The Great America Show - WHY UKRAINE WAR NOW？ LEE SMITH ON HOW IT HAPPENED

00:00:00.000 Hello everybody, I'm Lou Dobbs. China is now protesting the West's sanctions against Russia.

00:00:07.780 Xi Jinping clearly aligned with his strategic partner, Vladimir Putin. President Biden on his

00:00:14.620 way this week to attend the NATO summit in Brussels, more military aid to Ukraine, more

00:00:20.660 sanctions against Russia on the agenda. And the United Nations now says 10 million Ukrainians

00:00:27.340 have fled their country, a fourth of Ukraine's population. President Biden facing the strongest

00:00:33.680 attacks yet from Republicans who are demanding investigations of the long suppressed laptop

00:00:39.680 and its contents. Its owner, of course, the president's son, Hunter. This is the Great

00:00:46.740 America Show and welcome. Thanks for being with us. Russian forces are consolidating their advances

00:00:53.580 throughout Ukraine. They now have surrounded Maripol and are demanding surrender of the

00:01:00.180 city. While the onslaught and bombardment enter a fourth week, the two sides continue their

00:01:06.400 talks. They're far from achieving anything substantive. Zelensky wants to meet Putin face

00:01:12.340 to face. Putin says he's willing to join the talks personally at some point. He didn't say

00:01:18.260 what his conditions are or what must be done for those face to face talks to actually occur.

00:01:23.760 As President Biden prepares to head for the NATO summit, he finds himself the target of increasingly

00:01:29.940 incensed Republicans, many of whom are calling for full investigations of the Biden family now

00:01:36.760 because of the evidence on Hunter's laptop, because of the intelligence community's complicity

00:01:43.600 in what was without a doubt, a cover up led by corporate news outlets, Facebook, Twitter and

00:01:51.520 big tech. And of course, the FBI that sat on it for two years, a lot to investigate. Our guest today

00:01:59.580 is bestselling author investigative journalist, senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, Lee Smith,

00:02:05.740 author of the plot to overthrow the president and the permanent coup. Lee, thanks for being with us

00:02:12.180 here on the Great America Show. Lou, thank you again for inviting me on. It's always an enormous

00:02:17.760 pleasure and always great fun to be on with you. So thanks so much again. It's absolutely reciprocal.

00:02:24.300 Thank you. Zelensky, before Congress, speaking alternately Churchillian, and then as some sort of

00:02:36.560 neoliberal early post-World War II, trying to create new institutions globally for the preservation of

00:02:45.280 peace, it was an astounding performance. Your thoughts?

00:02:49.480 Yeah. I mean, looking at what's happening on the ground, I mean, it's sort of like Zelensky is speaking,

00:02:58.380 I wouldn't say against history, but contrary to history, right? And I'm thinking specifically about

00:03:05.140 NATO here. If NATO is intended or was intended through the Cold War to prevent war in Europe,

00:03:16.000 and what we have now is war in Europe, there's something wrong. And it's not just the problem

00:03:23.320 with NATO that it's not just that NATO is a patent failure. It's also that the purpose of NATO and

00:03:33.180 American strategic interest and the very serious interest we have in stability in Europe, including

00:03:41.780 Eastern Europe, needs to be rethought. So the idea that Zelensky is basically speaking to Cold War era

00:03:49.520 America and Cold War era Europe doesn't really make sense, especially when we understand the nature of

00:03:59.460 the nature of the regime now sitting atop the American government.

00:04:06.020 Atop the American government, and it is a regime that defies expectations, it defies description currently,

00:04:16.700 and frankly, I think most of us have very little idea as to where this all ends up.

00:04:22.700 With this hard left, even Marxist administration driving an agenda that is simply designed to crush

00:04:33.760 institutions, to crush traditions, and invert American history, from exceptionalism to dependency,

00:04:43.540 from great achievements to passivity. Your thoughts about the forces that we are contending with

00:04:50.480 as we have the leader of Ukraine, whose country has valiantly held off the Russian army. But at the same

00:05:00.220 time, we're engaged in a great confrontation in this country as well, aren't we?

00:05:06.900 Yes, absolutely. And I think that the real tragedy, I think, unfolding here is I don't think that

00:05:17.040 Zelensky or many of the other forces understand what's going on. I mean, I'm sure you and I will go

00:05:26.080 into some detail here and lay it out. But I'll just say right now on the surface, one of the things that

00:05:31.100 most people appear to be missing is that while Joe Biden and his validators and the press are painting

00:05:39.680 a portrait of a great American president who is calling on NATO to summon all of their powers,

00:05:46.200 and of course, nothing is happening. And I'm not saying that things should be happening. I don't

00:05:50.780 think that the United States should be making war on Russia's border. The reality is, is that while Biden

00:05:58.240 is employing this hortatory rhetoric, and while Zelensky appears to believe this stuff, in fact,

00:06:05.780 the Biden administration intends to flood Vladimir Putin's war chest with more money, as many of your

00:06:17.020 listeners will know, it's the Russians who are negotiating with the Americans in Vienna over

00:06:24.460 the Iran nuclear deal. So what's been going on for several months, and I think this is another way to

00:06:33.500 understand the onset of the Ukrainian war. So you wonder, well, why now, right? What was going on

00:06:40.160 now? Why did Putin decide to launch this invasion now? And I think a lot of it has to do with the fact

00:06:46.680 that Putin understood how important the Iran deal was to the Biden administration. And therefore,

00:06:56.000 as much as the Biden administration would want to respond, would want to start to sanction the

00:07:01.920 Russians, would want to do probably everything short of military force. Putin understood that 0.97

00:07:08.840 the Americans were greatly constrained by their own need. And by the way, the particularly foolish need, 0.97

00:07:13.720 which is about giving the Iranians a nuclear weapons program. And we can go into that in a little 0.91

00:07:19.140 more detail. I just think that, as you said, talking about the nature of this regime, the deceptions,

00:07:26.980 the misdirection. So I mean, you know, they put Volodymyr Zelensky in the middle, and they stage

00:07:32.800 a show in the middle of Washington, D.C. while what's going on in Vienna, not just on the ground

00:07:38.500 in Ukraine, what's going on in Vienna, that's the real show. That tells you who the Biden administration

00:07:45.180 is. That tells you what the regime is like. They want to give a terrorist state the nuclear bomb.

00:07:50.720 And once those sanctions are off the Iranians, they're going to go out and they're going to buy 1.00

00:07:55.840 arms from Putin. They're going to buy nuclear expertise from Putin. They're going to flood his

00:08:01.120 war chest. That's the real show that's going on. Not what Joe Biden says on the nightly news or just fake

00:08:11.560 press conferences. And why give Iran? Why would even the often perversely guided Biden administration

00:08:24.900 want Iran to have a nuclear weapon? You know, I still do a fair amount of foreign policy writing

00:08:32.280 and foreign policy analysis. But I know during the Obama years, when we were looking at the

00:08:40.600 Iran deal, we were looking at why Obama wanted to do it. I mean, you know, it appeared that there was

00:08:47.120 a stupid purpose, but there was a strategic rationale for it, which was to try to establish a balance of 0.99

00:08:54.740 power in the Middle East between Iran and the other powers, including Israel and Saudi Arabia. Again, 1.00

00:09:01.340 I thought it was a very bad idea. I thought it was a foolish idea. But Lou, after the stuff that you 0.98

00:09:08.980 and I have been looking at for the last five years, which includes what's been going on here at home,

00:09:14.620 whether this is, whether it was Russiagate, whether it's the impeachment of Donald Trump,

00:09:20.540 whether it's January 6th, whether it's the COVID as an instrument used against Americans,

00:09:32.880 my assessment right now is much starker and much plainer. Barack Obama wanted to give a nuclear bomb

00:09:41.780 to an anti-American regime. It's that everyone that you and I have looked at over the last 15 years

00:09:50.620 and said, you know, I'm not an Obama fan, but that seems to be taking it too far that he just hates

00:09:55.720 America. Those people were right. People, people like me who are trying to come up with some sort of

00:10:02.660 strategic or political rationale. I think we were wrong. I think the fact is, it's an emotional,

00:10:10.240 psychological response. And look, there are plenty of people who hate America. New York City hosts

00:10:16.320 hundreds of thousands of them. So the fact that a person like that is controlling important aspects

00:10:25.860 of the American government probably shouldn't come as that much of a surprise. But certainly what we've

00:10:32.280 seen the last five years domestically here should give us some sort of indication, as you were saying,

00:10:37.260 I mean, these people just want to burn everything down. American institutions, American prestige.

00:10:43.760 So that's what I think, that's what I think is going on. That's what I think is going on with the Iran 1.00

00:10:48.760 deal. Why Joe, while Joe Biden is pretending to be a noble and galvanizing force at the head of a

00:10:56.620 pro-Western alliance, there's something else going on, which is about undermining and destroying

00:11:03.440 the values of the West, the values that this country is built on.

00:11:08.640 And within the United States, there was a time in the 20s and 30s and 40s, people talked to fifth

00:11:17.520 columns as enemies built up forces within an enemy's society, economy, and body politic.

00:11:28.620 There isn't a like expression for what is going on here. There is fifth column, but most people can't

00:11:36.400 figure out the, I mean, they just, it doesn't seem relevant to our time as a, as a term, but it's,

00:11:44.500 it's more relevant in my opinion today than ever before, because there is a, an aggregation of aligned

00:11:52.320 interests, whether it's wall street, uh, the corporatists, uh, the, the elites of our country, whether in

00:11:59.180 academia, uh, or in government or politics, uh, that have formed up against, uh, our, our nation's heritage,

00:12:08.260 uh, its culture, uh, and it's, it's history. It's, it's a, to me, uh, an unthinkable, uh, evil, uh, aggregation,

00:12:18.460 but it is an aggregation that can be measured that is present. And it is dangerous. This is, uh, I think

00:12:25.240 this is essential. This is a, this is essential. I think for the, um, for our neighbors, our communities,

00:12:34.840 our fellow Americans to understand, um, you know, when you hear different when, you know, when we hear

00:12:41.580 different people, uh, you know, commentators, uh, you know, on the right, but I prefer to things

00:12:47.520 of pro-American commentators, pro-American journalists, pro-American officials. And they

00:12:53.860 point rightly, I believe they say, well, you know, our real, our real problems are here at home with,

00:12:59.980 with this regime, right? Cause this is the regime that is locking up, uh, locking up Americans for

00:13:06.660 January 6th for people exercising the first amendment rights for issuing these insane, um,

00:13:14.160 vaccine mandates. This is our problem. And I agree that is the priority. However, we should not

00:13:21.100 confuse that with a fact that we do have real adversaries abroad. And those at the here, the,

00:13:28.580 here is the key fact, which is, which is what you were saying that the people who are hounding us here

00:13:35.180 are in fact partnered with our adversaries abroad. That's why they want to give Iran the nuclear bomb. 0.86

00:13:43.060 That's why, I mean, right now, I mean, it's just taken for granted. There's nothing we can do

00:13:49.480 about the U S economy being an extricably linked to that of the Chinese communist party. And that's

00:13:58.780 because we hear this messaging because everyone is in bed with the Chinese. It's just, everyone 0.51

00:14:05.080 just takes it as a matter of fact, well, there's nothing we can do. So we're just going to keep

00:14:08.300 going on and doing it like this. If you look, I was just checking last night because, you know,

00:14:13.640 if you try to buy anything in this country, especially if you try to buy it on Amazon,

00:14:18.200 you almost, I mean, you're, it's, it's coming from China. It's made in China. So if you're going 0.92

00:14:22.840 to make a decent effort to find something not made in China, um, it's hard. So I went and I looked

00:14:29.960 to see these different, um, this one particular item, a Fitbit to see, uh, if this was made in

00:14:36.300 China. And in 2019 and the fall of 2019, October, 2019 Fitbit announced that because of Trump's

00:14:45.920 tariffs and because of Trump's trade war, it was going to start moving its operations out of China.

00:14:50.720 It's manufacturing out of China. And then I went through and I saw all the other different companies.

00:14:55.080 I saw that Apple at a certain point was going to try to move a lot of its operations out of China,

00:15:00.440 other places in Asia. Um, but a whole bunch of different companies were terrified, but what

00:15:05.800 Don by what Donald Trump was doing, right? Saying, no, we've got to get out of China. We've got to

00:15:11.760 decouple ourselves from China. And he was actually doing it. And this is what terrified these people.

00:15:17.960 And Lou, I think, I think if we were to lay out a map, put down a timeline, I think this is a large

00:15:26.480 part of the war on Donald Trump. Donald Trump was threatening the interest of the establishment

00:15:34.480 much, much of which are tied to foreign powers. So again, that's, this is why I think, look,

00:15:43.060 we are right to prioritize and say our problem. Our immediate problem here at home is Biden's DOJ.

00:15:49.380 It's Biden's FBI. That's true. Except Biden's DOJ also gave a pass to Chinese espionage. So again,

00:15:58.620 I think we need to understand that the bad guys abroad, it's not just that they have bad intentions

00:16:03.840 and they hate America, but our domestic opponents are tied to the bad guys abroad.

00:16:10.700 And to that point about China, we know the Chinese have more front companies, more spies in this 0.96

00:16:18.280 country than any other nation on earth. They may have more spies in our country than we have spies in

00:16:24.660 our country. It is, it is, it is definitely, it is stupefying to think that the justice department

00:16:33.980 pulled in dissolved, uh, its organization, uh, to, uh, to prosecute, uh, specifically Chinese

00:16:43.660 nationals who were working in this country, but also working for the CCP and the PLA while they're

00:16:50.700 here. And they decided to retire that idea because it was, uh, apparently an affront to the communist

00:16:57.620 Chinese who are spying here and have been doing so for better part of four decades. 0.92

00:17:03.600 The Chinese press, after this happened, the Chinese press took credit for it. They said the foreign

00:17:09.920 ministry and the Chinese, uh, embassy in Washington, large complaints for the Biden administration. And

00:17:16.100 that's why the Biden administration moved. It's obscene, but look, the thing is you're right.

00:17:22.040 There are more Chinese spies here than there are American spies. That's, that's absolutely the issue. 0.96

00:17:27.240 And it was set up like that. And do you know who did it? It was the academic establishment. It was

00:17:32.520 legislators. It was the business establishment. So they get a whole bunch of cheap foreign labor, 0.90

00:17:38.420 right? They get a whole bunch of cheap foreign labor to work, uh, in big tech. Do you know,

00:17:45.300 there are 13,000 FBI agents. And even if they're doing the right thing, even if they're

00:17:51.980 not spying on the Donald Trump campaign, even if they're not targeting parents or, uh, opposition

00:17:59.540 journalists, let's assume let's, let's assume they're all doing the right thing. 13,000 of them

00:18:04.820 compared to the hundreds of thousands of students from the people's Republic of China. I'm not saying

00:18:13.700 they're bad people. I'm sure a lot of these kids come over and they actually want to study,

00:18:17.560 but guess what? They don't have a choice. They only get out of their country. If the government

00:18:22.500 in Beijing says, yes, provided you do this provided to do that, but who set it up? The

00:18:27.380 Chinese didn't force us to have hundreds of thousands of, of, of their students. It was

00:18:32.280 our people who set it up this way. So that's what I mean, what I'm saying, our enemies abroad have

00:18:40.400 partnered with our opponents here in the United States. And that's who's, that's, who's eating at

00:18:46.660 us. And I do believe that's a major reason why they went after Donald Trump. I, I couldn't agree

00:18:53.960 with you more. And it's, it's so obvious to those who will look to see the alignment of, uh, Donald

00:19:00.560 Trump's enemies with the interest of in particular, uh, the CCP and communist China. And it's also

00:19:11.340 interesting to look at the disinformation, the psychological warfare, uh, the propaganda that was

00:19:17.380 constructed, uh, to blunt that relationships between wall street and corporatist elite, uh, business, uh,

00:19:27.080 business round table, uh, chamber, uh, suddenly there was a, a plan in 2016 hatched, as you will know, uh,

00:19:36.900 to, to connect Donald Trump to Vladimir Putin and to portray him as a, uh, as an agent of the, of the,

00:19:47.120 of the Russians, uh, the feared Russians. Well, if point of fact, what we had most to fear were Xi

00:19:55.460 Jinping and communist China, it's, it's, it's, it's just, you watch this and you think, my gosh, 0.88

00:20:04.240 if for having laid this all out, not one of our investigators and the justice department, the CIA,

00:20:11.700 the NSA, DIA, uh, you name it, not one of our foreign intelligence agencies, not one of our domestic

00:20:19.700 law enforcement, national security agencies had the capacity to understand through whether it's

00:20:27.540 counter-terrorism, counter-insurgency. Uh, it is amazing to me that we didn't have, first of all,

00:20:34.740 a whistleblower of any kind, but secondly, that we didn't have any talent that could put all of this

00:20:40.380 together and see it for the conspiracy. It was, I mean, you know, you, you, you'll remember the,

00:20:47.380 um, as, uh, John Radcliffe, as you know, as the Trump administration's coming to a close,

00:20:52.260 uh, the director of national intelligence, John Radcliffe produced a memo. It was an inspector,

00:20:58.540 uh, inspector general's report showing that CIA management, meaning at the time, CIA director,

00:21:05.780 Regina Haspel, had pressured different analysts, uh, a report on election interference, uh, in the

00:21:13.860 2020 election on election interference. Many of these analysts believe that China did play a very,

00:21:19.300 uh, a very sizable role. There was pressure coming from Haspel and CIA management to lessen, uh, or, or

00:21:26.840 to, uh, to meliorate that assessment. And why the rationale given was they, they didn't want those

00:21:34.820 assessments used to promote Trump's policies. In other words, they didn't want, they were against

00:21:41.840 Trump going hard on China. It's astonishing that the American intelligence community, it's not just,

00:21:48.120 it's, it's worse than, than them missing it. Many of them missed it. There were some of them who are

00:21:53.820 actively participant, who are actively backing Chinese interest against the United Mark Milley.

00:22:01.180 This is astonishing, but it tells you how far this country has gone or not the country. God,

00:22:08.200 God, God bless our great neighbors and our great fellow Americans, how far the corruption has gone

00:22:13.920 in the beltway. When Mark Milley and, and, and Bob Woodward's book boasts, uh, uh, boast. Oh yeah.

00:22:22.260 You know, things were looking crazy with Donald Trump. So I called my, uh, I called my, uh, People's

00:22:27.340 Liberation Army counterpart. And I said, Hey, if anything bad happens, I'll give you a heads up.

00:22:33.820 And, and, and he, he was celebrated, right? No one said, wait a minute. We have here one of the top

00:22:40.880 military officials in the country who is openly boasting that he would share classified information

00:22:47.320 regarding troop movements with an enemy, with a potential enemy combatant. This guy has to go

00:22:53.260 at the very least. He must be fired. We, we're probably, we probably have to, we probably have

00:22:58.060 to investigate this now. This is a very serious thing, but it just tells you who these people are,

00:23:03.120 that this was actually celebrated instead of people saying, wait a minute, what's happening?

00:23:08.220 What's happened with the people who are supposed to be governing this country? This is madness.

00:23:13.220 It's not just incompetence anymore. It's madness. And, and the, the left, the radical Democrat,

00:23:21.720 the Marxist driven democratic party up against the Republican party is not a fair fight. The Republican

00:23:30.160 party is not gifted intellectually. They are talented in governance and at worst they're cowards. 0.99

00:23:42.680 And they're lazy and they're lazy. And I'm talking about principally the leadership of the Republican 0.99

00:23:49.580 party, but for, for them to be the countervailing influence in this society of ours, a two-party

00:23:56.420 system, they're barely a quasi party. They're not a semi party, right? They're a quasi party. And

00:24:04.240 this is one of the difficulties they're bought off by actually, if they knew how cheaply they had been

00:24:10.000 bought by comparison to what communist China has invested. I mean, they would be even, even should

00:24:17.580 probably, well, they would be crestfallen, but they, they certainly wouldn't be chagrined at the

00:24:24.900 very least. I mean, you go through, I, I, I, I, um, urge your, your listeners to go through and just

00:24:33.800 look at the amount, uh, for instance, that Pfizer has spent in Washington, how many lobbyists they

00:24:39.920 have. I mean, it, it, it looks like a lot of money and it's a lot of money except compare it to how much

00:24:46.620 Pfizer made, right. To how much Pfizer made through, I mean, the whole thing, right. What people won't say,

00:24:52.560 but as obvious to everyone's like, are you kidding me? So they have the president of the United States, who is

00:24:58.220 basically working for Pfizer, who has controls of the federal government and says, everyone has to,

00:25:03.220 everyone has to get these vaccines or else you can't work. You, uh, you, you can't, uh, you can't do

00:25:08.280 anything. I mean, right. And, and, and the fact that, and, and the fact that the Republican party,

00:25:14.360 which is supposed to be the instrument of the pro America side of American society is totally, uh,

00:25:24.480 bought off as well. And for so little, it's astonishing. And the really dangerous thing

00:25:30.460 about it is this is supposed to be another one of our checks and balances, right? Not just the three

00:25:35.540 branches of government, but Democrats and Republicans. And that's supposed to be an

00:25:39.680 instrument that's supposed to bring about deterrence. And what happens if there is no

00:25:43.780 deterrence that you have, as you say, a radical, insane left doing these things to the American

00:25:50.640 public and no one is protecting them? Well, leadership will arise. Uh, leadership is definitely

00:25:57.340 leadership is definitely coming about. And I certainly hope that that leadership, um, the

00:26:01.660 leadership that is rising will be, um, responsible and will make it, uh, will make its points and

00:26:12.660 will make its arguments through as, as, as peaceful as possible, especially given all of the violence

00:26:19.740 employed against Trump supporters. But I, I think this is a very important thing. If the Republican

00:26:25.620 party cannot establish deterrence, they're pushing us toward a very, very dangerous situation,

00:26:30.160 right? If instead they're going to join with the Democrats to, um, to crush Americans as they often,

00:26:38.400 uh, did during the Trump years, as they often are now, it's a very dangerous situation. We need

00:26:44.800 Republicans. I mean, not just to help defend the country by checking Democrat excesses. It's just

00:26:53.240 madness if they won't, what that will lead to in this country is disaster. And Mitt Romney stepping

00:27:00.440 forward and lining up with the only Republican in the Senate, which is actually something of a small

00:27:07.360 miracle itself, uh, to, to line up with mandates of the Democrats, uh, I guess the Republican party,

00:27:15.400 that's at least beginning to come to its senses on the issue of science, the relationship to public

00:27:21.680 health policy, and the necessity of watching why people are motivated, uh, to, uh, be so energetic

00:27:29.920 in removing public rights, uh, our constitutional rights in the name of public health. Uh, it, this

00:27:37.820 should not happen again, but it's still persisting. It's still, there is a dogged, uh, determination on

00:27:45.560 the part of some local officials, some state officials, some federal officials to focus on COVID still

00:27:53.160 and use it as a, a, a bludgeon, a, a, a hammer, uh, against, uh, citizen rights. And it's, it's ending,

00:28:03.120 but my gosh, people should look around and say, you know what? The so-called dissidents were right

00:28:08.640 the whole time. The conspiracy theories, you know, it was a theory, but the facts and the theory happened

00:28:16.400 to match up. Right. There we are. You talk, you talk about Mitt Romney. I would love to know. I

00:28:24.200 would, I would just love to know who told him that that was a good idea, right? Like who put in a phone

00:28:29.660 call to Senator Mitt Romney's office or, or who grabbed his ear at a certain point, who took him

00:28:34.800 out to dinner and said, you know what? Let's keep forcing people to wear masks on airplanes. That's a

00:28:40.380 real winner. Yeah. That's, you got to stick up to that. It had to be somebody, uh, either, I don't

00:28:46.900 know whether a man or a woman on his staff, but it had to be the same person that said, Hey, why don't

00:28:51.520 we go out there and march with the BLM? Uh, they seem like a nice group of people to be associated

00:28:56.640 with. Another, another genius move, right? Hey, Mitt, you're, you're, you're quite white. I think 0.97

00:29:03.300 that we can help you by having you go out there and, and march and, and, and promote a,

00:29:08.520 and promote a violent group. That's really going to help you a lot. Yeah. But again,

00:29:14.460 the nature of the conversations that happen in Washington. And unfortunately this, this brings

00:29:20.080 us back to the, you know, um, you know, president Zelensky speech in front of Congress. What are

00:29:26.760 people talking about inside the beltway? What is it about? What is it about their own constituents?

00:29:34.000 They don't understand which of their constituents, who, um, who among Mitt Romney's constituents

00:29:41.500 is saying, you know, you're right. What's happening in Eastern Europe right now is the most important

00:29:46.320 thing to us. Other things are, are, are, are, are, are not that big a concern. It just, uh, again,

00:29:53.300 the, all these things are reflections of this very small and, and fairly shockingly ignorant place, 0.51

00:30:02.320 um, on the East coast of the United States where, um, where, where unfortunately our elected officials

00:30:09.300 and our policymakers work and reside. And you have to wonder, do the, did the good people of Utah

00:30:18.740 really want a democratic Senator? Because that's what they've got, uh, in Mitt Romney. He is a full

00:30:26.540 on Democrat. Uh, but we should have known that from his record. I know, I know we should have known

00:30:36.900 that in 2012. I mean, you know, when, when we go back and think about it, I mean, it's, it's,

00:30:43.660 it's a terrible, but also terrific irony. You know, all of the, the establishment were probably like,

00:30:48.500 oh, Donald Trump, he's an outsider. He's not really a conservative. Doesn't really believe

00:30:52.360 the stuff we believe. And as it turns out, Donald Trump in 2016 gets in there and does conservative

00:30:58.980 things, whether he believed in them or not. But before that, we had all these different people,

00:31:04.580 presidents like George W. Bush, candidates like John McCain and Mitt Romney said, oh yeah,

00:31:08.880 we're genuine, authentic conservatives. And at the, at the first moment that they could fold,

00:31:15.260 they fold it. Donald, Donald Trump, Donald Trump stood his ground. And of course, that's another

00:31:22.680 reason why, uh, why he was swarmed. All right. Absolutely. And had to be, uh, uh, expelled,

00:31:30.560 uh, because he, he was, uh, it was a threat, uh, to every quarter of the establishment left, right,

00:31:39.440 uh, North South, uh, every establishment interest was in fact, uh, in the swamp, uh, and he would not

00:31:48.540 go near it, uh, except to try to expunge it. And, uh, as you say, that's why 2020 had to happen and

00:31:56.560 unfold the way it did, uh, because the Democrats knew there was only one way, uh, to get, uh, to get

00:32:03.800 to Donald Trump. I, I, I, I, I just, oh, go ahead. I'm sorry. Yeah. No, I just wanted to say one thing

00:32:11.700 about Donald Trump. Cause I, I, I imagine that maybe to some listeners, people think it's kind

00:32:16.380 of crazy to talk about the former president, but of course it, it seems more than likely that he'll

00:32:21.240 be running in 2024. But I, I, I think the reason that, you know, I, I know you're, you know, you,

00:32:27.620 that you knew, uh, you've known Mr. Trump for a long time, then you've written about him a lot

00:32:32.600 and spoken with him a lot. And so I don't intend to speak for you. I'll just speak for me. I think

00:32:38.500 that one of the reasons that I refer to Donald Trump so much is because, uh, for all his many

00:32:44.860 flaws, but his flaws are human. We're all human. We're all flawed that it's, it's not just Donald

00:32:50.700 Trump. He represents something. It's not just that he represented. He continues to represent something

00:32:56.960 great, um, and strong and proud and independent about this country. So I think that's one of the

00:33:05.200 reasons that I know I ref that I know I refer to him. I see him as something, you know, not just an

00:33:11.280 interesting character and an important and in many ways, great president, but also as a touchstone.

00:33:16.180 So I think a lot of people, a lot of people are, are, are despondent or rightly so, or upset right now,

00:33:23.060 the different, you know, the, the, the, the unconstitutional, the criminal attacks on Americans

00:33:28.400 coming from this, this regime and in particular, the Biden government at the head of it, it's just 0.93

00:33:32.820 disgusting. But to remind people that we are Americans and that we are a people of great

00:33:39.840 resilience and resourcefulness. And, um, and, and again, that, that's why I like talking about

00:33:47.800 and thinking about Donald Trump because he seems to be a touchstone for that to remind, you know,

00:33:53.760 to help remind people that, that our leadership will come from ourselves and our own communities

00:34:02.540 and who we are. And as we stand up, uh, as we stand up for ourselves and our loved ones and our great

00:34:10.280 beloved country. Yeah, I, I, well said. And I, again, I agree with you absolutely, uh, about Donald

00:34:18.320 Trump. It's one of the reasons you were talking about his record, what he accomplished, what he,

00:34:24.480 I think still intends to accomplish. I am one of those who I, I, I can't tell whether this is a

00:34:31.420 judgment or a hope, but I truly believe he is going to run in 2024. Uh, part of that fervent belief

00:34:38.540 is built on my, uh, my, uh, you know, my absolute commitment to this country, because I believe

00:34:44.500 he's the leader that we still need. And I wish so desperately that we had had better judgment

00:34:50.920 and it avoided what transpired on the, um, in 2020. Uh, I, I also think, uh, as you said, uh, he was a

00:35:00.980 specific, uh, he had two words that he uttered that electrified the nation and brought into alignment

00:35:08.440 the thinking of left and right and some opposed and some for, but when he said America first,

00:35:15.580 do you remember how the left-wing media started hooting and howling and praying and, and, and on

00:35:24.140 the, at the center and on the right, people were saying, my God, that has a ring to it.

00:35:31.080 That is, those are the words I've been waiting for. And, uh, they are the, the, the words, I think

00:35:37.640 most patriots, nearly all patriots, I would think, uh, you know, we believe in, uh, we thrive on and

00:35:45.900 we, we understand to our, to our very souls. Uh, Lee Smith, thanks for being with us, sir. You get the

00:35:52.700 last quick word here. And if you, uh, is, is our custom, uh, well, that's really nice. Well, I, well,

00:36:00.220 thanks. I, I, I wanted to thank, uh, thank you again, again, it's always a pleasure and great fun to

00:36:04.820 speak with you, but I'll, yeah, the, the, the idea of America first, why did this become such a strange

00:36:10.180 idea, right? Why did, why did we need to be reminded of this? And you see now what an influence Donald

00:36:16.120 Trump has had on other world figures like Eric Zemmour and France. I mean, this is a, it's very moving. We,

00:36:21.840 we, we believe in nations, right? We believe in nations that, um, nationalism is a good and

00:36:29.760 valuable thing. Patriotism, love of country, love of your community, love of your family. These are

00:36:36.080 all really valuable things. So yeah. So to say like, you know, we live here, so we're going to put this

00:36:42.400 country first. Why, why should that be a strange thing? And it's not. Except, except to the globalist

00:36:50.480 elitist who have an entirely different plan for all of us. Right. It's a strange thing. If you don't

00:36:56.100 love America, that's though, those are the people to whom it's strange. It's like, why would we put

00:37:00.980 America first? We don't like this country. Yeah. Yeah. Lee is always God bless America and God bless

00:37:07.960 you, Lou. Thank you so much for bringing me on. Always really a huge treat. Thank you. God bless you,

00:37:13.120 Lee. Lee Smith. And be with us tomorrow when our guest will be General Michael Flynn. The general

00:37:19.740 and I will be talking about Ukraine, Russia, China, Iran, and the greatest scandal in American history. 0.94

00:37:26.820 That's tomorrow right here on the Great America Show. Till then, God bless you and God bless America.

The Great America Show - March 21, 2022

WHY UKRAINE WAR NOW？ LEE SMITH ON HOW IT HAPPENED

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