00:00:12.440We have, of course, the deadline of 8 Eastern time tonight for Iran.
00:00:19.060They either concede to the Trump administration demands or Trump will unleash hell.
00:00:27.020In fact, what he has said more specifically is he is going to, well, go after them in a very big way, including civilian infrastructure, things like power.
00:00:41.680So he is turning up the heat considerably for the regime to open the strait and concede to demands about the nuclear program.
00:00:50.700We will discuss that, of course, today, get into some of those details.
00:00:54.180J.D. Vance in Hungary, a place that has gotten a lot of attention in conservative circles for years now because it is a country, under the Orban government at least, that had taken on some particularly social conservative policies in the past.
00:01:11.260We'll have some highlights of what J.D. said there.
00:01:15.700And we've also got some updates on the Artemis II program,
00:01:19.880talking about the spaceship, or we call it a shuttle, I guess, a ship.
00:04:55.140I think we are going to get some form of resolution sooner rather than later because I think Trump has decided that he is in favor of getting the straight-up-form moves open
00:05:07.660and believes that he can negotiate with the existing Iranian leaders.
00:05:11.260I think that's where his game plan is.
00:05:13.420And he is trying to, in the meantime, extract the maximum amount of negotiating leverage that he can.
00:05:22.120And he knows that all of the Iranians monitor every single thing that he says on social media.
00:05:29.840So I just sometimes, Buck, am befuddled.
00:05:33.760I would understand if this were still 2016 and Trump had only been a political figure for a year and people were still trying to grapple and figure out exactly what the intent of these messages is, but the intent is quite clear.
00:05:50.440It is that he is going to try to get maximum negotiation leverage.
00:05:55.180Now, the argument I think you can make against this is not that Trump is going to suddenly start nuclear war or something like that.
00:06:03.360It's that by making all of these outlandish threats that he actually doesn't gain that much negotiating leverage or as much as he thinks he does because he's been doing it for a decade now.
00:06:30.100they've gotten at some point i think the regime feels like well what do we have left to lose
00:06:35.960and i think the answer is they aren't there they think that they are in a backed into a corner and
00:06:44.200do anything they can now to and they'll suffer through anything they have already rejected
00:06:49.780yesterday a temporary ceasefire that was offered if they would just open the strait of hormuz
00:06:57.080and the iranians clay this has been in every analysis whether you're writing a grad school
00:07:03.480paper or you're in the you know most deep dark bowels of the pentagon uh strategy files everyone
00:07:10.740knows the strait of hormuz is a strategic choke point for global oil uh and and that's just
00:07:15.880that's what iran has been really holding over the world for a long time more than anything else more
00:07:22.420more even i think in some ways than the threat of a nuclear program uh because it's all we know
00:07:28.260they can do this and we know that this is something that can start to have major economic
00:07:33.220impact so iran said no to that and now the the iranian regime to the degree that we can get
00:07:39.980insight into this uh the state of the negotiations they want a permanent ceasefire they want full
00:07:47.320sanctions relief and they are not willing to make any nuclear or other concessions so the
00:07:53.060iranians are taking a pretty hard line negotiating posture in at this point in response to where we
00:08:01.240are um you know hitting critical infrastructure if that is where trump goes with this when he said
00:08:08.040like we're gonna what is it just you know uh annihilate your civilization or something like
00:08:12.680that that can actually backfire on you a bit because they're then the people of iran start
00:08:18.040to say well hold on a second why are we all being punished they know it's not us
00:08:23.840that's a consideration that i know that trump and the team have but it's a it's a big one to
00:08:29.380to work through yeah look i mean the quote is a whole civilization will die tonight um which is
00:08:36.380so cinematic and uh and apocalyptic i read that as i will kill a lot of the iranian leaders and
00:08:45.760you should be aware that your civilization is going to cease to exist meaning the way that
00:08:51.640you run iran is going to cease to exist regardless the goal is to terrify people in iran that are
00:08:59.960still in power that if they are uh in any way um uh recalcitrant when it comes to negotiating
00:09:08.080with president trump that there will be consequences um and look what did we say buck
00:09:14.240um a couple weeks ago to me the off-ramp here is the challenging part i don't think there's
00:09:21.620any doubt that we have severely curtailed and diminished iran's ability to in any way
00:09:27.540inflict harm upon anyone in the Middle East or around the world.
00:09:32.520I think you would have to be a moron to argue against that.
00:09:36.040So the question is, to what extent is there an off-ramp here where Trump can claim,
00:09:42.880hey, we have reached a resolution, we've reached a cinematic conclusion
00:09:49.220in a way that he is able to declare victory and walk away.
00:09:53.680To me, that is the question of what is that off-ramp?
00:09:58.500What to him is a victory that he can claim?
00:10:01.980The Strait of Hormuz being reopened, obviously, is a very tangible one.
00:10:05.720The price of oil and gas would drop overnight, probably $30,
00:10:09.680and get us back down close to where we were before this all started.
00:10:14.760So I don't know that Iran, to your point, is willing to give that at this point.
00:10:20.200So what kind of negotiating victory is out there on the table that the president can take?
00:10:26.480By the way, Trump is very good at going out and claiming victory even when it's not necessarily a transcendent victory, right?
00:10:37.640So I think there are probably off-ramps that Trump can take that would allow him to say,
00:10:43.460we have chained our objectives, now it's time to ramp down everything that's been going on in Iran.
00:10:48.520well what he really wants is this straight to reopen which has been made clear by his truth
00:10:53.100social posts and everybody can see that and and that's because of the economic impact on the
00:10:58.680global oil markets which has an enormous uh possibility at least of affecting domestic
00:11:05.840politics here at home in an election year because remember the price shock can be a little delayed
00:11:10.840from all of this too i know we're seeing prices rise already but it could be there are things uh
00:11:17.500Like, you know, Amazon, I think, is even raising its prices on some vendors because of the increase in oil, right, for doing fulfillment for them.
00:11:27.180And products, 50% of oil globally, something like 50%, is not used to go into vehicles and for transport.
00:11:38.420So a lot of things that you buy are petroleum-based products, and those prices over time will also rise from all of this.
00:11:45.980So this is this is about Iran trying to use economic pain as its leverage to get Trump to back off and Trump just continuing to pound the Iranian military.
00:11:59.680And let's be honest, the Iranian infrastructure now, if that's what he does tonight, and say, have you had enough?
00:12:55.120I think right now, if there's an 11th hour deal, which we are now less than eight hours away from the deadline hitting here.
00:13:03.580If there is an 11 hour, 11th hour deal, Clay, I think it will be Iran has agreed to a temporary ceasefire and the opening of the strait with nuclear negotiations and other concessions to follow.
00:13:19.900But if they give Trump the Strait of Hormuz, that will be enough to avoid the end of their civilization strike that is supposed to come tonight.
00:13:29.020Yeah, I would also say the Strait of Hormuz can be a trust-but-verify situation that's very easy to test.
00:13:36.160If Iran says the Strait of Hormuz is open now, we're going to allow transit, and it doesn't occur,
00:13:42.860then you have a pretty good sign that you've been lied to.
00:19:41.600All this COVID fraud, all this Medicare fraud, Somali fraud, election fraud, it's been totally forgotten about seemingly by this administration.
00:19:50.060now we're facing a war that if this goes off the rails with iran i'm telling you people my
00:19:55.480generation do not have a stomach for this again i'm asking you guys because i think you're the
00:20:00.480best at what you do on on this side of things who is holding the trump administration accountable
00:20:06.040because we are the ones who gave him this mandate and i'll tell you there are millions of people
00:20:11.480like me who at this point are are thinking of sitting this one out in the midterms um so taylor
00:20:18.600I want to see how this Iran thing plays out, but I think someone needs to get in Trump's ear and say,
00:20:56.380Say wild stuff, no accountability, make crazy predictions,
00:21:00.460say, I will bet my career that space aliens will land tomorrow,
00:21:04.900they will rip off their humanoid faces, they will be lizards,
00:21:07.740and they will say we are actually all obeying Hillary Clinton.
00:21:11.780Like, I can say that, and that's interesting,
00:21:14.560but then tomorrow comes and i would hope that the audience would hold me to account but that
00:21:18.620doesn't happen anymore on the right so i'll just i'll put that out there first and foremost so i
00:21:22.260appreciate you and others because they're choosing to listen to this show instead of some of the crap
00:21:27.440that's out there make those distinctions so thank you and i really mean this the bottom of my heart
00:21:32.500it speaks well to your discernment and your intellect okay so there's that beyond that
00:21:37.760everything that you've said i think is completely fair you know i'm um maybe too nice sometimes
00:21:44.320about people especially if i think they're well-intentioned i think it's a general thing
00:21:48.980in my analysis that maybe uh is you know in in political commentary could be a shortcoming quite
00:21:54.380honestly if i feel like someone's a good person look christine ome shot her dog she got no there
00:21:59.580was no quarter no benefit for me after that thing okay i didn't like that and we we had that out on
00:22:04.200the show and everyone knows how i feel about it uh and among other things by the way not just the
00:22:08.360dog shooting but um so with pam bondy i think i go maybe i go a little soft her record was not good
00:22:13.960in her first year it just wasn't um but then again i'm saying that right so that's where i would come
00:22:18.560down on that on the but on the most important thing and trump i want to hand this to you because
00:22:21.300i think our callers hit like this is the site this is what's so critical right now because
00:22:26.100if it goes wrong it goes wrong in the midterms of the midterms goes wrong the trump agenda's over
00:22:30.660okay the party's over folks we're gonna it's gonna get ugly after the midterms if we lose the house
00:22:36.140and certainly if we lose the house in the senate clay it's like trump is the chief poker player
00:22:41.300and he has put a whole mound of chips in the front in the middle of the table on this iran thing
00:22:47.160if he wins if he gets this done i mean that's amazing so i'm not going to hit a guy i'm not
00:22:55.880going to come after a guy for making a bit's a big gamble a big bet before we know what's happened
00:23:01.400now would i have made the bet no but i'm not donald trump and i'm not the commander-in-chief
00:23:06.020him putting all these chips on the table this way clay to me if it comes back a big win great if it
00:23:13.600comes back snake guys we will hold the administration to account as much as we can here and
00:23:18.380you know god help our country because we're going to have some tough tough conversations ahead when
00:23:22.900democrats take control because that's what i see happening what do you think so i have obviously a
00:23:29.480lot of thoughts unfortunately we have a big show so we could share most of them look i think trump
00:23:34.720if you want to criticize him has been trying to fix too many things simultaneously there's a lot
00:23:42.180of broken things out there i think we also live in an era where whatever trump does there is a
00:23:49.720concerted opposition of people that's brains are broken that are lined up to convince you that it's
00:23:55.620the worst thing they've ever seen right now we have been at war with iran for six weeks 13 american
00:24:02.780soldiers have died i wish that we had lost no uh life at all in this uh in this event with uh that
00:24:11.080we're currently in with iran but that is one of the most successful operations of war in the history
00:24:18.360of the united states joe biden couldn't leave afghanistan without 13 people dying 40 plus people
00:24:26.080have died and been murdered in chicago since this war started if you had to choose whether you
00:24:33.240wanted to be an american soldier fighting in iran or just a regular american living in some
00:24:40.380neighborhoods on the south side of chicago it's almost to the point seriously where the danger
00:24:45.820on the south side of chicago is higher than the danger in the skies above iran to be fair clay
00:24:50.960though people would say you know if you live in chicago you have to live where you live we didn't
00:24:55.460have to we didn't have to start an air campaign against iran right so there's what but their
00:24:59.360position isn't that it's so few casualties or or whether it is few or not the position of those
00:25:05.060who are upset with trump is it should be zero we should not have lost a single american life in
00:25:09.500this well and that goes to the argument of whether you trust trump with the decision that he has made
00:25:15.260in iran i see all of these connected i see venezuela i see cuba i see uh iran connected
00:25:22.640directly. And I think Trump is seeing governments that are opposed to basic human rights and freedom
00:25:29.700that are close to toppling. And he has decided he's going to take them out while he can.
00:25:34.060Now, Venezuela seems to be going fantastically well. There's almost zero discussion about what's
00:25:40.320going on in Venezuela. That's a sign that things are going really well. Cuba, if we hadn't allowed
00:25:46.100Russia to deliver a couple of ships there, basically wouldn't have been able to even
00:25:51.020continue to exist as a country we can at any point in time i believe decide what's going to happen in
00:25:56.340cuba with iran trump believes and again you don't have to sign on to this although i do think there's
00:26:03.860some cogency to this that because of the power of iran to control some so much of the flow the flow
00:26:12.280of oil and gas that there is basically a surcharge on what oil and gas costs because of their
00:26:19.600government and the fact that they can't be relied upon and as a result he believes that if there is
00:26:25.320a more stable government that we do not worry about having nuclear weapons that things will
00:26:30.320be better for american commerce in the years ahead to me again this is overreach the easiest
00:26:36.320thing for trump to have done was just show up not really rock the boat very much and as a result
00:26:43.060there wouldn't be the these risks he's taking and this i think is the number one way to really sum
00:26:49.180it up i think trump sees what happened with north korea and i think bill clinton regrets the way
00:26:55.020that he handled north korea and trump wants to solve the problem of iran potentially having
00:27:00.980nuclear weapons if we could go back in time i bet if we got bill clinton on this program
00:27:05.840and other than sexual relations with monica in the white house right of the decisions that bill
00:27:11.960clinton made that were directly related to american foreign policy i bet i went back and
00:27:17.680read all about this buck i bet he wishes that jimmy carter hadn't parachuted into north korea
00:27:23.480for those of you who forgot how this all went trump i mean uh clinton was all prepared to
00:27:28.960attack north korea and try to wipe out their nuclear ambitions and then jimmy carter said
00:27:33.960i'm gonna go meet with uh the north koreans and i'll get us a deal and he did that and he went in
00:27:40.600and the deal was that north korea was never gonna have nuclear weapons and buck what did they do
00:27:45.000They got nuclear weapons. It is both imminently rational for North Korea and for Iran to want nuclear weapons because it guarantees the government will be in power forever and imminently rational for countries like ours to want Iran to not join North Korea and to keep them from ever having nuclear weapons.
00:28:03.260Trump could have punted on this whole thing, Buck.
00:28:05.720He could have just said, hey, I'm out in 29.
00:28:09.420We'll let the rest of the world deal with whether Iran has nuclear weapons in the future.
00:28:15.220I think Trump is genuinely trying to fix things for generations that he's not going to live to see.
00:28:21.400And that is a substantial overreach in ambition and intent.
00:28:25.160And if it doesn't pan out, to your point, he's put a lot of chips in the table.
00:28:29.300And some people are going to say he should have just left Iran alone.
00:28:50.840And so how can you be in a position that that's just people looking for a way to justify their own view of Mideast policy, their own view of Trump?
00:29:00.860there is still a possibility here of i think a high i think it's a probability better than 50 50
00:29:07.540i wouldn't say it's a sure thing that trump manages to completely change the trajectory of
00:29:13.160the middle east and uh put an end to the the middle east can never be stable it's just like
00:29:18.980a perpetual warfare jihadists blow themselves up crazy crazy zone okay there's a possibility that
00:29:25.700he changes that trajectory in a way that is a once in a once in a lifetime opportunity there's
00:29:33.180also a possibility that this thing continues to be a little bit of a mess and maybe he does more
00:29:40.100damage to iran maybe he lands some u.s troops on the shores of hormuz because they won't open hormuz
00:29:45.900maybe we take some more losses and things get uglier and worse and he gets absolutely shellacked
00:29:51.040in the midterms for this and then we will know that it was not a good gamble right yes we don't
00:29:58.540know yet and i'm just trying to be honest with you about this there's some people that want us
00:30:02.380to say it's amazing some people want us to say it's terrible we talk about what has happened
00:30:07.080and what we think is happening but tomorrow is going to be very different from today in terms
00:30:13.200of the scoreboard for iran i know i'm sorry that it's you know it's a war and it's not a game but
00:30:17.420in terms of the wisdom or lack thereof of this entire operation.
00:30:23.160We'll see what happens with this red line tonight.
00:30:25.780But because this is serious stuff, I don't think it's intellectually honest
00:30:30.220to just get dug into one side and either take out the pom-poms
00:30:33.960or take out the sledgehammer and pretend like that's being fair to the situation.
00:30:39.800I do have faith, Clay, still that Trump will pull this thing out.
00:30:42.840If he doesn't, we will say that this was a blunder
00:30:45.780and it will be apparent to everyone then.
00:30:47.800But I feel like prejudging the outcome from our perspective
00:30:50.880doesn't do any, what's the point of that?
00:30:53.740I'll just give you this prediction for tonight.
00:30:56.640If Trump announces that there's a deal,
00:30:58.920the same people who said he's going to nuke Iran
00:31:02.160are going to be upset and say the deal isn't good enough.
00:55:07.280We've got, you know, we did the MFN negotiations,
00:55:12.460Negotiations, the most favored nation status, which are going to give us the cheapest we had for the last 30 years, the most expensive pharmaceuticals in the world, in our country.
00:55:24.000We have 4.2% of the population, but 75% of pharmaceutical industry revenues and profits come from America.
00:55:33.100People in Europe pay a tiny fraction of what we do, but the same drug produced in the same factory in New Jersey.
00:55:40.100For example, when I took office, the list price for Ozempic in our country was $1,350.
00:55:48.140You could get the exact same drug in any pharmacy in London for $88.
01:01:23.540where Americans are being forced to buy these products
01:01:26.880from, in many cases, unethical formulators.
01:01:31.240There are many ethical ones out there, unethical ones.
01:01:35.200We're getting them from unknown sources,
01:01:37.860and they're allowed to sell them for animals, for research purposes.
01:01:42.180They're not allowed to technically sell them for human use.
01:01:46.240Right, for research only. I've seen the sites, yeah.
01:01:48.800Right, and that's where you're getting your peptides today.
01:01:52.220You're getting them from one of those black market formulators,
01:01:56.380And what, you know, we've made the argument, of course, there is resistance within, you know, EPA or FDA by some of the career people.
01:02:09.980We've made the argument that they should, we should move them back into a category where they can be studied, where they're going to be, where we know what the source is.
01:02:22.100They're coming from legitimate formulators who are getting them from FDA-inspected labs.