not the way that it works.

00:40:50.000 In short, the party that uses human shields is responsible for the harm to civilians.

00:40:55.000 The attacker still has to exercise the principle of proportionality, right?

00:40:59.000 That is the rule.

00:41:00.000 That is the rule.

00:41:01.000 But again, there is a group of people out there who are very invested, very invested in the idea that America is doing something horrible, that America is, in fact, a terrible place. 0.66

00:41:11.000 People who are, at this point, pretty much openly hoping that America loses in Iran.

00:41:19.000 So, yesterday, Tucker Carlson released what can only be described as an episode in which he appears to be suffering from some sort of mental break.

00:41:28.000 It's very hard to explain this otherwise.

00:41:30.000 So, Tucker had many things to say in this episode, including, by the way, suggesting that Christianity mandates socialism, which, strange.

00:41:39.000 I'll leave it to my Christian friends to debunk that one.

00:41:42.000 But I'm going to say, don't think so. 0.99

00:41:46.000 Don't think so.

00:41:48.000 And then Tucker starts.

00:41:50.000 Yelling about how President Trump should not mock Muslims, which, okay, here he was yesterday.

00:42:01.000 Who do you think you are?

00:42:03.000 You're tweeting out the F word on Easter morning? 1.00

00:42:09.000 You'll be living in hell. 0.98

00:42:11.000 Just watch. 0.99

00:42:12.000 Praise be to Allah. 0.98

00:42:16.000 So obviously, you're mocking the religion of Iran. 0.89

00:42:22.000 Okay. 1.00

00:42:23.000 If you seek a religious war, that's a good idea. 0.98

00:42:28.000 But by the way, no decent person mocks other people's religions. 0.99

00:42:33.000 You may have a problem with the theology.

00:42:35.000 Presumably, you do if it's not your religion, and you can explain what that is.

00:42:39.000 But to mock other people's faith is to mock the idea of faith itself.

00:42:44.000 And we should never mock that.

00:42:49.000 The hypocrisy might cause an aneurysm here.

00:42:52.000 This is the same person who. 0.94

00:42:54.000 Was mocking, quote unquote, the hummus eaters not all that long ago. 0.80

00:42:58.000 This is the same person who has said that Christian Zionists are the people he hates most on planet Earth, who spent pretty much every episode of his show attacking, quote unquote, dispensationalists and mainline evangelical Protestants.

00:43:09.000 Don't mock religion as long as that religion is Islam, says Tucker Carlson.

00:43:13.000 And then, of course, he says that Trump is going to commit war crimes.

00:43:17.000 Again, there are plenty of questions you can ask.

00:43:19.000 I don't know how many times I have to say it.

00:43:21.000 There are lots of questions you can ask about any American action, abroad or at home.

00:43:25.000 That is not what's happening here. 0.71

00:43:26.000 What is happening here is a demoralization effort by a person who wishes for America to minimize its presence on planet Earth, who agrees full scale with Alexander Dugan in the multipolarity model whereby we surrender power to Russia and China.

00:43:39.000 That's not speculation.

00:43:40.000 He says it himself. 0.81

00:43:42.000 And if you take that seriously as America first, if America first means you can't joke about radical Islam, you should leave in power radical Islamic tyrants trying to gain nuclear weapons, we need to cede power to China and Russia. 0.78

00:43:57.000 Russia, by the way, is amazing and has terrific subway stations and grocery stores. 0.82

00:44:02.000 And it's so much cleaner than any other American city.

00:44:06.000 We should maybe model ourselves on them. 0.99

00:44:08.000 Sharia law might be great in terms of cleaning up Americans. 0.99

00:44:11.000 And then you say at the end of that, that's what America first means. 0.97

00:44:15.000 I have some questions.

00:44:17.000 Here is Tucker Carlson saying that President Trump is a war criminal.

00:44:22.000 Franklin Graham, son of Billy Graham, shows up at the White House yesterday to pray over the president so he will have wisdom and restraint.

00:44:30.000 No.

00:44:32.000 To endorse the murder of civilians, which is a war crime, but more important, it's a moral crime. 0.57

00:44:43.000 You can't kill people who have committed no crime, who did nothing wrong. 0.74

00:44:47.000 You can't murder the innocent.

00:44:48.000 You can't kill kids and women.

00:44:52.000 And yet, Franklin Graham is up there standing at the podium praying for that.

00:45:01.000 What a slander. 0.95

00:45:02.000 The idea that Franklin Graham is praying that President Trump kills civilians is a lie. 0.91

00:45:06.000 It's a full scale lie.

00:45:07.000 By the way, the only person I know here who has endorsed killing civilians full scale is Tucker Carlson, who says that Vladimir Putin just has to do that sometimes.

00:45:17.000 It's totally incredible.

00:45:19.000 And then, of course, he sort of weirdly implied that Trump was subject to spiritual energies or something.

00:45:27.000 Here was Tucker.

00:45:29.000 Is it possible that what you're watching is a very stealthy, Yet incredibly effective attack on what, from a Christian perspective, is the true faith, belief in Jesus.

00:45:43.000 Is that what really is under attack here?

00:45:45.000 Is that what, maybe that's what's been under attack for a long time.

00:45:49.000 Maybe our whole lifetime.

00:45:51.000 Maybe almost everything we see is an attack on that faith.

00:45:58.000 The one faith that is always attacked.

00:46:01.000 Always and everywhere.

00:46:02.000 For 2,000 years, it's one, many faiths have been attacked. 0.61

00:46:04.000 Many religious people of different religions have been killed over the past 2,000 years. 0.71

00:46:09.000 But there's been only one sustained effort to exterminate a faith, and that's the Christian faith. 0.99

00:46:18.000 Could that be part of it? 0.79

00:46:20.000 And is it possible that the president sees this not just in geostrategic terms, in military terms, in economic terms, got open the straight?

00:46:28.000 Okay.

00:46:29.000 Is it possible the president sees this in bigger terms?

00:46:34.000 Sees this as the fulfillment of something or the elevation to some higher office beyond President of the United States?

00:46:42.000 That's entirely possible.

00:46:45.000 I'll leave it to my Christian friends to determine whether he is actually calling the president the Antichrist, which, I mean, kind of seems like what he is doing there.

00:46:52.000 First of all, we'll put aside the historical oddity of suggesting that no one has ever attempted to exterminate Judaism.

00:46:58.000 But the notion that the president of the United States is fighting Christianity by fighting radical Muslims in Iran, that's a hell of a take.

00:47:08.000 That's a hell of a take. 0.51

00:47:10.000 That the president is part of a global spiritual war, apparently, on Christianity by attacking, again, The Iranian mullahs who vowed to exterminate Christianity from planet Earth.

00:47:24.000 That's a move.

00:47:26.000 That's a move. 0.55

00:47:29.000 I mean, again, Tucker is so gone that in his morning newsletter, apparently this morning, he suggested that Israel doesn't care about human life when it says that people should not use the trains today because they're going to bomb a lot of the railroad tracks.

00:47:45.000 He says that that actually doesn't show their humanity because they could just not bomb the railroad tracks, which is like, I'm sorry.

00:47:51.000 It's an absurdity.

00:47:52.000 It's an absurdity.

00:47:53.000 And then, quote, would American leaders have the bravery to do the same?

00:47:57.000 What's he talking about?

00:47:58.000 Forming human chains around power infrastructure.

00:48:01.000 Or would they run for the hills to their private jets and remote getaways the moment their lives came under threat?

00:48:06.000 I have a question.

00:48:07.000 General Raisin Kane is standing next to the president during all of these pressures.

00:48:12.000 Is he also some sort of chicken hawk?

00:48:13.000 How does this work exactly?

00:48:16.000 Again, the goal of so many of these people to undermine full scale what America is, to turn America into a sort of rump organ, to turn America into a sort of vestige of itself. 0.99

00:48:28.000 It's pathetic. 1.00

00:48:29.000 It really is pathetic. 0.99

00:48:31.000 Tim Dillon, a An erstwhile comedian who has a podcast, I guess, where he makes fun of Erica Kirk disproportionately. 0.97

00:48:40.000 He was getting a lot of plaudits yesterday for cursing a lot and saying he doesn't care about Iran, which I mean, good for you, my dude.

00:48:46.000 Here he was yesterday.

00:48:48.000 I don't give a f about Iran either. 1.00

00:48:50.000 Sorry. 0.51

00:48:51.000 Throw him out if you don't like him.

00:48:53.000 It has nothing to do with me. 1.00

00:48:54.000 And the fact that the idea that I have to give a flying f, you should be standing with Iran. 0.99

00:49:00.000 Shut the f up. 1.00

00:49:02.000 Will you shut the f up? 1.00

00:49:04.000 Up. 1.00

00:49:05.000 If they want to throw the bums who run Iran out, throw them out. 1.00

00:49:11.000 But the idea that the United States of America, when people can't afford houses and they can't afford health care, spends all its time talking about the Middle East and Arabs and Jews and religion and the temple and slaughtering the heifer and Iran and Sunnis and Shiites. 1.00

00:49:31.000 Get what the is going on?

00:49:36.000 This was endorsed by Megyn Kelly as a very important rant.

00:49:39.000 Highly intelligent, because he said the F word a lot.

00:49:42.000 I'm just going to point out here that this bizarre notion that fighting off our enemies in Iran, ending a 50 year threat to the United States, destroying their forward capacity, destroying their nuclear weapons facilities, destroying all that, the notion that this is somehow deprived people of their snap checks is very, very, it's just a lie.

00:50:03.000 It's not true.

00:50:04.000 And it's always cover for the actual argument, which is you just want America not to be involved in the world.

00:50:09.000 And, you know, I also wish America didn't have to be involved in the world.

00:50:12.000 I do.

00:50:12.000 That would be wonderful, as if the world ran really nicely on its own.

00:50:15.000 But it turns out that the United States is the guarantor of global security because we have a bunch of pansy allies who won't help us, like the Europeans. 0.98

00:50:23.000 And if that's the case, then that's the case. 0.99

00:50:27.000 Again, when you look at the world situation right now, it's easy in the middle of a conflict to look at the fact that markets are down.

00:50:35.000 Yes, that's a problem.

00:50:37.000 Or that gas prices are up.

00:50:38.000 Yes, that's a problem.

00:50:39.000 You know what's more of a problem?

00:50:40.000 In America, that is so pathetically weak that it can be threatened for 50 years by a third rate power developing nuclear weapons and spreading terrorism all over the region and threatening the main waterways and be backed off because a bunch of podcasters say that they believe that the president is some sort of war criminal or because they want to spend more money, even more money.

00:51:01.000 We're spending $7 trillion a year. 0.89

00:51:03.000 We need to spend even more money on some sort of welfare program. 0.86

00:51:09.000 It's foolishness.

00:51:11.000 America remains the greatest and most powerful. Country in the history of the world. 0.83

00:51:17.000 That is because of the kinds of moves that President Trump is making to preserve that future, to preserve American power in the world. 0.75

00:51:24.000 Again, it is the same nation that is putting people around the far side of the moon, that is taking out the main foundations of the Iranian regime. 0.61

00:51:32.000 That is the same thing. 0.86

00:51:33.000 That is the same coin.

00:51:35.000 They are two sides of the same coin.

00:51:37.000 You don't get one without the other.

00:51:39.000 That is the reality.

00:51:41.000 And it should be the reality.

00:51:42.000 And it's a reality that is worth admiring.

00:51:46.000 Because an America that is powerful in the world makes for a better world.

00:51:50.000 And meanwhile, a lot of dyspepsia over the election cycle.

00:51:55.000 People suggesting that Republicans are going to get blown out because of the war in Iran.

00:51:57.000 Let me first of all point out the date today.

00:51:59.000 It is April 7th.

00:52:00.000 You know when the election happens?

00:52:02.000 November.

00:52:03.000 Let me ask you, what were you thinking about eight months ago, seven months ago politically?

00:52:09.000 Do you even remember how many news cycles ago that was? 0.85

00:52:13.000 So the notion that Iran is going to somehow decide the election is silly.

00:52:17.000 But beyond that, congressional Democrats got a problem. 0.99

00:52:20.000 That problem is that they're crazy and no one likes them. 0.96

00:52:23.000 So, Harry Enton at CNN points this out.

00:52:27.000 Given the political wins and whatnot, is six points really a big enough lead for Democrats?

00:52:31.000 Well, I would say this, Mr. Berman, and that is that this lead is historically low for Democrats at this point with a Republican president.

00:52:38.000 Because take a look here, and I'm taking a look at the average of all the polls Dem generic congressional ballot lead at this point in the cycle with a Republican president.

00:52:46.000 On average, their lead's actually slightly less.

00:52:48.000 It's five points.

00:52:49.000 That's less than it was back in 2018 when it was eight points.

00:52:53.000 And way less than it was during the 2006 cycle when it was 11 points.

00:52:57.000 So, yeah, Democrats are ahead, but they're only ahead by five with a president whose net approval rating is bordering on minus 20 to minus 30, depending on what polls you look at.

00:53:07.000 You'd make the argument Democrats should be way ahead, and they're just only sort of slightly ahead.

00:53:15.000 So, again, the Democrats are underperforming right now because we are in an off year cycle and the polls actually have not moved all that much.

00:53:22.000 When you look, for example, at the generic congressional ballot for 2026, what you see is that, honestly, like the Republicans were running a little behind and they're still running a little bit behind.

00:53:32.000 That's where we are in terms of the generic congressional ballot.

00:53:36.000 Right now, Democrats are running about five points ahead of Republicans.

00:53:40.000 That's grown some since the end of April, I mean, since the end of March, rather, but not massively so.

00:53:49.000 They've had about a five point steady lead on the Republicans since essentially the beginning of February.

00:53:55.000 So nothing really has changed very much here.

00:53:58.000 And I wouldn't expect it to change very much in either direction, actually, at this point.

00:54:03.000 Why?

00:54:03.000 Well, the Democrats are truly radical.

00:54:06.000 It'll be fascinating to see what happens in 28.

00:54:08.000 Our sponsor is CalShee.

00:54:09.000 If you check out the CalShee markets on the 28 nominations, Gavin Newsom continues to retain the lead.

00:54:16.000 29% of people saying Gavin Newsom's the likely nominee, followed by AOC.

00:54:20.000 At 10%, followed by John Assoff at 6.6%.

00:54:22.000 I don't know where that's coming from.

00:54:23.000 It ain't going to be John Assoff.

00:54:26.000 But the Democrats, the fact that Gavin Newsom is considered the most moderate Democrat says a hell of a lot about the party.

00:54:32.000 The Democratic Party has been skewing toward extremism in every possible way.

00:54:36.000 They've decided that their response to the podcast, bros, is going to be Jennifer Welch, which I guess some people like listening to her.

00:54:43.000 I don't know how.

00:54:44.000 I don't know what sort of disorder you must have to enjoy this sort of thing, but apparently some people do.

00:54:49.000 Here she was praising Hassan Piker.

00:54:51.000 You know, the guy who supports pretty much every terrorist group as well as the government of China.

00:54:56.000 And why Hassan is so important, the reason I even know who Hassan is, is because my sons listen to him.

00:55:02.000 And he has a massive network of engaging young men away from this horrific Andrew Tate, Joe Rogan.

00:55:12.000 I want to go triple Trump, quadruple Trump. 1.00

00:55:15.000 I want women to be submissive. 0.99

00:55:17.000 Hassan is the antidote to that. 0.99

00:55:22.000 So, okay, if that's the direction you guys choose to go, that you want to go with the guy who likes all the terrorist groups, all right. 0.63

00:55:30.000 Speaking of which, the Democratic Party continues to move in the direction of Zoran Momdani.

00:55:34.000 So, yesterday, Zoran Momdani in New York City released their preliminary racial equity plan. 0.59

00:55:40.000 Ooh, exciting stuff.

00:55:41.000 A racial equity plan.

00:55:43.000 On a scale of one to 10, how racist is it going to be?

00:55:45.000 Like a 17 or so.

00:55:47.000 Here is Zoran Momdani talking about, again, he's now just doing old jokes.

00:55:51.000 So, when I was growing up, The joke about the New York Times was that there would be a New York Times headline that said, End of the world tomorrow, black people and women hardest hit.

00:56:00.000 And that is where Zoran Manzani is now.

00:56:03.000 He says, Yes, we have affordability, but it's really about minority affordability.

00:56:07.000 Here is Zoran Manzani. 0.51

00:56:10.000 Man, I have to point out at this point that one of the funniest things here is that the New York City racial equity plan says, New York's history has been one of colonization, exploitation, and racial oppression.

00:56:23.000 That's the story of New York City.

00:56:25.000 The story of racial injustice in New York City. 0.89

00:56:28.000 So I'm just wondering can we consider Zorhan Mamdani a vestige of colonization? 0.55

00:56:33.000 It'd be like actual double colonization, kind of. 0.52

00:56:35.000 Almost triple colonization, actually.

00:56:37.000 Because you have colonization of Manhattan, and then you have Western colonization of parts of the Middle East and Africa where he grew up.

00:56:47.000 And then you have him coming from those parts to these parts to colonize America. 0.57

00:56:51.000 So he's like a triple colonization. 0.79

00:56:55.000 He's the full colonoscopy. 0.99

00:56:57.000 In any case, here is Zar Mamdani.

00:57:00.000 And while today's true cost of living measure confirms that the affordability crisis touches every corner of our city, we know that these effects are not applied evenly.

00:57:11.000 So often, it is black and brown New Yorkers who are hit the hardest.

00:57:15.000 This preliminary racial equity plan is the first step in developing a whole of government approach to tackling that reality.

00:57:25.000 So, um, what does that whole of government approach look like?

00:57:29.000 According to the New York City preliminary racial equity plan, quote, the first ever New York City preliminary racial equity plan is dedicated to New York's resilient communities whose voices have often gone unheard and unanswered.

00:57:40.000 We honor the individuals and organizations past and present who have tirelessly advocated for justice and equity.

00:57:46.000 And Mandani put out a statement as well.

00:57:48.000 Said New York is one of the wealthiest cities in the world, but too many people cannot afford rent, child care, food, transportation, or even time to breathe.

00:57:56.000 I love when people use phrases like that.

00:57:58.000 Time to breathe.

00:57:59.000 I feel like we can all afford time to breathe.

00:58:01.000 My evidence of this being that you're alive right now.

00:58:06.000 Time to breathe.

00:58:07.000 Like, I feel like we can breathe.

00:58:10.000 I don't know.

00:58:11.000 Call me crazy.

00:58:12.000 He says these pressures do not fall evenly.

00:58:13.000 They reflect decades of disinvestment, exclusion, and policy choices that left some neighborhoods, especially black, brown, and immigrant communities, with far less than others.

00:58:21.000 That's why in 2022, New Yorkers overwhelmingly voted to make racial equity planning a core part of how city government works.

00:58:28.000 And so he is doing the full DEI.

00:58:32.000 The statement from the city says that there is no economic justice without racial equity.

00:58:36.000 So we're just doing Ibram X. Kendi now.

00:58:38.000 They say that racial equity needs to be institutionalized into every facet of life and embedding equity into the very structure of city government itself.

00:58:48.000 The equity plan talks about Wall Street as a hub for trade, including the buying and selling of enslaved people.

00:58:54.000 Yes, clearly Wall Street was mostly powered by slavery.

00:58:57.000 Not true.

00:58:59.000 And they say there should be a budget reallocation and targeted investment.

00:59:03.000 To historically underserved neighborhoods, building on the 400 year trajectory of oppression, and directs agencies to build disaggregated data pipelines by race, age, and gender so they can measure all city functions in terms of racial disparity.

00:59:18.000 And then he also redefines poverty in this actual document.

00:59:22.000 They redefine poverty to include 62% of all people living in New York.

00:59:25.000 That's 5 million people.

00:59:28.000 He acknowledges that people are employed, housed, and meeting immediate needs, but classifies them as not meeting the cost of living with dignity.

00:59:35.000 Because they rely on public benefits, family help, or debt.

00:59:38.000 So the answer to that would be for them to be more reliant on public benefits and debt, I assume.

00:59:44.000 The new median annual true cost of living threshold for a family with children is $160,000.

00:59:50.000 In order for you not to be considered in poverty, a single adult needs $70,000 a year.

00:59:58.000 So, um, this is crazy.

01:00:00.000 And if they try to implement anything here, it's going to fail.

01:00:04.000 Not only that, it's likely illegal.

01:00:06.000 The Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights, Harmie Dillon, she put out a statement on Twitter, quote, sounds fishy, illegal.

01:00:13.000 Will review.

01:00:14.000 Uh, yes.

01:00:15.000 Yes, it does.

01:00:16.000 Yes, it does.

01:00:17.000 But this is where we are with the Democratic Party.

01:00:19.000 Their, their future is race conscious, race conscious socialism, essentially.

01:00:27.000 So sounds wonderful. 0.75

01:00:29.000 Are you joining us?

01:00:30.000 On the line to discuss the latest in news.

01:00:32.000 And he is the co host of Morning Wire and also the host of Daily Wire's newest show, Wired in Live, which airs every Monday through Thursday, 4 p.m. Eastern, to give you all the updates on what's going on in the news.

01:00:42.000 It's our friend, Cabot Phillips.

01:00:43.000 Cabot, how's it going?

01:00:45.000 It's going great, Ben.

01:00:46.000 The show was initially just one day a week, but the haters can't stop us.

01:00:50.000 We are now four days a week.

01:00:52.000 There actually are no haters.

01:00:53.000 Everyone's been shockingly supportive on this journey so far.

01:00:55.000 But regardless, we're now, yeah, like you said, four days a week.

01:00:59.000 Very excited to be going live.

01:01:02.000 That must be so nice for you.

01:01:02.000 No haters.

01:01:04.000 I'd love to experience that someday.

01:01:05.000 In any case, Kevin, tell us what can viewers expect to see from Wired and Live every afternoon?

01:01:13.000 Yeah, we've had the Morning Wire news show for about four years now.

01:01:18.000 That just goes in the morning, that's 15 minutes.

01:01:20.000 And our audience kept saying, hey, we need something later in the day.

01:01:22.000 We want something live.

01:01:23.000 So it's fully up to date on everything going on.

01:01:26.000 I want to be able to put something on while I'm driving home.

01:01:29.000 And so we started doing these live broadcasts during the election and during the inauguration.

01:01:34.000 And now we're doing them.

01:01:36.000 Four days a week.

01:01:37.000 Essentially, you know, it's a traditional live news broadcast.

01:01:40.000 It's just a lot more fun, a lot more daily wire for that matter.

01:01:44.000 So, you know, we've got any big story that's going on.

01:01:47.000 We're talking to experts.

01:01:48.000 So, we're talking to Iran.

01:01:49.000 We've got senators, lawmakers coming on.

01:01:52.000 We've got foreign policy experts.

01:01:53.000 Yesterday, we had former cabinet members on the show, lieutenant general and general the week before.

01:01:58.000 And then we're getting into, you know, some lighthearted, fun, crazy stories.

01:02:03.000 We've got culture reporters coming on.

01:02:05.000 On Thursday, we debated whether or not pit bulls should be banned.

01:02:08.000 We've got Talking about Disney adults and if adults should stop going to Disney if it's weird for them to do so.

01:02:14.000 And so a little bit of everything, but the exciting part is that it's live.

01:02:18.000 And you know, now that you're doing the show live, you know just the extra element and energy that brings to the broadcast.

01:02:26.000 It does add some craziness to the day.

01:02:26.000 Absolutely.

01:02:29.000 By the way, folks, you should subscribe at Daily Wire specifically so you can see Wired and Live.

01:02:33.000 It's part of Daily Wire's gigantic expansion in terms of our news coverage, including our huge expansion of our editorial team.

01:02:41.000 We've never had better content on our website.

01:02:43.000 We've never had better content on our app.

01:02:44.000 Wired and Live is part of that.

01:02:46.000 Okay, so where can people see it?

01:02:48.000 When can people see it?

01:02:49.000 And what do you expect to cover today?

01:02:53.000 Yep, 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. Eastern Time on dailywire.com.

01:02:57.000 That is where folks can find it.

01:02:59.000 DW Plus app is the best place because I'm monitoring the comments section the entire show.

01:03:03.000 And at the end, we take questions live from the audience.

01:03:06.000 And so you've got to become a member to add those questions.

01:03:11.000 Today on the show, we're talking war in Iran.

01:03:13.000 And one of my favorite parts of this show is that we get to showcase just how many Daily Wire reporters we have all around the country.

01:03:19.000 So, yesterday I had Mary Margaret Olihan standing on the White House lawn coming in for the show.

01:03:24.000 We had Tim Rice, our DC bureau chief.

01:03:26.000 We had Cassie Akiva up in Boston.

01:03:28.000 We had our immigration reporter talking to us about what's going on in Texas.

01:03:31.000 So, we have this entire national editorial team at Daily Wire.

01:03:35.000 And I love this show because we get to show off just how broad our reach is and how much we've grown just in the last few months from an editorial standpoint.

01:03:44.000 Well, that is Cabot Phillips.

01:03:45.000 Go check out Wired and Live again every Monday through Thursday, 4 p.m. Eastern.

01:03:48.000 Cabot, thanks so much for the time and congrats on the show.

01:03:52.000 Thanks, Ben.

01:03:55.000 Alrighty, folks, we are going to transition to the members only portion of the program.

01:03:59.000 We have some culture to cover, and of course, we will be taking your questions as the show continues.

01:04:04.000 Become a member and use code Shapiro at checkout for two months free on all annual plans.

01:04:08.000 Click that link in the description and join us.

The Ben Shapiro Show - April 07, 2026

NOTE TO AMERICA-HATERS: Sorry, We’re Busy Kicking A**

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