After Party with Emily Jashinsky - “Happy Hour”: Emily’s Travel Nightmare, Why Journalists Aren’t Special, Cuba Blockade, PLUS Demons: Emily Answers YOUR Questions

Episode Date: April 3, 2026

On this week’s edition of “Happy Hour,” Emily Jashinsky opens with her own personal travel nightmare story as she goes on the road to speak with students. Then she takes on your questions including her thoughts about the recent trip journalists and influencers took to Cuba and Emily reveals she almost went on that trip. She also shares her thoughts on the blockade, the recent No Kings protest, President Trump’s foreign policy and pragmatism, and the war with Iran. Emily also dives into some thought-provoking questions about the media, explains how she approaches a press conference, and why she believes journalists aren’t special and need to have humility. Emily also weighs in on recent After Party shows and guests, the topic of demons, and more… Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Welcome, welcome, everyone to another edition of Happy Hour. This is, of course, always a special edition already of After Party that we do here every Friday, and it's where I get to go through all your emails that you send in to Emily at Devil McHaremedia.com. Just want to thank everyone right off the bat for sending in so many great emails. And today, let me tell you, this is kind of a special edition of Happy Hour because I have had, this is maybe one of those days I described as a lemony snicket day. So I get up before we dive into your emails. Just some context. Right now, it is 9.49 p.m. in Hampton Inn, in Cedar Falls, Iowa. It just got done talking to some wonderful students at the University of Northern Iowa. They were kind enough to invite me here

to chat about family policy, some cultural stuff. And what a lot. a great group of students. I mean, you know that I enjoyed talking to students, working with students. It was fantastic to be out here, but I woke up at 4 a.m. in Washington, D.C., got my ass to the airport, got on my flight, get to Chicago around 7 a.m. might have even been a little earlier. I waited in Chicago for about four hours. It was supposed to be a 30-minute layover. 20-minute delay, 20-minute delay, an endless cycle of 20-minute delays. So finally I decided I have to fish or cut bait. I jump in a rental car and I am in a race against the clock to get across the entire width of Illinois.

And about half the width of Iowa. And it is a torrential downpour the entire time. People are pulled over on the side of the road because the visibility is just that bad. And it's, you know, one two lane highway, a good old 20 west on the way from Chicago to, Iowa where I was speaking today and I made it with about 10 minutes to spare to the wrong building actually. Then it all ended up being about 20 or 10 minutes late. So anyway, finally getting back to my hotel room, it's almost 10 p.m.

But, you know, the good news is I met a great group of students and I now get to commune with all of you through the emails you send in. So as a reminder, I do all of these, I read all of these emails live. for the first time. So I flag them in my inbox. Just note that they look like they're from a happy hour and then I get to them right now. So I'm going through them for the first time. I just think it's more entertaining. That way, this one is from Rachel who says, hi, Emily, can you give us the cliff notes on what happened with Hassan Piker going to Cuba? I know this wasn't a huge story, but I'd be curious on your opinion if you know what happened. Oh boy, Rachel, do I ever know

what happened. So my friend Ryan Graham, my friend of Colley, Ryan Graham was on that trip as well. I was like interested in going on that trip. I'll put it that way. I got pretty close to being on that trip and, you know, had a conflict. I think honestly I would have loved to, you know, to some extent, I think it would have been a media story. And I love media stories. I mean, you know, If I were to say I had a beat, probably be the most insufferable beat in media, which is media. So part of me would have been fascinating. I've always wanted to go to Cuba. So it was honestly a hard opportunity.

I had a conflict, and the dates were originally different. It's a long story. But anyway, the thing about getting a visa to go to Cuba, that was organized by Code Pink and a progressive international, I forget the formal name of the group. you know, the Cuban government is giving a visa to go to Cuba to code pink for a reason. And part of me thought, you know, as somebody who would have probably a different opinion than a lot of the folks on that trip, I almost felt like I was, had an obligation to go and to maybe pepper the process with some different questions, just from different angles and all of that. My perspective on Cuba actually is that I don't think the blockade is particularly

productive. I totally understand the like absolute hunger for the blockade. It's not just American exiles. It's also people in Cuba. I think I've talked about this before, but when I was in northern Mexico in like 2021, John Daniel Davidson and I met this Cuban kid named Osneal. He was so desperate to be in America. He showed us the scars, said he had been beaten on the July 11th protests. And just at one point, we were talking to him for like an hour. He said, we Cubans love the blockade. We support the blockade. Like out of absolutely nowhere, nobody was talking about the blockade.

He just really, he was sick and tired and fed up with the Cuban government. That's why many, many people fled. The blockade that we've had since January, I just don't think is particularly productive. I think we could have a very fruitful relationship with Cuba. It might be something, you know, I don't know that we need a military operation at all. It might be something that could be worked out along the lines of what's happened in Venezuela. And it actually might just be better for everyone all around. I don't want to push them further into the arms of Russia and China.

So coming from that perspective, I did think it might have been fascinating, a fascinating experience. And we talked about this on breaking points. You can't do anything in Q. on a visa that the government isn't basically sanctioning. And that's, you know, every time there's tourism of a dictatorship, you just have to be extremely careful. And I think the reporting that Ryan did was extremely careful and fruitful. And I recommend people go watch his collabs between DropSight and Belly of the Beast.

We talked about it a bit on breaking points this week. you don't also want to downplay the harms that the Cuban regime has done to its own people, let alone threats to the United States by cooperating with enemies. And you can peel back the layers of the Cold War and try to pin the blame on one person or another. But that also doesn't absolve the Cuban government of the political prisoners, the artists that are locked up in Cuba right now, of, the central planning gone awry. I mean, none of that absolves the Cuban government. And I think did not, there's plenty of skepticism, especially if you're somebody who's anti-totalitarian

to go around. So that's always where I'm going to depart from some leftists, though I do think we could have a much more constructive. I actually think it's one of the benefits of Trumpism is that he's such a pragmatist. And there's a real opening to have a much more constructive and fruitful relationship with the country that's 90 miles off our shore so that they are not persistently, at some point, you have to break the cycle and stop pushing them straight into the arms of Russia and China where they are right now. I mean, there are bases. Like, they are still a threat.

Literally right now, still a threat. But, you know, sometimes carrot, sometimes it's the stick. And we've been trying the stick for decades. And there's so much. suffering that I don't want to keep blaming, I don't want, I don't want the United States to continue punishing civilians that might end up hating the United States even more and more and more. Some of them are. Some of them will still blame their government. Some of them will blame the United States. But I think there's a real opening to have a more fruitful relationship with the

Cubans without going full, without going full Hassan, let's put it that way. Or did you see Ilhan Omar's daughter in the sugar cane fields? The memes from that trip were really something, and I will say that. All right. Jeff says, Emily, I'm a 75-year-old man trying to stay informed as to our toxic political environment. Your after-hours podcast helps me do that.

I found the program that featured Daryl Davis quite disappointing. His derogatory comments about President Trump for the most part went unchallenged, no pushback. As is often the case, those accusing folks of being racist often come across as racist themselves. I will continue to enjoy your work.

Well, thank you, Jeff. I appreciate the feedback. We talk a lot about Daryl on last week's happy hour because we got probably like 10 emails along the lines of the one that you sent Jeff. So if you go back and listen to last week's happy hour, sort of addressed this in depth. I will say I was thinking after that podcast. The other thing I meant to mention is that Daryl said certainly said things that I disagreed with.

I was also thinking, even as I was preparing for that interview, I was thinking expecting him to come from just like sort of a more center-left perspective. I was like, this man has done more than I will ever do to actually, you know, help fight the scourge of hatred. And I just felt, maybe I'm, maybe I'm wrong on this, but I felt like he'd earned the opportunity to kind of make his case to any audience he wanted to on that. And so anyway, that was another thing that I meant to mention on last week's podcast. I didn't disagree with him all I want. And you know that I don't necessarily disagree. All of you know, I don't necessarily disagree with your points and your feedback.

But also that was another kind of factor that was in my mind. So anyway, thank you. I appreciate it, Jeff. I appreciate all of you for emailing in and certainly appreciate Daryl for the great work he does and has done over the years. Abe says, Rejo Kent, your comments were 100% spot on. Let's see what else goes. Oh, a little bit of everything here. My wife agrees with you about hunting boring and cold.

That's funny. Let's see. Yeah, that's more here. Tucker's often misrepresented and or misinterpreted and right-coded media now, similar to how he always has been in left-coded media. Yeah, we talked about that last week, too. Just whatever you think about Tucker, this happens to people, whether on one side of debate or the other,

I've just seen so much more bad faith, social media clipping. We talked about this with Michael Malice. It's like a trend right now. And it's always been a trend, but it just seems like it's more than ever before. So I'm glad other people are seeing it because just attributing quotes to people. I mean, all I did was when we posted that segment with Michael Malice on the after after-party Twitter account, it really got people going. People were like, I got called C-word, like, three times by like grown men on Twitter because of that segment. I'm just like, there were a bunch of

people saying, you're missing the point. He's, you know, Tucker was saying, you know, he was saying nice things about Islam and Sharia law. And I was like, anytime you are saying, that I'm missing the point by criticizing someone for lying, you're missing the point. You're respectfully. I really hope we don't get to a place where we stop caring about, you know, actual quotes being attributed to somebody in quotes. That's a serious thing to attribute a verbatim quote to somebody that is not a verbatim quote at all. So anyway, that was a lot going on. All right.

Let's see. Hank says, I'm going to go out on a limb and guess Megan Kelly and Mark Levin aren't going to be spending any holidays together anytime soon. Let's see. Oh, Hank took in on no Kings rally today in Chicago. It says I'm 72 and it could have been a boomer high school reunion. Believeable, believable. I actually, I remember saying when the first No Kings protest happened that I was pretty, like,

I actually thought it was decent branding because it comes across as, I mean, first of all, I think it's a patriotic branding that like harkens to the founding, which is great, because I feel like the left has run away from that with 1619 project and the rest. And has, you know, if anything, been criticizing the right for being overly reverent of the founders, etc. But also it's just, hell yeah, like that's so American. And Trump, you know, some of you may disagree. I think there are real examples just like there was with Obama, where he goes over the line with executive power. And I'm not just talking about unitary executive theory, which I don't entirely disagree with at all. But anyway, all of this to say, the branding for No Kings has just

been utterly torched because of the cringe boomer tyranny of those events. It makes you just, why any 20-year-old would show up to one of those is beyond me. All right, let's see. Mike says, I'm sure you don't control this, but I saw you had a new updrop, so I popped an alp and cranked it up, boom, a Tom's Dyer ad followed by one voice by Ryan Reynolds. What a buzzkill, tough start. Yeah, so the only ads that we control are the ones that I'm reading live. So anything else is what's called the dynamic ad. And that means it's like roughly based on your cookies and browsing history. I'm saying roughly. That's generally how it works. There are some, I'm sure there are some like big buys. Anyway, I'm not in the weeds on that at all.

There's kind of a good firewall on that, but I dealt with it a bit at Federalist Radio Hour. We had even smaller team there. So that was, he was, sometimes we'll get notes about, you know, like local ballot initiatives or whatever. And usually what that means is like somebody is geotagging those, those ads just to anybody in the area. It doesn't mean that you've been like looking at lib stuff. or anything like that. Like some of the ways these ads are targeted, it's just kind of interesting. So yeah, that's, we have control over what we read, basically. Let's see. This one is from Bob. This says, I am Jewish, a huge supporter of Israel, and an Iran hawk done the right way, not this way.

And I completely agree with Megan on how she's gone after Mark Levin and Lindsay Graham. I don't know why people like this writer and Bob sends along a town hall column and says have to conflate Megan's views with anti-Semitism says more about him than what it says about her completely legit views. Yeah, Bob thinks of the email, you know, we end up talking about this every week, it feels like, unfortunately, but it's enormously frustrating. I think you can hear the frustration. in the whole debate. But yet, to me, it's just like, especially with Megan, you, Megan and I disagreed on the Megan Kelly show over college campus crackdowns,

crackdowns on what the Trump administration was saying was anti-Semitism on college campuses. And Megan was really, like, defending the Trump administration and going out of limb to fight. anti-Semitism. And just the notion that she's the one who's flipped is so, it's just so cynical. I mean, people can disagree. They can call someone ignorant. They could be just as mad as all get out about someone without assuming that they've become a bigot or they've become, it's just so, it's so unfortunate. I think it's being.

pushed by just very few people. The audience is not buying it. And Megan spoke to that. Megan has spoken to that. I've been doing breaking points with people on the left, you know, every week since October 7th and when this issue's been front and center. So you all know, I've certainly gotten this for years and years as well. And it's unpleasant, but it really is, you know, a few people. And most viewers and listeners appreciate and they get to know you over the months and over the years, and they know when you're coming from a good place. They know when you're operating in good faith.

They know when you have your kind of analytical hat on, and you're trying to make sense of the world the best that you can. And that's, I think, another really cool thing about podcasts. So it's amazing how few people actually listen and then criticize. It's like just what we're talking about with a talker clips. Like people will not even listen to the clip. Like we're talking about Ted Cruz, we're talking about major journalists, Chris Cuomo, just posting a clip and assuming that the verbatim quote, a non-journalist troll attributed to Tucker Carlson is true and spreading it to their massive audiences. These are people with big platforms and responsibility and they don't even check the video before spreading it.

And then they want to act like everyone else is irresponsible. They don't take it down or apologize or whatever, at least not that I've seen. So that stuff is really irritating. Always watch the full clip. Always. It's not always easy. It's very tempting to retweet or, you know, quote or repost with Instagram or comment on YouTube. You'd be surprised how many YouTube comments or maybe you wouldn't be are like clearly posted before somebody watched the full video because they're like, you need to address this.

And then like, it's just in the second half of the video. And you're like, okay, this person only watched the first 30 seconds and decided to leave it. a comment. That is very unhealthy, and I think it's structural. It's a structural part of the medium. So anyway, this is Howard who says, did you see the news story that J.D. Vance thinks UFOs are demons. Seems your friend John is not alone, feels more like the middle ages, true or not. Either way, we're probably screwed. You know, it's funny, Howard, because John and J.D. would agree. And they would say, yes, it does feel more and more like the middle ages. because what Rod Dreher and John and Rod is a friend of J.D.,

what they have written about is this, quote, re-enchantment. And we've talked about it on the show, too, but basically that the sterile high-tech world has lost respect for the enchantment. I actually think that came from Max Weber, if I'm remembering correctly. And the industrial world is in some ways out of touch with the natural world. in the supernatural world for obvious reasons that have to do with less and less friction between us and nature. And so they would definitely own that.

Of course, we talked about the JD story with Billy Hallowell on this week's episode as well, so people can check that out. Let's see. This is an interesting point from Dunn, who says, I think that Darrell, referring to Gerald Davis, is on the correct path. I also believe that when someone is looking for racism, they can find it or see it in many places where it does not exist. I think that's well said, done. I think that's true of just about anything. This is a huge problem that, not to comment on Daryl here, but just it's a huge problem that interest groups have. Like, one of my formative experiences was when I was an

AEI intern for the great Christina Hoff Summers, I was, Doing something in the wage gap, like I was helping Christina, like I was double checking her research on, I think it was like an American Association of University Women annual study on the wage gap. And I remember Christina was like, go look at this page in the very, very end of the report. And sure enough, it might have even just been a footnote. And they might have just been doing this every year too. I'm trying to remember exactly what it was. But they're like, well, when you control for this factor and this factor and this factor, the wage gap shrinks to 93%.

Okay, but your report is like 100 pages long and 95 of those pages are focused on like the 70 or 80 cent for a dollar wage gap. So like the 30 cent wage gap. So what are we doing here? Anyway, it's just to say the incentives when your life's work is built on something can sometimes genuinely get warped without you knowing it. Again, I'm not trying to comment on Daryl's career. I think when it is what you do, you see a lot of things just through that prism.

So it probably does come up more. It's kind of your lens. So I think maybe to outsiders. Let's see. Bill says Emily Schrader. I'd never heard of Emily Schrader until I saw this interview. Reasoned and seems knowledgeable about Ron in a way I have not heard before. Are you familiar with her?

I'm not familiar with her. Clicking through here. Now, let's see. This is an interview that she did with Quillette. You know, I have seen her before, and I have seen her refer. There is a red flag here, actually, now that I'm seeing this. I did hear her referred to 30,000 people being killed in the January protest. in Iran, which actually may be true, but I do not trust people who state that as a fact.

That's a fact that can be used to justify the deaths of American service members. So I think when you don't know, you say you don't know. You say estimates range from. It's way less satisfying. But anyway, that's just to say, for me, it's a red flag. if someone says that they know that number with great confidence, I just sort of distrust their motives and distrust, honestly, their research. So I would have to look into this deeper, but just to say, I don't know Emily, she might be wonderful, she's got a great name.

But I did see that now that I'm looking at this email. And I don't think that's, that to me is just always, it sets me off because, or just it puts me, makes me immediately. skeptical because again, it's really hard to know what's happening in Iran during non-times of war. But yeah, with those mass protests, I mean, the Iranian government slaughtered thousands of its own people. That much we can say. Horrific. Whether it was 3,000 or 30,000, we just don't know. And those 30,000 numbers are not verified.

And I hope to God it wasn't 30,000, but it may have been. I certainly wouldn't put that past the Iranian government. So hopefully that's not the number, but also it's just hard because we don't know. And what we do know indicates it's a big range. It could be a big range. So I get why people who are advocates, you know, kind of go on the higher end. But in terms of like people that I'm immediately going to kind of, start paying close attention to. I always get skeptical with that, but it may just be, I can be

wrong. I can be wrong. Richard says, I enjoy your show and notice you mentioned the book A Hunter Gatherers Guide to the 21st Century by Heather Heying and Brett Weinstein. You should have them on as guests. I would love to have them on as guests. They are brilliant. They've really been at the front lines of some big cultural shifts. So they have very interesting perspectives. And I If I'm remembering correctly, I've only interviewed them twice, or I've only interviewed them once. They're pretty big time. They're probably hard to book. But I would love that.

That's a great idea. We should give that a try, Richard. Let's see. Hank says, I love Trump's latest take on the war. Quote, you never know about Iran. We negotiate with them, but then we have to blow them up. And, quote, we don't deserve him. He's been saying all kinds of stuff this week.

Just all kinds of stuff this week. All right, let's see. Chuck says, love your show. I'm probably not the demo, which is a tribute to you. It will be 66 this July. Chuck says, giving up the MK show, Ben's stuff was just too much. I don't care who started it. Love Halperin.

Love the real clear guys. Chuck, I would say, first of all, thank you for the kind words. Second of all, it kind of goes back to what we were just talking about. I have to listen, I get to listen, to a Megan show every single day because I come on in the 2 p.m. hour on Sirius X.M. 111 to do the Megan Kelly wrap-up show. So this gives, I'm sure many of you listen to every episode in full. And you know, if you're one of those people who listens Monday through Friday, 12 p.m. on the dot to 2 p.m. You know how wildly skewed the media picture of the show is. And so I guess I would just say, and I would just say keep going, Chuck.

The conversations, I think, have just been wonderful, especially during a very difficult time. You know, to have Rich Lowry on and Glenn Greenwald. I mean, there are just no other shows doing that. And with the analytical prosecutorial questions that Megan asked, I mean, I was listening to her with John Kariaku today, former CIA, to the extent there is such a thing. And, you know, Megan was still manning the conspiracy theories about, you know, assassinations and the like and saying, if the CIA, you know, has all of these powerful technologies and, you know, we're told that they can. get into our cars and, you know, make a car drive off the cliff and the like. She was like, well, then why these, these conspiracy theories about the CIA still conducting M.K. Ultra type experiments and, you know, using the like kind of Manchurian candidate people, that doesn't make sense. Why would they

need to do that? And was poking holes in the conspiracy theories. So, oh my gosh, the prosecutorial lens, I just find so helpful. This is another one. from Hank who says you and Jason were right to be unclear about the legality of whacking and Chamehamee. Jason Willick got to read his columns in the Washington Post. It was great to have Jason on. Ryan says, when you're in a press conference and the person speaking doesn't call on you, how does that affect the piece you're writing? Yeah, that's a really good question. If it's a small press conference, you can kind of guarantee that you are going to get called on. if it's like a congressional thing, they don't attract as much attention.

So you can usually pretty much guarantee you're going to be able to shout a question. And even as the principal is kind of walking away, you usually be able to shout a question. And if they don't answer it, it's kind of just a no comment at that point. A lot of times you go to a press conference, not because you're writing a story, but because maybe you're looking for a story. And I think that's a good way to go into a press conference, unless you have something that you've been working on for days or something, and it's the only place you can see or get a question in.

Because a lot of that now is done just over the phone or over email or sometimes even over like a text message. But you're usually able to catch up with the person outside of a press conference. So one of the interesting things about press conferences is maybe you ask a question that is designed to see if there's a story, right, to kind of elicit an answer that might suggest there's something else going down beneath the surface or the answer is in and of itself murky or it's different than what people might have expected because you've got a tip in one direction or the other. But yeah, if you don't get called

on, usually then you'll just pick up the phone. And if it's for a story, if you have a story in mind, just pick up the phone or send an email, ask for a phone call. and do everything you can to keep getting the person on the record. And then you can keep going back to the press conferences, too, if you don't get asked the first time. You can, you know, I have those stories of colleagues like waiting in congressional offices until the congressman or the chief of staff walks out the door because they only have one way in and out for the most part.

So you can just wait there, and they can choose not to answer your question, but you'll get it in. And then you can add in the story that they never responded. Let's see. Jesse says, I hoped maybe the latest rebound of no king's protests would center around anti-war messaging. Instead, when I went through establishment media photo galleries, I saw a lot of costumes and protest signs like the seas are rising, and so are we. Climate change is real. My black pill take is that these folks just want someone with better manners and a nice smile to drop bombs and foreign school children. I generally try not to impugn motives, but this movement just seems like vague performance art. did you happen to observe any significant anti-war messaging on the ground in D.C.? I did not go to the No King protest in D.C. Sometimes the protests are so big that you can't even ignore them.

But in my case, this was last Saturday, right? I was doing something. I forget what I was doing, but I remember I took a bike right that day and there was no way I was going anywhere near the National Mall. Let me tell you that much. I went in like the exact opposite direction. And even then you still saw some people trickling around the city. So I did see a good bit of the signs and the protesters did not see anything anti-war. Now that Jesse mentions it, this was a super interesting observation.

The No King's protests did not, obviously did not spring up. There were a lot of Gaza protests, but there were not any specifically branded No King's protests that were drawing crowds this big during the Biden administration, which was the bulk of the Gaza war. So they're definitely not, you know, motivated, primarily by anti-war sentiments, which is interesting because it suggests that to Jesse's point, maybe there are folks who just want someone, quote, with better manners and a nice smile to drop bombs on foreign school children.

That it's, and this is really sad, it gets you mad when Donald Trump does it, but maybe you don't pay attention to it when someone else does it. Right, like the double standard when it comes to something like this. And by the way, some people don't even agree with that. Some people here say that this is, this war needs to happen. That's much more morally consistent than the folks are saying it, you know, that Biden is doing everything right. And then get mad about Donald Trump with similar policies.

Now, I'm not trying to say it's apples to apples and that Joe Biden would have done what he did or anything like that. Trump is prosecuting the war in a way that only Donald Trump can. So that's it's definitely not apples to apples with Biden. I'm not trying to make that comparison, but just the principle of it, that is an interesting question. Genuinely, I think that's an interesting question. David says, subject line two weeks to flatten Iran, should we believe it? David, I am absolutely torn on this because as we talked about on Wednesday show, that was a reset. that speech from Trump was a reset. It was an attempt to, and a clever attempt to inject his,

the messaging on his terms in a major way into the bloodstream of the mainstream discourse and onto social media and into the broadcast networks and the print outlets. And he wanted to be clearly very choreographed saying the best possible, putting the best possible foot forward. word messaging wise. Everything scripted by the speech writing team and everything like hitting the right emotional notes, hitting the right intellectual notes, and in a prime time address that you tease, as he did. He teased at one point that maybe it was going to be about NATO. A lot of people thought maybe it would be about boots on the ground, some type of big announcement, which of course you do when the president in the middle of war announces updates. He's going to give a live

address the nation on updates. But I think, are they sincere? Are they sincere that they think two to three weeks? I don't know because there were high-level people telling us two weeks at the beginning of the war, that it was like a two-week bombing run. So that's the kind of question about the escalation trap. If we have more service members killed in the next two weeks, can we do we get another speech three weeks from now saying all right we're this time we mean it two weeks if the straight of Hormuz isn't opened i mean it's just really it's really really hard to say do i think they want it to be another two to three weeks yes i think Donald trump wants it to be another two to three weeks i don't think he wants this to be drawn out much longer

others may wish to draw it out much longer but even lindy graham at this point is saying two to three weeks. I think the fear is what makes me believe it less is perhaps that you get caught in the escalation trap. So that's a good question. Marlowe says the discussions this week revolving on the fight of good versus evil had me thinking. Is President Trump making his decisions re-Iran because he sees his role as a personal mission of good overcoming evil having been spared death and Butler or was he influenced to act by evildoers acting selfishly for their own ends, Netanyahu? Graham. Oh, Marlowe, that is a deep and good question. I would say neither Netanyahu or Lindsay Graham likely sees themselves as a villain. You know, that's just a truism in life.

Very few people see themselves as the villain of their stories. You know, everyone likes to see themselves as generally being a force for good and being, you know, being the protagonist of their own life and certainly of their own country. But there was an episode that Talker did recently. And some of you may have listened to it. It was with the one-time interim president of Israel, who's been on a little bit. I've seen him on media interviews the last couple weeks. I want to make sure I get the name correct.

and he gave an explanation for Netanyahu that I thought made a lot of sense. Oh, yes, it was Avraham Berg, who said that framed Netanyahu as, you know, obviously somebody in the shadow of the Holocaust generation. And what you don't want to be ever, nobody wants to be the leader. that allowed for a second Holocaust to take place. You know, you wouldn't want that, obviously, morally, ethically on your conscience. You personally don't want that on your conscience. And that there's a perhaps a paranoia to Netanyahu that you can understand better.

And I'm paraphrasing, obviously, but if you think about it in that sense, that, you know, that's why October 7th is so visceral and animating. And I think that's not just true of Netanyahu. but I think it does kind of explain why obviously there is also a personal element to not being the person who lets that happen on your watch, right? Like you don't want it to happen on anybody's watch. You especially do not want it to happen on your watch for posterity, for the dignity of your family, the pride of your family, for, again, for posterity, for your reputation. let alone for, of course, the innocent lives.

But, you know, we're human beings, and we think about these things. And that may or may not be right, but, you know, positioning Netanyahu historically where he is and seeing, you know, in the generation of the state of, in the shadow of the state being created, the state of Israel being created and so much war and sacrifice from, you know, people just in previous generations. generations, or sorry, people in immediately previous generations, people that you knew, people whose children you still know and socialize with and run the country with. I think that's something we have a hard time understanding in the U.S. It's not to justify anything, but I do think it's an interesting explanation.

Lindsay Graham, I think, has just convinced himself that our interests, like the Venn diagram between America and Israel's interests is just a circle, always. and he's not flexible about that whatsoever because it is a deep-seated ideological, ideological, long-standing ideological principle of his. So that's the best that I can explain there. I don't know that they're necessarily, you know, I actually don't think Lindsey Graham is entirely cynical because I think he believes what he says. I'm sorry, I don't think he always believes what he says.

I mean, I think sometimes he's like willingly leaning on propaganda to prime the public for in one direction or another. But I think he's entirely sincere about his belief that the interests of Israel and the United States are always, not a Venn diagram, just a circle. I think he's sincere in that belief. So now Trump, it's a very, very interesting question. I think he must feel some type of provident. He must, he must, because he talks like that sometimes. You hear it sometimes come out when he references Butler, that there is some providential element to his being spared.

And, you know, he's, he talks about himself a lot, but he doesn't talk sort of introspectively about himself a lot. So it's sometimes, which is interesting, but it's sometimes difficult to know how these things, sort of affect him, but he has talked about that, and his kids have talked about it. So I don't know if, I mean, he's on a tear trying to make peace deals happen, and that's clearly something he's, it's at the forefront of his mind. And on top of that, you know, he feels like he has a generational opportunity of assembling this administration that's just ready to, you know, go all in. That's

like ready to leave it out on leave it all on the table, leave it all in the field, because they feel like it's a generational opportunity, which explains Doge to some extent, I think, as well. So yeah, I think there probably is some element of that. Let's see. Mary sends in a suggestion for reforming the FDA and says, take the approval of drugs out of the hands of the government altogether. This will limit government power and influence over our health care and reduce lobbying money in D.C. The accounting firms approve the financials for all public companies. Overall, the system has worked fairly smoothly. You can even ask the existing accounting consulting firms who stand up divisions to do this.

You can even require all drug approval contracts be limited to five years, and after that, they must change auditor slash approvers. Ooh, interesting, Mary. I have to, I haven't heard that idea before. Very, very interesting. My immediate gut reaction, like many Americans would be, I think it's perhaps one of the narrow responsibilities that should rest with government. But then again, to challenge myself, we've seen that go awry. And certainly you're not going to find a defender of the efficiency and accuracy. of a big government in me overall. But with drugs, it's just my natural instinct to say that

makes me nervous. Because, you know, we also, I have a hard time trusting the big accounting firms. Obviously, we all have a hard time trusting the big drug companies. And I think, you know, there's a logical argument that makes sense for what you're saying, Mary. I have to think about it all right. I have to think about it more. I don't mind my bag of fruit snacks rustling around in the background. It's been a long day. Dunn says, I should have Angela Duckworth as a guest. Let's see here.

Yeah, all kinds of guests that we need to get to. Good stuff, good stuff. email here from Howard looks like this is our last one for the day Howard says okay it's official this has definitely been demon week first John then demon guy number two Billy Hallowell got a lot of feedback from the Billy interview of people saying they wanted to watch his documentary you can go over to CBN to watch the documentary it's called investigating the supernatural angels and demons we really did get people asking where they could find it, including my parents. Let's see.

Howard says to each their own, but I always find it shocking when someone who's obviously intelligent and educated, believe something I think is crazy. You know, Howard, that's such, I just want to stop on that sentence because I was having a conversation literally today with someone about that. And, you know, we were talking about how, how to get college students who grew up in social media age, to just, like, what's the advice that people have for having those conversations? And the good way to put it is always just humility, right? But I think it's more specific than that, because humility is so abstract. You have to always believe that the other person you're talking to is just as good, as smart, and as worthy of consideration as you are.

if not more, right? This is a problem a lot of journalists have, is that they just assume that because they are experts, they see themselves as experts, and it's their job to sort fact-thrumbiction, apples from bananas, as CNN says, that they know more, that they are better qualified than the average newsreader.

And it's just so ridiculous. It's true that maybe journalists can list more things that happened in a given week on average, but that doesn't bestow them with a higher IQ, or greater analytical skills or the breadth of life experience that so many people outside of journalism have to help them make educated decisions or the ethical and moral compass, the ethical and moral what's the best way to put this, history, concern for ethics and morality. I mean, you're not special, basically, is what I would say to most journalists.

us who have that mindset. And I think it just applies to all of us. So I really like that because I was talking today to somebody who 100% thinks that a lot of what I think is crazy. We come from vastly different backgrounds. And you just get that sense, right? And we were even having a conversation along those lines, but you just have to have that like not abstract humility, but like abject humility. Like just who am I to think? that you know I have all the answers here and also by the way the other thing that I was talking about this today too perplexes me is are you not first of all constantly learning from others even if somebody you know maybe if you go through a conversation

you're like yeah this person is indeed this person is dumb I can say that respectfully having interviewed Don Lemon before and I really have we had them on breaking points like a year and a half ago two years ago you know something Sometimes you have a conversation with someone, you're like, oh, okay. That doesn't mean that you're better than them. It just like it means that, you know, for whatever reason, they are not applying. They're not sending their best brain cells to paraphrase Trump. So even if you think that's true, people have different life experiences.

People have different, all kinds of different experiences, not just like, travel or their backgrounds, you know, grew up in this kind of family or this part of, this kind of family, this part of the country, or that part of the country, we can learn from everyone, everyone. And like, don't people enjoy that? Don't people, your views, even if you're utterly confident in what you believe in, you will, iron will sharpen iron. Don't you want to read books from people who disagree with you because you expect that maybe you'll learn something, but also maybe you'll learn the best possible version of the opposition's argument. So you will emerge better.

Like, is that not interesting to people? It just drives me a little crazy because I think we all understood that. It's always going to be hard to challenge yourself. That's why it's called a challenge. But I think everyone just saw it as much more gratifying. You know, it's like the version of taking a run, getting on a treadmill. for your worldview. I think we used to understand that just much, much more.

Hopefully we're getting back to that. We'll see. We'll see. But, you know, that's, Howard, I appreciate that because I think, you know, it's good to be honest and say that is a difficult thing. Howard goes on to say, it's easy to dismiss a person who's just nuts,

but as you've correctly said, there are many brilliant people who believe this supernatural stuff. It is mystifying to me. The problem with believing, in the supernatural is where do you draw the line? I mean, I don't quite know what to say about that. Where do you draw the line? I'm trying to think of what that might be.

Where do you draw the line? I mean, I think if something, well, for me at least, if something is just out of whack with what scripture describes about the natural and supernatural world, then that's a line. And that involves, you know, going to the book. And, you know, listening to theologians and to clergy and their experiences with the supernatural,

synthesizing that with their study of scripture. And, yeah, I think it has to be concordant for me with what's in scripture. There's some like that's where the aliens and demon question gets interesting. You know, people talk about the Nephilim and all kinds of possibilities that are, that do draw directly from scripture that could explain some of this. And then again, there are other theories about aliens that just, I just don't think there's any precedent or there's any sort of scriptural basis for making that assumption. So anyway, that's where I would draw the line. And then Howard says, the second revelation is more disturbing that you like reality TV.

I think these shows are the sleazyest, tachiest, and most unredeemable junk out there, like a combination of candid cameras, soap operas, and Mexican wrestling. You are obviously a person of many dimensions, but I still think you are brilliant. Have a great week and watch out for those demons. Thank you, Howard. That's too kind. Really, too kind. I will say, I commend it to everyone, Camille Polly's writings.

You can just Google them. on the real housewives. So I actually kind of agree with Howard on The Bachelor, the Mormon wives, and some of what's on like TLC and the like. I do think a lot of it is just lowest common denominator, not in a good way. I don't typically have anything wrong with like midbrow offerings,

but I think Pollya is an art critic, an art historian. and has some fascinating insights on how the real housewives sort of draw on a Western tradition. Not just some of the great soap operas, which I'm sure people also are going to look down on, but also to understanding the nature of women and how women are different from men. I mean, it's some good writing. I think it's some persuasive writing. I'll put it that way. I don't want to act like the Housewives.

It's like watching Scorsese. It's not. It's not. I'm not saying they deserve any Oscars or even Emmys. But I do think done correctly, they aren't always done correctly, but like real Housewives of New York City. Some seasons of Beverly Hills, some seasons of New Jersey, probably the most recent season of Miami. some damn good seasons of Atlanta in there. But I mean, I think really

Real House Season of New York City is probably the best example where there's this very meta season where they're referencing gray gardens as a joke. But they're not in on the joke. You know, they're comparing themselves to gray gardens. It's a theme of the whole season. You know, living in this totally fading,

townhouse on the Upper East Side, Sonia Morgan's infamous townhouse that she got in her divorce from a literal Morgan. And it's falling apart. It's physically fading and she's shacking up with one of the other housewives and they're middle-aged, bringing different men in and acting a fool in this dilapidating. I don't even know if that's a word. townhouse on the Upper East Side. And it's meta, but it's really poignant. And I think it's quite a comment on the sexual revolution and baby boomers and wealth in New York and on the East Coast and one of the great world global power centers in history. So anyway, anyway, I'll stop ranching about the housewives.

It's probably enough for today. appreciate you guys for listening hanging in there uh boy has it been a day it was great to take some time and chat with all of you this evening uh just decompress a little bit so thanks for sending all your questions in we appreciate it we hope everyone has a blessed easter we'll see you back with back here with more after party on monday everyone so have a great weekend happy easter god bless